The Seeds of Change

by Lauraine Snelling

  “Jesse, sir.”

  “And I’m Clark.” She shook his hand. “You wouldn’t be making wooden animals for those children a few wagons up, would you?”

  In response, Jesse reached into his pocket and pulled out a half-carved cow. Already she could see the skill of the carving.

  “You have quite a gift.”

  “M-makes the children happy.”

  “So it does.” What a tender heart in this often hard world. “I don’t suppose you’d want to join a hunting party, Jesse?”

  “I’m supposed to d-drive the oxen. But my uncle might. I’ll t-tell him when he gets back.”

  “Do that if he’s back within an hour. Otherwise he can come another time.” They parted with friendly nods.

  All told, they gathered seven people for the excursion: Lilac, Lark, Little Bear, Dr. Brownsville, Martin Wheeler—the father of Robbie’s little friend, Sarah—and two other men. Some of them looked askance at Lilac joining the group, but soon she and Little Bear were comparing snares and swapping tricks of the trade.

  Letting Little Bear and her sister set the snares, Lark took Starbright and rode ahead of the wagon train into the woods along the Kansas. They’d be crossing this river tomorrow, according to Mr. Hayes—their first big river crossing.

  The cooler air amid the trees caressed her face, and Lark lifted her hat to let the breeze through her cropped hair. Lord, you’ve brought us this far. Take us safely across the river. And if you’d bring us some good meat today, that would be mighty fine.

  A squirrel darted across a branch, and Lark raised her rifle and fired. The small animal dropped like a rock. Thank you, Lord. A good squirrel stew might bring some strength into Alice Durham’s bones.

  When the party gathered back at the wagons that evening, they counted nearly a dozen rabbits—mostly thanks to Lilac and Little Bear—plus a number of squirrels and pheasants. No deer, but perhaps another time.

  They divided the game, and Lark took a skinned squirrel and rabbit to the Durhams’ wagon. She found Forsythia there talking with Thomas.

  “Brought you some meat.”

  “I appreciate it.” Mr. Durham took the carcasses, then stared down at them. “Now if only I knew how to cook ’em. Alice always did that.”

  “Why don’t we cook the rabbit for you, Mr. Durham?” Forsythia suggested. “We’ll make a big stew of it along with ours, then bring you some.”

  Lark said nothing until they were out of earshot by their wagon. “Sythia, we can’t do everything for them. One of these days that man is going to have to step up.”

  “I know. But Alice is even weaker today. She’s got to regain some strength. If us making extra stew helps toward that . . . well, then, so be it.”

  Lark wouldn’t argue with that.

  Thunder and rain woke them in the night, and they moved their bedrolls under and inside the wagon for cover. By morning the trail had turned into a muddy, soupy mess. Hayes ordered the wagons to spread out more to avoid sinking too far into the mud.

  Once they moved out, Lark hadn’t taken twenty paces before she was grateful for her men’s boots, already caked nearly to the knee.

  “Well, this dress will never be the same.” Del, walking beside her with a shawl over her head, made a face. She’d been trying to hold her skirt out of the mud, but the bottom twelve inches was already slick with muck. “Think Mr. Hayes will postpone the river crossing?”

  “He says no. The rain could go on for days and raise the river higher, so we’ll go ahead.” At least the rain was falling lighter now. Lark glanced at the Durhams’ wagon ahead. She hoped Alice wasn’t still running a fever. It could be dangerous for her to get chilled.

  The wagons gathered at the edge of the Kansas River and loaded one by one onto the ferries. Despite the rain and rising water, by day’s end they all made it safely across, though one family’s mules spooked midriver and nearly dragged their wagon off the ferry before the husband got them under control. Then Lilac surprised everyone by bringing in a deer from the surrounding woodland, just as the rain cleared and the wagons circled.

  Overhead, the moon lit the edges of parting clouds, stars pricking in a clean-washed black sky. Relieved chatter rose through the camp, along with cooking odors and woodsmoke.

  “Thanks be to God.” Forsythia shivered and held her hands out to their sparking campfire. “I’ve never been so wet in my life.”

  “Get yourself warm.” Lark draped a woolen blanket around her sister’s shoulders, worry blooming. Sythia always came down with things easily. “And no checking on the Durhams tonight. Sleep—and that’s an order.”

  “Sythia.”

