Wagon Train Sisters. Shirley KennedyЧитать онлайн книгу.
tossing her in the wagon, there’s nothing more I can do.” He cast a sorrowful look at his wife. “You win, Luzena. We’ll stay behind with our wagon. Hiram, you and Becky will take your wagon and move on. Sarah will go with you.”
Sarah raised a protesting hand. “I will not leave my mother.”
Hiram’s blue eyes filled with pain. “That won’t work. What kind of a son would I be if I left my parents alone in the wilderness?”
Becky glared daggers at her husband. “How dare you even think we’d stay behind? I won’t hear of it. We’re going with the company and that’s that.”
“She’s right,” said Pa. “Son, there’s no use you staying. Go with the company.”
Ma nodded in agreement. “Go, the three of you. Florrie will soon be back, and then we’ll catch up.”
“We’re going!” Becky screeched.
Sarah wanted to cover her ears. The Bryans had always been a peaceful clan. Harmony and good manners ruled in their household. What small differences they had were settled quietly without bickering. This was horrible, seeing her family torn apart by this sudden, shocking tragedy. There was only one way to handle this, and they’d better listen. “Hiram, you and Becky go with the train. I’ll stay behind because Ma needs me.” She crossed her arms. “Save your breath and don’t argue. I won’t change my mind.”
Becky gave her a satisfied smile. “Thanks, Sarah, that’s the perfect solution.”
I’m not doing this for you. Sarah looked toward her brother. “We will catch up. If we don’t, we’ll find you at Uncle William’s house in Mokelumne City.”
Biting his lip in thought, Hiram hesitated. Despite her plucky words, Sarah halfway wished her brother would stand up to his belligerent wife and declare they were staying. But no such luck. “All right, Becky, we’ll go.” Hiram turned to Sarah. “I hope you understand.”
Oh, I understand all right. Sarah hid her disappointment and gave him a smile. “You’ve made the right decision. Don’t worry, we’ll be fine. Florrie will show up soon. Then we’ll catch up with you before you know it.” Brave words, but she must remain optimistic. Florrie had to come back. She couldn’t bear the thought her beloved sister had disappeared forever.
As the last wagon left the meadow, Albert Morehead, riding horseback, returned for the last time. Looking down, he addressed Luzena. “You haven’t changed your mind?”
Ma folded her arms firmly across her chest. “No, I have not, Mr. Morehead.”
The wagon master sighed in defeat. “I’m sorry your daughter is lost and will pray that you find her.” His sympathetic gaze took in the entire family. “The best of luck to you all.” He turned his horse to leave but rounded back again. “By the way, there’s a small company of gold seekers coming through, by tomorrow I should guess. Rascals, the lot of them. Whatever you do, stay away from them. There’s one in particular you must avoid. Some of my men encountered him back in Independence. Lost all their money, thanks to that card shark.
“What’s his name?” Pa asked.
“Goes by the name of Jack McCoy. A scoundrel and ne’er-do-well if ever there was one.”
Chapter 2
After the last wagon departed, Sarah spent the rest of the day in the woods calling for Florrie, listening for an answering cry that never came. By evening, her appreciation of her brother had grown by leaps and bounds. She had never realized how much of the workload fell on Hiram’s shoulders. Pa, who’d never done hard labor in his life, had little to no aptitude for the hard work involved in driving a wagon across the country. It was Hiram who yoked and unyoked the oxen on both wagons, greased the wheels, built the campfire, found feed for their eight oxen and two horses, pitched the tents at night, and so much more. During the day, Pa drove their wagon because he had to. Other than that, he’d been content to let his son attend to the chores while he sat around the campground with similar-minded neighbors, discussing such topics as “manifest destiny” and why the United States must extend across the entire continent. He frequently quoted his favorite poet, Henry David Thoreau, with phrases such as “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you’ve imagined.”
Lately Ma greeted his remarks with a scornful sniff. “Right now the life I imagine is a soft bed and a roof over my head.”
With Hiram gone, Sarah assumed Pa would take over the tasks that needed to be done. Instead, when they returned from their search, he wearily sank to a seat by the campfire and waited for his supper. That they might need firewood never occurred to him. He looked so tired and drawn she didn’t have the heart to complain. Instead, she gathered sticks and branches herself, clumsily chopped them with an ax, and built the fire for their supper. Ma usually did the cooking, but tonight Sarah fixed biscuits, beans, and bacon while Ma sat silently by, occasionally throwing an angry glance at Pa. Not like her at all. Luzena loved her husband dearly, and he loved her. They never quarreled, but it was plain to see Ma was getting agitated. Each glance seemed angrier than the last until, while Pa was taking the last bite from his plate, Ma declared, “This is all your fault, Frank.”
Startled, he asked, “What’s my fault?”
Ma bristled. “All of this.” Her sweeping gesture took in the camp and surrounding forest. “You’re the one who insisted we come on this horrible journey. If it weren’t for you, I’d be sitting in my beautiful home in Indiana, and Florrie…Florrie…” She choked and could not go on.
“But that’s not so, my dear…”
Sarah shut out their voices. This whole disaster was her father’s fault, yet Ma wasn’t being fair. Never a good businessman, he couldn’t recover when his newspaper went bankrupt. Deep in debt, he was forced to sell the family’s home. Perhaps they could have stayed and somehow survived, but with unaccustomed firmness, Pa announced they were moving to California. Everyone assumed he, along with thousands of others, wanted to rush to the newly discovered goldfields, but his motive for moving was far less exciting. Mokelumne City was a small town in California, not far from Sacramento. When his brother offered a partnership in his general store there, Pa gratefully accepted. Others might get carried away by the prospect of picking huge gold nuggets off the ground, but he valued peace and security far more.
Like most of the women on the wagon train, Ma hadn’t wanted to go. Sarah didn’t either, although after her disastrous marriage, she would have been grateful to be back with her family, no matter where they went. No one suspected how awful her marriage had been. She’d never told. Even after Joseph died, she played the part of the grieving widow, fooling everyone. Well, not quite. Her perceptive brother guessed how miserable she’d been. Before they left Fort Wayne, Ma had wondered why she showed no interest in the suitors who’d begun to call. One of these days, she’d be honest and explain why.
Sarah slept fitfully during the night in the small tent pitched beside the wagon. Along with the eerie howling of the wolves, an unending swirl of unanswered questions kept her awake. Would they find Florrie? How much longer would Ma want to stay and search? Would they be able to catch up to the Morehead train? Loneliness gnawed at her. She missed her friends back home and the new friends she’d made on the train. She missed her brother, Hiram, the only member of her family who could even begin to understand her troubled heart. “Do you really miss Joseph?” he’d asked the day after the funeral.
“Why do you ask?”
Hiram got a quirky eyebrow-raised expression on his face. “They all think you’re grieving, but I know you, and I’d wager you’re not.”
She and her younger brother had always been close. She gave him a vague answer but wasn’t the least surprised he’d seen the truth. “I’ll tell you all about it when I’m ready.”
“That’ll be soon, I hope.” He eyed her with concern. “All you do is read and paint your little pictures. You need to get out