Sophie's Journey - Chapter 37
The Silence of Heaven
The first snowflakes fell gently, and no one seemed to notice them. The river crossing had been exhausting, and the Saints were trying to regroup. As dusk fell, the flakes thickened, and the wind picked up. It swept over the frozen ground, erasing tracks and hiding the hills. The cold pressed in around the camp.
Sophie crouched over her children, pulling the ashen blanket higher over Anne’s chin. Otto’s cough resounded through the tent. The last of the flour had gone with breakfast—a thin glue, not even a taste. Anne’s lips were blue.
Wind battered the canvas overhead. Snow blew in through the seams. Sophie came closer to the children. Her skin was numb and burning. She no longer shivered. The cold sat inside her just like a lead blanket.
A shout split the blizzard. Then muffled hoofbeats thudded past the tent. More shouting, floating on the wind: “They’re here! Scouts from Zion!”
She hesitated momentarily, then lifted Anne’s head from her lap and crawled to the tent flap. The camp was white with snow. People moved in the storm, huddled shapes staggering toward the noise. Sophie followed, holding Otto’s hand. Anne and Emma trailed behind.
Near the center of camp, three men on horses stood ringed by the desperate. One, a youth with a raw red beard, raised both hands. “Captain Grant’s wagons are at the ridge. Two days out. Flour. Blankets. Help.”
A woman screamed. Someone smiled, then wept. Sophie watched the faces: frozen, starved, suddenly brightening as coals catching wind. Peder Mortenson coughed and said. “Storytelling. No one’s coming.”
But Sophie sensed it in her heart. Hope hurt more than hunger.
The scouts handed out what they could: hard bits of bread. Sophie broke the bread into four pieces. She gave one to Anne, who sucked on it until it softened, then swallowed. Otto stared, eyes glaring, then took his piece from her hand. She gave a piece to Emma. She held out the last piece to Peter. He did not take it. He looked at her hand, then at her face.
"Eat it," she said.
"You."
"I ate."
"You didn't." He didn't raise his volume. He never did anymore. "I saw you divide it into four pieces.
Sophie kept her arm extended. The chill penetrated her wool sleeve. "You need it."
"So do you." Peter pushed her hand back toward her chest, gently, the way a man handles something fragile. His fingers were red and cracked, the nails black with frost.
"Peter."
"I'm not a child." His words sat between them, heavier than the bread. "Eat it. Or I won't pull tomorrow."
Sophie looked at the scrap in her hand. She thought of the miles behind and the miles ahead. The ridge where the scouts said the wagons waited. Her stomach clenched with hunger.
She broke the piece in two. She put the larger part, small as it was, into Peter's hand. She put the other in her mouth and chewed. She did not taste it.
"Half," she said. "Or we both stop pulling."
Peter held the scrap of bread for a long moment. Then he ate it. They sat in silence, with nothing left to say, as the wind and snow kept blowing.
That night, Sophie lay awake, hearing the wind. In her mind, she saw the ridge and the dark line of rescue wagons crawling closer. She did not pray. She just waited, holding her children close, willing the dawn to come before hope died again.
The night dragged on. By morning, snow weighed down the tent and covered everything outside in white. The wind was quiet, but the cold was worse than anything Sophie had felt before. Emma and Peter hid under the last blankets. Anne lay next to Sophie, shivering and blue-lipped. Otto coughed in his sleep and grasped a piece of flannel.
A foot of snow had fallen overnight, trapping the company in the Sweetwater valley. Hardly anyone moved. Sophie wondered whether anyone could even get up anymore. She knew hunger well now, but hopelessness was worse. The last of the flour was gone. They boiled snow for water, and the children’s lips stuck to the tin cups.
Sophie noticed a stir near the center of camp. Captain James Willie was getting on his horse. His face looked pallid under his hat. Joseph Elder was getting ready to ride with him. Both men moved quickly in the falling snow.
"Captain Willie!" a man shouted, his voice faltering with a desperate, jagged edge. "You can't leave us here! Look at the sky! We’ll be buried here!"
Captain Willie looked at the tired, frostbitten faces around him. The rations were gone. The cattle were dying. Every hour they waited made things worse. If the relief wagons were ahead, he had to find them and bring them back before the storm made it impossible.
"We cannot wait for rescue while the snow buries this valley," Willie said, his quiet voice traveling through the frozen air. "The Salt Lake party is out there, but this storm may have stopped them as surely as it has stopped us. Brother Joseph Elder and I will ride west, find their camp, and bring them here. Keep the fires alive. Care for the children. Stay together. God will not abandon us."
He spurred his horse and rode into the snow. The camp was quiet after he left. Sophie kept looking at the spot where he disappeared. He was in charge of four hundred people, and now he was gone into the storm to find help.
"He’s left us to die," someone said. Sophie turned and saw Peder Mortenson by his cart, fists held at his sides. He stared at the spot where Willie had gone, then at the children under the blankets. "He’s riding for help while we freeze here. He knows we won’t make it over that ridge, Sophie."
"He's doing what he has to, Peder," Sophie said, though her words felt hollow. "He has to find the wagons. If he doesn't, none of us survive."
Mortenson spat into the snow. The wind covered the spot. "He’s a coward and a fool. He should have listened back in Florence. Now he’s leaving us with this mess. Look at your hands, Sophie. Do you really think you can pull a cart through all this snow?"
