Read Jubilee Trail for Free Online Page B

fast.
    “It’s a hard journey, Garnet. I’ve got no right to ask you to take it. I ought to say I’d quit the trail now, and settle down in a civilized place like New York or Boston. But I can’t quit now. I’ve got to go back this year. My brother’s expecting me, and my partner John Ives; and there aren’t any mails. I can’t wind up the business unless I’m there to do it. But we can go to California this summer, and next summer we can come back for good. We can live in New York or Boston or anywhere you please.”
    Garnet tried to make her breaths behave. She could not answer. Oliver thought she was hesitating, and he drew her closer to him.
    “I’m such a fool, Garnet. You haven’t said you’d marry me at all.”
    When she did manage to speak, her voice was low and tense with wonder.
    “But Oliver, of course I will!”
    “Now?” he pled. “Before I go to California? You’ll come with me?” His voice was shaky with eagerness. “I ought to ask you to wait for me. But I can’t ask you to wait! It will be nearly two years before I can possibly get back to the States—and my dearest darling girl, now that I’ve found you, I can’t do without you for two years!”
    Garnet shook her head violently. “No, no, don’t ask me to wait! Please take me with you!”
    “It’s a terrible journey,” he warned again. “From here to Santa Fe it’s easy, but beyond Santa Fe—we go through deserts and wild bare mountains, we sleep on buffalo robes, you’ll travel with strange hard men and the sort of women you’ve never seen before, we live outdoors, we eat strange food, we—Garnet, it’s not like anything you’ve ever done, if you weren’t blooming with health I’d never dare ask you to do it—but will you? Will you, Garnet?”
    His words were like jewels in the air between them. Garnet began to laugh.
    “Oh, Oliver, won’t you ever understand what it’s like to be me? Don’t you know every word you say makes me want to go? Don’t you know you’re telling me what I dreamed about every day at that Academy for Young Ladies? Yes, I’ll go with you. I’ll eat strange food and I’ll sleep on a buffalo robe, and I’ll love it. Oh, Oliver, take me to California!”
    Oliver swept her into his arms and kissed her. He held her so close to him that she thought he must be crushing her ribs. It was wonderful. Oliver was splendid and the whole world was suddenly as glorious as she had always dreamed it might be. She was going over the Jubilee Trail to California.

THREE
    G ARNET AND OLIVER WERE married in March.
    Her mother had shed tears, and her father was graver than Garnet had ever seen him. They liked Oliver. But they said to Garnet that they hadn’t known him long enough, and neither had she. Garnet exclaimed,
    “I know him perfectly well! And I love him. He loves me. Don’t you understand? Didn’t you two love each other when you got married?”
    That was a strong argument. They had loved each other very much, and they still did. But everybody had said her mother was throwing herself away.
    Mrs. Cameron’s name had been Pauline Delacroix. Her father’s ancestors were French Huguenots, her mother’s were English adventurers. She belonged to a family as old and proud as any in New York. Horace Cameron was the son of an obscure Presbyterian minister from a small town upstate. He had come to New York with no fortune but his head and his hands, and when Pauline met him he was only a minor clerk in the bank.
    Pauline had a number of suitors. From everybody’s viewpoint but her own, she could have made a far more promising marriage.
    But Pauline loved him. To get her parents’ consent to the marriage, she and Horace had to fight a battle that lasted a year. Her parents finally yielded, though her mother wept through the ceremony and her father was so angry he could hardly be polite to the wedding guests.
    They began their married life in a tiny little house, with only one servant. But Pauline had