All Together in One Place Read online

  They began now the hard labor of the day. Mazy thought of Adoras words as she and her mother lifted the heavy yoke around the oxen's necks They had been given a gift with these women, chosen as though for a reason. Despite their uncertainties and irritations, they each had gifts offered just as they were needed. Even she offered something that had nothing to do with gardening, with planting seeds of columbine or peas. She could sort things out, excavate the gifts of others, encourage people to reach beyond their usual hesitations, work together as one.

  And she'd discovered another: There was nothing wrong with wanting to please, to care for others as she did, to be ready to listen to Ruth or Tipton. But it was meant to be a gift freely given, not one offered out of obligation. She wished Jeremy were alive for her to tell him that, to show him that she was still learning, that seeds had been planted in her soul that had not yet begun to germinate. The world needed people who could both till fresh soil and break new ground to expand the boundaries of a field, but who could also nourish the turned clods of worn-out dirt. Both promised places for seeds to grow with proper tending. She had found something essential.

  Emigrants moving on by offered to assist them.

  “Do we take their help?” Mazy asked. “We've had delays.”

  “Could do it ourselves,” Rudi said. “But I guess being independent doesn't mean being alone, just being responsible.”

  “Even you're willing to accept the help of men?” Adora asked. “Well, that is a sign of things changing.”

  They accepted. With a word from Mazy, Ruth began hitching Lura's wagon to go up and over first because it was the sturdiest, her oxen the steadiest wheelers. Eight animals were engaged to pull and they entered the loose line of wagons moving toward the mountain. The women cracked whips over the oxen's heads and pushed at the wagon at the same time, though the latter merely gave them something to do while the dust swirled around their feet, hung on sweat-stained wool

  Tall pines with barklike thick scales rose on either side of them. Rocks spit from underfoot; animals strained against the wagon weight. The air hovered hot and heavy. Dampness seeped at Mazy's seams, and she longed for a breath of wind to cool the bloomers that hung from her hips. She pressed the woolen jacket against her breast to pat some of the moisture.

  At the top of the grade, even Ruth cringed.

  “What'd you think?” Mazy asked

  “It's going to be a killer ” Ruth leaned toward her. “But I'd only say that to you.”

  “We'll make it, ladies.” One of the men helping at the top pointed over the side, at wagons already setded safely. Mazy guessed his face hadn't seen a razor since he'd left Missouri. “Be surprised what can be accomplished with tobacco and spit.” He signaled and other men removed their hats, wiped their brows with their forearms, then began the task that would consume the remainder of their day.

  “Zilah, you best go help Mazy and Ruth,” Adora said. “I lack your strength, truth be known. I'll look after Clayton and Sason when he wakes.”

  “Miss Suzanne, too?”

  “Of course.” She motioned with her fingers until Zilah handed her the baby, who slept in Tiptons alabaster shawl. Adora tucked the fringe beneath his tiny chin, and the child yawned in his sleep. “Go on,” she told Zilah, and the Celestial left, looking back over her shoulder.

  Adora tied the shawl so a big knot formed over Sasons body, making a handle for carrying. She walked toward the last wagon, set the baby down in the shade, then leaned back against the wheel. Drool formed at the corner of her mouth as she sank into sleep.

  Ruth chocked the wheels, then helped unhitch the oxen, careful not to step too close to the outer edge of the rockface. Mazy walked the oxen off to the side, patting and talking to the faithful beasts while Naomi and Sister Esther moved to the back of the wagon, swapping ropes with Ruth and Mazy. Even Tipton began throwing parallel lines, then tying them underneath. The callused hands of two men reached and tightened beside them.

  The wagons would swing out and away from the rockface like a child's toy sliding across two ropes stretched between the trees high on the cliff and others down below. But these would be real wagons, not toys, holding all that they had. The men tied huge knots buttressed out to the side, and then they brought the ropes to the trees, already showing yellowed, jagged scars around their girths.

  “Others have done it before,” Ruth said, reminded by the marks on the trees

  “Wish that were more comforting,” Tipton said.

