I sighed. For me it was the exhalation of my ribs in a breath of air because I was disappointed. I was back in that place that was no place. I didn’t waste my time or energy trying to walk anywhere. I knew it wouldn’t get me one inch closer to anything. I sat down and rested my head on my knees. Staring at my bare skin. For the first time, I realized that I was naked. Not a stitch of clothes on me. But then, who was there to see me? I didn’t believe God was watching, if he was, the place he had stuck me sucked. I was quite sure that I hadn’t done anything in my short ten years to warrant a shift in limbo. Although, I had murder in my heart when I had broken that wine bottle over my Dad’s head.
I sobbed softly. Alone and kind of out of my head with loneliness and despair. I wished that I was dead, or passed on, anything was better than being stuck in that place. I heard the wind blowing, soft sliding noises that whispered in almost a howl. That was something new and when I looked up, I saw a faraway figure slowly trudging toward me. I thought about jumping to my feet and running. I thought about going to meet it but in the end, I just let it come to me. What difference did it make if I ran, or let it destroy me? It was all the same in there. I would just wake, come to or be back where I had started.
I watched with indifference as the figure came closer. Not fear, not curiosity just acceptance. As it grew closer, I saw that it was a boy. Near my own age, small with a shock of curly black hair and blue eyes that twisted my gut. His eyes were the first color I had seen in a long time. He stopped in front of me and I was shocked to see that he wore clothing. Strange stuff. Leather pants, high leather moccasins and a shirt made from calico that looked scratchy on his skin. His hair was long, almost long enough for braids but he had tied it into a ponytail with a piece of red cotton. He was small, like me. Younger, though and tough. As if his short life had hardened him.
“Who are you?” I asked, and he didn’t smile.
“My name is Crispin Lacey,” he said.
“My name is Cris Snow. Where did you come from? I thought there was nothing in here but me. Why are you dressed so funny?”
He looked me up and down and laughed. “You’re naked.” His voice had an odd inflection, almost an accent. It sounded a bit like Irish but also French.
“That’s because I speak French and my da was Irish. I speak Gaelic and Welsh, too.”
“Are you reading my mind?” I goggled.
“No. More like we share the same thoughts,” he answered. “How did you die?”
“I’m dead?”
“Sort of. Something happened to both of us. Something so bad that we died but not all the way. We came back but you’re stuck halfway between life and the other place.”
“Hell?” I gulped.
He looked around. “Hell can’t be as bad as this place. So boring. I must have walked for years across this sand.”
“Why are you here?”
“I died too young. Before my time. So, I was sent back to fix things. But something went wrong, and I’m stuck here with you. We both have to finish our tasks before we can move on.”
“What would that be?”
“I’m not sure. I’m just supposed to tell you that there’s a plan. No matter how bad it gets, things will smooth out in the long run. I know it sounds stupid, but believe me, someone wants us to have the best life we can be given. I’m also supposed to tell you, ‘forever and always’.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. I whispered under my breath those same words.
“Now, wake up,” he said.
C
aptain Lacey had just turned his back on the mules as Fitzsimmons unharnessed. He was leading them off to a picket line when the Captain paused to listen with his head cocked in the quizzical position that had so endeared his wife.
“Fitz, you seen Cris anywhere?” he asked in his soft brogue. He scanned the small clearing, his eyes picking out movement and thin shadows just as the mules’ ears flipped forward.
His hands were lifting his rifle even as the men ran their horses into camp, scattering the mules and knocking over gear and tents. Lacey dove for cover behind a fallen tree trunk and sighted on the nearest man. He had Johannsen in his sights when he felt a presence behind him and turned just as an Indian aimed a tomahawk at his skull.
He heard Fitzsimmons yell and the big roar of a 50 caliber; a hole the size of a dinner plate opened a go-to-Jesus-hole in the center of the brave’s chest. Blood splattered Lacey’s face and he leaped for cover under the wagon as balls peppered the ground around them.
Without the element of surprise, Johannsen, and his crew melted into the woods but not before he threw words over his shoulder at the pair.
“Lacey!” he yelled. “You’ll be coming to me with that gold!”
They emerged from cover to take stock of the damage done. Both mules were down, shot with one dead. The other was groaning from a gut wound. Lacey quietly put the big mule out of its misery and began to gather what he could have their packs and gear. Most had been trampled but nothing seriously damaged and nothing had touched the wagon or its cargo.
“Cris!” Captain Lacey called. “Crispin! It’s safe to come out now!” They waited and when no childish voice answered, panic and pain crept into Lacey’s face.
“Fitz, we better go look for him,” he said with a tremble in his voice.
“I think he went to pee,” Fitz said and tucked two pistols into his waistband, slinging the rifle across his shoulder. “The…cargo, Cap’n?” His eyes flickered to the wagon.
“It’ll keep.” Lacey’s jaw was tense, and fear washed his face pale.
“I saw him headed that way,” the manservant pointed toward the break in the pine trees where a small deer trail led the promise of an easy passage for a small child.
Fitzsimmons walked slowly, his eyes scanning the ground while the Captain kept his on the rest of the surroundings. He watched the trees and the leaves, noted the birds and the black tailed squirrels and when something disturbed either, they paused until they could tease out its cause.
Fitz found the boy’s footprint in the soft dirt and scuff marks, following the trail for a few hundred yards until they reached a thicket of young saplings where they found a damp spot and the smell of human urine. On the other side of the thicket, they spotted an area where the trees were broken, and the ground torn up as if a fight had occurred there. There was blood on the large rock near the edge of the trail and further on, deep impressions made by several shod horses.
