“And?”
“I didn’t disagree with him.”
She stopped, her eyes narrowing, searching his. “You really didn’t? Not even to yourself?”
He shrugged. “Maybe there’s hope for me after all.”
“So, have you thanked the Lord for bringing him home?” she asked, eyeing him steadily.
He stopped. “In my own way,” he finally said.
She hooted softly. “What’s that supposed to mean? Did you thank Him or not?”
“Do I thank Him for the black lung disease, too?” Then, as her face fell a little at the bluntness of his words, he rushed on. “I’m not trying to be difficult, Abby. But that’s a question I wrestle with. I am grateful that Dad’s back. Incredibly grateful, actually. I do recognize the Lord might have had a hand in it.”
“Might have?” she chortled. “My goodness, that’s big of you.”
“All right, did have.”
“Eh?” she said, putting a hand to her ear. “Say that again.” Then she immediately laughed. “Remember, it was you who appointed me to be your humility monitor.”
“Do you have to be so darned good at it?” he grumbled. Then he was serious again. “Answer my question. Would the Lord give my father black lung disease so that He could bring him home again?”
“Bring him home just in time to join us,” she emphasized. But then she shook her head. “No, I don’t believe that. Your father has the black lung disease because he worked all of those years in the coal mine. But did the Lord inspire his mission president to send him to Black Country so it would affect him in such a way that he would have to be sent home? I think there is a very good chance of that. And, again I note, it happened just in time for him to join us on this trip.”
“Yes,” he said slowly.
She laughed softly. “This must be very hard on you.”
“What?”
“Mary Davis gets this remarkable blessing from her bishop, and David Draper, skeptic and doubter, just happens to be with her to see that blessing fulfilled in a most remarkable way. His father, serving a mission seven thousand miles away, suddenly develops a cough and is sent home just in the nick of time to rejoin his son.” She cocked her head and gave him a mischievous grin. “You’ve gotta be thinking you’re under siege here, fella.”
Now he was the one who hooted. “Ah, Abby. You do have a gift. The title of humility monitor doesn’t do you justice.”
They had reached the front gate of her house. As David reached out and opened the gate, Abby took the papers from him. “You don’t need to walk me to the door, David. Daddy said you and Carl have to have the teams hitched up for us in time to be there at five.”
He shrugged. “I don’t think many of us are going to be sleeping really well tonight anyway. Good night, Abby. See you in the morning.”
“Good night, David.” But she didn’t move. Her eyes, now black pools in the near darkness, searched his face. “You said the other day that you prayed on the trip. Is it too personal to ask you what your prayer was about?” Then, as she saw his mouth pull down, she retracted her question. “I’m sorry. I have no right to ask that.”
“I told God thank you for saving us that day.”
“With the old Navajo?”
He nodded. “I know that it wasn’t for me. It was for Mary and Emily and the family.” He sighed. “And Jim Decker and the others, too. They’re good men. So I thanked Him for that.”
For a long time she continued to search his face. Then, very softly, she said, “I appreciate you telling me that. Thank you.” She stood there for a moment, looking as if she wanted to say something more, but then just shook her head, turned, and started up the walk.
When she was about halfway to the house, David called out one more thing. “I also thanked Him for bringing Dad back home. Even before you told me I should do it.”
When she turned, her face was in shadow, but he heard the laughter in her voice. “I know.”
David stopped in the main room of the boardinghouse, which was as deserted as the hotel had been. He moved to a chair beside a lamp, took out his pocketknife and slit the envelope open, then sat down. He caught the faint smell of perfume as he withdrew the letter.
My Dearest David,
Knowing that we are going to be together every moment of every day for the next six weeks, it seems odd that I feel compelled to write you the night before our departure. But there is something I needed to say, and I don’t think I will have the opportunity to do so once we leave, nor the courage to do so face to face, even if an opportunity arises.