  Forsythia woke from a deep sleep to Lilac shaking her shoulder.

  “I’m sorry, Sythia, but Mr. Durham says Alice is in labor.”

  Oh no. Forsythia sat up from her warm cocoon of blankets and pressed her fingers to her eyes. Please, Lord, no—it’s too soon. Let this be another false alarm.

  “He says to hurry. Shall I come too?” Lilac asked.

  “Yes, please. You’ve got experience birthing animals.”

  Please, God, please. She gathered whatever supplies she could think of. “Del, could you go for the doctor?”

  “Lark already did.” Del slipped a shawl around Forsythia’s shoulders and squeezed her arm. “Want me to come too?”

  “Maybe—I don’t know. Yes, we’ll need someone for Robbie, at least.”

  The sisters made their way through the darkness toward the Durhams’ wagon. The moon had set, and only the stars were bright above, cold and clear. With the camp sleeping, all was silent but for the occasional whimper of a child or distant yip of a coyote.

  And a moan from the Durhams’ lamplit wagon. Forsythia’s chest tightened.

  “We’re here, Alice.” She climbed up, Del and Lilac staying below for the moment.

  Alice lay panting on the makeshift bed with Thomas kneeling beside her, her forehead and throat shiny with sweat. Robbie huddled sniffling in the far corner, obviously just awakened.

  Forsythia’s heart sank. This didn’t look like a false alarm.

  “When did it start?” She climbed in to join them.

  “Maybe an hour ago—I don’t know. She didn’t wake me at first.” Thomas smoothed his wife’s hair with a shaking hand.

  “Thought it was . . . just the tightenings again. Didn’t want to think . . .” Alice cried out, gripping Thomas’s arm with a strength Forsythia hadn’t known she had.

  They needed to get the little boy out of here. “Robbie, sweetheart, will you come to me? Del is going to take you to our wagon to sleep while we help your mama.”

  Without hesitation, he crawled over the rumpled bedding to Forsythia’s arms.

  Alice touched his nightshirt sleeve as he passed. “Robbie . . .”

  Forsythia scooped him up and turned him around. “Say good night to Mama, Robbie. You’ll see her soon.” Please, Lord, let it be so.

  Robbie waved and blew a teary kiss. Forsythia passed him down to Del’s waiting arms.

  “Lilac, can you come up here? And, Mr. Durham, perhaps you could get down for a while. There’s just too little room.” And his own panic was too obvious, though she wouldn’t say that.

  “I’ll be right outside.” Thomas pressed a kiss to his wife’s clammy forehead, then climbed down to make room for Lilac.

  Together the sisters examined Alice as she lay spent from the last contraction. Her pulse was fast, her temperature still elevated. And when Lilac checked below her nightdress, she shook her head at Forsythia.

  “She’s definitely progressing. Second baby and coming early . . . I don’t think we have much time.”

  “Hello?” Dr. Brownsville’s voice came from behind the wagon.

  “Thank heaven.” Forsythia crawled to look out the canvas flap. “Thank you so much for coming, Doctor.”

  “How is she?” He climbed into the wagon with them, his kind eyes and black bag lending a certain steadiness to Forsythia’s hea
rt despite their cramped quarters.

  “Seems like the baby’s coming—and fast. Is there anything we can do?”

  The doctor examined Alice and shook his head much as Lilac had done. “Just do our best to help her through this. And pray. Let me go see if Mr. Durham has any hot water.”

  Of course. She should have thought of that first thing.

  Waiting for the doctor, Forsythia and Lilac took turns cooling Alice’s forehead with a damp cloth and letting her squeeze their hands through the pains. They were coming harder and faster now, barely letting Alice catch her breath in between.

  “Hold on, sweet girl. You’re doing so well.” Forsythia stroked Alice’s damp hand, so weak now even when she gripped as hard as she could.

  “Please.” Alice’s voice came as merely a breath, but at the pleading in her eyes, Forsythia leaned close to hear. “If I don’t . . . make it through, take care of my boy, my . . . Robbie.”

  “You will make it through, dear one.” Forsythia pressed Alice’s fingers, willing strength into them.

  “But if . . . I don’t.”

  Hot tears pricked. “Then yes. Of course.”

  Alice smiled, her eyes closing as she rested back on the pillow for a moment. Then she grimaced, curling forward with a guttural groan.

