Then suddenly she froze. A face in the crowd was turned toward her. It was Joshua! His mouth dropped open as he recognized her, and for a moment their eyes locked. She ducked her head, the shock taking her breath away. “There he is!” she cried in a hoarse whisper.
Newel raised his head. “Where?”
Jessica couldn’t resist. She went back up on her toes to see if she had been mistaken. She gasped. He was coming toward her, pushing his way roughly through the crowd, face as grim as though he were death itself.
Jessica spun around. “He’s coming!” she hissed. “He’s after me!” She looked around wildly, seeking escape.
“But I thought—,” Newel Knight started, but before he could finish, Jessica plunged into the crowd, elbows up, pushing her way through with urgency. “Jessica, wait!” he called.
But the crowd had swallowed her up, and so Newel plowed in after her.
By the time Joshua reached the opposite side of the square, Jessica was nowhere to be found. He searched quickly, scanning the hundreds of faces. Nothing. Disappointed, he slumped back against one of the buildings.
“What is it, Joshua?” Clinton Roundy had come up to join him.
“I saw Jessica.”
Roundy’s jaw dropped. “Here?”
“Yes!” Joshua looked at Roundy, then rubbed a hand across his eyes. “I wasn’t going to hurt her. I just wanted to ask about Rachel.”
“All right, men,” Joseph said quietly, “I don’t want anybody firing unless I say. Just keep your guns ready.” He walked along the line, touching their shoulders momentarily.
The men of Zion’s Camp were standing in a half circle around the edge of a bluff that had been formed by two different branches of the Fishing River. Below them, at the fording place across the main stream, five heavily armed horsemen were crossing and starting up the hill toward them. Beyond that the land stretched out in a flat run to the Missouri River, about two miles south of them. The wheat fields and cornfields of early summer provided a rich patchwork of various shades of green.
Nathan stood next to Joseph’s young cousin, George Albert Smith. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw George A. lick his lips, then wipe first one hand and then the other on his trouser legs. Nathan did not smile at the boy’s nervousness. Suddenly his own throat was dry, and he found himself breathing a little more rapidly. His stomach also felt as though he had eaten something that disagreed with him and was thinking about parting company with it. He had heard men talk about the “taste of fear.” Now he knew what they meant.
The bluff was not an ideal defensive position, though it held the only high ground in the vicinity. But their wagons had broken down again and again during the day’s march, and they had not made Liberty as they originally planned. So Joseph had picked this site, and they had made do. Now there were armed men approaching. Only five, it was true, but they certainly wouldn’t be so brazen as to ride into an armed camp unless they had more men somewhere behind them.
As the horsemen approached the line, Joseph spoke quietly again. “Hold steady, boys. If they want trouble, we’ll give it to them, but we’ll not be starting it.”
Nathan swallowed, then swallowed again, trying to ignore the squeezing sensation in his gut.
The five riders topped the hill and pulled up a few yards short of the line. They were mean looking, bearded and unkempt. One swayed unsteadily on his horse, and Nathan guessed they had all been drinking, probably a lot.
Lyman Wight—general commander of the camp, and a man of considerable courage—stepped out from the line, his rifle cradled in one arm. “That’s far enough,” he said.
“This the Mormon army?” one of them sneered.
“What do you want?” Wight demanded.
The man looked up and down the line with contempt. “You mean this is it? This is what we’ve been hearing about for over a month now?” He threw back his head and laughed raucously.
Joseph stepped between the line of men and came forward to stand next to Wight. “If you have business with us, I suggest you get on with it. If not, I suggest you leave.” He spoke with mildness, but there was a hardness along the line of his jaw that Nathan could clearly detect.
The man’s face twisted with anger. “Oh, we got business with you, all right,” he said. “Our business is to see you in hell before morning.”
Another man leaned forward in his saddle and spit a stream of tobacco juice at Joseph’s feet. “Know this, Mormon,” he muttered. “We’ve got two hundred of the best boys of Jackson County at Williams Ferry. They’re coming across the river now. We’re goin’ to meet them, then we’ll bring them back here.”
