While he read, Maria entered the parlor with her sewing basket in hand. “Oh,” she said, “I didn’t realize anyone was in here.”
“Just me,” Will said, sitting up straight on the sofa. “I don’t mind your company. As long as you don’t have any of the little ones trailing behind you.” Maria was almost fourteen, the next sibling after Will. He liked his adopted sister better than his natural-born siblings. He remembered when Mac brought her home—she’d been only a baby, and Will had been three. He’d thought she was a pretty baby then, and he still thought she was pretty. More so than any of the other girls he knew. A lot prettier than Iris Hayes.
“Tell me about your trip to Portland,” she said, as she sat and began working on her sampler. Rufus moved to curl up beside her sewing basket.
Will grunted. “You must have heard it all from Cal already.”
She smiled at him. “Yes, but I haven’t heard what you thought.”
That was all the encouragement Will needed. He started with the steamboat trip and recounted the journey step by step, telling Maria everything he could remember about the telegraph office and the hotel. “Maybe someday I’ll be a telegraph operator,” he said. “I’d like knowing the news before anyone else. Though think of the trouble if I got the message wrong. I could start an economic catastrophe, or maybe even a war.”
She laughed, a musical trill. “You used to want to be a Pony Express rider. Remember?”
He grinned back. “But that didn’t last any longer than the Pony Express. And the telegraph is much faster. Only minutes to transmit information across the nation, instead of days.”
Maria’s face turned solemn. “What do you really want to do, Will?”
“I don’t know.” And that was God’s truth. Will had no idea what he wanted to do with his life. Just that it didn’t involve any more schooling at the Oregon City academy. He was ready to leave that place behind.
Chapter 4: Preparing for a Party
A week after Mac’s trip to Portland with the boys, Jenny woke up with a queasy stomach. A familiar feeling—she was likely with child again. And today, March 18, her youngest child Maggie turned two. Another baby was not a surprise, but Jenny wondered when she would be done with birthing.
She remembered her friend Esther’s mother, Cordelia Pershing. Jenny was carrying William—her first—while they traveled the Oregon Trail, and Cordelia was pregnant with Jonah. Cordelia had died with Jonah’s birth. Jenny shivered at the memory. She may not be scrabbling in the wilderness as Cordelia had been, but women died of childbirth everywhere. As did their babies.
Jenny’s morbid thoughts turned to the two children she had lost. A miscarriage in 1853 between Caleb and Nathan. And poor little Abram, born in February 1859—that mite had died mere weeks after his birth. She mourned him every day.
Jenny sighed and sat up in bed. Mac had left already. He worked too hard these days, trying to make up for losses from the floods two years earlier. The family had plenty to be comfortable, but Mac treated business like a battle, a battle he intended to win.
She rose, dressed, and went to wake Maggie. Jenny and Mrs. O’Malley had a long day of cooking and baking ahead. Tomorrow they were hosting a party for Maggie and Maria, both of whom had birthdays this month.
Jenny tiptoed into the girls’ bedroom, only to be greeted with shouts of glee. “Good morning, Mama,” Eliza and Lottie crowed. “It’s Maggie’s birthday,” one of them added with excitement.
“Yes, it is.” Jenny smiled.
“Two,” Maggie said from her crib. She held up all her fingers, causing Eliza and Lottie to giggle.
Maria stood dressing in the corner. “I tried to keep them quiet, Mama,” she said. “Did they wake you?”
Jenny shook her head. “It’s time to be up.” She hefted Maggie out of the crib and onto her hip. “Happy birthday, little one.”
“Two,” Maggie said, resting her head on Jenny’s shoulder and sticking her thumb in her mouth.
Jenny nuzzled the toddler’s blond curls, taking in the morning baby smell. Maybe another one wouldn’t be so bad. “Shall we go get ready for a party?”
Esther Abercrombie and Hannah Pershing arrived in midmorning to help Jenny and Mrs. O’Malley with the cooking. Esther’s waist had thickened with yet another pregnancy—this would be her eleventh child, due in late June. She’d miscarried one, but birthed two sets of twins.
Hannah had only two children—twelve-year-old Hope and four-year-old Isaiah. She’d had trouble with other pregnancies and lost several before birth. Privately, Jenny wondered if Hannah’s injured leg—she walked with a pronounced limp—contributed to her difficult pregnancies. But Hannah and her husband Zeke had raised several of Zeke’s orphaned younger siblings, and two of his brothers—grown men now—still lived with them. Hannah seemed happy with her life as a farmer’s wife, though it offered her little opportunity to use the education she’d had in the East.
As usual, Esther chattered non-stop. She complained about her feet hurting. “And I have three more months of my belly growin’ afore I’ll get any relief. Not that birthin’ brings any relief from standin’ and fetchin’.”
Jenny murmured sympathetically. She wasn’t ready to mention her suspicion that she was also pregnant—she hadn’t even told Mac yet.
“I used to pooh-pooh Ma,” Esther continued. “Remember how she always needed to sit and rest as we walked the trail?”
Jenny nodded.
“Well, I understand her a lot better now,” Esther said, stirring the cake batter. “She weren’t much older’n I am now. And I’ve borne more young’uns than she did.” Her expression turned sad. “Oh, how I miss her still.”
Jenny patted Esther’s shoulder on her way to get a ham out of the larder.
“You’re both fortunate to have so many children,” Hannah said. “They’re such a help on the farm.”
Jenny smiled. Trust Hannah to be the practical one. “Maybe, but here in town, they just fill up bedrooms and eat everything in sight.”
“They do that in the country as well,” Hannah said. “But the boys in particular are good workers. Isaiah isn’t old enough yet, but we have Zeke’s brothers.”
“I’m glad they all stayed near Oregon City,” said Esther, who was Zeke’s sister. “All us Pershings stayed close, except Joel.”
“What does Maggie think of her birthday?” Hannah asked.
“Oh, she doesn’t understand birthdays yet,” Jenny said. “Though the older children try to explain.”
Esther chuckled and gave the batter a final stir. “She’ll understand cake once she gets a slice.”
