

Beware the River

by

Kitty Margo

Published November 12, 2012

Second Edition February 10, 2017

Buttercup Publishing

Copyright © 2017 Kitty Margo

All rights reserved.

ISBN-13:978-1542594554

ISBN-10:1542594553

In Loving Memory Of

James Daniel Diggs

12 /10/1981 – 9/20/2004

Gone, But Never Forgotten
Chapter One

My best buds and I were going camping at grandpa's cabin on the river this weekend. We would need plenty of bait for two full days of fishing, so I was digging worms in Gram's compost heap.

I was just dropping a fat, juicy wiggler in the bucket when I noticed something out of the corner of my eye. I looked up to see a swirling dust devil spinning up from the dry field across the road. As I watched, it began bouncing and zigzagging toward the house like crazy.

I would swear the thing was getting bigger and bigger and bigger as it headed straight toward Gram's house.

I know that whirlwinds of dust are supposed to be harmless. We live in the country in the middle of acres and acres of farmland, so I have seen dozens over the years.

But this one looked more like a small tornado barreling across the dried up field of cotton.

It was at least thirty feet high and spinning furiously. In the few seconds that I had been watching, it had picked up speed and was taking dead aim for the house.

Screw this.

I knew when it was time to bust a move.

I ran to the porch with the intention of hiding inside the house until it had passed. I didn't see Gram and almost crashed into her when she shoved open the screen door carrying two glasses of sweet iced tea.

Her jaw dropped as she looked past me with eyes the size of duck eggs.

"Close you mouth, Gram," I shouted.

Then the ferocious wind hit the porch and surrounded us with a suffocating cloud of dust.

Choking and gagging, I quickly shut my eyes and held my breath.

I pulled my tee shirt over my face for added protection as the grit and sand stung the exposed skin on my arms and legs like jabbing needles.

Then, I sucked in a huge breath of dust and almost coughed up a lung.

Determined not to make the same mistake again, I pressed my tongue against the roof of my mouth. The pressure inside the dust devil caused my ears to pop like a bag of Orville Redenbacher's.

Luckily for us it was gone as quickly as it had arrived. But it left a thick film of dirt, cotton stalks, and gravel littering the porch.

I lowered my filthy shirt and picked up the hem to scrub the dirt from my face. "What was that, Gram?" I asked when I was finally able to draw deep gulps of sweet, clean air into my starving lungs.

Gram shook her head and gazed out across the cotton field with a troubled look on her face. "I've seen many a dust devil in my time, but never one like that."

Shaking off as much dirt as I could, I ran my tongue across my teeth. They felt like sandpaper. "I've never seen a dust devil that big before, have you?"

"No." Gram's hair was standing straight up on her head and filled with leaves, twigs and dirt clots.

Her hose, the kind that elderly women roll somewhere up around their knees, were now sagging pitifully around her ankles.

She wears a locket that holds a photo of Great Grandpa Tom inside. The gold chain was dangling precariously from her right ear. "I can't say that I have, son."

She was a filthy mess.

But she wasn't the only one. Our clothes were twisted and tangled, and a thick layer of dirt covered us from head to toe.

We had at least an inch in our hair. Our ears were clogged with topsoil. And I felt like even my eyeballs had a thin coating of grit over them.

Gram tossed out the dirty tea and spit a wad of gritty Tube Rose snuff over the porch rail. "My snuff tastes like dirt now."

With one last worried glance across the cotton field, she said, "After we take showers, will you get the hosepipe and scour off this mess? I'll fix us some more tea."

"Okay." But first, I had to know why she was so uneasy all of a sudden. "Why are you so worried about that dust devil, Gram?"

She shook her head and turned toward the door. At first I thought she wasn't going to answer me. Then, she stopped and turned back to look at me.

"There are four things that I consider to be bad omens, or signs of trouble ahead."

After all I had been through lately, did I really want to know what they were?

I asked anyway. "What are they, Gram?"

"One is when a bird flies into a window or glass door. That always sends a chill down my spine."

"What else?"

"If you see an owl during the daylight hours, trouble will follow. Also, if a hanging picture falls, it's a sign of bad things to come. But worst of all, in my opinion, is a dust devil."

"Really, Gram?" I said. "I've never heard that dust devils are a bad sign."

Opening the screen door, she went inside and called over her shoulder, "They call them devils for a reason, you know."

I headed upstairs for a much-needed shower, thinking over what she had said. If nothing good came from a dust devil, did that mean something bad was coming?

Chapter Two

As I was grabbing a towel and washcloth from the hall closet, Gram came to the bottom of the stairs and hollered, "Remember now, don't be lollygagging in the shower, BJ. The well could go dry any day now."

Which was true, even though I was really tired of hearing it.

We desperately need rain. A drop of water hasn't fallen in over eight months and practically everything in the state of North Carolina is parched.

In fact, water has become so precious that if you are caught watering your lawn, washing a car, or trying to have a little fun on a Slip and Slide there will be a hefty fine to pay.

To be honest, I couldn't believe Gram was actually allowing me to waste water in a shower. Normally I had to take a tub bath in no more than six inches of water.

The dust devil must have really rattled her nerves.

Now don't get me wrong, I love Gram with all my heart. But recently she has begun taking this drought business to the extreme.

Mom says that it's because Gram was raised during the Great Depression when times were hard. She thinks that I should just humor her and not let her little quirks get under my skin.

However, that isn't as easy as it sounds. Trust me, some of her ideas go way beyond the weird.

Like for instance, she is convinced that her well is going dry. So when she takes a bath she refuses to waste the water. Now wasting water is what you or I would refer to as a simple matter of draining the dirty water out of the tub.

Not in Gram's world.

I have to get a bucket and carry the water outside to water her tomato plants, pepper plants and petunias.

I know exactly what you're thinking. And yep, it does concern me as to exactly how much of that dirty water gets absorbed into her tomatoes.

Gram uses some kind of natural organic soap. I read the label myself and it does claim to be safe for plants and animals. However, even the fine print doesn't mention a word about it being safe for human consumption.

It's the sole reason I gave up tomato sandwiches, which I normally live on in the summertime.

And get this!

She even had some insane notions about us bathing in the same water to conserve the liquid gold.

Nope.

Not happening.

Not in this lifetime.
Chapter Three

The following Tuesday, the sixth grade took a field trip to the site of a historic Indian Mound. My question of what is an Indian Mound met with a pretty simple answer from one of my older friends. His class was leaving the visitor's center as ours was entering.

"Basically, it's just a large pile of dirt, dude."

Then our tour guide went into more detail about the Indian burial ground.

"When a member of the tribe died, he or she would be placed in a burial chamber in the center of the mound. The adults were positioned on their backs, sides, face down, sitting, or even standing, depending on their status in the tribe. The chief would be buried at the top of the mound."

"And the children?" asked the beautiful Megan.

Even though she had humiliated me at the sixth grade dance and ditched me for Derek the jock West, she was still the most beautiful girl in our school.

"Young children and infants were tightly wrapped in deerskins." Even the tour guide smiled brightly when he responded to the gorgeous girl. "Then they were placed in large pottery vessels that archeologists call burial urns."

Then we were forced to wait while Delbert Mulroney asked a foolish question. He is one of the more irritating nerds in our grade.

Pushing his glasses further up his nose, (during our tour of an Indian burial ground mind you) he asked a question about headache powders.

"Wasn't the guys who invented Stanback headache powders from this town?"

Why does someone always have to waste the tour guides time with unrelated nonsense?

Seriously?

At our age, who cares about a headache powder?

"Yes, I believe so." When Delbert had no further questions or comments, our tour guide continued. "Some of the dead were buried with wooden ear spools, rattles, a copper ax, a medicine bundle, beads, gorgets, and pins fashioned from conch shells."

"What is a gorget?" James asked.

"A pendant that would have been worn around the neck," the tour guide replied.

Taylor raised his hand. "An ear spool sounds painful. What is it?"

"To put it into todays terms, you would know it as earlobe stretching, or gauging," our guide answered. While he spoke, he was tugging on his own earlobe.

James cringed at the thought of walking around with a huge gaping hole in his earlobe. Even though the practice seems to be gaining in popularity with the emo set.

"Since ancient times Indian tribes have practiced the ritual of ear stretching. Bone, horn, wood, stone, shells, teeth and even claws were used."

Taylor and I exchanged brief glances of disbelief. Who would intentionally force a tooth, or a bear claw, through their earlobes?

"Historically, the practice would indicate a man's standing in the tribe. The bigger the stretching, the higher the ranking. As for women, ear stretching signified when a girl had reached womanhood."

For a moment, I totally forgot that Megan Cobb had ripped my heart out and that I never intended to speak to her again. Without thinking clearly, I glanced over at her and smiled as a pretty blush colored her beautiful cheeks.

Unfortunately, she caught me watching her and smiled back.

No. No. No.

Don't you dare smile at me!

Not after you made me look like a complete idiot at the dance.

Confused, I cleared my throat and asked what I hoped was an intelligent sounding question. "How many bodies would one mound hold?"

"That is a very good question, young man," the tour guide said.

I breathed a sigh of relief that I hadn't asked a stupid question, like Delbert.

"After a body was placed inside the mound, the burial chamber was then covered with dirt. As time progressed, more bodies were added, as was more dirt. Over the years this increased the height and width of the mound until as many as thirty five individuals had been laid to rest."

When there were no questions, he continued.

"Now, let's change the topic and speak about Indian life rather than death. "Do we have any twins in our group today?"

Lacey and Tracy, both with red hair and freckles, raised their hands.

"You ladies would be be treated as royalty if you were born into the tribe. Twins were thought to have unusual powers and it was believed that they would grow up to become priests or witches."

Lacey had a strange look, like she had been caught with her hand in a cookie jar. While Tracy smiled a wicked little grin.

"Now, by a show of hands, were any of you ever spanked for misbehaving?"

A couple of kids in the back raised their hands.

Our tour guide nodded his head to let them know that he had seen them. "Some of you might be surprised to learn that an Indian boy was never struck."

"Were they punished at all?" Tracy, the more vocal of the twins, asked. Their Mom was well known as a women's rights activist. "And if so, how?"

"If an Indian boy did wrong, he would be scratched with the sharp spikes of a garfish. This was especially embarrassing because it left scars on the skin for several weeks. This would lead to teasing from the other children and, for an Indian child, humiliation was much harder to bear than physical punishment."

"That sounds cruel," the kind and caring Megan said softly.

"Maybe so," he told her. "But the scratching was also thought to lighten the child's blood and make him healthier and less troublesome."

The guide held up a garfish. I noticed several kids unconsciously rubbing their arms as they imagined the sharp spikes digging into their tender flesh.

That had to hurt.

Suddenly it hit me that I really needed to go to the bathroom. While my group moved on to the next thatched hut, I informed Mr. Witherspoon that I would be back in five minutes.

I fast walked down the narrow path toward the visitor's center, really feeling the urge. When I turned a curve in the grass path I saw a very old and very wrinkled Indian man sitting beside a fire. He was smoking a long pipe that was decorated with feathers and beads and strips of rawhide.

He wore a deerskin loincloth, a feathered headdress, and a bear claw necklace.

That was odd.

The man had to be the world's fastest fire builder. He pushed at a log with a stick and it crumbled to ashes as if it had been smoldering for hours.

How was that possible?

I had walked down the same path fifteen minutes earlier and there had been no man and certainly no fire.

The elderly Indian man was slim, muscled, and very tanned from years spent under a blazing sun. He had two streaks of red paint under each eye and several smears across his chest.

He took a long puff of his pipe and held the smoke. When he released it, he said, "I am Chief Red Feather."

"BJ," I introduced myself, glancing around to see if anyone else was witnessing this. "Nice to meet you."

I had never seen a more realistic looking Indian man in my life. He had long grey hair and his teeth were a dingy yellow, with several missing.

A beautiful brown palomino horse with big white splashes of fur stood beside him.

