10 Pound Bag Ch. 051-055

**** Chapter Fifty-One -- Lazy day, Sunday afternoon ****

Afternoon naps on a warm spring day are the best. It was warm enough that April day that we had all the tent flaps open and the fresh spring air was envigorating. I thought I had smelled fresh air before, this was on an entirely new level, the air was so clear and clean that you could smell when dinner was cooking from a quarter of a mile away.

I decided we should probably sort out Holder's and his buddies belongings with the rest of the day. It wasn't real work and it needed to get done. We had stored it all in the small horse trailer but I had plans on turning that into my new chicken coop; I needed to get those birds out of the rig as soon as the eggs hatched.

Everyone pitched in, even Sonya; Matilda had to physically drag her along but she was there and helping. We unloaded all the gear and laid it out for inspection, it was a sorry lot for the most part but I was sure we'd find some treasures in there.

I let Holder separate his gear first, all he really had was a canvas shoulder bag, his knife, a well worn hatchet and what looked to be a Kentucky Long Rifle. In his bag he had some hard tack, wooden eating utensils, a pair of worn socks, and a spare shirt; he also had everything he needed for his rifle and a whetting stone for his axe. Various treasures were kept in his little pouch: a couple of copper coins, flint and steel, some leather cords, a bit of tinder, a chunk of soap and what looked like a makeshift tooth brush. He also had a water skin and a thread-bare blanket. His one treasure in the entire mess was an old copper compass.

I had him separate it all out into piles by function allowing him to keep his pouch and compass. He kept eye-balling that rifle but I just ignored him, I intended to give it back to him but that would come later. I had Esther grab him a new tooth brush from storage, he looked that thing over for quite a while; I had plenty of spare tooth brushes, I always seem to forget them when I went out camping just like everyone else I know.

We then went through the other packs, getting pretty much the same results. As far as weapons went it was a pitiful haul consisting of a musket and a musket pistol which had both seen much better days; there were three long knives and another hatchet. I could see why they recruited Holder, they needed a rifleman and he had the tools for the job.

The rest of the personal loot of any value consisted of a small pile of coins, a pair of cracked spectacles, a leather skin with a rough map drawn on it in charcoal and a pocket watch of dubious value. These guys weren't rolling in wealth by any measure.

The supply packs yielded better results, whoever had outfitted had done them pretty well. There was plenty of dry food, a cast iron pan, plenty of rope, and tack for the livestock. The food consisted of mostly dried goods such as beans, rice, and corn; there was a bag of coffee, a small bag of salt, some flour, cheese and some dried meats.

The true value in the entire haul was the horse tack. Four decent saddles with bridles and pommel bags, the pack saddles and most importantly there was draft tack for the mules. Michelle recognized it for what it was and between her and Holder they managed to sort out exactly what it was. It wasn't heavy duty stuff, we'd not be plowing with it but it would do for a lot of light work when the time came, hopefully it would hold up pulling logs out if we were careful.

In the end we had enough saddles for every horse in our herd. Michelle took that moment to point out that Lunch had been busy and our herd might be growing soon, I just shook my head.

We started moving the tack over to the tack room, Michelle was in charge of all things horsey using the fellas as a labor force; I busied myself moving the weapons and valuables to the table for further examination. Matilda collected all of the food and cooking items and all we had left was a pile of sad clothing and some empty personal packs which all needed to be cleaned and aired at the very least.

All that was left was mainly debris which we simply threw in our trash pit and forgot about.

Just like that those three men had disappeared from the face of the earth taking all of their memories and all of their dreams with them; life is a cruel thing and not the least bit forgiving.

I turned to Sonya and said, "It's like they never existed."

I walked away before she had a chance to fully comprehend what I'd said.

**** ****

Dusk was coming and so was another spring storm, we could see the clouds on the south-eastern horizon; that explained the two days of very warm weather in April. We battened down for a wet night.

Matilda put a cabbage soup on the fire to cook while we worked. We set up the table in the camper for use if necessary but I hoped that the winds wouldn't be a problem and at least some of us could could use the awning. Amos got all of the wood stoves going on low and Matilda had Holder set up the spare cot in her tent and told him he would be sleeping there. There was a look of doubt and fear in his eyes, after seeing her go to work with that razor I couldn't blame him.

