Seth and the Barbarian
- 4 years ago
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1873
"Caroline," said Mrs. Williams, coming quietly back into her kitchen, "my dear, you have a visitor." Two worry lines had appeared above her sharp nose and her voice had an unusual stiffness.
The young woman dried her hands on her apron and went into the front room of the Williams' farm house. There stood a well-dressed man of middle years with bushy sideburns and polished boots. To Caroline he looked vaguely familiar. He smiled at her. A round diamond glittered in the middle of his silken tie. He smelled of the barber shop.
"Mrs. Williams," he said with a small nod of his head, his fawn-colored hat in his hands, "I am MacNeal Holmes. As you may know, I have purchased your father's old place, bought it at the auction, lovely home, fine piece of land, well cared for. My property adjoins. We were neighbors."
"Yes," said Caroline, incredulous, "I was told." She felt acid rising in her throat as the man stood before her, obviously hoping to be invited in.
"Well, miss, excuse me, ma'am," Holmes said as calmly as he could, excited by the young woman's beauty as well as his goal, "as you may also know, I am a widower. My good wife died several years ago, and I hoped..."
Caroline held up her hand and shook her head, feeling disgust.
"I was going to suggest, " Mac Holmes hurried on, ignoring the shocked look on Caroline's face.
"No," Caroline said, working to control her voice as she stepped away from the man. "I can't imagine why you are here. I have no interest in you or your problems. Please leave."
"I've heard about your father's recent difficulties," Holmes said with a small, unpleasant smile. "I thought you might appreciate, well, a better future for your children. I am a very wealthy man, and I am not yet forty."
"Never," Caroline said hoarsely, turning on her heel, a knot in her stomach. She stalked from the entrance way, leaving MacNeal Peter Holmes turning the brim of his hat through his hands and wearing a determined look on his face, a look that combined his lust, hate, desire and discomfort.
"The time may come," he said loudly as the older Mrs. Williams reappeared. Now she stood at her kitchen doorway with her arms folded, silent, tapping her foot, her gray eyes boring holes in him. He nodded to her, put on his hat, adjusted the brim and left, closing the front door very gently.
Up in Luke Williams general store, Caroline's father hunched over the checker board where he now spent most of his days. He pursed his lips as if he were worried, glanced up at his white-haired opponent and pushed one of his black pieces to the right, leaning back with a frown, hoping he was not showing his eagerness to make the next move as he laid his trap. The other player paused briefly and then jumped him and took his black man from the board. Mr. French immediately pushed another of his pieces into harm's way and again his opponent took the bait. In the next move Mr. French took three red men from the wooden board and said, "Crown me, please."
The farmer facing him pushed all the remaining checkers together, dug in his waist pocket and then dropped a dime into Mr. French's outstretched hand. "Done it again, by golly," he said. "Thought I had y'that time. Dang bust it!"
"Another?" asked Mr. French who handed the dime to Luke Williams and was given a fresh mug of foaming beer.
"Maybe Sa'day," the man said, rising and stretching his back. "You are absolutely the slowest, meanest an' mos' aggravatin' player I ever seed. But I'm gonna beat 'cha."
"Just careful," said Mr. French, downing the beer and wiping his mouth, the back of his hand reminding him that he needed to shave more often to keep his beard properly shaped. "Careful and thirsty."
"Want a sam'ich?" Luke Williams asked. "Got some good ham. Hope done it Sunday, a whole ham fer jes' the two a'us."
"Don't have the price," Mr. French said with a slight smile.
"On the house. I was jus' gonna make myself one. You like mustard?"
"No, please, let me earn it." Mr. French rose from the homemade checker board and found the push broom. He started on the far side of the store and worked his way toward the front door with very small shoves of the wide broom, raising little dust. When he had covered the whole area, lifting each chair at the four tables where men usually sat drinking their beer in the late afternoons, talking crop yields under twisted reels of sticky flypaper, he pushed the accumulated dirt out the front door and then vigorously swept the roof-shaded porch, frightening the ever-present sparrows.
