American Revenant (Book 2): Settlers and Sorrow (12 page)

Winter’s
Passing

            The
first snow of winter came earlier than planned, with large flakes beginning to
fall just as the group began to build another funeral pyre. 

            Almost
a week after Jimmy and Tam had spoken to him in the woods, Jack’s body was
found impaled through the left eye with the stick he had been whittling on that
day.  He left no note, but the letters ‘J n S’ inside a heart were found carved
into the tree he was found under.

            Everyone
was saddened at the loss of someone they valued as a friend, especially by his
own hand.  Tears were shed, but at no great length.  Collectively, this group
of survivors was becoming numb inside. 

            The
winter would prove to be very difficult for the survivors.  Bitter cold and
harsh winds, deep snows that made working and walking nearly impossible,
cramped quarters were everyone was stuck inside for days.

            To
help alleviate the cramped living conditions, Jonathan gave an open invitation
to the group.  Several people could share his home, trading out as they liked,
so that everyone was able to enjoy his hospitality.

            The
winter lasted far longer than anyone had planned for, with the first thaw
coming in late April.  The anticipation of a winter that normally lasted about
four months led them all to believe that they would have sufficient food stores
to last until they were able to scavenge more homes and plant the large gardens
they intended for food.

            With
winter still going strong at the end of March tempers began to flare as food
ran low.  Everyone feared that they would starve to death before more food
could be found. 

Discussions were had about the paint factory that sat
on the highway just before the turnoff to Highway E and Saverton.  They
believed there may be food at the plant, as well as the houses at Woodland
Groves Place.   Woodland Groves was a small collection of homes that sat
directly across from the paint factory, but was separated from Saverton by a
wide expanse of woods.

Going out immediately was vetoed by a majority of the
group, but all agreed that if they got down to the last few days of food stores
people would have to go scavenging.

A final blow to morale was dealt when Dean, his sister
Anna, along with Rick and the Tanner children went to spend a few days at
Jonathan’s house during the first week of April. 

Early on the second day they were there Dean and Rick
were up early, drinking coffee and talking quietly at the kitchen table when
they heard a thump and crashing noise from Jonathan’s room.  They went quickly
down the hallway, afraid the old man may have fallen out of bed, only to open
the door to find Jonathan shuffling around the bedroom.

When the door opened the old man turned to look at the
two men standing there with cold cataract covered eyes.  His eyes were sunken,
skin sallow and loose on the frail old face.  His arms lifted slowly, the
pajama shirt he had worn to bed hanging from his thin frame as if he had been
draped in patterned sailcloth.  Jonathan had died in his sleep.

They closed the door quickly, but quietly, not wanting
to wake the children just yet.  The two men gathered the tools they would need
and returned to the bedroom.  Without a word they dispatched the kindly old man
that the children had taken to calling ‘Grandpa Jon-Jon.”

Once they delivered the news a quite despair settled
in over the remaining survivors.  Gone were the flaring tempers, and petty
arguments.

Unable to escape outside, many of the group fell into
a depressive state, spending most of their time sleeping.  This is how they
spent much of the next few weeks, until one afternoon when someone noticed that
the gray sky had become bluer than it had been all winter. 

Finally the snow had begun to melt.

Chapter
16

“Good freakin’ grief!  Where the hell did they all
come from?”

“That, Jimmy, is a damn good question,” Gordy said.

Jimmy, Gordy, Dean and Rick stood beside the old dodge
pickup, about one fourth of a mile from where Highway 79 intersected County
Road 453.  On the east side of the highway sat a small amusement park known as
Sawyers’ Creek.  On the west side, down a long narrow gravel lane was the Mark
Twain Cave Complex. 

The Mark Twain Cave Complex served tourists with tours
of the Mark Twain and Cameron caves, as well as a café, winery, and gift shop.
Tourists flocking to the Hannibal area often kept the large campgrounds filled
with RV’s, and tents.

“There must be hundreds of them,” Dean said, watching
through a pair of large field glasses. 

“Why clear out here though?  I could understand in
Hannibal, but this far outside of town?”

Rick looked over at Jimmy, “My guess would be that
when things started getting really bad, people thought getting out of town
would be a good idea.  Most of them probably believed that they could find food
and shelter at the caves as well as the buildings at Sawyers’ Creek.”

