Chapter Thirteen
That must be it, Pa.”
Nathan and Benjamin turned to where Matthew was pointing. To the west of them, across the seemingly limitless spread of dry prairie grass, there was a prominent knoll, the highest in the area. Against the backlight of the late afternoon sun, they could make out the dark outlines of several tents and the shape of a wagon. The wagon tracks they had been following since they had struck Shoal Creek and turned west led straight up the gentle rise toward where the tents were.
Nathan nodded. “I think you’re right, Matthew. That must be Far West.”
Benjamin let his eyes sweep across the breadth of the horizon. He turned to Nathan. “Remember that article in that Eastern newspaper I showed you? About that fellow, name of McCormick?”
Nathan looked blank.
“The one that invented that wheat harvester a couple of years ago?”
“Oh, yeah.” He still looked puzzled that his father would remember that right at the moment.
“Know what he said about his reaper? Said that now that the great flatlands of America were opening up to wheat farming, we had to have a machine to help us. Get spaces this big and you can’t get enough men to cut the wheat down by hand. They say a man and a good team of horses can cut twenty, maybe thirty acres in a day with one of those machines.”
Matthew’s eyes widened. “Really?”
Benjamin nodded, turning back to the land around them. “Imagine what a man could do out here. Put this all in wheat, get a couple of them reapers.” He turned to Nathan. “That’s the future, Nathan. Think about it.”
Nathan smiled with a ruefulness that betrayed his weariness. “I will, Pa, soon as we find a place to sit down and get off these feet.”
Benjamin laughed. “You’re right. And here I am standing around jawing. Let’s get on up there and find this daughter-in-law of mine.”
Nathan pulled his coat tighter around him and fell in behind his father and younger brother. It was the sixth day of October, and earlier in the day the temperature hadn’t been too unpleasant, but now that the sun was low in the sky, the air had taken on a definite chill. By nightfall there would be frost. He lowered his head and plodded on.
* * *
To say that the city of Far West was beginning to take shape would have been to overstate the case. There were only five permanent structures, all of them simple log and sod huts. There were several dozen tents of varying quality. Some were worn thin; some were torn to the point that they offered little more than a minimal privacy. Here and there, Nathan noticed, families had camped as best they could around their wagons. Children huddled around small fires, and there were simple bedrolls laid out on the prairie.
Their welcome was hardly a warm one. Heads lifted and people stared at the three men as they walked by. The expressions ranged from the openly curious stares of the children to the nervous, darting glances of the women. The men were sullen and suspicious. Nathan didn’t blame them. He had been in Missouri with Zion’s Camp. He knew what it meant when strangers appeared. Were they friendly newcomers or Missouri wildcats out looking for trouble? He kept smiling and nodding to the people as they passed, but expected no more than the response they were receiving.
Suddenly he stopped. Matthew and their father stopped alongside him. Nathan was gazing at a lean-to made from hazel brush and propped up against the side of a wagon. Crouching down in front of a small fire, nursing it with small twigs and buffalo chips, was a tall, slender figure. Beside him, half in profile, was a woman heavy with child.
Nathan strode forward. “Newel?” he called. “Newel Knight?”
The man straightened and turned. For a moment his face was blank, then it exploded into a broad smile. “Nathan? Benjamin?” In three great steps he was to them, sweeping Nathan up in a crushing bear hug.
* * *
“When is the baby due, Sister Knight?”
Newel and his visitors were seated on the ground around the fire. Newel’s little son had gone off to play with some of the other children. Lydia Knight was in the wagon box above them, half propped up on a quilt stretched over some sacks of grain. She looked very tired as she answered Nathan. “A little less than two months now.”
“I hope all goes well.”
“Thank you.”
“So tell me,” Newel said eagerly, “how are Joseph and Emma?”
Nathan shook his head. “Actually we haven’t seen Joseph since late July. He and Hyrum and Sidney and Oliver all went to New York City, then on to Salem, Massachusetts.”
