Westward Hearts (12 page)

Asa chuckled. “Not exactly.” He lowered her hand, extending her arm slightly. “Keep the gun level and aim at the center of the target. Your eye should help to align your hand.”

“Do you really think this is necessary?” she asked.

“According to Captain Brownlee, the wagon master we are signed up with, it is not only necessary, it’s required. All adults must bring their own firearms and be capable of shooting.”

She looked at Jamie. “But he’s not an adult.”

“Not officially, but he’ll be with you in the wagon. He needs to know how to handle a gun. And you may be capable of shooting a shotgun, but there’s plenty you don’t know. Today we’re going to practice until both you and Jamie are sure shots. But before we start shooting, I’m going to make sure you both know how to clean and care for your guns. Then we’ll work on loading them. No use in having a good firearm by your side if you don’t know how to load it.”

They spent an hour just learning how to clean the barrel with oil and a plunger and how to load the rounds and how to store everything safely and properly. They never even got around to shooting before Ruth came out to call them to dinner.

“What are you doing out here?” she asked curiously.

“Learning about guns,” Jamie said importantly.

“I want to learn about guns too,” she insisted.

“Not until you’re older,” Asa told her.

Ruth frowned.

“Grandpa’s right.” Elizabeth slipped her arm around Ruth’s shoulder. “Guns are very dangerous. I was much older than you the first time I learned to shoot.”

During dinner, all the talk around the table was about the upcoming trip. Matthew showed them the canvas water buckets he’d found in town.

“Why not just use a regular bucket?” Jamie asked.

“Because these are lightweight and don’t take much space,” Matthew explained. “We have to do all we can to keep the wagons from being too heavy.”

And so they continued, planning and debating and going over what remained on the lists, deciding what should go and what should stay and what supplies they should procure in Paducah and what should wait until Kansas City.

“I say we buy only perishables in Kansas City,” Clara finally said. “We can get everything else in town or in Paducah. Although I heard that Thorne’s has weevils in their flour. So I say let’s wait for Paducah for that.”

“Maybe we should get the rice and beans there too,” Elizabeth suggested.

“Let’s plan on it. And while you were working on your guns, Ruthie and I made up some saleratus,” Clara told her.

“What’s that?” Jamie asked.

“It’s what makes biscuits fluffy,” Ruth said with authority. “You mix baking soda and baking powder, right, Grandma?”

“That’s right.”

“So if we shop the food staples in Paducah, we need to make sure we’ve got plenty of time to transfer everything into our watertight containers and secure it all in the wagons before we get on the river.”

“Speaking of secure,” Asa said with uncertainty, “Vernon Griggs was just telling me about a family that did like we’re planning. They transported their wagons by riverboat only to discover, once they were on the trail, that someone had stolen provisions and tools from their wagon while they were on the river.”

“I’ll stay with the wagons and guard them,” Matthew offered.

“The whole time?” Elizabeth was skeptical.

“Someone will have to be around to tend to the stock,” he said. “I figured I’d do it.”

“And I can help,” Jamie offered.

“Maybe we fellas can take turns,” Asa suggested.

“Anyway, we’ll figure it out,” Matthew assured them. “For sure and for certain, we are not going to let some scoundrel pilfer from us before we even get on the trail.”

After dinner, Elizabeth offered to help her mother clean up, but Asa wouldn’t hear of it. “The most important thing right now is for you to learn to shoot.”

Clara nodded soberly. “Your father is right.”

So Elizabeth followed her father and Matthew out, where the two men both worked with the novices. And after a couple of hours, both Elizabeth and Jamie knew how to load and shoot.

“I want you to practice at home every day before we go,” Asa instructed Jamie as Elizabeth and Ruth were getting into the carriage. “By the time we’re on the trail, I expect you and your ma both to be sharpshooters.”

Elizabeth just laughed, but Jamie nodded as if he planned to do it. And, to be fair, he was a pretty decent shot for a boy his age. She just hoped this trip wouldn’t make him grow up too fast.

