Thunder in the Valley Page 6

  A hollow booming report echoed up the river valley, snapping my head up. The long thunderous rumble interrupted my pondering. It had to be the signal cannon at Fort Frye. I listened closely.

  A second report echoed up the Muskingum. Two shots. An alert had been signaled.

  Still I listened. One more report meant that everyone—man, woman, and child—should seek the safety of the Fort Frye palisade with all speed possible. A fourth shot, however, would be most revealing. Four signal firings meant only male bearers of arms need answer the summons. And since the next militia muster didn’t occur for another two days, four shots on this morning meant the search for Matthan Hannar commenced shortly.

  The third and fourth reports of the cannon followed at a measured pace. The final rumbling echo answered squarely Uncle Jeremiah’s challenge. The fox surely had it over the sheep, now and forever. Smell of wool fouled the nose anyway.

  Maybe he was truly dead and gone, but Jeremiah’s prophecy yet held fast. His teachings had saved the game for me one more time, pointing out the next move. He would guide his nephew through “this here silly fuss,” just as he’d promised.

  Without further babying of wilted legs and ouchy, blistered hands, I hitched feet beneath me and taken off westward down the ridge line. Just as any smart old fox would’ve.

  Chapter 8

  Noon–Evening—January 8

  That shortcut proved a heady challenge for any wily old fox. It led across the upper reaches of a mean godforsaken hunk of backcountry where no game or hunting trails existed to ease passage. Timber on the brow of the ridge line felled by lightning and storm wind blocked the way time and again and had to be clumb over or gone around. Creeping mats of vine concealed countless tree roots and rocks, and I found the few open glens overgrown with spiny bushes and well-nigh impassable. I plugged ever onward, stride after jolting stride, stubbornly refusing any halt before regaining the river. Once off my feet, I’d sleep for hours. As with the smart fox, first a secure den, then victuals and rest.

  The morning passed, an eternity of slow progress westward. The meager warmth of the winter sun melted the lingering haze from the upland, but lacked the heat for burning away the heavy lowland fog. From the ridge line the roiling sea of gray mist smothering the lowlands, white here, gray there, black further out, dazzled the mind and captured the eye. I was staring out over the top of it when I tripped on a tangle of vine and went sprawling in a nasty fall. Spitting dead leaves and bits of twig, I righted myself, pained and a smidgen wiser: blessed be the traveler who fixed his eyeballs on his moccasins and kept them there.

  The fall hurt but spared a greater calamity. At midday, a quarter step beyond a cluster of scruffy box elm, the ridge line ended without an inkling atop a sheer cliff. If I’d been larking along then bewitched by the fog I would’ve sailed over the brink and splattered on the rocks down below like a gut-shot bird. It was still a near thing. I teetered on the cliff edge, one foot touching nothing more promising than thin air. Too tuckered out for anything fancy, I leaned back and sat down hard and quick. The stony rim of the cliff held my weight without breaking away, and I ended up perched on the very lip of the rim, legs hanging free and clear in the wind, clutching the precious Pennsylvania rifle against my chest.

  It was an iffy, lofty perch, a real heart-pounder. I hung dead still for some long moments. The thought of those jagged rocks at the bottom of the cliff stiffened every bone. By and by, it came on me I was fairly well seated, not going anywheres soon, and I bent forward a hair and chanced a downward glance twixt my knees.

  I’ll never willingly hang on the rim of a cliff again feeling no more secure than a drop of sweat on the end of your nose. But on this occasion that downward glance at first certainly gladdened flagging spirits. Despite agonies to every bone and joint, despite a thumping knot on my skull, despite gnawing, hunger and parching thirst, despite the narrow escape from a deadly plunge off the cliff face, I’d at least completed my cross-country shortcut as planned. Far below, framed by my dangling feet, the muddy waters of the Muskingum shone dully in the weak foggy sunlight of winter afternoon.

  Why is it just when a glimmer of newfound hope peeks up at a man, events can sour so quickly his spirits sink back faster than the downward rush of a tall ship’s anchor?

