PLUS
BOOK TWO
CHERRY VALLEY
SUMMER 1778-SPRING 1788
*****
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
"DON'T BE AFFRIGHTED, Mrs. Shannon. We would be ogres, indeed, if the Committee of Public Safety were not allied with a widow of a Continental lines soldier."
Reverend Dunlap smiled encouragingly. The smile made him look like a quizzical sheep. For some unknown reason he wore a peruke on all occasions—including plowing his fields—as if he were still at Trinity University. Some suggested the shabby wig was the same he'd worn in Dublin thirty years earlier. Diana repressed an urge to bleat at the dominie, and retold her story, this time to a full committee hearing.
She had allies. Two of them were in the room: Reverend Dunlap and Captain Robert M'Kean, the closest thing to a professional soldier Cherry Valley had. There were others, very much offstage: the British now seemed hard-pressed to win a victory, let alone the war. The French had signed an alliance with America and declared war on Great Britain. Most importantly, the Four Horsemen were thundering very close to Cherry Valley itself: the Indians and their Tory Irregulars were burning the frontier. The hamlet of Springfield, less than a day's travel away, had been put to the torch two months ago. Cherry Valley might be next— and this was no time for fence-sitting.
Patriotism was a very convenient and easy feeling that summer of 1778, a feeling that should be demonstrated by a Noble Act, preferably one that involved no real risk nor financial sacrifice. So certainly the committee would want to help Diana now. The members were assembled in the main room of Samuel Campbell's log farmhouse. The men wore either the sober black of a Presbyterian elder—which many of them were—or any uniform they were vaguely entitled to don.
Diana had dressed for her audience. She wore a tasteful, self-designed and -sewn pastel dress—the skirt over a small hoop, and the dress sleeves short and flared to reveal the chemise underneath. In Albany or—she thought, anyway— Philadelphia, the chemise and lacing would show at the dress's plunging neckline. But this was Cherry Valley, so Diana had added a triangular kerchief to conceal her neckline. This was topped off with a very demure, very puritan-looking, close-fitting cap. She was every inch the respectable but well-to-do young matron. Her speech was as cleverly contrived as her outfit.
She explained—with only a few artful tears for punctuation—how her husband-to-be Emmett had been wounded in a skirmish and invalided home from his regiment. "I'm no doctor . . . but I think they should not have released him from the hospital." Because, she went on, he fell desperately ill in Easton, where her parents took him into their inn. "That was all we could see to do, sirs. The town is filled with poor people who have been driven off their land by the war." Her parents? No, they weren't rich. Easton had several inns more magnificent. But better in services? "It would sound as if I were boasting if I said that. But our custom grows and our guests return, year after year."
Diana heard a mutter from one of the committeemen that once again the Irish teague had fallen in love with money. It was Mister Gill—one of Cherry Valley's innkeepers—who looked too much like Nate Hatch for Diana's comfort. He added a comment that some of Easton's inns were no better than they should be. Captain M'Kean, a freight wagon of a man, growled that the Emmett Shannon he'd known since the Indian wars would have little truck with the kind of place Mister Gill seemed to be talking about. As a matter of fact, he personally found Mister Gill's statement offensive, and suggested an apology to Mrs. Shannon would be in order. Or else he'd crack Mister Gill's back for him. Mister Gill greened and stammered that apology. Captain M'Kean's nail-keg fist relaxed. Diana curtsied, flashed Mister Gill a smile she hoped was charming, and continued narrating the romance she'd created.
Sick, she had nursed the soldier, and in the natural course of things, they had fallen in love. Her parents approved of the match, but worried about Emmett taking his new bride on a perilous journey. Diana and Emmett's travels were almost over, and they had almost reached Albany, when they were hit by raiders.
"Indians?" came the sharp question from Campbell.
"No, I don't believe so. However, there were Tory renegades. White, with . . . with—" artful wail here—"scalps on their belts." She started crying. The tears were not planned. It was all Diana could do to keep from completely breaking down. Reverend Dunlap soothed her. "Emmett held them off long enough for me to flee into the woods. And then he . . . he . . ."
"I wager the raiders paid dearly for his death," Captain M'Kean rumbled.
