Where the Trail Ends: American Tapestries (10 page)

“I won’t forget this time.”

She nodded and began gathering up their dishes in a tub to scrub them down at the river. Papa spoke. “The Kneedlers have decided to leave our company.”

She put the tub down, turning back to face him. Sadness washed over her. “Can they make it on their own?”

“They won’t be alone.” He paused. “A few others are thinking about going with them.”

Relief passed through her at first, and then her heart seemed to collapse. They’d been a community for months now.

“What about us?” she dared to ask.

“Your mama would never forgive me if I didn’t keep you and Micah safe.”

She stirred her porridge. “Do you think Captain Loewe is going to keep us safe?”

“No one can guarantee safety out here.”

An hour later, Samantha and Lucille both cried as they hugged each other good-bye. Then Captain Loewe released his familiar cry. “On to Oregon!”

Wheels began turning as the oxen heaved the wagons forward through the valley, but this time the Kneedler family didn’t follow him.

And neither did the Waldrons.

Chapter Eight

About a dozen feet ahead of Samantha, Micah walked with Papa, hand in hand. The knapsack bobbed over Micah’s shoulder, and their palomino trailed behind them. Samantha smiled as she watched the boy who kept stopping to wipe the dust off the noses of their oxen so they could breathe. The boy who wanted to be just like his father.

When God created her brother, he’d lit the boy with sunshine from his light hair to the smile that radiated on his face. Samantha loved his laughter as he played with his Noah’s Ark set, bobbing the animals up and down as if they were in a great flood.

Papa had carved the ten wooden animals for Micah after he was born, but he’d never had time to carve the actual ark. Micah never seemed to mind. He’d brought every one of the animals on this journey and transformed crates and boxes into his ark.

When Samantha turned twelve, Mama thought she was much too old to be off hunting and fishing. But in those hours that Papa was out stomping through the forest without her, she and Mama had grown closer. Mama had asked Samantha to care for Micah when she passed on to the Celestial City, as she liked to quote from
The Pilgrim’s Progress
. Samantha promised her that she would.

Mama also wanted her to marry a man who would care for Micah as well, in case something happened to Papa. At one time, Mama thought it might be the clerk in Papa’s law office—until Mama was well enough to spend an entire afternoon with the stuffy Reginald
Poole. That evening, Mama said she would never permit Samantha to marry such a disagreeable man.

A laugh bubbled on Samantha’s lips at the memory. Her skin was raw from the dryness and the sun. Her legs ached. There was nothing she’d like to do more than take a bubbly bath, wrap herself in clean sheets, and sleep on a real mattress. But she was also grateful that she never married that man.

She looked beyond her father and brother to the other wagons in their party struggling up the mountain. When they left Missouri, the billowy white of the wagons’ bonnets had been a symbol of their hope and determination. The canvases were now shredded and streaked with brown. They’d spent the past week felling trees and creeping over piles of rocks, uncertain whether they would ever make it to the other side.

Captain Loewe and his train of ten wagons had disappeared on the horizon five days ago, while the Waldrons traveled with the four remaining families who’d decided they no longer trusted Loewe’s leadership. Eleven people were in this party including their new captain—Jack Doyle. She didn’t miss Captain Loewe one bit, but she did miss Lucille and Doctor Rochester and the doctor’s kind wife.

Jack was serving them faithfully as captain, but he stopped coming to the Waldrons’ fire at night. Samantha didn’t know if he was ashamed at how he’d handled the situation back in the valley or if he was too busy with his new responsibilities to associate with her family. Or maybe he was still angry with her. She was certainly angry with him.

She licked her lips as they climbed, wishing she could take a cup of water from their barrel. Papa had remembered to fill it, but she knew it was low again. And she couldn’t ask Papa to stop the oxen anyway. Perhaps when they reached the top of this mountain, they would rest.

Wind captured the canopy of their wagon, and it flapped against the hoops. The wind tangled Samantha’s skirt around her legs and
blew dirt into her eyes. The traders had described the Willamette Valley to all of them—the grass and fertile soil and water. The mild temperatures and acres of wood for houses and furniture.

