Chapter 21

Even with the stop for Cassie and me to get married, we made twenty-four miles for the day. Mina actually let my wives help with supper. While we were eating, Delia came over and sat beside me.

Sam was on the other side of me and Cassie had scooted over to let Delia sit beside me. "Hi," she said and then looked down shyly at her food.

"Hi, yourself," I said.

"Do you mind if I eat with you?" she asked.

"I never mind when a pretty girl wants to eat with me," I said.

"Do you think I'm pretty?"

"I think you're very pretty. So does Sam and Cassie."

Delia smiled and went back to eating. In the mean time, Dalia had taken a seat beside Andy. I could see her in low conversation with him and Sarah Beth.

"Jud, have you given any thought about what you want to do after we're in the free states?" I asked.

"Yes, suh. I've thought about it a lot. Mina and me was going to ask you if'n we could work for you."

"That'd mean moving to Oregon with us, Jud. Are you all prepared to do that?"

"Yes, suh, we is. We lookin for'ard to it."

"Have you ever worked with cattle or horses, Jud?"

"Some. Mosely I just work in the fiels. Workin with horses and cows is a lot easier than workin in tobacco."

"Yeah, I expect it is. We're going to be starting a ranch, so most of the work you'll be doing will be from horseback. You'll have to learn to ride better, but you sure won't have to be working as hard."

"That sure does sound good."

"Will I be helping with the cattle too?" Delia asked.

"I expect so. We all will. Sam won't be doing much until our baby is big enough to leave with M & M, but I'm sure Cassie is going to want to help right from the start."

"Wait a minute," Cassie teased. "The only reason I married you is so I'd never have to work again. I'm your princess, so all I should have to do is recline on my large bed and have people feed me and pamper me."

I looked at Sam and asked, "Do you think tonight would be a good time for a tickle party?"

Sam said she thought it was our duty to tickle Cassie until she begged for mercy.

Day 95 - Tuesday, August 3, 1847

"You know," Andy said as we were eating breakfast, "it's been almost a week since we met up with them fellers from Richmond. I wonder if anyone is kicking up a fuss over them?"

"Well, if they are we'll probably never hear of it. Do you know anything about the country north and west of here? If I remember right, we come to a split not too far ahead. I'm not sure if we'd be better off going up through the mountains of Western Virginia, or if we'd be better skirting south of them and going straight into Kentucky."

"I've never been in this area," Andy said. "Maybe we should stop somewhere and ask some of the locals."

"Okay, if we pass any towns today, we'll stop and ask. I think it's shorter if we head up through the mountains here, but if I remember right, it is some pretty rugged country."

The terrain we had been going through the last couple of days had been becoming more rugged as we went. The road we were on wasn't too bad though, so we had been making good time.

It was nearly noon when we came on to an ordinary. There were a few houses around it, but I don't know if they even called themselves a town. We stopped and watered the horses and mules, then something hit me, so I went to talk with Andy.

"Andy, I think Sam and Cassie and I are going to stop here at the ordinary for lunch. Why don't you guys go on out of town a couple of miles and stop and have lunch and wait for us?"

Andy grinned and asked, "You're going to ask them a few questions, aren't you?"

"Yep. I figure I can ask them about the best route through the mountains and pick up any gossip they may have heard from the east of us."

Andy agreed to wait for us down the road a ways, so I gathered Sam and Cassie up and we went into the ordinary.

This place was nothing like the last couple of places we stopped at. The landlord was a pleasant, talkative man and the serving girl seemed to be happy with her work.

The serving girl said they had shepherd's pie for their main dish. I'd never heard of it, but we all decided to try it. Basically what they called shepherd's pie was a dish that had a layer of mashed potatoes, then a layer of beef stew, then another layer of mashed potatoes, then a layer of cheese. This had then been baked until the mashed potatoes on top had started to brown and the cheese had melted. It was delicious.

We were the only people in the dining room, so the girl hung around and talked for a while. "Where are you all coming from," she asked.

"Well, originally, we came from up north. Most recently, we're coming from Richmond," Sam said.