"And . . . then I made my way to Albany. Mister van Ruysdael and his wife were kind enough to take me in. And write that letter you have before you." That letter was quite genuine, although Mister van Ruysdael had slightly modified Diana's story when she performed her dress rehearsal. He would be more acceptable to the stiff-necked committee of Cherry Valley as an old friend of Diana's parents rather than a reprobate ex-peddler of Indian potions and roistering partner of Emmett's.
"Gentlemen, I am not educated like Dr. Ruysdael," Diana continued, after each member had scanned the parchment sheet, some moving their lips noticeably in the attempt, "I am just a poor widow. Great with child. And there is no one to help me, my husband's sister, or these poor orphans." The committee looked behind Diana, at Ruth, her two children, and Brian and Farrell, all washed and wearing their best shabbies. "There is no one to help me except you gentlemen," Diana concluded.
Each committeeman put on his own version of Benevolence, Patriarchy, and Civic Virtue. Then looked at Mister Campbell to make sure they were making the Correct Impartial Decision. "1 think I may speak for us all," Mister Campbell started in his Ulster brogue, "in saying there is little problem in forgiving the past-due taxes on the farm. And certainly we have no intention of seizing any of the late Mister Shannon's property. As Dominie Dunlap said, none'a us are monsters." Diana cued Ruth . . . and Emmett's sister did an appropriate babble of thanks. The children knuckled their foreheads. Very good.
"There are two other things you might help us with," Diana went on. This drew a suspicious look from Mister Campbell. An uncollected and probably uncollectible debt of a dead man is quite easy to forget. What else did this woman want? "The farm belonging to my Emmett's former father-in-law . . . Mister Hopkins? The traitor?" Growls from the committee. Some of them may have been secret Loyalists—but they remembered Springfield. "His grandchildren"—Diana indicated Brian and Farrell—"have no legacy. They will grow up knowing their grandfather was a Tory, an unhappy and unfair burden for such innocents, I'm sure you will agree. I ask you to deed them the farm. It is lying unworked but still fallow. I still have enough remaining from my dowry to purchase seed for the late planting season."
One of the committeemen looked unhappy. "I have already discussed my own plans—" and he stopped short, after getting glares. Diana figured him to be on the outskirts of power.
"A reasonable request. Granted. We will prepare the proper correspondence. Is that all?"
"One . . . very minor thing. The land . . . my husband's land is very dry. I fear our well must fail us soon. But I saw, just across the road, what looks like a tiny spring. Reverend Dunlap told me no one holds title to that land. So if I must attempt to be father and mother, farmer and cook, to my family, could you not make my task easier?"
The Reverend Dunlap said something in another language, which Diana thought might be Latin. The other members of the committee looked equally mystified. "That was Cicero," he said. "Without the highest justice, a republic cannot be governed."
Captain M'Kean was still bewildered. Obviously he didn't know any Ciceros living in Cherry Valley or serving in the army. But that seemed enough for the committeemen. The plot of land was deeded to Diana, for the sum of one shilling—which, Mister Campbell said, need not actually be paid. Just a formality.
Diana Shannon had won her first battle. Weeping thanks—as was the rest of her troupe—she managed a secret smile. Now she had land that food could be grown on, and she owned both sides of the lane at the crossroads—even though "crossroads" was a grand description for the meeting of two tracks little more than Indian trails. She glanced at Mister Gill, thinking, When this damned war is over, I am going to put up an inn that will make your own look like a flea-infested stable. Ruth was staring at her as if she were a miracle maker. From that day there was never a question among the Shannons as to who made the decisions...
* * * *
There were too many decisions, too many worries, and too few hours, Diana thought, staring down at the falls from her rocky perch. The Indian name for them, she'd learned, was Te-Ke-Ha-Ra-Wah. It was a good place to think, and close to the farm.
The blessings first: the farms were secure. There would be food that winter—not only had Ruth and the children managed to get in a crop, but they had made a meager harvest as well. That had been a relief: Diana half expected that Ruth had spent the time from sending the letter to Valley Forge and Diana's arrival doing naught but weeping and tearing her hair.
In Albany, Diana had promptly converted the state and Continental currency taken from Hatch into specie. This was very much against Mister van Ruysdael's advice—he was convinced the current depreciation of paper money was a momentary thing. Part of the future, he had told her, was paper money, secured by faith or the labor of common people instead of gold or silver. Diana noticed the good merchant owned enough land and houses to afford this romantic view. She settled for the jingle of coinage. Three wagonloads of dried or salted provisions and seed accompanied Diana on the journey to Cherry Valley, and she still had far more coinage left than she'd led the committee to believe.
