“Please, Ruth, the girls,” Betha cautioned.
“They can hear it. The word meant ‘a woman who was complete unto herself, who was neither the property of nor dependent on a man.’ Not a brother, husband, father, or son. Just herself.”
“That's a strange thought, Ruth,” Esther said as she leaned over the boiling water to see if the dragonflies and other critters swimming there were dead, then strained the liquid into a tin cup.
“It was a definition in Greek and Roman times,” Ruth said. “When virgins sacrificed themselves to heal wounded nations. Their sacrifice made no difference; but that they could make every decision about their lives, life or death, made them fully complete.”
“Wasn't Mary a…one of those?” Mariah asked.
Mazy said, “Of course God would select a woman complete, one able to make the choice to accept what was offered her or not. To be willing.”
“Interesting to ponder,” Elizabeth said.
“And she took it,” Sister Esther said “Made the decision to bear the Messiah.”
“I never thought of her having a choice about it,” Mariah said.
“Its a precious gift, the ability to choose,” Suzanne said.
“But we always can,” Mazy said. “No matter what, we can always choose what's important and how to act to make that happen.”
“As we must now. What we take and what we leave behind,” Esther said.
“I'd adjust that definition a smidgen,” Elizabeth said. “Mary was dependent, just not on anyone earthly.”
Mazy found Suzanne crying, the dog asleep at her feet. His ears perked up and he stood, his tongue hanging out, ears partly up, his face happy when he saw his master. She scratched his ears.
“Must be Mazy,” Suzanne said, wiping her eyes. “Pig has a certain sound for you.”
“I'm glad I'm unique to him,” Mazy said. She buried her face in his fur. It smelled of smoke and leather. She sat down beside Suzanne. “I can sort your things, unless Zilah has,” Mazy said.
“Just feeling sorry for myself,” Suzanne said. “The sewing machine has to stay, I know. I don't even mind except that it was Bryce's last insistence to me. And the camera and the musical instruments. They're such heavy things. I wondered if maybe they could be lowered over separately and put back in afterwards, but Elizabeth said no, this was really the first of many crossings and how we prepared ourselves for this one would be a portent to the rest.”
“Mother sud portent?”
Suzanne laughed. “My word.” She removed her dark glasses, dabbed at her eyes. The corneas of both eyes were scar-crossed pits. “Its as though I keep reliving the loss, not just Bryce's death, but my accident. Every time change drops by and wants to be fed, I wonder if I'll have enough or if it'll eat me out of house and home.”
“Griefs ravenous, isn't it? I suppose that's where the emptiness comes from, and we keep trying to fill it with…food and blame, irritations and what all. Keeping busy.” Mazy chipped at a spot of dried beans clinging to her apron, picked at her torn nails. She patted the dog who had lain down between the women. “We have to throw out things that get in the way of our going forward.”
“I know,” Suzanne said. “It's just so painful.”
“I wanted to plant something at Jeremy's grave,” Mazy said. “But it wouldn't have grown.” Suzanne fumbled across the dog for Mazy's hand, squeezed it. Mazy felt the tears well up, spill over onto the dog. “Letting go of things in order to fill up. It's an essential I hadn't really thought of.”
Mazy woke to the soft strain of a troubadour harp's strings. The artist was accomplished. She chose a mournful Irish tune, and the singer's voice skipped up, low note to high. “He's like the swallow that flies so high. He's like the river that never runs dry. He's like the sunshine on the lee shore. I love my love and love is no more.”
Mazy woke her mother, and the two of them raised their heads to peer outside the tent. Moonlight filtered across a heap of chairs and chests, and barrels, Lura's table, Tyrell's anvil and small bellows, even a spare wagon tongue. A parasol lay there too, and pottery pots. A camera and sewing machine and the blanket chest that had belonged to Mazy's grandmother. Mazy hung on to a photo album, a few clothes, a small chest of blankets, and Mrs. Malarkys seeds in her decorated gourd. She'd dumped the Cassville dirt.
The crescendo of the harp's plucked strings brought an orchestra to mind The conductor was key. He—or perhaps she—helped all those independent musicians play together, bring their gifts to the same song. How could she do that herself? Respect what each could give and yet make of them a moving composition?
