by Nikki Tate
I nodded. Fact was, I knew Bart was scared. Not that he wasn’t brave—he was. Nobody could ride the Pony Express without being brave. But Bart was no fighter, and Black wanted his money back. My pa used to say that no man should wager who wasn’t willing to lose.
“I’ll sit up awhile,” Bart said after we had both tugged our blankets out onto the deck. The spring sun hung in the sky until late, and it still wasn’t fully dark when I lost myself to sleep.
When I rolled over at the first hint of daylight, Bart was still sitting up, leaning against the wall of the wheelhouse, his hand protectively covering his poke full of Black’s coins.
“You want me to sit up a spell?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Go back to sleep,” he said. “No sense the both of us feeling like there’s sand coating our eyeballs!”
I would have argued, but the words didn’t even have time to form on my lips before the toe of Mr. Emerson’s boot was in my side. “Git up. We got work to do.”
Chapter 6
Exactly twenty-one hours after leaving New Westminster, we disembarked and assembled our goods on the dock at Port Douglas. Soon about twenty others and all their gear surrounded us. We all intended to travel in the same direction, so it made sense to move on together.
Several men crowded around a map. Peering over their shoulders, I saw just how long a trip lay before us. Beyond Douglas, a trail marked on the map traveled twenty-nine miles to Lilloet Lake and then continued through a mountain pass, past Anderson and Seaton Lakes until finally arriving in Lilloet.
“How far?” one man said, scraping grubby fingernails through a rough beard.
Another man used a stick to measure and read off a list of distances at the side of the map. “Twenty-nine and seven to the end of the lake is thirty-six… and another eighteen…” The discussion and tallying went back and forth until the man doing the measuring said, “Not quite one hundred and ten miles, I’d say. That gets us to Lilloet.”
Mr. Emerson called out, “Let’s move on! It’s more than a hundred miles to Lilloet.”
Before the map disappeared, I caught a glimpse of Bald Mountain, not far from Antler Creek. Bald Mountain was at least two hundred miles beyond Lilloet. That was a long way to carry a bulging pack.
The others were eager to get moving, and suddenly everyone was hefting heavy loads to their backs.
“Give me a hand,” Bart said, one arm caught on a twisted strap. I helped him and then he added, “Hold still.”
Bart eased my load onto my back. As the full weight of it settled between my shoulder blades and I pushed my forehead into the wide carrying strap, my knees nearly buckled underneath me.
Mr. Emerson, claiming a weak back, carried a smaller load but was the first to start complaining as we made our way out of town.
We hadn’t even left the last rickety shacks settled on the shores of Harrison Lake before he said, “Lads, you may have to take on a small extra burden, or I shall delay the progress of the whole party.”
Neither Bart nor I nor any of the others in the group said a word. I leaned forward into my work like a carthorse and concentrated on the progress of my leather boots.
The easy banter among the men soon slowed. Not long after we had left the town and the boat behind, the group fell silent, except for panting, the occasional curse, and grumbling by Mr. Emerson.
Rocks littered the path and uneven dips made the going difficult. It was impossible to walk without keeping my eye on the trail ahead, which made me feel dizzy and in danger of toppling over the side of the bank.
As the trail grew steeper, the sun shone hotter. Sweat poured off my forehead and into my eyes. By early afternoon I was so hot I hardly had the strength to raise my arm to wipe my face. We stopped often to catch our breath, but it was so hard to start walking again after those short breaks that I wanted to say “Don’t stop. Keep going.”
At one rest stop, Mr. Emerson crossed his hands over his stomach and said, “I won’t push these lads another step.”
“We need to move on, sir,” said George, a little man from California.
“I must let these boys rest,” Mr. Emerson insisted.
What a joke. He was the one who slipped and cursed at every turn. He was the one who’d bribed several of the younger men into taking on extra weight to further lighten his own load. I was carrying his gold pan, and Bart had tied an extra bucket and an ax to the outside of his pack.
Bart and I stood behind Mr. Emerson on the trail, feet spread, tugging on the carry straps of our packs.
