This Road We Traveled

by Jane Kirkpatrick

  Dwelling in the past wasn’t helpful. Her grandmother had taught her that too. She poked her finger, sucked at the blood. At least her mother had rescued the porcelain thimble painted with tiny blue asters. She used it to push her needle through the leather. She’d have to keep pushing through this time of waiting, hoping that Fabritus had friends to help him plant so he could begin working on that cabin. Friends? Of course the man had friends to help, but why not her? She brightened. It would take some convincing, as Fabritus preferred to treat her like fine china. He’d held her bare hand once and frowned, saying a cared-for woman ought not to have calluses nor lift anything heavier than a child. I need more of Nellie’s lotion. She’d show him how sturdy she was. Hadn’t she survived the Applegate trail disaster? Hadn’t she slept with a rattler and lived? She helped raise her younger siblings. Maybe her mother didn’t go out and till behind a mule or an ox, but that didn’t mean Virgilia couldn’t.

  “Gramo, could I buy a pair of these gloves?”

  “Of course. But you don’t have to pay me. Let’s call them an early wedding present.”

  “Oh, Gramo, Mr. Smith hasn’t proposed.”

  “He will. I’ve seen the way he looks at you.”

  “You already have a wedding present for me. I get to wear the gloves you wore, the gloves that gave up your six-and-one-quarter-cent piece.”

  “A farthing that set me on my way.” Her grandmother smiled, showing yellowing teeth, while her leatherwork rested in her lap. “It’s a good lesson for me to trust in the Lord’s plan and not my own.”

  “You said once that it’s easier to change the direction of an oxcart that’s moving than it is to get one started in the first place.”

  “I did say that. Good you remembered, Child. But I’m learning too that it’s all right to be still. For if one’s always busy, busy—”

  “It’s hard to hear that voice moving through the vines and brambles of our lives, harder to let light in,” her mother interrupted. Was that a new sparkle to her mother’s eyes? Probably. Her father had moved them into that abandoned cabin and named the creek behind it “Pringle.”

  “I am so fortunate.” Virgilia rose to kiss her mother’s cheek and leaned over to hug her grandmother’s narrow shoulders. “Two strong women to show me the way forward.” She lifted the gloves. “I have plans for these, but I’ll keep listening, Gramo. I promise.”

  She had the discussion Tabby had been putting off, not wanting to hurt John’s feelings. But when she told him that she adored him, wanted him as a brother but that she didn’t think they’d make a marriage match, he’d nodded, already aware. “No need to saddle yourself with an old man,” he’d said. But he had a twinkle in his eye and told her he might find himself a ship and head back east. “Wouldn’t have missed this Oregon journey for the world, though.” They sat in the parlor, such as it was at the boardinghouse.

  She had wondered what he’d use for currency and considered asking him, when he unscrewed the top of his ivory-handled cane. “A few gold coins,” he said, flipping them in his palm.

  Tabby’s eyes grew large. “Saving them for a rainy day, were you?”

  “I’d have pulled them out if we’d have needed them, dear Tabby, but I knew we didn’t. You took care of things, like always.” He winked.

  She shook her head, but a part of her was pleased he hadn’t offered to rescue her. She liked knowing she’d made her way, almost alone.

  30

  New Trails

  They sailed to the Pacific, Tabby, the Robertses, and Nellie, deciding at the last to leave Beatrice behind. Tabby had turned her glove money into a place on a ship heading first north on the Willamette, then on the Columbia, the river they’d avoided by taking that fateful Applegate road two years before.

  The trip proved lovely. This was such beautiful country, August dressing in fading wild rose and vines sporting blue berries. She’d walked on the flat beach and seen where Lewis and Clark had their salt works, stuck her toes in the cold Pacific. Still she wondered what next for herself, what of her spent light? They stayed a month and then decided to head back toward Salem. But Reverend Roberts made some comment about them passing through Tualatin Plains and a forest grove being a mere twenty miles south where several independent missionaries settled.

  “A forest grove? Where Orus Brown has a cabin?”

  “Indeed.”

  How could she not go there and see how her son and grandchildren fared? And Judson.

  “Nellie? Shall we take a side trip to that forest place? We’re close.”