“Salem?” he said, a little surprised. “Why there?”
Benjamin snorted in disgust. “Some fool claimed to know where there was a chest of buried treasure.”
“Hmm. Did they find it?”
“Of course not. Once they got there this man who claimed to know ‘right where it was’ walked around the city with a dazed look on his face muttering, ‘My goodness, this place has really changed since I was last here.’ ”
“Pa,” Matthew broke in, “you know that’s not what Joseph’s letter said.”
“Well,” Benjamin retorted, “he said Burgess couldn’t even find the right house, let alone the treasure chest.”
Nathan was watching his father. This had turned out to be a real sore spot with him. There were several others in Kirtland, including some of the leading brethren, who were sharply critical of Joseph on this matter. Nathan decided to change the subject. “Emma had a little boy in June.”
“Oh, good,” Sister Knight said. “And everything is all right?”
“Yes. They named him after President Williams.”
“Yes,” Sister Knight said, “I remember Emma said that was what Joseph wanted to do.”
“And guess what else,” Nathan said, suddenly remembering. “Thankful Pratt is with child.”
“No!” Both husband and wife blurted it out together.
He told them quickly of Heber C. Kimball’s blessing and of the wonderful surprise they had when they returned from Canada and found Thankful cured. A week before Benjamin and his two sons left Kirtland, the Steeds had received a letter from Toronto announcing Parley and Thankful’s news that she was expecting. Newel’s wife clapped her hands. “That is wonderful news. I’ll bet she is so happy.”
“Parley too,” Benjamin agreed.
They fell silent for a moment as the Knights considered that news. Nathan turned and surveyed the scene that surrounded them. The sun had gone down, leaving the prairie in soft shadows. The air was cold enough that their breath was visible. “It looks like you’ve found yourself a lovely place here,” he finally said.
Newel looked surprised for a moment. “We’re just up here looking for possible sites for homes, since my relatives are all planning to move here. I don’t know if Lydia and I will be able to move when the rest of them do, but we’re hoping to get up here sometime next year.”
Benjamin was looking at the rows of tents. “Oh. By then this will be a full-blown city. When we came through Clay County looking for you, it looked like half the population was packing up getting ready to move.”
“Yep. Tempers in Clay County were on the rise again, and some were threatening to drive us out of there. I know Lydia’s time is near, but I didn’t want to leave her there alone while I was up here locating some places to build. You know, I guess, that the Saints agreed to move up here. The state has created a six-mile buffer zone between us and the non-Mormons.” He swung an arm, catching the scattered tents and wagons in his sweep. “And we’re gonna fill this place up with Mormons. There are more coming in from Kirtland and the East all the time.”
Matthew turned to the east, letting his eyes follow the line of trees that marked Shoal Creek’s meandering path. “This settlement called Haun’s Mill, how far is it from here?”
“About twelve miles.” The news from Newel that Jessica and Rachel were not in Far West but in Haun’s Mill had come as a bitter disappointment to them all, but especially to Matthew. If the
y had known, they could have just as easily gone straight there. The road up from Clay County reached Shoal Creek about midway between Far West and Haun’s Mill. Had they turned east, they would have been with Jessica and Rachel by now.
Newel’s wife sat up. “They’ve had some fevernager in the settlement.”
Nathan felt a quick lurch of concern. “Very much?”
Newel was grim. “Quite a bit. Someone said Jessica is down with it too.”
Lydia Knight frowned. “I had a real bout of it a few weeks ago.”
Benjamin’s eyes were grave. “How bad is Jessica?”
Their host shrugged. “Reports are pretty sketchy at this point. It’s the shakes, no doubt about it.”
Nathan looked at his father as he spoke to Newel. “We didn’t think we’d need it this late in the year, but we brought some quinine, just in case.”
“Good,” Newel said. “They’ll be glad to hear that.”
Matthew looked at his father, the concern clearly written on his face. Benjamin nodded somberly. “We’ll leave at first light.”
