“Did the Willapa colony not provide for you then?” Louisa asked, surprise in her voice. “You married our Jack not for love but to provide for your sons?”

  “Of course they did,” Helena said. “I heard that my brothers had to come by all the time to milk Emma’s cows and tend to other of her chores.”

  “Not that they were asked to,” I said. They’ve been corresponding with Barbara. “Not that I didn’t appreciate that they did, though,” I hastened to add. “Some sugar cookies and tea? We’ll have supper before long, but I wasn’t sure what time you might get here or how many there’d be. Or even if you’d come this way rather than coming up the Wallacut River as you did when you brought Willie’s hearse.” I could have bit my tongue for mentioning that. “I meant, I just wasn’t—”

  “Well, don’t go saying that the colony here didn’t take care of things,” Helena insisted. She brushed lint from her skirt. She must have bought new traveling clothes. The cloth looked new.

  “People don’t always do so well after the loss of someone they love,” Louisa countered.

  “Things needed tending after Christian died,” Helena reminded.

  Do these women argue?

  “And then you had that new baby,” the third woman said. She had been introduced to me as Margaret. She kept her bonnet tied so tight around her throat it almost disappeared in the soft flesh of her neck. “So soon too. Was it even nine months?”

  My face burned. How could they think any such thing? That the Aurorans talked about me and my affairs shouldn’t have surprised me, the gossip and speculating, but I’d learned well that one knew so little, really, of what went on beneath another’s roof.

  “My son’s name is Christian,” I said. He looked up at the sound of his name. I smiled, shook my head, and he and Andy and Kate returned to pretending to look at my latest almanac, though I knew they stayed curious about these new arrivals. “He is his father’s son.”

  “Oh, I didn’t mean to suggest—”

  “I’m sure the Giesys did the best they could for you,” Louisa said. “But it is sometimes hard to tend to things when people live spread out as you are here.”

  “Ja, it’s much easier to help each other as in Bethel,” Helena said.

  “And Aurora Mills,” Louisa added.

  “Well, there too, though we’re still spread out more than at Bethel.”

  “And not so many niceties as back there either,” Margaret lamented.

  Dissention at Aurora?

  I hurried to place a plate of cookies on the table, set before them tin cups Christian had made, and brought out loose tea to strain. The hot water steamed through the fragrant leaves. Then I donned my shawl to fetch eggs.

  “The men can handle things, Emma. You don’t need to help them,” Louisa said. She chuckled.

  “Oh, see, she can’t be without her Jack,” Helena cooed. “You always did like to do what the men did. Heading west alone with all those scouts.” She clucked her tongue. Christian’s sister had never married yet acted like she knew all about men and women’s ways. Louisa hid her giggle behind her fingers.

  “I’m getting eggs,” I said. “So I can make Spätzel later.”

  “The noodles don’t take much time,” Louisa said, waving her hand in dismissal. “Wait here with us. Sit. Talk.”

  “I like to dry the noodles,” I said.

  “They take a time to dry in this damp weather. I noticed that in Aurora Mills, too,” Margaret said.

  “We adjust,” Louisa said. “That’s what we women do. You don’t have to go to such lengths for us, Emma. Just boil them like we all do. No reason to be fancy. Anyway, we don’t need so much to eat now. You rest.”

  “You must be tired, too, Emma. I notice you’re with child.” Helena nodded toward my burgeoning girth. Small-framed women always swelled early.

  “Oh?” The soft-fleshed woman adjusted her glasses. “You’ve a good eye, Helena.”

  “That’s why you didn’t respond to any of my letters,” Louisa said. She fanned herself with her bonnet as she sat beside the fire. “Just so busy with the children, a marriage, and now a little one. When is the child due?”

  I didn’t want to talk about my pregnancy nor anything else with these people. I wanted to leave to get the eggs. But I hadn’t been aware of any letters sent to me. In fact, no letters had arrived to me since Jack and I had married, which was odd now that I considered it. I didn’t want to face Herr Keil any sooner than necessary either, so staying to talk might be wise. Keil was the reason my life had become so grim, the reason I’d had to make so many decisions. Maybe those eggs could wait.