Before going home, Matthew insisted on showing Elizabeth and the children his progress on the wagons. “I got the canvas covers put on two of them,” he explained as they went into the barn. “TJ Sawyer helped me put the bows in.”

“Where are the bows?” Ruth asked.

“These are the bows.” Matthew patted an arched piece of wood that supported the heavy white canvas. He did some maneuvering with the edge of the covering, and suddenly it was transformed into an awning of sorts, allowing more air into the wagon.

“That’s clever,” Elizabeth told him.

“TJ showed me how to do that too.” Matthew seemed pleased.

“You sure got plenty of ways to store stuff on the outside of the wagon,” Jamie observed as he opened a trunk-like box in the rear of a wagon.

“The more we can store outside, the more room we got inside. Besides that, you want some items handy, like tools or cooking pots.” Matthew squatted down and pointed to the bottom of a wagon. “And you see all that black tar down there? You know what that’s for?”

“Is it to protect the bottom of the wagon?” Jamie asked.

“Well, that too. But I sealed ’em up real good, so when we go through water, they should be as tight as a boat.”

“We’re going to take our wagons in the water?” Ruth’s eyes grew big.

“We’ll have to cross some rivers and streams to get to Oregon country,” Matthew explained. “But don’t you worry, Ruthie, these schooners will hold up just fine. I even tried one out in the pond just to be sure. Watertight.”

“You’re doing a wonderful job on these wagons,” Elizabeth told him. “I don’t know what we’d do without you.”

“I just want to be sure we’re in good shape when we head out, Lizzie. From what I’ve read, that trail can be real rugged.”

F
inally the big day was here. At the crack of dawn, and following a family prayer for traveling mercy, three fully loaded covered wagons rolled out of the Dawsons’ farm and headed toward Selma. Matthew’s sturdy wagon, pulled by four oxen, led the way. This was followed by Elizabeth’s smaller wagon, pulled by four strong horses. Asa and Clara’s full-sized prairie schooner, also pulled by a hefty team of oxen, brought up the rear. Tethered to the backs of these wagons was a variety of livestock, including three spare riding horses and three cows.

The plan was to get additional teams once they arrived in Kansas City. But traveling on the relatively smooth, flat road to Paducah didn’t require the same kind of strength that crossing the prairie, mountains, and rivers would.

“We’re like a short wagon train,” Ruth proclaimed as they rumbled along the road to town.

Elizabeth just nodded. She felt an unexpected flutter of nerves as she tried to remember if there was anything they’d forgotten, something important they’d left behind. Oh, she knew there probably wasn’t—they’d gone over the lists many times. And even if something had been overlooked, it was too late to turn back now. The Barrons had taken occupancy of her farm two days ago. She and the children had been staying with her parents because the new owners of their farm wouldn’t arrive until next week. The past couple of days had been spent tending to the final details and helping to pack and repack the wagons.

During the past several weeks, Matthew had built dozens of sturdy pine storage crates, all the same height and made to fit snugly in the boxes of the wagons. These were filled with goods and marked accordingly. And some were built with drawers that could be opened to retrieve necessary supplies. Then these crates had been arranged and rearranged to create a high raised platform, where feather mattresses and bedding could be unrolled and layered to create a bed when needed. Matthew had opted for a hammock beneath his own wagon. Besides that, they had a large canvas tent that Asa had insisted was necessary.

Matthew and Asa had come up with the final plan for packing the wagons, and Elizabeth thought it was rather ingenious. Most of the crates in Elizabeth’s wagon contained items for setting up housekeeping in Oregon. Consequently, most of these things wouldn’t be needed on the trail. This allowed her wagon to be less disturbed and to be available for the children or her mother to rest while traveling. It had various furnishings wedged along the sides as well as pieces, like the ladder-back chairs, that could be removed during stops. They had tried to take everything into consideration.

