A Light in the Wilderness (7 page)

“May I water my horse at your spring?”

“You may, Aaron,” Davey said.

Letitia took the bridle and led the horse to the trough as Aaron jumped down.

“And what’s the occasion?” Letitia heard him ask. The old tinker had endured his own brand of abuse but was no slave and had
never been, though his people had. Still, Letitia wished he’d move on. If there were no witnesses, the law wouldn’t ever touch them. She walked back toward the men. “Pretty posies whatever the call for them. Nice little vessel you have too. Looks like it’s engraved.”

“It is,” Davey said. “We’ve no need of trinkets today, but you’re welcome to water the horse, then be on your way.”

“Aaron Moshe doesn’t intend to barter when there’s an occasion presenting itself.” He nodded toward Letitia. “A bride?”

Letitia swallowed, her throat dry as a corn husk. What would Davey say?
He should let
the comment sink into the August heat.

“Truth is, she intends to be one. A wife for myself.”

No,
no.
But then the thought: a witness other than the dog would bring weight to the words. And he wouldn’t likely tell others, why would he? “Well now.” He looked around. “Moshe sees no preacher. But then, that’s not going to happen, now is it.”

Letitia’s heart thumped like a butter churn. Would Moshe let the sheriff know of their breaking the law? She looked to Davey. Could he keep her safe? He’d risked their safety with his blurting out their plans.
Make the best of
troublin’ times.
Rothwell bumped his head up against Letitia and she petted the dog, glad for the comfort. “Maybe you see yourself officiatin’ us today, suh?” Jews read Davey’s book too, didn’t they?

The man moved his head back as though accepting a remarkable thought.

And so on a hot day in August, David Carson once of Ireland took Letitia once of Kentucky to be his wife. Davey told the tinker the words about honoring each other, staying together in the hard times, caring for each other, and cleaving unto each other under God’s watch, not letting any others nose their way in. Davey spoke them, holding the Bible, then Moshe repeated the words for Letitia, her hands quivering on the worn leather. She was glad he was there. For while she had memorized the promises, the moment flustered her. Then Moshe added words of blessing, about not allowing men to split them.

“We need a proper ending,” Moshe added. He trotted to his carriage store. “Moshe has it, hold on. It’s right here.”

Letitia looked at Davey, who winked at her. She lowered her head, but Davey lifted her chin, his gaze making her chest tighten.

“Ah, here it is then. Let’s add another tradition, shall we?” He placed a glass goblet on the ground. “Now then. No canopy, but you, Davey, stomp on it. Breaking the Jewish wedding glass is yours to do.”

Davey laughed.

“Why he do that?”

“Oh, any number of reasons. That your children will be as many as the shards and your happiness also. Or that you will remember the temples destroyed in Jerusalem. And the one Moshe prefers, that the glass is fragile as is love, and marriage must be carefully cared for and never broken but in death. Go ahead.” He motioned with his hands.

Davey shrugged and stomped the crystal that did shatter to a hundred shards.

“Mazel tov!” the tinker shouted, raising his hands, startling the horse who lifted its head and shook the bit and reins, and that got Rothwell to howling. “You may kiss the bride. And may the broken glass be a reminder that while you cleave together as one, the world is still broken and will always need mending.”

It was the first kiss of her husband. His mouth was soft, his lips thin but moist; his whiskers bristled against her lips and cheek when he nuzzled her. A warmth formed inside that flowed to her toes and back up, settling at her heart.

Davey stepped away.

“Moshe best be traveling.”

“Lookee, let me pay you for the crystal and your blessings.”

“Consider them a gift.” Moshe grinned. “But I would join you for a wedding meal, if you’d planned one.”

Over food they spoke of festive things—weddings the tinker had attended in Pittsburgh before coming west, though he said this was the first time “Aaron Moshe has officiated at one.” Letitia served beef sliced from the smoked roast hanging in the larder. Fresh greens and beans from her garden, berry jam she’d put up. Buttermilk. Then she brought out a black raspberry pie with fresh cream she’d sugared with slivers of maple from the cone.

“You have made a good match, Mr. Carson. Mrs. Carson is a rare and opulent cook.”

“I don’t know what that means, but I’ll take it as a compliment. On my wife’s behalf.” Davey raised a fork full of pie toward Letitia. “To the opulent cook.”

Letitia didn’t know what the word meant either, but it seemed to fill Davey’s face with gladness, a sight that helped reduce the nervousness for what she knew would follow once the tinker left.

Moshe drove his carriage rattling down the lane. “I suppose I should have told him he could bed down for the night in the barn if he wished, but I was hoping to have my wedding night with my wife, alone.”

Letitia lowered her eyes. She had never felt this fluttering of her stomach with the fathers of her children, but then she’d never been given the choice to have them either. She was sent to those men to enhance the owner’s arsenal of labor. It had struck her as unusual; she was not a big woman and she found the taller, larger slave women produced bigger babies with less trouble, children who grew to be strong men and tall women. She didn’t know how big Nathan might have been if he had lived. His father was tall. But Jeremiah, at five, when he’d been sold, sprouted up tall as a possum haw holly. But perhaps her masters did recognize that she could reason well, worked hard, fit in, and didn’t carry anger around like a hot coal always burning. The gift of a marriage to someone she had chosen and who was kind enough to bring her flowers and break the wedding glass was more than she could have hoped for. There was a Bible verse about blessings being shaken down and pressed together. Today, she’d experienced it.