Without any other words of greeting, he issued what sounded to me like a dire warning.

"Running Deer, stay away from river."

I turned around to see who Running Deer was, but found no one else that he could be referring to.

Only me.

"Who is Running Deer?" I asked.

He tilted his head toward me and looked like he was about to answer. Then I heard James shouting my name. I turned around to see him jogging down the path toward me.

"Wait up, BJ," he shouted. "I need to go too."

I turned back toward the Indian man and shivered as goose bumps popped up all over me.

What was going on here?

I rubbed my eyes with my fists at what I was, or was not, seeing.

Nothing.

Only grass.

Where did the Indian chief and his horse go?

Better yet, who in the heck is Running Deer?

James passed by me on his way to the restroom. "Come on, BJ. I don't want to miss any more of the tour than I have to. I'm really digging this Indian stuff."

I looked back once more at the grassy spot where the Indian had been.

"Yeah," I mumbled. "Me too."
Chapter Four

Over the next few days, I tried to put the episode with the Indian chief out of my mind. It had been scorching hot in the windowless huts on the day we had gone to the Indian Mound.

That had to be it.

Seeing the ghost of an Indian man and his horse didn't necessarily mean that... it... was happening again.

Did it?

I had gotten too hot, and it had caused me to see things that weren't really there.

Right?

Anyway, it was Saturday and I wasn't about to let some Indian man ruin my camping trip at the river.

I hadn't told James or Taylor about my... episode... with Chief Red Feather, yet. I was going to wait until after the camping trip or they might chicken out and not go.

James and Taylor arrived and we strapped the food and fishing gear to my four wheeler. Then James climbed on the back as we headed down the winding river road.

I swerved to dodge mud holes, overhanging tree limbs, and briar bushes. They would tear the meat right off your hide if you weren't careful.

Finally, we parked under the shade of the cabin, eager to get unpacked and wet a hook.

James unstrapped the picnic basket that Mom and Gram had packed and was grunting like an old sow as he carried it up the steps. Taylor picked up one end of the cooler and I grabbed the other as we fell in step behind him.

About a mile upriver from the cabin is the Hydro Dam. Today they didn't have any wheels open to release water from the reservoir and generate electricity, so the river was dry.

We walked out on the riverbed and sat on a rock to fish in the hole where Grandpa Cliff swore the huge flathead cats lived.

A majestic bald eagle soared overhead guarding her nest in the top of a tall, dead tree.

A long-legged heron stood in the shallows feasting on minnows.

Turtles poked their heads out and occasionally a fish jumped and plopped back down in the water.

Piles of discarded muscle shells were scattered randomly around the riverbed where raccoons had feasted on the juicy muscles during the night.

It was a peaceful, normal day. Just what I needed after my...sighting... yesterday.

Using the worms I had dug for bait, we caught a mess of crappie, bream and several small catfish as fast as we could reel them in.

Since we had plenty of food for supper and didn't have any way to freeze our catch, we released the fish back into the river.

Mom had packed corn on the cob for roasting and potatoes for baking, along with some hothouse cucumbers and tomatoes.

James's mom had sent two jars of her famous dill pickles.

Taylor's mom had delivered two fresh-baked Hershey chocolate pies with meringue topping. My favorite.

Gram had supplied a bowl of mouth watering fried chicken, and a pan of her homemade biscuits.

Man, what a feast!

Later, when the sun went down, we planned to go frog gigging. Hopefully we would have frog legs for a midnight snack.

Taylor was a city boy at heart and had his fill of fishing in a couple of hours. So we swam in one of the deep holes of water. These holes were filled with the fish that normally have the entire river to swim in when it's full.

Now, with the river dry, all the fish were stranded in the deep holes. We could feel the fish and every other form of river creature slithering against our legs.

"What was that?" James shrieked. He jumped clear out of the water when something cold and slimy bumped against his leg.

"Um.... probably a fish," Taylor said. He was looking at James like he might have finally lost his last remaining marble. "What else could it be? The Lochness Monster?"

"Well, it could be a water moccasin you know!" James screeched.

Suddenly, after the events of yesterday, I was as nervous and jittery as James.

The occasional feeling of something swimming against my leg had never bothered me before. Heck, I had practically been raised on the riverbank and had been swimming in this river since I was old enough to walk.

Now, even the fish put my nerves on edge. It made me imagine all sorts of creatures that could be lurking in the murky depths.

I was the first one out of the water.
Chapter Five

Trying to push all of the craziness to the back of my mind, I concentrated on cooking. I love to cook. Mom says I should go to culinary school and be a chef on The Food Network someday, but that isn't in my plans.

I lit the charcoal. Then I pulled back the shucks on the corn and dropped a pat of butter in each. I wrapped the corn and potatoes in aluminum foil and when the flames died down, I dropped them on the grill.

An hour later, after fried chicken, corn on the cob, baked potatoes, biscuits and chocolate pie we were completely stuffed.

We wrapped the remains of our meal in aluminum foil for a midnight snack, and then sat in the swings hanging from the rafters under the cabin.

James was complaining about Amber's habit of talking and texting all night. "I mean, I love the girl, but I need a break once in awhile. It's nice to just play a video game or watch TV at night and relax. But that's not going to happen. She expects me to be on the phone with her 24/7."

"Just turn your phone off at night," Taylor suggested.

"I did, but she figured out what I was doing and pouted for two days."

Then a mosquito bit Taylor on the back of his neck, so he was ready to go inside.

It was dusk dark when we were headed up the cabin stairs and James' excited shout drew our attention. "Hey, look at that!"

I stood rooted to the ground as a dust devil spun along the dirt road toward us. It was swirling and gathering dust and speed as it bounced along the road.

I was about to race up the stairs to take shelter from the approaching dirt bath when it suddenly switched course and zipped into the woods.

"Hey y'all, was that dust devil spinning clockwise or counterclockwise?" James asked.

"Counterclockwise, why?" I said. "What difference does that make?"

"We studied about the Navajo Indians just last year, BJ. Don't you remember?"

"Not really," I said. "I don't have a photographic memory like you do."

"True," James said.

"Anyway, what has any of this got to do with the Navajo Indians?"

"The Navajo refer to dust devils as chindi. They believe they are the ghosts or spirits of the dead. Their religious belief is that a dust devil is actually the last breath to leave the body at death."

He looked at me and then toward the woods. We watched the swirling cloud of dust until it disappeared through the trees. "They believe that if the chindi spins clockwise it's a good omen. If it spins counterclockwise...well...a bad omen."

My throat was suddenly as dry as a powder keg.

"Gram says that nothing good ever comes from a dust devil."

Gram and I had seen a similar dust devil a few days before my fateful trip to the Indian Mound. That was the day I had also seen a man, a horse, and a fire that wasn't really there.

I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that seeing another dust devil just before dark didn't bode well for any of us.

I tried to shove thoughts of the dust devil into the back of my mind with the Indian chief and his horse. To be honest, it was getting pretty crowded in there.

Inside the cabin we began a game of Monopoly. I was too exhausted for frog gigging tonight. I needed something to completely occupy my mind and keep thoughts of the Indian chief out.

If that was possible.

I always win at Monopoly, but tonight I couldn't get into the game of high stakes real estate.

I didn't notice when one of them landed on my property, so I forget to charge rent. Then, I didn't remember to collect my $200.00 when I passed go. You can bet that James, the banker, wasn't about to remind me. He wanted to win the game too badly.

Too late, I noticed that James had put hotels on Park Place and Boardwalk.

About an hour into the game I was so sleepy that I could hardly hold my eyes open. I was actually to the point of hoping to land on James' Park Place just so the game would end.

On my next roll, much to my relief, I did.

"Busted!" James squealed like a stuck pig. "You are flat broke, BJ, and you will be soon, Taylor. So why not save yourself the humiliation of losing to me and admit defeat now?"

"Just roll the dice and don't worry about how much money I have," Taylor snapped as he popped the top on a Cheerwine. "The game isn't over yet, big boy."

He absolute hated to lose. Especially to someone who crowed about winning as much as James did.

I wasn't in the mood to listen to their bickering. I knew it would only escalate until one of them finally bankrupted the other. So I climbed up the ladder into the top bunk.

I was waiting for them to finish the game and turn off the lantern. But since I hadn't had a decent night's sleep since the trip to the Indian Mound, I was sound asleep in seconds.

Sometime during the night I woke up to find the cabin pitch black.

Which idiot had turned out all the lanterns?

Taylor!

The dimwit. It had to be him. James probably hadn't slept in a totally dark room since he was in diapers.

I lay there wondering what had awakened me from a deep sleep.

Then I heard it again.
Chapter Six

"Hey listen!" I whispered to the others.

I was straining to hear above the steady hum of croaking frogs, chirping crickets, hooting owls and other woodland critters that came out of the forest late at night.

"Did y'all hear that? It sounds like a horse snorting or something."

"No, I didn't hear anything BJ," Taylor mumbled. He covered his head with a pillow. I knew this from his next muffled words. "Go to sleep, would you? The only unusual sound I hear is James and his snoring. Stuff a corncob in his mouth why don't you?"

The second I shut my eyes there it was again. The sound of an animal blowing large amounts of air through his nostrils.

Why didn't it wake the others? It sounded like the animal had a bugle stuck up his nose to me.

James was sleeping peacefully through all the commotion, as usual.

And Taylor had enough pillows over his head to muffle the blast from a Civil War cannon.

Then I heard the snort again.

What was that?

The sound was drifting through the window beside me. Yet the actual noise seemed to be coming from Grandpa's pumpkin patch beside the cabin.

Then I figured out what the noise must be. Evidently, deer or some other wild animal was eating Grandpa's pumpkins and trampling his vines.

He had carried buckets of water from the river in the blazing sun to water those pumpkins. I couldn't just lay here while his entire crop was destroyed.

I climbed down from my top bunk, almost losing my balance when my foot accidentally slipped into the multiple folds of James's stomach.

My slightly overweight friend swatted at my foot like it was a fly and rolled to the other side. Then he mumbled a few choice words and continued snoring without missing a beat.

As I moved to the window, all was quiet. I thought maybe I had imagined the noise or perhaps even dreamed it.

I looked toward the pumpkin patch and didn't see anything. Then, glancing toward the river I saw movement among the rocks.

It looked like a cow. That must have been the noise I heard, but boy was she ever lost.

There weren't any cow pastures around for miles. There were two large dairy farms in the area, but I had never known the cows to get loose and travel this far from their barn.

If I left her free to roam the countryside she would probably return to the pumpkin patch for a midnight pumpkin vine snack. The patch would be ruined. I couldn't let that happen.

The only logical thing to do was tie her to one of the cabin stilts to keep her from doing any more damage to the crop. I would let Grandpa decide what to do with the cow in the morning.

All I wanted was to tie the blasted animal up and go back to sleep.

I grabbed a rope from the balcony. As my luck would have it, a cloud passed directly over the moon leaving me to stumble blindly down the stairs. It was so dark that I could hardly see how to put one foot in front of the other.

This was insane. I had to be crazy to be out rambling around the riverbank in the middle of the night. And why hadn't I grabbed a flashlight?

Well, because the moon had been shining as bright as day when I had looked out the window.

Unfortunately, it wasn't now, and snakes and who knows what else come out at night.

I could barely see how to climb down the steep riverbank myself. If the moon didn't come back out soon, how would I ever lead a cow up the slippery slope?

I relaxed, thinking my problem solved when the clouds parted and the moon once again illuminated the dark night.

It only took two seconds to realize that my problem was definitely not solved?

Far from eliminating my problem the moon had only brought it into sharper focus.

How could I have been so stupid? I should have known. I mean, was I brain dead or what? A preschooler could have figured this one out.

I had no doubt that I was about to pay dearly for my stupidity and lack of reasoning skills.

What I saw caused my mouth to open for a bloodcurdling scream, but nothing came out. My mouth was as dry as if I had just eaten a bowl of cornbread and milk without the milk.

