Whispers Out Of The Dust: A Haunted Journey Through The Lost American West (Dark Trails Saga)

by David J. West

  From the state of the skeletons I could not tell if there were but two opposing forces or what manner discerned theses forces. We found another antechamber and here did Oramel agree that we should wait for Mr. Dunn while we looked about. Inside this room were scrolls that fell apart like ash at our touch. Some few more lead plates were intact however along with what looked to me like instruments of some cruel torture. I had a cold feeling here and felt wholly unwelcome.

  Oramel poked around a few dusty bins and concluded that there was no treasure here either. We still had not heard from Mr. Dunn though he should have had more than twice the time to return to us.

  I recommended we go back to the entrance or at least the mess area when Oramel said we had only just begun to explore and learn. We then heard a murmuring of voices, gibbering from the dense darkness.

  At first we each assumed it would be Mr. Dunn returning but soon enough we could tell not only that it was not his voice, but that there were too many distinct voices as well.

  I panicked and went silent, hardly breathing but Oramel replied that perhaps Major Powell had seen the futility of the river and had come back and discovered us through perhaps the ventilation shaft from our cook fire, and that would explain Mr. Dunn’s rather long absence.

  How I wanted to believe that, I hoped for that very answer, but alas I knew it could not be so because the voices were coming from the wrong direction of the tunnel.

  I said as much to Oramel but he called me a fool saying it was but echoes in the dark.

  The voices came closer and were mumbling in a language I knew not and they did fill me with such dread as I cannot fully write down. I backed away from the light of the lantern. The dark was so enveloping that I could see naught but my brother Oramel’s face.

  A force came whistling into the chamber and shocked my heart with its cruel sharp sound. I watched Oramel and he could no longer deny the presence of something so unseemly, so unholy that he daren’t speak its name. He turned to face the darkness just out of my sight and I saw him clutch his chest and he wheeled to face me with such a look of horror as I have never before beheld. The horror. No words escaped his mouth but I saw the most wretched silent scream as even a veteran of the war of states has witnessed.

  Oramel fell over dead and a wave of coldness hit me and the lantern went out.

  I felt skeletal fingertips wash over me and I fought their awful possession with everything I had as they clutched and tore at me. All the while chittering their horrid teeth and snatching bites of my flesh as I writhed through them like worm in carrion.

  I don’t know how, but I gained my feet and found the threshold of the chambers door to the tunnel and while I could see none of my attackers their bites and grasping’s did not cease. Nor their vile mocking voices either.

  I knew to go to the right and I struggled tripping over bones and dross, choking on the vapors of rust and decay.

  My pursuers did not stop and several times I was knocked from my feet and bones pricked my flesh in lustful embrace.

  I was near the end of my strength and willingness to escape, my voice had long since gone hoarse from the screams. At last a light was dimly received from up ahead.

  Upon reaching the edge of light I saw that I was still only at the crossroads of the tunnels where the shrine to the tall mummy gods lay.

  And horror, there upon the altar lay a butchered Mr. Dunn!

  His clothing was shredded revealing numerous small wounds reminiscent of perhaps gigantic mosquito bites. His blood flowed lazily into the collection trough and there crouched behind and drinking from said trough was a skeletal lich of these forgotten peoples.

  The thing paid me no heed but did succor itself from the crimson draught of my butchered friend.

  Behind me I heard the clattering of bones and I knew more of these foul undead were coming.

  I went to rush past the drinking fiend when it reared up and grabbed a hold of my wrist and this time I felt flesh rather than just bone. This thing was regaining its foul semblance of humanity! Flesh was returning to it as quickly as it had supped upon poor Mr. Dunn! And shock, it was resuming its former appearance, that of a dusky skinned woman with hair dark as a ravens wing.

  I struck back and it lost its grip on me for a moment and I ran past to escape.

  The clacking and clattering of bones was still upon my heels and I did not stop running until I reached the outside world.