George shifted his load and trudged on, calling back over his shoulder, “Stay here if you like. Sleep on a rock.”
One by one the others in the group followed until only the three of us remained. Bart said nothing, but his eyes followed the others. Then he turned and left Mr. Emerson standing beside me in the middle of the trail.
“I suppose we’d best go,” I ventured. “Bart has the food.”
Given the taut feeling in the pit of my stomach, I wasn’t going to let him get too far ahead.
I hadn’t gone ten steps before I heard Mr. Emerson’s boots behind me. He stopped his grumbling, more or less, but he wasn’t the only one feeling the fatigue. If we made eight miles that day, I’d be surprised. At that rate, we wouldn’t have enough food to reach Lilloet! But none of the men ate any less that night. “The pace will pick up tomorrow,” Mr. Emerson proclaimed.
I could not bear to listen to another word from Mr. Emerson. I slipped away from the circle of men and tents and followed the cheerful burble of a nearby stream. How blissful it was to be free of my heavy load, to splash my face and neck with icy water. It was only after I’d pulled off my boots and dangled my feet in the water that I finally felt clearheaded enough to return to camp.
That night, with bellies full and weary from our long climb, we slept deeply, lulled into the world of dreams by the deep murmurs of the running water tumbling over rocks and pebbles on its long journey to the sea.
Chapter 7
The serious bickering started the next day at breakfast. “Blasted creatures!” Mr. Emerson’s face, neck, arms and ankles were covered with itchy red welts.
George smirked and scraped his spoon handle over a particularly large mosquito bite on his forearm. “The Good Lord made a mistake the day he created them nasties.”
“Between them bugs and your snoring—,” Mr. Emerson fumed.
“My snoring? I ain’t never heard so much noise as from your tent!”
“How could I be snoring when the danged mosquitoes kept me awake all night?”
None of us was spared. Splashing the bites with cold water helped for only as long as I stayed wet, not a practical way to get relief unless I was going to swim to the goldfields.
That night we camped near the inn at Hot Springs. After a hearty supper, most of the others in the group availed themselves of the hot-water baths offered at the inn.
“Ain’t you coming along?” Bart asked.
How sorely I would have liked to scrub away the sweat and dirt of the trail. How lovely it would be to pull on fresh petticoats, a clean dress and a crisp apron. I fingered the blunt ends of my short hair. I could scarcely remember what it was like to stroke a soft brush through my long hair, wind the strands into braids, or twist a thick hank into a bun at the back of my neck.
I shook my head. “I’m too tired,” I lied. Bart tipped his head to one side and his eyebrows pushed together.
“Every one of us is tired,” he said.
The face of the girl from the boat floated into my mind, and I closed my eyes to force her aside. She was there, I knew, because the feeling that ate at me as I glared at Bart was the same as what I had felt on the boat—pure envy. I hated that girl for having a mother who loved her. And right then I hated Bart for being able to saunter off to the hot springs.
“Don’t tell me what to do,” I spat.
Bart said nothing, but ducked back under the tent flap, leaving me alone with a b
itter aftertaste on my tongue.
I flung my hat after him, but he was gone. In a foul unhappy mood, I threw myself into my bed and fumed, imagining how lovely the warm waters of the hot spring would have felt to my aching muscles.
Small steamers chugged up and down Little Lilloet, Pemberton and Anderson Lakes. Even though the going was hard between these stretches on the water, travel by boat was a chance to catch our breath and rest our feet. The last of these steamers carried us to the east end of Seaton Lake, and after a steady march toward the town of Lilloet we found ourselves at the edge of a roaring river and not a bridge in sight. We’d been making good time, and nobody complained about dropping our loads and taking a rest. Several of the men pulled out pipes and sat down to rest, while others scouted up and down the banks, looking for a safe place to cross.
George and another man from California headed off to the right. They returned after a short time with a group of men carrying axes, huge saws and an assortment of other tools.
“Lookee what we found!” George said. “These fine Canadian gentlemen are building a real bridge up a little higher,” George explained. “But they’ve only got so far as clearing brush on this side of the bank.”