All was quiet as I stood face to face with the palomino horse from the Indian Mound and he was monstrous.

We stared each other dead in the eye for a few seconds before I noticed a glowing light on the rock bed behind him.

The glow came from a fire.

I walked toward the fire and stopped dead in my tracks.

OMG!

It was happening again.

I shuddered when I saw Chief Red Feather sitting beside the fire, calmly smoking his long pipe.

"What do you want from me?" I whispered. I was too terrified to say the words out loud.

He held his head back and blew several perfect smoke rings, before speaking. "It is time for Running Deer to become a man."

Who is this Running Deer that he keeps talking about?

Hopefully, not me. I can promise you that I had never felt less manly in my life. But who else could he be referring to when the only one's present are me, him, and a horse?

"Who is... Running Deer?"

He motioned for me to sit down on a stump opposite him, so I did.

He took another puff on his pipe and said, "When a boy reaches his twelfth year of life, it is time for him to leave childish ways behind and become a man."

Says who?

"You will face a difficult challenge before the sun greets the new day." He picked up a big stick and poked at the fire. "During this rite of passage, you will either meet with success or failure."

"But I don't want to participate in your rite of passage. I'm not ready to be a man," I insisted. I moved closer to the warmth of the fire. The night air was chilly. "In 2017, I'm still considered to be a child."

Chief Red Feather nodded his head solemnly. "You must pass the coming of age test, or you will be a weak and useless warrior."

"I'm not a warrior. I'm a twelve year old boy. Give me a break."

Chief Red Feather stood to his feet and started walking around the fire. He was chanting some words that I couldn't understand.

When he passed in front of me, he reached out his hand and smeared something across my forehead. "Before you greet the morning sun, you will hold the lives of many in your hands."

The lives of many?

He had to be joking.

I couldn't be responsible for one life besides my own, let alone many.

"I refuse to participate in your ritual." I crossed my arms over my chest and started backing up. "Count me out."

"Red Feather Smudge Running Deer."

Smudge?

"What is a smudge?"

He held a turtle shell in his hand. "Sage, cedar, tobacco and sweet grass."

I watched as his stuck a stick into the fire. Then he touched the glowing ember to the ingredients in the shell. When it started to burn, he blew out the flame until only smoke was rising from the shell.

Next he pulled what looked to be a small birds entire wing from his pouch.

"This is the the left wing, the heart side of an Eagle. It is what we call a prayer fan."

Leaning over me, he used the prayer fan to blow the smoke into my face while chanting some strange words.

"The smoke will purify Running Deer."

I had a choking fit as the smoke clogged my lungs. When I could breathe again, I pointed to the cabin. "Taylor will be thirteen in a few months. Let him take the test."

"This test is not for Soaring Eagle, or Spirit Warrior."

I briefly wondered who was who. For some reason I thought James was Soaring Eagle and Taylor was Spirit Warrior.

Then Chief Red Feather drew my attention back to him with his next words. "The test is only for Running Deer."

How did I get so lucky?
Chapter Seven

I stood there getting more nervous by the second. A breeze ruffled the horse's soft white tail and mane. Then I watched as great blasts of fog filled the dewy night air when he breathed.

Chief Red Feather made a running start and leaped onto the horses' back. I have to admit; he was pretty agile for an elderly man. I stood there speechless as the horse began slowly walking upriver.

Were they leaving?

It was like I was frozen to the spot. I was unable to make my feet, my voice, or any other part of my body function.

Then Chief Red Feather turned around to look back at me and said, "Running Deer, follow Red Feather."

I couldn't even find words for such a ridiculous suggestion. I just stood there shaking my head.

Nope.

Not happening.

When I was at last able to form sensible words, I found myself talking to what I now accepted was the ghost of a dead Indian chief. "You cannot be serious."

The horse tossed his great head upriver, and took a few more steps. Then he stopped and turned around to gaze at me with his huge charcoal eyes.

He kept repeating this same movement, but each time with a little more conviction than the time before.

To be honest, I was more terrified than I had been when a snake had fallen out of a tree and into the boat with Grandpa and me on our last fishing trip.

Surely the demented creature couldn't really expect me to follow him.

Did I look that crazy?

Evidently I did, because the horse seemed to grow extremely annoyed when I didn't move a muscle. He tossed his head wildly, snorting and stomping the ground with his huge hooves. Then he began to paw the riverbed sending rocks and mud flying in all directions.

The outraged beast was in a really crappy mood. And you can believe that I was not waiting around to witness any more of his midnight spectacle.

As unbelievable as it sounds, I shot up that steep riverbank like it was a flight of stairs. Then I raced toward the cabin shrieking like a train whistle with every step.

I didn't slow down until I was inside the cabin and leaning against a locked door.

"Taylor!" I fell to my knees beside his bunk wheezing in his ear. "Wake up! He's here!"

"Okay," Taylor groaned and rolled over. "Go back to sleep and I'll see whatever it is in the morning."

"Taylor!" I grabbed a flashlight from the table and shone the beam directly in his face. "Get up! Chief Red Feather is outside."

This made him open one eye and scream as the light nearly blinded him. He knocked the flashlight out of his face and yawned. "Who is Chief Red Feather?"

"The ghost of an Indian chief that I met at the Indian Mound. I didn't tell anyone about it... but... he's outside. Now get up."

"What do you mean by... ghost?" Taylor asked sitting sat straight up in the bed. "Do you mean as in an apparition, spirit... kind of... ghost

"The kind of ghost that we are becoming way too familiar with, Taylor."

"Where is he?" Taylor whispered nervously.

"He's down at the river," I said. "Come on and I'll show you.

"Are you crazy!" Taylor groaned and fell back on the bed. "I'm not walking down to the river in the the dark. You know snakes and stuff come out at night."

I sat down in a chair at the kitchen table. I must have looked pretty upset, because Taylor finally agreed to walk to the river with me.

"Okay, I'll go. But you better believe that if I get bitten by a snake and die, I will come back and haunt your sorry tail far worse than some dead Indian chief ever dreamed of doing."

Let him haunt me. I was thoroughly convinced that my life couldn't get any worse.

"I'll take my chances." He followed me out the door and down the cabin steps.

Please, let the Indian and his horse still be there.

Please let someone besides me see this poltergeist...ghoul...ghost...apparition... thing.

We hurried down the path to the river without saying a word until we stood on the riverbank. The full moon revealed that Chief Red Feather and his horse had already ridden into the sunset.
Chapter Eight

"He's gone." I ran out on the riverbed and looked up and down the river. There was not a trace of the Indian chief or his horse. I ran to the spot where the horse had stood and saw where his huge hooves had dug a deep hole in the rock bed.

All that was left was a muddy puddle.

"And that's a good thing," Taylor was quick to say.

We walked back to the cabin without saying another word.

James sat up in bed when he heard the door close. "Where did y'all go in the middle of the night?"

"I saw the ghosts of an Indian chief and his horse down by the river. I took Taylor down to the river to see him, but he was already gone."

"Oh." James laid back down for two seconds and then jumped straight up, banging his head in the process. You saw who? Where?"

"Chief Red Feather. I first met his... ghost when we went on the field trip to the Indian Mound. I guess he followed me here."

James' hiccups echoed around the room. "So you are telling me that you had a sighting of this Indian chief here, at the river, tonight?"

"He was here, James." I removed my shoes and grabbed a bottle of water out of the cooler. Turning the bottle up, I guzzled it and threw the empty bottle in the trash. "It's starting again."

"Tell me everything from the beginning." James said.

I repeated every detail of my horrifying encounters, starting with my first sighting at the Indian Mound. When I finished, James seemed lost in thought for a long time before finally speaking.

"BJ, we both know that the Indian chief wasn't simply taking a midnight stroll down by the river. He was here for a reason and the only way to end it is for him to reveal to you what that reason is."

"I know."

James was watching me intently. "Did he try to show you anything or lead you anywhere?"

"Actually, Chief Red Feather, and especially his horse, insisted that I follow them. And when I didn't, the horse started tossing his head and getting furious. That's when I got nervous and ran back to the cabin."

"He has something to show you." James walked over to the window and looked down toward the river. "And we all know that he won't rest until you have seen it."

Taylor was deathly pale, not saying a word.

James left his bed and popped the top on a Cheerwine. "Did he give you any clue as to why he was here?"

"He mentioned some coming of age test, or a rite of passage. He said it was time for me to leave childish ways behind and become a man."

"A coming of age ritual," Taylor said. "I remember the guide at the Indian Mound mentioning something about it."

"I missed that part of the tour. It must have been when I went to the restroom and had my first sighting of Red Feather," I said. "What did he say."

"He said that for an Indian boy to be considered a man, he must endure a rite of passage."

"And what is that?"

"It's some type of coming of age ceremony which may include a tattoo or the piercing of a body part. Then, he can either face a dangerous challenge, or be separated from the tribe to spend several days alone, fasting."

A dangerous challenge?

"Chief Red Feather mentioned something about a challenge," I whispered. "He said that I would hold the lives of many people in my hands before the morning sun rises to greet the new day."

For the first time in history, James was speechless as he swiped at the beads of sweat dotting his forehead with the back of his hand. "You just have to be ready, so that when he does return you won't run away again. It's pointless, really. You can't outrun a ghost."

"Don't bet any money on that," I said. "Because you just might lose."

Then I rolled over and tried to go to sleep.

However, sleep proved to be elusive.

The woods were full of small furry creatures scurrying around in the dark. I was sure that each sound that I heard was the horse snorting.

And it was so hot.

I will admit that it would have probably been a good twenty degrees cooler if I had uncovered my head. Ha! That wasn't about to happen.

Every time I closed my eyes I heard a replay of James' ominous warning in my head, "He will be back."

Well, let him come back.

I didn't have to follow him anywhere. Let Taylor or James go trailing along after him. I didn't sign up for this...ghost mission. Let him go find some other kid to terrorize.

After forty-five minutes my lungs were pleading for mercy. I was convinced that I might die from either heat stroke or suffocation.

This was ridiculous.

I had to have some air.

I snatched the covers off my head, gasping for a fresh breath.

My shorts were soaking wet from sweat and clinging to my body. My hair was glued to my scalp.

Man, what I wouldn't give to be at home right now in my air conditioned room. I would be sipping on an ice cold Mountain Dew and snacking on a bag of ChexMix, while watching _Through the Worm Hole with Morgan Freeman._

How wonderful it would feel right now to be relaxing on my soft cushion topped mattress.

I inhaled deeply of the crisp night air and wondered for the one-thousandth time how I had gotten myself into this unbelievable nightmare.

But, come to think of it, I didn't really do anything.

_It_ came to me.

_Why_ it chose me, I don't have a clue.

I lifted my face to the window to feel the cool breeze.

That is when I opened my eyes to one of the greatest horrors of my entire life.
Chapter Nine

What I saw caused my heart to slam against my ribcage and then hammer out a mad pounding in my chest. I gave it my best effort, but I couldn't even scream.

My vocal chords were frozen with fear as Chief Red Feather's horse glared back at me. I could smell his foul breath. Death, with a surprising mixture of fresh grass. Then I smelled his fur, wet dog, like he had been wading in the river.

At present, his eyes were charcoal, instead of glowing red. Unfortunately, I knew how swiftly that could change.

But seriously?

Who cares about any of that when a ghost is glowering at you through a window screen a few inches from your face? This could not be happening.

Yet, it was.

Again I tried to scream and alert the others, but not even a squeak could find a way past my numb lips.

I beat on the mattress with my feet trying to wake James, but it was impossible since he was busy dreaming and mumbling the name Amber over and over in a lovesick tone.

I kicked the bunk as hard as I could, yet he continued snoring. I grabbed the flashlight that I kept beside the bed for emergencies and threw it at Taylor.

Both of my so called friends continued counting sheep, even as I struggled to draw air into my starving lungs.