He wiped his hands on his britches and sat again at the table with the old checker board, its worn squares darkened with pencil. He arranged the men into starting position as Luke Williams put the sandwich before him on a piece of brown paper and fished a good-sized pickle from the barrel.
"Want a game?" Mr. French asked. "Just for fun."
Luke shook his head. "Naw," he said, "you're too damn good. I ain't never seen you loose less'n you meant to." He drew two glasses of beer and placed one in front of Mr. French.
"Thanks. Pay you after the next game," Caroline's father said. It was his habit to drink up the dimes he made as fast as he made them.
"Remember that feller," Luke Williams leaned back, scratching himself on the back of the chair, "canned goods salesman he was, tomatoes I think, you lost two or three games to him, raising the ante each time, double or nothin', and then y'beat the pants off him for five dollars. Took every man he had off the board. Should'a seed his face. You'd a'thought he stuck his hand in a buzz saw."
Mr. French smiled, chewing his ham sandwich, enjoying the crusty fat.
"You don't mind me asking," Luke Williams said, "ain't 'chu never goin' back to work?"
"I owe too much," Mr. French said. "I've got a dozen judgments against me. If I work, every cent will go to my creditors. What's the sense? If we still had debtors' prisons, that's where I'd be."
"You could move. Go out West somewheres. Start over."
Mr. French nodded. "I've thought of it, but I'd hate to leave Caroline and her children."
"You ain't helpin' them much." Luke raised his eyebrows and looked over his spectacles at the ruined man sitting across from him, his face showing both regret and defeat.
Caroline's father nodded, absorbing the criticism, as two farmers entered and greeted the storekeeper with waves and head nods. Both showed heavy chaws of tobacco in their stubbled cheeks.
"How about a game?" Mr. French looked up hopefully. "Ten cents to a quarter says I can beat you."
"Ain't got time," one of the men said. "Sides you're too darn good."
"Spot you two men," said Mr. French.
"Your two-bits to my ten cents?" said the man, shifting his chew to the other side of his mouth.
Mr. French nodded and the farmer sat down and moved a front-row red piece after Mr. French set two of his worn black men to the side of the board and put up his one and only quarter, the same quarter he had been using all week.
"Daddy," said Caroline as they sat around the table finishing their late supper of soup and soda crackers. "Guess who was here today."
"It's getting to feel like winter. About froze my ears off coming back from the store. Soup was just the thing, ma'am." Mr. French turned his attention to his daughter. "I'm sorry, my dear," he said. "I wasn't listening."
"Mr. Holmes came by this morning," Caroline said, looking at her father over her soup spoon and noticing that his beard was turning gray and that he needed to shave his cheeks and neck.
"Who?" asked Mr. French with a frown.
"Mister M. Peter Holmes, the blackleg smuggler or whatever he is, he bought our farm at the sheriff's sale."
"He did?" said Caroline's father. "Oh yes, Holmes. Isn't he the fellow that Robert... ?"
Caroline nodded, feeling her anger bubble up. "He certainly is."
"What did he want?" asked her father, setting aside his napkin. His head ached, and he was more than ready for his bed.
"I'm not sure," Caroline said, almost sorry she had mentioned the subject.
"Yes, she is," said the elder Mrs. Williams, returning from the kitchen with more soup. Both Seth and his sister refilled their bowls and smiled at their mother, trying to pretend they were not attentive to the conversation.
"Eh?" said Mr. French, rather bleary eyed after another day of beer drinking and checker playing.
"He wanted Caroline," said Mrs. Williams. "It was clear as day."
"I don't understand," said Caroline's father, licking at his lips and wrinkling his high forehead. He scratched his ear, feeling lost.
"He wants her for his wife. He wants your grandchildren." Mrs. Williams spooned up another ladle of onion and potato soup for herself. Her voice was unnaturally harsh. "He's got your house. Now he wants them."
"I can't believe it," said Mr. French. "She's still in mourning."
