Chapter 19: Thunderstorm

 

Jenny found Mac yoking the team early Monday morning. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“What’s it look like?”

“You feeling all right?” His dark hair hung lank against an ashen face.

“Better.”

“You should eat.” She hurried to boil coffee and make biscuits.

After he yoked the oxen, Mac sank down beside the fire and drank the coffee. “I’ll drive,” he said.

“You sure?”

Mac nodded. “Valiente needs a good ride. Take him out. He knows you now. Do you both good.”

“I’ll ask Zeke to stay close.” She was afraid to leave Mac alone, but it would be a pleasure to ride. The warm sun promised a lovely day.

“Sure, Miz Jenny,” Zeke said. “But stay within sight of the wagons.”

Jenny saddled Valiente. The horse pranced and tossed his head as she walked him beside the wagon. “He wants to run,” Mac said. “Go on.”

She clucked at the stallion, and he sped across the high prairie. Dust rose in puffs as Valiente’s hooves pounded the sparse grass. Jenny had paid little attention to the scenery in recent days. Now she saw mountains far to the west and odd rocks rising on the plateau.

She let the horse run, but kept the wagons in sight. When Valiente slowed, she turned him around and started back at a walk. How lonely and small their wagons looked in the distance. She would feel safer when they caught up with Captain Pershing and the others. Jenny missed Esther and even gruff Mrs. Pershing. She wondered whether Esther had enticed Daniel into proposing.

Mac said he’d been sweet on Bridget. He hadn’t said much—he must have loved Bridget so deeply he couldn’t speak of her death now.

Why had Mac left Boston? He said he wanted to see the West, but perhaps he was running away from losing Bridget. Jenny wondered if anyone would ever care about her so strongly. She felt so alone, friendless and unloved.

Her baby kicked and rolled in time with the horse’s pace. But the baby was no companion, it was a worry. A tear trickled down her cheek.

Jenny dismounted when she approached the wagons and walked Valiente over to Mac. The horse nickered when he saw Mac.

“Have fun, boy?” Mac reached out to stroke Valiente’s mane. “Did you go far?”

Jenny gestured. “To the top of the hills. There are some enormous rocks beyond. Big as buildings.”

“Zeke said we’d be seeing stone formations.” Mac stared at Jenny’s face. “You been crying?”

She swallowed hard. “A little.”

“Did you write your mother at Ash Hollow?”

“Nothing to say.”

“Not even that you’re doing well?”

Was she doing well? “I’ll write when the baby comes.”

Mac frowned. “Your decision.”

They traveled slowly until midafternoon, when Zeke called the halt. Jenny was glad for the early stop—Mac’s face looked ashen after driving all day. She fixed supper, then sat beside their wagon writing:

 

Monday, May 31st—We travel slowly. Mac tires quickly and barely eats. I hope he regains his strength. Silly of me to be sad today. No sense in fearing what lies ahead. I cannot change it.

Tuesday morning was sunny and warm again. Summer would come soon, though the night on the high plains had been cold.

“How do you feel?” Jenny asked Mac. His face had better color today.

He smiled. “Almost like new.”

She fixed bacon and biscuits. “Bacon’s almost gone. No fresh meat left.”

Mac took the plate she handed him. “Need to hunt soon.”

“Shouldn’t you wait until we’ve caught up with the others?”

“Need food now. I’ll talk to Zeke.” Mac walked off and returned shortly. “We’ll stop early this afternoon again. Hunt before supper.”

“Then rest this morning. Let me drive.”

Mac scoffed, but she insisted. She smiled when she later heard him snoring in the warm wagon.

She stared ahead, imagining what the shapes in the distance might be. For days, there had been little on the horizon but grass-covered hills. The huge formations she’d seen yesterday now loomed beside them. The few healthy children in their group ran to climb the rocks. One stone was larger than a castle in a fairy tale, Jenny thought.

“That’s Courthouse Rock,” Zeke said, as he rode beside her wagon.

“I thought it was a castle.” She pointed at the apex, laughing. “There’s the turret, where the princess lives.”