“And there’s seventy men coming from Liberty, and sixty more from Richmond,” cried another one of them. “Before mornin’, we’ll have four or five hundred men here. Then we’ll show ya a thing or two.”
Nathan felt his stomach plummet.
Four or five hundred!
That was double their number.
The one who was apparently the leader of the five horsemen grinned evilly. “We got cannon too! That’ll let hell know you’re coming.”
Lyman Wight looked up at them calmly. “When you think about it, I guess you boys would know a lot about hell, now, wouldn’t you?”
The man next to the leader uttered a curse, and his hand grabbed for the pistol jammed in the belt of his trousers. Instantly a hundred rifles and pistols jerked up. There were several sharp clicks as hammers were pulled back.
The leader’s hand shot out and he grabbed the man’s arm. “That’s all right, Eb. Let it go. We’ll have our fun soon enough.” He wheeled his horse around. “Come on, boys, let’s go get the others and show these Mormon boys how to die.”
Howling with glee, they set spurs to horseflesh and went hurtling down the hill. For a long moment, no one moved. The riders crossed the river ford in a grand spray of water, disappeared for a few moments in the trees, then reappeared again. They skirted a cornfield, then cut south toward the dark line of green that marked the bottomlands of the Missouri River.
“Joseph,” somebody finally said, “we can’t fight them here. We’ll all be killed. I say we march quick time to Liberty.”
Lyman Wight whirled around. “Liberty, my fat eye!” he cried. “Let’s follow that scum to the ferry, and catch the lot of them while they’re crossing the Missouri.”
Another man turned and looked toward the east. “If there’s men comin’ from Richmond, we could be trapped. Ambushed.”
Brigham Young snorted in disgust, as several men swung around and anxiously scanned the prairie. “Don’t matter much which direction they come from. We’ll be ready.”
The camp erupted. Everyone started talking at once, some calling for action, others for prudence, others for full retreat. Suddenly Joseph raised his hands. “Brethren,” he called. “Brethren, please.”
Immediately the noise died away and the group fell silent.
“Brethren, let us remember that we have come here in response to God’s commandment. We are here on his errand. We have a right to his protection, and protect us he will.”
He turned and gazed out over the broad expanse of prairie, his eyes grave and his face filled with solemnity. “Brethren, stand still and see the salvation of God.”
For several moments, the men stood around, a little bewildered, expecting more from the Prophet than that. But he finally turned to them, smiled, and walked back to his tent. After a moment, others began to disperse, and the tension started to die.
About five minutes later, as Nathan was cleaning his rifle, there was a cry off to the left. He looked up. One of the pickets was standing near the edge of the bluff and pointing toward the south. With a lurch of fear, Nathan leaped up and ran, along with others, to join the man. What he saw sent the adrenalin pumping through him all over again. From the Missouri River bottoms, about two miles away but clearly seen in the bright sunshine, a large group of riders had broken out of the trees and were coming directly toward them. There were thirty men, maybe forty. Instantly, the fear was back. The first ferryload of men was across the Missouri!
As men jumped for their weapons, and pandemonium broke out in the camp, there was another shout. This time it was Orson Hyde who was pointing, only now it was to the west. “Look!” he cried, his voice tinged with awe.
Nathan swung around. In the western sky, where just minutes before there had not even been so much as the wisp of a cloud, a small dark cloud was forming. Even as they watched it billowed upward and outward, doubling in size in less than a minute, then doubling again.
No one moved. The riders to the south were forgotten. Every man, woman, and child in the camp stood rooted in place, watching the heavens darken with a speed that was both frightening and eerie. In less than five minutes the sun was blotted out. In ten, the dark clouds filled the entire western sky and rolled toward them with astonishing swiftness.
A little chill shot up and down Nathan’s spine as he watched. The thunderheads were literally exploding upwards, towering mass building upon towering mass, the underside as black as night itself. The band of clouds was spreading in every direction, and coming toward them rapidly, unrolling like some massive black scroll. He had never seen anything quite like it before.
