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He was arraigned and held; but the date set for trial was not fixed before Benjamin took Frances and Georgia to Benicia, to enter the September term of St. Catherine's Convent School. Upon Ben's return, I observed that he and Elitha were keeping from me some mysterious but pleasurable secret.
Pursued by these fears, we returned to the ranch, where Elitha and her three black-eyed little daughters welcomed our home-coming and brightened our vacation.
Some one pointed to him who sat beside our eldest sister and gayly said, "Look at your new brother." Another asked, "How do you like him?" We gazed around in silent amazement until a third continued teasingly, "She is no longer Elitha Donner, but Mrs. Perry McCoon. You have lost your sister, for her husband will take her away with him." "Lost your sister!"
She also stated that her little daughter Elisabeth and her sister Leanna were with her on the ranch, and that she was anxious to learn how Georgia and I were getting on. By advice of short-sighted friends, grandma sent a very formal reply to the letter, and told us that she did not want Elitha to write again.
True enough, the least taste of anything sour produced the tell-tale shock. But the most aggravating feature of the illness was that it developed the week that sister Elitha and Mr. Benjamin W. Wilder were married in Sacramento; and when they reached Sonoma on their wedding tour, we could not visit with them, because neither had had the disease.
We were very proud of the new clothes she had made us; but the first time she washed and hung them out to dry, they were stolen, and we were again destitute. Sister Elitha thought perhaps strange Indians took them. In May, the Fallon party arrived with horses laden with many packs of goods, but their only refugee was Lewis Keseberg, from the cabin near the lake.
It was evening, and some one came to our door, spoke to Elitha and Leanna in low tones and went away. My sisters turned, put their arms about us and wept bitterly. Then, gently, compassionately, the cruel, desolating truth was told. Ah, how could we believe it? No anxious watching, no weary waiting would ever bring father and mother to us again!
Childlike, she wrote: I am happy, but there has not been a day since I left Sutter's Fort that I haven't thought of my little sisters and wanted to see them. Hiram Miller, our guardian, says he will take me to see you soon, and Elitha is going too.
Then they went up to fell the sheltering pine tree over our tent for fuel; while Noah James, Mrs. Wolfinger, my two half-sisters, and mother kept moving about hunting for things. Finally Elitha and Leanna came and kissed me, then father, "good-bye," and went up the steps, and out of sight. Mother stood on the snow where she could see all go forth.
Like Elitha, she hoped we would forget them, and as she watched me cheerfully adapting myself to new surroundings, she imagined that time and circumstances were dimming the past from my memory. She did not understand me.
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