Spake As a Dragon (50 page)

The sun was barely up when Luke awoke
to a noise. He looks toward the river’s edge and Nate is urging his
horse into the current. Nate’s intent is to swim the river to his
farm – he fears something is wrong and he is not waiting any longer
to find out what it is.

“
Hold on Nate, give me a
minute to saddle up, I’m coming with you!”

The Pee Dee River is not very wide,
and certainly not deep, so swimming the horses across was not
difficult at all. Coming up on the western bank Nate dismounted
from his horse and got the first good look at his homestead. “What?
He exclaimed. “This can’t be right!”

From the bushes a gun barrel protruded
and a voice demanded, “Hold it right there mister or I’m aimin’ to
shoot you dead where yer stand.”

Nate thought he recognized the voice,
but he could not remember from where exactly. “Be easy with your
trigger finger there friend, we’re not come to do you no harm. Do I
know you?”

For a second or two there was almost
total silence. The only sound was water dripping from the wet gear
on the horses. “Step forward mister, the sun is at your back and I
can’t make out your face.”

It hit Nate like the specter had fired
his weapon, it was what Nate would later call a ‘revolution.’ This
revelation that had come to Nate was the voice! He recognized that
voice, “Son! It that you, Nate Junior? It’s me Son, your
Pa!”

Cautiously from the brambles and
foliage along the Pee Dee emerged a youngster holding a double
barrel shotgun. He still had it pointed at Nate as he said, “Pa?
Pa? Is that you?”

“
Yes, boy, it is me, your
Pa – I have returned!”

Without waiting, Nate Junior dropped
the shotgun to the ground and began to run toward the small
weathered barn about a hundred yards distance. “Ma! Come quick Ma!
Ma! Ma!”

The hayloft door of the barn opened,
“Lands sake boy, what’s all this hollering about?”

Nate Junior could not speak; he just
turned back toward the river and pointed.

Elsa, Nate’s wife, could not speak
either. She continued to wipe her hands on the white apron she was
wearing although her hands had been dried moments earlier. Softly
she spoke, almost in a whisper, “Nate? Nate, is it really
you?”

She realized the tall, black fellow
standing soaking wet at the edge of her yard was indeed her
husband. He was so thin and his face had the haggard look of war,
but she could tell it really was her man Nate!

The embrace the three of them had
standing there in the yard brought tears to Luke’s eyes. He was
watching true happiness, and just to think, he said to himself, I
didn’t want to take this detour to Nate’s farm.

Later as the four of them sat eating
breakfast Elsa told of the battle, which to Nate and Luke was just
a small skirmish between a foraging party of the Union and a squad
of scouts from the Rebs. The Yanks did; however, have a small
cannon with them. They only fired two shots and one hit the small
smoke house, which sat between the house and the barn and the
second demolished the house. She said she and Nate Jr. were out in
the field some distance away and the smoke house contained a fresh
deer that had just been slaughtered. She supposed the story of her
and Nate Junior’s untimely death must have come from the mess that
cannon ball made with that deer meat; however, she could not
explain how Luke’s uncle Isaac found out about the
‘battle.’

After all the explanations they had a
big laugh and Luke repeated the axiom, ‘Don’t believe anything you
hear and only half of what you see’. “Amen, to that,” replied Nate.
Elsa explained she did not post a letter to Luke since she had no
idea where he was, and Nate responded that he did not write because
he thought they were both dead.

Elsa explained that the deer had been
the last of their food. Since that time, she and Nate Jr. had been
barely surviving making a place to live in the loft of the barn.
Nate hunted rabbits and squirrels until they exhausted all the
shotgun powder, since then they have trapped, raised a small parcel
of corn from corn kernels that she had picked up from the spot
where the Yankees corralled their horses. They still cooked in the
house’s fireplace eating mostly fish they caught in the river. She
said she and Nate had eaten so much fish she though Nate Junior was
sprouting gills. “Nate, the war has been over for a year and things
are not getting any better, what are we to do?”