That day out by Coal Creek, we decided to step back, put things on the shelf, as you said it. And then you said something that really hit me hard. You said that if our relationship was meant to be, that the Lord would work it out for us. How ironic! You suggesting that I have more faith. I don’t know what possessed you to say what you did that day, but you were like a rock in the middle of my turbulent river—steady, quiet, assured. I stayed awake for a long time that night thinking about it. And though I didn’t tell Daddy I was for sure going until just a few days ago, I knew that I had no choice. Not just for us. For me! I had to do it. I had to show you that I do truly believe what I say I do.
And then your father came home. I’m not sure if you see his return as one more evidence that God has not forgotten you, but I surely do!!! I believe that He has heard the “prayers of your heart,” as you call them. And that was as much an answer for me as for you. What a powerful reaffirmation to me that God is our Heavenly Father, that He knows us intimately, and loves us infinitely. If He knows how much you needed your father to come home to you, then He knows how much I hate the thoughts of this journey. He knows how weak my faith is.
That doesn’t mean that my heart is no longer heavy. I am still filled with dread. I still get sick thinking about leaving Cedar City. But I know that He has not and will not abandon me. Somehow, I will get through it. The only thing that makes that thought bearable is knowing that I will be with my family and that you will be with us too. And by that I mean more than just having you close because of my great love for you. Here again, you are our rock in this river of challenge and change. I thank the Lord every day that Daddy had the wisdom and foresight to ask you to accompany us. Please forgive me if I lean on you too heavily in the next few weeks.
I love you, David Draper. More now than ever before. Don’t worry. I will contain those feelings and act in perfect decorum whenever I am around you. But that doesn’t change how I feel. Whether it will work out for us, I am no longer sure. But this much I do know. The Lord has not forgotten you, and from that, I also know that He has not forgotten me. And that alone makes what lies ahead something that I can endure.
All my love,
Molly
For a very long time, David sat there in the quiet solitude, reading and rereading her words, thinking about Molly and what it all meant. Finally, the weariness of mind and body began to sink in. He folded the letter, returned it to its envelope, then stood and went up the stairs.
As he reached the door of his room, he paused, thinking of what Abby had said earlier. “You’re right,” he said to himself. “You’re absolutely right, Abby. She is much tougher than I thought.”
Chapter 49
Wednesday, October 22, 1879
Bishop Jens Nielson had set the gathering place as the tithing office at five a.m. But as David and Carl Bradford turned the first two wagons onto Main Street, it was obvious that they weren’t going to be leaving on time. It was already five-thirty, and first light was showing over the mountains to the east, but there were no more than a dozen wagons lined up. Even though the four men—Carl, Patrick, John, and David—had arrived at the barn at four a.m., hitching up sixteen grumpy and balky mules to the four wagons had taken them longer than they had planned. But David suspected that their captain had expected no more and had set the time early so they would still get away at a decent hour.
As if on cue, at that mome
nt David saw the tall, solid figure of their Danish leader on horseback near the lead wagon. He was shouting directions and waving his arms. Closer to them, David saw Joe Nielson, his son, and Kumen Jones, his son-in-law, helping him organize the train. When Joe saw the two approaching wagons, he rode over to them. Joe was as tall and solidly built as his father, and had the same jovial and cheerful nature. When he saw that it was David driving the first wagon, that ready grin of his broke out and he waved. “Mornin’, David. Mornin’, Carl. I understand you’ve got two more wagons coming?”
“Yep. Dad and Brother McKenna are only a minute or so behind us.”
“Well,” Joe said, “I assume you want to keep all four of you together. We’ve got about twenty-five wagons, so let’s start another line on the opposite side of the street. You may as well be the first in that one.” He was pointing as he spoke.
Just then Kumen, Joe’s brother-in-law, came up to join them. He too had been with David on the exploring party and had become a good friend. Kumen was closer to David’s age, whereas Joe was just nineteen. Strikingly handsome with his thick black hair, full beard, and serious dark eyes, Kumen had broken many a heart when he had married Joe’s oldest sister just a few days before Christmas of last year. “Mornin’, David, Carl.”
