The Hill of the Ravens

by H. A. Covington

  Cindy El was prim and attractive, and she promised to grow into a handsome and matronly woman, but Eva had the makings of a true beauty. The girl was blond and willowy, her hair a shining and living sheaf of gold, and her walk was that of a princess who would grow to become a queen. When Eva entered a room every male eyeball from eight to eighty clicked, and it worried Don. For Cindy there had only been one, Mark Conway, one of nature’s gentlemen, and neither of them had ever given her parents a moment of worry. With Eva, chasing every teenaged boy in Olympia away from the house had already become almost a full-time job for him and Sarah both. The kids were even willing to brave Baskerville for a moment or two in Evie’s company. Middle son Matt, aged nineteen, was stationed in Twin Falls doing his army service and trying to live down the reputation of his famous namesake. He was going to major in political science and criminal justice when he got out of the army and he had already told his father he wanted to follow him into BOSS after the required minimum three years in the Civil Guard as a police officer. Somehow it just seemed right that there should always be a cop named Matt Redmond in the service of his people. Third son John was now aged eight and worshiped his spaceman brother Allan. John’s room was full of photos, prints and crayon drawings of Allan, the Martian landscape and the spaceship Vanguard that took Allan to Mars. “Cindy El’s getting married!” John breathlessly informed to his father as he mounted the stairs to his bedroom.

  “Well, one would hope,” agreed Don genially. “I’d like to get her off my hands sometime this century.”

  “She’s getting married to Mark Conway!” yelped John excitedly.

  “Yeah, well, I’d admire if you let Cindy and your mother tell me all about it, young ‘un,” said Don. Every now and then a little bit of the South still slipped into Don’s speech, relics from his uncle and later association with John Morgan. Don hung up his coat and his gun in the bedroom closet and took off his tie, then put on the smoking jacket the girls had given him on his last birthday. On his way back downstairs Don poked his head into the sitting room of his aunt, the Contessa Stoppaglia. “Hey, Aunt Tori. How was your day?”

  “Fine,” said the old lady. She was a tall and elegant woman in her seventies, always flawlessly dressed. Tonight she sat by the log fire in her hearth wearing a tweed suit. On her lapel was a green, white and blue ribbon of the War of Independence identical to Don’s. “The kids did watercolors and made all kinds of lovely technicolor messes on their papers and on themselves, and we all enjoyed ourselves immensely.” Spry despite her age, Tori was a volunteer kindergarten teacher in Tumwater, where she managed a class of twenty little hellions with just the right combination of love, skill, and firmness. Her class called her Granny, but worshipped her as a god.

  “You coming to the reunion tonight?” asked Don.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” said Tori. “These shindigs are pretty depressing, really. They’re all much the same, just like any gathering of old folks. A bunch of aging men and a few old biddies like me getting quietly or not so quietly spiffled and learning who’s passed on, who’s having prostate surgery and showing off the latest pictures of the grandchildren. Along with belting out a few of those magnificent bloody songs we stole from the Irish. Then the memories start to crowd in, first the good ones, and then a lot of them not so good, and by the end of the evening we’re all maudlin drunk remembering the ones who ought to be there but who never made it. I don’t know if I’m up to it tonight, Don. In any event, I was always a rather reluctant revolutionary.”

  Don looked over to a large framed portrait on Tori’s mantelpiece, over the crackling wood fire. It showed a young woman with long honey-colored hair standing beside a darkly handsome man like a young Frank Sinatra with a long scar on his cheek. In the background was a wide lawn fronting a tall white marble villa in Tuscany. The youthful Tori Redmond held a wedding bouquet, and her face burned like a proud and radiant brand over the distance of more half a century. “Still miss him?” asked Don.