“
Well, I’ll be, so it was
that ole fireplace fire that I saw from ‘cross the
river.”

“
Yes Luke don’t know what
we’d done our cooking on without it.”

“
I’ll tell you what – Luke
and me have been all the way up in Virginny looking for Robert, his
pa. We got wind of him but never did actually find him. We was
headin’ back to Scarlettsville since all the family is gathered
there. No, not my Pa and brother Jefferson, both of them died down
in Alabama, but the rest, including Ma are at Scarlett. I’m
thankin’ all of us together have a better chance there than trying
to make a go of it on our own tryin’ to live here. Right now the
carperbaggers and scalawags is runnin’ everything.”

“
Elsa,” said Luke, “let’s
all go back to Scarlett, the big house is gone, but the guest house
and the barn are still there so is the Mill. We’ll have enough
menfolk to raise food and run the Mill and if we need to we’ll
build more houses. Whether white or black we are all family and
together no one can beat us, not even this awful War.”

VISIBLY SHAKEN

The string of horses is beginning to
get restless. They shuffle around each other, some whinny, others
snort, they are nervous. The two young travelers, Sam and William,
lay on their blankets sound asleep.

‘
Kaboom
,’
‘
Kaboom
,’ the noise from the lightning was deafening as it
reverberated through the trees. Sam leaped from his horse blanket,
fumbling to eject a shell into the Henry rifle. The night is cool,
but sweat is dripping from his face – “What in tarnation,” William
said rolling from underneath his poncho. “What is goin’
on?”

“
Don’t know William, one
of the scariest dreams I have ever experienced.”

“
Hold on and I’ll get us a
pot of coffee started before this storm moves in – looks like it
might be a little while before it gets to us. Tell me about the
nightmare? Scary huh?”

Sam still visibly shaken, sits down
next to the fire and tells William his dream about the five bandits
coming into their camp accusing them of killin’ Bert Black and
stealing his horses. The storm, which only a few minutes earlier
appeared to be heading toward them now seems as if it is going
south of their location. The string of horses begins to settle down
- instinct tells them the storm is missing them. Sam points to the
string of horses, “He said that pinto belonged to Bill Jackson,”
then Sam reached above his eye feeling for a cut from the blow from
the .45 pistol, it wasn’t there, “I’m telling you William that had
to be one more realistic nightmare, it seemed so real, and then
this desperado pulls his Colt revolver and shoots me and you, stone
cold dead. I even heard the sound of the .44 as he shot us,
KaBoom! KaBoom!”

Instantly a huge lightening bolt
cascaded from one cloud to another during the violent thunderstorm
almost overhead
, KaBoom! KaBoom!
Sounded the thunder,
shaking the ground.

“
Sound kinda like that?
Yeah, I know, sometimes them dreams can get pretty wild, here drink
this cup of coffee, its okay,” William said as another peal of
thunder –
Kaboom
- shook the ground, “it was just a dream,
with God adding the sound! It’ll be daylight in another hour or so,
we might as well pack up and get started.”

A week or so later Sam and William
ride into Gettysburg, leading the string of horses behind. They
stop at the livery stable and make arrangements with the liveryman
to corral their ponies. While getting their horses attended to,
they inquire as to the location of the business establishment of
Mark Holmes.

From the livery, they move down the
empty street to the building with a sign reading,
‘CLOCK REPAIR,
Mark Holmes, Prop’
. The hand-lettered sign in the door glass
reads ‘OPEN’. “I guess this is it,” said William, “Let’s giver a
try.”

A small bell over the door jingled as
it announces their entrance. From the back room, a man’s voice
answers the bell, “Be with you in a second.” A man with a slight
limp enters putting on his jacket. “May I...”

“
Matt is that you? Is it
really you?” Said William.

Looking surprised, Matthew looks at
William and then at Sam. “Sir I don’t believe I have had the
pleasure...”

Before he has a chance to finish,
“It’s me Matt, your brother William.”

“
William? Brother William?
Why boy you wasn’t no taller than this,” he indicated holding his
hand about waist high, “when I left home.
What...why...?”

