A Clearing in the Wild

by Jane Kirkpatrick

  “We’ll ask about illness on the wagons we encounter,” he told John Stauffer, who patted his horse’s neck as they spoke. “They’ll have sent scouts ahead and may know of places we should avoid.”

  “Scouts sending out scouts,” Hans Stauffer said. He removed his hat to scratch at his head where an early receding hairline made his hair look like a brown peninsula with white sandy beaches on either side. He scratched that spot so often that a callus formed on the right side.

  “How I felt about you sometimes,” Adam Knight told his brother, Joe. “When you’d run off as a Dummkopf and I’d have to catch you before Mama found out you’d left the yard or were so lost you whizzed your pants in fear.”

  “At least I explored a place or two over the years,” Joe Knight said. A pink flush formed on his cheeks. “While you were busy chasing skirts.”

  “Joe!” Adam chastised. He nodded toward me.

  “Oh, sorry, Frau Giesy. I forget you were here.”

  “I suppose that should be a compliment,” I told him, curtsying as I handed him a refilled cup of corn juice. “I don’t want to be a bother.”

  “No bother,” Joe replied. He raised a single finger to the air, one of his habits when he spoke.

  “I didn’t wish you along, Frau Giesy,” Adam said. “But you weren’t no trouble this past week, and you even helped some.”

  “That might make a fine epitaph,” I said. “She weren’t no trouble and she even helped some.”

  “Let’s not think morbid thoughts,” Christian said. “Indeed, you’ll help even more before long, become a true member of this scouting party.” His words lifted my spirits.

  “Ja? How will I do this?” Were they going to let me cook then at last?

  “You’ll be in charge of washing our clothes,” Christian told me.

  Unintended, my lower lip pouted out.

  I confess, the excitement of wagons and horses and mules and oxen and people with accents closer to mine—are they Swiss or maybe from Bavaria?—intrigued me when we reached St. Joseph, Missouri, where Christian had said we would cross the great river. I heard French and what I assumed to be Spanish intermixed with English, and within an hour my ears hurt with the barrage, and my head ached from deciphering. What were all these people doing here? Where were they going? How would they know when they got there? I began to appreciate that we scouts had criteria, we knew what we needed to find and why we were seeking. Wilhelm held all of us together even in his absence, his words of life and death reminding us of the little time we had in the former and the encroaching hot breath of the latter. Did these others traveling west trust only Hastings’s words? Or perhaps the leaders of their wagon groupings? I began to think about leadership and what it meant to the success of our task.

  We had all we needed for our survival, were secure in our journey west.

  We staked the horses above the ferry, awaiting passage while Christian and Adam Schuele, who understood English the best, prepared to venture forth to find out how long the wait for the ferry crossing would be. Adam headed south.

  Christian asked, “Would you like to come along?” I beamed. “You’ll need to watch where you walk to avoid horse apples and garbage plaguing the streets,” he told me. I didn’t mind. I could enter a world I’d never known. I’d love the confusion of people.

  “I thank you for the gift,” I said. “You were asleep when I found it. I didn’t want to wake you.”

  Christian nodded. “You’ll have need of it, mending our clothes.”

  “My mother sent her sewing kit with me. But this”—I patted the chatelaine hanging beneath my bodice—“the designs on the chatelaine make it more than just a tool. It’s … art. Beauty for its own sake.”

  Christian’s ear turned the color of tomatoes, and he seemed relieved when tent store hawkers offered meat on sticks and wild-eyed mountain men announced “essentials” for sale for the journey west. Christian’s height caused people to step aside for us, though he never pushed or shoved his way. He tipped his hat to women and children, and I wondered what it would be like to understand all their English phrases as easily as Christian did.

  A buxom woman with a painted face must have heard me talking to him in German, for she stepped out from the shade of her tent and smiled, boldly placing painted fingernails on his forearm. She said to me in German as she gazed up at Christian, “Your papa here is a handsome man, maybe in need of someone to look after his kind.”

  I frowned. “I’m not his kind.” I added in English, “I’m his wife, not his child.” Were these the kind of women that Willie and my brother spoke about in whispers after they’d come back from Hannibal?

  She stepped closer to Christian and patted the lapel of his jacket as she inhaled his scent. The drift of her perfume rose over the garbage smells from piles around her. “Ach, my foul luck,” she said, slapping Christian’s lapel now in good humor.

  I put my arm through Christian’s, something I’d never have done in a crowd back in Bethel, where I’d have walked a pace or two behind.

  She stepped away but kept eyeing him as though he were a good horse. “I always have an eye for the unavailable.”

  “Do you have an eye for the time of the crossing?” Christian asked her. “I suspect you’ve seen these lines before and know how long it’ll take.”

  She stretched her neck to look at the rows of wagons and cattle, people and dogs, that crowded toward the narrow docking area. “Days, I’d say. By wagon?” she asked. “You go west by wagon?” Christian shook his head no. “Moving fast then. Someone on your tail.” She leered at me.