  “Are we? Oh, yes, please.” She chewed on her lip. “I don’t know what awaits me there, but—”

  “Time we both faced fractures and see if we can chink them tight.”

  They boarded an open boat upriver again, but this time the wind and the tides were against them. They were thirteen days getting to Oregon City. There, she hired a wagon from a man who it turned out was a neighbor to Orus. She paid two dollars for their passage and vowed to stay but two weeks with Orus and then return to her “resting place” in Salem before the winter rains set in.

  Anticipation wrapped around her like a cape and she inhaled the landscape, different yet the same as Salem. Copses of trees dotted prairie browned by summer sun but promising green, come winter rains nurturing grasses tall. Land flat as a tabletop brought forth crops without the effort of clearing ground of trees. Trails crisscrossed the area. Their driver said they were Indian crossings, people of friendly souls he assured them, the Atfalati people. Wild strawberries grew unfettered, their fruit now gone to birds. Geese called overhead, reminding them that winter waited. Nellie chewed her lip.

  “It may be he wanted to write,” Tabby suggested.

  “I know.” The girl wore a straw hat Tabby had purchased for her and a new frock she’d sewn herself from material Tabby had purchased for her.

  The little village had few buildings, small, not as prosperous-appearing as Salem. But each cabin had a view of the spectacular Mt. Hood, snow-capped and splendid. They rode uphill.

  “Orus has the best sections of land,” the driver said, “above any flooding and with pretty nice views.”

  He pulled his team up in front of a cabin with wheat in sheaves dotting a vast field behind it. Outbuildings nestled amidst blackberry vines and hollyhocks. Orus came out to greet them.

  “Marm? Well, well. Wonders arrive in wagons. I never expected you’d ever make it.”

  “I have to say your forest grove isn’t . . . as large as I thought it would be.” She knew the minute she said it, she’d erred, criticizing before commenting on the magnificent views and worse, not speaking at all on her happiness at seeing her son.

  “Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks, Marm.”

  Oh, that tongue of mine. “And ‘whoever keeps his mouth and his tongue keeps himself out of trouble.’ You quote me Scripture, Son. I am humbled. Let me try again.”

  She alighted the wagon using her walking stick to balance. “Come here and let me hold you, Orus. It has been too long.”

  Orus hesitated, but only for a moment. Then he lifted her and swayed her like a metronome, the movement swinging the ties from her bonnet. It was enough to bring them back toward a synchronized rhythm.

  “The girls will be pleased to see their grandmother, and Lavina too. She is with child again. Nellie.” He put his fingers to his hat and nodded. The girl curtsied.

  Tabby held her tongue about Lavina’s state and entered the cabin. She felt the warmth of this place, children helping each other. Lavina greeted her with a hug. The cabin itself was tightly chinked. The men of her family were good providers in addition to being dreamers. They kept their feet on the ground, but they fluffed their wings as well. Orus told of selling part of what he’d claimed in land those years before to a Mr. Clark, for a school “for missionary children mostly” and church ground too. Orus may not attend, but something of his pastor-father’s influence continued.

  His cabin housed
her many grandchildren, and Tabby could see that staying even two weeks with them would be a burden. What to do? She did not know, not wanting to offend again, suggesting his home was insufficient for their stay.

  Nellie looked about and Orus said, “You’ll be seeking Judson.” He cleared his throat. “Nellie . . . there was an accident.”

  The color drained from the girl’s face, faded from cheery cheeks to white. “Is he . . . ?”

  “In his room, at the barn behind.”

  On Sunday, Orus and his family headed to a Presbyterian meeting. He introduced Tabby to the Clarks, Harvey and Emeline, formerly of the East. They had purchased land while Orus had made his claim three years before.

  “Will you stay with us?” Emeline said. “We have room, and Orus and Lavina have a houseful.” Tabby looked at Orus. She thought she saw relief on her son’s face as he nodded. Still, she had lasted one night with him and his. And she hadn’t been asked to leave.

  “Nellie too?” Tabby asked.

  “Of course, if she’d like.”

  “I’m needed elsewhere, Mother Brown.” And from what she’d told her, Nellie was.

