The Quilt Walk (13 page)

Pa went to the Schmidts’ fire and swiped the blade through the flame, then brought it back to where Buttermilk John knelt beside Joey. He had already taken a leather strap and tied it tightly around Joey’s leg, above the spot where the snake had bitten him. He made two slashes above the bite. Then he put his mouth to the cuts and began to suck out blood and spit it onto the ground.

“What’s he doing?” Mrs. Schmidt asked. She looked terrified and had begun to cry.

“He’s sucking out the snake’s venom that’s in Joey’s blood,” Pa explained. “He’s getting rid of all the poison.”

“He won’t lose the leg, will he, my Joey?” Mrs. Schmidt asked. There were tears running down her face. Mr. Schmidt steadied his hand on his wife’s arm, but she flung it off.

“You, Schmidt!” she yelled. “This is your fault. You sacrificed your son so that we can go to that godforsaken place, that Denver. If we’d stayed at home where we belonged, Joey wouldn’t have got bit by the snake.”

Mrs. Bonner walked over to her and touched Mrs. Schmidt’s face. “My dear, we are praying for Joey. Will you join us?” Ma and Aunt Catherine and some of the other women were standing at the back of the Schmidt wagon, their heads bowed.

Mrs. Schmidt seemed startled by the kindness. “I don’t know. You ladies are praying for Joey?”

“Please,” Mrs. Bonner said, leading Mrs. Schmidt to where the women stood.

Mrs. Schmidt didn’t pray. She only stood there and muttered, “That Denver. Why did I ever like strawberry tarts?”

After a while, Buttermilk John said he had sucked out enough blood. He removed the strap from Joey’s leg and stood up. “There’re other things I could do, make a brine of salt and plantain, but I don’t suppose anybody’s got plantain.” He looked down at Joey, then said, “We’ll put him in the wagon. He’ll ride there.”

“We go on?” Mr. Schmidt asked.

Buttermilk John nodded. “We got to keep moving. The boy’ll be out of his mind for a time. It’s a natural thing. Don’t let it cause ye to worry. It was a small snake and they can be meaner than the big ones. Still, this child thinks your boy will make it.”

Some of the men began to move the furniture in the Schmidt wagon to make room for Joey. Ma motioned me to slip away from the women, and together we found blankets and quilts to make a pallet for my friend. Then the men lifted him into the wagon.

Pa and Uncle Will yoked the Schmidt oxen and chained them together, then attached the chains to the wagon. Mr. Schmidt went to his wife and took her arm. “Mama, Joey’s in the wagon. We have to move on. Buttermilk John says so.”

Mr. Schmidt helped his wife into the wagon, where she climbed in beside Joey. When she was settled, she put her head in her hands and began to cry again. I could hear her all the way back to our wagon.

I walked along beside our oxen, next to Pa. We were silent for a time. Then, trying to keep my voice steady, I asked, “Is Joey going to die, Pa?” I hadn’t wanted to ask, because Pa always told the truth. I didn’t want to give up hope.

Pa flicked the whip against his hand a time or two before he turned to me. “I don’t know the answer, Emmy Blue. Nobody does. Buttermilk John says it depends on whether the snake was angry and injected a large quantity of venom into the bite. The bite would be worse if the snake was hungry, too. It also depends on how Joey’s body fights the poison. Right now, he’s very sick, and when he wakes up, he’ll be in pain. It’ll be two or three days before we know whether he’ll be all right. And if he is, it could be weeks before the pain and swelling go away.”

“But he might be all right,” I said, snatching at Pa’s words. Ma always told me to hope for the best and that was what I was doing now.

Chapter Fifteen

GO-BACKS

T
he camp was quiet that night, with no singing, no shouting. No one even yelled at the oxen. The children, too, seemed to be quieter than usual.

Joey wouldn’t have cared about noise, because he hadn’t awakened. When we stopped for the day, I went to the Schmidt wagon and asked if I could sit with him. Mrs. Schmidt had stopped crying and was sitting beside her son, stone-faced. She didn’t say a word but handed me a bowl of water and a square of cloth she had used to wipe Joey’s brow. Then she climbed out of the wagon.

“Hi, Joey. It’s me, Emmy Blue—and Barebones,” I said. My dog had climbed into the wagon and lain down near Joey.