  More activity as four oxen were hitched to secure the rope around the cliff tree. Mazy looked down the slope at Sister Esther, who seemed to be praying. Then with a massive thrust and jerk and a shout from the men, the wagon eased over the sheer face.

  Elizabeth and Betha waited at the bottom, staring up. They'd walked the mile or so around the mountains base on a shady trace too narrow for wagons. Their shoulders rubbed against the inside rock wall. Following behind, Mariah rode Jumper and pushed the cows, mules, and oxen single file along the path.

  Betha pressed pudgy fingers against her mouth, still staring upward. The wagon swung out and then, like a spider suspended on a double strand of web, it was lifted by the wind, then pushed back against the rockface.

  “Let out some slack!” Mazy shouted.

  The bearded man grinned and nodded, repeating the call.

  “Let out some slack!” Ned and Jason repeated, their job being to carry the message down the line like buckets passed along a water brigade.

  Inch by difficult inch the wagon made its way down the twenty-five feet until it jerked on the hard rock bottom below them. The ropes held. The wagon survived.

  A cheer went up from the women and the men at that end. One wagon down: three to go. It had taken two hours.

  “Today you move,” Deborah said, speaking in soft English to the bees. “Much activity in household. Not frightening. Queens sleep and sleep. The word sleep, it is spelled with eyes, yes?” Deborah asked.

  “I guess a double e looks like eyes,” Ruth said, wiping her forehead of perspiration. “Alphabet wagon goes up next. Then yours. Do you want to leave the bees to go over in the wagon or…?”

  The girl smiled. “They all I have, the bees,” she said. “I carry. One hive. You help please?” She lowered her eyes as though embarrassed to seek it.

  Sister Esther inhaled. “I almost sleep with them, so perhaps I could carry a colony.”

  Deborah crawled inside and handed out a box to the Sister. “Maybe Adora could carry one. Where is she?” Sarah had an active Clayton in tow, his bells jangling. They looked around. No one could see her.

  Deborah began carrying the bees, taking time with her painful quick, quick steps, talking as she moved. She didn't anticipate trouble

  “The horse took the baby!” Adora shouted, running toward the base of the hill. “Your horse,” she yelled and pointed at Ruth.

  Beyond, Ruth could see Koda walking with his white treasure, the shawl clamped between his teeth, Sason apparently still asleep inside. The horse set the baby down and ripped at grass beside it. Adora turned and ran toward the horse, which promptly picked the bundle up, moved four or five feet with it until Adora stopped. Then Koda set it down.

  “He's playing a game,” Ruth said. “Back off. He'll tire soon enough.”

  “But if he steps on that baby…” Adora wailed. “How irresponsible of you to teach him to steal babies!”

  “Tell me what I can't see,” Suzanne said, holding her side as she approached without Pig.

  “It's all right,” Ruth told her. “It's the white shawl Koda likes.”

  “Where's Zilah?” Suzanne asked.

  “I sent her off to help Ruth and Mazy,” Adora admitted. “And I fell asleep.”

  “Speaking of irresponsible,” Ruth snapped.

  Koda did tire of his game, and Ruth retrieved the child. As she did she made a decision: she didn't belong; she brought trouble wherever she went. She'd help them over this mountain, ride to the deciding place,
and then go on north—hopefully alone. If she was lucky, Zane would follow her, a last good thing she could do for Jessie.

  They pulled Adoras wagon up next. The oxen instead of the mules were hitched to it. That might have been the cause. Or perhaps it was the oxen resisting the strange men on an unfamiliar wagon, or perhaps it was as it was meant to be, no ones fault at all; an opportunity, Mazy thought later, to walk by wisdom instead of certainty.

  They had just unhitched the animals at the top when a chock slipped or a chain came loose at the tongue or who knew what. But before anyone could stop it, before the ropes had been secured to the trees, Adoras wagon lurched then slid then lumbered backwards, gaining speed.

  Shouts of “Hold on!” and “Out of the way!” tangled with frantic jerks against the ropes, then people slipping, rope burning against gloved hands and then “Let ‘er rip, boys, she's a lost one!” Men standing back, their hats perched back on dirty brows as Adoras green and gold careened back down the mountain, heading straight for Esther's wagon. And the four remaining colonies of bees.

