by John Jakes
He shrugged. “I stopped to get warm, that’s all.”
The glow of dawn set small fires in the pupils of the man’s sunken eyes. Jared had grown through the winter. He was approaching six feet; but the stranger was taller. The man’s slumping shoulders tended to minimize his height but not his aura of, strength.
“Hardly expected to find two youngsters camped in these woods,” the man said. “You realize we’re all trespassing—”
Jared said, “I didn’t see any signs posted.”
The man swept his hand in a wide arc. “Belongs to the judge all the same. Oh, but I doubt he or any of his niggers will be out this far this early. We can eat breakfast in peace and go our respective ways.”
Just then Jared noticed two other odd things about the stranger. Bruises showed not only on his hands but on his throat. And part of his right earlobe was missing; a half-moon of tissue had somehow been torn away.
The man swept off his disreputable beaver. “My name is Blackthorn, Reverend William Blackthorn. Who do I have the pleasure—?”
“Never mind. Amanda, let’s get our things together.”
“You mean you’re not going to eat?” Blackthorn’s heavy brows hooked together. He gestured to the bags hanging on his saddled horse. “I’d be happy to split some of my biscuits and wild honey—”
“No, thanks. We’re going on to Nashville.”
Jared got busy folding up the blanket while Amanda peered at the stranger, her dark eyes sleepily curious. The man acted polite enough. But for no reason he could pin down, Jared didn’t like him.
The Reverend Blackthorn sniffed. “Traveling on an empty belly certainly isn’t good stewardship of the health the Almighty granted you, boy. Strikes me that you and your ladyfriend—”
“My sister,” Jared snapped, angered by the lingering emphasis the Reverend put on the last word.
“Is that a fact?” Blackthorn ran a palm down the side of his patched trousers. “You’re fair and she’s dark—and you’re shoots off the same tree? Wondrous are the ways of God. Eh, boy?”
The sunken eyes—greenish, Jared noticed—seemed to stray past him again. He stepped to Amanda’s side. He wondered whether the Reverend actually deserved his title. The bruises, that bitten place on his earlobe—those hardly seemed appropriate for a man of the gospel.
Blackthorn scratched his groin. “How old are you, girl? Fourteen?”
“You’re way off,” Jared said, stuffing the blanket into the canvas bag. He had trouble speaking; the fever thickened his tongue and made his teeth click.
“Am I, now? Remarkable! I’d have sworn she was a young woman—”
Blackthorn’s eyes flicked back to Jared. “It’s strange indeed to find two persons your age abroad in the Tennessee wilderness. Run away from home, did you? Or maybe you’re indentured people? Give the slip to your masters?”
“None of your affair, Reverend.”
“Here, now!” Blackthorn’s voice roughened as he approached. “That’s no way to speak to a pilgrim who only seeks to share your fire—”
“We’re leaving. The fire’s yours.”
“You don’t look well, boy. Don’t sound it, either. Your teeth are knocking so loudly, I’m surprised it doesn’t wake the judge in his bed. Are you sick too, girl?”
Blackthorn reached around Jared, brushed his fingers across Amanda’s forehead. She retreated quickly. “Don’t you touch me!”
Jared’s hand dropped to the hilt of the Spanish knife. He made sure the man saw the move.
“Come!” Blackthorn exclaimed. “I meant no disrespect to your—ah—sister. I only intended to see to her health—in the manner of the man of Samaria.”
His eyes fastened on Jared’s, hostile despite the yellow smile. “I’d hardly say your behavior’s Christian, boy—”
“And you don’t act much like a preacher.”
Blackthorn rubbed his chin with one bruised hand. “I am. At the same time, I claim to be the best free-for-all fighter in half a dozen counties. I’ve had some setbacks in Nashville. Circumstances make it necessary for me to move on after a stop at my cabin for a few belongings. Traveling takes money if a man wants to sleep under a roof and partake of decent food. No doubt you have a little money—”
Dropping his pretense of cordiality, he extended his hand.
“Give me that canvas bag.”
Dizzy with fear and fever, Jared jerked out the knife.