Her parents’ wagon had Matthew’s drop-down kitchen board attached to one side, and this wagon was loaded with whatever was needed for cooking and had easy access to crates that would soon contain the food supplies they planned to purchase in Paducah. Once filled, it would be a heavy load too. But as Matthew had pointed out, half of their food would be gone and the load lightened when they went over the mountains.

Meanwhile, Matthew’s wagon contained all of the precious tools and guns, as well as many other everyday supplies that would be needed on the trail, including an interesting selection of wood, metal, and leather pieces that Asa had decided would be useful for repairs. Consequently, this wagon was probably the most valuable one, and because of the firearms, it would need to be guarded most closely during their river travel.

Asa had taken charge of stowing the cash from the sales of their farms. More than half of it, money they would need once they got to Oregon, was stored in a safe box that he and Matthew had rigged up in the bottom of Asa’s wagon. Without knowing what to look for, no one would ever guess what was beneath those boards. Besides that, it was now covered by boxes and crates. The rest of the cash, their much-needed travel money, had been divided between the four adults, where most of it was securely hidden in money belts. This money had to cover the costs of supplies in Paducah, riverboat tickets and freight charges, expenses in Kansas City, and finally their ocean passage fares. It would take what seemed like a small fortune to get the six of them to their new home. Still, Elizabeth believed it would be worth it. She prayed that it would.

“Flax is happy,” Ruth told her. “He’s all snuggled down in the bed I made for him in the corner of the wagon.”

“How are the chickens doing?” Elizabeth asked Jamie, who was sitting on the side of the wagon where they’d hung several crates of chickens.

Jamie crooked his neck to see. “They’re bouncing up and down a little, but they look just fine, Ma.”

“We’re on our way,” Elizabeth said as she clicked the reins. For now, she was driving the team. It was a new experience to be pulling a covered wagon like this. But she knew that before the day was over, she would let Jamie try his hand at it too.

“This seat is real nice, Mama.” Ruth patted the padded seat beneath them. “Lots better than a hard old board.”

“I hope we still feel that way a few months from now.” It had been Elizabeth’s idea to use spare blankets and quilts to create a padded bench. She’d folded several of them to match the length of the wooden wagon bench. Then she’d wrapped a couple of the old buckskins that had been hanging in the barn over the top of the blanket pad, securing the skins tightly around the bench with small brass tacks to protect the blankets. All in all, it was fairly comfortable. Still, it wasn’t as fancy as her parents’ wagon, where Matthew had managed to rig a padded carriage seat for his mother’s comfort.

They were about a mile out of town when Elizabeth noticed that her father’s wagon was slowing down considerably.

“Why is Grandpa stopping?” Jamie asked.

Elizabeth pulled back on the reins and slowly pulled on the brake. “I don’t know.”

“Is he broken down?” Ruth asked with concern.

“Is that
Brady
up there?” Jamie craned his head to see better. “By golly, it is, Ma. It’s Brady, right there on the road.”

“Oh, my!” She handed Jamie the reins. “I’d better go see what’s wrong.”

She climbed down and hurried over to where Brady and her father were talking.

“Brady?” She peered curiously at him. “What are you doing out on the road this early in the morning?”

“I’m leavin’, ma’am.”

“Leaving?”

Asa grimly shook his head. “Brady says he’s not happy working for the Barrons.”

“Oh, dear.” Elizabeth frowned. “I’m so sorry, Brady.”

“Not your fault, ma’am. Them Barrons, they make their own troubles.”

“But where are you going, Brady?”

“Don’t know for sure, ma’am. Just away.” He peered down the road and then shrugged as if it didn’t matter.

Matthew joined them, looking on curiously.

“You know you’re welcome to come with us to the West,” she told Brady. “I’ve told you that before.”

“I know that, ma’am.” He frowned. “I feared I was too old…and I feared I’d be killed by Injuns. But now I’m thinking Injuns might be better than them Barrons.”