“Marse Jesse?”
Jesselynn let her breath out on a sigh, not aware she’d been holding it until her shoulders sagged. “Over here.” She stroked Ahab’s soft nose and let him return to his grazing. She should have known that he recognized the person arriving even if she couldn’t. He hadn’t acted as if it were a stranger, come to think of it. Silly goose, she scolded herself, to get in a bother like that.
Benjamin swung into view, grinning wide as the Missouri sky with a string of perch over his shoulder. “Told you we have fish for supper.”
“We should have left a while ago.” She tightened the saddle girth and buckled the chin strap to Ahab’s bridle.
“Sorry. Dem fishes bitin’ so good, I din’ want to stop.” Benjamin handed her the lead lines and mounted Domino, tying the string of fish to his saddle. “Least de horses had a good rest.”
The evening star hung in the western sky when they trotted out on the Kansas Road looking both north and south. No sight of Meshach and the wagon—not that she’d really expected any. Still, she’d been hoping. Could the wagon have gone by this point already? Not likely. While she and Benjamin had made many detours, still they’d followed a fairly straight route—she hoped. At least they found the road, but then any route west would have eventually done just that.
Another thing—how far south of Fort Scott were they, and finally, where should they set up camp? The questions buzzed like angry yellow jackets in her mind.
“You think they’ve gone by?”
Benjamin, who’d been studying the surface of the road, shook his head. “Roman ain’t. Can always tell his prints.”
“Could another wagon or wagons have wiped those out?” She wished she’d been paying more attention to tracking, but then since Benjamin was so good at it, why did she have to? Questions, questions.
They could hear a dog barking off to the west. The road ran along the eastern edge of a gently rolling open prairie with a series of hills and draws, the likes of which they’d come through to the east. They’d crossed a creek a mile or so behind, but what could they hang a marker on out here?
Benjamin returned from a jaunt north. “Farms ahead, both sides of de road. We make camp back on de creek?”
“I suppose so.”
Benjamin swung down from his horse and, with the reins looped over his arm, set about gathering stones.
“What are you doin’?”
“Makin’ dem a marker.” He piled the stones on the right-hand side of the road and then, a couple of feet due east, piled a few more. Wiping his hands on his pants, he mounted Domino again and headed east. A willow thicket both signaled the location of water and hid it from sight. Rotting stumps showed where settlers had taken out the larger trees for firewood or lumber.
The horses pushed through the willows to drink, Ahab raising his head and looking back the way they had come. When he dropped to drink again, Jesselynn felt her shoulders relax.
Within a short time, they had hobbled the horses to graze, the foals had nursed, and Jesselynn dug in her saddlebag for the flint to start the fire. She and Benjamin gathered dead branches from the thicket, and after clearing out a patch of grass down to the dirt to keep from starting a prairie fire, they laid the wood and soon had a fire blazing. Jesselynn hunkered down on one of the stumps and studied the flames. She should be scaling fish. She knew that, but the knowing and the doing were two different things.
What if someone had stopped the wagon? What if the deputy had come after them in spite of the sheriff’s orders? She about gagged on the what ifs and threw herself to her feet. Digging a hunting knife out of her saddlebag, she set about the scaling, using the stump as a table. Work always held worrying at bay.
“How are they goin’ to see those stones in the dark?” She turned to Benjamin, scale-covered hands on her hips.
“Dey won’t. Meshach pull up someplace to wait till dawn. We wait here till dey find us.”
“I wish we’d never split up like this.” She dug down in her saddlebag for a tin of grease and dropped some in the frying pan. They’d be eating mush if it weren’t for Benjamin and his fishing. She dusted cornmeal over the fish and laid them one by one in the sizzling pan. She had to add wood often, since the branches were so small, but the fire was hot enough to fry supper, and that was all that mattered.
“I’se gonna set me some snares. See what we kin get.” Benjamin spoke from directly behind her, making her jump.