Just as I was about to launch myself across the room and onto Taylor's bed to shake him awake to see this thing, the horse snorted at me.

Snorted at, and on, me. He blew a cloud of foggy mist through the screen to settle on my face. This brought me back to my senses quick, fast, and in a hurry. I sucked in a lungful of night air before finally finding my voice and using it full force.

Pulling the covers over my head I screamed, yelled, and hollered. As Gram would say, I just plain out caterwauled until I finally heard the sound of feet hitting the cabin floor.

Taylor lit a lantern and put his hand over my mouth to stifle my hysterical screams. Then he began shaking me roughly by the shoulders. "What's wrong, BJ?

"The... horse... is... in... the... window." I knew he could barely hear my trembling voice through the pillow and blanket that I had covered my head with.

"Which window?" Taylor asked. "There's nothing in the window."

I stuck the very tip of one finger out of the cover just long enough to point to the window beside my head. "That one." It was hard to tell which one was shaking more, my finger or my voice.

Taylor was apparently so concerned for my sanity that he attempted to make a joke to ease the tension in the room. "BJ you realize that window is at least fifteen feet off the ground, right?"

I nodded my head.

"So how did our friendly neighborhood Indian peer through the window at you? Did he levitate? Sprout wings? Hang from the roof by a rope?" He propped his feet up on my bed, nervously waiting for my answer.

"He was on his horse."

Taylor's eyes grew as large as saucers as he whispered, "He has a flying horse?"

Actually, the thought hadn't even occurred to me and when he brought it to my attention. I began to tremble violently.

The beast could fly.

I had to clench my teeth to stop the other two from hearing their noisy chattering.

James shivered, having been startled out of his romantic dreams of Amber by my panicked screams. "He is determined to show you something, BJ."

I nodded my head. "I know."

"Then follow him for crying out loud before he gets really mad and decides to...oh...I don't know...kill us all!"

All I wanted at that moment was to go to my house and crawl into my bed.

"I'm going to call my Mom and tell her to come get us. I can't deal with the Indian tonight."

"I second that motion," Taylor said.

"You are only postponing the inevitable," James mumbled.

I looked at my phone, then glanced up at Taylor and back at my phone. No signal. Seriously? Grandpa had just called to check on us earlier. Mom had called about twenty times today and Grandma at least five.

And now suddenly there was no signal?

How weird was that?

"Taylor, I don't have a signal. Try your phone."

"I don't have a signal either." Taylor had talked on his phone several times earlier. "It's probably just a storm in the area blocking signals."

"The only thing blocking signals around here is Chief Red Feather and I think we all know it," I said. Holding my phone above my head hoping for a signal, I heard the beep that meant I had received a text message. "It's working."

I quickly retrieved the message and almost suffered a coronary event as I read: Running Deer must stay away from river.

Let's just say I had a screaming episode that put all previous ones to shame.

I couldn't help it!

I threw the phone across the room like it was a hairy tarantula.

Taylor picked up the phone and read the message. Running Deer must stay away from river. "What does that mean, BJ? Who sent you this message? And who is Running Deer?"

All the blood seemed to drain from his face as he said, "It's from an Unknown Caller."

A cold chill crept down my spine as I recalled Chief Red Feather's grim warning. How could I have totally ignored his bone chilling words?

Suddenly, I knew that I was Running Deer.

He had warned me to stay away from the river.

Why hadn't I listened?

Thanks to my carelessness, the others were in as much danger as I was now.

I had a confession to make.

"I forgot to tell y'all one other thing about my...for lack of a better word...haunting at the Indian Mound."

"What, BJ?" James whispered nervously. "There's more? Sheesh! What did you forget to tell us?"

"Chief Red Feather gave me a... warning."
Chapter Ten

"He did what!" James screeched. Forgetting that he had a can of Cheerwine in his hand, he slapped his forehead hard enough to give himself a concussion. "How could you have forgotten to tell me that?"

We heard a loud painful "Ouch!" before he shoved Taylor aside. He almost knocked him out of the chair in his haste to stand before me. "First, please reassure me that you had the common sense to heed his words."

I could only look at him, saying nothing. I wasn't about to admit to my own stupidity.

"What did he say, BJ?"

"He said for me to...um..."

"Say it, BJ."

"He said for me to stay away from the river."

They both glared at me with clenched fists and accusing eyes.

Then James jerked his finger in my face and shrieked, "Stay away from the river! Are you serious! If you had told us this earlier we would all be at home now, safe in our beds. Instead we are stuck at the river with no way to contact anyone for help."

He ran his hands nervously through his hair. "The Indian chief has us in his clutches now, right where he wanted us. Our lives are at stake and you forgot?"

Moving to the table, he snatched the lid off the pickle jar and began eating one dill pickle after the other. When the jar was empty he drank the pickle juice and then started pacing the floor.

He went back to the table, opened a Moon Pie and gobbled it down in two bites. "Now...well...to be honest...there's no telling what he might do to us before this night is over. I could speculate. But, whatever happens, you can't say that Chief Red Feather didn't warn you."

We all accepted the warning now, too late.

We were in serious danger.

We knew there was no way to get home short of riding our four-wheelers up that dark winding river road.

I knew beyond a doubt that Chief Red Feather and his trusty steed would be waiting for me in the middle of the road at every turn. That is if I was brave enough to try it.

Which I wasn't.

We were stranded here until morning. "Switch bunks with me James. I won't ever sleep beside of a window again as long as I live."

James was sitting at the table eating a cold chicken leg and nibbling on an ear of corn. All the while he was clutching a can of Cheerwine like he imagined it to be made from stronger stuff than carbonated water. He looked unusually pale in the lantern light.

Taylor was no longer cracking jokes. He peeled a cucumber with his pocket knife and sprinkled it with salt before taking a bite. He looked concerned that I might be about to go off the deep end or something.

He sat in the chair beside my bed, watching me like I had suddenly developed an incurable case of some mental illness.

"Just try to stay calm, BJ." Taylor said. "We're safe in here, for now."

"Why don't I feel safe?"

"I don't know, but just... try not to worry. It's only a few more hours until morning and then we can go home. We will go to school on Monday and forget this night ever even happened."

Morning seemed an eternity away.

An hour passed and nothing happened, so I slowly began to relax.

James had pulled the windows down and closed the blinds. It was stifling hot, but at least we couldn't see out now. Even better still, nothing could see in.

My breathing had almost returned to normal, but I was still too afraid to move.

Even if I lived to the ripe old age of 100, I would never forget turning my face to the window for a breath of fresh air.

Seeing that horse staring back at me and feeling the hot blast of air that he forced through his nostrils to settle on my face had almost stopped my heart.

If it had registered in my brain at the time that he was floating fifteen feet in the air, I would have lost control of all my bodily functions at once.

I couldn't go on living like this. Never knowing what would happen next.

Something had to give.
Chapter Eleven

James was no longer stuffing his face. Possibly because there wasn't any food left to stuff it with.

"BJ, the ghost will not rest until you see whatever he has come back to show you?"

"Shut up, James." Taylor threw a shoe and watched it bounce off James's head. "Can't you see that we are all scared enough already without you bringing up dead people? If you even think about mentioning that stupid Indian again, I'm going to shove my other shoe where the sun don't shine."

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Now, let's all just calm down and try to get some sleep. We'll go home as soon as the sun comes up."

Amazingly, James let the incident with the shoe rest. This was unusual and very out of character for him. He must really have a lot on his mind.

During the lull in their arguing, I decided to inform them of a decision that I had made during the last few minutes.

"James is right. The ghost won't give up. Like he said if I don't follow him tonight, I will only be postponing the inevitable. He will just keep coming back. So the next time he comes, I'm going to follow him."

I'm not sure how I went from being scared senseless, to accepting the fact that I was going to follow two spirits from the other side.

But it happened.

Maybe I realized that there wasn't much more Chief Red Feather, or his horse, could do. I mean they couldn't frighten me any worse than I had already been frightened over the last few months.

Could they?

Somehow this acceptance gave me some peace of mind and I was able to relax enough to become drowsy.

I was at that in between place where you are no longer awake, yet not fully asleep. Suddenly I was jerked upright by James's worst fit of hiccups to date, along with some pretty horrific screams.

His screams were even louder than mine had been earlier.

In my heart, I knew exactly why he was screaming. I just never in a million years expected the reason to be in the same room with us.

But it was.

Chief Red Feather sat proudly atop his enormous horse. The beast stood, unmoving, in the center of the cabin with his dark eyes boring into mine.

The wet dog smell filled the cabin and water dripped from his long tail to puddle on the floor.

He was looking me dead in the eyes. Somehow I knew the creature meant business this time.

I was in the top bunk, yet I could have reached out my hand and touched his back.

His enormous body seemed to fill the cabin and... he waited.

I glanced over at Taylor. His eyes were wide and his jaw was hanging open so far that I could count his teeth.

He was in shock. I knew the feeling well. His lips were moving, but he wasn't saying a word. He just sat there clutching the thin sheet to his chest like a shield.

He looked so frightened that I didn't even have the heart to say I told you so.

The horses' back half was facing Taylor. Without warning the beast swished his tail smacking Taylor full in the face.

This brought him around.

He screamed and jumped off the bunk like a village of fire ants had built a nest in his mattress.

His eyes darted from side to side like a trapped animal and he began edging toward the window. He was pressed hard against the wall, trying desperately to disappear into it.

I could see beads of sweat on his forehead glistening in the lantern light.

The horses' massive frame was blocking the only exit. Surely Taylor wasn't planning to jump out of a fifteen-foot high window.

He would break his fool neck.

However, judging from the look of stark terror in his eyes, the thought of bodily harm would probably never even occur to him.

"Don't even think about it Taylor," I whispered. "Just try to calm down. If he meant to harm us I would probably be dead by now."

Even as I said these words the horse turned his head toward Taylor and snorted.

Taylor didn't move another muscle.

Poor James had finally stopped screaming, but he was deathly pale. He had crawled behind the bunk and his body was wedged between the bed and the wall. Only his nose was sticking out for air.

The only sound in the cabin was his non-stop, rapid-fire hiccups echoing around the otherwise quiet room.

The horse lifted one huge hoof and brought it down on the wooden floor with such force that the cabin walls vibrated around us and rattled our teeth.

He was getting impatient, that was easy to see.

Chief Red Feather slammed the blunt edge of his spear down on the floor of the cabin and said, "It is time."

Time for what?

To die?

Accepting the fact that there was no escaping him, I said, "Okay, you win. Just get it over with."

Chief Red Feather's eyes never left me as I put on my clothes and shoes.

I glanced around and was stunned to see Taylor also getting dressed.

James peeped over the mattress and was even more shocked than I had been to find Taylor tying his shoes.

"Where are you going?" James tried to whisper the words out of the corner of his mouth, hoping not to draw undue attention to himself.

Even Chief Red Feather had glanced his way a couple of times to see where the ear shattering hiccups were coming from before returning his attention to me.

"I'm going with, BJ. Where did you think I was going?" was Taylor's startling reply.

"You're going to do what?" James screeched. He was greatly alarmed by this sudden turn of events. "Are you crazy? I am not about to stay here alone while you two go gallivanting after a ghost in the middle of the night."

"Well, make a quick decision James," Taylor said. "Because if you don't go you will be staying here alone."
Chapter Twelve

"This is insane!" James cried. Cutting his eyes toward Taylor, he began changing his underwear. "Why are you going when BJ is the only one he wants. There is no logical reason for us to go trailing along. He'll probably kill us just to get us out of his way."

"I'm not going to let BJ go alone, James. Have you lost what little mind you had to begin with? There's no telling where Chief Red Feather might take him on this quest."

"You certainly have had a change of heart in the last few minutes, Taylor." I said. "What happened?"

Taylor nodded toward the horse. "I'll admit that when I first saw this...this creature, my first reaction was to run fast and far."

"Mine too," I said.