“I can understand that,” Jimmy replied, “but why so
many dead?  You think they all starved to death, or froze even?”

“Probably,” Gordy told him.  “All these people out
here, no one really prepared.  Even if they had, there simply wouldn’t have
been enough food to keep everyone fed through the winter.  Look at all the food
we had, and we’re scrounging for whatever we can find now, just to get us until
we can restock.”

“So how do we get to Hannibal through all of them?” 
Dean asked, pointing to the massive horde of zombies wandering over the road
between the two destinations.

“We don’t,” Rick said, “this shopping trip is over.”

“Not necessarily over, we just can’t make a big one
like we planned to do in Hannibal.”  Gordy looked at his fellow scavengers,
saying, “There’s the little community of Monkey Run and the eight or ten houses
on Marble Creek Drive, just past Ilasco.  I think we should check those before
we go back.”

No objections followed, and the men divided up between
the old pickup and the De Soto.  Rick drove the pickup, with Jimmy riding
shotgun, while Dean handled the De Soto with Gordy.

The group had waited a week and a half since the first
signs of melting had begun.  The sun shone brighter every day, with each day
becoming progressively warmer.  The roads, while still slushy with melting snow
in places, were passable. 

The first scavenging team cleared out the Woodland
Groves area in less than two days, and even checked out the paint factory,
which had been completely abandoned.  The snacks and sodas recovered from the
vending machines were a pleasant treat for everyone.

Although their goal was to restock food, they were
also looking for gasoline for the vehicles and the power equipment. 

            Rick
backed the pickup into the driveway of the first house on Monkey Run Trail.  Leaving
the vehicle facing forward made it easier to get away quickly should they meet
trouble. 

            There
were fewer than twenty homes in the tiny river community, and they had found
that the first six houses they searched were completely empty of food.  In
several of the homes they found the slowly decaying bodies of zombies that had
been killed long ago, possibly before winter had set in.

            “Well,
we’ve found a couple of dead bodies, and some zombie corpses, but no food. 
Someone has cleaned this area out already.”

            “You’re
probably right Jimmy, but we still need to check each house.”

            “I
know Gordo, just pointing out the obvious,” Jimmy said, smiling.  “Next house,
then?”

            They
went through three more houses, before finding a house with anything in it. 
Rick had gone up to knock, and make noise, as usual.  At his first light tap on
the door it flew inward, and a man with a shotgun stared out at him.

            Dean,
Gordy and Jimmy, to their credit, brought their rifles to bear but did not
shoot the man.

            Rick
just stood there, startled that someone was alive and pointing a 12 gauge at
his head.  “Uh, hello there,” he said, feeling a little stupid at the moment.

            The
man in the door was shorter than Rick, but with shoulders wider than the man he
was holding the shotgun on.  Once he realized he had no chance against four men
with guns he lowered the weapon and took a step back inside the house.

            “Foods’
in the back.  Ain’t nobody here but me.  Take whatever, I’m just gonna go sit
in that corner and watch,” the wide shouldered man told them.

            Rick
glanced into the living room of the house, looked at the man and said, “First
off, you aren’t the only one here, there are at least two others.  Second,
we’re not here to steal from you, or hurt anybody.  We are simply looking for
food for our family.”

            “What
the hell do you mean ‘there are two more people here’?  I just told you I’m the
only one in the house. And if you aren’t out to steal from anybody, then why
don’t you just go on and leave?”

            “Stack
of bow-hunting magazines next to that chair, one open on top,” Rick told him,
“unless you also sit on the couch and knit from time to time, or lay on the
floor coloring.”

            The
man didn’t have to look to see the yarn and knitting needles on the couch, or
the crayons and coloring book on the floor.  He knew they were there, and was
angry with himself that he had left them where they could be seen.

            “Lower
your weapons guys;” Gordy told his men, “he isn’t going to believe we’re not
here to hurt anyone if we keep pointing guns at him.”

            Gordy
dropped his FN P90 to his side on its sling, placed a hand on Rick’s shoulder
and offered the other to the man of the house.  “I’m Gordon Fletcher; it’s good
to meet you.”

            The
man was momentarily taken back by the genuine gesture, looking from Gordy’s
hand to his face several times before lowering his shotgun, and extending his
right hand.

            “I’m
Alex Humbell,” he said.

            “You
any relation to Jack Humbell from Saverton?” Jimmy asked.