“Can’t you warn me? You’re quieter even than Meshach.” She knew she sounded grumpy, but frying fish didn’t keep her mind occupied, and the worries crept back in. No wonder Ophelia sang a lot. Kept the mind busy so she couldn’t worry.
“Sorry. I’ll whistle when I come back so’s you don’ go and shoot me.”
“Thanks.” The quiet but for the grazing horses should have been peaceful. Frogs sang in the bulrushes. The fried fish smelled heavenly. She set her mind to thinking of how to keep the fried fish overnight so the others could have some when they arrived in the morning.
Supper seemed extra quiet without Sammy and Thaddeus with all their giggles and Thaddeus’s eternal questions. She even missed Meshach’s reading from the Bible, and since she’d left her writing case in the wagon, all she could do was stare into the fire until her eyes refused to stay open any longer. Since Benjamin said he’d take first watch, she wrapped herself in her quilt and tried to sleep.
Praying didn’t help. She’d asked God’s blessing and protection for every person she’d ever known and still she lay awake. Until Benjamin started singing to the horses. His rich voice singing the songs of his people, of glory by and by, overlaid the songs of the frogs and peepers, and she slept.
Ahab whinnied halfway through the morning. The answering bray could only come from Roman. Jesselynn whooped and danced a shuffle step around the fire pit. She stirred what ashes remained, added thin twigs, and blew on the few glowing coals. A couple of dry willow leaves, an extra puff, and the embers came to life, sending up a tendril of smoke before bursting into flame. They’d have coffee before long.
“Jesse, we’s here.” Thaddeus, standing beside Meshach on the wagon seat, waved, his face one big smile.
Meshach stopped the team on the first level spot and set the brake. Thaddeus scrambled over the wheel and hit the ground running, straight into Jesselynn’s outstretched arms.
“Why you left us?” He put one hand on either side of her face and stared into her eyes. “You don’t do that no more.”
She kissed his cheek and stood up with him in her arms. “You know we have to keep the horses hidden, and when the wagon is traveling during the day, what else could I do?”
His frown said he was thinking hard. When he shrugged and squirmed, she set him down and, after greeting the others, looked up at her aunt.
“Everything all right?”
“Right as rain. Help me down, please. I about rocked my legs to sleep.” Once on the ground, she settled her skirts and looked around the camp, if it could be called that. “We drove until near dark before we found a good place to stop, but other than a wave from a couple of wagons passing by, we talked to no one. Meshach kept looking for a marker, but I never saw a thing when he pulled off the road. How did he know?”
“Two small piles of rocks off the right side of the road.”
“Well, my lands.” She reached back in the wagon for the coffeepot. “Is there fresh water here?”
“A small creek. Benjamin dug out a hole so we can dip clear water. I’ll get it.”
When she returned, Jane Ellen had the boys looking for wood, Benjamin was skinning the three rabbits he’d snared, and Meshach had the team hobbled and grazing. Since they’d eaten the remaining fish for breakfast, Ophelia set one rabbit to simmering and cut up the other two for frying. The fragrance of coffee and frying rabbit soon called to them all. Hard-dried biscuits tasted much better dunked in coffee.
They took turns napping in the afternoon heat and at dusk headed north toward Fort S
cott, with Jesselynn wondering how they would circumvent the fort when they got there. Just before dawn Daniel returned from one of his scouting forays to wave them off on a track heading west.
“Onliest way to get by de fort,” he reported.
They had to dry camp that night and ration the water barrel, letting only the mares get all they wanted so they would have enough milk for the foals.
“We better get another water barrel,” Jesselynn said as they ate dried biscuits and leftover fried rabbit. “I’d hoped to wait until Independence, but . . .”
“What we got, four more days?”
“Maybe six.” I wish I could talk to someone about Independence. Is there a fort near there? How will I get enough money for two wagons and all we need? How long, oh, Lord, how long will I have to make all the decisions?
She knew the answer to that. Until the war was over. Until she could bring the horses back to Twin Oaks. She’d kept the thought at bay, fighting to keep it from living full blown in her mind. If she made it to Oregon, how would she ever bring the horses back to Twin Oaks?
