Chapter 17
When it was time to cross the Kansas River not everyone in our party came along. The Duringtons had enough of this wretched trip and they turned back, afraid of losing another child in the water. Who could blame them? Losing Priscilla and nearly losing Oliver must have knocked the wind right out of them. Reaching another raging river forced some kind of reckoning, and they chose to return home to deal with their grief without the added burden of an arduous journey.
Willie Wetherfield is a collector of lost souls, I think. She has taken in Miss Beula Durington, who continued the journey alone after her brother and sister-in-law turned back. Willie welcomed Beula into our wagon family with the same openheartedness she had welcomed me. I’m not sure about Beula, but I say nothing