  Nellie Louise surprised Judson in the Brown barn where she’d climbed up the short ladder. In a moment she would see Judson again after all this time. She spoke his name, then popped her head up over the floor opening. She thought she heard a groan before his voice called out, “Don’t come in, Nellie Louise.”

  “I have to.”

  He’d made a spot in the loft with a mattress. A canteen of water sat on the loft floor beside his bedding. Her eyes scanned the space. A hummingbird paused at the small window opening before flitting away, finding nothing sweet at this spot.

  He stood to the side, shoulders hunched.

  “Oh.” Nellie hoped he couldn’t hear the gasp escape.

  “Yes, oh.”

  “What . . . what happened?”

  “I’d rather not have words about it, if you don’t mind.”

  “I don’t mind. I mean, I’m sorry it happened and that you don’t want to talk about it, Judson, but I don’t really see—”

  “You can’t see that I’m maimed?” He held his arm up, elbow accusing her for not seeing.

  “I do see that you’ve been wounded. Was there a skirmish?” She stared at the empty space below his left elbow.

  “What are you doing here, Nellie?”

  “Why, I came with Mother Brown. We were at the ocean and then on the way back there were terrible storms that stalled us so here we are, a side trip. I’m sorry if I’m intruding.” But she wasn’t sorry, not really.

  “You saw me, so now you can go on back to Salem.”

  “Is that what you want?”

  He sat on his mat, his legs crossed. “Oh, Nellie, everything has turned out poorly. I can’t ask you to come into this. I’ll never be a blacksmith. You don’t need a . . . broken man.”

  “What if I choose it?”

  “A life of looking after someone else?”

  “I saw veterans of the wars when I was in Illinois, some without limbs. They carried on and more easily if they had someone to walk beside them, holding them up—in their hearts. That’s what I can do. Hold you in my heart where you’ve been these many months.”

  “You had a whole person in your hopes.”

  “I’ll adjust. I’m learning how to do that with a little less disruption.” She hoped he’d smile.

  He didn’t. “Go on back to Salem. Make a new life for yourself.”

  “I’ll decide what sort of life I want and where I want to live it.” He was being pitiful but telling him so wouldn’t help. No, the way to walk beside Judson Morrow was not to use words to convince him of anything but to be generous in her spirit, continue on as though his injury was just another boulder on the road, one they’d have to go around or climb over. “I’ll see you at supper. I’m helping Lavina at least until the baby comes.” He looked up at her. “Yes, I’m staying. I’m not sure if Mother Brown is, but I came here for a reason and I don’t see that that has changed. Don’t nap too long. You’ll miss Lavina’s fixings.”

  Tabby’s life took on a new rhythm with the Clarks. A shipment of religious books arrived from Fort Vancouver and the Clarks relished turning the thin pages. With Tabby they read until the evening light faded. There were others staying with the Clarks too while working on homes they built, and it seemed emigrants coming down the Columbia often made their way to the kindnesses of these hearts. Mr. Clark had built their two-story home himself, made the furniture, shaped the doors, and used a pocket knife to trim the windows. He had a skill he put to service.

  Tabby thought they missed their families and she brought something of the East Coast to their hearth. She saw the young couple as an extension of her own family. She hoped she wasn’t betraying her sons and daughter in broadening family that way.

  “How did it happen, Judson?” Tabby looked at the sleeve tied up at his elbow.

  “I’d rather you not know, Mrs. Brown. Just that it did. A foolish mistake on my part, though I had the best of intentions.”

  They were at the trading post where Judson had been hired on as a clerk. He’d grown taller and the strain of the injury had put creases in his forehead and around his eyes. Freckles still dotted his nose and his red hair looked healthy again. “I can manage the till here and Orus spoke kind words about my character to the owner.”

  “It must be good to have Nellie close by too.”

  He looked away. “Can I get you something from the shelf? I made this stick that works like fingers to reach high for packages.” He showed her.

  “Why, that would be right handy for the likes of me and Nellie Louise too, short as we are. You just pull this little rope and the ends open up like a forked tongue. Aren’t you clever.”

  “Necessity.”

  “Plato wrote that a need or problem encourages creative efforts to solve the problem.”

