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In the spring of ’61, I raised the issue of the dry winter and my concern about the cattle surviving this new year. My husband frowned.

“This isn’t any problem, Eliza. A fellow has to weather the ups and downs of the market. We still have a large herd, and yes, we drive them farther to get them feed, but we find it. And no one’s told us we can’t be where we are. Where would we go with two hundred fifty head of cattle?”

“But you risk danger, being on Indian lands.”

“From who?”

“Whom,” I corrected. “From the government if they find out we’ve been using the land set aside for Indians.”

“They adjusted usage for the miners. They’ll do it for cattlemen too.”

“But they haven’t yet. And what if we don’t get the rain again? Or we have a hard winter, what then? I think we should sell out and go back to Brownsville.” There, I’d said it. Blunt and pushy.

“What’s your father say?”

It surprised me he would ask. “I haven’t talked with him about it.”

“See what he says. I bet he’ll argue for staying.”

“Timothy thinks it wise to sell and leave.”

“He would. He’d be happy to have us
So-ya-po
gone.”

“Maybe he would, but he would be honest with me of his assessment.”

“What? Are you crazy?” This from my father when I told him of my concerns. “Sell out? No. Why, we had hard times, your mother and me, and we stuck it out.”

“But you had no choices.”

“We did. We could have gone to Waiilatpu or Fort Vancouver and rode out the season, returned when the weather improved. But we’d have left behind all the Nimíipuu and our sheep and the orchard. No, we had to stay and God gave us a way.”

“You didn’t have two hundred fifty head of cattle to feed.”

“I don’t have that many now. My small herd can find feed through the winter. No, you’re mistaken and you do your husband a disservice insisting that he leave. Doesn’t she, Rachel?”

“A wife must share her concerns, Husband. She would be derelict in her duty if she did not.”

“Eliza’s stubborn. A wife needs to defer to her husband when she’s wrong.”

My sister Millie expressed no opinion verbally, but as I left, she raised her eyebrows and showed me clapped hands barely lifted above the waistband of her apron.

I did caution myself, to see if I was pushing Mr. Warren because I’d been left out of the decision-making; or if I was trying to think the worst, as prevention. Or if I didn’t like him being gone so much chasing after cattle. But I didn’t believe I filtered this solution through fears or old patterns. I could see signs. The cattle hadn’t gained as much weight as the previous year. The grass had not grown back in all its flourish. The kelpie walked as though on coals in response to the hot ground that never cooled. My own garden even well-watered couldn’t resist the hot sun that stayed warm even when it was near ten o’clock in the evening. The land needed respite, too, and would achieve it however it must.

“I’m concerned enough that I will move back to the valley. Without you, if need be.” I told him this in late summer of ’61. He’d been back less than a day after being gone with the herd for two weeks.

“What?”

“Not as a threat, Mr. Warren. But to prepare, as I believe you’ll come to my thinking by next year. But it may be too late then.”

“You would just leave me, take the girls, and poof?” He snapped his fingers.

“We’d just be waiting for you ‘down the lane,’ so to speak.”

“A couple of months down the lane.” He paced, his agitation a surprise. Then, “I need to imagine you’re waiting here. It’s part of what keeps me going.”

“Does it?”

“Oh, Eliza, if you only knew how much I need you. And I do respect what you have to say, more than ever since we’ve been here. Something changed.” He scraped his hand through his thick hair.

“It did. I think it’s been finding a way to make it on my own, not blaming Father—or you—so much. That’s why I believe we need to make this move. Sell, now. Even if Father resists it. If I’m right, we can rebuild the herd when the weather is better. We can start again. But if we wait, we could lose it all, not be able to restart.”

“I . . . Let me think on it.”

We lay awake side by side that night, a hot breeze blowing. They’d brought the herd in closer and would take the cows upriver seeking untouched grass. They bellowed their discontent. “You really think we should quit?”

“I believe their cries will only get worse.”

I’d almost found sleep when he said, “All right. We’ll sell. Move back. You win.”

I wanted to correct him, say this wasn’t a competition, but I didn’t. “You will?”

“Yes. I’ve been trying to think what to do. I can see them skinny as rails, some of them. The grass isn’t feeding them like it did, even when there seems to be a lot of it. And wandering so far for feed takes pounds off them too. I . . . wanted to talk with you about it, but I . . . was ashamed.”

I blinked. “What on earth do you think is shaming?”

“Bringing you here only to have to turn back.”

“We made the decision to come here together. At least, we both wanted it. In the end.”

“But then how can we turn our back on it?”

“We have new information. There’s nothing to be ashamed of in changing one’s mind in a thoughtful, prayerful way. We’re doing that. I haven’t ‘won’ anything, Andrew.” I stroked his whiskered face.