Finally, the weekend is here and it’s time to get Seth's birthday party ready. My boyfriend Seth, is turning twenty-five and we talked last night about how many people we should invite to his party, he just wants his closest friends from work here, so that's who is coming to his party. Tomorrow night we will go out to dinner with his family to celebrate with them. As his family are very religious, they wouldn't approve of the alcohol that will be served here tonight, so we will just go out...
ReluctanceSeth woke in a large, open field along the Darnestown Road just west of Rockville's court house. His hands were tied together, and for a moment he wondered where he was. He stretched carefully and felt pain knot his leg muscles and his backside. His knee hurt, too. He bit his lip to keep from crying out and massaged his calves and thighs, but he could not move freely because one of his ankles was tied to the leg of the snoring man lying next to him. The hazy sky grew slightly brighter, and...
"Who was that you were talking to out there?" Seth's mother glanced at him as she put down her ladle and began slicing carrots into the soup pot. "That's what I was trying to tell you, Momma." Seth watched the orange rounds plop into the bubbling soup, the slices getting larger as the carrot got smaller. "He's a soldier. A cavalryman, a rebel soldier, Momma." Seth watched his mother for some reaction, but she kept chopping carrots without missing a beat. "And he cut the telegraph...
The rebel soldier led Seth's horse a few hundred yards along the all-weather road toward Washington, past the place where two wagons had overturned and burned the previous summer while the others tried to escape Jeb Stuart's whooping horse soldiers. At the top of a rise they crossed the dirt track beside the macadamized road and stopped in the shade of a small stand of locust trees. The boy sat on his horse, saying nothing but watching his captor carefully and considering his situation....
For what seemed like a long time there was no sound in the dining room of the Williams's farmhouse except for the ticking of the clock, the flutter of the curtains and the whirr of insects. "Yes, I recognize him," Mrs. Williams said to Seth, her face white but her voice steady, and then to the soldier, "How may we help you, sir?" The man stood in the doorway with his weapon held loosely in his right hand, pointed more or les at the floor. Seth noted with some pride that it was a Sharps...
Seth licked his fingers, scooped up the last bits of his second piece of pie and gulped down his third cup of milk. Jefferson sat stiffly at the kitchen table with his frayed hat in his lap. Annie and Caroline watched the boy eat and listened to a disorganized story that seemed like the odd-shaped pieces of a jig-saw puzzle. Mrs. Williams busied herself at the stove, but Seth could tell that she was listening, too. Between bites and gulps the boy had told them, in disjointed fragments, where...
Confederate General Jubal Early and most of his staff spent Sunday evening near Gaithersburg, Maryland, a few miles north of Rockville, at the home of a very angry slave owner and Union sympathizer named John DeSellum. Mr. DeSellum was particularly unhappy because passing Rebels had pretty well cleaned him out of food and fodder before someone on the General's staff decided that his home would be a good place to locate the invading army's headquarters for the night. The few dark hours of...
1865 The first snow of the winter was a total surprise. The citizens of the Capital area awoke one morning late in November, and there it was, milky white and tombstone quiet, a half-foot deep and still coming down in flakes the size of silver dollars. The field where Seth and his brother had been cutting hay lay buried, the uncut stalks now bent low into mounded hillocks near the old road, both parts of which had all but disappeared. The wet snow even clung to the deep loops of the...
Sweating junior officers called squads of soldiers from the walls, trenches and firing pits of Fort Stevens, and at a sergeant's insistence, Seth and Jefferson joined a shuffling chow line. The busy cooks never looked up as they served everyone a piece of gristly meat, a hunk of dark bread, and a cup of thick bean soup. The soldiers stood or squatted in the shadiest areas eating and joking about the probable age and source of their meat. They could not decide whether it was mule or camel,...
The President joined his wife and the other sightseers in a place of relative safety behind the fort's thick wall, and General Wright went back to his troops. Seth left the fort and crossed the crowded turnpike. The eager spectators pressed forward, excited by the increased activity. Seth elbowed his way through the mob, most of whom seemed to be in a holiday mood. He moved into the scrubby woods and past the piles of cleared brush where he had seen the New York soldiers disappear. He wanted...
