With a grimace, she looked out at him striding back toward the wagon. Trying to figure out how to deal with both her feelings and reality was going to be the hardest thing she’d ever done. Trace leaned his head back into the wagon and looked at her sitting there, still in the blankets. He studied her face before he quietly asked, “What’s wrong?”
She didn’t understand what he was asking. “What do you mean?”
“You don’t look very happy all of a sudden. Is something wrong?”
Thinking about that for a minute, she wondered how to answer that. Everything was wrong. How could they have such a nice morning and then just plan to walk away from each other? But then that had been the plan all along, so maybe nothing was wrong at all, but she was incredibly sad about it anyway. But what to tell him?
Theirs had been such a sweet and simple friendship and she had always felt comfortable talking to him, but she felt a little foolish telling him she wanted to stay with him when he went on to California. Finally, she just decided to be matter-of-fact about it all. She shook her head and admitted, “Nothing’s wrong, Trace. I’m just going to have a terribly hard time telling you goodbye in a few days.”
She changed the subject. “What did you say to Many Feathers?” The brave had lost no time in heading straight out after Trace’s tongue lashing. She smiled. “I don’t speak Indian, but that sounded suspiciously like swearing from here.”
Trace chuckled and climbed back into the wagon, slipped off his boots, began to pull his pants on, and put on his shirt and coat. “I’m not admitting anything to you, girl. He got my point, I’m sure. It probably won’t dissuade him from wanting you, but at least he knows I’m not considering his offers by any means.”
He put on his hat, dug in the pocket of his coat, and donned leather gloves. “I’m sorry. I may have ruined your dress last night. At any rate, it will probably never be the same after that storm. It’s still soaked and sitting on the floor up by the seat with your petticoats. Be sure and dress warmly. Pneumonia wouldn’t be out of the question after what you went through last night. Stay snug here and I’ll bring you some breakfast.”
He went to climb back out and she put a hand on his arm to stop him. “No, Trace. I’ll get up and get the breakfast and bring it to you. You do whatever else needs doing. I’m fine.”
“Giselle, everything out here is covered with ice and completely waterlogged. It’s going to be a chore just to get a fire going. Stay down and rest while I see to it.”
She reached into a satchel to find underclothing. “No, Trace. We’re in this together. I tire easily sometimes, but I’m fine and we need to hurry. I’ll rest when we’re on the trail.” She tried to make him understand. “I want to be honorable, Trace. I need to be part of this trip, not just a burden. I’ll be careful, I promise. If I don’t feel good, I’ll tell you.”
She slipped a chemise over her head and began to lace it up. He looked at her steadily for a minute and then nodded. In a gentle voice he said, “All right, Elle. But you promised. And you have to rest when we get going. Agreed?”
“Agreed. Do you, by any chance, know where my boots ended up?” She started rooting around under the quilts and then looked up when she caught him watching her with quiet eyes. “What?”
He shook his head. “Nothing.” He reached into the corner of the wagon and drew out her boots and began to feel inside them to see how wet they were. “They’re still a little damp. Do you have any others you can wear?” She met his eyes and nodded without answering. “Good. Let these dry for the day here in the wagon.” He was still watching her with unfathomable eyes as he hopped out of the wagon again. “I’ll get the cow milked.”
When she made it out of the wagon fully dressed and started to pull wood out from under the wagon sling, he was surprised. “I wish I’d known that wood was there last night. I didn’t realize you’d put any down there. I didn’t even try to start a fire in that wet. I might have been able to get you warm faster.”
She looked up at him and then said, “Then I’m glad you didn’t know it was there.” She turned and went to finish starting the fire while he just stared after her for a second.
Trace thought about what she had just said and then he turned and went to do his own chores as well, but he couldn’t get that comment out of his head. What had she meant? The whole time he milked and fed, hitched up and rearranged the wagon, he tried to figure out what she had inferred by that comment, but the only thing he could come up with was that she was glad he had ended up skin to skin with her instead of using a fire.