Mazy scanned their gathering. Ruth lay on her stomach in her tent, arms crossed but head raised to the song; Betha and Lura stuck their faces out of their wagon, one over the other. Even Tip ton stepped down, shivering in the cooler mountain air, but drawn to the plunk and blend of harp strings. Adora slipped out behind her, wrapped a shawl around the girls thin shoulders. The Asian women, every one, knelt, eyes closed in concentration. Sister Esther towered above them in her nightdress, her nightcap pulled over a long braid cascading down a shoulder. The singer moved on to a tune they all knew, “Down in the Valley,” and they sang as one, all together. Only the children slept, and that was as it should be. These were women sharing and preparing for a crossing, God willing. Women, together, complete unto themselves.
20
sason's song
Mazy watched Suzanne as she stepped back into her wagon. She stopped halfway. Her back arched, and she dropped down beside the discards.
“Somethings wrong,” Mazy said to her mothers turned back. Mazy scrambled out, her bare feet cool on the damp ground, doing the calculations, her hands clammy with knowing. “Is it early?”
Suzanne shook her head, reached out, then gripped Mazy's hand. “No. Just not now, I didn't want it now, before we crossed the mountain.” She gulped in a breath, held it, then exhaled in a moan “I'm scared,” she said. “So scared.”
“We're all here together, Suzanne. That's how we'll get through it.” ”Out of the way, Pig,” Elizabeth said behind her. “This is one you'll have to let us handle. Birthing's as natural as wind.” The dog whimpered.
“Find his sock,” Suzanne said. “He likes Bryce's old sock.” Elizabeth laughed. “Not put in the discard pile, I'll wager.” His whining roused Zilah, who was dispatched to find Pig's sock, and then the others rose, their breaths puffs in the air as the starlit night dissolved into sunrise.
Surrounding camps began to stir. Wagons beginning the ascent passed the women by, word reaching them of a baby making its way to the world. That a baby was being born gave an unexpected lift, joy wrapped inside dusty uncertainly New meanings scrubbed away the past. Life continued. Here arrived a baby as proud proof
“Who'd a thought we'd use our skirts for more than the necessary circle?” Betha said, standing in front of the tent opening to protect Suzanne's privacy. Pig lay in front of her with his wide paws crossed over a dirty, knotted sock.
“I hope nothing goes wrong,” Lura said, looking behind her.
“It is of the LORD'S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not Lamentations 3:22,” Esther said.
“I hope he's got lots of those compassions,” Lura said. “We seem to be needing them.”
“The next verse says ‘great is thy faithfulness.’ So I believe we have nothing to fear I will boil water now. For hyssop tea,” Sister Esther said. She walked the short distance to stir the fire and gather up her tea caddy.
“She doesn't know there's no real use for hot water till after the baby comes,” Betha said, “and then just to clean up.”
“Heating kills those squiggly tails at least,” Adora said, approaching. “I'll be most grateful for well water once we reach the West.”
“Straining bugs with every swallow. I'll remember this trip for that, if nothing else,” Betha added.
“Now we can remember it for a birthing,” Mazy said, crawling out of
the tent. “A new beginning, everything going as planned.”
“Still so many fearful things,” Betha said. She swatted at flies.
Mazy surveyed the landscape, inhaled a deep breath. “I don't ever want to fear the face of tomorrow,” she said, “or put features there that ache away the hope.”
“Who you talking to?” Ruth asked Mazy later in the morning.
“Jennifer.” Mazy scratched at the wide bone between the cow's horns. The cow lifted her head, pushing against it as though to make Mazy repeat the scratching.
“Good-natured, at least,” Ruth said. “We could start yoking animals around the base ofthat mountain. Maybe figure out how to get the bees there.” She lifted the bucket of milk Mazy'd set aside from Mavis. Not much there.
“Everything in its own time. I think that was one of the things I was meant to learn here, to stop trying to push it all into my time, and trust I'm not alone in it. We'll get the wagons over, the bees moved. I feel it. Besides, we need the celebration of this birth.”
“Bringing a baby into this world may not be wise,” Ruth said. She swatted at the dust on her pants with her felt hat and looked away.
“What eats at you, anyway?” Mazy asked her.