“Good day,” the first of the strangers said. “You fellows having a rest?”
Mr. Emerson puffed on his pipe. He scowled and nodded toward the river. “Too deep to cross,” he said, raising his voice to be heard over the rushing water.
“Would a bridge help?” one of the Canadian men asked.
“Would a bridge help?” Mr. Emerson said, mimicking the man’s tone of voice. Given the fact that the men were toting a lot of sharp tools, I thought it was less than sensible to mock them. The Canadians seemed not to mind, but fanned out up and down the bank.
“Here!” one of them shouted, and the others joined him. Their saws coughed and scraped through the bark of the massive tree they had chosen, two men at a time pulling at either end of a notched blade until the trunk was cut through and the tree crashed over, spanning the entire fifty-foot width of the river.
“Bravo!” Bart shouted, and George clapped one of the woodsmen on the back.
“Well done!” George said as he hoisted his pack to his back. “But will it hold us?”
“Wait until we clear some of those big branches away.”
With axes hacking, the woodsmen soon cleared a narrow space along the trunk, then hopped nimbly to our side and disappeared back along the river.
“By the time we travel this way again, the real bridge will be finished.” George nodded toward our giant log.
Our spirits lifted at the sight of our lovely new bridge, but we were foolish to think our troubles were so easily solved. The Canadian woodsmen might have been used to balancing on a narrow log, but we were not. The tree was wet, and the bark, though it looked rough from shore, proved slippery.
George made it safely to the other side, but the next man across, an Irish lad called Iain, caught his trouser leg on one of the cut-off branches and tumbled into the water. Luckily he fell on the upstream side and was able to hold onto the log until George could haul him out. Iain moved more slowly after that.
The rest of us crossed without incident, but poor Iain was chilled to the bone, and it took him some time to dry out despite the heat of the afternoon. The worst part was that his Wellington boots had filled with water, and by the time we arrived at our camping place his feet were so blistered and painful that he was scarcely able to hobble from the fire to the tent he shared with four other Irishmen. It was only after he had downed a considerable quantity of whiskey that he stopped complaining and instead, entertained the rest of us with his spectacular snoring.
Chapter 8
When we reached Lilloet on the third day of our journey from Douglas, it felt at first as if we had survived a great ordeal. This feeling soon disappeared as our group discussed the best route to the Cariboo.
“We’re still two hundred and fifty miles from Antler Creek,” George said.
“I can’t carry any more weight,” Mr. Emerson said, and I nearly laughed out loud, especially when Bart’s shoulders quivered.
The noisy discussion soon attracted others, until there were about thirty men gathered around, all shouting and arguing about the best way to proceed.
“I say we buy mules!”
“I hear that they charge thirty-five cents a pound for bacon at Antler Creek—if you can find anyone to sell to you! We’d better buy plenty here.”
“Thirty-five cents a pound! That’s highway robbery!”
“Everything’s more in the Cariboo!”
“Will we have to pack in feed for the horses if we hire some here?”
“There’s good grazing if we take the Brigade Route.”
“Isn’t there gold hereabouts? Why don’t we just stop here?”
“Only enough for Chinamen. I ain’t breaking my back for three dollars a day.”
Eventually it was decided that our group of twenty or so would join up with another party of some two dozen men who had arrived earlier in the day. A local man introduced us to Joshua, an old fellow who hired out pack-horses. Joshua was from Oregon, and I liked him right away.
“How much can each animal carry?” Mr. Emerson wanted to know.
“A fit horse can take three hundred pounds, more or less, if you know how to pack him,” Joshua said.
“And I suppose you know how, for the right price?” Mr. Emerson sneered.
“I suppose I’d know how to do anything for the right price,” Joshua said with a wink in my direction.
Mr. Emerson took several quick pulls on his pipe and narrowed his eyes. “You don’t say.”
Never in all my life had I met a man as humorless as Mr. Emerson. How he was able to get through every day without so much as a smile was beyond my understanding. I raised an eyebrow back at Joshua, and the old man answered me with a little shrug followed by the clear statement of his fee.
