0800722329 by Jane Kirkpatrick

Author:Jane Kirkpatrick [Kirkpatrick, Jane]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FIC042030, FIC014000
ISBN: 9781441228208
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2015-08-16T21:00:00+00:00

16

Unpredictable

The winter rains and mild weather of 1858–59 with no hard freeze had doused the ground in springtime, making squishy everywhere, walking to the smokehouse, gathering chicken eggs, feeding the hogs. The neat cows stood in muck while I milked them, and the bottom of my skirts and the girls’ caked with mud, straining the threads at the hemlines. I’d put the milk bucket into the spring and had just returned to the house to skim the cream from another pan. Lizzie would be ready to nurse. It was but a month or so after Andrew’s revelation about Jeremiah and I’d noticed his pacing had returned. Irritable, restless in the evenings when I urged him to whittle something for America Jane, hoping that might distract his thoughts. Still, his announcement was totally unexpected. “We’re moving.”

“What?” I turned to him, spoon in hand. “Moving? Where is it you plan to go and why?”

“Washington Territory—on the Touchet River.”

I barely had a breath. “Near . . . Waiilatpu?”

“No interfering state rules there. It’s still a territory. Man can do what he thinks best for his family. No taxes. Fewer regulations.”

“If I’m remembering, our Oregon Territory didn’t even have money to fund an army to send for our hostage rescue after the Whitmans died nor put down the uprising with the Yakima. A tax might have been a good thing.”

“They got you back.”

“The British got us back. They paid the ransom.”

“It’s about time you put those memories to rest, Eliza. Life goes on. Are you going with it is the question.”

“But this is our home.” Why was he upsetting our lives like this? He paced, the slight limp a reminder of his earlier choices. My sisters listened but offered no commentary.

“I want land where cattle don’t have to stand in muck more days out of the year than I care to count. There’s free land east of the Cascades and few people to populate it so we can have that cattle spread I’ve always wanted. You’re familiar with the terrain. Hillsides with grass to their bellies. Treed areas near the streams and then, gracious goodness, almost no rain in the winter. Snow, but no constant drizzle for weeks at a time. Don’t you miss that high dry country, darlin’?”

I didn’t. And I didn’t want to leave what we had in Brownsville. Why hadn’t I imagined it might have come to this?

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