Three nights later they smelled smoke before they saw the orange glow in the sky.
“Somebody’s barn burnin’.” Meshach clucked the team into a hard trot. Perhaps they could help. Riding Ahab, Jesselynn leaned forward and let him out. Within three strides, he was running free, for the first time in months. The even beat of his hooves sang to her memory of mornings on the track at home, brought back the laughter of old Joseph when he punched down the stopwatch, the smell of horse sweat and good leather. She slowed her horse, swerving to follow Benjamin into a farmyard. Not only the barn was blazing but the house too, even though the distance between the two should not have set one from the other.
Ahab snorted and tried to turn and leave, but she kept him steady with a firm hand. When Benjamin called to her, she dismounted and led Ahab over to a tree where Benjamin knelt by a woman who appeared to have crawled there for safety. But she hadn’t been safe. The blood from the gash on her head and another from a bullet wound in her right shoulder said as much.
“Who did this?” Jesselynn handed her reins to Benjamin and pillowed the woman’s head on her knees.
“Quantrill’s Raiders. They . . . took . . . our . . . cattle. When . . . John . . . my husband . . . shot one of them . . .” The pause lengthened. “Th-they . . .” Her voice grew fainter.
“Don’t try to talk. We’ll find a doctor.” She’d have missed the shake of the woman’s head had she not been watching her so closely.
As if she hadn’t heard, the woman continued. “They . . . shot . . . John . . . and . . . fired . . . the . . . house. The . . . children . . .”
Jesselynn knew no one would have survived that blazing inferno. With a crash the beams of the barn collapsed. The woman sagged, gagged, and was gone.
Jesselynn laid her back in the dust. The house, too, fell in on itself. A dog howled, a mournful lament that sent shivers up her spine.
Benjamin went to the wagon that had just arrived. Meshach joined Jesselynn beside the body. “How come no neighbors come to help?”
“Quantrill’s Raiders.” As she said the words, an idea slugged her in the chest. “They must have left just before we got here. We could have run into them. Oh, Lord, our God.” Tears gathered and broke. She wasn’t sure if they were tears of sadness for the woman and her family or tears of gratefulness that they’d been spared. Surely the raiders would have killed them all to get such horses as theirs.
“He surround us wid angels, just like we asked.” Meshach got to his feet. “You see any other bodies?”
“Ask Benjamin. I’ve been right here.” The howl rose again, eerie. “Do you see the dog?”
“Over by de house.” Benjamin joined them. “Onliest thing alive, far as I can see.”
“Get de shovel. We bury her, den get outa here.”
“No, we just leave. The neighbors will come by when they know it is safe.” Jesselynn wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
“But . . .”
She snatched her reins out of Benjamin’s hand and threw herself into the saddle. All they needed was to be caught here and accused of killing the family and starting the fire. They’d all be hanged.
They pulled back to a slow trot after they’d covered enough distance from the burning to be safe. Jesselynn settled into her saddle, fighting to keep her mind from replaying the death scene. No wonder people spoke of The Raiders in hushed tones. Fear did that to a body.
When the sun rose, she hated to stop. The closer they were to Independence, the safer they’d be—at least from the Raiders. But as the area became more settled, a new danger arose.
“Hey, Marse Jesse, you see dat dog followin’ us?” Benjamin motioned with his head.
Jesselynn looked back to see a black dog, part shepherd from the look of him, with a patch of white around one ear. “How long he been with us?”
“Saw him at first light.”
“Where do you think he’s from? Someone’s goin’ to be real sad, missing their dog.”
“No, I think they all dead.”
“Oh.” What more could she say? Looked like another war victim had joined their journey.
Where could they hide the horses until they could purchase their supplies and head out with a wagon train? And for how long? The farther north they traveled, the less the grass had sprouted. For the horses it wasn’t a problem; for oxen it would be.