The Blue Mountains, though, were daunting.

As she pushed through the wind, she pretended that she was almost to the Willamette. That tonight she could bake bread for Papa and Micah and sleep in a feather bed with lots of blankets. Papa could read the family Bible by the fireplace. He’d make a new fiddle to replace the one he’d left in Ohio and play it by the fire.

As the wagons ahead of her moved toward the mountain’s peak, the ground flattened. The party’s wagons stopped in a narrow line. At first, Samantha thought they’d found water for the night, but Jack rode toward them with a grim look on his face.

“What is it?” Papa asked. Even though he tried to mask it, Samantha heard the worry in his voice.

“We’ve come to a cliff.”

Papa sighed. “Any sign of water?”

Jack ground his heel into the dirt, shaking his head. “Do you think we should stop for the day?”

“We can’t stop.” Papa eyed the sun leaning toward the horizon. “The animals need water.”

Samantha could see for miles up here, the mountaintops rippling out as if they were traveling across a giant pond. But Jack was right. Their path stopped at a cliff that sloped a good fifteen feet. Beyond that rose a mountain higher than any she’d seen yet.

Jack, Papa, and two other men fanned out to see if there was another way around this cliff and mountain, but when they returned, they announced that there was no other way. They had to lower the wagons down the cliff, and to do it, they had to lighten their loads. The heavier items would be impossible to lower with the wagons and then drag up the next mountain, especially if they wanted to
take their remaining food and enough seeds to plant crops on the other side.

It had been painstakingly slow, climbing the steep mountains through the trees. At this pace, it may take them another month or even two before they got to the Willamette. There was no way they could make it before the snow.

If only the men could fell some of these giant trees or find a trail to take into a valley, they might be able to make it through the mountains before November. No one wanted to admit that they were lost, and they refused to discuss what would happen if winter arrived while they were still in the mountains.

Samantha climbed into the back of the wagon and smoothed her hands over the dark grain of her mother’s rosewood chest, sniffing one last time the sweet scent that lingered in its grain. The chest had been a wedding gift from her grandfather to her mama almost twenty-five years ago. Mama had treasured it.

Before Papa and Arthur lifted it out of the wagon, Samantha took out the linens, the clothing, their family’s Bible, and Mama’s copy of
The Pilgrim’s Progress
. She wished now that she had brought more of Mama’s smaller treasures instead of the chest so they could carry them all the way.

She lifted Mama’s shawl out of the chest, the shawl Mama had displayed on the formal chair in her room until she died. It was made of white wool, embroidered with lilac and green flowers, and every time Samantha looked at it, she remembered her mother’s love of beauty.

She packed the heirlooms and clothing in a burlap bag and put them back into the wagon. They all knew that there would be sacrifices on this journey—they’d already given up their homes and gardens and most of their furniture. How much more would they have to give up before they arrived at their new home?

Papa stared down at the chest as if he were leaving Mama behind instead of her things.

“She would understand,” Samantha whispered.

He slowly turned away, wiping his dusty sleeve over his eyes. “The important thing is that our family gets to the Willamette. Together.”

She nodded, her heart warming with his words. That was exactly what Mama would have wanted.

Papa removed the extra axle he’d stored under the wagon and set it on the ground beside Mama’s chest. It was either that or the tools he’d brought to farm their new land, and she knew he wasn’t ready to give up their prospects for the future.

Dust clouded around them as Jack rode his horse up to their wagon and hopped off beside her. Papa turned toward the wagon and called for Micah.

Jack eyed the chest before looking at her. “I’m sorry, Samantha.”

“It’s not your fault,” she said with a shrug. “It’s a small sacrifice.”

His eyebrows climbed.

“Really,” she insisted.

Jack took off his hat as he studied her. The families in front and behind them were busy unloading their wagons and reorganizing, trying to determine what they could leave behind in the wilderness and what they couldn’t live without. The easy smile had been erased from his face, replaced with a worry that concerned her.

“How are you?” he asked.

“At this moment—a bit sad. And worried.”

“It’s a tough journey for everyone.”