The French's winding farm lane met the long-traveled Pike about a half mile north of Luke Williams' general store. At the open gate Jefferson pulled the faded, gray wagon into the shade of a weeping willow near a dried up brook. The three of them listened. Insects whirred and a faint breeze rustled the dry leaves. Seth walked out into the middle of the worn, hard-surfaced road on stiff legs. He could not see anything out of the ordinary. He had expected cavalry patrols racing back and...
In a few minutes Seth looked back again. The Confederates were nowhere to be seen in the dappled sunlight. The boy sighed and relaxed, feeling his heart thumping. "What was you so concerned 'bout back yonder?" Jefferson asked in his normal bass rumble. "I knew you could act crazy-like. I warn't worried none." "I think one of those soldiers, that sergeant, he recognized me. I'm pretty sure I ate breakfast with him out in Rockville early this morning." "Aw, come on now, Seth. How...
After the first rush of confusion produced by the sound of the big guns to the east, the men of Fort Reno settled back into an afternoon of disciplined routines. Now only the occasional crack of a sharpshooter's rifle reminded General Hardin's men to keep their heads down as they went about their tasks. They fired off a few heavy rounds to harass the people on the old turnpike and then settled back to wait and watch. Jefferson and Seth found a safe place for flop-eared Ben and Mr....
Hamare pariwar me 4 sadasya hai. Meri mom savita umra 34 saal, papa hansraj, umra 38 saal, joki gaon ke sahukar ke pass accountant ka karya karte hai. Mai dilip umra 19 saal, kaksha 12th ka chatra, aur meri choti bahan vidya umra 18 saal, and kaksha Kabhi hamara pariwar bhi hasta khelta pariwar tha. Papaji bahot mehnati the aur sahukar ( seth dilawar khan ) ki un par khas inayat thi. Seth jee ke yaha bade bade log aate jaate the, jaise ki collector, police captain, tahsildar, bade bade afsar,...
1876 "Caroline," Seth said as she gathered up the soup plates from their supper, "Got a minute? Need to talk to you." He looked very serious, and he felt very nervous. He licked his dry lips and attempted to slow his breathing. He could feel his heart thumping. And he almost lost his nerve. The young woman nodded and furrowed her brow at her brother-in-law. Winter was finally easing its frigid grip; the maples were showing some dark red buds, and a lot more migrating birds were out in...
Seth sat quietly beside Jefferson rubbing his wrists and flexing his cramped fingers. The trooper lay sprawled on his back with his arms extended. He did not seem to be breathing. "Didn' mean to hit him so hard," whispered Jefferson, still holding an ax handle in his huge fist. "We jus' sort'a run together at the corner there. He turned an' I whacked him. I heered you comin' up the hill, Seth." The boy put his ear to the man's chest. "He's not dead, Jefferson. His heart's still...
1866 "Love is certainly a funny thing," said Seth's mother, steadily snapping beans while she looked out her kitchen window. Rustling leaves now filled the fruit and shade trees and the trumpet vine on the outhouse wandered in glorious bloom. "A very funny thing. Don't you think so, Annie my sweet?" "I dunno," her daughter said, scratching her shaggy head. "And don't you say anything 'bout Jimmy Willson jus' 'cause he throws acorns at me." "Right," said her mother, smiling...
Disbelieving, shocked, frightened, Seth watched as his mother faced this angry soldier holding a gun. He felt frozen to his chair as if time had stopped. Unconnected images and sounds flashed in his memory: Mr. Willoughby, his skinny teacher yelling there was no school because a war had started; his Aunt Hope screaming in anguish when he told her that the soldiers had taken Uncle Luke away; the blue-clad men whistling as they smashed down his father's fence; his mother reading and rereading...
1865 "Uncle Luke wants to talk to you," Seth told his brother breathlessly. "Right now." He had run all the way back from the store with that request and stood panting beside Robert's old rocking chair on the back porch. The kitchen door stood open as it nearly always did, and two guinea hens seemed to be discussing whether or not they would explore the house. The cat dozed. "About what?" asked Robert, crossing his ankles the other way and holding up the boat hull he was carving, a...
