41
I arrived at Alder Creek to find not a sight of Mrs. Donner. There was nothing but the sad remains of their camp: some little tents peeping above the snowline and within, a body wrapped in a sheet. The sun was shining down, and all was silence; not even a bird singing in the trees. A colder and emptier situation you could not imagine.
The minute we are born, Death sets out on his journey to greet us. I had determined to wait for him no more, but to set my steps to find him. But it would not be in this desolate place.
Beside me the creek went tumbling away downhill, swollen with snowmelt, and throwing little cascades of water into the air that glittered in the sun and threw colored rainbows into the air. And I set to follow it. I traced my footsteps back down the trail that we had climbed with such hope all those many months before. I walked all day, though hard going it was, stumbling as I made my way along and needing to rest often. But every slow step lightened my spirit, for here was life starting anew. A bird gave a sudden trilling cry, and was answered by another. Their song was echoed by a third, someplace in the distance. The dense forest gradually gave way to woodland and a soft haze showed where the fresh yellow leaves were unfurling in the sunshine. Here and there I saw green shoots thrusting through the snow, and I knelt down and brushed the snow away so that the brown earth beneath was discovered. A rabbit hopped across my path, taking no heed of me other than to pause for a moment, ears back and nose twitching, before deciding I was of no consequence and continuing his journey. I laughed aloud. The spring was returning at long last.
The sun was hot on my face, and presently I stopped to take a drink from the creek. There were some boulders that were free from the snow, and I sat here and rested. I was trembling from head to foot. I had no food, and no way of getting any. My plan was simple. I would walk onward until I could walk no more, and then I would find somewhere pretty and peaceful and make myself a bed for the night. I knew I would die. But I was ready. Death would be my friend, at the last.
I thought of Mr. Breen’s prayer that he had said every day and that he had written down for me. I took the scrap of paper from my pocket and looked at the words, though I knew them pretty much by heart. Now I closed my eyes and said as much of it as I could remember, bowing my head and folding my hands. I said,
“Ever blessed and glorious Joseph, kind and loving father, and helpful friend of all in sorrow! You are the good father and protector of orphans, the defender of the defenseless, the patron of those in need and sorrow. Look kindly on my request. My sins have drawn down on me the just displeasure of my God, and so I am surrounded with unhappiness. To you, loving guardian of the Family of Nazareth, do I go for help and protection.
“Listen then, I beg you, with fatherly concerns, to my prayers and obtain for me the favors I ask.”
It was a long prayer, and I said it all, slowly and with great thought over the words, thinking all the time of Heaven. Whether I would be accepted there, and whether the little children who had eaten that food, and the poor mothers who had been driven to give it to them—for the farther I walked away from the camp, the clearer my thoughts became, and I could see that Mr. Keseberg was right; there must have been more among us than I admitted, who had done so—whether those children and those mothers would find a home in Heaven after all their suffering and their dreadful sin. I thought we must. God would not be so cruel as to punish more, those who had suffered so much already. And being so truly sorry for what we were driven to must count in our favor.
“Oh, good Father! I beg you, by all your sufferings, sorrows, and joys, to hear me and obtain for me what I ask.”
This was the point where you could ask for your wish to be granted. I had nothing to ask for except to die easy, and so I asked for that.
“Obtain for all those who have asked for my prayers everything that is useful to them in the plan of God. Finally, my dear Patron and Father, be with me, and all who are dear to me, in our last moments, that we may eternally sing the praises of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.”
I opened my eyes. The sun was as shining as ever; the creek still running with water; the trees rustling in the breeze. I climbed to my feet, and set off along the trail for the final time.
I rounded a bend, and there, in the shelter of some small trees, were five or six little tents. Standing in my path was an Indian girl carrying a basket filled with roots. She dropped it with a sharp cry, and two young men squatting at a fire stringing bows jumped to their feet and ran toward me.
I turned to flee, but my feet gave out beneath me. I sank to my knees and covered my eyes with my hands, and thought of St. Joseph answering my prayer.
* * *
The Indians did not kill me. They gave me a blanket made of strips of woven rabbit fur to wrap around me, and a mat to sleep on, and led me into one of the tents, and there I stayed, too weak to do more than sleep, and eat, and sleep again.
* * *
One afternoon the woven mat that covered the entrance to my tent was removed, and I was summoned forth. I emerged to find the men departed, and all the women standing round, waiting for me. At the front of them was what I thought must be a wisewoman, or some such; very old, with hair that was turned completely white, and hung in long, wispy braids over her shoulders. She wore a great necklace made from feathers and shells, and I remember thinking we must be a ways from the ocean, here, and wondering where the shells had come from, and that I had not seen her before, and wondering if she had been summoned especially to deal with me.
She showed me that I must take off my clothes, out there in the open. I had no shame, or no courage to resist, I know not which, but I did it without a second thought. There were gasps when I stood in front of them entirely naked. I knew what they saw: each rib showing near through my skin, and my belly sunk in.
My clothes were picked up on a stick, and carried to the far end of the clearing, where a fire had been lit, and they were dropped on it.
