Across The River

by Jeanie P Johnson

  The reason I couldn’t put the thought of Wolf behind me was because a part of him was inside of me, taking over my emotions in a way I hadn’t expected. I wondered if I would be brave enough to kill the baby, once it was born?

  CHAPTER FIVE

  I slept on my mother’s side of the bed, filling my senses with her essence. I had dreams of my childhood and how happy I had been back then. There was a part of me that wished we had never left Ireland only I was too little to actually remember living there. All my memories were of the events that happened at our homestead. I remember watching my father and some of our friends build our house, the sweat running from their hair in the heat, and how it made trails over their dusty faces. I remember the first day my father allowed us to go inside and look at our new home, my excitement almost impossible to contain as I danced and skipped through the rooms smelling of fresh cut wood and whitewash. I recalled the first night I slept in my room in a simple cot feeling snug and warm, protected from the night by the walls and roof of the house my father built just for us. Now my room was filled with beautiful furniture made by my father’s loving hand. The whole house spoke of his talent and love for his family. Not only that, but it spoke of his need to protect and provide for us in this strange, new world. Only he was gone, while the memories remained fresh, bonding me even closer to him in a way that merely brought sadness.

  I didn’t want to wake in the morning to face my reality, knowing that in a few months I would be having Wolf’s baby and feeling so frightened about it, I could barely breathe. I worried about the winter months that would soon hit, wondering if the winter was going to be harsh or mild? I remembered past winters with deep snow and frigid weather. I knew the duck pond would freeze in the wintertime and Ben used to have to break the ice so the animals could drink. Only Ben was not here, and there were no animals to worry about watering, I sighed. The bleakness seemed to seep into my bones just anticipating the coming months.

  I lie in bed thinking of all the good times I had experienced there, which I doubted would ever return even in a different fashion. My mind was clouded with all the worries of the months ahead when I would be all by myself in the house, trying to survive. I didn’t know if I even wanted to survive?

  Finally, I had to get out of bed. Not only was my body screaming out to use the outhouse, but my stomach was crying for food. The only way I could fix anything to eat was to break down and face the horrors of the kitchen. Horrors I didn’t even want to think about, let alone look at.

  Later, I stood at the kitchen entrance, it seemed for an eternity, before finally gaining the courage to step into the room. My body shivered involuntarily as my eyes squinted at the scene before me. The floor was covered with clutter and dried blood. I winced at the sight and looked away, focusing my eyes on something more pleasant, like the hills in the distance outside the window. Hills I had come from to get to this place which only brought back sad memories. I wanted to just sweep everything into a pile and throw it out in the dump hole, only I knew I needed to save all articles that would be useful to me, which meant I needed to go through the clutter I found on the floor, even if it was distasteful. I tried to close my mind to the scene that kept leaping up through my throat and then sinking to the pit of my stomach, making me feel nauseous. When the feeling overcame me, threatening to erupt in its need of release, I had to run from the kitchen and retch out the back door.

  I felt better, after that. My body calmed. The previous heat from my body now feeling cold and clammy. I shivered and I went back to the kitchen and began sifting through everything, trying not to think about what had transpired in that room. Whatever was stained with blood or dirt, I put in the dishpan sitting on the drain board. I built a small fire in the hearth and filled the big iron pot, that hung from the swing out arm, with water and then pushed it over the flame to heat while I continued working.

  It brought back memories of my mother who had often heated the water or cooked the meal over that hearth. She had looked worn and tired. Caring for a homestead was not easy work for either men or women. They usually died young because of overwork. I wondered if I would end up dying young? I may not even last out the winter, I thought wearily.

  By the time I was finished cleaning up the mess, the water would be hot enough to wash everything in the dishpan. I finally finished cleaning the debris from the floor and went to the barn to bring in one of the wooden water buckets and filled it with water. It had dried from lack of use and some of the water was seeping out of the cracks between the slats, dripping on the floor as I carried it across the room. Once the wood absorbed the water, I knew it would stop leaking. Slowly, I poured part of the water over the floor where all the blood had coagulated and dried. I watched as the water started turning red when the blood became soft once more, slowly spreading out with red fingers to gobble the water up and turn it to blood as well. I could barely watch, remembering how the blood had seeped from my aunt’s body and the others killed there that day. I forced myself to dip the rag mop, made up of old clothes, in the bucket and begin swishing it over the red puddle on the floor, dipping it in the bucket several times until all the water in it turned red. Then I would take it outside and empty it, watching the red stain seep into the brown grass, then starting over again. It seemed to take hours before the floor was actually clean again, and I could see the wide boards of the white pine floor showing through, smiling up at me as though thanking me for saving it from the ghastly stain.

