A Light in the Wilderness

by Jane Kirkpatrick

  Lord willing.

  “Some say they staying here at these dalles, buildin’—building—winter cabins. Others leavin’ wagons and supplies, say they come back in the spring. Will come back in the spring.” Sometimes forcing her words to sound like Nancy’s made her tired. She was very tired now.

  “That ain’t us. We’ve come this far, made good. Still got our cows and oxen, a good wagon, and enough supplies. They’ll serve us well when we settle in the valley.”

  “Transport money be spent better in the valley.”

  “No. Sometimes you got to spend in order to make money. Tish, I want you safe. That’s why I’m sending you by water.” It was hard to argue with his goodwill.

  “Barlow goes south through the mountains. With wagons. Why can’t we—”

  “Barlow’s making his own road and there’s no guarantee he can do it.” He stood up. Fluffed Martha’s kinky hair. “Look at that mountain.” He pointed with his tin cup toward the triangular snow-covered peak taller than any Letitia had ever seen. “It would be dangerous to try to make a road through that.”

  She could see that for herself, really. But why should he decide things and then tell her about it?

  “I’ve decided how we’ll do this,” Davey continued. “I paid for Hudson’s Bay crafts. They’ll take you and Martha, the anvil, tools, your . . . things. Wagon is almost taken apart. Knighton and I’ll finish that today and wait to head out ’til I wave good-bye to the two of you. You’re on the Bay’s list for transport. It’s all settled.”

  “I gets no choice.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “What happens to Roth?” Someone chased the dog away from salmon drying on sticks near a fire, and he headed toward them, tail between his legs. He stopped on the way, sniffing greetings to the numerous Indian dogs running about.

  “He’ll come with me. He can help with the cows.”

  Letitia thought that he might not come back for her and Martha, but he would for the dog.

  “I hope they get you out of here before you take on mountain fever. Or I do. Place is rampant with sickness and I can hardly hear myself think with the roar of these falls.”

  That conversation had taken place two days before. She’d spent a sleepless night beneath stars so close she could pluck them. Now she took another bite of salmon, liked the firm pink fish. Another immigrant told her not to let the dog eat any raw fish as it would kill him. She broke a piece of the smoked fish off for Martha, softened it in her mouth before placing a touch of it on the baby’s lower lip. She gave another swatch to Roth. Letitia smiled at the expression on her four-month-old daughter’s face. “Is it good? Jus’ different.”

  She watched as the Indians stood on rickety platforms with spears and nets, stabbing at fish roiling in the thunderous falls. They did what they had to do regardless of the danger. So would she. It would be her and Martha going on alone because Davey said it would be safer. But she couldn’t let where they’d be meeting stay floating in the air like leftover chicken feathers.

  She walked back up to the area where Davey disassembled the wagon. Others in their company had cut trees they were strapping together to make their own rafts, crafts that looked more frightening than Hudson’s Bay’s. The British boats were the best she could hope for and Davey had paid their way. They would leave in the morning.

  Back at their camp she said, “We meet up at Oregon City, not Linnton.”

  A man lifted his head from his work, looked at Davey and scowled.

  “What?” Davey turned. “What’s that you say?”

  “We meet in Oregon City.”

  He stepped away so the men couldn’t hear. “Lookee. I think you might be better waiting at Linnton or even go on to Fort Vancouver. The Chief Factor at the fort is known to be partial to caring for women and children. At Oregon City . . . don’t know if you can find a boardinghouse that’ll take you . . . but at Linnton you can stay in the wagon. Safer. I don’t want to be worrying over you.”

  How much had he run interference for her with others that she didn’t know about? Maybe he was right.

  If he didn’t come for her, she’d have to begin a life on her own. He didn’t seem to grasp that. But for now, she would comply. “I gives you two weeks after I makes it for you to come for me. After that, I sells supplies what I don’ need and me and Martha begin a life on our own.”

  “Fair enough. But I’ll come. Trust me.”

  “You gots Charity. I feel better if I have Roth.”

  Davey hesitated. “All right.” He scratched the dog’s neck. “Roth can go with you.”

