His eyes are dark circles. His shoes are covered with wet dirt, and his sleeves are rolled up to the elbows. He’s been up all night digging his wife’s grave. My joy at finding Andy dissolves like a drop of water on a hot frying pan. Instead of yanking away my hand, I give his a reassuring squeeze. “I’m so sorry, Reverend Lowrey.”
“Don’t be,” he says earnestly. “The Lord taketh away, but he also giveth. Finding that boy was a blessing.”
He turns away, and finally, Jefferson and I can take the saddles off our horses and rub them down. Dawn bruises the horizon. It’s been twenty-four hours since the stampede woke us up. I could use a hot meal, though I don’t know that I could stay awake long enough for someone to cook it.
“It’s like we’re heroes,” Jefferson says. “Did you see the way everyone looked at us?”
I certainly saw the way Therese looked at him. I suppose he earned it. “Thanks for coming with me.”
“Of course. You’d have done the same, if I had asked.”
Yes, I would have.
He tosses his saddle under the wagon, and he pauses, thinking. “Mr. Joyner says if we ever need anything, all we have to do is ask. I bet he forgets by tomorrow.”
“I bet you’re right.”
We give our horses some oats and fresh water and lay out our bedrolls. For the first time since we set off from Independence, I’m asleep so fast I don’t even see Jefferson’s head hit the pillow.
“Hey, Lee.”
I jump awake from the deepest sleep, heart hammering.
It’s Henry Meek, leaning down toward me. His eyes are red-rimmed, his beard ungroomed, for once. “So sorry to wake you, Lee,” he says. “But can you come to our wagon? Jasper needs some help, and he says it’s got to be you.”
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Chapter Twenty-Five
Jefferson mutters something, rolling over. I clamber to my feet, yawning, and follow Henry. The angle of the sun indicates late morning. At least I got in a couple hours of shut-eye. I’m not the only one late abed—the camp is silent and still as a graveyard as Henry and I wade through cold campfires toward their wagon.
Tom stands outside, hat twisted in his hands.
“I’m really sorry about Athena,” I say. “She was a good cow. Everyone liked her.”
A muscle in his jaw twitches. “Everyone liked her butter,” he says, not meeting my gaze. He indicates the wagon with a tip of his chin. “Jasper needs you in there.”
I push aside the flap. It’s warm and bright inside. An Argand lamp hangs from one of the bows, and two candles rest on the front edge of the box. It’s a fire waiting to happen, and I’m about to say so but speech leaves me.
Jasper leans over Major Craven. The Major is in a bad way. He’s pale and dry with fever. His trousers have been removed, leaving flannel drawers that are cut off at the knee. The bandages wrapping his broken leg are yellowish brown with pus and blood.
I flash back to Frank Dilley offering to put him down.
“I . . . I can’t do anything here,” I say before he even asks.
Jasper reaches over to clasp my wrist. “His leg has to come off if we want to save his life. I need your help to amputate it.”
“Get Tom or Henry.”
“Absolutely not,” says Henry. “The one time my father tried to show me how to butcher a hog, I passed out cold.”
Tom shakes his head. “I tried, but I vomit every time I get close enough to smell it.”
I yank my hand free of Jasper’s grip. “Get Jefferson. Or Mr. Robichaud. Or any of the other men.”
Major Craven raises a cadaverous hand toward me. His voice sounds far away. “I . . . want . . . you.”
“He says you’re good luck,” Jasper says. “You got help for him right away after the stampede. You went out and found that missing Joyner boy.”
“You’re . . . blessed . . .” the Major says.
Right about now, I feel a little cursed.
Jasper whispers so low I must strain to hear: “Doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. He wants you here, and a hopeful, cooperative patient is about a hundred times more likely to pull through.”
“Oh.” It’s hard to say no to a man who wants you to help save his life.
“We have to do it soon,” Jasper adds. “So the Major can spend his fuel healing up his broken ribs and other wounds. He can’t move his toes anymore. The wound hasn’t stopped seeping blood, not even after I stitched it up. And now it’s infected.”