Taylor reached up to feel his hair. "Is my hair white?"

"No, why?"

"You know, sometimes you watch a horror movie where the person gets so scared that their hair turns white. Just checking. Anyway, like you said, if he was here to harm us he would have done so by now. And let's face it, there is no denying that he is real."

He cut his eyes toward James. "So, I say we follow him. We can't hide from him. We can all agree on that, right?"

"Evidently," I mumbled.

"That is what I have been saying all along," James added.

"Therefore, what I am trying to say is, if he takes you he takes me too, BJ."

"If he takes you he takes me," James mimicked. He was mad enough to chew nails and spit bullets.

He hated sounding so lily livered while Taylor came off smelling like a rose.

"You had better hurry up and get dressed, James," Taylor said. "Or you will be staying here by your lonesome in these dark woods."

The words achieved their purpose and James was fully dressed in seconds.

When everyone was ready, I slowly inched my way behind the huge beast. "Let's get this over with."

I eased open the door, praying all the while that the horse wouldn't kick me upside the head with a gigantic hoof when I turned my back on him.

"I wonder how he got in with the door locked?" James asked.

We exited the cabin in a tight little huddle.

"How do you think he got in you moron?" Taylor whispered back. "You know James, to be so book smart you don't have a lick of common sense."

We followed the horse down the steps.

Each time his huge hooves fell on the wooden stairs it sounded like thunder echoing in the stillness of the quiet night.

"I'm surprised all of this noise didn't wake us when he was coming up the steps." Taylor and I both turned and looked at James like he had just announced his purchase of season tickets for the Charlotte Symphony.

Then sudden realization dawned on him and he went pale all over again. "Oh, right. He just walked through the door, didn't he?"

The moon was bright. We had no trouble seeing as we followed the horse down the path, down the steep muddy bank, and out onto the rock bed. He turned left and started up the river.

I couldn't imagine where he was leading us.

Over the years, I had walked up this river hundreds of times when it was dry. I had never noticed anything out of the ordinary. Certainly nothing spectacular enough to bring an Indian chief back from the grave to show me.

Obviously, he thought otherwise.

The horse strode up the river, sailing over slippery moss covered rocks that we practically had to crawl across on all fours. I wondered what could be this important.

Evidently, James was wondering the same thing.

"BJ, I have a really bad feeling about all of this. Sort of like a premonition of impending doom or something. I mean, nothing good can come of this. Right?"

"Gram said that dust devils were a bad omen," I said. "I should have listened to her."

James looked at the moon for several seconds before speaking again. "Chief Red Feather warned you to stay away from the river. I mean for crying out loud, that was a sign if I ever heard one. And here we are marching right square in the middle of it. This is suicidal."

"That shows what you know." Taylor had a smug expression on his face. "You know, the more I think about this, the more I'm convinced that this old Indian isn't so bad after all."

He picked up a rock and sent it skipping across the water. "I don't know what got into me back there in the cabin, but I'm man enough to admit that I almost lost my Doritos when I first saw him. And that's still considerably less than you lost, James."

He cut his eyes at James, daring him to dispute his words.

When no rebuttal was forthcoming, he continued. "Heck, those two could make Freddie Krueger chew his nails down to the quick. But do you want to know what I think?"

"Pray tell," was James's unenthusiastic reply.

"I am convinced that Chief Red Feather is leading us to a buried treasure. Haven't you ever heard that if you follow a ghost it will lead you to a pot of gold?"

"No," I answered. "I can't say that I have."

"That's a leprechaun, you idiot," James mumbled.

I pressed the button to illuminate my watch and saw that it was 1:10am.

Somehow I knew that Taylor was way off base on this one. "That's not where this ghost is leading us."

I was certain that Chief Red Feather had returned for a purpose far greater than money.

I was positive of it.

Nevertheless, what that reason was, I couldn't even begin to figure out. I was too busy concentrating on keeping my footing on the slippery rocks.
Chapter Thirteen

"I have to rest," I said, sitting down on a rock.

Before the words were out of my mouth Chief Red Feather's horse turned and looked directly at me. He snorted, then he tossed his great head and motioning forward.

I was just about to get tired of this furry beast ordering me around.

"Chill out for a few minutes," I shouted. "Can't you see how tired we are?"

"I don't really think he cares," James grumbled.

"Why me?" I whispered. I stood to my feet and struggled to climb over the moss covered rocks that were more slippery than a sheet of ice.

"What did you say, BJ?" Taylor asked.

"Nothing."

"You know what they say," James whispered to Taylor out of the side of his mouth. "It's okay to talk to yourself. It's when you start answering yourself that you have a problem."

"Why me?" I said out loud this time. "Why is this crazy Indian chief haunting me?"

"I've been asking myself that same question," Taylor replied.

"I don't know why a ghost would choose you to haunt, BJ." James was trying to keep his balance and shake a rock out of his shoe at the same time. "But I have a sinking suspicion that we'll find out the answer before this night is over."

"I know we will," I said. "Chief Red Feather said that I would hold the lives of many in my hands before the morning sun greets the new day."

"What does that mean?" Taylor asked.

"I wish I knew."

James put his shoe back on and rubbed his stomach. "I wish I had a Snickers bar."

"You just ate three fourths of a chicken, a dozen ears of corn and a box of Moon Pies." Taylor was quick to remind him. "You cannot still be hungry."

"Even though that was a slight exaggeration of my midnight snack, you know water always makes me hungry." James put his hands on his hips and glared at Taylor. "Plus, I am a nervous eater."

"Well, you might want to see about getting a prescription for some nerve pills before you get as big as the broad side of a barn."

Chief Red Feather's horse stopped their ribbing from escalating into a full fledged argument with a loud snort and a toss of his head.

Suddenly a feeling of intense anger washed over me. I was furious at the horse, the Indian chief, the circumstances, and this night in general. "I'm going to put a stop to this nonsense right now."

I can't say where I got the courage, but I ran ahead of the horse. Then I stopped and turned around to face him.

Unfortunately, he didn't seem the least bit concerned by my small showing of courage. To be honest, I would even say that Chief Red Feather had a smirk on his face.

Then the horse leaned over and touched his big, wet, cold nose to mine.

Suddenly, I didn't feel quite as brave as I had only seconds earlier.

Now that I was face to face with the enormous beast, I came to a sudden realization. If he wanted to go to all this trouble to show me... something... hey, who was I to argue?

Evidently he had drawn the same conclusion and wanted me out of his way, because he snorted at me.

Only this time he pushed a gob of what I can only describe as nasal secretions out of his nose and into my face.

Snot for lack of a better word.

I gagged and wiped at the sticky, gelatinous, gooey mess with the back of my hand. This only smeared it across my face.

I didn't open my mouth to say a word, too afraid his mucus would get in.

I quickly jumped out of his way and dove into one of the deep holes of water to scrub every inch of my face. But his snot clung to my skin like Elmer's glue.

Diving back under, I scooped up a handful of sand off the bottom and rubbed my face until it was raw and stinging like fire.

"BJ, are you... alright, man," I heard Taylor ask as I broke the surface of the water. He was gagging, making some really uncomfortable noises and losing his midnight snack.

Taylor was dry heaving and sounding almost as bad. I glanced upriver and saw that Chief Red Feather and his horse were on the move again.

In fact, the horse had walked about one hundred yards upriver and just stood there... waiting.

I should just turn around and go back. I didn't have to take this kind of abuse from any old dead Indian chief and his horse. What could they do to me anyway?

Plenty. Apparently, this was just a small sampling of his temper. No telling what he might do if he really got mad. Still, he could have found a way of convincing me without having to be so gross about it.

I mean who clears their nasal passages on somebody? As Gram would say, "It just isn't done in polite society."

"Go on, BJ," James said with a quivering voice. "We'll be right behind you. And for the love of God don't say anything stupid and get him angry again. That was some pretty disgusting... stuff...that came out of his nose."

"Snot, James," I snapped. "It was snot."

He swallowed, covered his mouth and looked like he might hurl again. "Man, if we live through this night, I doubt that I will be able to eat for a month after seeing that."

"Yeah," Taylor mumbled in agreement. "BJ, you might want to consider zipping your lips before he decides to spray you from the other end."
Chapter Fourteen

Much later, when I was so tired that just the thought of placing one foot in front of the other required way too much effort, James asked, "Where do you think he's taking us?"

No one answered. We were too tired.

We just kept walking.

I wondered how much longer any of us could hold out. Glancing at my watch I saw that it was 3:25 am.

I was exhausted from slipping and sliding over moss covered rocks for the last two hours. Plus, we had to deal with the constant fear of stepping on a snake, and worrying if they were going to release water from the dam at any minute.

If I was this tired, poor James must be on the verge of collapsing.

We heard him squeal every few minutes when a bat swooped too close to his head.

I was about to ignore the horse's hair trigger temper and demand that we be allowed to rest. Then we turned a bend in the river and I saw lights.

"If he keeps walking he'll run right into the dam. And why do you think he insists on walking up the river? We could have easily covered the same distance in half the time if we had walked on the riverbank."

"No argument here." Taylor looked like he was ready to drop as he constantly swatted at a bloodthirsty mosquito that was determined to have him for a late night snack.

"If we are supposed to stay away from the river then why is he making us walk in it?" James asked. "I'm not going to suggest it though, are you? Just the thought of him blowing his nose in my face makes my skin crawl."

The buffalo continued walking while we half crawled and half walked for what seemed like hours. He would occasionally glance back and snort if we slowed down. Then he would beat one of his huge hooves on a rock if one of us even considered sitting down for a much needed break.

When he did, the sound echoed off the rocks filling the night air with vibrations. The sound made the eerie moonlit night even creepier than it already was.

"BJ," James groaned. He fell to his knees on the sharp rocks of the riverbed, not even seeming to care. "I have got to stop. I've been walking and trying to keep my balance on these slippery rocks for hours and I am way past exhaustion."

He sat down on a rock, gasping for breath. "Besides, you know we can't go any closer to the dam. This is getting too dangerous. What if they decide to turn the water on?"

When no one answered, he continued, "We would be covered by several feet of rushing water, that's what. And there would be no way to get out in time. Duh. Stay away from the river. Remember?"

James was quiet for a few minutes as he struggled to get his breathing under control. "Your mom would have a dying duck fit if she knew we were this close to the dam and you know it. She would probably ground you until your senior prom."

"He's right." For once Taylor was in agreement with James. "Let's just turn around and go back."

"I don't think Chief Red Feather would like that," I whispered as I rose to my feet. I was focused on the horses' hindquarters as the creature continued steadily moving toward the dam.

"Who cares what he likes!" Taylor stormed. "Ghost or not, he's not going to lead me into a death trap. Listen, I've been timing him for the last hour. He only turns around to check on us every ten minutes or so. That's plenty of time for us to..."

Taylor gasped and then his terrifying screams echoed across the rocks when he saw the enraged horse charging toward him at full speed.

Before he could draw breath for another scream, the horse stopped directly in front of him. They were standing face to face as the horse breathed great blasts of steam through his nostrils.

The horse's eyes were bright red as he lifted one foot and began pawing the riverbed.

"He's gonna charge!" Taylor shrieked. He found a sudden burst of energy and raced like the wind to hide behind me.

"Then why are you behind me?" I yelled, anxiously moving a few steps away from him.

Ignoring me, Taylor turned to the horse. With a soothing voice he promised, "I get your message loud and clear. Hey, to be honest, I'm not really even that tired anymore. Let's get going, shall we?"

Chief Red Feather cut his eyes at Taylor. "Spirit Warrior not ready to become man yet."

I was right. I knew James was Soaring Eagle.

The horse snorted once more for good measure, turned, and headed toward the dam.

"You are absolutely correct," Taylor called after them. "I have no manly illusions whatsoever."

We breathed a collective sigh and fell in behind him. Taylor was right.

This could very well be a death trap.

Nonetheless, I had to keep going. I wanted this horrible chapter in my life to end, tonight.