"Were you there when Bobby Wadsworth came up missing?"

"Who is Bobby Wadsworth?" Sam asked.

"His father owns one of the biggest plantations around Richmond," the girl said. "About a week ago he came up missing along with three of his friends. Nobody seems to know what might have happened to them."

"Maybe they just went for a trip," I said. "How old are they? Sometimes young people just take off for a while."

"That's what most people are thinking. They're all in their early twenties. Old man Caleb Wadsworth thinks there's been foul play though. He says Bobby would have told him if he was just going off somewhere. He's had people out riding all over the country asking about him. There was a guy came through here yesterday."

"That's interesting. He must have passed us while we were camped. We didn't see anyone on the road yesterday," I said.

"I think Bobby probably took off south," the girl said. "I expect he'll be back home in a week or two."

"Do you know anything about the road to the north and west of here?" I asked, changing the subject. "We're trying to get to a horse farm out of Ashland, Kentucky to buy some horses and we don't know which is the best way to go from here."

"No, but I can get you someone who does."

She took off and in a few minutes, the landlord came back to our table. "I hear you're trying to get to Ashland, Kentucky," he said.

"Yes, sir. I've heard there's some kind of pass through the mountains up ahead. I was wondering if we'd be better going through the mountains here, or if we'd be better following them to the west for a ways before going through."

"Well, as far as getting through the mountains, it's about the same either way. If you're going up to Ashland though, you should go on and go through the mountains here. There's a fork in the road in about four miles. Just take the right hand fork. About two or two and a half miles after that, you'll see a road going off to your left. That's the one that goes through the mountains."

"We've got a covered wagon. Will there be any problem getting that through there?"

"No. Might be a little slow, but you won't have any problems. There's a big tobacco warehouse just south of Ashland. People haul loads of tobacco there all the time. It gets a mite dicey in the winter, but it's fine this time of year."

We talked a bit about the weather then when we finished eating, we paid the bill and got on our way. We caught up with our family, that's the way I thought of them now, about a mile out of town. They were still eating lunch.

I told them all we had learned and Andy was in agreement we should head on through the mountains here. "You know, that about Wadsworth kind of lets me breathe a little easier," he said. "It don't seem like anyone is connecting his disappearance with the slave auction."

We all agreed that made us feel better. We didn't get a lot farther the rest of the day. We camped just after we made the second turn the innkeeper had told us about.

Day 96 - Wednesday, August 4, 1847

Delia sat with Sam, Cassie and me again this morning, and I noticed that Dalia was sitting with Andy and Sarah Beth again.

"Andy," I said. "We were talking yesterday about setting up a ranch. Cassie asked if we were all going to live together and share a ranch or if we were going to go our separate ways when we got to Oregon. How do you feel about that?"

"Well," he grinned, "Sarah Beth and I have been talking about that too. For our part, we'd like to stick together. If you folks don't want to share a ranch, then we'd want to make our start right next door to you, if you didn't mind."

"Oh, we don't mind," Sam said. "We were talking that we'd like for all of us to stay together if possible."

"Do you mean my family too?" Mina asked.

"By all means, Mina. You are all my family too, now," I said.

Mina smiled and nodded, then Jud said softly, "We'd like that."

Traveling was definitely a lot slower now. The mules slowed down a lot while they were pulling up steep grades and we had to rest the animals a lot more frequently. We had only made around six or seven miles when we stopped for our nooning.

Mina was fixing lunch and Andy, Jud and I had sat down under a large tree and were talking about the ranch. Sarah Beth joined us after a while and then Dalia joined the group. I saw Sam, Cassie and Delia wander away from the wagon, but didn't really think anything of it.

Maybe twenty minutes had gone by when Delia came back and tapped me on the shoulder. "Could you come with me for a minute, Ed?" she asked.

I thought about refusing, since I figured all three women were going to jump me about Delia. Finally, I sighed and got up. We had walked about fifty feet when Delia stopped and said, "There are some runaway slaves hiding in the woods back here. Sam wanted me to come and get you so you could talk to them."