Several men jumped as a jagged shaft of lightning streaked downward, forking out to hit the ground in several places. A moment later there was an ominous rumble of thunder. “See to your tents, men,” Lyman Wight hollered, “there’s a real gully buster coming.”
Joshua Steed had his back to the west as he helped the ferry operator get the lines straightened out and the raft ready for the return trip. He cursed steadily and passionately, including in his tirade every Missourian who lived south of the river in Jackson County.
They had ferried across the first load of men and wagons with no problems. But five men who had already been to the Mormon camp were waiting for the new arrivals, and began hollering and bellowing about where the Mormons were camped and how few they were. Before Joshua could stop them, the men from Jackson County had jumped on their horses, whipped the wagon teams into action, and thundered off, leaving him and the ferry operator shouting after them.
The raft was a big one, made of long logs lashed together, with boards nailed over them to provide flooring. It had brought across the river two wagons and more than thirty men, so it was heavy enough that one man couldn’t get it launched again without help. It would be no easy task for the two of them, Joshua and the ferry operator. But no one had thought of that. Not one of the stupid idiots had paused long enough to consider that if they didn’t get the raft launched again for the next group, there wouldn’t be enough men to cause the Mormons any more than a minor sweat. And so he cursed as he tugged and shoved the big raft.
“What the...?”
He straightened. The ferry operator had turned and was looking across the river where a dark shadow was moving swiftly across the face of the muddy water. It was moving faster than a man could run.
Joshua whirled around to the west, and his jaw dropped open. Now it was he who was stunned. A massive thunderhead darkened the whole western sky, like a wall thrown up by some fantastical giant. Even as he watched, a shaft of lightning flickered between two of the massive thunderheads, lighting up the dark underside of the cloud mass for a moment.
Joshua stared, dumbfounded. As the ferry was coming across, some of the men had been bragging about having the “Mormon business” done by nightfall. Joshua was more realistic than that and had looked to the west to check the sky, thinking in terms of a night battle. He had grunted in satisfaction when he saw that the sky was perfectly clear. That had not been more than five minutes earlier. Maybe ten. He passed a hand across his eyes, his mind refusing to accept what his eyes were telling it.
“Balls afire!” the ferry operator gasped. “Would you look at that!”
That jerked Joshua out of his trance. He whirled. “There’s a storm comin’!” he shouted. “Get that ferry back across the river.”
The man backed up a step, still staring towards the heavens.
Joshua grabbed him roughly. “Hurry, man! We’ve got to get the rest of the men across before it closes in.”
Finally the man leaped into action. He raced to the tree where the line secured the raft, undid it, then jumped onto the raft and began to pull on the rope with all his might. Joshua waded in to his ankles, giving the ferry one last shove so that it cleared the grassy bank. Across the river—which was close to a hundred yards wide at this point—a man leaped to that end of the rope and began to pull in rhythm with the first. The raft slid out into the water, it’s tail swinging around slightly as the current caught it.
Joshua saw a man, near the landing, waving frantically at the others on that side. Several leaped to the rope and began to pull now too. There was a soft sighing above him, and Joshua looked up. The air had been perfectly still until this moment; now the leaves and branches above his head were starting to stir. Even as he watched, the breeze stiffened and started to blow, bending the branches back.
He swung around, amazed at how rapidly the wind was rising. Even as he did so, it picked up in velocity again. It was blowing straight out of the east, which caught the raft broadside. Now the wind and the current fought for dominance over the ungainly craft.
“Pull!” Joshua screamed. “Hurry!”
The ferryman’s hat went sailing out over the water. He made a wild grab for it just as a heavy gust caught the raft and jerked it around sharply. The man lost his balance and nearly pitched into the water before he was able to steady himself on the ropes.
Across on the far side, Joshua saw someone cup his hands to his mouth. There was a faint shout, but it was snatched away as quickly as Joshua heard it. Above him now, the wind was howling through the treetops, and the great trunks creaked back and forth in protest. The water was fast getting very choppy, and the wind was starting to whip the tops of the waves into a fine spray. As Joshua turned to check the western sky again, the first raindrops stung his cheeks. They came slashing in, nearly horizontally, feeling like pebbles being hurled against his face.