John rides back to the cavalry encampment and is allowed to pitch his tent within the perimeter. Once he is able to get set up, he is invited to a nearby campfire to share in the soldiers’ meal. Finally, able to relax a little, he falls into his bedroll heavily and sinks into the deepest, easiest sleep he has seen in months.
Chapter 7
After they shared their sweetness in the darkness, they slept. The emotions and release have taken their toll, and both sleep heavily in each other’s arms. It takes Josh more than 15 minutes of banging on the cellar door before they awake and respond groggily to him. After unblocking the door, Josh storms in, and they notice large red welts on several parts of his body.
“What happened to you?” Liz asks concern written all over her face.
“While I was up the tree, I noticed a beehive not too far from me. I got tired of waiting for the bear to give up and let me out of there, so I decided to kick the beehive down onto him. These are from the bees I couldn’t swat away. Bees make a rather interesting noise when irritated by the way,” Josh replied sardonically.
“Wow, are you okay?”
“Well, I got stung eight times, but otherwise, I think so. Thankfully, I got the stingers out already.” He looks at the two of them, and a questioning look flickers over his face, but he lets his questions remain unasked.
Johnny could feel the blush rise in his cheeks, but he too allows things to remain unsaid.
They gather a few more jars and cans of food and leave the cellar. They are greeted by the noonday sun. Once they are able to gather their few possessions together into some hastily and simply made cloth packs, they set out to the northeast in search of civilization.
They travel on foot for four days in the wilderness. While Johnny and Liz spend their nights together, they do not have the privacy or the energy to explore the feelings of intimacy like they had that first night. On the morning of the fifth day, they come across a deeply rutted wagon trail going to the northwest and the southeast. They follow the track southeast for another two days. On the morning of the seventh day after leaving the orphanage, they come to the bustling metropolis of Springfield.
They were close to running out of food, but the first order of business was to find a place to stay. They choose a hotel on the main stretch, called the Springfield Inn. It does not quite look to be expensive, but neither is it ratty. The front desk clerk doesn’t give them any guff about their ages, particularly since they pay for two rooms for a week in advance in gold.
After they get set up in their rooms, they meet downstairs and leave to get some clothing and weapons. They have gone through less than one hundred dollars of their stashed gold. Both boys get plain and serviceable brown pants, white muslin shirts, and frock coats. They also each purchase a belt-knife and an 1851 .36 caliber Colt Navy. To show their brotherhood, they get their guns as a matched set. Their guns are intricately engraved on the detachable barrel.
Liz gets herself a light blue cotton dress, undergarments, and a .36 caliber Derringer. She and Johnny pick out each other’s outfits. Johnny had originally chosen a dark blue silk dress for her, but she came back and chose the cotton one, saying, “I may be your girl, but I’m no floozy.”
They meet back up with Josh at a diner called “Ma’s.” They are seated at a table in the comfortable, candlelit dining room and are served quite possibly the best meal any of them has ever tasted. Both boys enjoy a nice thick steak and Liz a scrumptious roast. Of course, Johnny and Liz share their food, so Liz gets to enjoy Johnny’s steak as well. After finishing dinner, Johnny and Liz go back to their room while Josh goes down the street to the nearest saloon. He says he is going to look for information concerning the soldiers. Johnny, however, is certain that Josh is just looking forward to trying whiskey and beer for the first time.
Johnny and Liz spend their night together and pass out in each other’s arms from exhaustion. Johnny is awakened several hours later by drunken singing coming from the hallway as Josh stumbles his way to his room next door. Johnny snorts in amusement, puts his arm around Liz again, and promptly passes back out.
They spend the rest of the week in the same routine. By day, Johnny and Liz would ask around, looking for information on the soldiers, then spend their nights together. Josh spends most of his day sleeping off the previous night’s hangover, with his evening and nights being spent in the saloons, asking to see if anyone knew who the soldiers were.
At the end of the week, all of their efforts prove to be fruitless. The only information they are able to gather is that there are troops moving across the border with Kansas. There is raiding across the border on both sides now for about a year.
By this point, all three are frustrated with the lack of progress, and decide they need to be somewhere else. They buy horses, tack, and supplies for a several-weeks journey, with the last of the gold they had brought with them.
Johnny and Liz decide they are going to start a new life with each other, while Josh decides he will go southwest, to the Indian Territory, and start a life down there. All three agree to go back to their root cellar, and get as much gold as they can carry. They travel for three days until they arrive at the clearing where their most recent long-term home sat.
Chapter 8
When they rounded the trees, they smell wood smoke and hear men moving around. Afraid who might be over there, they move back into the woods and skirt the edge of the clearing. They get close enough to see the clothing of the men in the clearing. They are wearing blue uniforms and red gaiters covering their shins. Silently, the three of them move further back into the woods, dismount, and the two boys leave Liz with the horses as they skulk closer to the camp. From the smell of the necessary’s trench, the camp has been there several days.
They get close enough to hear a couple of the officers talking about needing to find whomever had buried the orphans. The officers don’t want any witnesses present to be able to tell anyone what happened. A lieutenant makes mention of needing to report back to Doc Jennison. The boys move back into the woods and discuss what to do. In their whispered conversation, they decide to steal as many rifles as they can, then set fire to the tents as a diversion.