  “Who’s Plato?”

  “A wise old man. You’ve proven him a prophet.” She smiled. “I’m sorry this happened to you, Judson, and I’ve been remiss in not keeping you closer. You were my responsibility. I should have fought harder to have you stay in Salem. Maybe this wouldn’t have happened—whatever it was that happened.”

  Judson’s freckles had faded, but his face flushed pink. “A man has to make up his own mind, Mrs. Brown. You didn’t interfere with that and I’m grateful.”

  “I am pleased to see your good spirit has kept you above the sorrow. Now, how do you and Nellie Louise fare?”

  He swallowed and his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. “I can’t be a burden unto her, Mrs. Brown. A man with one arm? I’ve told her as much.”

  “Fiddlesticks. How can an inventive young man like you not see the love that girl has for you?”

  “She’ll find another, just as she’ll find her folks one day.”

  Tabby thought less than a moment before blurting out, “Why don’t the two of you go to California before winter sets in and see if you can find her folks, together. People check in at the posts along the way. If you haven’t heard of any Blodgetts in Oregon country by now, why not set your sails for California?” She could finance the trip, use what few coins she had left. Start making more gloves, if need be. “It would be a good task for the two of you. Of course, for appearance’s sake, you’d want to marry.”

  Judson laughed, but bitterness tinted the sound. “Orus told me that you were a woman of many inventions.”

  “Did he, now? So I am. But this invention is to help you see beyond that missing limb and to what a future with the right young lady can mean. I believe that Nellie Louise Blodgett, for you, is a necessity.”

  Her grandmother had promised to return to Salem before September, but she detoured to Forest Grove instead. “She’ll miss the wedding,” Virgilia pouted.

  “You could wait,” her mother said. “There’s no need to rush.”

  Virgilia shook her head. “One less mouth for you and Papa to feed and one le
ss person taking up a mat.”

  “Oh, you’re marrying to help us out?”

  Virgilia laughed. Her fingers embroidered a red rose onto the bodice of her yellow flower-printed dress, material she’d swept the trading-post floors and stocked shelves for in order to trade for the cloth. She bunched the material onto her lap. “Gramo wouldn’t want me to delay nor let her absence ruin the day. She’d say, ‘Decide if you’re going or staying—I’m going.’”

  “You’ve done your part for us, Daughter. I’ll miss you.”

  “Don’t cry, Mama. We’re less than a day’s ride distant.”

  Fabritus had asked for Virgilia’s hand in marriage in July, and they’d set the date for August 15, expecting her gramo to be back by then. Nellie too. But her grandmother hadn’t returned, and finally, Virgilia decided it was her wedding and Gramo would simply have to hear about it from others. At least Uncle John was there to play the violin.

  Nellie would miss the nuptials too, but maybe she would have preferred that. Virgilia’s boldness on the day she’d met Fabritus still amazed her. Had she been selfish, thinking only of her interests? No, it was all right to recognize a desire. It didn’t mean she’d forget how to care for others’ feelings. Nellie’s interest in Fabritus Smith had faded in Virgilia’s glow, and she’d remembered that Judson was somewhere on the Tualatin Plains and planned to return for her. That he hadn’t yet concerned them all, but Nellie had stepped off the craft on the way back from the ocean and hopefully found her way to him.

  The rest of Virgilia’s family would celebrate the nuptials with her, and she had the gloves Gramo had worn when she married Grandpa Brown, a man Virgilia had never met. Still, the soft leather on her hands reminded her of that long devotion cut short by death, but a devotion that remained for her gramo. Virgilia hoped for that kind of love and marriage too.

  Reverend Roberts officiated at the Salem Methodist Church on a sun-drenched day. No humidity, a light breeze to lift tendrils of her hair. Her mother had wrapped greens and both purple salal and white snowberries among the braids that crowned Virgilia’s head. She’d dry those winding vines and put them in the book of sermons of her grandfather’s. Her little sisters spread wildflowers before her as she and Fabritus walked down the aisle together, her parents preceding them, then standing on either side. Fabritus’s voice boomed as he repeated the vows, and Virgilia heard twitters of laughter from the audience delighted by his exuberance.