Chapter 18: Back on the Trail

 

May 28, 1847. Two days lost. I have no memory from late Monday until yesterday morning. It took all my strength to write home—told Mother I’d been ill, but not how bad, nor that I had an angel watching over me.

 

Mac’s hands shook, and the wagon jarred over rocks and clumps of Indian grass, so he stopped writing. Jenny had been an angel—a soft hand on his forehead, a gentle voice urging him to drink. She’d kept him alive.

“Your young wife took good care of you,” Doc told him. “Better’n most of the older women. Now you take care of her and your child.”

How could he care for Jenny when he would return to Boston in the spring? He couldn’t take her with him. Not after what his mother had done to Bridget—his parents would never accept Jenny.

Jenny was strong, as he had said. But she needed someone to protect her. If Mac left, would Zeke marry her? The notion stuck in Mac’s craw, but maybe it would be best. When he left her in Oregon, Mac decided, he should tell her to find a good husband. In the meantime, she needed to act like Mac’s wife, not make eyes at Zeke.

The small caravan reached the North Fork of the Platte at midday noon and stopped to eat. “We follow this branch all the way to Laramie,” Zeke said when he called the noon halt.

“Do we have to cross the river?” Jenny asked.

“Not now,” Zeke said. “Pa said stay on the south side.”

Mac struggled out of the wagon, managing to keep upright. He couldn’t work, so sat on an upturned bucket until Jenny had dinner ready. Doc said he could eat solid food, but after a few bites of meat his stomach churned. He climbed back in the wagon, wondering if his dinner would stay down.

Mac tried to sleep as the wagon rocked through the afternoon. When they stopped, he looked out. The sun was still high. “What’s the hold up?” he asked.

“Zeke called it a day,” Jenny said. “Folks are feeling poorly. One man’s vomiting again. Doc thinks we’d best stop.”

Mac slept until evening. When he awoke, Jenny had soup ready. “Doc says to eat something easy. Or you might relapse, too.”

He drank the soup slowly. It went down better than the meat at noon.

Jenny hovered over him. “I can make some mush,” she said. “If you’re still hungry.”

“No, thank you. I’d best not.”

Mac pulled out his journal and wrote:

 

May 28, 1847, evening. I have no strength. I’m no help to anyone. We’re on the North Platte, stopped at Spring Creek. This branch of the Platte is cleaner, more sand than mud. How can we make up our lost time?

The next day, Saturday, the group got underway slowly. The few healthy men in the party were worn out—standing guard at night and doing heavy chores by day. Mac watched Zeke, Tanner, and Doc haul water and hitch wagons, while he sat, not even able to help Jenny cook.

He complained to Jenny, but she said, “You get better. That’s your chore for today.” Still, his patience grew thin, and he snapped when Jenny coddled him.

While they traveled, he dozed in the wagon. Jenny tried to make conversation. He grunted in response. After a while, she was silent.

Later, through his fuzzy brain he heard her say, “Who’s Bridget?”

“Huh?”

“When you were fevered, you called for Bridget. Who is she?”

How much should he tell Jenny? “A girl I knew in Boston. She’s dead now.” The words hurt to say.

“Were you sweet on her?”

“I guess you could say so.”

The wagon jerked along. Then Jenny asked, “How’d she die?”

“Fever, I think. That’s what I heard.”

“You aren’t sure?”

“No.”

“How’d you meet her?”

“She worked in my parents’ home.” He frowned. He didn’t want to talk about Bridget.

“A governess?”

“A maid.”

More silence. He could tell Jenny was trying to puzzle out what Bridget had meant to him. Bridget wasn’t any of Jenny’s concern, but maybe if he explained she would drop the subject. “My mother found out we were ‘sweet’ on each other, as you say, and dismissed her. I was away from home. I never saw her again. I later heard she died.”

“Oh.” Jenny paused. “I’m sorry. Sorry for your loss.” Then she was quiet.

Mac slept. At noon he roused long enough to eat, then dozed again. In midafternoon the wagon stopped, and Zeke called, “We’re halting.”

Mac stuck his head out. “How far have we come?”

Zeke shrugged. “Far enough. It’s a good place to camp. I got to hunt, if’n we’re going to have meat.”

“Damn. I feel so helpless. Let me get my rifle. I can at least stand guard while you’re gone.”

“Can you stay awake?” Zeke grinned.

“I’ll manage,” Mac said.

That evening Mac wrote:

 

May 29, 1847. Another short day. Still too weak to be much use. I could barely hold my rifle steady while healthier men hunted. They only shot small game—we’re past the buffalo herds. I am determined to drive the wagon tomorrow. Jenny looks weary.

But Sunday Mac shivered in the cool morning air. He forced himself to tote buckets to fill the water barrel, then had to rest.

“I’ll be more help tomorrow,” he promised Jenny.

“Don’t push yourself,” Jenny said, as she stirred porridge. “Won’t do us any good if you relapse.”

After breakfast Mac climbed on to the wagon seat and took the whip. Jenny frowned. “Can you drive?”

“For a while.”

She clambered up beside him. “Tell me if you get tired.”

He lasted about half the morning before his legs and back ached. “Think I’ll lie down,” he said. He napped the rest of the day.

In camp that night he wrote:

 

May 30, 1847. Can’t seem to get enough sleep.