  My next task was to fill the dish pan with hot water and then shave homemade soap into the pan. This was a task I had been doing since I was young, but the very act seemed to sap me. I had to tip the pot of water I swung out from the flame into a picture and transport the water to the dishpan several times until it was full. All the time, being careful not to burn myself with the scalding water. Regardless of my tired state, I wouldn’t stop until the whole kitchen was clean and looked the way it had looked before the Indians ever burst through the door. It was like I was trying to turn back time, and when I was finished, I would look and see Ben, with my father and mother, sitting happily at the kitchen table, smiling and talking together.

  By the time I finished, I was exhausted and feeling queasy again because I hadn’t eaten yet. Now I didn’t feel like eating. I wretched again, but there was nothing in my stomach to come up, which made it even worse. I dragged myself up to my parent’s bed and fell upon it in an oblivious sleep.

  When I groggily woke, it was evening. My head was splitting and my stomach was rebelling because I hadn’t fed it. The house was dark, and I had no way to light the lamps or candles. I hoped there would still be some hot coals in the fireplace, as I cautiously made my way downstairs. I felt in the box where we kept the tapers and brought one out. I blew on the coals and they started to glow red. Then I stuck the taper into the coals where it immediately burst into flame. I lit a candle stick in a candle holder with a handle, which was sitting on the kitchen table. The flame seemed to mesmerize me as I stared at it like it was my only beckon of light in a cruel, dark world. I shook myself out of my daze and went about lighting the candles and lamps in the house from that one candle.

  The tiny flames flickered, making shadows move with their dance while creating a soft glow throughout the house. A welcoming glow of safety and shelter, welcoming me home, I thought as I settled into one of the chairs in the parlor with a smile upon my face. It made me feel better, but then I suddenly realized that I needed the candles and lamp oil to last throughout the winter. I jumped to my feet and hastily went about blowing out all the lights, watching the house fall back into darkness, matching the darkness I was feeling inside until I was down to the original candle I had lit that had been on the table. It was going to be a long, lonely winter, I thought as my spirits started to fall deeper into a gulf of hopelessness.

  During the next few days, I brought up food from the cellar and put it in the cupboards of the kitchen taking note of everything I had and how long I thought it would
last. I dug up some of the root plants from our garden that managed to survive, such as potatoes, onion, and carrots, and stored them in the cellar. The corn had been eaten by the raccoons and deer. Everything else was shriveled and dead. However, I collected all the dry beans that fell from the pods when they dried up. I also collected whatever seeds I could find from other plants so I could plant them in the spring. I discovered preparing for winter kept me busy, and I was thankful for the chore to keep my mind off of everything else. I knew the routine of preparing for winter. It was a little easier because I did not have to put food aside for the animals to use during the winter. However, since I was the only one working, it filled my days and at night, I fell depleted onto my father and mother’s bed. It was comforting there, to feel my mother’s spirit around me, hugging me, saying… “Don’t forget I love you.”

  There was very little salt pork in the cellar since we usually killed a pig in the fall to last us through winter. That meant there would not be any lard to make candles or soap or lamp oil with. I decided to harvest the honey, only the raccoons had knocked over one of the hives and made short work of it. Still, the bees left inside were determined to carry on making honey, only since it was on its side, it would be difficult getting the honey out because the bees changed the way they made the honey comb, attaching it to the side of the basket instead of following the lines we put in the hive for them to attach their combs to.

  We had what was called Greek Basket Hives, where sticks with rows of string hanging from them were placed in rows within the hive. The sticks lay across the brim of the basket. The bees would make their combs on the strings hanging from the sticks, connecting the combs together across the length of the stick, then we could lift a whole row of the honey combs by removing a stick at a time when harvest time came. A lid was put over the top of the hive until it was time to remove the sticks.

  It was tricky business removing the combs since the bees would get upset, so I had to wear a long-sleeve dress, gloves, and a straw hat with netting hanging from the brim, which I secured around my neck with a ribbon. If I stayed calm, the bees merely hovered around me, and I didn’t have to worry about getting stung. Also, I had to make sure I did not remove the honey comb that contained the queen and her eggs or I would lose the whole hive by next spring.

  Honey dripped from the combs and got everywhere on the small table I was using. The bees were eagerly trying to reclaim the honey as I worked, sucking it up and taking it back to the hive. I felt sorry that I was taking some of the food they would need for the winter, which meant they would size down the hive over the winter and start building it up again come spring. I was a sticky, honey mess by the time I was through.

  I had just finished cutting the honey combs and putting them in a honey crock when I noticed dust in the distance. That meant that there was someone coming in the direction of the house. Since the dust rising in the air came from the direction of Philadelphia, I was certain it was not Indians. I knew the Indians would be involved preparing for the winter, the same as I was, which meant they would not send a large group of their braves in this direction. Besides, the French had informed them about the British patrolling the area, so they wouldn’t risk coming here again. On top of that, it seemed like the French were retreating and the war would be over soon. The Indians were actually starting to side with the British instead, I learned later.