Gram had said that what happens twice will happen three times. So, after tonight this would all be over. I would have had my three ghostly encounters.

There would never be anymore.

If I survived my coming of age test tonight.

"You two go on to the riverbank where it's safe. I'm the only one he wants."
Chapter Fifteen

"We are not leaving you, BJ." Taylor insisted. "No freaking way. We're in this together."

"Taylor is right, for once in his life." James said. "We've come this far. We're not going to leave you now."

"Why?" I asked. "It's pointless for both of you to endanger your lives for no reason."

"Because, for one thing, it's obvious that Chief Red Feather's horse isn't particularly fond of you." James gagged a couple of times before continuing. "A face full of...mucus... was proof of that."

"Snot, James." I said. "It was snot. Just say it."

Why did he have such a problem with the word?

"I would rather not...say it. Anyway, Chief Red Feather is probably mad because you've ignored him the whole time that he has been trying to show you something."

"Look James." I decided to try reasoning with him. "We already know that Chief Red Feather can levitate, and walk through locked doors. Do you honestly believe a little river water is going to bother him?"

"It's not him that I'm worried about. Of course it wouldn't bother him. He can just take flight on his flying horse. It would bother you though. And it won't be a little water either."

He made a good point.

"You know good and well what will happen if if they turn the water on. The spot where we are standing right now will be covered by at least ten feet of rushing water in a matter of minutes."

James looked me in the eyes. Deadly serious. "You couldn't survive it, BJ. Even if you are a great swimmer and plan to be a United States Navy Search and Rescue Swimmer one day."

I shook my head. "He isn't giving me a choice."

"I know what you mean," Taylor said. "I would probably just want to get it over with too, if I was in your shoes. But at the same time you have to realize how dangerous this is. If you don't make it out alive, how are we ever going to face your mom again?"

"In that situation it would suck to be you." I laughed. Then I turned serious. "You two go and watch from the bridge, and see where he takes me. You know, in case you need to notify the... police... or something. You'll be safe there."

I turned and began walking towards the solemn Indian Chief. Then, I stopped and turned back to my friends one last time. "Oh, and if you have to tell my mom and Gram and my grandparents... anything... be sure to tell them that I love..."

I stopped, unable finish what I had been about to say.

"We will see you later, BJ," Taylor said. "We will probably have a good laugh about this night tomorrow."

"You think so?" I asked as I tried to hide the doubt in my voice.

"Yeah, I do."

I felt like men must have felt in the old days when they had to walk to the gallows to be hung.

Like I was walking toward my own death.

Where was Chief Red Feather taking me?

Why did he insist on walking in the middle of the river?

And, more importantly, why me?

Was Taylor right? Would this nightmare be over tomorrow? Would I be allowed to live a normal life again after tonight?

As I followed along behind Chief Red Feather's horse, I had to wonder if I would ever see my family, or my best friends again.

Chapter Sixteen

I followed Chief Red Feather for another thirty minutes. Then the dam loomed ahead of us dark and sinister in an eerie fog that floated across the water.

Fog.

Just what this night needed. Like it wasn't already spooky enough and I wasn't already scared past the point of even being scared.

I looked up and saw a single row of nightlights stretching across the top. The lights cast shadows over the soaring concrete structure.

The dam itself was 152 feet high and 3200 feet wide. 21 floodgates made up the majority of width with 4 gigantic turbines, or water wheels, on the right.

It was these water wheels that caused my insides to churn.

If one of those turbines were opened, water would come rushing out of the reservoir behind the dam at a rate of thousands of gallons per second. I remembered this from a tour of the dam my class had taken in the fifth grade.

If by some grand stroke of misfortune they opened all four wheels at once? Well, I couldn't even allow myself to consider that possibility.

Being this close to the wheels gave me the heebie jeebies for real.

Even as I was rolling these thoughts around in my head, the horse kept steadily walking through the increasing fog. It was soaking into my clothes and chilling me to the bone.

We were directly in front of the dam now. Was he going to go around it? Or did he expect me to scale the 152-foot cement wall like it was an obstacle course?

The horse didn't slow down until he stood in front of the first wheel. Why on earth would he go there?

There was absolutely no reason for anyone of sound mind to just stand in front of a dam and wait for water to come rushing out. Then again, I had no idea if ghosts had sound minds.

Still, what possible reason could he have for walking right up to the dam? Sure, he was a ghost and didn't have to worry about dying.

But what about me?

Or was he merely trying to decide how to get me around the towering concrete structure?

I thought about the millions and millions of gallons of water being held back by the dam. As I did an icy cold shiver raced down my spine.

I didn't know what his plans were. But since I couldn't think of a single logical reason to wait patiently for disaster to strike, I quickly decided to go around the dam.

I started walking toward the riverbank. With each step I prayed that there wouldn't be a sudden demand for electricity on a Sunday morning.

The horse saw me walking away and snorted loudly. I stopped and turned to see him tossing his giant head angrily toward the dam.

Crap. His eyes were glowing red.

That was never a good sign.

Let me tell you, you have never really been frightened until you see red eyes glowing at you through a thick, eerie fog at 4:00am in the morning.

"Yeah," I said. I was desperately trying to control the trembling in my voice as I looked toward the dam. "I know it's there. The question is how am I supposed to get around it? You can walk right through it or probably fly over it, but in case you haven't noticed, I can't."

I glanced up at Chief Red Feather. He was watching me intently, but he didn't say a word.

Then I looked at his horse. Double crap. The hair on his back was standing straight up. He was getting all riled up about something.

I looked around, but my eyes kept roaming toward the safety of the bank some 75 feet away.

My mind filled with the horrible possibilities that could happen. Even as I prayed that they wouldn't.

Throwing caution to the wind, I ignored the horse's furious red gaze and slowly began inching toward the bank.

Was that ever a mistake.

The horse definitely lost his cool then. He began pawing the ground slinging rocks, muscle shells, and mud all over me.

His eyes were even darker red than usual.

You can believe that was a sight that will haunt me for the remainder of my days.

However, few they may be.

Okay. I tried to put aside for the moment how truly dangerous my current predicament was and force myself to think logically.

It was safe to assume that whatever he wanted to show me was in this general area, since he showed no sign of budging from it.

The horse must have realized that my mind had wandered to a subject other than him... like... oh... I don't know... living to see another day. He angrily tossed his head toward the dam and snorted.

I decided to humor him until I could somehow figure out a way to get to the safety of the bank.

Couldn't this game of charades be played out just as well on dry ground?

As my mind tumbled over one possible life saving scenario after the other, the stillness of the quiet night was suddenly shattered. It was that heart stopping sound of metal clanging against metal, followed by a slow grinding sound.

Unfortunately, I recognized the sound immediately.

Chapter Seventeen

It was a noise I had heard many times before when one of the four enormous turbines inside the dam started to turn.

Like a film in my mind, I remembered our tour guide's speech last year.

"This dam stores water behind it in the Lake Tillery reservoir.

Near the bottom of the dam wall there is what we call the water intake.

Gravity causes the water to fall through a large pipe inside the dam called a penstock.

At the end of the penstock is a turbine propeller, which is turned by the moving water.

The shaft from the turbine goes up into the generator, which produces the power.

Power lines are connected to the generator.

These lines carry electricity to our homes and businesses.

Then the water continues past the propeller through the tailrace and into the river."

He had motioned to the 4 wide tunnels in the wall where the water would come rushing out.

"By the way, you don't want to be playing in the water below a dam when the water is released."

I had heard the sound of the turbines beginning to spin before. Only then I had been safely fishing from the bank or in a boat with Grandpa.

My eyes seemed to be working in slow motion as I watched the water begin to rise.

Without another thought for Chief Red Feather or his horse, I ran for my life.

I fell down repeatedly and got back up. With each step I prayed for a miracle that would allow me to outrun the water. It would be the toughest challenge I had ever faced, but it was my only chance for survival.

It was only one water wheel.

I knew I had a better than average chance of making it to the bank since I was a strong swimmer.

Then, above the loud roar of the water rushing through the tunnel, I heard the loud squeaking thump of another wheel beginning to rotate. I knew it was over then.

I closed my mind to the horror that was unfolding before my eyes.

Running Deer must stay away from the river.

Then, as if in a dream, I heard two more loud thumps and realized they were about to open all four wheels at once.

I couldn't swim against that much rushing water. Nobody could. And I was directly in the waters path.

Stay away from the river.

In a daze, I watched the rocks around me quickly disappear under the churning water.

I was going to die.

There was no possible way to survive this nightmare. But even though I was faced with impossible odds, you can believe I wasn't going down without a fight.

I took a quick look around to study the situation. It was grim to say the least.

A railroad trestle ran along the front of the dam and the cement support columns were only a few feet away. Needless to say, they were rough cement and at least 40 feet high. It wasn't likely that I could scale one of them in the next few seconds.

But that's about all the time I had.

I knew it was my one and only shot as I made a mad dash for the nearest one.

When I reached the base of the column, I stopped in my tracks. Completely stunned. I couldn't believe my eyes. Talk about a miracle.

There was an old timey rope ladder hanging from the trestle. It was old and frayed and didn't look 100% reliable, but it was definitely a ladder.

"Yes!" I cried.

But where did it come from? I had fished from a boat under this trestle just last week with Grandpa and there hadn't been a ladder here then.

But thank the good Lord one was here now.

I took a quick glance over my shoulder to look for the Indian chief. He wasn't in the water, so he must have made it to the bank safely.

Of course he had.

Duh.

But was he the least bit concerned about saving me? Obviously not. Just goes to show that whatever he wanted me to see wasn't so all fired important after all.

I lunged for the bottom rung of the ladder and grabbed it just as the cold water began to swirl around my knees.

Struggling to grab the second rung, I gasped and then cringed as the icy water soaked into my Fruit of the Looms. Within seconds the water rapidly advanced to my chest.

The rushing water seemed to have icy fingers that clutched at me. Trying to pull me off the slippery ladder.

The strong current succeeded in dragging my feet from the ladder as my fingers held on for dear life, and I prayed.

I reached for the third rung even as I realized it was hopeless. I could already feel my hands beginning to slip. I wouldn't be able to fight the strong pull of the powerful current much longer.

The ice cold water that had seconds earlier been at the bottom of the reservoir began to lap around my neck. It filled my ears.

Then it was sloshing up my nose and I couldn't breathe.

The swift current tore the fingers of one hand off the ladder. I was losing my grip as my fingers slipped off one by one. I couldn't hold on a second longer.

I was going to die while James and Taylor watched helplessly from the bridge.
Chapter Eighteen

Then, above the deafening roar of the rushing water, I heard Chief Red Feather's horse snort.

There was nothing above the water now except my eyes and nose. I looked up as the swift current stripped my shoes from my feet and almost took me with them.

There he stood on top of the trestle looking down at me... impatiently.

Impatiently?

Who did he think I was? The son of Superman who could leap raging rivers in a single bound?

He gave one great upward toss of his giant head with his red eyes glowing, and snorted loudly.

"Okay... you... over... grown... hairy... beast." I choked on the water that rushed into my mouth when I opened it. "I'll...show... you!"

I coughed, trying desperately to clear my lungs. Rage gave me an adrenaline rush and I was able to grab the ladder with both hands.

Using every ounce of my dwindling strength, I grabbed onto the next rung. I slowly dragged my exhausted and numb body out of the cold river.

The water had leveled off and after several agonizing minutes I was able to climb up the tall, tall column.

If only the threadbare ladder would hold until I reached the top.

Thankfully, it did.

When I finally reached the top, I stood shivering on the railroad track and glanced around nervously.

It didn't take long to realize that I had climbed out of a bad dream and into a nightmare.

The image of those kids stranded on the trestle above the river with a train coming in the movie Stand by Me flashed through my mind.

I knew exactly how they felt.

Just like them I was standing on a railroad track at least 75 feet from dry, solid ground.