Sophie kept her eyes on the handcart's wooden bar. "I’ll pull it as long as I can stand. Then I’ll crawl. You will too. We don’t have any other choice."
Mortenson stood for a moment, then returned to his cart. Sophie watched him leave. She realized hunger and cold were no longer their only problems. The faith that had helped them before was starting to break in the Wyoming winter.
Sophie walked to the small fire where Marianne Lautrup sat, hands in her lap, staring past the flames. Marianne had hardly moved since they crossed the river. Sophie looked for any sign of the woman who used to sing hymns in Denmark, but Marianne seemed far away.
"Marianne, you need to get up," Sophie said, squatting next to her. The air smelled of damp wool and sweat. "The snow is still falling. I need your help with the children."
Marianne looked at her, eyes slowly focusing. "It’s so quiet, Sophie," she said softly. "Back home, snow meant the harvest was over. We could sit by the fire and wait for spring. This isn’t the same. This snow wants to cover us up."
"It’s just weather, Marianne," Sophie said, trying to sound reassuring. "It’s a storm, and storms end. We’ve come too far to stop now. Think about the valley. Think about the house you’ll have. You have to keep going for the children."
Marianne gave a short, rough laugh. "There are no houses here, Sophie—only ice. Only the sky coming down on us. Can’t you feel it? The world is closing its eyes."
Sophie held Marianne’s shoulders. She wanted to shake her and tell her to be strong. But when she saw Marianne’s eyes, she stopped. Marianne had already given up and was waiting for the cold to take her. Sophie felt that same feeling creeping into her.
By afternoon, the coldness had stopped all movement in the camp. This was not like winter in Denmark, where people scurried inside to a warm fire. This cold felt like the end.
Sophie huddled with her freezing children, hearing Captain Willie’s promise repeat in her mind.
“God will not abandon us.”
Captain Willie’s promise now seemed empty. He had ridden into the snow, and when she saw him disappear, something inside her broke. It was not her back, though the handcart had nearly done that, but something inside her chest.
She had told Peder the captain was doing what he had to do, but she knew it wasn't true. Peder’s words stayed with her: He knows we won’t make it.
She wondered if that was the truth. Had they brought their children into a frozen grave, singing hymns to cover up their fear?
Sophie looked at her children. Anne’s lips were blue, and Otto coughed as he clutched his blanket. The flour was gone. The firewood was gone. She had nothing left to give them except promises, and even those felt empty.
In Denmark, the missionaries told her the Lord would prepare the way. They talked about Zion in the valley and beautiful snow-capped mountains. Sophie had believed them. She remembered feeling hope when the Elders talked about the green fields. She truly thought the Lord was leading her across the sea and the plains.
Where was that hand now?
It was not here in the Sweetwater valley. Here, there was only white. The sky did not care that Anne was shivering. The mountain did not care that Otto was sick. The snow kept falling, covering them little by little, while God stayed silent.
Marianne had seen the truth. Sophie tried to say it was just a storm, but Marianne knew better. Sophie was afraid her friend was right. The world was not watching them. Heaven was not helping them with their heavy handcarts.
The day went on. A few men tried to make a path, but the snow covered it, and soon they stopped. Sophie stood by her handcart and watched as the camp disappeared under more snow. Tents bent, wagons faded, and every path was gone. Cold seeped through every hole in the canvas. Nearly four hundred people clustered tightly, shivering in their frozen clothes.
Families crowded under damp blankets on the frozen ground, sharing what little warmth they had. Hungry children cried until they were too tired to cry. Across the valley, the sick coughed. They had eaten the last of the flour the night before, and every adult knew what the quiet meant.
The company no longer moved together. Men who used to walk fifteen miles a day now sat with axes on their knees, too tired to chop firewood. At the edge of camp, the last cattle fell in the snow, and the wind quickly covered them.
As night came, no one knew if Willie had found the relief wagons or was trapped in the storm. One by one, the weakest stopped breathing. Deep snow covered the tents, the handcarts, and everything as far as the eye could see.
Willie’s words came back to her: "God will not abandon us." But Anne’s lips were blue, Otto’s cough was getting worse, and the road west was gone.
Sophie closed her eyes and tried to pray as she had in Denmark, when prayer felt like a conversation, and she could almost feel the warmth of divine attention. She whispered, “Heavenly Father, bless my children,” but the words fell flat against the canvas, absorbed by the cold like breath into frost. No answer, no comfort, only the relentless whisper of snow against the tent and Anne’s shallow breathing beside her. She thought of the missionaries who had spoken of miracles, of a God who parted seas and sent angels to guide His people, and she searched the white wilderness outside for any sign that He was watching. But the sky remained empty, a gray bowl of indifference pressing down on the valley, and Sophie felt her faith slipping through her fingers like the last rations of flour, leaving her with nothing but the hollow certainty that she was alone.
She had prayed for strength, warmth, food for her children, and for the storm to break, and each unanswered plea now felt like a rebuke. If God saw them, why did He let Otto cough blood into his blanket? If He heard them, why did the snow keep falling? The questions rose in her throat, bitter and blasphemous, and she swallowed them down, afraid that giving them voice would somehow make them true. But the silence had already spoken. It filled the tent, heavier than the snow on the roof, telling her what she did not want to believe: no hand was guiding them through this wilderness, and the only warmth her children would know tonight was the failing heat of her own body.