  “June,” I said, turning back to the room. “The baby is due in late June. And I’ve never received any mail from you, Louisa. Only my brother sent a letter from Aurora Mills telling me he was heading back to Bethel, and that was sent nearly a year ago.”

  “You were married in September or the summer then?” Helena said, holding her fingers up as she counted. So cheeky!

  “He and August left together,” Louisa said. “But I sent you more than one letter. I wonder where they might have gone.” Louisa rubbed her hip. I’d forgotten she had a limp. The ride must have been difficult for her, and the rain would just make it worse.

  I thought of Jack’s teasing me with the letters I had gotten before I became ill. No doubt he’d confiscated Louisa’s letters, read them, and threw them aside as “women’s missives” of little merit. I wondered who else might have written to me, offered me encouragement of sorts. Maybe my parents? Even my sister’s letters made me smile. They might not after I told her about Jack.

  “What news did you share in them? Do you remember? And yes, Margaret, we married September 16 to be exact, in Olympia.”

  “I just wrote that we missed you.” Louisa sat up straight. “And I told you that my husband realized his error in being so hard on Chris, on all the scouts who stayed to help build homes for us before we came out from Bethel.” Her words stopped my hand midair. Louisa brushed her fingers to smooth the hair on either side of the center part.

  “The doctor made no error,” Helena said.

  “He would not call it an error. Those are my words. But he’s realized the difficulty involved in building a colony in this vast country. I do believe he shared that with Chris, at least in the way men do that sort of thing, and that Chris forgave him his harsh words. Building up a colony in this landscape takes more hands than just to hold hammers; it takes hands to hold each other up. That’s why he so hopes those back in Bethel will come out soon and those of you here will find your way home to Aurora. He’s such a good, good man who wants the best for all of us.”

  She made her husband into some sort of saint. It was unlikely that Herr Keil would have had any real change of heart. Christian might have forgiven Keil, but Keil would calculate his apologies, especially if he saw some benefit to himself in it. Apparently there was, as Christian had since repaid the land debt. It was what had killed him. I looked at Louisa. She exaggerated her husband’s abilities, she so adored him.

  “Your parents might come to Aurora soon too, Emma. You could join them,” Helena said. She hadn’t noticed my absolute amazement at Louisa’s words.

  “I don’t think they’ll ever come west.”

  “That’s not what your father wrote to my husband,” Louisa said. “He said they would come to be of assistance to you, their widowed daughter. Of course they didn’t know then that you’d remarry so soon.”

  “It was almost three years,” I defended.

  “Ja, well, a bed gets lonely after a time with only one in it.” Helena said.

  “And you’d know of that how?” I asked.

  “Well, I just suppose.” The other women laughed and nodded their heads. Helena’s face took on a rosy hue.

  “They’ve already left to come here?” I changed the subject and knew my voice raised an octave because Andy looked up, a question in his eyes. “Why didn’t they tell me?”

  “Th
ey were going as far as that Deseret place, where the Mormon saints are,” Louisa said. “I worry over that because of the skirmishes there. The soldiers were called back to the States, so there’s little protection for outsiders.”

  “My aunt lives near Deseret. They’re just visiting, I’m sure.”

  “Ja, I know. They didn’t have mail service for quite some time, so it must have been hard for your mother to know how her sister was. They’ll be surprised when they get here to find you safely taken care of by Jack Giesy.” She sighed. “My Wilhelm will be so pleased that they’ve come to help him at Aurora Mills.”

  I’m not sure why this news stunned. Maybe because of the timing. Perhaps my brother had returned to Bethel to handle things and help my parents come out. But they would have written to me if that had been in their plans. I’d not gotten Louisa’s letters. I must have missed getting their letters as well.

  Their arrival would bless me and my children. Jack wouldn’t impose his threatening ways with my father present.

  “I suppose they’ll go on to San Francisco and then take a ship north. That’s what I did,” Helena said.