  I gripped Christian’s arm. “Ach, you are a—”

  “Our marriage is blessed,” Christian said, “and our journey, too.” She lowered her eyes just a moment, and Christian spoke into that interlude. “You could have such assurances too, Fräulein. There is someone always available, someone who would care for you as a parent loves a child. A whole community exists of people who love each other, who serve and demonstrate God’s grace on this earth. No needs go unmet. It is a place of Eden.”

  “An Eden on earth,” she snorted, then looked down, stuffed a handkerchief into the cleavage exposed at her breast. “There are always snakes in gardens.”

  “All the better then to enter all gardens with others.”

  “One day, perhaps.” Her words softened. “If it were me, I’d go north to Harney’s Landing. Takes you sooner to the Platte. It’s about thirty miles south of Nebraska City, what they’re calling it now. Used to be Old Fort Kearny. Ferry’s good there, I’m told. Not so long a wait.”

  “I thank you for your help, Fräulein.” He tipped his hat to her again, as though she were a regal lady. “In a year or so, a larger colony will come this way, and you’d be welcome to join us. We’re Bethelites. Mostly German, in service to each other as we’re commanded.”

  “If they’re as handsome as you, I might join up,” she laughed.

  “Not the best reason to come along, but God can use even that,” he said.

  “Danke,” she said. “I’ll consider it if my fortunes don’t pick up.” Then she ducked back under her tent awning.

  So this was how Christian won people over, not only with his smile and dazzling eyes but with his tenderness, his ability to see through the thick perfume, look past the sagging cleavage. He listened to what she didn’t say and treated her with a dignity I hadn’t thought she deserved, not with her suggestion that I was too young for Christian or that our marriage couldn’t be real. He stepped over those things.

  “What did you think of that woman?” I asked as we walked away.

  “It doesn’t matter what I thought,” Christian said. “Like you, she is a child of God and therefore my sister. So I love her just the same.”

  The same as me? I felt a rush of some emotion I couldn’t even name.

  Christian and Adam Schuele compared notes upon our return to where the horses grazed. We’d made camp a good two miles out of town, as already the grass
had been ripped clean by earlier wagons passing through with their stock. We agreed we’d head north, but Adam suggested we take the steamer Mandan up the Missouri River instead of going by land.

  “We can afford this?” Hans asked John Genger.

  John Genger frowned. I’d become aware of the separation of duties of the men. Hans Stauffer handled the stock. The Knights did the packing and cooking and determined when we needed to stop to check packs and ropes and seek supplies. The Stauffers were skilled at finding agreeable sites for our stock and for us to camp and seemed to have a unique understanding of landscape and weather. Adam Schuele and Christian did the negotiating with people along the way and brought into the open any issues needing decisions. George Link hunted and handled the weapons and ammunition. John Genger, the quiet one, kept the money and the records of expenditures.

  Back in Bethel, I’d never even heard John Genger talk, and Mary Giesy once told me she thought he might be Jewish. At least one Jewish family lived within the colony, my father had told me, but he never would say who they were.

  The unsavory task of laundry became my expertise, but fortunately, these were tidy men more interested in speed than in sanitizing often. Like me, they were anxious to enter land they’d never encountered before, land beyond the Missouri.

  “I think we should not spend the money this way,” John Genger answered.

  “It’ll save us time to go by steamer,” John Stauffer said. “Our goal is to get west as fast as we can, find the site, and send some of us back to bring the main colony forward. The sooner we do this, the better, ja?”

  “The steamer would rest the stock,” Adam Knight said, nodding in agreement.

  “We must save all the money we can in case we need to buy our land rather than get free Oregon Territory land,” John Genger said. “This is not wise to spend so freely when we are only out a few weeks.” He wore a small-brimmed hat that couldn’t possibly shade his eyes from the sun, and he squinted as he spoke.

  “You’re the banker, John, and we value your advice,” Christian said. “We’ll pray about this tonight, and we will all decide in the morning.”

  We will all decide. I wondered if that meant my view would also be considered. If so, I’d vote with John, not because of the cost but because of the steamer. It was worrisome enough to think of crossing a swollen river, but to be on a larger body of water, well, the thought of that made my mouth dry. I hated the lurch of boats and their uncertainty, the need to place trust in the captains and pilots. I had to watch the weather more whenever we went somewhere by boat. I had to grip the sides and never rested, not once. I secretly thanked my parents, who preferred carriages over canoes.

  But no one asked my opinion, and so I didn’t have to disagree with my husband in front of the others.

  In the morning, it was decided. Each man awoke to some assurance that taking the steamer north would be the wisest course. Even John Genger concurred. This surprised me. I hoped for a rousing debate with John taking my side, since my voice wasn’t invited into the fray. But no, it appeared all were satisfied with the choice to spend the money and rest the stock. This consensus Christian labeled “God’s will.”

  “Why are so many heading westward?” I asked Christian as we waited to board the steamer, my heart pounding, seeking diversions. The line for the steamer wasn’t nearly so long as that of the ferry. “Were they all so unhappy where they were?”

  “We didn’t leave from unhappiness,” he said. “We left because we were sent, for the good of those left behind. We have a privilege to prepare for the decisions that matter most in life, not just how to live, but where we go when we die. We listen to our leader and follow his advice. He leads us by his passion for keeping us from eternal damnation. I don’t know whose advice all these other people follow.”