After supper Amos, Holder and I sat down to examine our new weapons. My opinion was that only the Kentucky rifle was worth keeping but the other two pieces could be cleaned up and used for trading. Both of them agreed, Amos because he didn't really know and Holder because he wanted to keep his treasured rifle. We put the two muskets away and looked at the knives and hatchets, I told him he could keep his hatchet if he liked so he did; the other we'd clean up and trade. None of the knives were worth keeping so into storage they went also.

All we had left now was the valuables and there wasn't much to that. All of the coins were put in a single purse and stored in the lock box, Amos professed he'd like to have the watch. That was the end of that.

I asked Holder to tell me about his rifle, he told me it had been handmade for an Uncle who died out logging a couple of years back. He inhereited and had been using that rifle ever since, it really was a fine piece of work. It was true museum item in my mind; in my mind it was still classified as being more than 200 years old. I told him we'd keep it since it mattered to him on a personal level however he still wasn't trusted enough to be allowed to carry around a rifle.

I pulled the Hall 1819 out of storage and laid it on the table, he pretty much gawked at it. He said he'd seen one before down in New Orleans, the US Troops that had just arrived were carrying them and one of the troopers had even shown him how it operated. That was very good news, I'd probably have him give me some lessons before I left for my first trading trip.

With that the rain started and it was time for bed, we shut down the camp and wandered off to bed; me to sleep a peaceful night in Michelle's arms and Holder to a night of fear sleeping on a cot in Matilda the Slasher's tent.

I truly felt sorry for the guy.

It started to rain hard.

I drifted off to sleep.

**** Chapter Fifty-Two -- Rainy days and Mondays ****

Morning broke.

Somewhere morning broke but it sure wasn't here, it was dark, gloomy and still raining hard.

In keeping with 21^st Century mass media traditions I gave the storm a name, I called it "Tropical Storm Bitch". Michelle was the only one who chuckled.

Thankfully the wind wasn't a major problem and I could put the awning back up, the seven of us could survive in the camper and under the awning. I made the coffee on my wood stove in my tent. We shared my rain slicker as we ran between covered areas, it was raining that hard.

The livestock were miserable and I needed to come up with a quick plan for them, it appeared that one of my tarps was about to make the ultimate sacrifice. I gathered two of those stupid emergency rain poncho's out of the truck for Amos and Holder to use. We fetched one of my two extra large tarps, hatchets, stakes and line from the storage room.

We huddled under the awning to make a plan; actually we drank coffee and tried to procrastinate but we got busted by Michelle. The first step was a run to the sapling pile, we chose eight about twelve feet long and we them back to the awning. We sharpened both ends of five of them, one end to help it anchor in the ground and the other to hopefully fit the eyelet on the tarp. The other three we tied together at the center so we could twist them out to provide a center support.

The plan was to use the heavy corral fencing to hold down one end of the tarp and use the poles with guy lines to keep the other end and sides upright. It should work, for a while anyway.

We unfolded the tarp and rolled it into a giant cigar, the tarp was 50'x50' so it was quite a large cigar. We ran that cigar out to the southeast corner of the corral, unrolled it partially and while Holder and I worked on our eventual hernias lifting the corral sections Amos stuffed and spread the edges of the tarp underneath.

We then raced back to the awning and complained loudly; the joys of bonding as men. There was fresh coffee in our cups which was appreciated quietly.

We moved the poles out next and laid them out as best we could figure. We laid out the guy lines and stakes as we hoped they go. We flipped the tarp over the corral fence and rolled it out as best we could in the mud. We worked each pole as a team; setting up the pole, sinking the tent stakes, and finally tightening the guy lines a enough to keep it upright.

The five outer poles went up without too many face-planting mistakes and we followed by quickly tightening all of the guy lines. Suddenly we were out of the rain.

The center of the tarp however was quickly gathering water so we set up the tri-fold center pole pushing the center up almost a foot higher than the edges. We'd have to keep a constant eye on it but we could at least feed the poor horses now.