I wasn't a bad kid.

I didn't lie, (only little white ones).

I didn't cheat, (only off of James's math homework).

I didn't steal.

So why were so many awful things happening to me?

What if a train should come? That was actually funny. I had come to the conclusion that there were no what ifs in my life anymore. The way my luck was running, I should just start listening for a train whistle.

I was having trouble concentrating since I was beyond tired and freezing. All I wanted was to get off the railroad track before a train came, and change into some dry clothes.

However Chief Red Feather didn't seem to be in any great rush. His horse stood completely still, just staring at the dam.

Then he whinnied fiercely and tossed his great head. He wanted me to look in that direction, I assumed.

So I did.

I didn't see anything unusual, just some lights through a haze of thick fog.

"What?" I asked through chattering teeth. "I'm... freezing and I'm soaked to the... bone, in case you haven't... noticed." I could hardly get the words passed my numb lips. "Sorry, but I don't see any...th...th...thing out of the ordinary."

Evidently those were not the words he wanted to hear.

The horse raised up on his hind legs as his front hooves clawed the air. My jaw dropped to my chest as the massive beast towered above me. His angry whinnies echoed through the still night sending a shiver down my spine as Chief Red Feather hung on to his mane.

I knew the beast was trying to show me something, red eyes were a dead giveaway. But no matter how mad he got or how loudly he snorted, all I could see was the dam.

"I really don't see anything unusual about the dam," I said. "It looks just like it always does."

With these words the horse became absolutely enraged.

He picked up his huge hoof and slammed it down loudly on the railroad iron. My entire body shook from the vibration and my ears chimed like a church bell. Then he started pawing the trestle and snorting like he was about to charge.

"Okay, calm down will ya?" I cried. "I'll look again."

Heck, I would agree to anything to keep the beast from charging me on a railroad track suspended above a raging river.

What was his problem anyway? He definitely had a few anger issues to deal with.

I squinted my eyes and peered into the fog.

Nothing.

I looked at the dam top to bottom, side to side and from every angle.

Nothing.

Yet there must be something that I was missing. Why else would he be getting so riled up? Then suddenly the fog lifted.

And I saw it.

A crack.

In the dam.

It was hard to make out by the light of the moon and the dim glow from the nightlights, yet it was unmistakably a crack.

Even as I watched, the fault was quietly snaking its way down the smooth face of the dam.

And in the few seconds I had been watching it had grown noticeably wider.

Suddenly, a stream of water shot out of the fissure with so much force that it splashed me on the trestle 100 feet away. It completely filled my mouth, which was hanging wide open.

I spit and rubbed water out of my eyes with my fists. When I opened my eyes a stream of water was shooting into the air as far as I could see.

The dam was going to fail.

I was such an idiot. That's what Chief Red Feather had been trying to show me all along.

Seconds earlier I had been so terrified of four water wheels. That seemed like a minor inconvenience now, compared to a 152-foot wall of water crashing down on me.

Suddenly, all I could think about were the news reports that I had watched following the Tsunami. Those poor folks were just minding their own business when the giant wave had come ashore. They never stood a chance.

From the way things were looking, neither did I?

What could I do to stop it? For crying out loud I was only twelve years old. Couldn't the Indian chief have picked a more mature person to reveal this impending disaster to?

Wait. I had to tell someone. Where was my phone? Oh, still at the cabin of course. Maybe there was still time to save the dam, but I had to act fast.

I ran to the horse and put my hands on each side of his head as I shouted up to Chief Red Feather. "You have to get me to a phone! Maybe there is still time to save the dam, but we have to hurry!"

While Chief Red Feather gazed up at the moon, I grabbed onto the horse's neck and held on for dear life. I waited patiently or him to fly me to the nearest phone.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I held my breath and prayed for strength. My arms still trembled from the climb up the ladder. Would I be able to hold on when we became airborne?

The horse didn't move a muscle.

I shook his furry head in frustration and yelled close to his ear. "What are you waiting for? Could we pick up the pace here? I mean if I am ever going to encounter a life or death situation, this is probably it."

Instead, the horse jerked his head out of my hands, snorted at me, and then ever so slowly began walking across the track. "Chief Red Feather, come back! You brought me here. Show me how to fix this!"

Chief Red Feather looked back and raised his spear high in the air in a salute. Then he turned his back on me as if to say, "I've done my part. The rest is up to you."

Chapter Nineteen

"Are you kidding me?" I yelled to Chief Red Feather's retreating back. "You can't bring me here and show me a crack in the dam and then just leave. Don't you see that thing is about to blow?"

That was a pretty stupid question. Of course he did. He was the one who showed me. In fact, he had been trying to show me for several days now.

But I didn't have time to worry about that now. I had to get them to move a little faster or we wouldn't have a prayer of saving the dam.

Apparently, what I thought didn't seem to matter to the irritating Indian chief. His horse just strolled casually across the railroad track like he was at a garden party sniffing roses.

He simply would not be rushed.

But what could I do?

I kept glancing back at the dam and each time the crack had grown longer and wider.

I had a nagging suspicion that even if I could get help here it would be too late. Would it even be possible to stop the reservoir from crashing through the crack that was growing larger with each passing second?

At last we reached the end of the trestle and I jumped down and sprinted to the office. There would be a phone in the office where I could call for help.

But, as my luck would have it, I noticed one small obstacle to this plan.

There was a metal fence around the office. It was at least 12 feet high with razor sharp barbed wire strung along the top.

Going over the fence was out. There was also a huge padlock on the gate. There was no way I could break the lock.

Sure, it seemed like the odds were stacked against me, but I had to get inside to a phone.

Hey, a horse could push over a fence, couldn't he? I turned around to ask him just that, but he was gone.

Where was the ornery creature when I needed him? He had been my constant companion all night and now he decided to pull a disappearing act?

I would look for him later. Right now I had to get inside the fence and to a phone. The million-dollar question was... how?

Looking around for anything that I could use to break through the thick wire, my eyes were drawn to a drainage pipe. It was under the fence and just above the rapidly rising waterline.

I glanced back at the crack that was growing wider as I watched and knew it was my only option.

For once in my life, I was thankful for being skinny. However, there was one problem.

I am severely claustrophobic.

And the odds were stacked against me that I wouldn't have enough time to make it through the pipe before water covered it.

I would suffocate.

My worst nightmare.

I was having difficulty breathing just thinking about it. My pulse was racing and I was feeling dizzy.

I couldn't do it. The way my heart was hammering against my chest, I might have a heart attack if I even tried.

Then again, if the dam broke I would be carried away on 152-foot wall of water, so either way my life would end in a watery grave.

I had to try.

I glanced at the water jetting out of the ever widening crack. It quickly convinced me that I was wasting precious seconds even thinking about it.

Taking a deep breath, I squatted on my hands and knees and climbed into the pipe.

It was a tight squeeze, but I held my arms straight out in front of me. I was able to inch my way along by pushing with my toes.

I have a horror of closed tight spaces, and this was the worse yet, by far.

I would swear the sides of the pipe were closing in on me, getting tighter. I was having difficulty taking a deep breath and my head was starting to spin. If I passed out now, it would be over for me.

I felt my heart rate speed up even more. The fear that the ghost had caused was nothing compared to the panic that I was feeling at that moment.

It was pitch black in the pipe and getting harder and harder to breathe. It felt like there wasn't any fresh air coming in.

Then I heard water sloshing into the pipe as my worst nightmare came to life.

My first impulse was to back up. Then my panic increased by one million as I felt water soaking through my socks.

I was a goner.

It would take at least five more minutes to get through the pipe at the rate I was moving. That was about four and a half minutes too long.

I would drown before being swept into the river when the pipe filled with the cold water.

"Help!" I screamed as water began to trickle around my waist. "Help me, please!"

I stretched my head to the top of the pipe, gasping for air as water lapped over my head. But there was precious little air left.

I didn't want to die here, like this.

Alone.

I inhaled the last of the air and held my breath. I had risked everything and lost. No one would know what had happened until it was too late. Only Chief Red Feather. And his trusty steed.

Where were they? Would he just let me die after all we had been through?

And then I heard my mom's voice, like she was whispering in my ear. She was, telling me what to do in an emergency.

Don't panic, BJ. Remain calm.

You can survive anything as long as you use your head.

Think of a solution to the problem.

This was my last chance. If I failed, I wouldn't get a second chance. There was no one here to help me. I had to figure this out on my own.

Or die trying.

In a last ditch effort, I dropped my head into the frigid water.

The water had made the pipe slippery. As I slowly pushed with my toes, I found myself actually making slow progress.

My chest was on fire and my lungs threatened to burst as I inched along the floor of the pipe.

Just as my lungs were issuing a final plea for air, I was able to grasp the outside edge of the pipe and pull myself free.

I surfaced taking deep, deep gulps of the sweet night air. Another second in the pipe and Taylor's dad would have been writing my obituary come morning.

I looked up completely exhausted and shivering. There stood Chief Red Feather and his horse casually waiting for me out of harms way.

I grabbed onto the horses' hairy leg. With what little energy I had left, I pulled myself out of the water.

I wanted to scream at the Indian chief. Punch him square in the face, and call him every name in the book for allowing all these terrible things to happen to me.

But I didn't even have the energy to speak.

He was a spirit for crying out loud. Why hadn't he used his supernatural powers to help me?

I wanted nothing more than to fall to the ground and forget everything, including the dam and all the other horrors that had filled my life for so long that all I remembered was horror.

But I knew I couldn't. I felt the weight of the world on my slim shoulders as I took a second to look back at the dam. Then I remembered Chief Red Feather's words.

Running Deer will hold the lives of many in his hands before the morning sun rises to greet the new day.

I looked up into Chief Red Feather's smiling face. He slammed his spear on the ground and said, "Running Deer is a man now."

Chapter Twenty

I didn't feel very manly at the moment.

What I saw made me lean against the horse for support.

The crack was at least a foot wide now and spreading fast. It couldn't hold much longer with that much pressure behind it.

I ran to the office and picked up a flowerpot of lavender geraniums. I used it to smash the window. Carefully reaching through the jagged glass, I opened the door and had to wait a few seconds until my eyes adjusted to the darkness.

Flipping on the light switch, I finally saw what I was looking for.

A phone.

"Yes!"

Taped to the phone was a piece of paper. There were words written in large red letters that make me laugh out loud for the first time since the Indian chief and his horse had come charging into my life: IN CASE OF EMERGENCY CALL.

I dialed the number with trembling fingers. Then I watched as water began to seep over the threshold into the office. It took forever for the call to go through and the phone begin to ring. I finally heard the receiver click on the other end of the line.

Help was on the way!

And it was a good thing, because the water was up to my knees and I only had the light of the moon to see by as I waded out of the office and through the swift current.

The water was rising faster than before and there was a 12-foot fence between me and safety. Thankfully a squad car arrived within five minutes.

The office was built on a hill and I ran to the top above the rapidly rising water line. I waiting patiently as the two officers approached. One of them was shining his flashlight in my face.

"Okay, young fellow. I don't know how you got in there, but come on out now before you get yourself into more trouble than you're already in."

I had to pinch myself to keep from laughing in his smug face.

Didn't he see the predicament I was in?

I was locked inside the fence with the dam about to break any minute. I didn't see how it would be possible to get into more trouble than that.
Chapter Twenty One

Wisely, I decided to control my sarcastic comments.

These men were my only hope of making it out alive.

"I can't get out," I shouted to be heard above the noise of the river.

"There must be a power outage," the officer muttered, squinting his eyes to see in the darkness. Then he turned toward his partner and frowned. "The river is unusually loud tonight, Jim. I can hardly hear myself think."

Then he turned to me. "Come out the same way you went in, kid."

Wow. Was he ever clever? Why hadn't I thought of that?

I was standing inside a locked fence with water creeping into my shoes just for the heck of it. "I-can-not-get-out."