1874 In mid-March with the wind playing tricks in the bare-limbed trees, Caroline, Johnny and Seth rode out the Pike in the Williams' farm wagon and found Zedediah Snowden at his small home in the black section of Rockville, an area called various demeaning names by the local whites but most generally referred to as "the run." Zed put down his hoe and welcomed Caroline with a smile, and then he shook Seth's hand. "Too soon to dig nohow," he said, wiping his hands on his heavy thighs....
In the barracks behind Fort Reno, a broad bar of golden sunlight slid across Seth's face while the boy dreamed of his mother's sewing circle. His tiny grandmother Axminister, red-faced Aunt Hester who always smelled of camphor, his maiden aunt who was called Miss Vidy, and his mother were knitting at his house. He could hear the needles clicking. Annie sat on a stool playing with her doll. Seth crouched back in a corner, watching and listening. All the women were saying nasty things to his...
In the French's dark, dry barn that smelled of hay and horses, Corporal Wainder swam back to consciousness after the repeated thud of distant cannon fire. He lay some six miles north of Fort Stevens, but he could clearly hear echoes of the guns' booming reports and even feel the ground beneath him shake. He looked around his horse-stall prison and saw nothing but piles of straw and worn, pine boards. "Water," sounded in his parched throat, but he was not sure whether or not he said the...
They met very few travelers on the highway, passing only two mule-drawn farm wagons headed toward the city, one loaded with a jumble of furniture. That surprised Seth since there had been a lot of traffic heading south the previous couple of days. A half-dozen Union cavalrymen clattered past, Illinois boys, heading toward Rockville with hardly a glance at the two dusty riders going the other way. Seth noticed that many of the farms along the old road seemed abandoned. Some of the houses and...
As Mr. French's buggy topped the hill near the Bethesda Meeting House, Seth looked back, but Jefferson was not in sight. He probably took that shortcut that fords the creek, thought the boy. Mr. French had been full of questions, but Seth had been more interested in looking at the damage done along the Pike by the retreating troops. The fences were gone and so were the flocks of chickens. The blacksmith shop where Jefferson had sought information on the way into town was closed and the...
It had been dark for some time. Fireflies flickered in the smoky gloom when General Jubal Early sent for Kyd Douglas. With former vice-president Breckinridge and John B. Gordon, Early had been discussing the long, hot campaign. In a month they had accomplished most of General Lee's basic purposes. Crops were being harvested in the Shenandoah Valley. Hundreds of horses and tons of supplies were on their way to Richmond. They had not suffered very many casualties, perhaps a thousand, but many...
Robert weighed barely a hundred pounds when he came home. His yellowish skin looked like old parchment, his joints seemed only tenuously connected and his cloudy eyes hid deep in dingy hollows. His lank body bore a multitude of sores, some of which had scabbed over but many remained open and running for a long time, seeping a greenish pus. Seth, along with his mother and young sister, made the morning-long trip into Washington City to retrieve him from the crowded hospital near the Capitol....
1873 After several days of iron-willed control, the young woman was exhausted. "But Daddy," Caroline wailed, a sour knot in her throat, "he was only thirty. It's so unfair. We were just getting started." She beat weakly on her father's chest with one fist, her confused baby trapped between them. Mr. French held his daughter as best he could as she cradled her youngest in her crooked arm and had her other two children hanging to her skirt and legs, impatient to be somewhere else,...
The wobbly farm wagon and its happy outrider proceeded up the long hill to Tennallytown at Ben's steady pace and then, at what was called Gloria Point, turned a sharp left across the Georgetown-Rockville Pike by the old tavern. The sporadic firing had quieted again, and the only sounds Seth could hear were the familiar creak of the wagon and the clip clop of the mule and horse. Now I'm in the other army, he thought as they arrived at the huge fort's impressive back gate, Robert's army,...