“I want to make them pay for what they did, killing our friends and family like that. I don’t care how many of them have to die in the process,” Johnny says in a harsh tone to Josh.
“I don’t know. Having all that blood on our hands might not be a good thing. They need to pay, but to try and kill all of them? There’s several dozen here.”
“We could stampede their horses through the camp,” Johnny replies, as if Josh hasn’t said anything at all. “They all need to be gone before we dig out any of the gold.” They discuss it quietly for several more minutes, before they hear what sounds like footsteps approaching their location. Both boys draw their revolvers and hide behind separate trees. They hear the footsteps of two different soldiers, but being hidden, are unable to see them.
“I know I’s heard sumtin, sarge.”
“Boy, you need your hearin checkt.”
“We was told to keep an ear close to the grount, ‘n I’m tellin ya, I know’s I heard sumtin.”
“I think you’s hearint things after that black bear we shot t’other day. I’m goin’ back. You keep lookin’ if ya hafta. Just don’t be out lookin’ for that gold we heert about, private.”
Johnny motions to Josh, making the motions like he is getting his throat cut. Josh shakes his head emphatically. Johnny nods, just as quickly, and crouches. He picks up a stick and waits. After a few moments, a blue uniform passes between them on its way toward Liz and the horses.
Johnny tosses the stick into the brush by Josh, startling the soldier, making him turn his back to Johnny. Johnny steps up behind him and bashes him in the base of the skull. The soldier falls to the ground and starts twitching uncontrollably. After a few moments, the seizure stops. Josh, startled by the violence, walks over to the man and feels for a pulse. “You killed him. I can’t be
lieve you would be so brutal.”
“How do you know he isn’t the one that raped and killed Sister Margaretta? Or any of the girls that were here? They all deserve to die, and in the same way they sacked and burned our home.” Johnny starts undressing the man. When he turns over the body, he sees the person is around his and Josh’s age. Not even old enough to shave regularly yet. Johnny shakes his head in disbelief. He finishes taking the soldier’s uniform off and starts putting it on over his clothes.
“What do you think you are doing?” Josh asks him.
“Disguise. If we are going to kill them all, we'll need to be in the middle of them to do it. I’m going to gather up all the rifles I can. I need you to get their horses ready to stampede. I also need you to see if you can gather up their tack as well; we may need to make a quick getaway.” He slips through the trees, noting that it is already dusk. He’s glad night will be coming soon, since this ruse would not work during the day. He walks up to the sentry, keeping his hat low.
“Sanders? Find anything?” the sentry asks.
Johnny shakes his head and moves on. He takes note of the haphazard placement of the tents, and that most of the men appear to be getting thoroughly drunk, gambling in the front of their tents. A wild idea comes to mind, and he starts running from tent to tent yelling, “Jennison is coming! Everyone needs to form up at that end of the camp!”
All but a couple of the troops stare at Johnny in their drunken state, then start running to form up. Most of them got into a ragged double line by the time Johnny had gotten to the commander’s tent.
The commander comes out, bleary-eyed, looking as if he had just vomited. “What’s going on here?” he bellows, then gapes down at the smoking hole in the front of his shirt, where Johnny just shot him straight in the heart.
The men start yelling and shouting, but the shouts can’t be heard over the thunder of the horses’ hooves as they stampede through the camp trampling the tents in their headlong rush. The men have no idea what hit them when the stampede goes right through them, as if the lines were warm butter and the horses a hot knife. The cries of outrage at seeing their commander be killed turn into screams of pain as the men are trampled to a bloody pulp.
Of the three dozen men in the camp, only two escape the stampede. Those two are quickly dispatched by Johnny’s revolver. From the stampede, there are another six survivors, that Johnny releases from their mortal agony, using his knife.
Just as he is dispatching the last one, Josh rides up with Liz and the three horses.
The horses shy away from the broken bodies and the smell of all the blood. While Liz is barely able to keep control and prevent being thrown, Josh isn’t so lucky. He lands heavily on the ground and rolls away from the horses’ hooves. When Liz is able to get her horse reined in, she gasps at the sight in front of her. Her boyfriend is dressed in a soldier’s uniform with blood all over it, standing in the middle of a gory, hellish scene of mangled bodies and equipment strewn about. She sees the wild look in Johnny’s eyes and pales at the sight.
Cursing heavily, Josh is finally able to wrangle his horse. He looks at Johnny. “Was all this necessary? You just turned us trying to get some money into an absolute bloodbath.”
He starts taking off the uniform and shakes his head. “The sisters needed justice. These monsters need to be raped, tortured, bound, then bled to death. This death was too good for them.”
Liz takes a long hard look at him. “You don’t even know these are the same men that burned us out.”
Josh shakes his head. “We heard them talking. It was them, but blood thirsty over here decided to make himself judge, jury, and executioner.”
Liz dismounts, and leans heavily on her horse, Starfire. Johnny finishes taking the uniform off, walks over to her, and takes her into his arms. He holds her trembling body against his, smelling the rank sweat in her hair, thinking it is the best thing he has ever had the pleasure to smell. He leans down, and whispers, “Marry me,” into her ear.