  A long brown log floated into sight down below, a log with large stubby growths sticking up stem to stern. The wind cleared a hole in the fog hazing the river, and the growths at either end of the log moved at exactly the same instant. Curiosity aroused, I leaned further out for a better look.

  My breath stayed of its own accord.

  That wasn’t a log down there. It was a dugout canoe, and those large stubby growths were not the remains of broken limbs.

  They were redskins!

  There were five in all. A paddler sat fore and aft. Three of the bloody devils occupied the middle of the vessel. All were clothed in leggins and vests made of bear and sundry other pelts with the hair turned in. The middle three bore arms, smoothbore trade muskets. A rainbow of colors, ranging from vermilion to high yellow, decorated their faces and heads under roached topknots, unmistakenably the paint of war.

  The center warrior dwarfed the others. A wide span of shoulders and deep chest stretched tight the skin frock covering his upper body. A necklace of large white claws fronted the brown throat. Beneath a full head of braided hair, his face stood out clearly, painted all in black hue.

  The black face had before been a bad omen for white men. The Ottawa, a fierce clan, painted themselves thus as a token that they killed all and took no prisoners. The absence of the black face on his companions meant they would take prisoners if they chose.

  A guttural command issued from the Ottawa. The paddlers laid to with hearty strokes and the dugout gained speed and glided off under the fog. None of the members of the war party were aware they had been under observation from above. Thank the Lord.

  I laid back and rested my thumping head. While the war party, bound downriver, separated itself from Matthan Hannar with every stroke of their paddle, that was not true of the settlers at Waterford and Fort Frye. An alert had been sounded summoning all able-bodied males to engage in a downriver hunt for Matthan Hannar. Womenfolk and youngsters at Fort Frye would be left under the care of a skeleton militia hopefully strong enough for fending off the approaching Ottawa and his fellow warriors. Outlying cabins inhabited by wives and daughters and youngest sons, if left unguarded, would be in the most danger.

  A deep foreboding welled in my chest. I knew full well where the blame for any harm suffered at the hands of the war party by the relatives of those I’d decoyed downriver would come to rest—squarely on my shoulders. No matter what happened, my situation darkened at every turn. Even events in which I played no part threatened to heap further condemnation on me.

  Let me tell you, the overly fresh memory of those armed and painted redskins, ‘specially that big black-faced Ottawa, put yet one more dose of spunk into tired legs and bones. If those red devils were headed downriver to raid, burn, and loot, they fully intended to escape back the direction they had come. It surely behooved Matthan Hannar to forge on for the cave with the spring—another two or three miles—before engaging any notion of ending the day. I inched back from the cliff, made a crutch of the long rifle, and got on my feet.

  The rendezvous with Abel Stillwagon, set for ten days on the bank of Johnathan Creek above the falls of the Muskingum, required a journey of several miles. In the meantime I needed to hang shy of any unnecessary entanglements and circumstances. I couldn’t help the Fort Frye settlers in any way. They must fend for themselves, just like me.

  Within a mile loomed a familiar landmark. Big Rock, even when obscured by lingering ground fog, boggled the mind. The huge shelf of stone extended far out into the river only to thrust upward and end in a blunt crown of stone fifty feet high. It was as if the heel of a giant hand had shoved a defiant barrier into the Muskingum. Big Rock narrowed the river and shouldered the cu
rrent hard against the east bank, creating a chute through which the water shot in a sea of churning brown foam that tossed off a veil of billowing mist. Red men and white men, far and wide, when detailing their travels on the Muskingum, always noted when they arrived and departed from the site of Big Rock.

  Arrival at the renowned trail marker had great import for my travels. Here the way finally eased for a while. From dawn through the day I had traversed wild terrain scarcely touched by man or beast. Ahead now lay a portion of the old Indian pathway that ran along the Muskingum a number of miles, sticking to the highest range of hills along the waterway. The warrior path lacked great width since the redskins, whether afoot or mounted on horses, always moved single file. But while narrow, the track stood out clearly, worn a foot deep in the soft places by the passage of moccasined feet and unshod hoofs over scads of years. I trudged the pathway trampled by the very redskins I feared, munching chunks of johnnycake on the march.