Cherry Valley itself was beautiful. Emmett had not gilded anything in his stories. Its people were nowhere near as monstrous as she'd expected. Greedy, selfish, shortsighted, and opportunistic, to be sure. But that was the frontier. The town was a paradise compared to New Kent. Possibly it had been the leavening influence of Reverend Dunlap, who'd led the original settlers in 1740. Or maybe it was the casual surveying when the original patent was granted. More likely, Diana decided, the original settlers hadn't been as rich or well-connected as those who came to New Kent. Regardless, she felt she could make her way among them. For a while. For a while.
Ruth, thank heaven, was not the complete flibbertigibbet Diana had dreaded. She did make the worst of a problem—but she also made the best of a blessing. She spoke her mind to too many people—but she never lied. She hated the farm, the woods, and Cherry Valley, but that was just Ruth. If she wanted to dream of fleeing away to Boston once this awful war ended, so be it. Diana had her own dreams. Her two children had some of Ruth's faults. They would attempt too many tasks at the same time, and get none of them accomplished. But once set a single job, Samuel, fourteen, or Mary, twelve, would see it through.
Both Brian and Farrell were their father's children: bright, eager, alive to the world. She hoped they would have better luck in life than their father. To the devil with hope. Diana was determined she would make it so!
Enough of the blessings, because the problems were very large—as large as the flames that had engulfed Springfield, flames that ran wild across the frontier that summer. From Canada the great war chiefs of the Seneca and Mohawk had taken the tribes south with torch, lance, and tomahawk. Companies of white men went with them. They were called many things: Tories, traitors, rangers, "Destructors," Loyalists, or renegades. Diana, who gave not a damn for politics, thought them one and all as the monsters who had killed her Emmett. With six helpless lives to worry about, she also wished every red devil all the plagues of Egypt.
But Abraham and his family had been Indians.
She had asked Captain M'Kean about them. When home from the militia regiment, he had adopted the habit of dropping by the farm. He said he was concerned about these women and children so far from the center of the village. The captain, Diana suspected, had a bit more in mind than just the welfare of the Shannons. She would find a way to handle the problem later. There were greater matters on her mind. Why were the Indians the butchers they were?
Captain M'Kean thought a minute, and asked for another cup of the wild raspberry tea Diana was taking religiously, as part of Gramer Fahey's regime for gravid women.
"I s'pect—and since I've been against 'em since King Philip's War, there's truth to my thoughts—they ain't the heathen murtherers some would think.
"Consider. We came in. Took their land. End of the war, we'll take more of it. There's a lot more white folk than red. From the Indian's viewin', we don't fight like real warriors—and he does. We ain't willin' to take risks in battle—an' he is. We're after money, an' the Indian, he don't see no use for it except decoration. We slave on the land, and the Indian's got the forest givin' him what he needs. An' to him, we're dirty."
"What?"
"Surely. White color's a sign of sickness. We don't have any of the ceremonies to make us pure like he does. We're drunks ... an' we turn the Indian into a drunk. We mewl when we're hungry an' scream when we're burnin' at the stake. Hard to respect a people like that. If you're thinkin' like an Indian. Not to mention we whipped 'em pretty good at Oriskany. They're lookin' for revenge. Pretty sure . . . were I Mohawk or Senecy, I'd be out with Brant, too."
"What's going to be the end of all this?"
"We're going to kill all of them ... or they'll kill all of us. Don't see any other ways."
Captain M'Kean was a soldier, Diana mused, with a soldier's simplicity. Perhaps the solution wouldn't be that brutal. She flipped a pebble down into the churning pool below her. Not that this had anything to do with her present problem. She doubted if any Indian—bursting out of a thicket with a tomahawk—would inquire as to her social feelings. The problem was keeping the six of them alive if the Indians did show up.
The Campbell farm had been fortified with a crude log-and-dirt breastworks a year earlier. During raiding season the settlers huddled behind them, working their fields in armed groups. That was not enough now. Rumors ran through the valley that thousands of Indians were out this summer. Mister Campbell had convinced General Lafayette that Cherry Valley was too important a post to be ignored. The general had agreed, and ordered the militia to build a proper fort in the village center, and for the county militia to garrison it. The fort was slightly reassuring—it was solidly built of logs, reinforced, and given a parapet. It enclosed the church and burial ground, and a blockhouse was being finished inside the walls. A regiment of regulars was on its way to garrison the post, according to Captain M'Kean.
