ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Just growing up in the beautiful hills of West Virginia gives you a vast amount of adventure to write about. When I was a young boy, every time I would step into the woods, I would expect to rediscover something that had not been seen in decades; maybe an old abandoned house miles away from any road that could get you to it, or a cave or maybe a piece of century-old farm equipment that would become an instant treasure to me. I loved the woods as a boy and was fascinated by the rivers as well.
There are so many people through the years who have shared these adventures with me and have helped to influence this book. You know who you are, friends, cousins, aunts and uncles. Thank you all very much! I also thank God and my parents for the good fortune of being raised in West Virginia. There is no better place to be a boy! Thank you Valentina, my wife, who supported this project and served as my final editor free of charge. I want to thank my children who supported me with their enthusiasm and encouragement. I hope you all enjoy it!
With the previous being said, just remember, this novel is completely fiction and any similarities of characters to anyone living or dead, or events past or present are purely coincidental.
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For Beverly
RIVER ROCKS
STEVE KITTNER
CHAPTER ONE
1903
The railroad tracks glistened from the night rain and ran straight as an arrow for about a mile before they made a bend to the south and crossed the newly-constructed stone trestle that had just been built a year earlier by migrant European stone masons. The limestone structure was built over a small stream that emptied out into the Elk River right at the sand bar.
The two men were hunkered down in a ditch alongside the new C&O Railroad route that ran out of the hills of Mountain County. Clyde Franklin’s eyes widened when he saw the bright headlight of the midnight freighter which originated in Hillsburg and was running right on time out of the hollows of Red Creek. The train then made the turn towards them and lit up the mile-long stretch of parallel steel.
The night sky was illuminated with lightning as rain poured on them as if it were being dumped out of buckets. Water washed off the hills above them and thunder crashed every few seconds. Clyde was worried that the matches wouldn’t light the oil lamp for being too wet. His partner shot him an icy look and then slowly nodded his head.
Clyde reached into an inside pocket of his long overcoat and pulled out a scrap piece of sandpaper that he stayed crouched over to protect it from the rain, and then one of the long matches. With rain running down over his hat and his overcoat and onto the ground, Clyde managed to keep everything dry as he quickly scratched the match across the sandpaper and it instantly fired to life. He kept his coat arched around the flame as Arthur maneuvered the old railroad oil lamp into the protected area of his partner’s coat and opened the glass door to the lamp. The lamp then came to life and both men grinned.
The scruffy-looking man nodded his head again.
They crawled their way up out of the ditch and onto the tracks as the train rounded the curve nearly a mile from them. Arthur, the older of the two, held the lantern high and swung it back and forth to signal the train in an official-looking manner.
Both men were close in age, somewhere in their fifties, Clyde Franklin being the more socially received of the two. He was clean-shaven, held a regular job and upheld the law most of the time…up until this point in his life, that is. Clyde lived in a modest little house along the side of the road that paralleled Red Creek, a rather large creek really, which poured out into the Elk River. It was at the intersection of these two waterways that earlier pioneers had erected a small store for trading and buying dry goods, and also had constructed a few small houses, calling their town Red Creek, just like the creek itself.
Clyde’s partner Arthur was, on the other hand, a rough mountain man-looking type. Sort of wild-eyed and crazy in appearance, he lived in the mountains with very little in the way of extras. His full, un-trimmed beard, long hair and large, bulging eyes gave him a very intimidating demeanor. Most kids were afraid of him and would stay close to their parents in those days, when he would come down from the mountains and trade his furs routinely every month at the little crossroads General Store in Red Creek. He had a real nasty side to him, folks would say, and Arthur Otis was a man whom you didn’t want to be on the other side of the gun that was pointed at you in 1903.
The train flashed its light and Arthur stood his ground and waved the lantern back and forth in the stormy night as the train cut its engine with a whoosh of steam and started grinding to a halt on the cold steel tracks.
The engineer certainly didn’t want to stop the train, considering the additional high-value cargo they were secretly hauling that evening, but felt safe with the added security men on board. A swinging train lantern sometimes indicated track trouble ahead such as rockslides or mudslides in these hills during a bad storm, and the veteran engineer would, of course, take no chances. After all, the lantern light and signal style did seem to be official-looking and they were in an area of frequent rockslides.
The train finally came to a halt at the beginning of the turn that would point them east. After a few puffs of steam from various relief valves on the old engine, the white-haired engineer stepped out the side of the train to a small platform and called “Yonder there,….Hello”!
While going through the routine of braking, stopping and shutting down the train he had lost track of the light that had waved him to an urgent stop. The engineer grimaced at the thought of leaving the protection of his dry surroundings and called again “Yonder out there…What seems to be the problem ahead?” He heard or saw no response; only the sound of the hard rain that pinged off the steel engine broke the silence of the night. He swallowed hard and glanced over at his fireman as three armed security men stepped into the engine. “What seems to be the hold up, gentlemen?” the first security man inquired officially.