But I had won something. I’d won a way to speak clearly what I wanted without cajoling him or threatening him or making him feel worse. I’d put out my wishes and I suspect it was that clarity of purpose shown with respect that “won” that day when we decided we would leave.

The Diary of Eliza Spalding

1850, D
ECEMBER

Before leaving the States to answer the Nimíipuu call to bring the Book of Heaven, we had ruminated about whether to travel with the Whitmans. How we whispered in our shared tent, S and I, deciding together as good marriage partners do. We had buried our first child before leaving, a grief that joined us rather than caused a split; I carried with me the pain of that child’s loss. It rode beside my joy in having a shared life with S.

I rode sidesaddle across the continent with only one major mishap. My horse startled at a snake or hornets nested in the ground and I was thrown except my foot hung up in the stirrup. I remember Mr. S shouting to a marksman to shoot the horse while my back scraped against rocks and vines and mountain shrubs, dust clogged my throat and I thought I would die and then I lay still when my foot broke free. I thanked God that I didn’t hear the marksman. Couldn’t have, because the horse was caught and rescued. As was I. But ever after that, my back pained me. And for just a short time, I believed I should return with a trapping party heading east, for I had lost another child. I feared my health would interfere with God’s call. S would have nothing of it. He promised to remain with me for as long as needed and the Whitmans too. I was forever grateful, as going back would have been the hardest journey I would ever have had to make. It would have been a disappointment, but turning back doesn’t mean one has failed, does it? It can be a needed new direction.

26
Grateful I Am

We chose a new direction. It’s not easy turning back. We heard of people on the wagon trains who changed their minds. I doubt my parents ever had to make such a choice. I remembered the Exodus of the Bible and how those people wanted to turn back because things got hard. And oh what horror there would have been if they had done so, gone back into bondage, into slavery. But we were not merely selling out; we were starting over even though we’d been in Touchet country less than two years. It takes courage to risk, to quit on one’s own terms, taking what you have as the humus for new growth.

“May I go back with you?”

Millie cornered me after I’d told my father we were selling out, taking the herd to market to get what we could get. He was welcome to put his cattle in with ours. He declined.

“I don’t think Father will let you.”

“I’m nearly sixteen. I can make up my own mind about things.”

“I won’t pamper you the way Father does.”

“Pamper me? I’m doing the cooking and cleaning and laundry and—”

“I’ve seen Rachel doing laundry. And every second time I come to visit, you’re off riding Nellie, so I know you have some time not spent in slavery.”

“There’s no future here for me. I want to be where people are. I heard a war has started between North and South. It could come here and I’d have lived my short little life without ever knowing true love or true trials or true hope for the future.”

She was being dramatic, but then, she always was. Still, I could see how she longed for something more.

“If Father allows it, I’ll agree too.”

Of course, he didn’t. “I need her here. Besides, you’ve talked Warren into this crazy decision to sell out when you’ve barely gotten here, so I don’t think I trust your judgment. We had hard winters in Lapwai too. We got by. The Lord always provided.”

“I fully accept manna from heaven. But he also admonished us to learn what this means. And what this means is that we need to sell and make alternate plans.”

“Well, do that without us. Millie included.”

I’d packed the wagon yet again, this time secure that I could manage it with the girls, knowing that Mr. Warren would be not far ahead. We had decided to replicate our journey of two years previous. We’d travel together leaving this Touchet country as far as The Dalles. I’d board the steamboat into Portland with the girls. Mr. Warren would sell what he could there, then he and the drovers would head south through the Warm Springs reserva
tion, maybe selling beef to the Indian agency, then through the meadow and across the Cascades coming into the Willamette Valley just east of Brownsville.

We separated at The Dalles and Mr. Warren kissed me beside the wagon before we parted. “Pray the market’s better in the Valley.”

“I’ll pray for a safe journey. For both of us.” I kept my anxieties wrapped in prayer.

“See you in a few weeks.” Then, “Oh, I have something for you.” He pulled a small box from his pocket. “I noticed awhile back that you took off the wedding ring I gave you. I didn’t blame you, after my, well, my lapse.” He cleared his throat. “These two years in Touchet with you, I’ve felt more married than I ever did before.” He took out a gold ring and slipped it on my finger.

“Can we afford—?”

“It’s less than the price of a cow, darlin’, and you deserve it.”

“It’s lovely. I really didn’t remove the other one. I lost it. In the manger the night the O’Donnell brothers brought you home.”

“Fortuitous.”

I punched his shoulder. “You and your big words. Oh, I have a gift for you too.”

“You do?”

“I planned to give it to you on your birthday but so much happened in August. Mama had an August birthday too.” My mind wandered. “Wait. It’s in the trunk.”

I handed him a leather belt tooled with his initials in it.
AJW
. “To go with our brand,” I said. I’d worked the leather myself in those long hours when Andrew was away. He rubbed his thumbs over the raised letters.