Diana didn't think this was good enough. If she and the others huddled inside the post, how could their farms be worked? But if they stayed on their land . . . They were almost two miles from the fort. It would be a long, hard run for children and a pregnant woman. Diana determined to think on this further. She shivered. It had suddenly turned cold and dark.
She looked up through the trees and was startled to see the sun vanishing. A disk of blackness cut into it. It was an eclipse, something she had never witnessed. She didn't believe in omens. But the gray twilight was entirely too easy to see as a prediction for the future.
* * * *
The first refugees stumbled into Cherry Valley four days later. Eyes shattered, they were broken by horror. The Wyoming Valley had been obliterated. No one was sure how many Iroquois had attacked the fertile granary, nor how many of Butler's Beasts had been with them. The forts of the settlers had surrendered or been bypassed by the Indians. The militia went out to fight—and was broken and decimated. But that was not the worst. Farmers were taken captive and their children slaughtered, the story went. Their women led away or ... or worse. Farms and fields roared in flames. The valley would sell nothing to Washington's army for winter supplies. There was nothing to sell. The stories of the Wyoming Massacre that Diana heard from the broken men and women grew worse with each retelling. Diana did what she could, putting up as many people as the small farmhouse could hold. Others were quartered in the Hopkins's farmhouse and outbuildings on the property next to hers. A very poor excuse for an innkeeper's first venture, she thought. She couldn't bring herself to charge for lodgings. But the refugees could help her with her main problem.
She'd tasked a few of the abler boys and men to help build a root cellar near Emmett's house. It was a deep one. Another group, a few days later, put in cross beams, roofing, and a floor. She was surprised none of her laborers wondered why she insisted the roof of the cellar be placed well below ground level. She had another "cellar" dug and framed in a similar manner by other refugees—this one nearer to the crossroads, on the property with the spring. Eventually the refugees were collected and convoyed toward Albany by soldiers. Diana then finished her cellars. The roofs were covered with dirt and turf. Bushes were transplanted. When she was finished, it would take a very skilled eye to see there was anything except innocent land. The Shannon clan now had two hiding places.
She tried to teach Ruth to fire Emmett's rifle. It was hopeless. Ruth would aim the massive tube vaguely in the general direction of a target, squinch her eyes closed and yank the trigger. Fortunately, Emmett had a shotgun. That was kept just inside one shelter. Diana told Ruth if the Indians attacked, she and her children were to make for the hide. Don't come out, no matter what happens. If anybody opens the shelter door besides me, grab the shotgun and use it. Ruth's son and daughter proved more apt pupils in musketry. They were given other tasks—to keep the rifle and shotgun clean, and to recharge the weapons every day or so with fresh powder. Diana thought this was what Emmett would have wanted. She herself had the teamster's pistol. For the first time she realized what an awkward contrivance a weapon was, and wondered why men had such a fondness for possessing them. A better question, she pondered, was why they enjoyed using them so greatly.
Diana's fears were driven not only by the Indian raids, but by the arrival of the soldiery. Three hundred of them had marched into the valley just after the Wyoming Massacre had begun. It was the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment. Continental Regulars. The settlers of Cherry Valley felt very secure. Diana felt very insecure. Not that she was, or wanted to be, a military expert. What little she knew or cared about the army came from the stories Emmett had told her or what she'd heard at the Black Lamb. But these men didn't spend much time practicing, Diana noticed. When they did, it was marching up and down in regular lines, as if they expected British Regulars to oppose them. They were led by a fat puff of a colonel named Alden. He and the other officers dressed most finely. The men were dirty and lazy. The officers sought quarters with the better folk of the valley, while the men were left to shift for themselves in the blockhouse or to await invitations to share settlers' lodgings. Diana had asked if she could quarter a few men, but an officer said no. She lived too far from the fort. The soldiers had two shiny brass cannon, which they polished constantly but never fired.
Diana prayed the Indians wouldn't come. And, for the rest of that long, scorching summer, Cherry Valley was left in peace. Some of the more timid settlers asked Colonel Alden if they could stay in the fort. There was nothing to worry about, the colonel blustered. The time for raiding was over. A cold, windy fall was settling over the frontier. The danger was past.