  The moon was high outside and the stars above gave weak comfort. I did fear that the night would allow a pursuit so I ran on in a foolhardy bid for life trying my best to sight a way up the canyon walls.

  I thought I heard pursuit but could not be sure, I ran on so hard, and so afraid to look back and see what dark horde came after me.

  Sometime by morning, I reached the top of the mesa and though I was gashed and bruised from a thousand wounds I kept moving if only to be away from that awful place. I still had my pack with pen and paper, and astonishingly my revolver though I had been too afraid to use it, but I had forgotten my canteen and was indeed suffering even by mid-morning.

  I was incredibly relieved that nothing had followed me over the rim of the mesa. I travelled down what might have been either a game trail or an Indian path until I found a small village. I believed these Indians were Sheewits[21] Paiutes but I could not be sure.

  I found that a young man among them could speak poor English and gave me some water. His name is Saw Bucks? And he did tell me what direction I might go to get to white civilization. I spent the rest of the day with them and they were indeed curious about my wounds but I did not yet feel like speaking about it.

  I slept uneasily and was ready to head to St. George and the Mormons in the morning. But the Sheewits chief wanted me to stay another day and heal my wounds more, they told me that Saw Bucks would guide me in a day or so. I reluctantly agreed though I had wished to be farther away from that terrible cavern.

  Come evening, I had packed my few possessions and felt good and full from the food the Sheewits did feed me. Saw Bucks could not speak good English but is a pleasant companion. I prepared for sleep when an uneasy feeling stole into camp.

  A shadow wandered into the Sheewits camp and it seemed no one bore it any mind but me. It was a woman with a haggard dusky face wearing faded red clothing and what looked like canvas trousers. They looked familiar and I realized in horror as she approached that she was wearing Oramel’s trousers. It was that unspeakable ghoul I had seen devouring Mr. Dunn’s very lifeblood and her she was trailing me like a hound of death!

  I drew forth my revolver and shot her dead until I had emptied the chamber. I was about to reload and keep firing when Saw Bucks and the other Sheewits tackled me and clubbed me unconscious.

  Saw Bucks told me when I awoke the next day that I had murdered one of their tribe and I would have to die.

  I tried to explain what had happened that she was no Indian but a ghoul, a lich from the cavern of doom.

  Saw Bucks said that such was not possible that they [The Sheewits] did not speak of such things. It seemed they knew of the cave but considered it bad medicine and tried to deny its existence.

  I begged Saw Bucks to let me write my last letter and that it might get to white men that he could have my pistol and other valuables. To this he reluctantly agreed and he is sitting with me here as I write this last account of my horrific ordeal.

  They will slay me now saying I am a murderer, but know this, I only slew a demon in human form, if indeed it could even be killed for Saw Bucks told me that the body was dragged away in the night by coyotes, but he said this as if he was trying to talk himself into it. I suspect that they are shedding my blood as a way to appease these wretched old gods who do secretly hold power and sway over this enchanted land.

  May there be a road for me in my passing.

  Seneca Howland

  Account of William Asa, September 1st 1869

  I was delivered a letter from a Shivwit name of Saw Bucks with instruct
ions that the man who had written it, wanted it given to Major Powell. I confess I did read it before taking it to Major Powell myself and was quite stunned at the contents, but I did steel myself to hand it over to him and act as if I did not know of what it said.

  I did travel to the Majors camp and gave him the letter. I then waited as unobtrusively as I could to gauge his reaction. I spent a small bit of time speaking with Major Powell’s men while sharing in watermelon grown at St. Thomas. The Major read it with some interest and after furrowing his brow and calling it terrible and impossible libel, he proceeded to throw it in the fire.

  Snatching it[22] from the flames I was chased out of their camp with not but a few bruises and curses to my name, but I was not about to give up the terrifying message to the flames.

  The next day when the major came to town, he demanded the letter. I did not relinquish it until the Major insisted to Bishop Leithead that it be surrendered as property belonging to the U.S. Government. I quickly made a copy, then gave Major Powell the original which I am sure he soon destroyed.