Nodding, David looked around, thinking of that morning six months earlier in Paragonah. “This has a familiar feel to it, doesn’t it?”
“It does,” Kumen agreed. “Only this time we’re a lot bigger.” Then he grinned. “And this time I get to take my wife with me.”
“Get to?” Joe guffawed. “You can’t be taking any credit for that, Kumen. After leaving your new bride for six months, you think she’d let you go off again without her?”
Kumen looked at David. “Did you hear that Silas Smith won’t be joining us for a while?”
“No. Why not?”
“Guess what with all his reporting to the brethren since he returned, he hasn’t had time to get ready. He’ll join us in Escalante or points south. Says he’ll be a couple of weeks behind us.”
Then Kumen turned to his brother-in-law. “Aunt Kirsten wants to see you, Joe.”
Joe nodded and rode away. Kumen waved and moved down the line to guide the next wagons in. As he watched them go, David thought about the use of the title of aunt. In plural-marriage families, it was common for the children to refer to the wives other than their own mothers as “Aunt This” or “Aunt That.” Like many others of the more established Church leaders in Utah, Jens Nielson had more than one wife. One night on the exploring party, Joe and Kumen had tried to explain to David the complexities of the Nielson family tree.
Jens had married “Aunt Elsie,” as everyone called her, before they joined the Church in Denmark. It was tiny little Elsie who had come across the plains with him, pulling him in the handcart when his feet were so badly frozen he could go no farther. They had lost their only son somewhere in Wyoming about that same time. After arriving in Utah, Elsie had been unable to have any more children. When Jens was asked by the Church leaders to live in plural marriage, he promised Elsie that if she would allow him to take another wife, she would be able to have additional children. She had done so and gone on to have two more girls. Her oldest daughter, Mary, was Kumen’s wife.
Jens’s second wife was “Aunt Kirsten,” and her firstborn child was Joe. Joe and his father were very close, and, in fact, it was mostly because of Joe and Mary that Brother Nielson had asked to be called to accompany them.
The third wife, the youngest of the three, was Aunt Katrine. Brother Nielson had married her just a few years before. Thus Joe had a mother, two “aunts,” two brothers, three sisters, two half-brothers, three-half sisters, and a brother-in-law. To an only child like David, that seemed like a bewildering tangle of family, but Joe and Kumen were quite comfortable with it all. And, as near as David could tell, in their minds there was no distinction between siblings and half-siblings.1
The whole idea of plural marriage had set David’s teeth on edge in his first few years in Utah, but since then he had learned firsthand that, with few exceptions, plural marriage was not entered into for salacious reasons, as all the outside world seemed to think. The families were close, often living in a single large house built by the father, as the Nielsons did. The wives viewed each other more like sisters than competitors. In a land and era where men were often gone from their families for months at a time, such an extended family structure provided much support to the women and their children.
Not that he ever intended to take up the practice himself. To his way of thinking, keeping one woman happy would be challenge enough for a lifetime.
“Hello. Are you there?”
David jerked up. Carl was looking at him quizzically, and David realized he had gotten lost in his thoughts. Just then he saw two more wagons and a single rider come around the corner behind them. “Ah, there they are.” David jumped down and motioned for Patrick and John to pull the other wagons in behind them. “Billy Joe,” he called. “Tie Paint up behind that last wagon for now.”
They did so, and got down. As the four men came together, David looked around. “Where are the girls?”
Patrick shook his head with infinite patience. “They’ll be along soon. When I left them, they were sweeping the house one last time.”
David’s eyebrows raised. “But they cleaned the house yesterday.”
Patrick turned to David’s father. “Your son doesn’t know much about women, does he?”
John laughed and shook his head. “Naw in the least.” He looked at David. “It be thare way of sayin’ g’bye. As fur Sister McKenna, Ah be guessin’ she be ’orrified ta think that anuther lady might see ’er ’ouse even the tiniest bit dirty.”
“That’s exactly right,” Patrick said. “I’m guessing they’re also having one last good cry.”