* * *
Malaria got its name from the Italian word meaning “bad air.” Like the dreaded yellow fever, it had probably been carried north from the West Indies in the bloodstreams of slaves and slave traders, sailors and merchants. These innocent walking carriers of death simply had to come into contact with the right species of mosquito to provide incubation and transmission of the disease across much of America.
At that point, of course, medicine had not yet learned the role of the mosquito in the spread of malaria. It was widely held in early America that disease came from an imbalance of the “humors,” or the basic body elements. The settlers were perceptive enough to see a correlation between the occurrence of the disease and what they called “sickly country”—areas with enough wetlands to provide the breeding ground for mosquitos. Unfortunately this described most of the country penetrated by settlers up until the Civil War. But people thought “the shakes”—or “fevernager” or “ague” (pronounced ay-gyoo) as it was usually called—was caused by the bad air that came from the decay of vegetable matter around swampy areas. This bad air, or “malaria,” set the body’s functions in imbalance.
But whatever the cause, malaria was commonplace throughout the first half of the nineteenth century. In its most virulent form, death would come in an agonizing alternation between raging fever and violent chills and shaking. In its milder forms, it could be tolerated, but often left the victim susceptible to other ailments. Ague was so commonplace that it was accepted as a natural part of life. One Missourian, when asked if he had become acclimatized to the area—meaning, had he become immune to malaria—replied, “I’ve been here twenty-five years, and bless my soul if I haven’t gone through twenty-five separate and distinct ‘earthquakes’ in that time.” Many a large family expected the chills on a daily basis. One child would have it one day, another the next. Usually a cup of sassafras tea and a dose of quinine kept it manageable, and people accepted it as part of the mortal experience.
The problem was, no one in Haun’s Mill had any quinine. The drug was extracted from a South American tree, and while it was widely available along the Eastern Seaboard, it was much less so—and terribly more expensive—along the frontiers of America. Among the little body of Saints who had settled with Jacob Haun on Shoal Creek, what quinine had been available had been thoroughly exhausted by summer’s end. So for more than a fortnight now, Jessica had fought the fevernager without help.
Now she was exhausted. Sister Mary Beth Lewis sat on the edge of her bed. It had been the Lewises who had first taken Jessica in when she came stumbling into Kaw Township back in the summer of 1831, battered and dazed from Joshua’s beating. When she returned to Missouri, Jessica found that Joshua Lewis had died. Sister Lewis offered her room and board in return for her help with her family of small children. It was Mary Beth Lewis who had cared for Jessica throughout her long siege of the ague.
Now Sister Lewis was sponging her skin with a wet rag. The flesh was hot to the touch. Jessica’s eyes fluttered open. “Rachel?”
Sister Lewis reached out and took her hand. “It’s all right, Jessie. Rachel’s out playing.”
For a moment, it didn’t register, then finally she turned. Her face was gray, the eyes sunken and listless, the skin drawn tight across her cheekbones. “Is she—” She had to stop for a breath. “Is she all right?”
“Yes, yes.” Sister Lewis patted Jessica’s arm. “She hasn’t had the shakes for almost five days now.”
Jessica nodded weakly, then suddenly moaned and tried to rise. Sister Lewis tossed the rag into the basin of water and grabbed her shoulders. “What are you doing? You can’t get up.”
“The children. School. I’ve got to go.”
Mary Beth Lewis was a small woman, but there was no lack of determination in her. She gently pushed the weak and struggling Jessica back down to the pillow. “If you do, it’ll be on a slab.”
“They’ll be wonderin’ what happened to me.” She gave up and stopped fighting it. “I can’t lose this chance, Mary Beth. If I don’t go, they’ll find someone else.”
“In this country?” She gave a short, mirthless laugh. “Who they gonna find?” When that didn’t take the anxiety from Jessica’s eyes, she went on with a more soothing tone. “Some of the brethren have spread the word about you being sick as best they can. Those families will understand. You can’t be teachin’ school with the shakes.”
