Now where was the road they were to take to California and how long was it? How much farther to the gold land?
Robert spread his map of the United States across the empty boxes beside them. He had not had access to a table on the boat and had been unable to inspect it earlier. Now he looked at it carefully, and the longer he looked, the wider his eyes opened; could it be right? Was this map correct?
California, the newest state of the Union, was the long, narrow strip of land near the Pacific Ocean. If they walked overland from St. Louis straight west, they would reach the Pacific Ocean, and the sun setting in the west would point the way for them. But how long was the road?
“Let me see. .”
Robert used a six-inch pencil to measure as he figured the size of the United States. From the east coast to St. Louis the distance was exactly the length of the pencil. But then it took two whole lengths of the pencil and still another half to reach the Pacific Ocean!
He measured several times, but he couldn’t make the distance across the broad continent an inch shorter; they did not yet have one third of the way to the Pacific behind them. And the distance before them was two and a half times longer! Last year they had traveled one month through the country to Minnesota, this year from Minnesota to Missouri, and they were not yet halfway through America! Not even a third!
At this discovery Robert grew very serious. With a pencil and a map on an empty box he had obtained his first general view of the New World. It made him dizzy. He felt as if he had been kicked in his behind and flung back a couple of thousand miles. Arvid would be scared to death if he were to know how great a distance they had left to go; he had better keep the discovery to himself.
He folded the map quickly and said truthfully, “We have a goodly part left — America is broad!”
But where was the road to California? They must ask someone.
Robert and Arvid resumed their wandering through the town. Whom should they ask? Robert chose with great deliberation among the people they met on the street. Here came men riding sleek horses, dressed from head to foot in soft deerskin, with ten-inch-wide belts from which dangled revolvers and knives. But these riders sat so loftily on the horses — how could a walker dare stop them? Instead Robert turned to the crowd on foot, more simply dressed people; he asked those who had neither revolvers nor knives in their belts, feeling in some way on equal footing with them.
The road to California. .? Some replied at length, others in few words, but all replied willingly and kindly. Some smiled, thinking perhaps the question was a joke, some looked serious or surprised.
“To get to California is more complicated than you think.”
This was the general reply; some said about the same thing in different words: to travel to the goldfields was not an easy undertaking. And concerning the road there was no definite information; on this all agreed. When Robert had asked half a dozen people and added together their replies, he came to the conclusion that no road had been built — nay, not even staked out — to California!
The gold seekers found their way, as best they could, along different routes which had a name in common: the California Trail. People traveled in large parties, a thousand persons or more; the distance was over two thousand miles, and the crossing took four months — a whole summer.
But there was no specific road to the goldfields.
“No road. .?”
Disappointed, Robert repeated the words to himself: that was the silliest thing he had ever heard! In the Old Country, roads ran to the smallest hamlets where only potatoes and grain grew in the fields, but here a road was not even surveyed to the fields which produced gold! Nothing in the world could be more important than to build a wide, even road on which people could travel in comfort to the gold land!
“They could be lying to us,” suggested Arvid. “They might like to get there before us and take the gold?”
“No road!” repeated Robert without listening to his companion. “Of course there must be a road to the goldfields!”
Arvid thought for a few minutes, more intensely than was his custom; then he said: “If there is no road to California we might have trouble finding the place, or what do you think, Robert?”
They must stay in this town for a while and think over their situation. It was late in the afternoon and they began to look for a cheap boardinghouse. On the outskirts of town they found a place where they could sleep for twenty-five cents apiece. They could hardly expect to find cheaper lodgings in a big town like St. Louis. Their host was a fat Irishman who showed them their bunks in the Jameson Lodging House: mattresses filled with rotten straw, spread on the floor and for cover, torn horse blankets. Four men had to sleep on one mattress. Their sleeping companions had already gone to bed, two bearded horse grooms who slept with their boots on, even though a notice on the wall pleaded with gentlemen guests to please remove their boots before going to bed. The place smelled of manure, whether from the bedding or the sleepers.
Robert and Arvid reluctantly unstrapped their rucksacks. This was a poor lodging, but to them it smelled in some way of home since it exuded such a strong odor of stable; once they had lodged together in the stable room at Nybacken.
Their host was talkative and when he heard that the Swedish boys were on their way to California he was ready with good advice; he himself had a brother who had set out on the Trail last spring, so he could tell them all they needed to know.
There was a road to the gold land, in fact, three different roads — the Overland Trail, the Santa Fe Trail, and one trail between these two, following sometimes one and sometimes the other. Most travelers used the Overland Trail, which started at Independence, Missouri.
“You must go to Independence and join the golden army!”
Robert had looked only casually at his map with its many western states and territories, all of them void of place-names, it seemed. Now he asked how far it was to Independence. The Irishman said that this town lay two hundred miles to the west of St. Louis.
Robert felt as if he had got another kick in the behind throwing him still farther back across the American continent. Two hundred miles!
Mr. Jameson continued. It was too late for them to join the caravan of gold seekers this summer, a whole month too late. It was May now, the train to California had left Independence in April and was on its way west. A new caravan would not leave until next spring. When the buffalo grass turned green next spring, then the gold seekers would gather again.
And so Robert and Arvid discovered they must join others with the same intention. But this spring it was too late to sign up in the gold army; it had already left. New grass must sprout on the prairie before they could join. They would lose a whole year.
Their host wished them goodnight and good sleep and left. They sat down on their mattress and opened their rucksacks, still full of the bread and cured pork Kristina had packed for them, and ate. The food prevented Arvid from talking; for him to talk while eating would have been as sacrilegious as swearing in church. But Robert too sat silent now as he chewed. What he had just heard required some thought.
While peeling potatoes on the boat, they had figured that their twenty-five dollars would take care of their food and lodging for a month’s travel from St. Louis to California. For they had hoped to reach the goldfields in a month, and once there they would have no further need for money.
And now this — they couldn’t get there for a whole year.
When Arvid had finished eating he took hold of the nickel chain on his vest and pulled his watch from its pocket. He said that whatever else happened on this journey, he wouldn’t sell his cylinder watch. They might have to go without food but he wouldn’t part with his watch even if they starved. It was his inheritance and could not be touched. And Arvid’s watch showed ten minutes after nine this May evening of 1851, in Mr. Jameson’s manure-smelling lodging in the town of St. Louis, Missouri, where they had paid 25 cents apiece for sleeping accommodations. Gentlemen please take off their boots in bed!