David blew out his breath. “You’re right. I don’t understand women. Never will, either.”
“Me neither,” Billy Joe said in disgust. “Last night both Abby and Molly just kept hugging me and hugging me, and crying and crying.”
As they all laughed at the disgust on his face, a movement caught David’s eye. Behind them, two more wagons were coming up the street. Kumen was motioning for them to get into line about three wagons back from the McKennas. Although the sun was still half an hour or so from rising, it was light enough now that he could see things distinctly, and David immediately recognized the man driving the first wagon. “Hey, Dad,” he said, taking his father’s elbow. “Come with me. There’s someone I want you to meet.”
By the time they walked back, the two drivers were down and checking the barrels, buckets, cages, and other things tied alongside their wagon. “Ben Perkins?” David called.
The man turned. He was surprising small—no more than five feet five inches tall—with a lean, wiry figure, dark hair, dark eyes, and a dark beard worn in the goatee style. He couldn’t have weighed much more than ten stone—around 150 pounds, David guessed—and was in his early thirties.2
“’Owdy, David.” There was a twinkle in his eye. “Whate’er possesses ye ta be out of bed at sooch a dreadful ’our as this?” His accent was pure Welsh—or Wenglish, as he liked to call it—and had a bit of singsong lilt to it.3
“Come on,” David laughed, “I hear you’re up at four o’clock every morning of the year.”
“Nawt true,” he said soberly. “In the winter, Ah allow meself an extra hour, Ah do.”
“That much, eh?” David turned. “Ben, I would like you to meet my father, John Draper. You probably heard, he just returned from a mission in England about a week ago.”
“Ah did ’ear that,” he said, “and wur ye so fortunate as ta be assigned ta labor in the green hill country of South Wales?”
“Ah, no,” David’s father said, feigning great sadness, “Ah were naw so blessed. Most of the time Ah was in the Black Country around Wolverhampton.”
Just then, Ben’s brother, Hyrum Perkins, came up fr
om the second wagon. David introduced him as well. “Ben and Hy were also coal miners. I thought you ought to know each other.”
Ben was shaking his head sadly. “Ah ’urd ye ’ave the black lung, eh?”
“Ah do,” John said, shrugging it off, “but it be joost b’ginning. Naw mooch of a problem as yet. And this dry, warm air already be mekin’ it better.”
Just then a shout turned David around. Joe Nielson was coming toward them astride his horse. “David. Dad would like to see all the scouts up front.”
He waved. “Be right there.” He turned back. “All right, you three. I know for myself how coal miners love to tell stories, so keep them at least halfway honest.” Then to his father, he added, “I’ll see you at the wagons.”
As he walked away, he heard his father say, “He’s got a lot o’ cheek, don’t ’e?” There was an answering laugh, and David had to smile as he walked on. This was good. He guessed these three were going to become good friends.
By the time David came back to their wagons, the McKenna women were there too. He looked around, counting quickly. There were twenty-two wagons in the two lines now, so they were getting close to being ready for departure. All around them was a swirl of activity. People were everywhere, many of them obviously not going on the trip. It was something to behold when a train this size came together and began to form up. It was like a giant carnival. Those who had turned out to see them off and bid them farewell outnumbered the missionaries by two or three to one.
Men, women, and children walked up and down the double line of wagons, stopping to talk, but mostly just gawking at everything around them. The men moved along, checking out the wagons and teams with admiring eyes. Once the company jumped off at Escalante into the desert, there would be no trading of jaded teams for new ones, no running to the nearest tack shop for more harnessing, no crossing the street to restock supplies at the dry-goods store, no pulling a wagon into a blacksmith shop for repairs. Whatever they needed, they were taking with them. So, like the McKennas’, most of the equipment here today was new or had been completely refurbished. And though there were a few wagons being pulled by spans of oxen, most of the teams were either horses or mules. With very few exceptions, these were the finest animals to be had—young, strong, well-matched, and a beauty to behold. All up and down the line, men were nodding their approval as they took their measure.
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