Smith's Monthly #27

by Smith, Dean Wesley

  TWENTY-SIX

  May 9th, 1902

  Boise, Idaho

  SOPHIE SAT ON a chair in the top floor suite of the Idanha Hotel in Boise Idaho, looking out over the hard-packed dirt of Main Street below. She had noticed this old historical building a couple times when in the downtown area, but had given it no thought, since it had a restaurant and a bar and apartments in it in 2018. Nothing she was interested in.

  But now, in 1902, she and Wade, traveling under the names Sophie and Wade Olsen, had a top floor suite and were getting ready to go down for dinner with Duster and Bonnie and Dawn.

  The suite was wonderful, with a living room of overstuffed furniture and a large stone fireplace. Hardwood floors were polished to a shine and in places covered by tan area rugs. The trim was all painted a dark brown and a round area on one corner with a table in it gave them a wide range of vision over the growing city.

  The bedroom had a massive feather bed, two dressers, and a closet. And the bathroom had running water and an actual toilet with the tank about six feet in the air.

  Stunning luxury for 1902 as far as Sophie knew from her research. She had liked the hotel instantly, from the first moment walking into the high-ceilinged lobby to the wonderful smells of fresh bread coming from the restaurant.

  For two days, after getting established in 2218 and returning to 2018, she and Wade had talked and trained with Bonnie and Duster and Dawn. Sophie could have never imagined herself riding a horse. Just not something she had ever thought of doing in New Jersey. But they had taught her how to ride on a saddle from the 1880s. And ride like a woman of the time would ride.

  And they had gotten both of them a wardrobe. She would be allowed to wear her own underwear, and the pants and dresses they had made for her used modern materials, even though they looked authentic to 1885. They were about as comfortable as possible, considering the fashions and constraints of the time on women of means.

  By the morning of the second day, both she and Ward were so nervous, they couldn’t even eat breakfast. With every passing minute she had come to love him and depend on him more and more.

  And he said he felt the same way, that without her beside him, he never would be doing any of this.

  They had walked hand-in-hand from their condos to the institute along the river walk, both carrying small bags of personal stuff. They both knew they would only be gone from here for a few minutes, that later today they would make this walk back along the river, but there was no telling how long they would live in the past before that.

  Bonnie had told them a story about how she and Duster, when they first started going into the past, had taken so many trips, done so many lifetimes one after another, that when they finally had decided to stop going back and actually go home, neither of them could remember how to drive.

  They had laughed at that, but the idea of that had scared Sophie more than she wanted to admit, and that night, both she and Wade had talked and agreed to only a few trips into the past at a time before coming back to grounding and their work in this time.

  But even with that, Sophie had no doubt she would be a different person the next time she walked this sidewalk.

  And Wade would be different as well.

  “Do you love me?” she had asked Wade right before they got to the institute.

  He had stopped and faced her and taken her in his arms. “I love you more than anything.”

  “So you want to spend a lot of time with me?”

  He had smiled and kissed her.

  Then he said while holding her, “I can’t imagine not being with you. In any time.”

  That had been what she had needed to hear.

  Exactly what she had needed.

  They had jumped to 1902 instead of all the way back to 1887 for more training.

  For Sophie, the ride into Boise along the wagon trail that was Warm Springs Avenue was amazing and scary at the same time.

  Sophie had spent her entire adult life researching the past she now was in, trying to imagine it, trying to imagine how women felt living in it.

  For the moment, all she felt was total fear combined with a feeling of awe that she was actually here, in 1902.

  Wade asked her at one point how she was doing and she had said, “Scared to death.” He had asked of what.

  “Riding into an unknown situation and falling off the horse,” she had said. “Take your pick.”

  For the entire ride she couldn’t decide which fear trumped the other.

  Besides that, the leather and cloth riding clothes of the time pinched her in places she didn’t realize could be pinched.

  She wore her wide-brimmed hat to keep the sun off her fair skin. She had brought suntan lotion in a bottle from the time, but not a lot and Bonnie suggested she not use it unless in an emergency.

  Beside her on the ride, handsome on his horse, Wade looked both worried and fascinated and seemed to be taking in everything with his wonderful green eyes. He had on dark jeans, a wide black belt, a light blue dress shirt, a long oilcloth coat, and a black cowboy hat.

  He hadn’t ridden a horse either before, but had taken to it faster than Sophie had. He almost seemed at ease. She hoped she got to that state.

  The plan was to spend a week or two in Boise in 1902, keep up their training, before jumping back to 1887. As Bonnie had said, the difference in Boise of 1887 and Boise of 1902 was stunning. Clearly she and Duster loved 1902.

  Duster had jumped back a few seconds ahead of them from a different crystal, but about six months ahead of them in historical time, to get details ready such as making sure they all had horses and equipment for their short stay in 1902. Bonnie and Dawn had also used a different crystal and gone together.

  They would all be gone only just over two minutes, but by taking different crystals, they could leave 1902 when they wanted.