  “Every day,” she replied softly. “I think his love made me a Sicilian myself, you know. I still speak the dialect like a native, or so Bill assures me. He ought to know. He grew up in Castellamare del Golfo. When the monsters took Tony from me, I decided I would devote the rest of my life to making them pay. I always wondered if they understood that? The terrible rage of the widow whose beloved man has been taken away forever? The power of the vendetta? Their own stupidity in unleashing it on themselves?”

  “Tori, more than any of us, you earned that ribbon,” said Don quietly. “I really think you should come with us tonight.”

  “I miss Mom and Matt as well, but you and Bill and those great kids of yours make up for it,” continued Tori, as if she had not heard him. “I remember the old world I grew up in, Don, and I will always thank you and those people at that get-together tonight for making this new one for me and the children. But somehow, tonight I don’t feel like going back there, not even for an evening. We sing about it like we were all Irish, but the fact is that it was a very bad time, a time of horror and wretchedness and evil. At my age I think I’ve earned the right to be a bit selective about which parts of the past my mind wanders back to. Can you make my excuses for me? Tell them my lumbago’s acting up or something.”

  “Sure, Tori,” said Don with a laugh. He strolled back downstairs into the kitchen and poured himself a bourbon and soda from a bottle of Old Log Cabin, product of the state distillery in Hayden Lake. Cindy El had gone upstairs to change out of her coveralls. “Your Dad called me over to Longview House today,” he told her. “Another special job.”

  “What did he want?” asked Sarah.

  “Wanted to talk about the Andrews case first, like I figured he might. Then he surprised me. He told me a ghost story,” replied Matt.

  “Eh? He usually saves those for the annual Halloween bonfire,” said Sarah.

  “This time it’s a real one. A ghost from revolutionary times is about to rise from the dead, although she may return there very quickly.”

  “What are you talking about?” asked Sarah. Most men in BOSS made it a point never to bring their work home with them. But since the first day they had met, there had never been a single secret between Don and Sarah except for one, by a kind of unspoken consent, which was her mother’s death during the revolution. Even that wasn’t really a secret. It was simply something that they never spoke of. In any case Sarah was an Alpha One citizen and a Party member with a full security clearance. Don sat down at the kitchen table and ran down his morning’s conversation with the president.

  “Oh, that poor woman!” exclaimed Sarah when he had finished, shaking her head in horror. “Just think of it, Don! Even if she is a traitor, imagine what it must have been like to carry that guilt all these years, never able to live among your own people but forced to exist in that human cesspool down there. And if she’s innocent…”

  “If she’s innocent then someone has been thumbing their nose at justice for almost a lifetime,” replied Don grimly. “Some of those survivors are in key positions in the Republic now. If that’s the case, then I wonder what the hell they’ve been up to since then?”

  “Don,” said Sarah in a worried voice. “What about Bill Vitale?”

  “I know, Snoops. Bill was one of the eight people who survived from the Olympic Flying Column. And before you ask, I don’t believe for one instant that Bill Vitale ever committed anything even remotely resembling a dishonorable act.”

  “Nor do I,” said Sarah.

  “But do you see now why we have to find out, one way or the other? If Trudy Greiner really is innocent of treason, or if she is guilty and for whatever reason she’s decided to go out with one last attempt to throw sand in our faces, if she can create any kind of doubt at all, then Bill and the others will live the rest of their lives under a shadow.”

  “Are you going to say anything about this to Aunt Tori?”

  demanded Sarah.

  “Holy Moses, no! If she thought I was investig
ating Big Bill she’d stick a stiletto in my ear!” laughed Don.

  “How are you going to go at it?” asked Sarah.