“
It’s okay Matthew, this
is our brother-in-law Sam Babb. His sister Catherine went and
married brother Luke. We figured you needed help making them fake
legs so Sam and I come to help.”

Hollering to the back, “Mark! Mark!
Come up front, I’ve got some people you need to meet.”

A few hours later Matt and Mark had
brought Sam and William up to date on the manufacturer of the
artificial legs. They had explained they were broke and unable to
pay the mortgage and had suspended all work on the soldier’s
artificial limbs.

“
Well, not to worry no
more brother Matthew. That’s where me and Sam come in. We’ve got
the money,” and William told the entire story of the Cumberland
Mountain gold creek and the two pouches of gold nuggets he and Sam
had brought with him. “Sam hand me your saddle-bags.” William
searches through both the left and right side then says to Sam,
“They must be in my bags. Check mine?”

Sam turns after thoroughly searching
every possible place two bags of gold nuggets could be, “William,
they’re just not here!”

“
They’ve got to be Sam, we
haven’t taken them out since we left. Oh, wait a minute that last
river we crossed was rough, you suppose the gold fell outta our
saddlebags. You know being so heavy and all?”

Sam looks at the leather bags then at
William, “What about them outlaws? I told you they took our
gold!”

“
Sam, be reasonable, that
was just a nightmare. And nightmares didn’t steal the
gold!”

“
Well, it ain’t here and I
told you that the dream felt awfully real.”

“
Yeah, you did Sam, and
you also said we were killed dead too! If you ain’t a ghost, and I
feel reasonably sure I’m not, then we’re alive!”

“
You’re right William, I
guess they fell out crossing that river.”

Mark speaks up, “Fellers Matt and I
appreciate your good intentions. We sure could have used that
money, but I guess we’re back to square one now, nothing to do, but
move out to Alabama.”

“
Wait,” said William. “We
still got a trick or two up or sleeves, right Sam?”

“
You may have one up your
sleeve William, but mine’s empty,” said Sam.

“
The string of horses! Our
horses at the livery stable – them’s just greenbacks walking around
on the hoof, we can sell them. I’ll wager we can get maybe ten or
twelve dollars a head for them. Mark that’ll give you and Matthew
enough money to make your mortgage payment, buy a few supplies for
the work on the soldier’s legs, while me and Sam go back to the
Cumberlands and get some more nuggets. We should be back in less
than a month or two.”

Matt asked, “How much you think you
can get for the horses Sam?”

“
I reckon at least a
hundred dollars, maybe a little more. Why, how much do you
need?”

They were told the mortgage money was
due at the end of the month and they owed two hundred dollars,
Mark’s tools had been pawned and he owned another fifty on them.
Supplies for the artificial legs were going to be another hundred
and all were due way before they had time to travel to the
mountains, load up some gold and return.

“
What is you’re idea
Matthew? What do we do Mark?”

“
For sure,” said Mark, “We
can’t meet this month’s mortgage and pawn payments much less order
supplies, that bandit that holds the note on my place will not give
us one extra day. Yeah, he’s one more snake-in-the-grass,
that...that...Bill Jackson son of a gun! He’s already sent his yes
‘man’ Lucky Lawson over to demand the money...no we won’t be able
to meet their payments.”

Sam’s ears perked up, “Who did you say
Mark? Did I hear you say Bill Jackson and Lucky?”

“
Yes, why? Do you know
them Sam?”

“
You wouldn’t believe it
if I told you, but yes, I believe I do, but actually I don’t
personally know those scoundrels, but I don’t want to dwell on them
too much, I have this splitting headache right above my
eye.”

“
What? You do and you
don’t? Can I get you anything, maybe a cold compress to put on your
forehead?”

“
I’ll explain it to you
both some day,” answered Sam. “But right now I believe Mark is
right, we need to sell our ponies to the livery and get out of this
town and head south to Scarlett as fast as our horses will carry
us. I have the feeling of impending harm if we stay in this
town.