INDEPENDENCE, MISSOURI
Jesselynn rode past camps of staring sojourners before she found Independence proper.
“Hey, Chess, if all of these people are wantin’ to go on to Oregon, there might not be room enough left over for us.” The horse twitched his ears and trotted on. Riding Chess was immeasurably easier than riding Roman. Cows bellowed, horses whinnied, children ran screaming after one another, two men stood toe to toe slugging at each other while a crowd cheered them on. Wash hung from lines strung between wagons and tent poles. The smell that assaulted her nostrils could have used a stiff wind to blow it clear to the Mississippi. By then it might be bearable.
Two dogs ran in front of her horse, setting him to shying and her to paying better attention. Wouldn’t that be wonderful to fall in the slop that Chess’s hoofs clopped through?
The recent rain hadn’t helped—that she knew for certain—but still, had no one dug latrines? Or if they had, didn’t the people gathered here use them?
She stopped at the first store she came to and asked how to find a wagon train to join.
“Sorry, son, but most of the trains are already made up, just waitin’ for the grass to grow.”
“But surely there must be one that will take on two more wagons. We’ll more than carry our own load.”
“If’n there is such, you tell yer pa to come on in here and do the dealin’. Nobody’s going to talk with a young boy like you.” The bearded man behind the counter scratched his belly through a shirt that might once have been white.
“Like I said, my daddy is too sick to leave our camp. He sent me ahead to . . .”
“Sorry, can’t help you. Next?”
Jesselynn turned away. It didn’t help that this was the third time she’d heard those same words, or close to it. She thought of taking out the gold coins in her bag and dropping them on the counter, but from the looks of the crowd, that didn’t seem to be a good idea either.
Besides, from what she could tell, supplies cost about twice what she’d heard before. Or more. Maybe they ought to set up an outfitting business of their own. Surely Meshach could get work here. There were enough wheels to fit and repair to keep a hundred blacksmiths busy.
At the end of the fruitless day, she asked directions for the post office. At least she ought to be able to find that. On the way she noticed another store, this one closed for the day. She’d try there tomorrow. She flipped Chess’s reins around the hitching rail and took the two steps to the post office in one stride. The four le
tters the postman handed her when she said her name made up in part for the futility of the day. Two from Richmond, one from Sergeant White, and the last from Lucinda. She stuck them in her pocket to read back at camp and strode next door to an apothecary. She chose a peppermint stick for each of the boys and a packet of horehound drops and another of lemon drops. They’d all earned a treat. After studying the man’s wares, she promised him she’d return to load up her simples box, then headed back to camp.
The heavy feeling persisted, just like the gray skies that hung low enough to snag with a fish pole. In spite of the gray she reminded herself that even though she hadn’t found a wagon train, she’d learned plenty about getting ready.
And a possible way to make some money. She nudged Chess into a canter all the way back to the river bottom where they’d made camp.
“No wagon train, but we got letters.” She dug them out of her pocket. “Which do you want to hear first? From Richmond or from Lucinda?” She’d keep Barnabas’s letter to read by herself later.
“Lucinda.” Her black members spoke as one.
Jesselynn opened the envelope and withdrew the ink-dotted sheet. While Lucinda could write well enough, she had a hard time keeping the quill from blobbing ink.
“ ‘Dear Marse Jesse and everyone,
We miss you so bad here. But thank the Lord we are alive and well. Joseph say to tell you he found some tobacco seeds, so we will have some crop in. Thanks to the garden and Joseph setting snares, we been eating well enough. Many have died of influenza, but we are safe so far. Black wagons carry bodies to the cemetery often. Men come home to die if they can.
I thank the Lord He keeping you safe. Tell Ophelia we are glad she and Meshach will have a baby. When will you come home? I got a letter from Miss Louisa. She working at the hospital. What her mother say about that, hmm? We digging the fields with a man pulling the plow. Goes slow.
Crocus come up, war or no war. Lord keep you in His care.
A Secret Refuge [02] Sisters of the Confederacy Page 18