I led Lunch into the shelter and the rest followed after. Amos and Holder drug their water bucket over and with that we headed back to our own cover. Another high priority item had just been added to my list.

I was soaked even under my rain slicker and the guys were no better off. We had hot drinks and hot porridge waiting for us when we got back, that had been a hell of a way to start the day. I started out to take the livestock some hay but Michelle was already heading out on the cart with a bunch of hay bags ready to hang. I just needed to eat and warm up.

**** ****

It turned into a serious school day. Our students spent the day working on reading and writing, we had a tiny white board on the wall that came with the camper; I suppose it was intended for shopping lists and so forth. Sonya put that to good use in simply working on the alphabet. I took possession of our single box of white board markers and hid them away, another finite commodity.

I did warn them that power was a consideration on days like these and to not get carried away if they wanted hot water and such. It was going to be an entire separate class to even begin to explain solar power to them, that would definitely need to happen before winter.

I took the time to do more research, I didn't have a particular subject in mind I just surfed the archive until a topic met up with something my mind was fussing over. Today I got stuck on St. Louis and the Panic of 1819. This wasn't a new topic for me having worked in the financial industry through three crashes I had looked at the history of crashes before. But today I decided to delve into what ever ripple effects I could find related to that event, I needed to know what to expect financially over the next few years.

The rain lessened and then picked back up, lessened again and changed it's mind again; the rooster crowed his indignance at the travesty of it all. Nobody was happy. I told them there was more than enough power for a movie or two if they wished. I did caution Sonya to becareful with the movie era so we didn't completely overwhelm them. I mentioned that Braveheart or Last of the Mohicans would work for the guys.

Dinner and supper were cooked in the camper; frozen pizza for dinner and an oven baked casserole for supper. I retreated to my tent to read and research; Michelle and Matilda could handle the helm for today. I took a bottle, some beer and Brin with me.

I learned a lot, I was fed, and I eventually found myself being fussed over and put to bed. Maybe I drank too much or maybe I let my focus get too tight and the world just passed me by while I absorbed information. Whatever happened I do remember being put to bed.

**** Chapter Fifty-Three - Road Work Ahead ****

Drizzle.

Miserable spring drizzle.

It doesn't soak you but every thing is wet and slippery.

But you can work in it and we had some work to do. We needed to build and for that we'd need logs, we also need a road to the Nemaha and for that we had to clear trees. Priorities ordered themselves, we'd cut the road and haul the logs back to build with later.

After breakfast Michelle and I rode out to make a final decision on which trail to follow, smoothest terrain won out over shortest route. The fellas were back at camp sharpening our axes and I headed back to get them, Michelle would prepare the mules and our pulling trace. Brin happily brought all of our tools out for us and we started in.

Holder and I swapped axes as we worked using the woodsman on the saplings and smaller trees while the logging axe went to work on anything larger. Any tree that was too large we simply detoured around. Amos and Michelle worked around us with hachet and machete clearing brush and trimming branches, once a tree was down and mostly trimmed they would pull it out with the mule team.

It was slow going the first few days as we got our routine down and our muscles started to really harden. Our poor hands were completely miserable and Matilda was treating blisters every night. We slept well and ate hearty, Matilda and the girls would bring out lunch and dinner during the day; the only meals we ate in camp were breakfast and supper. We worked in four hour intervals, work then eat lunch and rest, work then eat dinner and rest, work and head home for supper. Evenings were spent sharpening blades and repairing gear.

Wash, rinse, repeat.

**** ****

Saturday finally arrived and road cutting was done for the week, the weather had slowly improved and while we still had work to do we had a minor respite from swinging the axe. The ladies had been busy around the camp site while we worked.

They had torn out most of the tomato field and replanted a variety of vegetables and grains including my much desired hops. This was a calculated move on our part, average tomato yield for plants like we had was ten tons per acre, we decided we really had no use for fifty tons of tomato. Our corn yield was still expected to be rediculous with nearly five acres of corn at an expected minimum yield of nearly ten thousand ears per acre. Those were the numbers Oscar gave me when chatted about the farm and I had no reason to disbelieve him. Tomato soup with cornbread anyone?