“Some folks call it Castle Rock.” He smiled. “Guess you can call it what you want.”

Zeke stopped them at Three Bluff Springs, and the hunting party set out, leaving Doc behind as a guard.

“Do you think Mac’s all right?” Jenny asked Mrs. Tuller while they talked and sewed.

“He’ll improve. Give it time.”

“He thinks he’s well now, but he tires so easily.” Jenny shook her head.

Mrs. Tuller laughed. “Men think sickness ain’t manly. But nature has a way of letting ’em know their limits.”

When the hunters returned, Mac slid down Valiente’s shoulder and staggered. “One antelope and six birds,” he said. “Think I’ll go sleep.”

“What about supper?”

“Not now.” He tottered toward the wagon.

After she ate, Jenny sat beside the fire and wrote:

 

Tuesday, June 1st—Hunting tuckered Mac out. He takes on too much and won’t listen to reason.

The next morning heavy skies forecast rain by midday. And by the look of the clouds, maybe hail. “Best keep the wagon cover closed today,” Jenny told Mac.

Mac grunted as he hitched the oxen. He didn’t eat much breakfast, even though she urged him.

“I’ll ride Valiente,” he said. “You drive.”

Jenny nodded. “Keep your coat with you. It’s going to rain.”

As she drove, Jenny watched Mac and Zeke ride along the wagons. Mac hadn’t taken his coat, and she was sure it would rain. She feared his health would relapse.

The animals were restless through the humid morning. A terrier tethered in one wagon howled whenever the wind whistled through a loose flap of canvas. Jenny watched the clouds billow and churn, as dark as any she’d seen in Missouri. Black enough for a tornado.

They stopped at noon on the bank of a small creek. Jenny pulled pots and food out of the wagon. Just as she started a fire, huge raindrops splatted the ground. She stowed her provisions back in the wagon, then rushed to help Mrs. Tuller do the same.

“Coming down in buckets, ain’t it?” Mrs. Tuller said.

“Yes, ma’am. Have you seen Mac? He doesn’t have his coat.”

Mrs. Tuller waved toward the other wagons. “Saw him not long ago.”

Jenny retrieved Mac’s coat and went in search of him. She found him at the Tanners’ wagon. “Here,” she said. “Put this on.”

Mac was already soaked. “I need to tie this cover down,” he said, but he shrugged his arms into the coat sleeves.

It started to hail. “Mac, come get in our wagon. It’s too stormy.”

“I have to finish. You go on. Take Valiente and tie him up.”

“Mac, please.” She pulled on his arm.

“Jenny, I can’t. Take Valiente.” He turned his back to her.

She ran with Valiente and tied him behind the wagon. The stallion whinnied when lightning forked to the ground. The oxen, still in their yokes, bellowed. Valiente stuck his head into the back of the wagon and flinched with every hailstone that struck his quivering hide.

Ice tore a hole in the wagon cover. Jenny spread her buffalo robe over their food. She cowered beneath the heavy skin as well, while thunder rumbled through the skies.

The hail didn’t last long. Soon Mac returned, shivering in his wet shirt and sodden coat.

“What were you doing out there?” she asked, handing Mac a towel.

He stripped off his coat and shirt and dried himself while she found him another shirt. “Had to secure the camp. Zeke can’t do it all. Sat in Tanner’s wagon when it hailed, but I was already wet.”

Jenny clucked over him and handed him dry trousers. “Here,” she said, turning her back while he changed.

It poured all afternoon, forcing them to stay in the wagon. Mac shivered, though Jenny put her buffalo robe around him. “When it stops, I’ll make soup,” she said, as she stared into the gloom.

Mac tried to repair the gash in the wagon cover from the inside, but the water dripped on him faster than he could close the gap.

“Leave it,” Jenny said. “We’ll fix it when the rain stops.”

As daylight faded, the rain slowed enough to prepare supper. Jenny used coals saved in a bucket and a few sticks kept dry in the wagon to start a smoky fire. Then she made a broth from antelope meat. Mac drank it slowly.

That night Jenny heard Mac groaning in the tent where he slept. When she went to check on him, his forehead burned with fever.