“The shock could kill him,” I whisper.
“…heard that . . .”
“He’s going to die, anyway—slowly, and in a lot of pain. If we amputate the leg, he has a chance.”
“I’ll take it. . . . Even a small . . .”
A knot of fear is forming beneath my breastbone, and I swallow against it. “What do you need me to do?”
“Be my assistant. Hand me the tools I need, when I ask for them. Do what I tell you.”
“All right.”
“Thank you. Now, go wash up—scrub with soap and hot water. Tom’ll show you. Do you have a clean shirt to put on?”
“I’m going to get all bloody! Why would I ruin a clean shirt?”
“Dr. Liston—the man who invented that splint I used—He’s shown conclusively that clean hands and clean clothes mean clean wounds, and that means less infection.”
It’s been weeks since I did laundry. “I don’t have any clean shirts.”
“You can use one of mine,” Henry says from outside the wagon. “Put it on over the other one. I’ll wash it when you’re done.”
“Thanks,” I say, relieved he doesn’t expect me to change in front of them.
“I’ve boiled some water for you to scrub with,” Tom says. “And I’ve got a fresh bar of soap.”
Jasper turns to the Major. “I don’t have any ether. It’s going to hurt bad.”
The Major closes his eyes tight. “Just . . . do it.”
I pause at the edge of the wagon. “The Joyners,” I say. “They have laudanum. Would that help?”
Jasper’s eyes widen. “That would ease things considerably.”
“I’ll be right back.”
I hop down and dash across the circle to the Joyners’ wagon. Jefferson is still curled up beneath it, snoring softly. I peek inside the bonnet. “Mrs. Joyner?” I whisper.
“Lee?” she responds blearily. “Everything all right?” Someone murmurs beside her, and she says, “Go back to sleep, darling.”
“We’re about to amputate the Major’s leg,” I tell her. “Jasper says it’s the only way to save his life. Could you spare some of the laudanum?”
She hesitates before saying, “Mr. Joyner needs it.”
Mr. Joyner must be sicker than I realized. “It would be a real blessing to the Major right now.”
A soft sigh. I hear rustling, the sound of a trunk opening, a slight thunk when it shuts again. “Here.” Her hand thrusts from the bonnet, holding a small glass jar with a cork. “Bring back whatever’s left.”
“Thank you so much.” I grab the jar. The skull-and-crossbones label gives the recommended dosage: only one drop for a three-month-old baby. Surely something suitable for babies isn’t truly poisonous?
I jog back to the college men and hand the bottle to Jasper.
“Hallelujah,” he says, popping the cork. “All right, Major, two full swallows, but no more, or that leg will be the least of your worries.” He holds the bottle to the Major’s mouth, so he can sip it. “That’s good. I need to scrub my hands again. We’ll be back in a minute, and it will be over before you know it.”
We climb down and find that Tom has set up a wash area with towels and soap and fr
esh water. I take off my hat and splash hot water on my face to wake up my eyes. Jasper starts scrubbing, and I follow his example.
“You ought to think about coming to San Francisco with us, Lee,” he says, rubbing suds all up and down his arms.
“Why’s that?”
“Gold mining is hard work.”
I laugh. If only he knew.
He grins. “Seriously. People work hard for gold, but they spend it easy. They might as well spend it buying services from the likes of us. Plus, I’ve seen how you look at Jefferson sometimes—You’re one of us. Scrub under your nails. That’s where the worst dirt hides.”
“You sound like my mama,” I say, but I clean under my nails, one at a time, making each one gleam. “What do you mean I’m one of you?”
“A confirmed bachelor. San Francisco is a new world, with more money than laws. There’s a place for us out there. To live the way we want to live, without interference.”
He looks up to gauge my reaction.
“I . . .” Tom and Henry are staring at me too, waiting to see what I’ll say.