That’s how we hired Joshua and six of his horses to accompany us on our way. It was quickly apparent that Mr. Emerson had no feel for horses.
“That one there looks good and strong,” he said of a black horse that was tall enough, but not carrying much weight or muscle. When the horse swung his head around to sniff Mr. Emerson, he stepped back, obviously uneasy.
“Sir? Do you think it might be a good idea for Bart and me to keep an eye on Joshua?” I asked, desperate to think of a way to keep as far from Mr. Emerson as possible.
Mr. Emerson squinted at me. Fact was, I believed that Joshua was both honest and capable. I also knew that Mr. Emerson was greedy, suspicious and lazy.
Rolling the bowl of his pipe back and forth between his cupped palms he pronounced, “I like the way you look out for our best interests. You let me know if there’s any trouble.” He squeezed my shoulder as if we were the best of friends, and it was all I could do not to pull away.
After that Bart and I were expected to help Joshua. Mr. Emerson frequently reminded us of our responsibilities, as if working with the horses had been his idea. Though our workdays grew longer, we were happy enough with the new arrangement.
With more than two weeks of travel ahead of us to get to our next proper stop at Williams Lake, we took advantage of the supplies available in Lilloet. Our group now numbered forty-four men, some from as far away as Wales, Scotland, Ireland and England. Soon sacks of flour, more bacon, beans, coffee, salt, sugar and tobacco piled up with the rest of our gear. Early the next morning, Joshua, George, Bart and I loaded all that we could onto the newly procured horses.
There was plenty to learn about packing the horses so the loads were secure, evenly balanced, and didn’t cause any troublesome sores. A sore horse was another mouth to feed, and I sure as anything didn’t want to carry even another ounce if I didn’t have to.
When we finally set out, our own loads were considerably lightened, but we knew that British Columbia was a vast and mighty territory that took the lives of horses and men alike wi
th no concern for those left behind.
I had felt almost smug striding into town, but leaving again made me realize that the wild country ahead was probably beyond my imagining. Already the way had been diffi-cult, but judging by stories told by some of the men who had traveled this way before, only the very strongest, the most determined, survived to see the Cariboo. Would I be one of them?
The flutter in my belly could have been fear or excitement, or maybe some of both. The only way to know for certain if I was making a terrible mistake or embarking on the most amazing adventure of my life was to put one foot in front of the other and see where the path would lead.
I squared my shoulders and took my place in the line of men and horses heading north.
The trail beyond Lilloet was some of the toughest terrain I had ever seen—worse, even, than the canyons and passes in Utah Territory or the rough going through the Sierra Nevada mountains.
What a blessed relief it was each night to duck into our tents, footsore and bellies full. Bart and I often shared a bit of conversation before falling into an exhausted sleep that was never long enough nor deep enough to leave us fully rested.
One night, camped in an open area with good grass for the horses, Bart and I had wrapped ourselves in our blankets in the tent we shared with Mr. Emerson. We didn’t have to wait long before low rumbles rose from our plump companion.
“Joe?” Bart asked.
“Mmmm?” After three days of traversing switchbacks on steep mountain trails, every part of my body ached.
“You still awake?”
I groaned again, helpless against the pull of sleep.
“Do you ever think about going back?”
Now that woke me up. Bart had never talked about leaving.
“What’s to go back for?” I answered, not wanting to think too hard about giving an honest answer.
In the lingering twilight I could make out Bart’s nose and chin poking up between his blanket and his hat. We all slept in our hats, boots and long pants to try to gain some protection from the mosquitoes. I was likely the only one who found some joy in this wretched state of affairs. For once I didn’t have to worry about what the others might think of me keeping every inch of skin covered. The poor horses were driven nearly mad by the wicked biting insects, and they huddled head to tail and tail to head, swishing the flies and mosquitoes from each other’s faces. Even so, they often stamped their feet in irritation and frequently pinned their ears and shook their heads trying to rid themselves of the tiny beasts.