For several seconds Jessica stared up at the woman who was not much older than she was and who had been so kind to her. Suddenly she turned her head toward the wall. “It was all a mistake, wasn’t it?”
Mary Beth leaned forward. “What?”
“I should never have left Ohio.”
“Nonsense! Now, don’t you be takin’ on like that. You’re just feelin’ poorly and that makes your heart feel poorly too.”
“No.” Jessica turned her head back. Her eyes were filled with tears, a rare thing for Jessica Steed. “I thought it was the Lord calling me back here. But look at me. No husband. A child to care for. At least there I had family.”
“You got family here,” Sister Lewis said, looking a little hurt.
“I know that,” Jessica said quickly. “You have been wonderful to us. But—” She had to stop, exhausted by having spoken that many words.
“But nothing,” Sister Lewis said firmly. “I won’t have you talkin’ like this. You said the Lord called you here. You said you knew that sure as anything. So, here is where you’re going to stay. As soon as you’re over this, you’ll feel better about it. You’ll see.”
Jessica just shook her head, closing her eyes. That squeezed the tears out and they started to trickle down the sides of her face. Mary Beth Lewis reached out and wiped them softly with her two thumbs. “You will, Jessie. I promise. Just try and sleep some more now.”
* * *
About an hour later, Jessica awoke. She had fallen into a deep sleep, and only gradually did she realize that someone was gently shaking her shoulder. She opened her eyes, aware that the chills were gone and she was being consumed with the fever again. Mary Beth stood directly above her, smiling down at her.
“Jessie?”
She tried to shake off the lethargy, come up out of the depths, but it was a struggle.
“Jessie, there’s someone here to see you.”
Jessica Roundy Steed had never been much concerned about personal appearance, but almost immediately her hand lifted up to touch her hair. It was matted and greasy. More than a week had gone by since she had been out of bed. “No, Mary Beth,” she started, her voice half a croak, but Mary Beth just smiled the wider and stepped back.
“Hello, Jessie.”
She turned, blinking against the light coming through the doorway. There was a large figure there, blocking some of it, but she couldn’t see any features. Nevertheless her heart leaped at the familiar voice. The figure stepped into the room, and another fig
ure, not as broad but equally tall, took its place.
“Hello, Jessica.”
“Nathan?”
Suddenly they were at her side, both men kneeling at her bed, reaching out for her hands. She stared up at them, barely comprehending. “Benjamin?”
“Yes, Jessie.” Benjamin’s voice suddenly caught and he shook his head quickly. “We’re here, Jessie. We’re here.”
She was still too dazed to believe what her eyes were seeing. She reached up and touched Nathan’s face. “Is it really you?” she whispered.
He couldn’t answer, just nodded, swallowing hard twice, gripping her hand tightly.
Tears sprang to her eyes, and this time there was no effort to fight them back. For a long moment, they sat that way, none of them speaking, Jessica and Mary Beth crying freely, the two men struggling to get control of their emotions.
Finally, she pulled her hand back and brushed at the tears. “Rachel?”
“We saw her,” Benjamin said. He laughed huskily. “I’ll bet she’s grown a foot since you left.”
She nodded, then had to stifle another sob that rose in her throat. “I can’t believe it,” she cried. “I just can’t believe it.”
Benjamin stood slowly. “We brought someone else.”
She looked around. “Not Mary Ann?”
He shook his head. “We thought you might need a man around the house, someone to take care of you and Rachel.”
She was baffled. Then a third man stepped into the room. Rachel was at his side, holding his hand. “Hi, Jessica.”
She came up on one elbow, her head jutting forward. “Matthew, is that you?”
“Yep!” He stepped forward, grinning widely. “It’s me.” Then in a rush he was to the bed and putting his arms around her shoulders.
“I can’t believe it. I can’t believe it.” She just kept saying it over and over as she hugged Matthew tightly to her.
Nathan, smiling now too, swung his knapsack around. “We brought you some medicine.”
Her eyes turned to him, puzzled.
“Quinine. For the ague.”
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