* * * *
Brian and Farrell found the three bobcat kittens while playing pirate around one of the streams flowing down toward the fort. The mother was gone. Perhaps having a double estrus that year had weakened her and she'd fallen prey to a hunter. Brian had wanted to bring them back to the farm on discovery. Farrell had argued against that most vehemently. Why? Mother won't mind.
Because . . . because then we won't have a Secret, Farrell came up with. That made excellent sense to Brian. A Real Secret, not like the Pretend ones he and his brother shared that they were really Indian chiefs, or somehow related to some king somewhere, or that they were going to run away to sea one of these days. Something to exchange Knowing Looks about at mealtime, and to ask Innocent But Leading Questions to their elders. And something to giggle about when they were curled in the bed loft at night.
They'd started feeding the kittens on pap—milk-soaked bread. Now the bobcats' eyes had opened and they were exploring their den. And biting. Brian and Farrell began thinking what could be done with these three wonderful animals. Farrell wondered if they could take the cats to Philadelphia when they ran away to be sailors. Even though he was younger, many times Farrell was the Planner of an Adventure, and Brian the one who'd actually carry out that plan.
"Would they let them on our ship?" Brian asked.
Farrell thought. "No," he decided. "We'd have to sell them."
"But then somebody would put them in a cage." That didn't sound right to Farrell either. But he told his brother they couldn't just turn the cats loose here in Cherry Valley when they ran away to sea. Brian understood—they probably wouldn't be able to take care of themselves.
"We could teach them how to hunt. Or ... or maybe they could hunt rats like Tabby does."
Farrell giggled. "Big rats," he said.
Then Farrell had the solution—they wouldn't just run away to be sailors, they'd start at the top and be pirates. That's what Aunt Ruth's husband had done, was it not? Nobody would tell a pirate he couldn't have a bobcat if he wanted. Brian thought that excellent.
"That's what they'll eat," Farrell decided. "People we don't like. People like . . . like ..."
He stopped. His world didn't have many enemies. Or at least ones that should be eaten alive. But there would be, later. Indians, maybe, although how Indians suddenly were encountered by Farrell's pirate ship, as clouds of sleep drifted over him, he wasn't sure. But they were. And they were eaten. And on that note of gore, the loft fell silent. ...
* * * *
It snowed all day November 9. At dusk the snow turned into sleet. Under no circumstances, Diana said firmly, could Farrell and Brian go out. The kittens would go hungry. Brian listened to his brother crying, and could stand no more. Tomorrow, he said, we'll feed them. Before anyone wakes. They'll be all right.
"Promise?"
"I promise."
Farrell looked at Brian's face in the dimness, then nodded. "You promised," he said, and promptly fell asleep. His big brother never lied. At least, not to him. . . .
* * * *
Farrell kicked his brother, and Brian jerked up, eyes blinking. Then he ducked back under the feather comforter. The loft was chilly, and the fire down below still banked.
"Wake up," Farrell insisted. Brian growled, not emerging. Farrell kicked him again. "Let's go! Before Mother wakes up."
"She'll catch us."
"No she won't. We'll be back first."
"What're we going to feed them?"
"Milk. And some ham."
"Farrell, go back to sleep. They'll be okay."
"No they won't! It rained all night. They'll drown. Or starve dead. You promised!"
Brian said a word he didn't know the meaning of, a word Diana would be surprised he knew, took a deep breath and rolled out, the husk mattress crackling.
"Sssh!"
"Sssh yourself. Get dressed. This is your dumb idea. They'll prob'ly bite me again."
The two boys, alternately hushing each other to silence, crept down the ladder toward the door. One of the dogs woke and whined. Brian patted him back into sleep. Farrell borrowed one of the dog's pannikins from the porch and tipped milk from the pitcher into it. Brian, rather awkwardly, sawed a slab from the ham on the sideboard. He tucked an end of a bread loaf into a pocket. They pulled on their fur jackets, hats, and wool mittens, and went out into the storm.
* * * *
The boys' track led them behind the Gordons' place, toward the stream. Brian and Farrell, like every other boy in Cherry Valley, prided themselves on being able to go anywhere without being seen by an adult. These secret routes, of course, took twice as long to travel with three times the scrambling. But. who said adventure was supposed to be easy? They'd wrestled a fallen log across the creek for a footbridge, and now edged out on it. The creek was shallow—but if they came home frozen and wet, both of them would be for a switching. Farrell put the bread into the milk and started coaxing the kittens awake. Brian was rinsing the salty ham in the creek when he heard the first scream.