He was totally unprepared for the astounding speed with which Blackthorn moved.
The man grabbed Jared’s arm with both hands, twisted. Jared’s fingers opened. The knife fell into the coals. Bobbing down, Blackthorn closed his big yellow teeth on the back of Jared’s hand.
Jared yelped. Blackthorn let go, stepped back, wiping his lips.
“All’s fair in free-for-all, boy. Now may I examine that bag?”
Jared launched himself with fists up. Blackthorn sidestepped, brought his knee up savagely. Pain erupted in Jared’s groin.
He tumbled into the ashes and embers, yelped again, rolled away. Amanda’s cry of terror sounded above the chatter of birds and the burble of the river.
On his back, Jared started to get up. Blackthorn dropped on Jared’s belly with both knees. The tall man’s face twisted with glee as he jabbed his thumbs into the outer corners of Jared’s eyes.
“I can pop ’em neat as grapes,” he breathed. “There’s several in Nashville who can testify to that—”
The thumbs dug deeper. Jared kicked, to no avail. Tried to tear at the massive wrists against his jaw. Futile—
The edge of a thumbnail scraped Jared’s left eyeball. Wildly, he hammered at the tall man’s forearms. He couldn’t dislodge the huge hands.
“Shame to blind someone so young,” Blackthorn panted. “Shame to rob you of the sights of God’s bountiful creation. But you’re not Christian—”
He wrenched his left knee over, drove it into Jared’s crotch a second time. Jared screamed.
Amanda leaped on Blackthorn, trying to claw his face.
“Goddamn you for a spiteful child!” Blackthorn roared, battering her with one fist. Amanda sprawled, the wind knocked out of her.
Jared jerked his head to escape the darting thumbs. Blackthorn pounded his nose twice. Already dazed, the boy watched the tall man and the rustling trees blur and distort—
Gasping, Blackthorn lurched to his feet. One huge boot lifted; Jared saw the hobnails on the bottom. Blackthorn stomped his stomach, leaving him retching and half conscious.
“Now I’ll have that peek in your bag.”
Amanda crawled toward her cousin, repeating his name. Jared locked his hands over his middle, thrashing from side to side. He had to get up—
He heard Blackthorn open the canvas bag, dump its meager contents: the pistol, the fob, the blanket, items of dirty clothing—
“Nothing!”
He flung the bag on the ground.
“You’ve not been Christian, either of you. I think I’ll repay that in kind before I ride on—”
He pointed down at Jared. The bruised hand seemed huge, the fingertip even bigger. “I’m glad I didn’t take your sight. I want you to watch what happens next. William Blackthorn’s fought boys and made ’em grow up right while they bled. Done the same thing for girls in a different way—”
The gray-haired man tossed his hat on the ground and unfastened the buckle of his belt.
Frantic, Jared drove his right hand toward the knife lying in the ashes. Blackthorn paused in unbuttoning his trousers, raised one leg and brought his boot down on Jared’s fingers.
Again Jared cried out. His limp hand flopped into the coals. He smelled burning hair, pulled his hand back as pain seared it—
“Amanda—run!”
She tried. But the stranger was faster. He caught her around the waist, laughing. Her shrieks stilled the birds in the nearby thickets. Blackthorn’s horse stamped and blew noisily.
Still laughing, the Reverend tumbled to the
ground, the girl trapped in his arms. Jared dragged himself to hands and knees. He tried to move fast but he couldn’t. Blackthorn flung Amanda on her back, fastened hands at the throat of her dress and ripped.
Jared kept crawling toward the big man as he straddled Amanda’s thighs. Blackthorn plucked aside her gray chemise, fondled the small nubbed mounds of her breasts. He bent down, nuzzling her cheek.
“Thy lips, o my spouse—drop as the honeycomb—honey and milk—are under thy tongue—”
Jared realized the crazed preacher was quoting scripture. He careened to his feet, took one faltering step and fell.
Wailing, Amanda pounded fists against Blackthorn’s ribs. But he overpowered her by sheer size and weight, ripping and tearing until her body was bared below the waist.