  “I’ve already started. I spent this afternoon digging around in the records at work, the ones we captured from the Feds when they pulled out. They’re not complete, though. A lot of the relevant material was destroyed before ZOG skedaddled, especially stuff relating to their informants. It took us years to dig some of them out of their holes. I’ll start with the FATPO defector, McBride, and then I’ll have to talk to the eight survivors of the Olympic Flying Column, of course. But I’m blessed if I can see what I could possibly turn up after all these years. Actual information is so sparse that even if they’re all straight with me, it’s likely that all they will be able to come up with will be ancient memories and half-memories. Criminy, Snoops, we’re talking about a trail that went cold when I was ten years old! We may have to wait for Trudy Greiner to rock up and finally tell us her side of the story, and then we hope to God she doesn’t have some piece of evidence or proof that shatters one of the greatest legends of the War of Independence. Even though we’ve raised a whole new generation and we’re working on our second, the Republic is still under siege. We’re the only nation on earth whose very right to exist is not accepted by most of the world. We don’t need and can’t stand a scandal like this! Who knows where it would lead?” He sighed. “Never mind, enough about work for the evening. Now what’s this about Cindy getting married to Mark Conway? I mean, it’s not unexpected. It’s always been on the cards since they were in elementary school, but have we finally gotten a formal proposal?” She smiled.

  “Yep. We received a registered letter from Pastor Marlon Carlisle today,” said Sarah, handing him the envelope.

  “I’m flattered the Conways elected to use the most prominent Christian Identity minister in the country as the matchmaker.” Don read the letter out loud. “On behalf of the Conway family and their son Mark Isaiah blah blah…a true and honorable affection having grown between Mark and your daughter Cynthia Ellen blah blah blah…sure looks like a proposal to me,” asked Don, glancing over the text. “And they’re not asking for a dowry. Always a sign of a love match. Okay, Snoops, now that it’s finally coming down to brass tacks, how do you feel about the prospect of Mark as a member of the family?”

  “I think he’s a fine young man and a very good catch for our daughter. I always have.”

  “I agree, one hundred per cent. Does Cindy El think he’s a good catch?”

  “Oh, yes. You said it yourself, she’s been chasing Mark for years.”

  “But…?” prodded Don, sensing a small hesitation.

  Sarah frowned slightly and chose her words carefully. “Cindy El wants the marriage, but the religion aspect worries me a little bit. Cindy has never been all that spiritual in the old ways, not like Eva who does all her alignments every day. Cindy’s the stolid and down-to-earth one among our kids, she always was, and she lives very much in this world. We’ve talked about it and she assures me she won’t have any problem attending church with Mark or allowing their children to be raised as Christians.”

  “Yeah, well, at least the Conways are CI and not holy-rolling Pentecostals who want to burn you at the stake for that voodoo that you do so well. I know that ZOG persecutes them, but I swear that sometimes I think that’s one group of immigrants the Republic could do without. It’s really ironic. In the United States the Pentecostals are accused of being racists and fascists because they preach against interracial marriage and homosexuality to their congregations, but when they come here they cause nothing but trouble. They get in everybody’s face by demanding Bravo citizenship without having served in the military. At least once a year I have to bust some group of tub-thumpers for sneaking into race and politics disguised as religion, especially since they can’t seem to shake this stupid obscene idea about Jews being God’s Chosen People. They’re as hare-brained as Todd Andrews and his so-called Heroic Vitalist Center.”

  “How odd of God to choose the Jews,” quipped Sarah.

  “Not news, not odd, the Jews chose God,” replied Don with a smile.

  “We’ve news for the Jews: they’re going to lose!” giggled Sarah, completing the third line. “To think that one used to carry ten years in Federal prison!”

  “Yeah, I know. Sometimes I think we overthrew the United States government simply for the right to tell jokes. But the Conways aren’t bigots like the Pentecostals. Your father came to accept your own adoption of the Craft,” pointed out Don. “Nor do I mind having Christians in the family as long as they’re sane and decent people. Why shouldn’t it work in reverse?”