  Letitia was about to follow the two other families boarding the raft behind their wagons when she thought she saw someone familiar. Yes.

  “It Martha Hawkins,” she told Davey and rushed toward the girl, carrying baby Martha in her board. She didn’t want to lose sight of the washed-out ruffled dress. “Martha!” She shouted and the girl turned, then was lost behind a team of oxen pulling a log. “Martha Hawkins. That be you?”

  Davey called after her. “Letitia! You got to go.”

  She rushed around the log to see the girl still standing, eyes as hollow as the holes that Rothwell dug. The dog barked as he followed her. Breathless, she reached for Martha, who shrank from Letitia’s touch. “Martha? It be Letitia, Letitia Carson. And Baby Martha. Where’s your mama and papa?”

  Martha pointed toward a group of men resting beside unpeeled logs. Letitia didn’t recognize Doc among them but saw his father and Nancy’s brother, Judge. None of them looked well: thin as oars with clothes even more threadbare than her own. Mountain fever? She didn’t want to expose Martha to it.

  “Your mama?”

  “She’s crying. Always crying.”

  “Why she cry, chil’?” Letitia squatted to look into Martha’s eyes, held her shoulder. She was thin as a chicken leg.

  “Baby dies and so does Papa. And Mr. Meek left us and we almost died too.”

  Then, as though she just now noticed Baby Martha, the girl’s eyes flooded with tears that ran down sunken cheeks. “Baby Martha.” She said it as a sigh.

  Chil’ needin’ comfort from a bad, bad time. So will her mama.

  Letitia took Martha’s hand. Her troubles were pebbles in this child’s rocky trail. “Show me your mama, baby.”

  “Letitia!” Davey had caught up with her, breathless. “You got to go now.”

  “We gotta make things better first.”

  Nancy lifted vacant eyes to Letitia and patted the ground where she sat on a faded log cabin quilt. She nursed Nancy Jane though she had almost no milk to give her baby. She considered getting up to hold her friend but didn’t have the strength. She wanted to sleep and never wake up. The company they’d traveled with sought a shortcut, and though Meek had warned them against taking it, the men had insisted that he guide them. That Greenberry Smith the most vocal.

  “Letitia!”

  Nancy watched Letitia turn toward Davey. “You give me a time here with my friend. I be along.”

  Davey puckered up his mouth, but he stomped away leaving the women alone.

  Letitia turned back to her. “You not doin’ well. Nancy Jane . . . she hungry.” Letitia nodded to the child who fussed in her arms. “I’s milk enough.”

  “Oh, would you?”

  Tears pressed behind her nose as Nancy handed her child to Letitia. Something substantial for one of her children at least. They were all starved.

  “Judge and the others blame Meek for getting us lost. But he’d told them he wasn’t sure of the trail before we even left the Boise country. But after Zach . . .” Her arms lay limp in her lap. “I didn’t have the interest. Or will. Or faith or anything to put my two cents into the discussion. Not that the men would have listened.” She gasped for breath. “People started dying. Twenty they said. I wanted to survive. I don’t know why. Zach’s gone, Tisha. Or maybe he’s waiting for a rescue.” Her throat caught. Her friend didn’t ask questions. She was so grateful. They’d
arrived at the place Sarah Bowman described in her letter. Pounding waterfalls, bare brown hills. “There’s nothing to look forward to now, is there? This has all been a terrible, terrible mistake.” She coughed, the words draining her as they had since she’d lost the baby. The last child she and Zach shared.

  “But you makes it here, thank the Lord.” Letitia’s dark finger stroked the cheek of Nancy Jane nursing beneath an apron Letitia pulled over her.

  “I don’t know about the Lord, unless he sent Major Moses ‘Black Squire’ Harris.” Saying the long name tired her. “Meek said he’d get help from the missionaries. They declined. But Meek spent his own money getting food and pulleys and axes—and got this Major and some Indians to bring them to us. He guided us across the Deschutes and brought us here. Thank goodness a good man was willing. Maybe it will change a few minds about the hearts of black men, though I doubt your G.B. Smith will change his.”