“ ‘Who?’ is the truer question,” Ruth said. “But Im not sure you'd like to know, not really.”
Mazy heard something in Ruths voice, saw the clenched jaws, the protected eyes shadowed by the felt hat. She wanted to think of the joy of the birthing, but something in Ruths posture, the challenge in her offer, told Mazy that this was Ruths moment to stretch.
“Lets see if Esther has her tea caddy handy, and you can tell me what you will.”
The women dropped leaves in their tin cups, and Esther poured hot water over them. Then the two, one dressed this morning in bloomers and the other in her husbands buttoned pants, sat off to the side.
“I'd tell it as a truth or lie, but no one would believe it. And it would be more…painful spoken there.” Ruth sipped. “He's been released. May be right behind us. My husband,” she said to Mazy's questioning eyes. “He's served five years for the death of our son. I was the witness against him. He's coming after me.” Her hands shook around the cup. “Oh, he's charming, always in awe’ of me until I gave birth and the baby…died. Zane said I was as guilty—I didn't get up when I should have, to save my baby. So he's right. I should have gone away as soon as he was sentenced, but I couldn't. I kept putting it off, the leaving. Maybe as penance.”
“I assumed your interest in horses drove you west.”
She nodded. “I wanted to escape…to follow…I'm as bad as Suzanne,” Ruth said, shaking her head. “Starting out and not finishing thoughts”
“I think Suzanne's coming out ofthat, getting clear inside her mind.”
Ruth took a deep breath.
“Jessie's my daughter That's what drove me west.”
Mazy s heart skipped a beat. Her mind raced back to the love she'd seen in Ruth's eyes when she gazed at the child, the love and the longing. “How hard for you,” Mazy whispered, the ache of her own loss piercing She swallowed. “I didn't know.”
“Good. I don't want anyone to know. I came in part to win her back, to tell her that I was her mother, who gave her up to save her. But I don't believe I can. Not now, not after I see all that Betha is to her. And then she'd have to know about her father, and why…I let her go And that I didn't save…I'm not sure she could forgive me.”
A pink dawn had blushed its way across the camp, washed up onto the western mountain, revealing a straggle of wagons. They caught the shouts of men and women and animals straining their way up. Mazy heard anticipation in their banter, doing it all together, strangers helping strangers, turning them to kin.
“My mother's always told me that forgiveness begins at home, not that I listened,” Mazy said. “We seek it, receive it, and savor it, and it turns into love. Then, we can give it away”
“It's too much to forgive,” Ruth said. “My son died by my inaction. I hoped Jessie might forgive, someday. Now I'm not sure if I want her to ever know. I'm constantly arguing with myself about something, about whether the truth is helpful or harmful, whether to stay with her or leave them be.”
“Whether to forgive yourself.” Mazy paused. “If you'd like,” she said, surprised at her own offer, “I could pray that you'd know.”
Ruth's breath vaporized in the morning air. “I don't think anyone has ever prayed for me,” she said. Her jaw unclenched “Maybe not that youVe known about,” Mazy said. “Not something folks talk of much. Do you ever pray?”
Ruth coughed, fidgeted, brushed at her pant leg. “A few weeks back, when we rounded up the stock, after the storm, something strange happened. I prayed, that Mariah and I…that we'd go unseen by one of the Sioux warriors. And it was so odd, but he didn't see us. I…it couldn't have been an answered prayer, though. I would have felt something, some power, wouldn't I? All I felt was relief.”
“An answer,” Mazy said. “Relief from worry and fear and hurt feelings and frustration and misery and guilt, all there.” She wondered if she was speaking to herself. “I suspect you could be forgiven, too, Ruth, for still loving your children's father.”
Ruth swallowed and tears pooled in her hazel eyes. “It's that obvious?”
“I think we're destined,” Mazy said. Ruth looked at her, such large, disquieting eyes. “We're drawn by…difficult men, you and me. Now there's a truth I'd rather not confess to. I wish it were a lie. Jeremy wasn't always…forthcoming. I don't even know how much I don't know about him. It's strange to love someone who could be two people almost.” She sighed and wondered if sighing meant she was hanging on or letting go. “Don't suppose that'll change until we figure we're worth someone different, worthy by ourselves.”