  “Doctor?” Lilac called out. “I think she’s trying to push.”

  Dr. Brownsville appeared, shoving back the wagon flap. Gray light filtered in as dawn approached. He assessed the situation with a glance.

  “Miss—Forsythia, was it? Sit behind her, please. We need to prop her up a bit. Miss Lilac, would you help hold her legs?”

  They shifted into position. Alice groaned long and shrill.

  “We’re right here with you, Mrs. Durham.” The doctor’s voice came reassuring and steady. “We’re going to help you deliver your baby, all right?”

  A faint nod.

  Please, Lord. Please help her. Forsythia pressed her cheek against Alice’s sweaty hair.

  A moment, and then Alice arched forward with a scream, pushing hard. Fluid gushed.

  “That’s good, Mrs. Durham. Very good. Let me just check to see if I can feel your baby.”

  Forsythia stroked Alice’s arm, murmuring prayers and hymns, whatever might be comforting.

  “Your baby is on its way, Mrs. Durham.” The doctor sat back on his heels. “And quickly too. But he or she is coming feet first. I’m going to need to help you deliver, all right?”

  Alice sobbed a nod, her head lolling weakly on Forsythia’s shoulder.

  “On this next contraction, I need you to push with all your strength and then some, you hear me? You can do this, Mrs. Durham. We’re all right here with you.”

  He’d barely finished speaking when Alice’s body tensed again. She arched away from Forsythia, clawing her knees as she pushed from strength beyond herself.

  “Good, that’s good. We’ve almost got a baby here. Once more.”

  A keening cry from Alice, and a baby girl slid into the doctor’s hands, tiny and still.

  In a quick motion, Dr. Brownsville cut the cord and wiped the infant’s mouth and nose. He flipped her over and slapped her bottom. Nothing.

  “Doctor.” Forsythia’s voice caught. “She’s bleeding.” In the dawning light filtering through the canvas, dark red spread through the bedding beneath Alice’s legs.

  “Try to get her breathing.” The doctor pushed the tiny form into Lilac’s hands. “Mrs. Durham—Alice—I need you to stay with me. We need to get your afterbirth delivered.” He kneaded her flaccid abdomen firmly. “Help me, Miss Nielsen.”

  “Alice, sweetheart, see if you can push once more,” Forsythia urged into the mother’s ear. Alice sagged against Forsythia’s shoulder, unable even to lift her head.

  “Come on, little one.” Lilac worked over the baby, pressing the tiny chest and patting the little bluish cheeks. “Breathe. Please breathe.”

  Dr. Brownsville caught the afterbirth in a gush of blood. “Forsythia! Help me. Her womb needs to contract to stop the hemorrhaging.”

  Forsythia scooted from beneath Alice’s limp form to help massage her belly, almost pounding. Please, God. Please, God. The prayer moved in rhythm with their hands.

  “My . . . baby?” Alice’s eyelids fluttered.

  Forsythia glanced at Lilac. Eyes filled with tears, her little sister shook her head.

  “Stay with us, sweetheart.” Forsythia squeezed Alice’s hand. “Your family needs you.”

  “Robbie . . . Thomas.”

  The doctor’s mouth set in a grim line as he tried to stanch the bleeding with linen. “Get her husband.”

  Tear-blinded, Forsythia scrambled down from the wagon and almost crashed into Thomas Durham.

  “What’s happening? The baby?”

  “She’s asking for you.” Forsythia dashed the tears from her eyes as he clambered up. Oh, Lord. She peered back inside the wagon.

  Mr. Durham knelt by his wife, clasping her hand. “Alice, no. Don’t leave me.”

  “Love . . . you.” Alice blinked long and slow, then glanced at Forsythia, standing at the back of the wagon. “Take care of . . . my Robbie.”

  She nodded hard. “I will.”

  A sigh and a smile, and Alice closed her eyes.

  Lilac, holding the tiny, still bundle, choked on a sob.

  The doctor checked Alice’s pulse, then sat back, shoulders sagging in defeat. “She’s gone.”

  15

  It rained again the morning they buried Alice and her baby, a soft mist that dampened the sheet wrapped around the mother and infant and mingled with the tears on the mourners’ cheeks.

  Rev. Green, who held church services for the wagon train, spoke comfort from Scripture. The twenty-third psalm and the part in Revelation about God wiping all tears from all eyes. But nothing covered the broken sound of Thomas Durham’s sobs.