So Saturday was a busy day with maintenance being the number one task, everything had to be checked and maintained. Sonya kept a running log and handed out tasks to insure that nothing was missed.

After all the weekly chores were done Michelle ran everyone through the showers, nobody got clean clothes until they had a clean body. The men were made to shave or at least trim their unruly facial hair and hair trimming was done all the way around. There was some grumbling from the guys but this also meant the end of the work week and it was time to relax.

We BBQ'd that evening, Esther making a sauce her momma had taught her and Amos running the grill like a champ. I made my famous potato salad again and Michelle whipped up an amazing coleslaw that was so good I made sure to question Matilda about how much cabbage we had managed to plant. Venison ribs are a bit lean but they are tasty and the brine they had soaked in made them incredibly tender. Roasted potatoes and roasted onions finished the main offerings. The food was incredibly good.

After supper cleanup we enjoyed the warm spring evening and discussed the successes and challenges of our week. Esther was proud of her work on the leather and told us all about it and even Sonya piped in that she had built a frame and started oiling canvas to make rain ponchos for the next big storm; Matilda had the look of a proud mother on her face.

We finished the day off with popcorn and a movie, we were still stuck with 19^th century movies giving us a limited selection but we managed pretty well with Bambi as the selection for the night.

**** ****

Sunday morning had the guys up early to go hunting again, I'd seen deer sign at the edge of our corn field during my daily rounds and wanted to chase them off. We'd take any bucks we saw and hope the does got the message. I allowed Holder to take his Long Rifle, I carried the .30-06 and Amos had the .22 lever action. After we got our deer we'd have Amos do some target practice, I needed to get him up to speed.

We followed the same plan as last time: IR check before daylight, locate the herd, and take a single mule. We set up a couple of hundred yards from where we thought they'd come out of the forest at and waited. Sure enough just as dawn was breaking the herd ventured out of the woods and began to feast on our corn, there were three yearling bucks mixed in with the does so Holder and I each chose one at opposite ends of the herd. We had agreed on a three count and once we both met eyes and nodded the count started, I gave him a half a count lead and our rifles roared together. Both bucks went down but the herd didn't move, they looked around in confusion so I racked another round and got off a second shot at the third buck.

I rushed the shot and hit him in the spine just in front of his rear legs, he wasn't down but he couldn't run. I furiously racked a third round and Holders rifle went off again finishing the poor guy. I just looked at him, that was a really quick reload for a muzzle loader, I was impressed and re-evaluating things about my new world. I safed my weapon and collected my brass.

We managed to get all three bucks up on the mules back, they weren't big ones and I wouldn't have harvested them if they hadn't been eating my corn. When we got back I gave each of the guys a piss jar for their morning urine, we had to start spreading human urine each morning to help deter the deer from out fields. It'd be my job at first but eventually it'd go to whomever had fucked up most recently.

Matilda and Holder gave a carcass cleaning class when we got back; we didn't process the meat simply separated skin, guts, and carcass. We then rinsed everything off and stuffed it in the game freezer for processing tomorrow. The game freezer was kept at 30°F, large items wouldn't freeze overnight but they wouldn't start to spoil either.

We cleaned our rifles and cleaned ourselves and then proceeded to enjoy our lazy day Sunday, tomorrow would come soon enough and there was a road to cut.

People took turns reading outloud that evening, it was calm and relaxing. I was proud to see how quickly those three had come along in their reading although it is strange to see a grown young man like Holder struggling through Dr. Suess.

I went to sleep that night with the smug thought that I had been able to avoid Sonya's bible talk that day.

**** Chapter Fifty-Four -- Surprise! ****

Monday morning started with a loud ralph, well actually a series of them.

I had been pulling my clothes on in the dark when I heard the commotion and the unmistakable sound of someone getting sick. I rushed outside to see Matilda emerge from the bushes wiping her mouth. She made it halfway back to her tent before turning and rushing into the bushes again. She serenaded us in the early dawn, the rooster crowed in accompaniment.