Gone West by Kathleen Karr Read Free Book Online Page B

enough soup here to warm up an army.”
     
    The tears stopped. “You’re a saint!”
     
    “No,” Maggie retorted good naturedly, “I’ve just got the only decent fire in camp tonight. But I’m on the last of my firewood, so tomorrow night we’ll all be in the same boat together, or maybe swimming, from the looks of things.”
     
    Gwen raced out as Johnny’s eyes met Maggie’s. She knew the expression. The ‘here she goes collecting more orphans again’ look. She grinned at him suddenly. It was true. Her only weakness, and nothing could be done about it. That’s how they’d adopted Jamie, after all, and Flower Blossom and her brood. Now here they were with a new set.
     
    Maggie tasted the soup and added a pinch of salt and another of pepper. Come to think on it, there could hardly be a better way to spend a wet night on the prairie~with the sole exception of some complete privacy with Johnny. And that was far from forthcoming.
     
    They were crammed in tighter than the books on the wagon shelves outside and the soup pot was scraped clean. Jamie had fallen asleep on the top bunk, Charlotte snuggled safely between his body and the wall. Maggie and Gwen sat on the bottom bunk, the men slouching comfortably on grain sacks in front of the women. Irish was sucking on an unlit cheroot, and they were all speculating on their futures.
     
    “I had a word with Josh Chandler this afternoon at the crossing,” Irish commented. “He’s worried about Pawnee country coming up. Seemed even more concerned about the Mormons, though.”
     
    “Does he really expect Brigham Young to sweep down across the prairies and wipe us all out, or worse yet, force polygamy upon us?” Johnny looked amused at the idea.
     
    “What’s polygamy ?” asked Gwen.
     
    “That’s when, that’s when . . .” for once Johnny seemed at a loss for words.
     
    “It means a man can take as many wives as he wishes, Gwen,” Maggie filled in for her husband.
     
    Gwen looked shocked. “Oooh. Is that what that Celestial Marriage business is that the Reverend Winslow’s been going on about?”
     
    “They also call it the doctrine of `Spiritual Wives’,” continued Johnny, more at ease now. They were among a group of adults, after all, even if Gwen weren’t a married lady. “There was a wonderful joke going around Independence about it over the winter. It seems that shortly after Joseph Smith came up with this particular revelation a gentile lady had the nerve to ask his first and number one wife where the Saints found this doctrine. With eyes blazing, Smith’s wife answered, ` Straight from Hell, Madam !”’
     
    Chuckles rose from all save Gwen. “The man deserved to be shot!”
     
    Johnny was serious again. “Not necessarily, Gwen. It turned him into a martyr. Worse still, it took the reigns of power from a sly, but inefficient man and turned them over to Brigham Young, who’s apparently becoming a real leader of men. From what I’ve heard, he’s transformed Smith’s militia and is honing it into an efficient group of killers. They call themselves Danites, and sometimes Destroying Angels~”
     
    Johnny stopped when he saw the frightened look on Gwen’s face. He’d gone too far.
     
    “But their ways needn’t concern us. They’re struggling to the north of us, without even proper wagons for shelter. They’ve no cause or reason to know of our existence~” He halted again. Unless, of course, someone had gotten wind of that Ramage press. He’d not really taken serious precautions to hide their leaving Nauvoo . . . No. He shook his head almost perceptibly. That was long ago and far away. It had been fair game. And the Saints had the survival of their people to busy them now.
     
    “They’ve much more serious things on their minds,” he repeated aloud for the benefit of everyone, including himself.
     
    “Seems to me you take the Mormon threat too calmly, Stuart, especially after what you’ve just said.”
     
    “They