“—the smell of thy garments is like—”
Jared saw a bruised hand draw out a huge, stiffened penis; press it down on the tiny mound where a few dark hairs had sprouted to signal the start of womanhood.
“—is like the smell of Lebanon—”
Blackthorn wedged a knee between Amanda’s thighs, forced them open.
“A garden—enclosed—is my sister,” he grunted. “My—spouse—a spring shut up—a fountain—sealed—”
Blackthorn jerked his hips forward. Amanda cried out and arched her back.
Jared started crawling again, around the fire toward the interlocked bodies. Amanda struggled feebly now that Blackthorn had penetrated her. The girl’s eyes were closed. Her palms pressed against the ground. The tall man’s trousers and drawers hung around his calves. His coat tails flapped over his humping buttocks.
Jared heard the shrill, hurt screams of his cousin, tried to shout, “You—filthy bastard—I’ll kill—”
Pain weakened his braced arms. The ground lifted toward his eyes with a strange, terrifying slowness—then slammed his face.
Time went by. How much, he didn’t know. Once more he fought upward, catching a glimpse of Amanda. Her dark hair was fouled with dirt. She bit her lips and flailed her head back and forth and beat the ground, the cordage bracelet bouncing, bouncing—
Blackthorn convulsed. Groaned. Withdrew his dripping, bloodied organ and panted for air.
He pinched Amanda’s chin between his fingers. His green eyes glowed in the sunrise. His yellow teeth bared in a grin. “Now,” he breathed, “now you’re worth something. Many a man won’t pay to pleasure himself with a virgin your age. But once a girl’s torn, that’s another story. You’ll finance my travels nicely—”
The words whined and echoed in Jared’s mind as he pitched onto his side, blacking out. When he awoke sometime later, the gray horse, its owner and his cousin were gone.
iv
Bedraggled and heartsick, Jared ranged the clearing, trying to discover some sign of the trail Blackthorn had taken. On the clearing’s east side he found a few low branches broken off. He knelt over them, gulping air and fighting off tears of rage.
He still could hardly believe the inhuman act he’d witnessed. But there was no denying Amanda had been abducted. By a lecher—a maniac—who called himself a man of God—
Guilt overwhelmed him for a moment. When Amanda had needed him most, he’d failed her. Just as he always failed. He couldn’t excuse the failure on the grounds that he was ill—or that Blackthorn was too strong for him. He was supposed to take care of her—and he’d let her be kidnapped.
Well, now he had another responsibility. To find her—
The boy stumbled on through the brush for several hundred yards. He lost the trail. There were too many broken branches, too much brush disarranged by animals.
He shouted Amanda’s name, heard it boom through the stillness of the woods. On the way back to the clearing, he had to sit down once. The physical punishment he’d taken at the hands of the self-styled preacher had left him almost without strength. He sat very still, cursing himself silently—oath after damning oath.
In the clearing, he collected the few belongings spilled from the canvas bag. The stranger had found nothing worthy of theft except Amanda. He’d left Jared his knife, his pistol, his clothing—
Stuffing them into the bag, he almost missed the fob partially buried in the ashes of the dead fire. He flung the fob on top of the other things and jumped up—too fast. He swayed, sickeningly dizzy.
When the spell passed, he dragged the bag to the trees along the river. There he sat down again, trying to order his thoughts.
What Blackthorn wanted with Amanda, he couldn’t imagine. Surely the man wasn’t so vile and deranged that he’d do what he said—use her; sell her as a whore to pay for what he called his travels—
Travels, Jared said to himself. Start there—travels.
The man had left Nashville. There was a strong intimation of trouble connected with the departure. Blackthorn also had a cabin in the vicinity—
Where?
He needed to find someone who could tell him that—without delay.
Another of Blackthorn’s remarks surfaced in his mind. A reference to someone named the judge, living nearby—
He glanced back toward the clearing, trying to guess where the judge’s house might be. Toward the south or in the other direction?
He decided to go the latter way, to the winding Cumberland River. If he found no house, he’d work southward again.
