Adam I have loved

One

"I can't find him, Ben," Inger said, her voice edged with panic. "I went to all the wagons and checked with all the children—none of them have seen Adam. Oh, Ben!" Inger Cartwright pressed a hand over her mouth as she feared she was going to start screaming like a mad woman. The boy was gone and although he was her husband's son, she loved him as her own and he loved her. That she knew. There was no mistaking the tender kiss goodnight he placed on her cheek or his smile when she tousled his dark, wavy hair and called him her söt pojke.

Ben Cartwright held his wife by her arms; he wanted to calm her but he felt cold fear himself. "We'll find him—don't worry. Tom Burnside and Walter went west, Jeffers, Simon and I are going to search north—Franklin and Joregensen are sweeping the east side and Millard, Hudson and Sanderson, the south. We'll find him. We'll find him." But Ben wasn't as sure as he sounded. The name "Adam" echoed in the falling darkness, called by many different voices; even the children secured within the circle of wagons called for their lost friend. This was their basic, submerged terror brought to the surface, that something would happen to them and their parents would be at a loss to prevent it so their calls had an urgency that was also of self-interest.

Ben Cartwright had a deeper fear that was weighted with guilt—his boy had disappeared and it was his fault. He had punished the boy for fighting and then refusing to obey, taken his razor strop to him and when Ben had finished, his chest heaving with suppressed emotion, Adam had taken off to the surrounding trees. Ben hesitated to call him back—the boy was going off to cry alone. Adam was only five years old but even at that age, the boy was proud—too proud, Ben always thought, and wouldn't cry in front of others. That was Adam—proud and remote.

"It helps to talk, Adam, to share your pain with others," Ben had once told him as the boy sat holding the limp bird he had rescued and tried to raise with Inger's help. It had died and the child was distraught, Ben knew it, but all he did was hold it and stroke its smooth feathers with his thumb while Ben dug a hole.

The boy had looked up at him with his hazel eyes that seemed much older than his years said as way of explanation, that the bird had died—all things did. Then he placed it in the hole and taking the spade from his father, he piled the dirt on top, then pounded it down with the flat side. And that was all Adam had said about it.

The sun was setting quickly and Inger lit a lantern and held it up, walking about the perimeter of the circle of wagons and calling. "Adam! Adam! Time to come home now! Adam! Oh, please, Adam, come home now, söt pojke!" Her voice cracked into tears, sobs escaping her as the only answer was the echoes of the boy's name from the searching men.

The child wasn't found that night and the next day, the wagons agreed to stay and search. All that day the men searched but it was a small wagon train, only nine wagons, and they couldn't waste much time. It looked as if it would be an early winter—already the mornings were chilly and they could ill afford to be caught in snow. But after another restless night throughout the camp, they stayed their departure another half day but at noon, one of the men said it was time to move on; they might be able to make three-four miles before dark.

Ben Cartwright said he'd stay behind and once they found Adam, they would catch up with the train. The other men tried to discourage such recklessness—the women as well; there was safety only in numbers and precious little safety at that—a man alone with a wife about to birth her first child, well…. Besides, loss wasn't unknown to anyone. The Hudson's youngest child had died of a fever a month earlier. Sanderson's girl had been bitten by a snake and died in agony and the grieving mother ripped out hunks of her own hair and shrieked at burying the body in the wilderness. She had to be tied inside the wagon so she wouldn't run off to remain beside small grave. It was weeks before anything resembling sanity came back to her. And she still had the hollow-eyed look of someone on the tenuous verge of madness, looking blankly ate her husband and their remaining two children as if they were strangers.

But the men's pleadings that Ben move on with them, were of no use—Ben said he wouldn't leave without Adam—they hadn't found his body so he must be alive. The other men looked at one another—the knew that wasn't true. Bears and panthers often pulled a large catch off to eat in private away from circling wolves or other competition.

But the women used another approach. "Think of Inger," Jorgensen's wife had said to him. Ben looked at his wife; she was heavy with child and lately she hadn't been well. Although Inger was a healthy woman, earlier on she had a scare—it seemed the child may have died in the womb but then she had felt the quickening and was relieved as was Ben but ever since then, the child had constantly moved and struggled against its restrictions seeming impatient to enter the world.

"He seems to think he can kick his way out," Inger had whispered one night, smiling wanly as she had lain on the pallet, unable to sleep.

Ben had glanced over at Adam to be sure he was still asleep. "Let me help," he had whispered to Inger and raising her gown up to below her breasts, he massaged her abdomen and he could feel the child moving about, highly restless as he pressed his broad hand against the movements. And Ben smiled. "He's going to be a strong boy. Strong. I think the name Hoss will fit him perfectly."

Inger lightly laughed. "Oh, Ben-Hoss? I think Erick is better and we had decided…"

"You know Adam's set on it. Why he talks about teaching 'Hoss' to fish and how to read—all he talks about is Hoss, Hoss, Hoss! And he still remembers what your brother said, or as he puts it, what Uncle Gunnar said about hoping our son will be called 'Hoss,' a man of 'friendly ways.' You don't want to disappoint Adam, do you?" Ben asked playfully as he rubbed the taut flesh of his wife's abdomen.

"Oh, heavens no. But maybe, Ben, the child will be a girl."

"Well, as big as this child is going to be, I hope it's a boy—but if it's a girl, she'll be such a big woman she may well fit the name Hoss as well!" And the man and woman laughed together—it would be the last time they would know complete happiness.

Heeding Mrs. Jorgensen, Ben looked at his wife, Inger. She had barely eaten since Adam went missing and had been restless the night before, unable to sleep not just from worry about Adam, but from the size of the child she was carrying. Ben knew her time may be early and that alone on the trail, both she and the child might die without the assistance of the other women—and even with their assistance it was still possible that he could lose them both. The women on the train, as they had traveled the same path, had formed a communal bond and had assisted and comforted each other in ways known only to women; men couldn't understand a woman's true lot in life. Only another woman could understand and give what is needed.

So Ben relented after one more quick scouring of the area; everyone who could, searched again but after another two hours, the wagon train moved on and Ben felt as if his heart was wrenched from him as the wagon wheels began to turn and carry him further and further away from his lost child. And it took a few months before Ben could bring himself to write in the family Bible that became his when his own father died, the two deaths- Adam Stoddard Cartwright, firstborn son of Benjamin Cartwright and Elizabeth Stoddard Cartwright, lost and presumed dead the month of September, the year of our Lord, 1836. Inger Borgstrom Cartwright, most beloved wife of Benjamin Cartwright, born 1811, died 14 October 1836, Ash Hollow, Utah Territory.

And then, below the record of the two deaths, he wrote: Erick Borgstrom Cartwright, born 2 October 1836, Utah territory.