Lawrence Smith

At the Junction of Two Trails Lawrence Smith

A near three-year-old orphan, name unknown, was taken to St John's Asylum for Girls in Philadelphia upon her arrival in America, where she was adopted by a couple from Maryland. They named her Henrietta. Seventeen years later, at the junction of two wagon trails in an uninhabited valley deep within the Rocky Mountains, Henrietta gives birth to the valley's first white child. She named him William, but called him Billy. The identity of Billy's father has remained a family mystery. As Henrietta's grandson once said of his grandmother, "She had all the answers. I knew she had all the answers, but she never talked about her past and nobody ever asked ... and I wondered why." A great-grandson sets out to solve the mystery, uncovering the identity of four men: a carpenter from Maryland; the son of a fur trapping family from Upstate New York; the son of a farming family from North Carolina; and a cowboy from whereabouts unknown . Be it the allure of gold, an escape from the turmoil of the Civil War, the need for anonymity, or simply wanting a second chance, all four were at or near the junction of the two wagon trails where Billy was born. Who is Billy's father? There is an answer, of course ... or is there?