  “They could come up here to see you and then of course come up the Columbia later to settle in Aurora Mills,” Louisa persisted. “You’ll have to come too, Emma. Jack can bring you and we’ll be together again.”

  “Then they’ll be here by spring,” I said. I didn’t want to disagree with Louisa about their ultimate destination. I had no intention of ever coming to Aurora Mills or letting my parents settle there.

  “We don’t know when they left, you understand,” Helena said.

  “Just that they plan to. I think my tea is strong enough, danke.” Louisa put the strained tea on a plate I’d set beside each cup. I wished I had pretty teacups, porcelain, like the ones I’d seen in that shop in Olympia. My mother had lovely tea things. Maybe she’d bring them with her. I’d write to them, tell them of the marriage myself and welcome them to my home. Our home. If they hadn’t left yet. Jack would have to build them a cabin. He had to. Lou could heal here. Their presence would bring safety. Maybe with safety I’d let myself become Jack’s wife in truth and not just in demand.

  Herr Keil and the other men entered then, removing their capes and coats and brushing water from them. They stomped their feet, but the mud was always with us this time of year. I stepped back away from the door; the scent of wet wool mixed with tobacco filled the room. I said to no one in particular that I’d be back in a moment; I was going to get the eggs. My heart felt light as a feather with the idea of my parents on their way west, and I wanted to be alone to savor the thought.

  “Ach,” Keil said. “Jack. You go do that. We need some tea here for these men.”

  I didn’t look at my husband or Keil. I just stood at the door, sideways to them all, waiting for the explosion.

  “Brother Jack, you’re already wet.” Keil’s voice rang out in the small cabin. “You go now. Pick up those eggs and bring them back. Frau Giesy and I have much to catch up on.” He laughed then. “Frau Giesy. I don’t even have to remember to call you by a new name.”

  Why would he call me at all?

  I wanted to go outside, but I couldn’t let my first encounter with Keil be a defiant act over eggs. “Go,” Keil ordered. Jack brushed past me without protest, an act that surprised me almost as much as Keil’s interest in having a conversation with me.

  “Come.” He took the only empty chair, then patted the one next to him that the soft-fleshed woman had vacated as he sat. She heaved onto our bed, using it as a chair, the children scurrying behind her. “Sit down now and tell me how things go with you,” Keil said.

  I couldn’t believe he was speaking to me, asking me to sit while men stood. “I … we’re fine,” I said. I didn’t sit. There was too much to do, too much going on. “Let me get you tea.”

  “Louisa can do that, ja?” Louisa nodded and grabbed the potholder so she could pour water into his cup. “How are your boys?”

  “My boys grow strong.” I motioned for Andy to come forward. He stood in front of me and he lowered his head in deference to Keil.

  “He is well taught. This I can see. And does he do his lessons with diligence? My friend Karl is your teacher, ja?” Andy nodded.

  “It was good of you to let Andreas and Barbara bring him to Aurora Mills,” Louisa said. I bit my lip but decided they didn’t need to know that Andy had gone there without my consent.

  “And that he had days with his grandfather before he passed,” Helena said.

  Keil agreed, patted Andy on the head. “And your other son, Christian is it?” I nodded. “Where is he?” He twisted around. “Ach, ja, there’s the boy with his father’s name. That was good to call him for Chris.” He patted my clasped hand. His flesh felt clammy. I pulled my hands away.

  “And here’s my daughter, Kate,” I said.

  Kate stood, her light curls dropping into her eyes as she skipped between the adults to stand before him.

  “Ja, your daughter.” He reached in his pocket for peppermint sweets, and when she bit into the candy the smell of mint filled my head, taking me back to Christmas and my parents. He handed one each to Andy and Christian too. “I miss my little Aurora even though we will see her again in just a few days when we return home.”

  Does Louisa fidget?

  Louisa sighed. “It was hard to leave them, but the weather … well, the journey is better this way.”

  “Is it true that my parents are on their way here?” I asked, the words flooding from my mouth. I ignored Helena’s frown.