  As the afternoon wound down, the breeze freshened and quickened and low slate-gray clouds sailed in from the northwest. A deepening chill tweaked the nostrils. A norther wlis brewing just as I’d speculated last night. The unseasonal thaw of yesterday would be blunted by the norther, a true blunderbuss of winter capable of burying everything in inches of snow in a few short hours, rendering movement day or night a trial for even the most seasoned traveler.

  A final landmark set my course. Across the river loomed the blackened skeleton of the Big Bottom blockhouse. The redskins had plundered and burned the structure a year ago, January of 17 and 91, when they swept across the ice and wiped out the settlement, slaughtering ten men, a mother and her two children, taking five male prisoners, and panicking the local populace into a sudden retreat behind the hastily built walls of Fort Frye. The fear that black day might be repeated still upset the nightly sleep of young and old clean down to Marietta.

  Past Big Bottom blockhouse the path along the top of Wallace Ridge had been marked by the axe of a white man. Each tree on one side of the trail had been deeply notched, pointing the way straight for the cave with the spring. I followed the line of blazed trunks with the very last bit of strength left in me, overcome with weariness, dragging one foot at a time ever forward.

  At the sighting of the cave, hesitation and caution skipped off with the wind. I trudged the last few yards to the opening amidst a jumble of large boulders and heaped stone and went in on hand and knee, caring little if any other creature lurked in the darkness.

  Matthan Hannar had made his den.

  Feeble light bled into the cave through a natural smoke hole in the roof and reflected from spring-water collected in a large stone bowl jutting from the rear wall. In a near corner was a faggot of kindling and a pile of stacked wood left by some passer-through. Before any other indulgence I knelt on one knee at the water bowl and drank my fill, waited, and drank again.

  With thirst sated, I set about getting an evening meal. An old trick of Jeremiah’s quickly started a cooking fire. I cocked the long rifle, plugged the touchhole, then placed a wad of tow sprinkled with powder in the bottom of the pan, and pulled the trigger. Sparks flared down into the pan off the face of the frizzen and fired the dry cloth. I dropped the burning coal of tow on the earthen floor and gingerly heaped cave kindling and oak shavings from the haversack on the flames. In no time I had an iron noggin of water for sassafras tea boiling merrily and bacon crackling in a small frying pan.

  The hot tea spread warmth mouth to toe. I chewed the bacon long and hard, sopped up the grease with wedges of johnnycake, and gobbled that down too. After the ordeal of last night and the long march of today a meal fit for a prince had nothing more to offer. I licked each finger twice.

  The cave was a first-rate overnight camp. Clear water trickled in through a crack near the ceiling, trickled down the wall and filled the stone bowl. Overflow from the bowl, in turn, trickled downward and disappeared into a narrow channel where the wall met the floor, leaving the rest of the cave high and dry.

  With a goodly supply of fresh firewood close at hand, I stretched out on the buffalo hide, hair side up, and slept with the lock mechanism of the long rifle, firing pan reprimed, clasped securely between my thighs to keep the powder dry.

  Because of all that was to happen over the next few days, it seemed odd later that before sleep hooded my eyes, the last thought in my head was of the Shaw family, father Zebulon, sons Zed and Zeb, and loony daughter Zelda, breakfasting as a family before that roaring fire way back there this morning at the start of my long trek upriver.

  Thank the Lord, I slept the sleep of the dead that night with no bad dreams, the blessed gift of total exhaustion.

  Chapter 9

  January 9

  Trouble of a different stripe loomed next morning.

  I stepped from the cave having slept well past dawn, pleasantly surprised that the ground was still bare. A draft of bitter cold wind nipped at my face. When I looked up at the sky, a bell of alarm clanged in the back of my head.

  A low curtain of silvery clouds streaked with darkest gray churned overhead, hurled toward the east by a powerful wind on high. On the ground gusts swirled in one direction, then another. The air was rank with moisture, almost wet when touching bare skin. The norther, arriving later than expected, was about to bust loose with all the fury of hell incarnate.