A woman. Then something else—it sounded like a catamount's screech. But somehow Brian knew it wasn't. The scream stopped short. Brian heard the thud of rifle shots through the sleet. And then he saw the Indian.
He was just across the creek from him, skull face leering and long lance lifted. With a bound, the Indian was at the edge of the creek. "Run! Run, Farrell!" Brian screamed, and kicked the log into the creek. Farrell found himself up the bank, over the bobcat den, fingernails ripping on the stone, and behind him the Indian's war cry, and he was going into the brush on his hands and knees and heard a loud shout from Brian.
He spun and saw the spear driving forward, down into his brother, and heard a gurgle like when they cut the pig's windpipe at slaughter, and the lance standing in Brian's body and the Indian pulling a knife from his belt, and then Farrell was gone.
* * * *
Diana was out of bed, reaching for the pistol before she realized what had awakened her. It came again. The crash of the fort's cannon.
"Get up," she shouted unnecessarily. "To the cellar." Her fingers needed no instructions. The pistol was cocked, powder poured from the small horn into the pan, and the weapon put down to half cock while she watched the flurry from Ruth and her two children. She turned to the loft— and saw and heard nothing. She was at the top of the ladder. Brian and Farrell were gone. As were their coats, which should have hung behind the kitchen door.
Ruth was starting to keen in panic. There wasn't time. She jerked the woman toward the door and told Samuel to get everyone into the cellar. Load the rifle and shotgun. Kill anybody who opened the trap. She pulled her coat around her shoulders and was almost out the door. No. You won't save anyone if your feet freeze. She forced them into boots, then grabbed the pouch with pistol balls and powder horn. Then out the door.
She couldn't find any footprints in the muck. A thick fog hampered her search. Think, woman. The creek? It was one of their favorite playgrounds, although what they could be doing at this hour of the morning was unknown. But both of them of late had been behaving like there was some great secret. Maybe the creek. She could think of no other possibilities. The creek was nearly in the middle of Cherry Valley—in the same direction the screams and battle sounds came from.
The sleet was now coming in drifting sheets, with clear patches between. The rising wind was driving the fog out of the valley. She stumbled through the fields, deep in mire, and tore her hands and clothes pulling herself across the stone fences.
Suddenly Diana went to her knees and threw up. Damn you, woman. Damn this child in my belly. I have no time to be sick. She refused to allow her body its dictates and ran on.
* * * *
Farrell knew not to cry. But the tears came anyway. Silent tears. He'd gone back along the secret path—and seen, in a clearing ahead, more Indians. Farrell went in another direction. The fort. The soldiers would save him. The soldiers were busy. The fort was surrounded with screaming Indians. White men—Tory rangers—were crouched behind fences, wagons, and houses. Shooting at the stockaded walls.
Farrell saw one Indian holding one of the soldiers by his arm. Another soldier—Farrell thought he was fat enough to be the head soldier—ran out of a house toward the fort. The Indian ran after him. The fat soldier turned and aimed a pistol. The Indian hurled his tomahawk. The fat man's skull split and he fell. Without realizing it, Farrell moaned.
The fort's gate opened and a cannon mouth came out. The cannon blasted. Three men knotted near a wall went spinning away. Farrell saw, even at this distance, the wall painted red from an invisible brush.
* * * *
The four women walked like they were entranced. The Indians around them were laughing, joking. Diana, hidden in brush, saw a long, red scalp swinging from the belt of one Seneca. Mrs. Dickson had been very proud of her hair, the longest and reddest in Cherry Valley. The Indians passed, and Diana chanced moving along the edges of the road. She heard more happy shouts. Another party of Seneca, whooping around a farmhouse. Some of them wore women's shifts. A steady stream of goods was pitched out the door into the mud. Pots, pans, worthless tools of the white man. Diana saw one Indian replace his headdress with a sunbonnet before she passed.
The Campbells' house and barns roared in flames. Diana could see no sign of life. Nor were there any bodies. Again, in the fields beyond the Campbells' were Indians. The Campbell cattle had been herded together, and six Indians were slaughtering them. This was quite a celebration.
