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Blakely’s, I’m told. On a Saturday night or two. While others drink only to relieve their thirst, I hear that you drink beyond quenching. You’ve even been loaded on your horse and led home, or so I’m told.”
    “You hear wrong. Haven’t any other good occupation to commit my efforts to. A certain young lady won’t commit herself.”
    “I’ve told you the conditions.” In fact, if he had expressed his faith in God, I wasn’t at all sure that would be enough for my father’s blessing on our marriage. I knew I’d have to work on that, but his reluctance to commit suggested I had time. And during that time I looked forward to the kind things Mr. Warren whispered to me, the gentle stroking of my arm, theway my heart beat faster when he came near, how time stood still when I was with him and did not start again until I heard the pounding of his horse’s hooves leaving me, my breathing and heart rate once again becoming as steady as a metronome.
    “Then let it be known that I do accept your conditions. That I intend to speak to your father about your hand in marriage. I’ve secured a position in Oregon City, working at the docks.”
    “You have?” Oregon City was some miles away, across a ferry, though on this side of the Willamette. It’s where the trial was held. I didn’t like to go there.
    “The docks? But I thought you were a cattleman.”
    “I need to earn funds to buy those cattle, and working for my pa isn’t making that happen fast enough. They need strong arms to load and unload cargo. I’ll come back on Sabbath days. That’s when I’d like to see you, proper.”
    “I don’t think my father will—”
    “Does he intend to keep you cloistered in that house until your sisters are married off?”
    “I . . . I don’t know. I just know that he needs me now.”
    “I need you too.” He crooned the words with that husky voice he used at times that thrilled me. Yes, that is the word, I was thrilled that someone loved me—someone who held me, told me I was precious, adored, who cared for me. And who now was leaving in order to earn money so he could marry me. I wasn’t sure I wanted that . . . but I didn’t look forward to the drudgery of caring for my siblings and my increasingly erratic father despite what I knew my mother would want. “I need you to say yes to me, to make my longings honest.”
    “You understand.”
    “Yes.” He pulled me back down onto the quilt. “I understand that I love you, that I cannot live without knowing you love me too. Just say the words, Eliza.”
    I wanted to. And yet a part of me believed that once I did, all would change. My strength would dissolve and then what? What if the rumors were true?
    “I’ll keep you safe, Eliza. No one else on this earth will ever love you as I do.”
    “And what if I can’t ever say it?”
    “I would still marry you. I love enough for both of us.”
    Could that be? Could one person love enough for two? I didn’t know. I wished I could ask my mother if one’s love was enough. I only knew my heart pounded, and that if he threatened to leave, I’d race after him shouting that I loved him. Then I’d be sunk, buried in the well of needing to be loved by someone other than my Lord and living in the depths of consequences such a separation would entail.

The Diary of Eliza Spalding
    1850
    Today, while they are gone to trial, my mind races backwards like a tongue on a broken tooth, always hunting for familiar, something worthy to think upon following my daily Scripture reading. I used to daydream as a young girl, of having an education and then marrying a man who adored me, promised to keep me safe. I wanted a dozen babies to play at my feet. I love S so. Yet how greatly my life has changed from those youthful thoughts. But today, while my child is grilled by lawyers, forced to recall that wretched time, I pray for her, that she will find happier things to think upon when the questions cease. I must do the same, pray I