Bentonville, Arkansas
September 1860
The Army men gave me a chance to say goodbye to Not-Mama and Not-Papa in Fillmore, but I told them no. I didn’t want to.
I cried when I hugged Peach for the last time though, and Violet.
I cried when Kima Robison came bursting into the yard and ran after the wagon, calling for Amina, begging the men to bring her back. Triphena wailed too, and as I held her tight against me I thought about how both ends of the time we spent in Fillmore were spent rocking in a wagon full of hurt.
There were other children who traveled with us, in more wagons driven by other Army men. Seventeen, in all. The oldest was thirteen, a little girl with bright red hair and a scar on her cheek that I knew better than to ask about. The youngest was the same age as Tri, barely more than a toddler.
For the most part, we kept to ourselves, tucked into our own places in the wagon, wondering what would become of us. The Army men said they were taking us back to our families, in Arkansas. What was left of our families, at least. Everyone had an aunt or a grandmother waiting there. They’d been trying to find out what happened to us and our mamas and papas and brothers and sisters for nearly three years. They’d sent their precious photographs with the Army, knowing they might never get them back.
At first, everybody thought us kids were dead.
But when the Army men started looking at the mass graves in the Meadow, they realized that the bodies didn’t line up with Captain Alexander’s list of travelers. Some were missing. Seventeen children’s bodies, to be exact.
We were a surprise, tucked away into Utah Mormon families, scattered from Cedar City to Salt Lake.
The Army men said the newspapers were talking about all of us. That there were people waiting to scoop us up when we arrived.
Some of the children looked afraid when they said this. Others couldn’t stop crying, no matter how many miles we traveled. I felt a nervous kind of hope fluttering in my chest at the idea of being scooped up into arms that wanted me so much they’d been trying to find me for years.
It took a long time to get back to Arkansas, and while we went, I told Tri every single thing I could remember about her mama and papa and my mama and papa and everyone else who loved us before the awful thing happened.
Some of it I made up, since I couldn’t remember. Every time Tri—who let me call her Tri without a fuss—asked me for “another story,” I couldn’t help myself but tell one. It felt like a little miracle that she’d said anything at all.
Some of the memories really did come back, and those were the ones that made the long trip pass in a blur.
“We called your mama Sissy Lou,” I told Tri. “She hardly let anybody else carry you except Mary. And then she fussed so much with your bonnet, worried you’d get sun in your eyes, that Mary always had to give you back before long.
“Our papas were strong. They could take the big heavy yoke off the wagon like it was nothing. My papa, your uncle, would sing them a song and they’d close their big old eyes and stand there calm and quiet. We liked the song, too.”
Tri sighed against me like some part of her remembered, even though I knew she couldn’t. “Sing it.”
The words whispered around my mind like leaves in the wind.
“And joy be to you all,” I sang softly over and over.
* * *
The Army men seemed to delight in spoiling us, preparing stews and biscuits for dinner that made my mouth water every time we stopped for the night. Once, after a rider appeared in camp, they gave us red lollipops after dinner.
I got the feeling the men were as uneasy as us children, at first. These stiff, uniformed men with their shiny brass buttons and wide-brimmed hats. But as the miles went by, they seemed to take it as their own personal goal to draw smiles from even the most tearful children.
And by the time we pulled into Bentonville, I saw some of those big men wipe their eyes just like us kids.
There was a group of people gathered to meet the wagons, standing outside a red-brick store with glass windows.
There in the streets were men and women wearing clothing I’d never seen back in Fillmore. Fancy dresses of all different colors, shaped like bells. Men in smart jackets that almost looked like the Army men’s uniforms, but longer. Some of the women wore delicate shawls over their shoulders.
To my surprise, Triphena didn’t shrink against me. Instead, she joined me and a couple of the other kids in gawking out the side of the wagon flaps as it rolled to a stop.
My eyes scanned the crowd that was beginning to rush toward us. People were talking excitedly. Some were crying. My heart beat faster.
I’d learned that me and Tri’s grandparents were named Eliza and William Huff.
My eyes landed on a tall, thin woman with salt-and-pepper curls peeking out from her hat. She stood next to a man with a bald head and a fluffy white beard. She gripped his arm harder, and her mouth puckered in a way that I knew she was about to cry.
“Nancy.” Her mouth formed the word, even though I couldn’t hear her yet.
Then, “Tri.”
She reached out a hand to the woman and man standing beside her, not taking her eyes off me.
The commotion on the street turned into a dull roar that quieted when I moved my gaze to the people standing beside her. There were an elderly man and woman who looked so much like Mama it made my teeth hurt.
The Army men hadn’t said anything about Mama’s parents. Just Papa’s. But there they were, all four of my grandparents, like memories brought to life.
We stared at each other for a long time, and I could read in their eyes that they were seeing ghosts in me and Tri, too.
Then all four of them rushed forward, jostling through the crowd to scoop us up and hold us tight.