  Deborah heard the shouts and turned in time to see the wagon rattling backwards, watched with huge eyes as it struck Esther's team, two oxen bellowing from wounds inflicted by the now shattered wagon.

  “The bees!” Deborah gasped. “The queens!” She set her own colony down, trying to run in her blue silk slippers. “Wait, please, wait,” she said. Sister Esther stood alone with the bees now, swallowing, her hands trembling.

  “What's happening?” Suzanne asked, turning back. She held Sason, Clayton roped to her side Esther told her, her mouth dry and scratchy as she described the wagon, her oxen. They could hear the high-pitched humming of bees spilling from a box knocked out of the wagon's back. “I'm setting these down,” Esther said “Don't stumble on them.”

  Esther called the names of her oxen as Deborah found one box slammed against another and the lid loosened, allowing the bees to spill then swarm away. Deborah spoke in her calmest voice, in her native language, straightening a box, a dozen stings at her wrist, near her eyes. She watched the open lid of the other turn black with a swarm of escaping bees.

  “Leave wagon here,” Deborah told Ma2y, who arrived breathless from atop the hill. The bees hovered around her face. “They fly away! Home no move or bees lose way. Not come back.” Her reedlike voice shook.

  Deborah told Mazy to be calm, to send no signals of fear. It looked as though only one colony'd been freed. The others, though humming loudly, appeared to be intact. Mazy stood still, not batting at the bees that fluttered over her nose, buzzed near the pasteboard of her bonnet.

  “They come back,” Deborah said, crying softly. She pulled an already swollen hand from within the hive, setting the small box upright. “The queen still lives inside. They die we move box. Need come home same place.”

  “They sure dont accept much change in where their homes at, do they?” Mazy said. “Must be related to me.” A black cloud of bees lifted away. “All right,” Mazy said. “We'll find a way.”

  With effort, they unyoked the two wounded oxen as extra hands helped move aside the wreckage of Adoras wagon. She and Tipton picked at the spillage of photo albums and hats, flour and shoes. A blizzard of destruction, of wounded oxen and what was left of Adoras precious things, littered the side of the trail. Adora sobbed, moving splintered wood, sucking at fingers full of slivers.

  The white bee box remained in the dirt where it had spilled out, set as Deborah told them. They worked around it.

  Ruth, Naomi, and even Tipton tended the oxen's wounds with vinegar splashed on the gouges and flaps of loose skin. Lura's sewing kit was requisitioned for the task, and Tipton drew the needle and thread as the oxen permitted.

  Then they took Betha's alphabet wagon up the hill, leaving Sister Esther s for last.

  Deborah, eyes pinched nearly shut from the stings, still managed to return along the trail that skirted the mountains rocky base. She'd carried one box and delivered it to safety. Mariah and Naomi each moved a box while Esther led her precious oxen. Then Deborah came back and remained in the exact spot where the wagon had been hit, sat in the dirt near the white box while other wagons moved on around them

  And she'd been right. At dusk the bees returned, retracing their flight, landing backwards as they did, Deborah talking, talking until she closed them inside the small, square hive. She'd waited until almost dark and then Suzanne and Pig had joined her to walk back. “But it is dark,” Deborah protested when she saw them.

  “We all need to rest in a place we're familiar with,” Suzanne told her as she listened to the girl pick up the precious box of bees and carry them along the trail to meet the wagons successfully lowered over the mountain's shear face.

  The crossing had destroyed the Wilsons’ wagon but left Esthers usable, though the contents inside suffered. One of Sister Esther's oxen, mangled beyond doctoring, had been put out of its misery by Ruth's pistol and then butchered, the meat shared with those who'd helped their crossing. OI’ Snoz survived

  “At least we feast tonight on fresh beef,” Adora said as they sat at the evening campfire.

  Elizabeth said, “I am as tired as I have ever been in my life and not even hungry.” She set her plate down.

  “You could have bartered or sold the beef,” Lura told Esther. “What you won't need and can't dry ourselves you could sell, even at reasonable prices.”