  Therefore, the only explanation of that much dust being thrown in the air meant it must be a patrolling troop in the area. I hastily rinsed my hands in the bowl of water I had for that purpose, removed my beekeeping hat and sticky apron, took my tools, and the pot of honey to the house and prepared myself to meet the troop.

  I calmly sat in the rocker on the front porch and watched as the group approached the house. There were about ten men with one man in the front, leading them. They all wore their bright red coats and three-cornered hats. The very color red always alarmed me, reminding me of the blood spilled upon our kitchen floor. I had to swallow hard, to keep my mind from conjuring up past memories. As they stopped their horses, I stood up and walked out into the front yard. The man in front got down from his horse, removed his three-cornered hat, revealing his powdered blond hair that was stiffly curled in ringlets on the side and pulled back in tail in the back, and gave me a small bow.

  “We thought this place was abandoned,” the man said. “I am Captain Millwood. Where did you come from?”

  “I live here,” I told him. “This is my family’s house. My father Tobias O’Malley built it. I’m Candice O’Malley.”

  “We were informed that the members of this house were all killed, or taken captive by the Delaware Indians.”

  “They were. I was captured, but I managed to escape,” I informed him.

  “Mercy! Are you all right?”

  “Of course. Don’t I look all right?” I half-laughed.

  His eyes scanned over me.

  “You look malnourished,” he said seriously, his face taking on an unreadable expression. “You are staying here all alone? You know that is not safe.”

  “I am fine,” I insisted, wishing he would just take his men and ride out from my property. “The Indians are preparing for winter. They will not come out this far again, seeing as how the French are losing the war. What other danger would there be other than wild animals? And I am aware of those dangers. I have my father’s long gun Musket.”

  I didn’t tell him I did not know the first thing about using it, and I wasn’t even sure if the Indians had taken it when they raided our house, but I didn’t want him to worry on my account.

  “How are you going to survive the winter?” he asked with concern in his eyes.

  “I have plenty of provisions to tide me over,” I told him.

  “You know you no longer have any neighboring friends to help you if anything happens.”

  “Yes, I am aware of that. They were all at our home when the Indians raided our homestead. I watched on as the heathens killed most of them and captured the rest. I was there when they killed my parents, older brother and the other adult captives when the British would not relent in hunting them down. They blamed the deaths of those captives on you.”

  I gave him a glaring look before I continued.

  “Only the children were spared.”

  “And you were the only one to escape?”

  Captain Millwood looked astonished as I spoke.

  “They divided all the children up and took us all to different villages of the Lenape tribe. My cousin, Jamie, and I went to one village. The others went somewhere else. I was trusted to gather berries for the family who took me. It was then I managed to escape. I have been here for two or three weeks and have been able to manage just fine.”

  “Are you sure you will be all right? After the snow falls there will be no one coming out to this area until it melts again.”

  “I have plenty of wood and food to last the winter. I don’t need anyone checking up on me,” I boasted, giving him a determined look, which I hoped said clearly to him that I didn’t need his help.

  “You look like a capable young woman,” he mumbled, actually stopping to look at me a little closer. “Do you have a horse or some way to leave if you had to?”

  “No, which means I will be remaining here no matter what!”

  “I’ll come to check on you from time to time before the snow falls,” he informed me.

  “You don’t have to do that,” I insisted.

  I was starting to feel exasperated at him.

  “I will worry, otherwise,” he told me. “Besides, we are responsible for protecting the citizens here.”

  “I am very capable, as you mentioned.”

  “Yes, I am sure you are, but nonetheless, I will feel better if I can witness for myself that you are safe. Once the snow falls you will be entirely on your own. I will come back as soon after winter as I can to make sure you made it through.”

  “That is very kind of you,” I conceded, deciding to worry abo
ut it when the time came.

  I hoped by the time he came after winter, the baby would have been born and disposed of. Before that time, I would wear loose clothing so he wouldn’t notice my condition, I decided.

  “I would invite you in for tea, only I fear I was not prepared to have any visitors,” I told him, hoping he would take the hint that I was through talking to him.

  “I understand,” he said, nodding at me.

  He appraised me for a long moment with his deep blue eyes, then replaced his hat over his powdered blond locks and took on a more serious expression. Without another word, he mounted his horse, instructed his troop to turn from the yard and proceeded to gallop away, as I watched them retreat.

  I realized I had begun to shake. I didn’t want Captain Millwood coming around checking up on me, but it looked like I had little power to prevent it. Finally, I shrugged and turned to go in and prepare something for lunch. I was very proud of myself for the way I had been able to do all those chores I knew were necessary to provide for the winter. The house was immaculately clean. The kitchen showed no sign of a massacre taking place. It was only in my mind now, which I tried to ignore. I would never look in that corner where they dragged my aunt. Her baby would have been born by now, had they not killed her. Occasionally, I thought of Jamie and wondered what he was doing or if he even thought of me any longer? At night my dreams would be haunted by Wolf, but during the day I would try to put him out of my mind. However, there was always that child, growing inside of me to remind me constantly of him.