“He has Crispin,” Lacey said in despair. “Johannsen has my boy.”
Fitzsimmons put his hand on the Captain’s shoulder, felt the shudder that went through the Irishman's slender frame. “I believe so, Captain. He likely wants to trade for the gold. He’ll keep him safe until then.”
“I know Johannsen, Fitz. He’ll want more than that. Johannsen is a…pederast.”
At Fitzsimmons blank look, Lacey explained, and the color drained from the servant’s face. “Shit-fire and damnation! I’ll kill him if he touches the boy like that!” He cursed wildly and would have bolted blindly through the woods if the Captain hadn’t held him back.
“We have to bury the wagon and burn the mules,” Lacey added. “If anyone finds it, we’ll have nothing to bargain with him.”
Slowly, the madness faded from Fitzsimmons’ face and he nodded. “I know just the place.” Slowly, they trudged back to the destroyed camp and set about the grim task of hiding what had happened in the clearing.
Lacey eyed the side of the ledge and agreed. Fitzsimmons had found the perfect place and after two days of ferrying the leather bags to and fro, they had finally emptied the entire wagon. Broken into pieces, they piled it high and dragged the mules bodies atop it, setting the entire pile alight. The smell of roasting mule meat brought home their predicament in cold harsh reality. They were deep in the wilderness with no form of transportation and very little in the way of supplies with his only child in the custody of killers.
“You know where we are, Cap’n?”
“Next town is Natchez on the Trace, I think. We should be able to get fresh horses and have a detail sent back to retrieve the gold. It’ll make it back safely to HQ under guard.”
“Your commission, Captain?”
Lacey snarled. “I told them that this was to be my last assigned duties. I am resigning my commission and starting fresh with Crispin in St. Louis. I took this job on as a favor to the Quartermaster General.”
“We’d best get going then, Captain.” Fitz bent over three saplings and tied them together with a leather lace. By the time the lace would have rotted, all three trees would have grown together making a marker distinctive enough to find years later if need be.
They walked grimly, carefully, cognizant of their surroundings and every noise around them. Days passed, and they lived on hardtack and biscuits until that ran out and then they hunted and fished, the forest providing them with food wherever they looked. They followed the creeks into rivers and when they emerged on the banks of one broad glistening ribbon of water, the Captain pointed to the valley spread out before him.
“The Susquehanna Valley. There’s a small town near here where we can get help. An Army Depot.”
“Cap’n,” Fitz said softly, and Lacey looked up to stare into the solemn face of an Indian warrior. Neither man made any move toward their weapons.
“I have been trailing you for many days,” the Indian said. “You travel fast with much purpose, yet you have no animals.”
“Why are you following us?” the Captain asked. He knew that the brave was Cherokee, one of the tribes that favored white settlers. They were called the ‘Civilized tribes’ and had adopted a constitution and laws like the white government.
“Men came. Attacked my wagon, killed my mules and took my boy,” Lacey explained. “I have to reach the town and my Commander. Pick up horses and find my son.”
“How old is he?”
“Eight-years-old,” the Irishman said bleakly, and the blue eyes reflected the pain and uncertainty of the child’s fate.
“I am Tall Man Who Walks Slow, Cherokee. I will help you track these bad men. Do you know them?”
“Yes. Jimmy Johannsen. I’ve had dealings with him before. He’s headed to St. Louis.”
The Cherokee nodded and whistled. Stepping out of the woods, three other braves appeared as if by magic and neither white man had had any idea that they had been that close or even under surveillance.
Their names were interesting; each seemed to describe their method of moving, a part of their body or an animal but no odder than some biblical names that Lacey had heard.
“I’m Captain Faille Lacey and this is Seamus Fitzsimmons, my servant.”
All of them had the white man’s habit of shaking hands. All were six-feet or over yet moved through the woods like ghosts. They did not seem to tire or waste time nor did Tall Man walk any slower than the slowest man. Which would be the tired whites.
Tall Man led them down to the river where several canoes made of smooth bark had been pulled onto the banks. Gingerly, the two white men took a seat and allowed the Cherokee to paddle swiftly downriver with the confidence that no one would bother them on their own lands.
“You are on our land, Cherokee land, and the Shawnee know not to invade,” Tall Man said. “Their warriors are not welcome here, and they have lost many to our arrows. They will stay away.”
“Johannsen had braves with him,” the Captain added. “Iroquois, I think.”
“They are uncivilized warriors,” Tall Man spat. “They steal our women and force them to work as slaves. If they are caught running away, they mark them with a split nose.”
“Split nose?” Fitz asked, having seen such squaws at camp.
“The mark of an a…fallen woman. One who did not fight back. No one wants such a disgraced wife.”
“What do they do to little boys?” Lacey asked, his hands gripped white-knuckled on his rifle.
“We do not hurt our children. They are our treasure. We do adopt many into our tribes as do the Shawnee and Iroquois to replace the children lost to war and disease. If your boy winds up in the tribe’s hands, he will be safe. Only older children are…”
“His name is Crispin. He has yellow hair and blue eyes. He’s only eight years-old,” Captain Lacey said and closed his eyes on the image of his boy’s young face. The Cherokee laid his hand on the Captain’s shoulder as he considered the weary blue eyes of the Officer.
“I will find your son, Captain Lacey. I promise you that we will not stop searching until we find him. Rest, we will reach the town before the sun sets this night.”