  The coming storm gave me pause. Any hunter caught in the jaws of this approaching blunderbuss without shelter need clearly fear for his life. Now was not the time for rash action.

  My mind swept over the terrain ahead upriver, sorting out recollections of journeys by Uncle Jeremiah and Stepfather. The nearest camp offering protection against the wind, cold, and snow about to break over the land lay miles away, a march of four or five hours in the best of conditions. Close was what it would be, a real race to see if I could reach that safe haven before the norther trapped me out in the open to freeze to death.

  Was I better off sitting out the storm right here in the cave?

  Dare I linger a day and sacrifice the lead I’d gained over pursuit from Fort Frye?

  Where were the painted redskins I’d spotted just yesterday? How would they face the rapidly changing morning?

  The presence of the Ottawa war party in the scheme of things couldn’t be ignored. The savages traveled by dugout canoe and covered considerable distance in short spurts out on the Muskingum. If the redskins finished raiding downriver last night and knew of the cave behind me, they might well abandon the waterway and wait out the storm here in safety, having little cause to fear the settlers would follow them till the storm blew over. The war party was a much greater threat than the brewing norther. I turned back into the cave, somewhat put out about how other people and happenings always determined the fate of Matthan Hannar.

  Within minutes I finished a cold breakfast and was on the trail. Since the redskins might next occupy the cave, I left the woodpile depleted and stuffed the remaining kindling in the stone water bowl. I prayed no white settler sought refuge there before the weather cleared.

  At the northernmost point of Wallace Ridge, the Muskingum swept by in a wide curve below the high ground. Winds steadily gaining in strength whipped the surface of the river into choppy waves. I leaned against the sheltering bole of a large tree and eyed the brown expanse of water in both directions with Jeremiah’s spyglass.

  Nothing. No sign of anyone on water or land. For the moment, anyway, the country was mine alone.

  “You can’t always make tracks when you’d like—by sun or moon. With trouble about, lay ’em when you can, fast as you can, and long as you can . . . and pray your Maker favors you this go-round.”

  Sound teaching from Jeremiah. And I heeded it. I mean I sincerely heeded it. My pace was quick and stride long.

  Though the high ground past Wallace Ridge swung away from the Muskingum awhile, the hill tops with the ever-present Indian pathway presented fewer obstacles and delays than the bottoms. I stuck up high, tight as a wood tick in a hound’s
ear.

  The norther broke within the hour. Flurries of grainy snowflakes began bouncing about on the gusting winds, and by the time ridge line and river ran back together, the dancing flakes had been replaced by hard crystals of snow that stung hands and face.

  Eyesight range dwindled rapidly. Where the face of the ridge hung out over the rushing water below, I halted, and with one hand shielding my eyes, glassed the Muskingum again. Again nothing in sight in either direction on the waterway. Fair enough. Snowstorms can mask the whereabouts of both friend and foe alike. Speedy upriver travel with little risk of detection was in the offing now.

  The sky darkened into a solid gray dome of heavily burdened clouds. Snow came down harder, hissing when it struck the barrel of the long rifle. I stepped up the pace yet another notch. Footing would be doubly treacherous once the ground covered over.

  The wind blew without letup. Each gust had a cold hard edge that knifed through the smallest opening in search of skin and bone. I wound a woolen muffler round my neck, donned a fur cap under flat-brimmed hat, and pulled mittens over hands, all without missing a step.

  Snow began driving out of the northwest. The leaden clouds lowered till they seemed just overhead, and the sky simply disappeared as slanting flakes exploded into upturned eyes like handfuls of gravel. A layer of white that crunched underfoot buried the pathway. My pace slowed and my stride shortened as the slick snow deepened with each mile.

  Short of my destination, much to my dismay, conditions worsened. The raging blizzard, a cornered wild beast growling ever louder, bit and clawed with all its might. Only a thong tied under my chin held my hat in place. Glazed snow rattled off the buttons of my greatcoat. The pathway turned slipperier than sheet ice. My worst dread came true: I was caught in a swirling white cauldron of snow, cold, wind, and ice that promised a stiff and frozen demise unless I got under cover soon, mighty soon.