Joey moaned and muttered words that I didn’t understand. For a time he thrashed around, but I held him with my hands, and he was still. I dipped the cloth in water and washed his face, because he was sweating. Barebones licked Joey’s face, too. Joey was hot and had a fever. Once he called out, “Papa!” and another time, “Pretzel,” which he’d told me was the name of the mutt he’d left behind.

I sat there for a long time until Mr. Schmidt relieved me, saying, “Thank you, little girl. You are Joey’s friend. When we’re in Denver, I’ll bake a cake for you.”

“For me—and Joey,” I said, and Mr. Schmidt patted my head.

As soon as I got out of the wagon, I saw Ma standing with Mrs. Schmidt. I’d forgotten all about doing chores, and I thought she would be annoyed with me. Instead, she said, “You gave comfort, Emmy Blue.”

Ma held a tin plate of biscuits. I noticed other women with food in their hands. At home, when a neighbor was hurt or sick, the women baked cakes and pies. They brought them, along with stews and vegetables and fruit from their orchards, to the family in need. That was what they were doing now. They couldn’t bake or make custards or jellies, but they shared what they had. Even Mrs. Bonner came with a plate of food, and I wondered if it was her own supper. I doubted that her husband would have shared his food with anyone.

Mrs. Schmidt didn’t seem to notice the women, but Mr. Schmidt shook the hands of each woman and thanked her.

“How is Joey?” Ma asked me.

I shrugged. I’d never been around a snake-bit person before. “He was acting crazy. He cried and carried on, but he didn’t wake up.”

“That’s called delirium,” Ma explained.

“Oh, Ma, is he going to be all right?” I put my head against her and started to cry. I’d held back the tears all day, trying to be brave, not wanting to sound like Mrs. Schmidt, but now I couldn’t help myself.

Ma put her arms around me. “He’s still fighting. That’s a good sign.”

“If something happened to him, I don’t know what I’d do. He’s the only friend besides Barebones I’ve made on this whole trip.”

“We will hope for the best. And pray. Buttermilk John is as good a doctor as we could have on the trail.”

“If only—”

“Hush, we cannot change what has happened.” She put her arm around me.

We watched while Pa and Mr. Potts lifted Joey out of the wagon and laid him on the ground. “He’ll be cooler there,” Ma explained. “They want to keep the fever down. Let’s get fresh water and help sponge him off.”

We went to our wagon where Ma dipped water into a washbasin, which I carried back to Mr. Schmidt. He was sitting beside Joey, and he smiled when I began to wipe Joey’s face.

“He’s better, don’t you think so, Emmy Blue?” he asked.

I didn’t want to hurt Mr. Schmidt, so I thought it was all right to tell a lie. “Much better.” But I couldn’t see any difference.

After a while, Pa told me it was time to go to our wagon. The women would take turns looking after Joey during the night. I should sleep so that I could sit with him again the next day, Pa told me. He would be better then.

But when daylight came, the only difference I could see was that Mrs. Schmidt had stopped crying, although she still blamed Mr. Schmidt for Joey’s condition. She sat on the wagon seat while I crouched inside the wagon beside Joey, and she muttered at Mr. Schmidt, who was walking beside the oxen.

Inside, Joey murmured in his sleep, gibberish mostly, although once I thought he said, “Emmy Blue.” I sang to him in a low voice, the way I sang to Ulysses Potts, and that seemed to calm him a little.

Joey was delirious for two days. The third morning, I was lifting his head to get him to drink a little water, when he opened his eyes and said, “My leg. It burns like fire.”

I realized that he had come out of his delirium. “Mrs. Schmidt!” I called. “Come quick!”

Both of the Schmidts heard me. Mr. Schmidt tapped the lead ox on the head and called, “Whoa.” Then they climbed into the wagon.

“He’s awake!” I cried. “He talked to me!” I was as happy as if it was my birthday.

The Schmidts pushed past me, and I climbed down the wheel and hurried to our wagon, shouting, “Ma! Ma!” I ran so fast I had to catch my breath before I could say, “Joey talked. He’s going to be all right.”

“Oh, Emmy Blue, thank God.” Ma took a deep breath while I looked toward the wagon behind us. Mr. Bonner was scowling, as he always did, but Mrs. Bonner and Celia, who was walking beside her, clasped their hands together and lowered their heads. I knew they were thanking God for making Joey better.