  “Aren’t you frightened, even a little?” I asked.

  He frowned. “Fear does not come from the Lord, Liebchen. I am cautious. We must be careful, ja, but not fearful.” I rubbed my thumb and forefingers together. He held my hands in his. “Something bothers you? Your fingers tell me their story,”

  I rolled my fingers into my palms, and shook my head no. “I feel a little ill. The water makes me dizzy, that’s all. It will pass.”

  He pulled me to him, tucked me under his arm as a mother hen does her chicks. He patted my shoulder. I looked around to see if others frowned at this public display of affection. No one appeared to care. Worldly ways had merit.

  “Perfect love casteth out fear,” he said. “Perfect, as in complete. We have nothing to worry about.”

  Now was not the time to tell Christian that his wife objected to watercraft. I’d probably never be forced to take a steamer ever again. The prayers of the men had been answered, not mine. They had a more direct voice, I imagined, than a woman. That was a thought Helena Giesy might have. So this must be God’s will, that they all agreed. Mine was a singular fear, one I’d have to swallow.

  We were told to come back in the morning.

  As we led our animals through the dust back to our camp, I decided it would be difficult to be a part of this jumble of wagons and horses and people and cows without knowing why we were leaving, or if we weren’t well led. I had assurance to both of those questions, or so I thought. Such assurance should help me overcome my fears.

  That’s what I told myself as I took a deep breath and boarded the steamer the next morning.

  10

  Willing Things Well

  My mouth watered, my fingernails burrowed into my palms, I felt ill and thought I’d lose my breakfast. I could barely keep my balance with the swirl and sway. But an hour or so out, I apparently got my sea legs, as George Link called it, his chipped tooth giving his words a kind of whooshing sound. I could walk along the deck without a wobble. The water pooling in my throat stayed swallowed, and I breathed in spring air. As the shore sped by, the wind dried my watery eyes. I could hear the steady swish of water rising up over the wheel, pushing us north. When I tired, I leaned up against our stack of packs and saddles piled on deck and pulled my notepad out to write in. I’d decided to describe the fearful parts, but list what went well, too.

  I prepared a letter for Jonathan, and later, Hans loaned me a book he’d finished reading and said he wouldn’t start it over for a time. I read, and the leather dropped into my apron when I slept as the afternoon heat warmed my face. I could still sleep.

  When I awoke, I looked for Christian and found him engaged in animated conversation with a man. And another woman.

  That feeling rose again, and I could name it now. Envy, what our leader once described as the greatest sin, for it announced awareness of the self; vanity—desiring more than God provided.

  God had given me a good husband when we lived in the cocoon of the colony where each member understood our commitment to each other, would never think to flirt or interfere. Here, amidst the world where people spoke a different language than what I could understand, here the rules were different. Perhaps Christian might regret his vows spoken to a young girl. Perhaps he resented having to translate for me, felt embarrassed by a woman who could not speak English well or gather information that would ease our journey west. The buxom fräulein came to mind.

  I jotted my worries into my journal and wrote to Mary then to take my mind from my sinful state. She would be working in the school in my place, I supposed, laughing with the children, suffering Helena, assisting Karl Ruge. I hoped we could post the letter somewhere along the way.

  It would have been a placid journey if not for the weight of my worry. Not just about the river and how it could claim whole wagons, horses, and lives, but about my deception, for that was what it was. Christian loved Truth, changed his life for Truth, and here he was, unaware of a truth that would affect his life.

  That evening, as Christian stood with his arm wrapped protectively around me, I considered again when to tell him. We curled up near our packs. John Genger had booked passage for us but no berth, no privacy. I
t saved money, and our exposure to the elements would be only for the night. Others, too, slept on the deck. I tried to imagine the best time to tell Christian so together we could enjoy the arrival of this child. But something told me I should wait. We were too close to Bethel here. I could too easily be sent back.

  Nothing dreadful happened on the steamer north. It seemed sometimes the bad things I thought would happen didn’t. Maybe by imagining the worst, I was able to keep them at bay. Helena said once, we should always think on worthy things, that Scripture encourages us toward joy not sorrow. But joy arrived to welcoming arms; sorrow needed reining in.

  Instead of being bounced around and tussled, we eased through floating logs and flotsam, landing on the west side of the Missouri the next morning. At last we stood in “the West.” We’d sleep this night in Indian Territory, as the scouts called it.

  Maybe we were all regaining our land legs, but once on shore with the horses gathered together by the Stauffers and Knights, and Opal whinnying notice, we all stood silent for a time. The breeze played with my hair braids wrapped in swirls around my head now. I hoped the style made me look older. My bonnet hung loose at my back. I could say truthfully that I enjoyed this watery journey and wondered at such a change.

  Around us, people bustled away, called out to friends and family, but we stayed silent, staring east. Maybe the men prayed.

  Christian looked back across the water toward Nebraska City—what little there was of the town. I touched the sleeve of his coat. “What are you thinking of, husband?”