  Keil looked surprised, turned to Louisa, then back to me. “They don’t come yet, though. I’ve asked them, but …”

  “Oh. I thought—”

  “They do consider it, and I think they’ll come before too long. They know, as do all the rest there, how we struggle. We would struggle less if people from this Willapa country came to Oregon too. I’ve asked Jack to consider this and will tell John and Henry and Martin and my good friend Karl the same when I see them tomorrow. They’ve proven that they can make it here. But the work is hard and there is more commerce available at Aurora Mills and less rain.” He laughed. “We should gather all the saints together in one place.”

  He droned on for a time while my mind wandered to my parents. They hadn’t already left then. Louisa was wrong. She hoped for something and created a world that wasn’t real, just as she imagined things about Keil’s great goodness.

  Maybe I did the same thing. There’d been no letters from my parents about coming out to help, and yet I’d grabbed onto that thread as though it were a rope thrown to a drowning woman, and I’d plunged my children into a treacherous pool in the process. The only way out meant giving Jack what he wanted and hoping in time he’d see the children were no threat.

  I felt my eyes begin to tear and bit my quivering lip. My parents weren’t going to rescue me. No one was. I shook my head without realizing it.

  “What? What do you disagree about?”

  “Nothing, Herr Keil. My mind wanders. I need to prepare supper for us.”

  “Louisa, you help. You go now.” He shooed her with his hands. He treats her like a child.

  Jack opened the door then and gentled the eggs onto the table.

  “Sister Giesy needs to rest, ja?” Keil said. “She still grieves the loss of her Chris.”

  Jack glared at me as though I’d caused him some personal grief. There’d be no rest for me.

  The evening continued in those hop-skip jumps when I felt lightened by an interest Keil took in our lives and burdened by the uncertainty of how Jack would respond to it. I hadn’t remembered Keil being congenial before except on Christmas or his birthday in March, and maybe New Year’s Eve. My father had always described him as a compassionate man, a fine leader with the colony interests at heart. My family had followed this man from Pennsylvania to Indiana to Missouri. I’d never understood why they absorbed all he said, acting like a sponge. Christian had too. Did they all
see a different person?

  I’d missed detecting Jack’s darker side, or at least recognizing all the behaviors I thought I could live with or change. Maybe grief and change and babies had impaired my thinking about Jack. Now about Keil too. Was Keil the friend my husband always claimed, or was Jack more of a culprit than I thought?

  At least my husband did nothing to challenge me in front of Keil while I prepared the meal. I convinced Louisa to rest, too, while I cooked. Busy chattering with the men, Keil didn’t even seem to mind that I contradicted his directive to Louisa. No one would prepare my meals in my house, not even at Keil’s command.

  Jack made jokes while I worked. He didn’t bark at the children. He told tales of life in Willapa that made it sound Edenlike. He said “his place” was one of the finest in the valley. Every time he said “his place,” a hot poker seared my side.

  “Did you do the woodwork?” Keil asked. “It took a fine hand to make the loops on those plate shelves.”

  “What? No. That’s Emma’s plaything,” Jack said. “She doesn’t have time for such little frivolities now.” He reached around me as I bent to check the bread baking at the side of the hearth. He patted my stomach and laughed. Louisa giggled. I felt my face grow hot, but as I leaned over the fire, no one else appeared to notice.

  “Ah, another child,” Keil said. “It will take you from your work, Jack.” He wagged his finger at him. “Now that you know the cause of such things, you should be able to stop at just one.”

  “Give me more hands to do my work,” Jack countered. “That is what children are for, ja? To work so as we age we will be taken care of.”

  “The colony takes care of us in our aging,” Keil told him.

  I prepared a hearty vegetable stew instead of Spätzel. I thickened it with flour, then poured it across freshly baked biscuits. We had slaw kept in a wooden barrel cooled at the river, and without protest when I asked him to, Jack brought that in and I sweetened it with dried berries. The aromas filled the small space and Margaret moaned that the food smelled “divine.”