She searched his face. “Do you know where we’re going?”

He lowered his voice. “None of us know exactly where we’re going.”

She nodded her head. The fur traders had talked about a pass through the Blue Mountains that would take them north to the Columbia River. Once they reached the river, they could go east and
spend a few days at the Whitman Mission or follow the river west to Fort Vancouver. But after searching for days, they’d yet to find anything that Jack or Papa or any of the other men considered a mountain pass.

“Do you think we’re going to make it?” When Jack hesitated, she stepped closer to him. “Tell me the truth.”

His gaze wandered to the rocks and trees behind her and then snapped back to her. “We’ll make it.”

How was she supposed to believe him when uncertainty shadowed his voice? He didn’t even believe what he said.

Jack’s eyes softened as he looked down at her. “You know I didn’t want to hurt you back at that valley.”

Her heart beat faster. “I wanted you to stand up for Boaz. And for me.”

“Sometimes you have to do hard things. To protect the people you care for.”

She expected her heart to flutter again at his words, but she felt empty instead.

“I have to know....” She looked straight into his eyes. “Did you vote to kill the dogs?”

He released her hand, his face hardening again as he dropped his arm to his side. For a moment, he had the look Captain Loewe wore when he had to make a difficult decision. “Does it matter how I voted?”

She nodded. “It does to me.”

“You have to learn to trust me.”

“Samantha,” Papa called, his voice urgent.

She picked up her skirt. “I have to go.”

She didn’t look back at Jack as she rushed toward Papa. How could he ask her to trust him? She had to follow his leadership, at least until they reached the Willamette, but she couldn’t trust him. Not if he voted to kill Boaz.

She found Papa on the other side of the wagon, scanning the trees. “What is it?” she asked.

“Have you seen Micah?”

She shook her head. “Maybe he’s visiting with Mrs. Kneedler.”

“I already checked their wagon.”

“Where would he have gone?”

Papa turned to her, lines of worry etched across his forehead. “When did you see him last?”

She swallowed as fear clutched her heart. “He was playing with his toys under the wagon, before you went for water.”

“Where is his knapsack?”

She checked under the wagon and then looked under the bonnet. “It seems to be gone.”

Papa started yelling Micah’s name into the woods, and Samantha ran for Jack. He quickly sent Miles Oxford and Neill Parker to the north. He and Papa went south. Arthur Kneedler stayed with the women at the train.

Samantha waited with the other women, trying to keep her mind occupied by mending her hem. Then Boaz barked, his eyes focused west. She put her needle and thread back into her sewing box and grabbed her rifle.

“Where are you going?” Mrs. Kneedler asked.

“To find my brother.”

“The men are searching for him.”

Samantha shook her head. “There aren’t enough men.”

Mr. Kneedler protested her leaving, as did the other women, but she couldn’t leave her brother out there to die. Her eyes on the sun, she followed Boaz west, calling Micah’s name. When they found him, she would never let him wander off again.

She kept calling his name as she and Boaz climbed over massive rocks, pushed through ferns taller than her, and then struggled to
get around pine trees without wounding themselves. Boaz began to run through the pines, and she hurried to catch up with him. They stopped at the edge of the cliff.

Down in the chasm she could see Micah’s blond hair, and her entire body felt paralyzed for a moment, as if she were living a nightmare.

She hoped she was in a nightmare.

Then she heard Papa calling Micah’s name.

“Over here!” she shouted.

Jack sighed when he saw her, but it was no time for a lecture. She pointed down over the cliff. When Papa saw Micah, he threw a rope around one of the trees and began to descend. Jack descended after him.

When they carried him up, Micah’s eyes were closed, his face bloody. She felt sick to her stomach.

Dear God, don’t let him die.

She would be a better sister to him. A better mother.

“We need to get him back to camp,” Jack said.

When they reached the wagons, Papa placed a blanket over the place where Mama’s chest had been, and Jack set Micah inside. Samantha snapped open the medicine box, and her hands shook as she tried to read the labels on the bottles—castor oil, laudanum, whiskey, essence of peppermint.