They heard the baby cry then, born worthy all at once.
“I want a word that means joyful,” Suzanne said, holding her son in her arms. Her fingers explored the child, his ears and nose. Zilah hovered over her, and from a pottery dish marked with dark shapes drawn on the butternut bowl Naomi handed her, she took a damp rag and wiped Suzanne's forehead with sweet-smelling herbs.
“Sason,” Sister Esther told her. “It is a Hebrew word that means rejoicing, gladness, joy that comes from the Lord.”
“Sason. Lovely. Musical and strong. With his father s middle name. Sason Bryce Cullver.” She repeated the name to her son, her fingers memorizing. “Let me see your face, Sason,” she said. “Let me see your face.” She looked up, and Mazy realized she did not have her glasses on. “Describe him, Tipton, would you?”
“Dark hair, like yours,” Tipton said. “And a mouth that's perfect and lifts upward at the ends. Bright blue eyes, the color of a spring morning. Your nose. Looks like he's got everything, all his fingers and toes He's so alert,” she said then in wonder. “Just watching you and your face, your eyes. I didn't think a baby could be so watchful, so early on,” Tipton said.
Elizabeth had wrapped the boy in a portion of quilt, but Tipton handed over now a fringed shawl the color of snow. She'd taken it from the single trunk still remaining in her mother's wagon.
“That's your best shawl,” Adora said, pushing against her daughter's hand. “You'll need it when we reach—”
“It's a gift, Mother,” Tipton interrupted, extending the cloth. She tucked the silky alabaster wrap around his tiny face, and the baby cuddled into the cloth. “See? He likes it Look at how he stares at you, Suzanne.”
Suzanne clutched at her eyes then, patted around for her glasses.
“No. Let him see you,” Mazy said. “You're beautiful. He knows.” She thought of something “Let's plant a columbine seed in Sason's honor. I'll get my seed gourd, grab up a handful ofthat Wisconsin soil, and plant it in a cup. You can plant a new one every year, no matter where you are, and when they bloom, you can think of us.” Suzanne nodded her approval.
Jessie made her way over then, shy behind Betha, holding the cup while Mazy retrieved dirt and pressed a
seed deep inside.
“First time I ever saw you holding back,” Betha said, pulling the girl into her skirts.
“He won't break,” Suzanne told her. “Bryce always said they don't break unless left untended.”
The girl stepped forward. “I got the seed,” she said and ran a small finger over the baby's forehead. Clayton squeezed between the women and came to lean into his mother, pushing Pig to the side.
“Meet your brother,” Suzanne said, and she lifted the toddlers hand and placed it like a summers leaf drifting, caressing the baby's head. “Feel your brother's fuzzy hair?”
“Fuzzy hair?” he repeated.
A thin scar marked the spot where Jumper had struck Claytons head. Mazy thought it a miracle he walked and talked and laughed. Sason was a miracle. She looked around. They were all miracles together, in one place.
Lura made up a batch of hot cakes and bacon, and Clayton ate his fill. Then he led Naomi and Deborah, and they clustered around Suzanne suckling her baby. Behind them rose the final discards from their lives back home including a tidy stack of men's clothing bearing the sign: “Please take.”
We needed this time of rest, Mazy thought. This pushing, pushing doesnt make the gains that stillness does Perhaps it was having something to celebrate first that gifted them with vigor. She would try to remember that, to look for moments of gratitude and joy and convert them into fuel to propel her through difficult days.
Deborah turned to the group. “I tell bees of baby,” she said. “They rest.
“Praise the Lord,” Sister Esther said, lifting her eyes and hands to the heavens.
“Bees go way if not like you,” Deborah told her. “They—”
“Choosy about their traveling companions,” Mazy said.
“Aren't we all?” Betha laughed.
“Or should be,” Adora said, stretching as she walked toward the newborn baby. Zilah walked with her wide, flat-footed gait to hand Adora a cup of hot coffee, her eyes lowered as she made the offer. “If truth be known,” Adora said, taking the cup, “we couldn't have selected a better crew than what got chosen for us.” She sniffed at the coffee. “I do believe I can almost smell this brew,” she said. “Now, wouldn't that be a miracle?”