  So when they all reached the Idanha Hotel’s beautiful stone and mahogany lobby, Duster had made sure they had room reservations

  Now, after checking into the hotel and going to their suite on the 4th floor, Sophie was staring to relax and see the charms of being rich in the Old West. Especially with a wonderful room like this one.

  But living in those mining camps was going to test her and Wade more than she could imagine at the moment. She wasn’t sure she was up for it. She had never done any camping as a child and still hadn’t spent a night in a tent. All of this was totally new, but she sure wasn’t going to back out now.

  She had studied the past most of her adult life. Now she got to be a part of the past, to actually start a western mining town. Fear of making a fool of herself or falling off a horse wasn’t going to stop her.

  Besides, this was where Wade was and being beside him, having him as her partner, just felt perfect.

  She could have never imagined loving one person as much as she did Wade.

  Ever.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  May 23rd, 1887

  Central Idaho Mountains

  WADE HAD BEEN surprised at how much he had enjoyed the two weeks in Boise in 1902. During that time, both he and Sophie had gotten much more comfortable on horses and learned how to care for them and saddle them and brush and feed them.

  They both had also learned to shoot their saddle rifles and both had learned how to act as a married couple of money in 1902.

  The last part had been the hardest for Wade. Sophie caught on quickly to that since she said she grew up with a lot of rules in New Jersey. She had also been a natural with a rifle, something that seemed to even surprise her.

  Duster had spent a few hours teaching them how to pan for gold, the hardest work that a human should ever be allowed to do. If it wasn’t for some lotion that Bonnie had brought along, Wade was convinced his hands would not have recovered quickly.

  Now, after two weeks, it was just Duster with the two of them headed into the tall mountains of central Idaho. Around them the mountains towered impossibly high into the crisp blue sky. The pine trees smelled wonderful un
der the warming sun, and the snow on the mountains seemed to shine like a beacon of brightness.

  Both Wade and Sophie had one packhorse each. They carried enough supplies to last for a month without problem. It would allow them to set up a camp in the future home of Grapevine Springs they could leave to go back into Boise in a month.

  During the three-day ride into the mountains, they had seen a number of bear and more deer than Wade could count. Duster had taught them how to catch trout and how to cook them over an open campfire so that they tasted like a chef in San Francisco had done the job.

  Both Sophie and Wade had decided that cooked like that, they wouldn’t get tired of fresh-caught trout.

  Duster had laughed and said that he never did. Considering how many thousands of years Duster had lived in the past, that was amazing to Wade.

  Duster wasn’t going all the way with them into the valley. He was going to show them the entrance to the drainage for Grapevine Springs valley and then head back to Boise.

  The stream that flowed through the town site and down the valley was called Shannon Creek. None of them could figure out how the stream got its name. More than likely, Wade decided, it hadn’t been named yet.

  They had about a two-day ride to the future town site up the drainage from where he was going to leave them. Duster warned them about a few areas along the rough game trail. No trail in there was cut.

  At one point, when describing the two-day ride they had into the future site of Grapevine Springs, Duster had said, “Some real rough stuff, so go slow.”

  Wade hadn’t liked the sound of that in the slightest. And having Duster leave them scared Wade and Sophie more than either of them wanted to admit. Being alone in a wilderness was one thing, being alone in a wilderness well over a hundred years in the past was downright terrifying.

  Duster just radiated confidence and considering the vast amount of years he had spent in the wilderness and in western towns, his knowledge seemed to be like a light to Wade in the darkness.

  But now he and Sophie needed to go it alone. And into a valley that Duster, a man completely comfortable in the wilderness, thought was “Some rough stuff.”

  But history said they went in alone. The great Duster Kendal had not been with them when they entered the valley the first time.

  The plan was that Sophie and Wade were to set up a camp and then pan for gold in the valley. They were to stake out a placer claim along the most open and flat part of the valley where the future mining town of Grapevine Springs would be, then head back to Boise with their gold and detailed, hand-drawn maps of the area.

  That part would take about a month total, Duster had figured.

  In Boise, Duster would help them through the process, be a secret investor, and they would file the claims as well as a plat for a proposed town mostly on their claims.

  Then, with Duster with them, they would go back in and stay and work the placer and build a general store until just before winter set in, then go back to Boise to live in the institute until the spring.

  Duster had suggested at that point that they might want to winter in the valley if they could get a house built before the snow started, but both Sophie and Wade had decided to hold that decision until later.

  Wade was convinced it was a great plan, following what all of them knew from history of what Sophie and Wade Olsen had done.

  But reading about it in history was one thing, riding along a streambed on a narrow game trail with snow-capped mountains towering over him was another thing completely.

  Duster got Sophie and Wade both squared away the last night he was with them around the fire as they finished dinner. They had camped on a flat area above Shannon Creek.