He was so confused about it that he finally just asked her outright when he helped her back into the wagon box. She gave him a shy smile and then was frank in her sweet, Dutch accent. “Waking up next to you was much nicer than the fire, Trace. I must be honest.” She looked at him with those bright eyes and he was more confused than ever. She was pretty forthright with him. Why was he having such a hard time figuring out what she was thinking?
The weather was remarkably clear considering how nasty the storm had been. The ice melted off and even the sucking mud began to dry up by early afternoon. They left the river valley and entered a wide plain of low, rolling, sagebrush covered hills that stretched to the western horizon. He was glad the weather had calmed because there was nothing to break that bleak wind out here if it picked up. He drove the hours away, thinking.
There were a number of things on his mind and the day seemed to fly. He had all but given up on catching the other wagons. Their tracks were still days old and they would be clear into the valley long before he and Giselle could make up the distance. He thought about her and how he felt about her for hours, and when he couldn’t figure out what to do with those feelings and their situation, he tried to put her out of his mind and ended up thinking about the journal he had been reading those days ago.
Josiah and Petja’s thoughts and beliefs had been enlightening, the more he learned of Giselle and her character and honesty, the more the Mormon beliefs intrigued him. She was smart and sharp as well as being kind, hardworking, and honorable. He had to wonder what would so touch her about her religion that she would give up what she had and put up with what she had to pursue it. When she leaned over the wagon box after lunch and hesitantly asked if she could get up now, he was grateful for her company. There were a thousand things he wanted to ask her.
All the rest of that afternoon and into the evening as he drove he asked her questions and she answered him. He wanted to know both about her religion’s beliefs and what she and the other Saints had been through to get to where they were. By the time he stopped the wagon when it was too dark to see where they were going any longer, he knew much more about the Mormons and had even more questions than when they’d begun talking.
There was no shelter of any kind and they made dry camp with only the wood that was still in the sling and sticks from the sage brush bushes. The sage smelled terrible as it burned and their dinner tasted a little like it, but they were hungry enough that they didn’t even care.
Trace had wondered that day if going to bed that night would be uncomfortable after their interesting night the night before, but he should have known they’d be fine. They were good enough friends and were tired enough that bedding down was completely normal. They prayed and snuggled up to each other and as they drifted off, he asked her what a
flanel bord geschiedenis
was.
She sleepily tried to explain the idea of a story stuck to a board covered with flannel and he laughed. No wonder she’d been more comfortable. He held her gently, wishing that he didn’t feel like such a flannel board story in his long handles himself. Last night had been an eye opener for him that way as well. He would never look at long underwear the same again.
Waking in the dark the next morning was reality compared to the heavenly morning before, but the feel of another storm in the air had them both up and moving immediately anyway. The clouds had kept the frigid, cold temperatures at bay, but the damp, biting wind more than made up for it with its icy chill. They raced through chores and breakfast and Trace began hitching up in record time. Giselle finished packing the last of the camp gear and was gathering the eggs and feeding the chickens when she heard Trace begin to cuss the rogue mule. It always seemed to pick the days with questionable weather to act up.
She came around from the back of the wagon with five eggs in her skirt just as the mule began to raise a ruckus as Trace went to finish hitching up. As he leaned to hook the trace on the single tree, the mule reared and rammed into the harness. The free end of the single tree swung and the iron hook on the end of it slammed Trace in the side of the head before he could jump out of the way.
He went down like a rock. Giselle dropped her eggs and ran to try to calm the mule before Trace was trampled to death or run over by the dragging wagon. After several minutes, when the mule had settled down enough that she dared leave its side, she went to him and was horrified to find him still out cold, lying literally between the mule’s hind feet and the front wheel of the wagon.
Praying like never before, she took hold of his leg and tried to pull him out of the way. She couldn’t believe how heavy he was as she struggled for all she was worth to budge him even a few inches. It took her almost ten minutes and several prayers to find the strength to move him enough that she wasn’t terrified the mule would kill him with its fool antics.