            “Yeah,
he’s my dad.  Have you seen him, is he ok?”

            “We
only know him by name.  Jonathan Cambrey said that your dad could work wonders
on just about any motor out there,” Jimmy told him.

            “Mr.
Cambrey, how is he?”

            Jimmy
and the others looked at the ground for a moment, silent grief still visible.

            “Oh,
damn.  Mrs. Cambrey too?”

            Gordy
simply nodded in affirmation.

            “They
were good people,” Alex said.  He paused, thinking for a second before telling
the men outside his door, “Uh, I guess I’m gonna have to take a chance
sometime.  Why don’t you guys come on in?”

            Joining
Alex inside the house, the men stood there looking around at the neatly kept
living room.  They noticed a plastic truck, and a few dinosaur toys, besides
the coloring book.

            “Evie,
Alex, you can come on out.”

            A
young woman carrying a boy about five came from a back room, walking slowly,
eyeing the men standing in her living room.  Walking to her husband she said
nothing, only nodding a greeting to Gordy and his crew.  Alex put his arm
around her waist, above hips any mother would be proud to have earned.

            “Feel
free to sit,” Alex told them, “Sorry the place is a mess, we weren’t expecting
company today.”

            “Man,
if this is a mess, you would have hated my house,” Jimmy said laughing.

            Everyone
chuckled, helping to break the tension.  They sat in the comfortable living
room talking, feeling each other out.  At one point Evie left the room, taking
her son with her.  When she came back she was carrying a tray with steaming
cups of instant coffee, passing one out to each of the men, and taking one for
herself.

            “So
that’s it really,” Alex was saying, “we just holed up here as soon as the
reports of that sickness hitting St. Louis.  I had to chase a few people off,
people that were obviously sick.  I hated doing it, but my wife and son, well…”

            “I
understand perfectly well,” Gordy told him, thinking of Jenny Appleton.

            “I
really haven’t had much trouble out here, other than Walt Smith, from down at
the end of the road.  We were ok for a few weeks after the power went out, but
I knew we would need food, so I started going to the houses out here, looking
for other people.  If I didn’t find anyone I cleaned out all the food and
stuff, brought it back here.

            “Well,
as I’m doing this I came across Walt Smith.  He’d been doing the same thing,
and we started talking about pooling everything and waiting out the winter
together, him and my family. 

            “Then
he starts asking me about my family, a lot of questions about my wife.  If she
was healthy, did she ever want more kids, even stranger stuff I don’t care to
repeat.  I realized then that there was no way I could trust the old bastard,
and I told him as much.  Needless to say, he didn’t like that very much at all.

            “About
a week after that he shows up at my doorstep, apologizing and asking
forgiveness and all that, asks if he could hunker down with us.  I tell him no
way, and I meant it.  I didn’t trust him as far as I could spit.

            “He
goes crazy, starts screaming and carrying on, so I reach for the shotgun by the
door, when he pulls out a pistol and fires off a couple of shots.  Nobody is
hurt, but the crazy bastard starts to step backwards when he sees the shotgun,
falls over and drops his pistol, all the while blubbering and screaming like a
lunatic. 

            “Well,
he jumps up, grabs that pistol and starts to point it at me.  I didn’t even
think about it, I just put a load of buckshot right in his chest.  It made me
sick, and I’m standing there outside my door puking my guts out, when he stands
back up.  I swear he just stood right back up and came after me.”  Alex stopped,
looking at his wife and son.

            “You
don’t need to say any more, we know,” Rick told him.

            Alex
looked at Rick, thankful for letting him stop his story right there.

            After
sharing a few of their stories with Alex, including Dean’s run down Broadway,
Gordy asked if they would like to come stay with the group back at Camp Oko
Tipi. 

            Gordy
explained to them how everyone did their part to help make it a safe place.  He
told Alex and Evie about their intentions for the group and the Camp over the
long run.  He explained the council and why they had it.  It all led to
protecting each other and building a lasting home.

            Alex
and Evie took Alex Jr. too a back room in the house, coming back ten minutes
later.

            “You
guys seem genuine, and I believe there is strength in numbers, same as you.  We
would be happy to join you folks, but I have to say, if people are praying to
goat heads, or start talking about ‘Long Pork’ as a food, I’m outta there.”

            The
men laughed, and Jimmy said, “No weird stuff, we got it.”