1872 Two late snowstorms blanketed the area and gave Robert Williams plenty of time to read his borrowed law books as business all but disappeared. He found that he enjoyed it, completely lost track of time some days, and by March had struggled his way through most of the Maryland code, at least those parts he found interesting and relevant. In the back of one of his ledgers he had accumulated several pages of notes and, with lawyer Anderson's help, a list of Latin terms and their...
1865 Despite the late August heat, Sunday dinner at the French's large farmhouse, which lay less than a mile away "as the crow flies," turned out to be a pleasant affair. Mr. French insisted that Robert and Seth doff their coats and roll up their sleeves as soon as they arrived, and his sweating cook served a meal of cold fried chicken, German potato salad, pickled string beans and thin-sliced beets with onions along with tall glasses of cold milk, iced cider and fresh-baked bread. All...
At about half past ten that sultry night someone knocked at the seldom-used front door of the Williams' dark farmhouse. The air was still warm, stirred only by the slightest breeze. The night was full of the cicadas' song and the churr of crickets. Lightening bugs flickered in the fruit trees, and heat lightning flared quietly out toward the hills. Seth's mother, still dressed as she had been when her younger son had been taken from her, carried a small lamp to the door. "Who is there?"...
Seth's mother offered him some more cold pork and fresh-made applesauce, but he said he was not hungry. He sat staring into space and ate what he had without tasting it. He rubbed at the small swelling above his right eye, a reminder of Wainder's visit to his house. He could barely feel it now. "Don't you worry," his mother said as she moved about her kitchen doing the familiar things that were somehow comforting in their ordinariness. "Caroline's going to be all right. Her father...
1871 Robert leaned on the small oak table in the sitting room of the farmhouse where he and his family had lived for more than two years. The clapboard home with its two frail-looking chimneys perched on a rounded hilltop near the road to Darnestown, barely a mile from the center of Rockville and the busy store where he worked ten or more hours a day, six days each week. He could hear his wife upstairs getting their children to bed, his son squalling as usual about wanting to stay up...
1866 The store just off the wide main street of the bustling county seat opened very early on Tuesday, January 2, 1866. It was near the livery stable and the hotels, diagonally across Montgomery Avenue from the courthouse. The dark green sign with gilt lettering that hung above the deep-set door and many-paned window read "Montgomery Farm Supply." Robert Williams, who had hiked the four frigid miles from his home long before the sun appeared, and Zedediah Snowden, who lived within easy...
1876 M. Peter Holmes stared down at the man with the big pistol in his hand, feeling his pulse quickly increase, his stomach churn, his eyelids flutter. The flickering gaslight was behind the gunman, and Holmes could not make out his bristly face. He quickly reached for his whip, and the man smashed his forearm with the barrel of his heavy weapon, a Navy Colt from the look of it. "Git down," he demanded. "Be quick about it. Ain' gonna tell you agin." Holmes stepped to the brick street...
1865 Caroline French had just turned fifteen when Robert came home from the war and took up his position on the back porch. He always seemed to be sitting in the shade, whittling sticks or peeling apples for his mother, his feet raised on a piece of stove wood and his skinny ankles crossed, often barefoot. She had known Robert almost all her life and, as a child, had admired his quick wit and friendly nature. Both now seemed to have disappeared. He usually returned her cheerful greetings...
1865 MacNeal Peter Holmes stood in the paneled bar of the Willard Hotel, his dark suit, fancy weskit, glowing boots and silk cravat helping him blend in with the dozens of prosperous-appearing men about him. The room was thick with tobacco smoke. He touched the diamond-looking stickpin at his breastbone and sipped his watered brandy, patiently waiting for his drinking companion to find the end of a muddled story about some inebriated duck hunters on the Eastern Shore. "So," his young...
1866 In the week before the wedding, after considering a room in Mrs. Hardesty's boarding house, Robert and Caroline fixed up make-shift living quarters in the front part of the storage space above the store, both saying repeatedly that it was only temporary. They smiled at each other a great deal. The room had two small, casement-type eyebrow windows that looked out on the cobbled street and a low ceiling which sloped toward the back of the brick and frame building plus a very steep and...