Davey walked up beside her on the porch. A warm dusk settled like a shawl around her shoulders, and she remembered a custom of her people with a quilt wrapped around a wedding couple as they jumped the broom together. She’d seen it done, a happy leap.
Her mother had told her it was an African tradition. She stepped inside, grabbed the broom, and the two jumped it, laughing.

“You know we won’t be able to tell folks that we’re married.” Davey caught his breath.

“I knows.”

“But I will treat you as though we are.”

She’d been thinking about something all day. “We could have a contract, separate from the marriage.”

Davey raised his eyebrows.

“I agrees to stay with you, to help you along the trail next year and build our land claim. Clear brush, cook, do your laundry.” She didn’t say
bear your children.
“I’s your wife so no need to pay me. In return, you agrees to take care of me and if something happen to you, you say whoever ask whatever property you have, you leave to me. And to your sons and daughters, if we have any . . .” She looked away then. They’d never discussed children.

He plucked at his beard. “That I could do.”

“And you would put that onto paper, that I could keep? And sign it, with your name?”

“I could do that.” He was removing the bow at the back of her hair, sending his fingers down the sides of her cheek.

He didn’t say he
would
sign such an agreement, but Letitia feared to push him too far at that moment, when they were just beginning and she’d done nothing for him yet.

“Then we agree. Together we plan for Oregon. You and me.”

He moved closer to her, ran his thumbs over the medallion of braid in the center of her forehead while his wide hand held her chin steady. “I like the way you braided this little piece. It’s like a tributary finding its own way out of the river of your hair.” His hand was on the back of her head now, his palm warm. She could smell the coconut-honey mixture smoothing her hair. “’Spect the larder cot isn’t needed anymore, wouldn’t you say, Mrs. Carson? That is, if you’d care to share my bed.”

“I would.” She liked being asked. And when he tugged at her
ribbons and led her toward his chest, his mouth bending to cover hers . . . she let him lead her forward.

She lay awake with the August moon shimmering as on a lake but through thin curtains. Davey snored beside her, contented, as was she. Who would have thought she might find joy in this cleaving together. She would discover more about this man she knew, but for now she could rest on his words of promise, like the vows they’d spoken. She had even said she’d obey him, but he had later assured her that he did not think of her as a slave needing obedience but as a wife wishing to please her husband just as he hoped to please her. This promise was respectful, new.

She tried not to wake him. She would gather new straw for this bed as they had both rolled into the impression his body had made through the years, sinking like a hammock in the middle. Straw stems broke down over time. She’d find the bed key and tighten the ropes as well. Now there were two of them and this bed needed
adjustin’
. She smiled. Like every other part of her life, she supposed, now that she had a husband.

He had surprised her with his tender loving. They whispered of where they’d come from, sent fleeting words of memories they cherished and dreams that might help them soar. Davey talked to her, told how he hated the patrolling and found discomfort with the men who didn’t. She shared her greatest losses, her sons, and he assured her between soft kisses and his thumb stroking her cheeks that this would never happen under his watch. And with those intimacies of the heart shared, their bodies had folded together like the wings of a great bird wrapping itself around its young.

In the days that followed, she cooked outside during the hot month, and over meals they ate on the plank table carried out onto the porch, giving them an evening breeze. Davey told more tales of his trapping and trading times, mixed with some brief memories of his father and a sweet mother and his brother named Smith he
rarely saw. Letitia talked of her midwifing, how grateful she was when she heard the cry of life. She gave him efforts of her cheese-making, asking his opinion. She didn’t tell him of the longing that she might still like a child of her own, born to a free woman.

Summer turned itself into the colors of fall, and Letitia dried vegetables and fruits, saving seeds, planning now for the trip they’d make next spring. Davey looked over his stock, choosing the seven steers he’d train to the yoke. He had thirteen loose head they’d drive west. In the cold months he planned to butcher beef and the hogs, which they’d smoke to preserve. He’d cure tobacco for trade. Davey tapped a pipe now and then but didn’t chew, and Letitia told him she was glad for that. “I disliked cleanin’ the spittoons at the hotel.” She shivered in disgust.

Letitia sewed, making pantaloons for Davey and buying calico for shirts with her earnings. At night, she knit stockings and socks. For herself she bought wool and flax, planning on two dresses which Davey assured her was all she’d need for the trip. She’d use her tow dresses until then, and wear layers of petticoats she could tear into rags for bandages and for her monthlies along the way. She wasn’t much of a seamstress. She knew that. But on Saturdays she carried the wool Davey got for her from a neighboring farm to the pastor’s house, and with his wife they’d spin and weave and stitch. The subject of her relationship with Davey was never raised, the silence expected. It was safer that way. Letitia did wonder if she’d find someone to stitch with once they reached the territory and if she’d ever be able to share the musings of wives with another. Perhaps she would be alone always, even with a husband she couldn’t claim in public. But his actions toward her carried love like a gentle breeze and he could keep her safe. That was what mattered.

Letitia found the box not much wider than her palm behind the boardinghouse stable. Should she ask if she could take it? It was in the junk heap with old wheels, frayed rope, a broken crock
pot, and other miscellaneous discards. Already someone decided it was worthless. She could take it and not be in trouble, couldn’t she? Moisture settled on her upper lip. Sometimes gifts arrived, her mother had told her, and one must learn to receive. Her dismissal at the hotel had been a gift in the end, giving her more time to prepare for the journey. This little box was a gift too. She would go to the blacksmith who repaired wagons and reworked wheels. He’d have a small piece of lumber already smoothed. She’d use that for the false bottom and her papers would be safe. When Davey wrote out his promise to care for her and leave any property to her, she’d put that paper there with her free papers. Now she was set to head West.