Jasper must trust me completely to be so frank. Or maybe secrets have a way of making people so lonely that they eventually take a risk on someone.
“Do you want to get married someday?” he persists.
And never have anything of my own? “Lord, no. But . . .”
I shut my mouth. I have thought about marrying Jefferson. All because of that fool-headed proposal, which he probably wishes he could take back.
“So you’re a confirmed bachelor?” he says.
My heart kicks in my chest. Jasper is on to the fact that I have a secret or two; he just hasn’t figured out what they are. Maybe I could trust him. Maybe I’m lonely enough to take a risk on someone.
The Major groans in the wagon, and I realize Jasper has been distracting me from the unpleasant task at hand.
“We must work quickly,” Jasper says. “Dr. Liston can amputate a leg in two and a half minutes. I won’t be that swift, but speed is of the essence. The faster we cut, the better his chances.”
It’s a good thing I didn’t stop for a bite of breakfast.
Henry returns with his best shirt. At Jasper’s instruction, I lift up my arms, and Henry pulls it on over my head, so I don’t have to touch it. Henry is much taller than I am, and his shirt hangs on me like a dress.
He steps back to check me over, and his eyebrows go up. Jasper is also studying me; a tiny grin quirks the edges of his mouth.
My heart is suddenly pounding like a herd of buffalo. I resist the urge to check whether Mama’s shawl wrapped around my chest has come loose. “Um . . . into the wagon now, right?” I say.
“Yes, of course.” Jasper climbs inside, with me on his heels. Tom helps us up by the elbows, so we don’t have to touch anything. There’s hardly room for the three of us, not with the Major stretched out.
“Stay on my right, near the Major’s head,” Jasper says. “I’ve got all my tools laid out. Knife, saw, towels, needle. Hand me whatever I ask for, but don’t touch anything I don’t tell you to. If the Major tries to jump up, you hold him down.”
“Ain’t gonna jump,” the Major slurs. His voice is less pained, thanks to the laudanum. I hope that’s a good sign.
“First, we tie down his wrists,” Jasper says, looping a rope around the Major’s wrist and tying it to a bolt in the floor. He indicates that I should do the same on the other side.
“How tight?” I ask.
“Loose enough that he still has blood flow, tight enough that he doesn’t punch me in the nose when I’m cutting through the bone. Sure wish we had leather buckles. His wrists are going to be a mite sore afterward.”
I do as Jasper asks, while he quickly ties down the Major’s good leg. He props the broken one up on a wooden box. My heart is racing, like I’m the one who’s going to be cut.
“Bite down on this,” Jasper says, reaching a leather-wrapped bit toward the Major’s mouth.
Craven turns away his head. “Just be careful how high you cut,” he says. “I might want to use some of those parts later.”
“I won’t cut any higher than your knee,” Jasper says. He fits the bit into the Major’s mouth. “I’m tying a tourniquet around your leg. This is going to pinch, but it’s got to be tight.”
The Major nods.
Jasper works quickly and efficiently. “Are you ready?”
The Major squeezes his eyes shut and nods again.
“God be with you—with us all,” Jasper says. “Knife.”
I hand him the hunting knife, handle first, then I concentrate on the Major’s face, so I don’t have to see what else is going on. I’ve butchered deer, sure, but the Major is a man, and alive.
I wince at the sound of the blade biting into flesh. The Major clamps down on the bit and grunts. His shoulders curl, and he starts to rise up.
“Hold him!” Jasper snaps.
I press his shoulders back down until he stills.
“Saw,” Jasper says, and puts the handle of the bloody knife in his mouth, between his teeth. I hand him the hacksaw. The scrape of metal on bone makes the hair on my neck stand on end.
The Major’s nostrils flare as he pants through his nose. Tears leak from the corners of squeezed-shut eyes. “You’re doing fine,” I tell him, though I have no idea if it’s true.