  The stream was wide at this area and high, running fast over rocks. To Wade it looked dangerous from all the spring runoff of the snow. Duster had told them they wouldn’t need to cross the stream until just below the town site where the stream would be much smaller.

  Duster had assured them that the stream wouldn’t be like that at all up at the town site. “Good fishing there,” he had said.

  Wade and Sophie had pitched their tent, but Duster said he wanted to sleep out under the stars, even though the night was cold and the air still damp.

  At first light of the sun coloring the tops of the nearby mountains, Wade left Sophie snuggled down in their bedding and climbed out of the tent.

  Duster was gone.

  They were alone.

  In the most rugged and dangerous wilderness on the continent.

  In 1887.

  Terrified didn’t begin to describe how he felt.

  Somehow, he managed to not just crawl back into the bedding with the woman he loved.

  Somehow, he managed to start the day.

  Somehow.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  May 24th, 1887

  Central Idaho Mountains

  SOPHIE TRIED TO keep up a cheerful attitude as they made themselves breakfast in the cold, morning air. The sun was still hours from finding the steep valley floor, but it shone bright on the snow on the mountain tops above them.

  She found it funny that neither of them talked about the sheer terror of being alone she knew they were both feeling. Her attitude was that if humans could survive in this country hundreds of years before them, then she and Wade could as well.

  She just didn’t say that out loud, and the thought honestly didn’t help much at all. Her problem was too much research into this time in history. She knew how really hard it was on the people of this time. That very difficulty was what had fascinated her and how women had dealt with it.

  Now she was dealing with it.

  She just never expected to be one of the people from her own research.

  They repacked their saddlebags, saddled their horses and the two packhorses. Both of them double-checked everything.

  Then both got saddled and he said, “Here we go.”

  “I love you,” she said to Wade.

  He smiled at her, even though she could see the worry in his eyes.

  “I love you as well.”

  “Together,” she said.

  “Together,” he said, nodding.

  At first the going was easy.

  Wade led the way, followed by one of the packhorses. Sophie followed a safe distance back as Duster had taught them to do, letting her packhorse follow without much effort.

  The pine trees around them seemed to tower into the sky, often blocking most of the sunlight off the mountains and making it feel almost gloomy in the bottom of the valley.

  The rushing sound of the high, angry water of Shannon Creek seemed to fill every sense she had as the sound was often trapped under the trees with them. It was far, far too loud for them to talk.

  There was very little underbrush since no sun seemed to reach much of the steep valley floor and Sophie only caught glimpse of the snowcapped peaks above them through the branches.

  The path they picked along the river seemed to constantly climb upward and at times they had to dismount and lead the horses around rough areas or up steep slopes.

  There was also still a lot of mud and some snow hadn’t melted yet under a lot of the trees. Twice she had slipped in the mud, but otherwise she had done fine.

  They rested after an hour in a very gloomy small rock shelf above the raging stream, each snacking on some nuts and getting a good drink of water.

  Duster had warned them that at this attitude, they needed to make sure they were drinking regularly and taking in salt. He had laughed and said, “The last thing you two need on your first time out would be altitude sickness.”

  The next two hours just repeated the first and it wasn’t until starting the fourth hour, after a short lunch break, that they broke into the daylight. The sun was now almost high enough in the sky to hit the bottom of the valley and it had warmed up enough that Sophie had shed her heavy coat.

  She couldn’t believe how good the warmth felt after being hours in those dark, damp trees.
r />   The game trail they were on went up away from the edge of the stream and through some lower brush. It was easy going until they broke out of the other side of the brush.

  Ahead of them was a talus slope.

  The game trail sort of vanished out into the small rocks and nothing at all grew on the slope. The slope seemed to start at rock cliffs a good thousand feet above them and ended only in the angry water.

  To Sophie the slope looked like an impossible river of rock wider than any football field. She couldn’t even believe that rocks could stay on that steep slope without just tumbling on down into the water.

  They both dismounted and just stared.

  “How are we supposed to get across that?” she asked, knowing Wade had no more idea than she had. They were about fifty yards above the fast-moving water. One slip and they would be in the water faster than they could react, of that she had no doubt.

  “Duster said to just go slow across it,” Wade said. “Or we could stop and just camp and spend a week digging a trail and securing the trail across.”

  “He suggested that?” Sophie asked, glancing at Wade, then back at the slope blocking them. She had no idea how they would even begin to build a trail across that. But she had a hunch if she had asked Duster, he would have said, “One rock at a time.”

  He often had answers like that.

  And she knew that the people who lived in this time period had the attitude of “You did what you had to do.” Especially the pioneers into the west, which was, in essence what she and Wade were at the moment.

  “He said that’s what many do on slopes like this,” Wade said nodding. “But he said he made it across and back without a trail and it is possible if we go slowly.”

  Possible?

  She looked down at the raging water of the creek below. Going into that snow-melt water wouldn’t be survivable.

  She just couldn’t believe that literally on their first morning alone, they were facing death.