  “I’s not claimin’ Greenberry Smith.”

  “He was one of the ones who insisted Meek lead us and then . . . we got so lost.” She put her palms up to the sky. “It was . . . there are no words.”

  Nancy wanted to ask how she was and where Davey wanted her to go. He paced off to the side. She was too exhausted. Letitia had taken the tiny rows of braids out of her hair and held the thick tight curls now with a strip of petticoat tied back away from her pretty face. She didn’t have that hollow look of Nancy’s children nor of the other men and women who’d followed Meek. Sighing, Nancy asked, “How are you faring?”

  “We have trials but we weren’t long hungry. Doc Whitman helped resupply. We met that Major Black Harris. Good the Lord turn him aroun’ so he be here to help you.”

  “Maybe. Oh Letitia, what will I do now with Zach gone? If it weren’t for the children, I wouldn’t care but . . . Judge says I need to marry quickly. Says I won’t survive otherwise. Then I can have half a land allotment. As though I cared.”

  “A wife own land?”

  “So they tell me. But I can’t marry again. You understand that, don’t you? Zach is all there’ll ever be for me.” She looked at her daughters, all sitting listless, close to their mother. Maryanne, her face as pale as a fish bone, lounged against a wagon wheel while Martha stared into space. At least when Baby Martha squealed, Martha paid her attention. Samuel had buried himself with the men’s work, taken little Edward with him. Sometimes she felt as though she’d lost both boys. The lost Meek train held more losses than people knew of. “Zach might still live and find us. How awful if he waited and then . . .”

  Nancy wasn’t certain they’d have the strength to resist the mountain fever that swirled around them, let alone go more miles that people said were the worst of the trip. Maryanne was still poorly. Maybe from eating food not fully cooked when they arrived at the Columbia River. Everyone was so desperate for nutrients they grabbed at even rotten food. But they all lived. Zach had been so sure of this journey. What was it she was supposed to discover in this wilderness place of the soul?

  “The worst is not having the certainty, just as with Laura. A wooden cross from another piece of quilt frame. I’ll never see those crosses again. They were here one moment then . . . gone. I didn’t even tell him that I loved him.” She blinked back fresh tears, rocked back and forth, her arms empty, no one to hold. “We told each other those words every day. I thought I’d have the evening to say it.”

  “You alive. Kept your chillun alive. You still dream, for your chillun now. Later you dreams for you.”

  Nancy looked at the indigo face of her friend. “But I have not the will. I am so very weak.”

  “Just live today. Lord take care of tomorrows.” Letitia handed back the satisfied infant, adjusted her apron.

  Nancy had always prided herself on taking each day as it came without worrying about the morrow. Maybe now she’d have to rely on the hope of the future to keep her facing forward.

  “Letitia, they won’t wait forever,” Davey interrupted, insistent.

  “I keep lookin’ for you,” Letitia told Nancy. “Leave you a message, ask people going to Oregon City to tell you where we end up.”

  Nancy’s kin would take the river route too but on rafts the families worked on building. They needed more days to gain weight back and shudder less from their weeks of meandering, burying those who didn’t make it.

  They said their good-byes and Letitia let Davey lead her back to the craft. “Doc Hawkins dead,” she said. “Nancy wished she told him words she never get to say. So I’s tellin’ you words.” She corrected herself. “I’m telling you words.” She faced him. “I want you to make it through, Davey Carson. I’s hoping we have a good life together when we reach that valley.” She didn’t know if she loved the man or not, but she was tied to him in her heart and maybe that’s what love was. She’d do anything for him and she believed he’d do nearly everything for her. He’d paid money to Hudson’s Bay men and he’d not have done that if he didn’t care about what happened to her and Martha. She chewed her lower lip. “I feel for you, Davey Carson.”

  “Do you now.” He looked at her. “I feel for you, Tish.” He touched her forehead in the center where her hair came to a little peak. She felt callused fingers. His voice was soft as he said, “Do what the men tell you to do and you’ll be safe. And wait for me. I’ll be coming with Charity. You trust that. We’ve come a long way, Tish. Lord willing, we’ll meet up in ten days.”