The sawing goes on and on, and bone dust fills the wagon, making the air smell like a wet dog. The Major shakes his head back and forth. He cries through the bit, kicks out with his bad leg.
Jasper spits out the knife. “Hold it down,” he says. “Hold it down so I can finish!”
I grab the Major’s thigh with both hands and press it down. Jasper goes at it again with the saw. I turn my head away as a strange squealing sound leaks from the Major’s lungs. Jasper picks up the knife to make a few last cuts, but I refuse to watch. With a heavy thump, the leg falls off the box and onto the bed.
“Needle,” he says. I hold the leg down with one hand, even though the Major isn’t kicking anymore, and grab the needle. It’s already threaded with gut. “Be ready to cut the thread when I tell you.”
I pick up the shears and wait while he sews. The tiny wagon smells of fresh blood now, which is a vast improvement on bone dust and sour flesh. The Major is as still as death. I peer close and am relieved to see his chest rise with a breath.
“Cut,” Jasper says.
I snip where he indicates.
“Towels.”
I hand him the clean towels, which he packs at the base of the Major’s stump. He wipes his hand on the last clean towel, and he pulls the bit from the Major’s mouth and checks his pulse.
“Well, he’s alive for now,” Jasper says. “You did good work.”
“Thanks.” I hardly did anything. Just held the man down and tried not to be sick.
We climb from the wagon to find Henry offering another pot of clean water. Tom stands beside him with a stopwatch. “Five minutes, twenty-seven seconds,” he says. “Nowhere near Liston’s record.”
Henry’s smile is squeamish. “But not bad for your first time.”
“Your first time?” I say. “I thought you said you were a doctor!”
“I said I want to be a doctor.” Jasper scrubs his hands again. Triumph fills his face. A man lays near death in his wagon, but Jasper is grinning from ear to ear. “That’s the exciting thing about California—We can all go there and be whatever we want to be.”
I peel off the white shirt and toss it back to Henry. “Well, if he lives, then I guess you really are a doctor.”
“What do you want to be, Lee?” Jasper says. His face is euphoric enough to make me wonder if he snuck some laudanum, but the look he’s giving me is pointed and strange, like he’s searching for a specific answer, one I’m not ready to give voice to.
“
Right now? I want to be asleep.”
All three laugh at that. Jasper says, “You know, you helped save two lives today.”
“And if I don’t lie down right now, I’m going to die.”
I can tell Jasper wants to talk more—he’s all wound up from what he’s just done, and I don’t blame him—but I can hardly stay on my feet. I make my good-byes and stumble away.
Jefferson is still asleep under the Joyners’ wagon. I flop down beside him, exhausted, but I can’t sleep for thinking about the preacher’s wife and little Andy wandering around lost and my own baby brother and the Major and even Athena the cow. Above it all rises the possibility, both wondrous and frightful, that the college men have realized I’m a girl. And they didn’t seem even a little bit angry.
When I wake, the Major is still alive. He does not die that day. Or the next.
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Chapter Twenty-Six
Summer brings blazing sun and hot winds. The horizon shimmers gold with long, waving grass all dried out and gone to seed. Above it is a sea of sky, crystal blue and stretching forever. The Missouri men insist we’re near the mountains, and indeed, our trail has a slope to it, so gentle you’d never know until you stop the wagons without braking them and watch them roll back a piece. For several weeks, we make excellent time, and on July 3, we make twenty whole miles in one day.
Frank Dilley is so pleased with our progress that he announces a half day’s rest to celebrate Independence Day. We roll out before the sun rises.
“I’m going to go ride with the Hoffmans,” Jefferson says after we’ve mounted up.
“Oh.” It’s such a pretty day, and I was looking forward to riding together. “All right.”
“Do you want to come?”
“I . . . Okay.”
My stomach is in a tangle as we approach the wagon. I know I’ve done the Hoffmans wrong, and I’m not sure how to make right. But when Therese sees me coming, she grins ear to ear and says, “Hallo, Lee!” And that’s that.