Inside the wagon Emma cradled the sick child against her breast, and she
prayed as she always prayed when baby Emma was sick. "Dear Lord, spare
us our little girl. She is a good child, Lord, and will grow up to be a
good woman. We'll take care of her, Lord, and do the best we can for
her, if only you'll pull her through again, as you did before." She
rocked the child gently, and her thoughts went on after the prayer in a
kind of formless argument. Little Emma hadn't asked to come out here in
the wilderness. They had brought her, and now she was sick. For one
wild, horrible moment she thought of baby Emma dying and being buried
out here in the limitless plain, and her breath stopped. But no, no,
no--she would be well again, she would be well and laughing and running
in the tall grass. Emma bent her tense, determined face over the
feverish child, as though by sheer will she could drive the illness
away, banish the fever and the pain. And in her mind the prayer
continued, over and over: "Dear Lord, spare us our little girl."
Snow fell so thickly that the mules, tethered only fifty feet from the
wagon, had their coats plastered with it and were dimly seen shapes
against the white background. They shook themselves when Joe approached,
and the harnesses knocked off such snow as still clung to them. Joe
backed the mules into place, hitched them to the wagon, and climbed up
beside Tad. He crossed his fingers as he did so.
Once he had driven two mules, pulling a ton of weight in addition to the
wagon, fifty miles in the course of a day. But the mules were grain-fed
and rested, and they hadn't had to pull their load through snow. This
team had worked every day, had had no grain, and they were tired. Joe
picked up the reins and started them at a fast walk. The wagon wheels
made crunching noises in the new snow, and the mules blinked their eyes
against the storm. Joe stopped at noon only long enough to build a fire
so Barbara could cook a meal. Hastily, Joe gulped his food and looked
into the wagon.
Barbara had kept the drop curtain down, and Joe, Carlyle and Alfred, on
one side of it. She had served their meal there, and they were eating
hastily too so they could snuggle back beneath the warm quilts. Joe
parted the curtain to look at Emma, and he knew a sudden sense of loss
because it seemed that she had gone away from him. Her whole physical
and spiritual being were with the sick baby, and Joe swallowed hard. He
had a sudden, wild and dreadful notion that his youngest daughter looked
the way angels must look. Joe stepped outside, wiped his sweating
forehead, and set his jaw. They would get to Laramie tonight.
The snow fell neither faster nor more slowly, and Joe breathed a sigh of
thanks because there was no wind. Without wind the snow could not drift,
but there was no assurance that the wind would not blow again tonight or
tomorrow. If it did, if he had to stop and shovel through deep drifts,
they might not get into Laramie for two or even three days, and with the
child feverish such a delay was intolerable. She must get in out of the
storm and feel the good heat that comes only from a stove or fireplace.
Joe kept the mules at a fast walk but he did not let them trot or
canter. Whether or not they got into Laramie depended almost entirely on
how skillfully he handled the team.
Seven inches of snow covered the ground, but where it lay smoothly on
both sides, the Trail itself was deeply rutted with crowns between the
ruts, and snow followed the road's contours. It was easy to see, and
mules had a feeling for trails that horses and oxen did not possess. But
the mules were walking more slowly now, and when they came to a slight
rise Joe halted to let them breathe.