Chapter 9
John awakes to the sun shining in the flap of his tent. Apparently, he’d forgotten to secure it, he was that tired. He covers his eyes against the glare and sits up. He hazards uncovering his eyes a moment to look around. Seeing nothing amiss, he starts gathering his possessions together. Just after he finishes getting everything set back up to go on the road, he begs a cup of coffee from a local campfire, and sets back out for the old homestead.
The road back is much, much longer. He was able to keep a steady canter before, eating up close to fifty miles a day. Now, even though he is able to go down some trails, he can barely manage three miles an hour. It is around midnight when John rolls the wagon into the campsite.
The campfire is burning low. Both of the Lings are next to each other. At hearing the clattering of the cart, Ling Quan stirs, pulling the rifle and points it at John.
“Don’t shoot, Quan. It’s me, John.”
“You gone awhire. We beginning do dink you god hurd, or addacked.”
“Nah, had to go to town to do some trading. That can take a few days. Has it been quiet here?”
“Nod a sound.”
John nods accepting the response. “Wanna brew up some coffee? Got any food? I’m starving.”
“Ridduh. Nod much ad rees.”
Sometimes I wish that man could speak English better. Little? Not much at least? I don’t know, John thinks to himself.
John unhitches the horses and gets them set up with halters, allowing them to rest and eat at whim. He sits down and shares some of the snake soup with Quan. At the smell of the brewing coffee, Ling We stirs, looks around, smiles, then goes back to sleep. John and Ling Quan stay up discussing small, meaningless matters for several more hours, until exhaustion drives both men to seek their bedrolls.
A couple of hours later John wakes to the smell of frying bacon, boiling coffee, and murmuring voices. He sits up and sees that it is just past false-dawn coming up to true day break. Figuring he has only been asleep for a couple of hours, John groans, cursing his body's inability to rest.
After breakfast, John unloads the wagon and sets up the timber to start being drilled, pegged, and set up as timbers for the soddie. He gets done around lunchtime. When he goes back to the camp, he is greeted with some fry-bread and a hearty stew.
While eating lunch, he muses on the changes two weeks can make in a person’s life. If this much has changed in the last two weeks, what will the next two bring? After lunch, John starts drilling holes into the wood for the pegs to go into and is approached by Ling Quan. “Wan hehp?”
“Know how to work a drill?”
Ling Quan only smiles in response, walks up, and takes the drill from him. He grabs a little dirt from the ground, and puts it into the partially started hole. After he finishes the hole, John is surprised to see the hole is cleaned out, and completely smooth.
“You’ve done carpentry before.”
A nod is his reply.
With both working at drilling holes, they were able to get it done after several hours of work, even with Quan needing to take a break every few minutes. Once they decided to put it up for the night, both men fall into their bedrolls, exhausted. John immediately falls into a deep dreamless sleep.
The two men spend the next week building the soddie, having to take frequent breaks to allow Quan to rest and heal. The sisters always said, "Activity is the remedy for pain," and to a certain extent, John agreed. As long as the person gives themselves the time to rest, physical activity is the cure for many ailments. However, as an unexpected bonus, Quan being familiar with carpentry made the process go that much faster.
After they complete it, they move into the soddie. During the night of the third day, a storm hits. After checking the roof to ensure a minimum of leaks, John goes back to sleep with the sound of the rain hitting the building, and all over outside.
Chapter 10
After Liz says yes to his proposal, Johnny is the happiest man on earth. Nothing could brea
k his good mood. That night, they gather up the weapons and get them ready for transport. Josh says he is going to take them with him to use for trading with the tribes when he gets down there. They take the soldiers’ cartridges for their own, and leave the bodies to rot. They visit their “personal gold mine” and remove the rest of the gold from it. When they finish, the chest has only some paper money in it. When they leave, they filter through the chest of personal possessions to make sure there is nothing else waiting for them, then put it back in its place and cover up the door.
Johnny and Liz part ways with Josh as they had planned. Josh takes four of the horses from the troops, with all the rifles, pistols, and as much of the powder he can take with him to Indian Territory. Johnny and Liz travel west-northwest out of Missouri, into Kansas. They travel at a comfortable pace, but also quickly. Once they get into eastern Kansas, they see signs of a horrible drought. They arrive in the town named Marble, due to the marble quarries in the area, and turn due west. While they are going through the area, they hear people talking about the drought, how it has been going on for a full ten years, and how they hate the people of Missouri for not sharing their water. By the time they are through Douglass, they have trouble finding water themselves. There are no more wells they can use, and both people and horses dehydrate badly. Johnny decides to travel at night and seek cover by day.
Johnny has become so dehydrated that he is incoherent. So much so, in fact, Liz has to tie him to his horse for the last ten miles before they make it to Pleasant Grove. It is early morning that finds the couple checking into the hotel, leaving orders for their horses to be stabled at the livery and their bags to be brought up to their room. Liz orders water—lots of water—be brought up. After going through the third pitcher each, they both pass out for two days.
The Marshal of Denver Page 4