Where the Lost Wander_ A Novel - Amy Harmon Page 0,15
Ma is trying to do it, ignoring Pa when he insists she rest while she can.
Wagons start to arrive at the staging area near the trading post. Some folks have painted their names, slogans, or the places from which they hail on their canvas covers. Oregon or Bust; California Bound; Born in Boston, Bound for Oregon. The Weavers; The Farleys; The Clarkes; The Hughes. Pa decides we should paint our name too, and he writes May in dripping red letters along the sides. Ma isn’t happy with his handiwork.
“Good heavens, William. It looks like we’ve marked our wagons so the angel of death will pass us over.”
Every wagon is packed to the brim with supplies—beans and bacon and flour and lard. Barrels are strapped to the sides, and false bottoms are built into the main body of the wagon—the wagon box—to stow tools and possessions not needed during everyday travel. Pa has extra wheels and enough rope and chains to stretch cross country, along with saws and iron pulleys and a dozen other things I can’t name and don’t know how to use. Ma has her china stowed below, packed in straw and prayed over. We eat on tin—cups, plates, saucers—with iron spoons because they don’t break.
One woman has a table and chairs and a chest of drawers in the back of her wagon. She claims the furniture has been in her family for generations, and it made it across oceans, so why not across the plains? Some people have far more than they can use, far more than they need, and some don’t have nearly enough; some don’t even have shoes. It’s a motley assortment of fortune hunters and families, young and old. Like St. Joe, except most everyone is white. Everyone but John Lowry, but I’m not exactly sure what he is.
Mr. Lorenzo Hastings wears a three-piece suit with a watch chain and a neatly knotted tie. His wife, Priscilla, has a lace parasol and sits primly in a buggy pulled by a pair of white horses. They also have a huge Conestoga wagon pulled by eight mules and driven by two hired men. Wyatt got a look inside, and he claims it has a feather bed in the back. Mrs. Hastings has two middle-aged sisters serving as her “companions”; they are traveling to California to join their brother. The sisters introduce themselves to me and Ma as Miss Betsy Kline and Miss Margaret Kline, but we don’t visit long. Mrs. Hastings keeps them running for this and that, scrambling to make camp. I overhear Mr. Abbott telling Pa that the Hastingses won’t last a week, and it’ll be better for everyone if they don’t. Every train has its share of “go-backs,” he says. I hope for the two sisters’ sake that they don’t.
Regardless of their possessions or their position, it seems everyone has the same dream. They all want something different than what they have now. Land. Luck. Life. Even love. Everyone chatters about what we’re going to find when we get there. I’m no different, I suppose, though I’m more worried about what we’re going to find along the way. Some people have so many belongings wedged into their wagons it’s a wonder their teams can pull them, but pull them they do, and the next morning, following a breakfast of mush and bacon, the long train rolls out, everyone jostling for position.
They call it a road, and I suppose it is, the ruts and the wear of thousands of travelers creating a path that stretches for two thousand miles over plains and creeks and hills and hollows from a dozen points along the Missouri to the verdant valleys of places most of us have never been.
With so many wagons in the train, the travelers are either stretched out across the trail, following the ruts of the wagons that have gone before, or lined up like waddling white ducks, one wagon behind the other, bumping over the terrain. Mr. Caldwell insists on being at the front near Mr. Abbott, and he manages to spur his family and his animals to lead the pack. We happily fall back to the end of the line, which looks more like a sloppy triangle formation than a tidy row. Ma needs a slower pace, and it’s a great deal more pleasant to walk without another wagon nipping at one’s heels. The distance from the Caldwells is good. I won’t see Elmeda Caldwell’s mournful glances or be put to work looking