When, some days later, the man returned for his clean and well-ironed garments, Martha eyeballed him directly and announced that she, too, would be coming along. She deliberately did not ask, but he, with equal deliberation, did not respond. So once again, Martha informed him of her decision, and only now did he put down the clothes and begin to explain why this would not be possible. He advised Martha that this was to be a long and difficult journey, with at least twenty wagons, and they would have to cope with what the Indians called ‘crazy weather’, both blizzards and heat. Martha simply stared back at the man, forcing him to continue. ‘We’ll be following stream beds most of the way, but you never know.’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘And we’ll likely be called upon to walk, for the wagons will use every ounce of space for food, water, tools, and so on.’ Martha found herself borrowing courage from this conversation, the way she had seen some men do from tequila. ‘My role will be to cook for you,’ she said. ‘I won’t be a burden, but I don’t have no savings.’ She went on, assuring him that she knew about wild and dangerous country, and had many times seen horses and oxen shot that had broken their legs, and watched as the trailriders made soup out of their hides and bones. She claimed that she had been aboard wagons that had fallen clean apart, that she knew sagebrush and sidewinders like they were her kin, and the shifting sands and whirling dust of the cactus-shrouded world would suit her just dandy. ‘I’m afraid of nothing,’ said Martha, ‘least of all Indians or hard times. Colored folks generally got to be obligated to white folks to get clear to California, but you colored pioneers are offering me a chance. You let me work my fare out and I’ll cook, wash clothes, and powerfully nurse to the sick and ailing. And I ain’t fussy about sleeping on no bare ground. I done it plenty of times before, had the beaten hardness of the earth for a bed and the sky for covering.’ The man looked blankly at her, but Martha, anxious that she should not be fooled, pressed on and asked after him when they proposed leaving. ‘The day after tomorrow,’ he said, his voice low, his expression now one of confusion. ‘I’ll be ready,’ said Martha, tearing at her apron. ‘And you just tell your people that you done found a cook.’ He smiled weakly, then turned and left, his arms laden with clean laundry. My daughter. The energy of youth once more stirred within her. I know I’m going to find my child in California.
But the woman who now stood above Martha, casting pitiful glances, was not her daughter. Eliza Mae? ‘I’ll leave you now,’ she said. ‘But you must expect to receive me in the morning.’ You must expect to receive me? Did she mean by this to suggest that Martha had some choice over their arrangement? That she could, if she so wished, choose not to receive her in the morning? Martha watched the woman back slowly out of the cold room. Thank you. She left Martha alone. Sickness had descended upon her and she was unable to respond. Martha felt the sadness of not possessing a faith that could reassure her that, having served her apportioned span, she would now be ushered to a place of reunion. She looked through the cracked window-pane. Dawn was some hours off, back east, approaching slowly. To be reunited. The town of Denver was mantled in a deep snow, the arms of the trees sheathed in a thin frost, the same thin frost that enveloped Martha’s faithless heart.
The evening sky is streaked with red and yellow. I watch as the sun prepares to go down beneath the horizon. To my left, there is panic. Voices begin to climb. A pioneer has broken an ox by driving it too hard. It has to be slaughtered, but at least there will be fresh meat. He ignores this commotion and stands before me with frustration written across his face. I know that I have slowed down their progress. It is this that he wishes to talk with me about. He rolls a cigarette, his fingers clammy and stiff, and then he gestures me to rest upon the hide-bottom chair. He is a man who speaks as much with his hands as his voice. I had noticed this when he first came in with his bundle of flannel shirts and coarse pants. ‘Well?’ This is his beginning. I know what will follow. I look beyond him. A storm is working its way across the land. My old ears can still hear the dull rumbling of thunder.
Six weeks ago we set out across the open prairie, dust clouds rising, the noonday sun at full strength, a party of seventy colored people walking to the side of our wagons. The wagons were drawn by six oxen trained to work in pairs, animals which have a tendency to skittishness, and as such they initially frightened me. The first and rear wagons were attended to by experienced drivers, but the rest were handled by we pioneers. The idea was that I should cook for all those without family, mainly bullwhackers, all men, and this I tried to do, rustling up bacon and salt pork and any game or beast that the men might happen to shoot along the way. I made sure each wagon had ample amounts of flour, sugar, coffee and rice, and a plentiful supply of ten-gallon water kegs. Other provisions and equipment in my charge included vinegar, soap, matches, cooking utensils and field stoves. But it was never easy. Before dawn, the freezing wind ripped through our clothing and right into the marrow. At noon, and early in the afternoon, the sun often caused us serious discomforts, made worse by the type of clothing that we wore. Heavy pants and flannel shirts for the men, and high-necked, long-sleeved, dark dresses that wouldn’t show the dirt for the women. At night, we drew the wagons into a circle, and camp fires were built, meals cooked, and tales told of white expeditions where cruelties were often inflicted upon colored men and women.
The wagon train soon settled into a routine where one difficult day seemed much like the next, and where there was no discernible change to the uniform landscape. However, I felt myself growing weaker, and I tried in vain to diguise my ailments. Some days we covered ten miles across the dry grass, some days twelve or fifteen, depending upon repairs or the weather. We saw Indians, and I felt some sympathy with them, but the Indian bands kept their distance and watched, choosing not to make anything of their encounters with the dark white men. Except on one occasion, when a column of a dozen warriors, at their head a chief, rode out towards the train. Behind them came the squaws, some with papooses slung across their backs, and all around them yapped pitiful-looking dogs who would in time become food. The chief halted, as did the wagon train, and he dismounted. By means of facial expressions and gestures, he made it known that we could pass in peace. I watched as our leader rewarded him with sugar and tobacco, and he in turn was rewarded with grunts of approval. Our only other visitors were the dark, shaggy buffalo who moved at such a slow pace that it was difficult to make out their progress. Our leader, forbade the men, who were tiring of my pork, to stalk and hunt these monsters, informing them that should they be spooked and stampede, they would happily trample all before them. The occasional deer or game bird was the only alternative to that which we carried aboard the wagons.