“We had some sort of track warning signal waved to us.” He paused. “I don’t ….seem…to see….the signal…man …now, though.“ the engineer responded slowly as he stared out the front. A few seconds of silence went by and the engineer mumbled something and swallowed hard once more.
The three security men gave each other a quick glance and the first one nodded to the other two to return to the area of the train which they were assigned to protect. The engineer reached for his overcoat to step outside as the three security guards opened the door to return rearward.
It was at that second from outside and behind them that it happened. As the engineer opened his door, a sizzling, short fused full stick of dynamite flew onto the floor of the engine room at the feet of the engineer, the fireman, and all three security men, none of whom got out quite fast enough.
The explosion was deafening to the two heisters outside the train, but with one lucky toss at a very lucky moment, Otis and Franklin had taken out all five of their objectives on the seven-car freight train.
The Gold was theirs!
It had been as easy as that.
But as fate would have it, only one man would carry it off the hill on that stormy, rainy night. Only one man would know, that night, the whereabouts of the 162 pounds of
Confederate treasure that had been locked up for 38 years in a Mountain County bank vault waiting to be placed in a Washington, D.C., museum for a temporary show. And only one man would know the truth, that night-- who killed five men in cold blood so quickly, and with not a moment’s remorse. Only one man would know because the killing wasn’t over. One more had to die. They were partners no more.
The treasure would now belong to only one man as a single gunshot ended a night of murder and greed and number six fell dead on the tracks of the C& O Railroad.
CHAPTER TWO
Present Day
Skip…..skip….skip….skip….skip.
“Five! That’s not good enough!” Eddie exclaimed.
“Lemmee try again,” Josh said while searching the sand bar for the perfect flat river rock. “Here we go.”
Josh Baker reared back and let loose with a swinging, sidearm throw, flinging the rock in a perfectly flat trajectory across the river.
Skip, skip, skip, skip, skip, skip, skip, skplooosh. “Yeah!” Josh said, throwing both arms up into the air and proclaiming himself King of the Elk River Stone Skippers. “Eight!”
“No,” protested Eddie. “That was seven! That last one wasn’t a skip.”
“That was clearly eight skips,” said Josh.
“Maybe, but it’s nowhere near the record anyhow. And we know who holds that,” Eddie said, grinning and pushing his chest out a little. Josh returned a side mouth grin and flung another rock across the still waters of the Elk River. The boys were quiet for a moment, leaving only the bugs and frogs along the river banks to disturb the silence.
“I guess throwing rocks in the river probably does nothing for attracting fish, does it?” Eddie said, laughing.
“Fish ain’t biting anyhow.” Josh mumbled, shaking his head. “Sometimes I think there’s about ten fish in this whole river.” He paused and tightened his line again, studying it carefully. “Of course there are some people who will tell ya there are catfish up by the dam that could swallow your leg.”
Eddie grinned. “I don’t believe half the stories on this river. I have to see that stuff for myself.” He paused for a moment, looking across the tranquil waters on that warm summer Saturday morning. ”It’s like the Wills Creek Monster story your aunt tells, or the Braxton County Monster or those UFOs they saw up near Flatwoods. Just a bunch of stories.” He picked up another stone and gave it a fling across the river. “Same thing with the monster fish. Show me one, then I’ll believe it!”
Josh nodded his head in agreement. “But my aunt swears by that story.”
“Maybe we should go up to the dam and find out about those fish then!” Eddie smiled and lifted his eyebrows.
Josh and Eddie returned to their fishing poles, reeling in and repositioning their bait, hoping for a bite.
Josh Baker and Eddie Debord were best friends and had been since first grade. Josh was a couple of inches shorter than Eddie, with sandy blond hair that flowed straight to the bottom of his ears and touched the collar on his T-shirt in the back. Eddie wore his light brown hair short on the sides and off his collar in the back and, like his friend, always sported a T-shirt and Levi jeans.
They had grown up in the same area of Red Creek together and shared the same interests. They were both good students and they both liked being outdoors in Mountain County, West Virginia. It was great place to grow up and be a boy, or a girl for that matter. They had rivers to fish and swim in on hot summer days. They had hills with endless trails made by the whitetail deer, and the hunters that search them out, that could lead you into the next county if you could hike that far.
The riverbanks that flank the mighty Elk River are a blend of sand and mud and decayed leaves and trees that have fallen, and create a slippery mix on the steep banks that lead down to the river. If you don’t watch your footing, it will send you down the bank on your fanny in a hurry. The mix also has its own scent that stays with you even if you go away for many years and come back. If you grow up on the Elk River, the river never leaves you. Not the scents nor the culture nor the life lessons learned along these muddy banks. It’s in you for your whole life. You are an Elk River Boy.
And Eddie and Josh liked it all! They loved to fish and hunt and run up and down the riverbanks on their bikes. They loved to take their backpacks with only a tent, sleeping bag and a little canned food and head up into the hills to rough it for a weekend, to sit around a campfire and talk about whatever: fishing, sports, school, girls, anything. That’s what country boys did.