Groaning, he stood up. He stumbled to the edge of Stone’s River and checked the position of the sun. He set off as fast as his bruised, aching body permitted, trying to shut from his mind the images of Amanda’s rape. She wouldn’t be eleven until the summer—and Blackthorn had savaged her—
Better that he’d slain her outright!
No, don’t think of that.
Find the house of the judge.
Someone—anyone—to tell you where Blackthorn might have gone.
v
The trees grew thickly here, screening the source of the sound Jared was too dull-witted to identify. He was weak, damnably weak. The fever and Blackthorn’s pounding made him stagger like a drunken man. Branches stung his face as he stumbled toward brighter light that indicated an end to the dim woods—
He emerged on open grass. He took a few more steps, blinded by the sunlight. He scuffed a boot in dirt. He was standing on some sort of smooth track—
Only then did he recognize the thundering sound on his left. A horse—
In a whirl of dust, a big bay stallion with a black-skinned rider pounded along the track. Jared had walked directly into the rider’s path. The frightened black saw him, frantically reined in—
“Whoa, Truxton! Hol’ up—!”
Jared hurled himself toward the far side of the track. Halfway there, he stumbled and went down.
Sharp front hoofs dark against the sky, the bay stood on hind legs, neighing wildly—
The last thing Jared saw were those hoofs slashing down toward his head.
Chapter VI
Judge Jackson
i
A SWEET SMELL DRIFTED through the dark of Jared’s waking mind. He didn’t know the origin of the pleasant odor then, and it wasn’t until later that he learned it came from the blossoms on scores of apple trees surrounding the two blockhouses.
A passage connected the main blockhouse and a similar one for guests. It was in this last that he opened his eyes, resting on unbelievably clean linen.
He discovered his battered ribs and hand were bandaged. He blinked, saw a slender, sinewy black woman drift into his line of sight and bend over him. Her cheeks glowed. So did the whole room. May sunlight fell through one large window whose shutters had been opened all the way.
From Jared’s right, beyond his range of vision, fragrant blue smoke drifted. The black woman felt his forehead.
“Well, his eyes are open, Miz Rachel. Fever’s gone, too.”
Jared twisted his head to see the source of the smoke: a plainly dressed woman running to stoutness. At one time she might have been quite pretty, but sagging flesh, and strain suggested by her
melancholy eyes, had left little more than a hint of beauty. She pulled a corncob pipe from between her teeth and laid it on a small table.
“I’m not so sure the young man will be thankful to be awake when the judge comes home,” the woman said. To Jared: “Truxton is the prize horse in my husband’s stable. You nearly lamed him by dashing out of the trees onto the racecourse.”
Jared tried to sit up. The effort hurt. He tugged the wool nightshirt from under one arm. It itched ferociously.
“I didn’t mean to startle the horse,” he said. “I’m sorry it happened. Is the animal all right?”
“Yes.”
“I was pretty worked up. Not thinking clearly—”
“Sick, too,” said the black woman.
Jared nodded. “I was trying to find help because my cousin was kidnapped—”
The white woman and the Negress exchanged quick glances.
“Where’bouts?” asked the latter.
“We were stopped at a clearing on your property. Near the river, south of your racetrack. How did I get here?”
“Grooms brung you in. You were mutterin’ something fierce,” the black woman said.
“Early yesterday,” said the white woman.
“Yesterday—!” Jared started to struggle upright again. The white woman pressed him back. She had strong hands.
“Last evening, the judge fetched the doctor from Nashville to look you over. The doctor said you weren’t to get out of bed for three days.”
“I can’t lie here!” he exclaimed. “I’ve got to find my cousin!”
“What’s your name, boy?” the Negress asked.
“Jared Kent. My cousin Amanda—”
“A girl?” the white woman interrupted.
He nodded. “She’s not yet eleven. She and I met a man in a clearing—”
The black woman raised a hand. “Hold on, you’re sashayin’ way too fast. You and this cousin—you’re not from these parts?”
The white woman picked up her pipe! She tapped cold dottle into her palm, walked to the window and let the dottle blow away in the pouring golden sunlight.