  “Dad is an old fashioned hoot-’n-holler Baptist, not Christian Identity,” said Sarah. “Insofar as he has any religion at all, which isn’t very far. The Aryan race is his real religion, always has been. He thinks my Craft is just a silly little girl phase I never grew out of. It doesn’t offend him because he doesn’t take it seriously. Yes, I know, the Conways are good folks and they think the world of Cindy, but I’m concerned about how the rest of the CI community here will treat her when they learn she was brought up in the Old Ways. It seems to be getting worse every year, this pointless, stupid bickering over religion. Why can’t we just lay it aside? Like we don’t have problems enough with those American maniacs constantly scheming to re-conquer us and enslave us again?”

  “It seems to be the peculiar curse of our race,” sighed Don.

  “I know it was during the early days of the Movement,” recalled Sarah. “Commander Rockwell and the Old Man tore their hair out trying to get what few people we had to see sense on the issue and not fight over it.”

  “It was bad,” agreed Don. “It’s hard to believe that even at the height of ZOG’s power, there were racially aware white people who hated other white people so badly that they would rather ZOG continued to rule than the people they hated have any part in the solution. That period of history was never entirely sane, and in some respects we were just as nutty. Even before ZOG, religion was our curse. We spent many centuries merrily butchering one another by the millions over the Great Jumping Jesus, yea or nay or how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. No matter how imminent the existential threat from the üntermenschen, there is always a white man somewhere that we hate worse. It’s like we need a white opponent to fight against, as if it fills some deep psychological need. It’s almost as if a non-white enemy just doesn’t fill the bill in some weird corner of our soul. I always thought that Commander Rockwell had the best way of dealing with it, which is just not deal with it. The Constitution of the Republic gives every man and woman the right to freedom of religion, freedom to practice their faith and to raise their children in that faith, with the critical proviso that they do not attempt to disguise political activity or ideology wrapped in a religious cloak. That’s a lesson we learned the hard way back in the twentieth century, when the established Christian churches then were almost totally corrupted with Zionism and sexual perversion. In the States they still are. We rightly guard ourselves against that particular Trojan horse, but beyond that we should all worship God or the gods in our own way and just shut the hell up about it. Sorry, I know I’m rambling, but the whole situation just plain ticks me off.”

  “Listening to one’s husband ramble comes with a wife’s job description,” she said with a quick kiss.

  “Look, Tim and Stephanie Conway are both B-category citizens. They’ve got a prosperous contracting business building immigrant housing for new settlers, good quality homes and apartments. We’ve known them for years, and I’ve never seen a sign of bigotry against any other white person or group out of them. They know you’re Wicca and I’m NS and if it’s ever bothered them, I’ve never detected it. And I’m a detective, remember? Mark’s a fine and steady boy. He’s coming out of the army in January and going to work for his dad part time, and the rest of that time he’s going to work on a civil engineering degree from Oregon State. That would mean that he and Cin
dy would have to move down to Portland, but hey, it happens. They grow up, Snoops. It’s the right point in both their lives for him and Cindy both to start a family, and I’ve got no problem with it if Cindy doesn’t.” Don grinned at his wife. “You just don’t want to give Cindy the Little Talk,” he said with a chuckle.

  “I already did, last year,” Sarah reminded him. “Just in case she and Mark…well, never mind, we both know that wouldn’t have happened, Mark is almost like a medieval knight with his lady when he’s with Cindy, but still I figured it was better to be safe than sorry. Thank the gods that we now live in a society where it was mine to do. I remember my sex education classes starting in second grade, before the revolution. Some of them were so filthy I still can’t believe anyone could teach such things to children.”

  “I was home-schooled by my aunt and uncle for that very reason. This is now. What did you think of it then?” asked Don curiously.

  “I was seven years old, and you have to remember most of what we were taught wasn’t normal sex. I thought it was all very silly and gross, and it convinced me that grownups were mostly insane. Why on earth would they want to do nasty stuff like that, otherwise? One day I went home and told Dad about what we were doing in class. The day after that Dad came to school and beat the faggot sex education teacher to a bloody pulp. That was his first arrest for hatecrime. He broke out of King County jail and from then on it was…well, you know what it was like. But I never went back to that school.”