1866 Mac Holmes licked his cracked lips, stubbed out his thin cigar and took a deep breath. "Whisky," he said to the rotund bar tender, "not rye, Jimbo. Some good stuff. And not any of mine, please." He chuckled. Holmes looked around the smoky room, found the face he wanted and drained the glass without tasting the liquor. He crossed the room, nodding to several men he knew. "George," he said happily as he pulled out a chair, flipped aside his coattails and sat, pulling down his...
1866 Robert and Caroline awakened to the odor of smoke. Night lay on the town, chill and moonless, a harbinger of the coming winter. The trees stood nearly bare. Dead leaves covered the courthouse lawn and filled the gutters. "Smell that?" Caroline asked as her husband got his feet on the floor. "Um," he said, padding to the window. He could not see anything or anyone, but tendrils of twisting smoke rose before his eyes. "I'd better go look." Barefoot and in his nightshirt, Robert...
1867 The fruit trees were blooming and wild flowers lined the old road when their baby arrived. Caroline labored for most of a night and nearly the whole next day with the midwife's help. It was a tiny girl, a fine, pink, cooing little girl, and they named her Amanda after Caroline's late mother. Amanda was almost seven months old when she died. Pneumonia the doctor said over her swollen body. The ground was not frozen yet so they buried her near Robert's father in the hillside cemetery...
1871 The election registrars met in one of the smaller courtrooms on the first floor of the old courthouse. Robert Williams sat on a narrow, wooden bench along with about twenty other men, two of whom were black. As each man's name was called by the clerk, the would-be voter rose to stand at the end of the long, bare table. Sometimes the registrars asked him a question or two but most often the group's secretary simply stamped the paper and handed it to Mr. Meriwether, the head registrar,...
1871 Robert Williams flopped into a high-backed chair, rubbed his sore calves and smiled weakly at his wife who sat nursing their daughter in the corner by the stairs, well away from drafts and out of the lamp light. For Caroline it was a pleasant time, a time she looked forward to and knew would soon end. "How was your day?" she asked quietly, crossing her feet on the wooden stool between them. "Where's Johnny. It's too quiet for him to be home." "He's sleeping at the Crowleys,...
1873 After the chill rains brought forth a glorious spring, track laying on the twin rails of the Metropolitan Branch of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was finally completed. Ballasting work continued steadily, but the sweating crews missed a mid-April and then an early May date that officials had announced for an long-heralded opening celebration. A special excursion train did travel up to Cumberland one weekend, proving that the tracks were actually finished, but it made no stops. When...
Ki Jung has had plenty of experience dealing with people who underestimated her, which has led to her seemingly becoming a cold hard bitch when it came to such people. Bullies in school, individuals at martial arts competitions and exhibitions, the list goes on. Master Chen is just the latest in their numbers, and she already understands the fact that with such people, “Might Makes Right,” and “The Strong Thrive; The Weak Die,” are their watch phrases. One cannot act weak with them. This is...
Kyle ends the call and hugs his new bride while asking, “What do you want to do now, Missus Alexander?” “Besides losing my virginity? I guess go to our new home.” “I like your plans, but I think we have a problem.” “And that is?” “From what I remember about our tour of the house there are no linens, kitchenware, or food in the house.” “Let’s call Paula and make sure as well as updating her of our new plans. If you’re right about the linens and other household items we can stay in a motel...
I resisted waking, for never before had I been wrapped in such warm comfort. The child who had grown to a woman on the streets of Arabel refused to believe that such sensations could be true, or deserved by one such as I. Surely this was a dream and my slumbering body lay wrapped in rags in the basement of a tenement in my adopted city. If this was a dream I thought it odd that the finest part came at the end. All of my nightmares before —and there had been many—had begun with the Halcyon...
It was four days after Warren and Sophia had returned to Oceanview after the tour. And Warren was trying to be patient, but was getting a little upset. Sophia and Jessie were really into each other. They weren't really excluding him-well, Sophie wasn't--but he felt like kind of a fifth wheel. He understood part of it-that they'd been separated for months-and that he had had Sophia all to himself for all those months. He guessed what bothered him is that Jess had showed no interest in him....