  His reminder of the Lord’s willingness to look after them and his hopeful words comforted. So with more confidence than she’d felt in a long time, she stepped onto the wide boat, supplies wrapped in the canvas sitting in the wagon boxes, wheels stacked, saplings limp but alive, Roth standing beside them, tail wagging. On soft lips, she pressed a prayer onto the forehead of her daughter. She waved at Davey and they pushed off into the current well below the dangerous falls, headed for the other side. She said a prayer for Davey too and then one for herself, that she’d see him again and their life would finally be settled in this wilderness place. They’d come this far, Davey had reminded her. The Lord had been willing. She’d hang on to that.

  21

  The Separation

  Davey and four other sturdy and younger men started pushing several families’ cows as well as their own—about 150 head—up the “walk-up trail.” Davey captained their small party and took as a compliment that the men called him “Uncle Davey.” They were a kind of family after all this time, looking after each other, enduring trials, partying now and then as they’d come across the plains. That’s what families did for each other, wasn’t it? He planned to party when they reached Oregon City, that was certain. He could hear Charity’s cowbell clanging as they moved through blackberries and bramble, crossed streams and found themselves in steep, narrow ravines.

  On the third day out light rain fell. When the rain let up, fog took its place.

  “Hello! Hello!”

  Davey turned to the direction of the call. Out of the timber murk came a woman riding a horse, and a boy, maybe nine or so, and four men. One of his drovers preceded them and told Davey he’d found Mr. and Mrs. Walden and their small party whose provisions had been stolen by an Indian. “They hope to travel with us.”

  “Well, of course.” Davey thought Walden daft for bringing his wife and children this way, but he kept his thoughts to himself. The terrain demanded too much.

  The next day they spent hours going around a fallen tree. Another day an elk trail beckoned but led too high. They returned to spend the night where they’d left the camp that morning. On the seventh day, Davey frowned at what route to take. Laurel shrubbed its way beside the path and a few cows ate it before the men chased them away. But before the afternoon was out, several died. “We dare not eat the meat,” Davey said. “We’ll perish as they did.” He didn’t have enough supplies for all of them. They’d have to ration. All this way and at the end starvation threatened. Didn’t that beat all. And he was responsible, the one who said “do this or that.” Maybe conf
erring with others as Letitia always wanted wasn’t such a bad idea when it came time to spread fault.

  A raging snowstorm and high winds pushing against tall timber woke them in the night. The roar and biting sleet pierced their clothing and within a short time each was soaked through. They rushed about, trying to break camp, check the cows.

  The cows were gone.

  With cold fingers they ate a biscuit each and reloaded their pack animals with what they had left and began a descent, hoping to find a lower elevation trail. But the wind blew snow into their faces, covered the questionable path and their own tracks, and by noon their horses were giving out and had to be led. Davey held his hat in front of Fergus’s face to keep the snow from the animal’s eyes. Davey’s beard froze, his lashes crusted with ice, and he lost sight of the pack animals forward. The group splintered.

  “Go back and let the stragglers know we’re ahead,” Davey shouted to a drover through the din of wind. By night, the snow lit the way such as it was, and for the first time Davey felt the gall of fear in his throat. They were out of food, cold and frozen. The storm might continue for days. And they were lost. The woman, Sarah Walden, was soaked through, wearing only a blanket dress. He could hear her teeth chatter. He was the captain. Responsible. Sleet cut his face like thousands of bee stings, keeping his thoughts from marching straight. He pulled the neckerchief up over his nose. It was nearly frozen to his face.

  Sarah Walden’s husband placed her on one of the stronger horses. She looked to be light as a child and shivering despite her husband’s placing his own blanket around her. The horse wouldn’t move nor could it carry the Waldens’ sons, either one, though the boys were small.

  He thought about Letitia. She’d survive. Their child too. He should have gone with her, forgotten about the cattle. But he hadn’t. That raft had sailed. He was here now. Here. Trying to survive. He confessed his sins to God then, wishing he’d had a better friendship with the Creator so as not to be such a surprise to him now with these trembling prayers.