  “Some of those wagons serve very lean people,” Esther said. “A little beef before heading into these last weeks might make the difference to some of those grizzled-looking children I've seen. No, I'll give away what we don't use. I believe it is the Christian way,” Esther said

  “Antone said the Californians and the Oregonians had to send relief parties out almost this far the last two years,” Lura said. She chewed on a biscuit, brushed the crumbs from her cheeks.

  “Those traders we met awhile back said there are relief stops set at the Humboldt Sink and Carson and on the Oregon route, too,” Ruth said.

  “Doesn't speak well of what's ahead, does it?” Mazy asked. Rethinking she added, “On the other hand, its nice to think that someone's out there, preparing if we need to be rescued.”

  “Antone wanted us to be sure to have enough supplies so we wouldn't need charity,” Lura said.

  “Got enough bacon, but he didn't pack enough tobacco, right, Ma?” Mariah asked, giggling.

  “Oh, pooh,” Lura said. “I've decided to give that up anyway. Bad habit. Makes me cough.”

  Adora looked at her. “Another piece of discard? Well, maybe we should all forgo our attachments.” She looked at Tipton.

  “Like your sugar tooth, Mother?” Tipton asked.

  “Hard to believe I can't taste much when I crave that maple candy. Deborah's promised to introduce me to honey dishes, haven't you, Deborah?”

  “How'll you get the goo out without wrecking the hives?” Elizabeth asked, addressing Deborah.

  “She has a special way of designing the hives,” Esther told them.

  “That'll be a fancy thing, all right,” Lura said. “Make raising bees a sweet and profitable proposition.”

  Adora would never have made it alone, Mazy thought. She needed help more than most, always hanging tighter to what was. Still, on this big mountain crossing, she'd seen most of these women shift to accommodate each other, put memory and useless baggage aside in order to make room for the new. Even Sister Esther seemed to soften her certainty. Perhaps that wasn't fair. They needed the Sisters assurance of Gods presence when it wasn't obvious he was there.

  By the campfire light, Adora and Tipton moved what things they thought essential into Betha and Naomis wagon while Lura joined Mazy and her mother, Suzanne and Zilah, too.

  “I thought you might like these,” Tipton ventured, handing a small package to Lura.

  “What?” The woman loosened the string. Her face became a question as she held up two silver combs. “These aren't mine,” she said.

  Tipton shrugged. “They don'
t stay in my hair much. And I thought you could…in return for your cooking, you know…” Her eyes dropped. “I know they're not what you lost. Couldn't find what you lost, nor what Mama lost, either.”

  “My, oh my,” Lura said and wrapped Tipton in her arms, still clutching the girl's hair combs And Tipton let her.

  “I kind of like lying close to Mavis,” Mariah said. “She chews her cud and those sounds and the coyotes howling just drop me to sleep. Ruth likes my company back there with her too. I'll see you in the morning, Ma.”

  “At least you have plenty of room to sprawl out,” Adora told her. She had that indignant tone in her voice, and Mazy wasn't looking forward to the evening's sleeping arrangements.

  How odd, Mazy thought as she walked to milk the cows, that Adora should be in the company of her and Suzanne and thus with Zilah, the woman she once charged with theft.

  “Distance breeds distrust,” Ruth told her when Mazy expressed the thought out loud as the two finished the milking by lantern light.

  “But isn't it amazing how it worked out, with the very people needing—whatever it is they need—forced together. Just funny how that happened. Like it was meant to be. Love and loss and betrayal, all a part of life, but we're given gifts to get us through.”

  “Through to what, I wonder.”

  “Maybe understanding,” Mazy offered.

  “I'd like a safer place,” Ruth said.

  “Kinship. Kindness. Security. Strength. Guess they go together,” Mazy said, the words coming to her like the scents of favorite flowers.

  “Adora,” Lura said, “If one of those Californians comes by, you can sell what mules you have now and make good money.” It was the evening after the mountaintop experience, and Tipton's combs sat on Lura's head like jewels in a rat's nest, packed inside the snarls of her unwashed hair.