AUTHOR’S NOTE – For best effect, read parts 1-16 before this part. The main character, Sethy, is based upon the real woman who is an active member of the XHamster community (Sethy is not her XHam name). Sethy is an avid supporter of the Sethy series. This story is the property of the author and cannot be copied or used in part or in entirety without express written consent of the author. Sethy – Part 17 – 22 footballersSETHY“Wake up! Wake up you bitch! Wake up!” I heard Hiro’s voice. How long...
AUTHOR’S NOTE – For best effect, read parts 1-15 before this part. The main character, Sethy, is based upon the real woman who is an active member of the XHamster community (Sethy is not her XHam name). Sethy is an avid supporter of the Sethy series. This story is the property of the author and cannot be copied or used in part or in entirety without express written consent of the author. Sethy – Part 16 – The AuctionSETHY“Wake up bitch! Wake up!” I heard Hiro’s voice and then felt him pinch my...
AUTHOR’S NOTE – This story is partly fantasy, partly true. For best effect, read parts 1-13 before this part. The main characters, Sethy and Shinny, are based upon the real women who are active members of the XHamster community, and much of these characters reflect the true women. The photos included in this story of Sethy and Shinny are of the real women and are here with their permission. Both are readers of and supportive of the Sethy series. Be advised there is no sex in this part of the...
AUTHOR’S NOTE – This story is partly fantasy, partly true. For best effect, read parts 1-12 before this part. My apologies for the long interval of time between part 12 and this chapter. The artistic process runs on its own time. The main characters, Sethy and Shinny, are based upon the real women who are active members of the XHamster community, and much of these characters reflect the true women. The photos included in this story of Sethy and Shinny are of the real women and are here with...
AUTHOR’S NOTE – This story is partly fantasy, partly true. For best effect, read parts 1-11 before this part. The main characters, Sethy and Shinny, are based upon the real women who are active members of the XHamster community, and much of these characters reflect the true women. The photos included in this story of Sethy and Shinny are of the real women and are here with their permission. This story is the property of the author and cannot be copied or used in part or in entirety without...
AUTHOR’S NOTE – This story is partly fantasy, partly true. For best effect, read parts 1-10 before this part. The main character, Sethy, is based upon a real woman who is an active member of the XHamster community, and much of Sethy reflects the true woman. The photos included in this story of Sethy are of the real Sethy and are here with her permission. This story is the property of the author and cannot be copied or used in part or in entirety without express written consent of the author....
AUTHOR’S NOTE – This story is partly fantasy, partly true. For best effect, read parts 1-9 before this part. The main character, Sethy, is based upon a real woman who is an active member of the XHamster community, and much of Sethy reflects the true woman. The photos included in this story of Sethy are of the real Sethy and are here with her permission. This story is the property of the author and cannot be copied or used in part or in entirety without express written consent of the author. ...
AUTHOR’S NOTE – This story is partly fantasy, partly true. For best effect, read parts 1-8 before this part. The main character, Sethy, and the new character Shinny are both based upon real women who are active members of the XHamster community, and much of these characters reflect the real women they represent. The photos included in this story of Sethy and Shinny are of the real women and are here with their permission. This story is the property of the author and cannot be copied or used in...
AUTHOR’S NOTE – This story is partly fantasy, partly true. For best effect, read parts 1-7 before this part. The main character, Sethy, is based upon a real woman who is an active member of the XHamster community, and much of Sethy reflects the true woman. The photos included in this story of Sethy are of the real Sethy and are here with her permission. This story is the property of the author and cannot be copied or used in part or in entirety without express written consent of the author. ...
AUTHOR’S NOTE – This story is partly fantasy, partly true. For best effect, read parts 1-6 before this part. The main character, Sethy, is based upon a real woman who is an active member of the XHamster community, and much of Sethy reflects the true woman. The photos included in this story of Sethy are of the real Sethy and are here with her permission. The photos of Linda were used with permission as well.This story is the property of the author and cannot be copied or used in part or in...