  Robbie clung to Lilac, his face pressed into her shoulder against the rain. He’d hardly let the sisters out of his sight since losing his ma. Forsythia held Del’s arm close to hers. Would Thomas even be able to care for his son?

  When the reverend nodded to them, Forsythia, Del, and Lark stepped up with guitar, fiddle, and harmonica. Softly Forsythia picked out the melody.

  “Jesus, lover of my soul,

  Let me to thy bosom fly,

  While the nearer waters roll,

  While the tempest still is high:

  Hide me, O my Savior, hide,

  Till the storm of life is past;

  Safe into the haven guide;

  O receive my soul at last.”

  She closed her eyes as she played, words rising from memory and her heart. “Safe into the haven guide . . .” Alice was there now. But oh, the grief left behind.

  Several men shoveled damp earth over the body, and the crowd dispersed.

  Forsythia stopped by Dr. Brownsville and Jesse. “Thank you, Doctor, for all you did for Alice and her child.”

  “It seems I’m not much good at saving lives of late.” Lines of grief etched his face, though he smiled sadly. “Thank you also, Miss Nielsen. You did all you could for her.” His arm around Jesse’s shoulders, he headed back toward his wagon.

  Forsythia watched him go through the rain, her heart aching for him.

  She woke two nights later from another dream of her knife in the back of the man she’d killed, that image mingled with nightmares of Alice’s blood spreading, of the tiny babe buried with her mother without ever drawing breath. She sat up shivering and rested her head on her knees.

  Lord, it seems like there’s death everywhere I go. But no, this thought is not from you. I reject it in the name of Jesus. I know you have not forgotten us. But this is so hard.

  She lifted her head at a barely heard sound. Had something woken her besides the dreams? There, again—a child’s whimper. Mournful, abandoned.

  “Ma . . . Ma.”

  Robbie. Her heart twisted. Forsythia got up and walked toward the Durhams’ wagon. Should she inter
fere? Thomas would have to learn to cope sometime. Perhaps comforting his son would be a step in that direction.

  “Ma. Maaa!” Robbie’s voice rose in panic.

  Forsythia stopped on the edge of their campsite and called softly. “Mr. Durham? Do you need anything? It’s Forsythia Nielsen.”

  “I want my ma. Where’s my ma?”

  “Robbie?” Forsythia peered through the darkness and crossed to the bedrolls beside the dying campfire.

  Robbie sat up in a mass of tangled blankets. Mr. Durham’s bedroll, she could see now, was empty.

  “Where’s your pa, little one?” She gathered Robbie in her arms.

  “I want my ma.” Hiccupping, he clung to her neck.

  “I know, sweet boy.” She pressed a kiss to his tousled hair. Thomas must have gone to relieve himself. “I’ll sit with you till your pa gets back, okay?”

  Forsythia sat down and stirred the glimmering coals, then wrapped a blanket around both of them. Humming a hymn, she rocked Robbie till he fell asleep and her arms ached with his weight.

  But Mr. Durham did not return.

  Lugging the sleeping child, Forsythia walked back to their wagon. Lark was sitting up.

  “Everything all right?”

  “I’m not sure. Robbie was crying, and I can’t find his father. It’s been at least an hour.”

  “That’s not good.” Lark stood. “Want to lay him down here?”

  Forsythia tried, but Robbie woke when she released him, screaming.

  “Ma, no, Ma. Want my ma, my ma!”

  Fighting tears herself, Forsythia tried to comfort him, but Robbie arched and thrashed. Del and Lilac were up now, and Lilac took the little boy, but even her attempts at comforting were to no avail.

  “Can’t you keep the kid quiet?” A grumbling call came from a nearby wagon. “Some folks are trying to sleep.”

  Forsythia set her teeth. The child had just lost his mother. Couldn’t whoever Mr. Grump was understand that? She took Robbie back from Lilac’s arms.

  Lark pushed to her feet. “I’ll go explain. We’ll need a search party come dawn if Durham’s not back.”

  Holding Robbie close, Forsythia walked a bit beyond the circle of wagons into the cool of darkness. The breeze caressed their hot faces, and Robbie’s wailing quieted to sobs. He laid his damp cheek on her shoulder, little arms tight around her neck.