That night, a Saturday, there was singing, and Buttermilk John danced a jig with Celia. Buttermilk John told us it would be several days before Joey could walk, and then he’d have to use a stick because he couldn’t put pressure on the leg. It might be weeks before he would be back to normal. He was still a sick boy, but he was going to be okay. We were all relieved, and Mr. Potts found a straight branch, stripped it of bark, and carved it, which he presented to Joey as a walking stick.

“I feel as if we’ve all come out of a dark place together,” Ma said.

We were happy that Joey was better, although Mrs. Schmidt didn’t stop complaining. We heard her continue to yell at her husband, blaming him because Joey had almost died. I heard Joey plead, “Mama, I’m okay.”

“You are okay? How do you know? This is what happens to us when we leave our home.”

The guards didn’t need to pound on a dishpan to wake the camp that morning, as they usually did, because Mrs. Schmidt had already awakened us. She cursed her husband and then she began to throw his baking pans and mixing spoons out of the wagon.”

“No, Mother,” Mr. Schmidt begged.

“We must go back,” she yelled.

“Please, Ma,” Joey pleaded. “I want to go to Denver with Pa.”

“No. I do not go a step farther. Go ahead if you want to, but I am not going with you!”

Mr. Schmidt stepped out of their wagon and walked past ours to where Buttermilk John was helping someone yoke a stubborn ox. “I talk to you,” Mr. Schmidt said. His shoulders were slumped, and he didn’t look Buttermilk John in the eye.

Buttermilk John seemed to understand what was going on. “Going back, are ye?”

Mr. Schmidt nodded. “I don’t have the choice. You heard her. We got to go on back. She says bad luck comes in twos. If we go on, who knows what happens.”

“Could be bad luck going back, too. Alone like that, ye’ll be easy prey for Indians or anybody that ain’t up to good. What if ye break your leg or the oxen take sick? Ye’d be on your own.”

“I tell her that, but she won’t listen.” Mr. Schmidt looked at the ground, and I could see the sadness on his face. “I never wanted to get rich. I thought Colorado would be a nice place for Joey to grow up. She doesn’t understand.”

He started back toward his wagon, and when he passed us, Pa said, “Schmidt, good luck.”

“Ya, you, too, Hatchett,” Mr. Schmidt replied.

“I’ll help you hitch your oxen,” Pa said.

I followed behind and stopped at the wagon when I saw Joey peering out the back. “Your pa says you’re leaving,” I told him.

“If I hadn’t stepped on that snake, we wouldn’t have to.” There were tears on his cheeks. I didn’t know if they were there because he was in pain or if he was disappointed about turning back. “Darn snake!” he said.

“I’ll miss you,” I said, feeling shy.

“Me, too.” He turned and reached into a pocket in the wagon cover. “I got something for you.” He held out his hand. Inside was a rock that was the color of a pigeon’s egg. When we’d spotted it, we thought it was a snake’s egg. I’d wanted it, but Joey’d seen it first, so it was his.

“That’s your egg-rock,” I said. “It’s your favorite thing.”

“Take it for good luck,” Joey said. “Besides, I want something of mine to get to Denver. I want you to remember me, to remember me as something besides a go-back.”

I took the rock, feeling sorry I didn’t have anything to give him in return. But as I put the treasure into my pocket, I felt something and pulled out the quilt square I had finished the day before Joey was bitten. I hadn’t worked on my piecing since then and had forgotten it was in my pocket. It was wadded up, and I ironed it between my hands. “Here.” I held it out.

“Your quilt square? How can you make a quilt without it?”

I shrugged. “I don’t care. I want you to remember me, too.”

Ma came up to the wagon then, and I got down. Then we stood back as the Schmidts turned their team around and started east.

“How come Mrs. Schmidt acted the way she did?” I asked Ma. “You didn’t want to go west either, but you never complained like that.”

Ma patted my arm. “I believe we have to look on the good side of things.”

Buttermilk John told us it was time to line up, and the men pulled their wagons into place. But I stood where I was, watching the Schmidt wagon get smaller and smaller. Joey waved from the back, framed in the puckered oval made by the wagon cover. Every now and then, Mr. Schmidt raised his whip hand in a farewell gesture. Mrs. Schmidt never turned around, I noticed. I watched them until I couldn’t see them anymore. Then I turned and hurried to catch up with our wagon.