With him moved, Giselle hooked up the offending trace and then wondered what in the world to do next. She went to Trace and began talking to him and patting his face. She even brought water from the bucket to splash on his face in hopes of making him come to. He didn’t even flinch and she stared at the first huge, fat flakes of snow that began to fall sideways from the force of the cold wind all around them.
The snow falling on his face didn’t faze him, but it made her feel an incredible fear in her heart. She had hardly even been able to move him. How was she ever going to get him into the wagon and head on towards the valley without his help? For the first time, she was facing this journey without his stalwart strength beside her and it scared her. It scared her a lot.
Trying to push back the fear, she dropped to her knees there beside him and told the Father about her troubles and fears, how she needed to hurry to get across this wide expanse of rolling sage hills to find shelter so that they didn’t all freeze to death in this exposure. She begged for his help and then sat with her head bowed as she finished to listen and absorb the sweet peace that her prayer had brought her.
It was as if her Father in Heaven was gently telling her that she needed to pull herself together and have faith that she could handle whatever she needed to with His help and her work. After sitting for a minute, she studied the situation in front of her and tried to think things through. The first thing she needed to do was find a way to get Trace into the wagon and then find someplace to get out of the weather and wind as soon as she could.
The only idea that she could come up with to get him into the wagon was to hook ropes to the hoops that held the wagon cover and somehow lift him in. If she used her grandfather’s pulleys from his tool box, and ropes in a couple of places so that she didn’t have to try to lift all of his weight at once, she hoped she would be able to do it. She set to work, unlaced the wagon cover at the back of the wagon and rigged up the ropes and pulleys.
She had to try maneuver the wagon to where she could get him lifted up without accidentally running over him or getting him stepped on. He was lying there in the falling snow without even a slicker, and she got a canvas tarp and covered him with it until she was ready to lift him. She got out his slicker and put it on herself and then rolled up the sleeves several inches to try to make it less cumbersome to work in.
As the storm grew in intensity, she prayed again and picked up the mule’s lines and began the delicate process of moving the wagon around to where she could lift him into the back. Praying all the while, it seemed to take forever to maneuver it to where she thought she could lift him. She set the brake, tied off the lines and jumped down.
Her hands were already freezing as she began to rig up the ropes to him, wishing that she had a pair of leather gloves like he had to work in in this wind driven snow. She kept reminding herself of the reassurance that her prayer had brought as she struggled to untangle her ropes and pulleys and get ready to lift Trace. She hooked one rope over his thighs and one around his shoulders and finally began to pull with all of her might. She was discouraged to tears when she could lift him only a few inches with one rope, and she found that she couldn’t tie it off to go pull on the other without it slipping and letting him fall back to the ground. She tried time after time to no avail, and at length, dropped to her knees to pray one more time for inspiration.
Upon saying amen, she resolutely wiped at her tears and climbed back up into the wagon to dig through her grandfather’s tool box in hopes of finding a magical fix to her dilemma. She was so busy digging that at first she didn’t hear Dog growl until he started to snarl in earnest. She dropped the lid of the tool box and was just about to scramble to the flaps of the wagon cover when they were brushed abruptly aside. Dog was still raising a commotion and suddenly Many Feathers’ head appeared inside the flaps.
She gasped in panic, but then she realized that he was holding Trace. As she met his eyes, he unceremoniously lifted him and dumped him roughly over the side of the wagon box into the bed below and ducked back out of the flaps. Hurriedly, she went to Trace and wiped the snow and water off of him as best she could and pulled their bedding up and over him snuggly. Then she went to climb out of the wagon herself.
As she reached the opening, she met Many Feathers again. He handed her the coiled ropes and pulleys without expression and bent to fold and roll the tarp and handed her that as well. Without a word, he turned and walked to his horse and mounted and then turned towards her as if he was waiting.