Their resourcefulness was also something to be admired. There was the one time they took all their gear, all their food and enough water for a one-night campout but forgot to take any type of eating utensils. No forks or spoons. They had plenty of food but nothing to eat it with, so, being the young improvisers that they were, they simply found themselves a couple of sticks about an inch in diameter and about 8 inches long and carved themselves a fork to eat their canned stew with. It may have been a problem for some other kids, but not these two young country boys. They were, at 14 years old, true adventurers!
The two boys stood over their poles quietly for a few minutes, patiently waiting for a nibble, when Josh Baker’s pole suddenly bent nearly double.
“Look at that!” Josh yelled out. “OH YEAH!!!”
“Man, Josh, whatta ya got?” Eddie said calmly, running over to his friend.
Josh had grabbed his pole from the forked stick that acted as a rod holder and gave a yank to the line. It didn’t give an inch as the drag on his old Zebco 33 whizzed out the line to give the fish the running room he wanted.
“Don’t lose him, Josh!” Eddie yelled “Give him some line, give him some line!”
“He’s taking it…..I don’t have to give it to him! He’s taking it!” Josh exclaimed, wide-eyed.
“Loosen your drag!” Eddie yelled.
The fish took Josh’s line down the river in front of the sand bar and then back up the river over and over again, pulling and tugging all the while as Josh struggled to get a yard of his line back. After a couple of minutes, Josh’s forearms and biceps began to tire.
“Just hope he don’t wrap you around a log,” Eddie said as Josh gave a big pull on his 10-pound test line.
This fish was big, maybe the biggest he had ever hooked here at the sandbar, and it was a fighter. Josh couldn’t help but think that maybe an upgrade to his reel would be a good idea for Christmas this year…and maybe a line upgrade as well. Back and forth, up and down the river the fish took his line, looking for a rock or tree trunk to wrap around and break the fisherman’s line. This clever old fish had not gotten so big and old by being brainless. Josh fought back with all he had, waiting to see who would make the first mistake.
“Man, Eddie….this sucker is bi--”….SNNNAAPP!
Josh’s line fell limp on the water as a look of disbelief immediately fell onto Josh’s face.
“OOHHH NO, NO, NO, NO !!!” Josh screamed out in defeat. “I can’t believe it…I can’t believe it!!! How BIG could that fish have been? I can’t believe it!!!”
“Wow,” Eddie said, shaking his head, “that guy was huge!”
They paused, Josh catching his breath with his hands on his knees and his rod still in his right hand.
Eddie laughed. “Hey…. Maybe that was one of those legswallowing catfish from up at the dam, Josh.”
Josh looked at Eddie and they both laughed as the defeated fisherman just shook his head.
“Ya never know. The spring floods stirred the fish up a little, that’s for sure. Maybe some big ones washed downstream.” Josh paused, looking up and down the river, just waiting for Mr. Fish to pop his head up and say “nice fight…see ya next time!” He looked at the banks of their river and the warm sun that cast its glow onto it and figured it was a good day anyway. “Sure washed a lot of garbage downstream, I know that,” Josh said regrettably. “Look at that. Washing machines. How do washing machines end up going down river? Do people have them on their boat d
ocks?” Josh asked, while reeling in his limp line and shaking his head. “Wash clothes while you fish,” he mumbled, still feeling bitterly defeated.
Eddie just grinned and gave Josh a few quiet seconds then said, “I think it was a big bass, Josh.”
“I’m ready to go.” Josh surrendered .
The two freshman friends collected their fishing gear and headed across the sand and rock bar that arced out into the water. To the left of the sand bar was the old limestone train trestle that was built long ago to cross over a stream that flowed out of the hills. The trestle replaced an even older wooden bridge that carried the train over the stream prior to 1902. During the construction of the trestle, the engineers figured out a way to keep the tracks open and the trains rolling while they replaced the old wooden structure with the new permanent stone trestle. The stream, over the years, had washed sand and rock down out of the hills and deposited them into the Elk River, eventually creating the sandbar (more of a rock bar but they called it a sand bar) that the boys spent many hours on every spring and summer. On the right side of the sand bar was a steep path that led up to the railroad tracks of the C&O Railway about fifty feet above the river.
Josh and Eddie had just started to pack up their boat to head back across the river when they heard the whistle of the train.
Eddie looked at Josh, grinned and asked, “Got any change?”
The two boys dropped their poles and ran up the bank via the path. At the top Josh fumbled through his pockets and pulled out a nickel and two pennies. Eddie took the nickel and he and Josh carefully placed the coins on the center of a rail. They could hear the train but not see it, so it was still over a mile away, up past the curve. The two boys scurried back down the bank and waited by their fishing gear for the train to go by. As the coal-hauling beast bore down on them they could feel the ground rumble under their feet for about a minute as nearly a mile of steel and coal roared past them. When the caboose brought up the rear, the two boys ran back up the bank to search for their newly-pressed coins.
River Rocks: A West Virginia Adventure Novel Page 1