* * * *
Farrell looked through brush at the Mitchell farm. Mrs. Mitchell and three of her children lay dead outside the door. Mister Mitchell was holding his daughter in his arms. She wasn't moving. Mister Mitchell was talking to her. Farrell would go to him. Mister Mitchell could help him. Mister Mitchell suddenly looked up. Then put the body down and ran behind a shed.
A white man walked into the yard. He had a rifle over his shoulder. The man was dressed like an Indian. He walked to the body of the little girl, put his rifle carefully on the ground and drew a tomahawk. He lifted the little girl's body by the hair . . . and Farrell could watch no more.
He was crawling away, backward, his eyes squeezed shut. The boy had no idea where to go. Hide, in the brush. Your mother will find you. Be like Brian told you the little animals were. They kept quiet when men were around, and no one could find them. Farrell, crying for his brother and himself, crawled into the heart of a thicket and curled up like one of the bobcat kittens. His body shook with fear and cold.
* * * *
Diana would never get the chance to put the Gills out of business. The Indians had seen to that. Their mutilated bodies sprawled in the road, half hidden in a deep, dark puddle. She realized she heard no more gunshots. The fort had fallen, she thought. There were shouts from around the bend ahead of her. Diana ducked behind a rocky outcropping.
The raiders came around the curve. She didn't know how many hundreds of them there were. They were driving the valley's women and children ahead of them. Like drovers going to market, Diana thought. They disappeared into the drizzle. Shaking in fury, she continued her search. She would find Farrell and Brian. But she wanted to find an Indian. Just one. She would not miss.
After an hour she chanced calling. The raiders had gone. Soldiers came out of the fort. It had not been taken. The Tories' attack had failed. The Seneca had refused to attack the fort. They wanted loot and revenge. One sergeant chanced a boast. Diana almost shot him.
* * * *
Diana found Farrell in the late afternoon. He'd awakened, hearing her shouts, and stumbled out of the thicket. Brian! Where was Brian? Farrell could not talk. But he could lead. Brian's body lay half in, half out of the creek. His chest was torn open from the lance wound. He had been scalped. There was no sign of the bobcat kittens.
* * * *
There were still people in Cherry Valley. That night and the next morning settlers trickled out of their hiding places in the woods and into the fort. The Seneca sent halfhearted skirmishing parties back into the settlement the next day— but there was little left to loot. The Seneca wanted the white man to know this raid was in return for the butchery of their best warriors at Oriskany. And so scalps were nailed to poles, and the poles staked in the village. Finally, near midday, they were driven out of Cherry Valley by a company of Continental Regulars.
About noon there were shouts from outside the fort— and the captives came running back toward it. They had not escaped—the Indians had decided the captives would slow them down. Brant, of the Mohawks, who'd come on the raid with fifty of his warriors but refused to take part in the sacking of the village, had kept the settlers from further slaughter. But some of them—the Campbells and Mrs. John Moore—would be taken to Canada. Valuable hostages. Diana did not give a damn about any of this. She had Brian to bury.
She had failed Emmett.
NEXT: CHRISTMAS IN CHERRY VALLEY
*****
S.O.S. ALLAN'S NEW NOVEL
Between February and May of 1942, German U-boats operated with impunity off the Florida coast, sinking scores of freighters from Cape Canaveral to Key West and killing nearly five thousand people. Residents were horrified witnesses of the attacks—the night skies were aflame and in the morning the beaches were covered with oil and tar, ship parts and charred corpses. The Germans even landed teams of saboteurs charged with disrupting war efforts in the factories of the North. This novel is based on those events. For my own purposes, I set the tale in the fictitious town of Juno Beach on the banks of the equally fictitious Seminole River—all in the very real Palm Beach County, a veritable wilderness in those long ago days. Among the witnesses were my grandfather and grandmother, who operated an orchard and ranch in the area.
*****
A DAUGHTER OF LIBERTY
The year is 1778 and the Revolutionary War has young America trapped in the crossfire of hatred and fear. Diana, an indentured servant, escapes her abusive master with the help of Emmett Shannon, a deserter from the desperate army at Valley Forge. They fall in love and marry, but their happiness is shattered and Diana Shannon must learn to survive on her own. From that moment on she will become a true woman of her times, blazing a path from lawless lands in the grips of the Revolution, to plague-stricken Philadelphia, to the burning of Washington in the War Of 1812.
*****
TWO NEW AUDIOBOOKS ONLY $4.95!