One of the girls brought a flat paddle of wood, which she used to scoop some grease from a small basket, and approached me with it. I stepped forward to take it, and she jumped back in alarm. It was clear that no one would come near me or touch me. I stood still, raising my hands to show that I meant no harm, and she leaned down and placed it on the ground in front of me, and then backed away, and showed me in gestures that I should rub this all over me, hair and all. It looked to be something like bear grease, and ashes perhaps with some green leaves pounded into it, and smelt about as bad as anything could.
When I had covered myself in it to their satisfaction, I was led to the creek and bidden, by signs, to wash myself. All through this the old woman squatted down at the creek edge, and sang a low song, with her eyes fixed on me all the time. When I was clean once more, and right glad to be so, I was bidden to step out of the water, and given some clothes: a skirt and a tunic, made from animal skin, and shoes made from woven grass and tied to my feet with strips of hide.
Other than the old woman’s singing, all this had been conducted in silence, and then I was led back to my tent.
As I improved in health, I slept less. In the evenings I was given a place to sit, near enough to the fire but something away from them all. They shared out their food, each taking what they wished from a communal pot, but my food was set out on a woven platter and put down in front of me. I was with them, but no part of them.
I watched them. I reasoned that they could have killed me but instead had kept me, and fed me, and if they had meant me any harm it would have come earlier than this. All the same I was wary, waiting for trouble. I might not have spoke to them, nor they to me, but all the same I listened as hard as I might, intent on discovering their language and something of how they lived, and to see what was to become of me.
One night around the fire, there was a sudden shout of laughter from a little group of men, absorbed in some story of their own that they were telling over in low voices. And one of them stepped into the firelight to share it with the rest of the group.
&
nbsp; He engaged in playacting of a sort, with cowering and grimacing. Everyone roared with laughter, and then a young boy was pushed to his feet. He made his way into the center of the circle, where he was presented with three white owl feathers, and there was more laughing and pointing. With a shamefaced look and a laugh of his own, he accepted the feathers and stuck them into the braided leather strip that held back his hair, and returned to his seat, where he was clapped on the back by his neighbors.
To my surprise I found that I understood the entire story, not just the playacting part but some odd words here and there as well. He had been frightened by something in the woods and had made a great show of himself, but it was nothing more than an owl swooping out of a tree above his head.
That night, and the nights after, alone in my tent, I went over the words I understood, practicing them below my breath. By and by I came to understand a goodly part of what they said. They were travelers, moving from place to place and living upon what they found. This camp was only a resting place, and they were heading back the way I had come, up to the lake. They were only waiting for me to be rested and strong enough, and then we would move on.
* * *
Day by day the sun rose higher in the sky, and soon enough all the snow was gone. Seven weeks after I stumbled into their camp the Indians continued with their journey, and took me with them.
We traveled light, with just our sleeping mats and the rabbit skin blankets we slept in tied on our backs. As well as their bows and arrows, the men and boys carried the makings of our shelters: long poles that they carried between them on their shoulders, woven matting tied in rolls and slung on their backs, and coils of fiber slung over their shoulders. And the women carried baskets that contained our food: dried berries and meat, and flour made from acorns. This was made into flat cakes with the water from the creek, and roasted on hot stones. We ate it with a thick paste that tasted like it was made from onions.
We climbed back up through Alder Creek, and once again I looked upon the sad remnants of the Donners’ camp.
Standing so forlorn in the sunshine were those pitiful little tents, still. And now I could see all the things that had been hidden away beneath the snow. There were broken sticks of furniture tumbled this way and that, and a scattered array of cooking pots and knives. Mrs. Donner’s books were there, sodden and mashed into the dirt, and there were broken slates, and carpenter tools.
A wild dog growled at us over a pile of bones. I picked up a stone and flung it at him. He yelped, and scurried off into the shelter of the trees, his tail between his legs. Other than that, there was no sound, except for Mrs. Donner’s wedding ring quilt, made, she once told me, with all the scraps from the girls’ dresses, and now all torn and filthy, flapping in the breeze.
I stepped forward, thinking to fetch it away with me, and my foot crunched on something.
Beside me was a wooden crate broken open, like someone had been searching through it. I had stood on the contents, that were spilled over the ground. I bent down, and pulled back the lid a little. It was full of broken china, painted with pink roses—Mrs. Reed’s teacups that had come from the emporium in New York City, and that she had been so mighty proud of, way back at the start of our journey. I thought they had been left behind when she lost her wagon in the desert, but I guess Mr. Reed had known what they meant to her and had rescued them. And then she had been determined to keep them at all costs, and had carried these teacups with her and put them into the Donners’ wagon.
I hardly knew whether to laugh or cry at the foolish woman. Without knowing what I was doing, I fetched up one of those broken bits of teacup to my lips, and said, “Oh, what delicious water, your Ladyship!” in a squeaky voice, as if I was playing tea party again with little Ada and Margaret Eddy. Then I clutched that bit of painted china to my heart, and for the first and only time in all our hardships, tears come into my eyes and streamed down my face.