  I have never forgotten this tale and I do often wonder about those evil and blood thirsty gods of the old lands that Seneca Howland spoke of. Do they still wander out in the wilds, do they still hunger for human blood and when might they call upon someone again in some forgotten and lonely place?

  “But not all men seek rest and peace; some are born with the spirit of the storm in their blood.”

  — Robert E. Howard

  Right Hand Man

  Account written by George D. Watt[23] in January of 1870 and left in the possession of Daniel Bonelli[24] in St. Thomas.

  We had only been in St. Thomas proper for but a few hours and already Brother Brigham’s de facto and oft times drunken bodyguard, the gunslinger Orrin Porter Rockwell, was embroiled in the middle of quite a ruckus with the local red natives.

  It seems that the Paiutes, who camp alongside the ‘Big Ditch’ – a canal that flows through St. Thomas to irrigate the fields therein, began to have a dispute over a woman. Supposedly one man decided to claim the wife of another man and the two began scrap over her and gradually a large number of the restless braves took sides.

  They did have the civility to lay aside their weapons and duel using but their bodies until but one could claim victory and thus gain the woman. But of other such barbarities in the fight they had many, especially in the way they treated the squaw during the conflict.

  She, unfortunately had no say in the matter, but such is the way of the savage. The two sides did beat each other furiously wrestling and boxing one another after a fashion and it did sway each way in an undefinable manner as far as I could perceive.

  When they weren’t beating each other over the head, they would then grab the woman by the arms and pull her each way in a veritable tug of war virtually killing the poor creature.

  Now some of the Saints did try to intervene and thus save the woman but they were largely beat back by the strong willed natives whose blood was up in the heat of the moment. And of course Brother Rockwell’s intervention was especially misconstrued as he has all the subtlety of a pair of brass knuckles.

  He approached them when they were pulling hard on the young squaw and he admonished them to let her go and settle the dispute without harming her. They however took it to mean that he was saying he wished to join in the fight and he, being a white man, was the instant focus of their wild aggressions.

  Rockwell suddenly had some twenty braves assaulting him and while for a moment one might have thought that the bearded gunslinger would be overwhelmed, Rockwell who has always been a hard man to handle, proved himself to be the meanest, toughest man I have ever seen.

  I should add that at this point in the evening, Mr. Rockwell had already had a fair amount of drink in him and could not nearly have been at his full wits and capabilities.

  At one point the braves had all taken hold of Rockwell by his arms and legs, picking up fully off of the ground and having him stretched out like a Christmas goose, but he ferociously kicked his legs until they were forced to drop him and he struck them with his fists until all tumbled down and then all at once he was punching them into submission. He whipped the lot of them and they did concede and allow him full access to the squaw. She herself was more than resigned to such a grim fate as that.

  The braves having fully accepted that he was the victor, now cheered that the conflict was resolved and that he was the ‘wyno’[25] Mormon.

  Rockwell then did try and turn her over to that man whom he believed had the legitimate claim to her , but she did refuse such saying that he [Rockwell] was the man who had fairly won her hand and that she did belong with him now.

  This put Rockwell in more of a fix that he had anticipated even facing off against twenty men. He told her he was already married and she only brought up the LDS custom of plural wives. Rockwell said that he did not wish to take her from her people and upset her family and that she should stay with her first husband.

  To this she reluctantly agreed, though she said she was still truly his squaw and would only stay with her first husband on Rockwell’s permission and that when he should desire her, she should come to him by and by.

  She did also give him a small beaded medicine pouch she said she had made and placed sacred items inside. She said it was enchanted and would protect him from the great evil and ghosts he would soon encounter in this country. Rockwell reluctantly put it around his neck, wearing it much to his apparent chagrin. But I must add that he did never take it off so long as we were in the Muddy Mission.