Tales Sometimes Tall, but always true, of Allan Cole's years in Hollywood with his late partner, Chris Bunch. How a naked lady almost became our first agent. How we survived La-La Land with only the loss of half our brain cells. How Bunch & Cole became the ultimate Fix-It
Boys. How an alleged Mafia Don was very, very good to us. The guy who cornered the market on movie rocks. Andy Warhol's Fire Extinguisher. The Real Stars Of Hollywood. Why they don't make million dollar movies. See The Seven Pi$$ing Dwarfs. Learn: how to kill a "difficult" actor… And much, much more.
THE TIMURA TRILOGY: When The Gods Slept, Wolves Of The Gods and The Gods Awaken. This best selling fantasy series now available as trade paperbacks, e-books (in all varieties) and as audiobooks. Visit The Timura Trilogy page for links to all the editions.
NEWLY REVISED KINDLE EDITIONS OF THE TIMURA TRILOGY NOW AVAILABLE. (1) When The Gods Slept;(2) Wolves Of The Gods; (3) The Gods Awaken.
*****
A NATION AT WAR WITH ITSELF: In Book Three Of The Shannon Trilogy, young Patrick Shannon is the heir-apparent to the Shannon fortune, but murder and betrayal at a family gathering send him fleeing into the American frontier, with only the last words of a wise old woman to arm him against what would come. And when the outbreak of the Civil War comes he finds himself fighting on the opposite side of those he loves the most. In The Wars Of The Shannons we see the conflict, both on the battlefield and the homefront, through the eyes of Patrick and the members of his extended Irish-American family as they struggle to survive the conflict that ripped the new nation apart, and yet, offered a dim beacon of hope.
*****
NEW: THE AUDIOBOOK VERSION OF
THE HATE PARALLAX
What if the Cold War never ended -- but continued for a thousand years? Best-selling authors Allan Cole (an American) and Nick Perumov (a Russian) spin a mesmerizing "what if?" tale set a thousand years in the future, as an American and a Russian super-soldier -- together with a beautiful American detective working for the United Worlds Police -- must combine forces to defeat a secret cabal ... and prevent a galactic disaster! This is the first - and only - collaboration between American and Russian novelists. Narrated by John Hough. Click the title links below for the trade paperback and kindle editions. (Also available at iTunes.)
*****
THE SPYMASTER'S DAUGHTER:
A novel by Allan and his daughter, Susan
After laboring as a Doctors Without Borders physician in the teaming refugee camps and minefields of South Asia, Dr. Ann Donovan thought she'd seen Hell as close up as you can get. And as a fifth generation CIA brat, she thought she knew all there was to know about corruption and betrayal. But then her father - a legendary spymaster - shows up, with a ten-year-old boy in tow. A brother she never knew existed. Then in a few violent hours, her whole world is shattered, her father killed and she and her kid brother are one the run with hell hounds on their heels. They finally corner her in a clinic in Hawaii and then all the lies and treachery are revealed on one terrible, bloody storm- ravaged night.
BASED ON THE CLASSIC STEN SERIES by Allan Cole & Chris Bunch: Fresh from their mission to pacify the Wolf Worlds, Sten and his Mantis Team encounter a mysterious ship that has been lost among the stars for thousands of years. At first, everyone aboard appears to be long dead. Then a strange Being beckons, pleading for help. More disturbing: the presence of AM2, a strategically vital fuel tightly controlled by their boss - The Eternal Emperor. They are ordered to retrieve the remaining AM2 "at all costs." But once Sten and his heavy worlder sidekick, Alex Kilgour, board the ship they must dare an out of control defense system that attacks without warning as they move through dark warrens filled with unimaginable horrors. When they reach their goal they find that in the midst of all that death are the "seeds" of a lost civilization.
*****
TALES OF THE BLUE MEANIE
NOW AN AUDIOBOOK!
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Venice Boardwalk Circa 1969
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In the depths of the Sixties and The Days Of Rage, a young newsman, accompanied by his pregnant wife and orphaned teenage brother, creates a Paradise of sorts in a sprawling Venice Beach community of apartments, populated by students, artists, budding scientists and engineers lifeguards, poets, bikers with a few junkies thrown in for good measure. The inhabitants come to call the place “Pepperland,” after the Beatles movie, “Yellow Submarine.” Threatening this paradise is "The Blue Meanie," a crazy giant of a man so frightening that he eventually even scares himself.
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