The Indians turned their eyes at me and then at one another. Then they led me away from that dreadful place, and we continued our journey up to the lake.
We made our camp at a place a long way from the cabins where I had spent so many dreadful days.
I stayed here with them for one day and night only. They did not intend to keep me with them, that much was clear. But just that one day and night I spent back at the lake was enough for me. It was just as beautiful as I remembered it. I saw again the hills reflecting in the calm water, and the soft wind sighing through the trees, and the pink and gold and violet of the evening sky. But as well, I could see that there was food in plenty, if we had but known it.
The women dug roots from the plants that grew along the margins of the lake to roast in the embers of the fire, and good eating they made. They gathered great handfuls of peppery-tasting leaves from the shallower reaches of the creek, where the water ran more gentle. Pinecones were picked apart to reveal soft white seeds, and long sections of bark were sliced from the living trees and split apart to reveal a layer of thin white flesh. This they roasted on hot stones around their fire until it was crisp. With that, and the fish the men caught, we ate full well.
I watched the men, marveling at how easy it was. They wove reeds together to make nets, and then one stood in the water to one side of the creek mouth, and another to the other side, and together they walked slowly to the bank. In this way they drove the fish before them, flapping in the water as they were forced back against their will. Someone else reached down with a deep basket and scooped up just enough fish for that night’s meal, and the rest were let go, to live or die another day.
Again and again, my mind turned to our party, how we all of us sank into the greatest of despair, when, had we but known it, there was food for the taking, enough so that the babies and children might not have died calling for their mothers, in those long cold nights.
I ventured next morning to the edge of our camp. Here was the tumbledown remains of the lean-to where I had stayed with the Kesebergs, and the Breen cabin, now with the roof caved in.
I wondered whether this was where Mr. Keseberg had ended his days, waiting for my return, or if he had gone searching for me. Did he think to find me in the Murphy cabin at the end?—and was his body in there now with that of Mrs. Murphy’s, both of them moldering away together, a dreadful thought.
Perhaps he had given up on waiting for me, and managed somehow to stay alive and get across the mountain in the end, to join his wife and child.
I knew he could not be there still. Even so, I called his name, gently like a whisper, half-dreading and half-hoping that he would walk out into the sunshine and stand before me, his hair all golden in the sun, as it was the very first time I saw him.
But he did not come. And I did not go and look for him.
42
Two of my Indian companions led me through the mountain and down the other side and into California. I had been in such mortal terror of the mountain, and yet now I walked up its steep slopes with no more fear than if I was walking along the street back home.
After a further day’s traveling they pointed out a long, low building away in the distance. Then, without a word, they turned and vanished back the way they had come. And this is how I finally arrived at Sutter’s Fort. Alone, in the early part of the summer, and in the clothes that those Washoe Indians had give me. My skin weathered and browned by the sun, and my hair darkened with oil and braided down my back.
I approached the place with great apprehension, not knowing what to say when I got there or what welcome would await me; turning over and over in my mind how I might explain myself, and wishing I could say nothing at all.
Sutter’s Fort was a big place, a stockade with a great stone wall built round enclosing barns and stables and outhouses. It was a pretty rough place by the look of it, and right busy, with folks coming and going, mostly men, and some Indians here and there, but there was a family or two, as well. Just as I approached the entrance, a couple of carts rolled up, accompanied by a little knot
of people and a string of heavily laden mules. I walked along with them, keeping my head down, and passed through the big wooden gates pretty much unnoticed, I guess.
Inside the walls it was something like a small marketplace. There was a blacksmith over in one corner with horses tied up to the hitching rail waiting to be shod, and a pretty bay mare being walked about by a prospective purchaser who was feeling her legs and looking at her teeth. There was a dry goods store, and beside it a wagon drawn up with a woman selling garden produce. Squatting on the ground were a couple of Indians with blankets and baskets set out for trade. They were Washoe, but not folks I had seen before, and I kept my distance from them.
I cast about me, trying to decide what to do or where to go. Near me was a respectable-looking man with his wife and child, all dressed decent and sober enough, saying that they were intending to get their dinners in the servery. Across the yard I saw there was a doorway open with a couple chairs and tables set outside, and I made up my mind that this is what I would do, too. I would take the money that had traveled with me from Cincinnati, and buy myself some dinner, and sit and eat it while I decided what to do next.
Buy myself some dinner! It was a little passing thought that popped itself into my head as if it was nothing, but it grew and grew, blotting out the mutter of conversations around me and the ring of the blacksmith’s hammer, and the clop of the horses’ hooves.
The blood pounded in my ears. Buy myself some dinner! I could make no sense of it. It seemed easy and impossible, both at once. That thought was followed by another. Here I was in the middle of strangers, none of them hungry and all, seemingly, in the best of health, concerning themselves with such everyday tasks as shoeing horses and purchasing corn. I had money in my pocket and food all around me, just as it was the day I left Cincinnati; and now, just the same as then, no one in the least bit concerned about me, and caring nothing for what had befallen me. These folks went about their business as if I wasn’t there at all, stepping around me and looking straight through me. It made me want to shout at them,
When Winter Comes Page 26