  And so ended our first night in St. Thomas, which I must say ended up being the lightest conflict of the visit to the Muddy Mission.

  Now Brother Brigham had asked Bishop Leithead to have a flat boat large enough for a wagon and team, prepared for the sake of going down river to do some exploring of the region. This was accomplished shortly before we arrived but upon inspection Brother Brigham seemed to have changed his mind and declined to float the river. This was obviously disheartening for those who had worked so hard on the project as timber was hard to come by here. But he did encourage the Saints there to remain and work hard in the region even if they should remain there forever.

  That last particular remark is on account of the restructuring of the territory boundaries and that as of now the Federal government had moved the markers now making St. Thomas within the state of Nevada instead of the Utah territory, and as such the inhabitants were now a full three years behind the exceedingly high state tax commissions of Nevada. This did constitute quite a financial burden upon the folk as making a living in that arid land was already difficult enough.

  These incredible hardships of living in this desolate land did make quite a few of the Saints wonder on their place in the kingdom and I can’t say that I blame them.

  I did have a long talk with Brother Daniel Bonelli on my own tribulations within the kingdom and with my recent reconnection after having been disfellowshipped on account of my adherence to the counsel of William Godbe. I cannot as yet say that I was wrong, but at this time neither will I say I was right. The fate of the Godbeite reformation remains to be seen.

  The flat boat did however see its use. The matter began on the next morning, when one of the Paiutes came to our camp and did call specifically for the help of Brother’s Brigham and Rockwell.

  Apparently the squaw Rockwell had rescued the night before had been taken by a bitter shaman by the name of Toohoo-emmi who was reputed to be quite evil and always working mischief in the area. He had slain the woman’s husband and made some incredible demands that we all knew by no means would Brother Brigham abide by. This Toohoo-emmi was lord of a place known as Kai’Enepi or ‘Demon Mountain’. The other Lamanites came to express similar grievances and soon enough the chiefs delivered their plea to Brother Brigham for help in dealing with the wicked shaman who was so vexing their lands and peoples.

  At first it seemed that Brother Brigham would not hear their pleas
as he had said they should sort this thing out themselves but this only caused confusion and much grumblings. It looked like things were going to get out of control and in an attempt to normalize relations with area bands, we did convene a meeting with Tut-se-gavits, chief of Santa Clara band; To-ish-obe, principal chief of the Muddy band; William, chief of the Colorado band; Farmer, chief of St. Thomas band; Frank, chief of Simondsville band; Rufus, chief of the Muddy Springs band above the California Road; and Thomas, chief of the band at the Narrows of the Muddy. Sixty-four braves from the seven bands accompanied the chiefs to the meeting. And this was one of the few times I saw Brother Brigham smoke the peace pipe with the Lamanites.

  To the overall request for assistance Brother Brigham replied that he would do what he could while also saying that they should still take care of their own problems. To-ish-be replied that while he agreed there should be a separation and such that this was a spiritual matter that was beyond his people’s abilities and that we [meaning the Mormon brethren, who said we had the Great Spirits blessings in all things] should be obligated to do something about this wicked man who could consort with devils. This made Brother Brigham smile in a way he knew he had been caught with words. He agreed to send who he called his right hand man for just such a situation, Orrin Porter Rockwell. Brother Brigham said he would have Rockwell go out and solve the matter—if the Paiute would also put forward a squad of their own best men for the job and in this they very specifically volunteered a young medicine man whom the local saints called Chief John as well as five of their stoutest braves. Chief John was somewhat reluctant to accept this charge and I did understand that for some reason he was looked down upon, but until later I had no idea as to why.

  And here is where I was also roped into accompanying this venture as Brother Brigham decided that I should go along and record their doings. It would be fair to wonder if he wasn’t punishing me for the whole of the Godbeite debacle and I did wonder if this wasn’t a surreptitious way of simply being rid of me should some unfortunate accident happen along the way. It is unkind of me to write or even think such things but this wretched land and heat has played with my very reason.