I spoke slowly, trying to remain calm when I really wanted to tell Barney Fife to earn his paycheck. "I climbed in through a drainage pipe under the fence and now it's covered with water."

How much longer could the dam hold?

"Didn't you read the no trespassing signs posted all over this property?" the officer asked. "I bet you'll think twice before breaking into private property again won't you, kid?"

"I will definitely think twice before I ever crawl through another cement pipe. Now, will you please just get me out of here before the dam breaks?"

"Whoa, take it easy there, son." He chuckled. "We're going to get you out, and don't you worry about this dam breaking."

He had a determined look on his face as he fiddled with the huge padlock. "Why, we had a disaster drill just last month and the topic was the safety of this very dam. We were told that nothing short of a plane crashing into it could bring it down."

He tilted his head back to look up at the sky. "I don't see any planes circling overhead, do you? Where'd you get such a foolish notion anyway?"

"Shine your flashlight toward my feet and you'll see exactly where I got such a foolish notion." He did and gasped as his jaw dropped to his chest. "Where do you think all of this water is coming from? I haven't seen any clouds in the sky tonight, have you?"

I pointed to the huge crack that was now gushing water in several directions at once. It looked like the fountain at the park.

He aimed his flashlight toward the dam. Even though his whispered words were drowned out by the roar of the river, I got the general idea.

In a daze, he began backing up the hill like he had just come face to face with some frothing at the mouth, rabid animal. He had the same bewildered expression as Taylor had when he awakened to find Chief Red Feather and his horse in the cabin.

Was he going to get in his car and hightail it back to Mayberry, leaving me here to be swept away by the raging current? Evidently. He didn't even look back as he turned and sprinted up the hill.

"Hey, come back!" I shouted. "Don't even think about leaving me here. You took an oath to protect and serve, didn't you? Well, get back here and start protecting. I am a citizen of this county and my mom pays a hefty chunk of her salary each week for taxes, which by the way pays your salary. So, get back here."

But he didn't seem to hear me as he shouted to his partner. "Jim, call the station. Tell them the dam has been breached and we could be headed for a catastrophic failure. We don't have a second to waste. Tell them to start evacuating downriver. I've got to get this kid to safety."

"How are you going to get him out, Sam?" Jim glanced anxiously at me and then toward the spider web of cracks that were now branching out from the original breach.

He had most likely taken a tour of the dam as well and knew that the immense cement structure held back roughly 5,264 acres of water. "We don't have any bolt cutters strong enough to cut through a fence that thick. I doubt we can get help here before..."

"Well, what do you expect me to do? Leave him?" Jim interrupted his dire prediction. "Don't just stand there with your mouth hanging open. Go make those calls."

Then he turned to me. His words seemed to be in slow motion and I couldn't focus on what he was saying.

My pounding heart fell to my feet as one word echoed over and over in my head.

Downriver.

Everyone I loved was downriver.

Asleep in their beds.

Chief Red Feather had said, "You will hold the lives of many in your hands before the sun rises."

I wasn't afraid for myself anymore.

I had to save my family.
Chapter Twenty Two

Sam was yelling and waving directly in front of me, trying to get my attention. "Get behind the building, son Hurry up!" He waited while I slowly trudged through the swift current. Then I stood behind the building as he began firing his gun at the lock.

The gunshots echoed against the dam and were deafening. Sparks flew from the padlock, yet it remained intact. It barely made a dent.

I turned to look at the dam and my heart sank in my chest. Water was shooting into the sky like a geyser at Yellowstone National Park.

"Please, get me out of here." I looked toward the heavens knowing that only one of Gram's miracles could help me now. "Please, I have to warn my mom."

Then a thought hit me and I plowed through the current and to the top of the hill toward Sam. "Hey Sam, you have a phone in your car, don't you? Please call my mom. Don't worry about me. Just warn my mom so that she can get my family to safety. I'll wait here while you make the call."

"You can forget about that, son," Sam said. "I'm not leaving you here alone. You just calm down while I get you out and then you can make the call yourself. Now get behind that building."

Running down the hill toward us, Jim screeched to a grinding halt. He gasped when he saw the water beginning to lap around my knees. "Help is on the way."

I was trapped, pressed against the fence at the top of the hill. I could see his fear and it tripled my own. I read it clearly in his eyes when he realized that I would probably drown before they could rescue me.

"Okay, kid, you have to trust me now," Sam yelled above the noise of the river. He looked around frantically. Get behind the building and don't come out until I tell you to. Do you understand? No matter what you hear, stay put. Got it?"

"I got it." I forced my way through the rising water to stand behind the office, grasping the back door handle to keep my balance.

I looked back once to see Sam climbing the hill toward the squad car. He looked like a man headed to the electric chair.

I'll admit that seeing his lack of confidence didn't do a lot to boost mine. Neither of the policeman had any hopes of saving my life.

They thought I was a goner.

Sam got in the car and backed to the top of the hill. I knew this was my one and only chance. If Sam failed, I wouldn't get another one. "Please let this work," I prayed, as I gazed at the heavy-duty fence that had been designed to keep out all intruders.

There were huge metal poles sticking up from a cement base about every three feet apart. He would have to hit at least one of them.

Sam gunned the motor like he was getting ready for a Nascar event at Lowes Motor Speedway. Gathering his courage I suppose. Then he floored it and the police car headed straight for the gate. I closed my eyes. I couldn't watch.

Then I heard a loud crash and the horrible sound of metal crunching against metal. The car's engine made a hissing sound as it was submerged in the cold water.

I couldn't bring myself to look.

After several long minutes had passed, I knew that Sam wasn't coming. He had been my only hope. Without him, there was none. I felt scalding tears stinging my eyes. "I'm sorry, Mom."

What had I ever done to deserve an ending like this? I had heard someone say once that you should live your life like there was no tomorrow. If I had it to do over again, I would tell my family that I loved them every single day.

Unfortunately, it was too late for could haves and should haves.

Then, suddenly, a comforting hand was placed on my shoulder. I looked up to see Sam standing beside me in the rushing water.

"Let's just say that I am eternally grateful to the inventor of airbags." He winked. "I said you could trust me, didn't I, kid? Have a little more faith in those who have sworn to protect and serve next time. By the way, what's your name?"

"BJ?"

"Let's get out of here, BJ. I don't know about you, but I'm not in the mood for a swim tonight."

"Me, either." I actually laughed out loud as we waded through the waist deep, swiftly moving water. Then we climbed over the jumbled wreckage of the hissing, smoking police car.

We turned briefly to watch as water covered the office. Within seconds the police car went sailing down the river and bobbed along under the bridge. "Dang." Sam winked. "My doughnuts and coffee were in that car."

His mention of food caused me to think of James. I looked toward the bridge to see them waving like crazy. I motioned for them to follow us. If the dam broke they would be sitting ducks.

"Get off the bridge!" I yelled.

They couldn't hear me above the raging river.

"Come on, BJ. I think you and I need to head for higher ground." Then Sam shouted for his partner to get Taylor and James off the bridge.

"I need to use your phone, Sam." I stopped, refusing to move another inch until he found me a phone. "Please, Sam, I need to call my mom."

"Don't worry about your mom, son. Everyone downriver has already been evacuated. They're all safe. Now, let's get you and your friends to safety."

As we approached the top of the hill, the bright lights of several helicopters suddenly illuminated the night sky. Man, that was fast. The town of Twin Rivers had its emergency preparedness plan on point.

I ran to where James and Taylor waited to greet me with excited high fives. "Chief Red Feather wanted to show me the crack in the dam." I was shivering from cold, fear, and exhaustion. "He was only trying to warn me and save our lives."

I was grateful when someone gave me a blanket. I sat down against the trunk of a tree awed by the sights and sounds around me.

Military helicopters airlifted in a giant crane. Engineers were rushed to the site, one still in his pajamas. Huge construction trucks, cement trucks, and Red Cross vehicles arrived.

Helicopters carrying the governor, a senator and several experts on dam faults set down in the parking lot.

TV cameras and crews were everywhere. Then huge pieces of machinery were brought in.

The noise of the river was soon drowned out by the sound of walkie-talkies. The next thing we knew helicopters were hovering overhead. Soon we heard the deafening sound of the huge machines being put into action.

I was relieved when Sam borrowed a squad car and took us to a makeshift shelter in town for the evacuees. I saw Gram and my grandparents first.

Then I saw Mom and rushed into her welcoming arms. It felt so good to finally be safe. She wrapped me in a warm blanket and handed me a cup of hot chocolate.

Just before I dozed off, I heard a loud chorus of cheers go up in the shelter. A Red Cross volunteer had just announced that the dam could be saved.

"Thank you Chief Red Feather," I whispered. Then I closed my eyes for a few minutes of well deserved rest.
Chapter Twenty Three

We were heroes. Mom said we were bigger than the Beatles, who the heck ever they are.

We knocked a Kardashian off the cover of People magazine. We were also the lead story on every news show and on the front page of every newspaper in the country.

Can you believe that I even received a call from President and Mrs. Obama, and talked to Sasha and Malia?

And by 5:00 that evening Anderson Cooper was sitting in my living room waiting to interview us for AC 360?

I could hear Mr. Cooper and his camera crew chatting with James and Taylor while I handled some very important business.

I was stretched across my bed with the phone glued to my ear. Megan Cobb was going on and on about my amazing bravery and heroism. She had explained to me that she had been dancing with her cousin Derek at the sixth grade dance.

I had been such a dork to jump to harebrained conclusions like I had.

But she had forgiven me and now we were making plans to attend the Fall Festival together.

Life was good.

That alone was worth every minute of our terrifying ordeals.

We repeated the story about the dam over and over. It was a fictional tale of how we just happened to be out walking around the dam that night. And just happened to notice a crack in it.

You can believe that I received a major tongue lashing from my mom for strolling around the dam at 5:00 am.

We never told anyone the truth. Who would have believed us anyway?

"They would have us all committed," Taylor insisted.

At one award ceremony Governor Jim Cooper said that almost everyone downriver owed their lives to the quick thinking of the three young heroes.

It was nice to hear, but we knew we weren't the ones who deserved the credit for saving so many lives.

Chief Red Feather would forever remain their unsung hero.
Chapter Twenty Four

Even though Taylor, James and I hadn't been alone much since that memorable night, it had been a blast. We had flown to New York for all the morning news and late night talk shows.

Then it was on to Los Angeles for more talk shows and a special for Oprah's cable channel. She treated us like royalty and laughed until she cried every time James hiccupped. Which was every few seconds.

She and my mom discussed the possibility of her production company making a movie about us. Who would play us?

James's character would have to be played by someone similar to the chubby kid in The Sandlot. Taylor sort of resembles Harry Potter without the glasses. For me, picture Opie on The Andy Griffith Show reruns.

We stayed in fancy hotels with unlimited room service. What a life.

For about three weeks we told our story. It was the fictional one and we repeated it so many times that it was like a well-rehearsed play.

The excitement was finally winding down though. Probably because there wasn't anyone left who hadn't heard the story.

But, even after most of the commotion had died down, I still asked myself one question over and over. Why would a great Indian Chief return from the grave to show me the crack in the dam?

As James had said, he didn't at any time during our adventure seem overly fond of me. He didn't hesitate for one second to scare me enough to send me into cardiac arrest. Or allow a claustrophobic kid to crawl through a cement pipe.

Fortunately, for all of us, Chief Red Feather had used me to save the lives of hundreds of innocent people. An entire community would have been lost if the dam had failed.
Chapter Twenty Five

I was sound asleep a few nights later when I smelled the now familiar smell of Chief Red Feather's tobacco pipe.

I opened my eyes to see him sitting in the window seat looking out across the dark night. Without looking my way, he knew when I had opened my eyes.

"Every man is born with a Great Spirit inside him, Running Deer," he said. "It is a seed, waiting for the right time to sprout and grow."

He turned to look at me as I sat up on the edge of the bed. I was eager to learn what this great man wanted to teach me.

"A terrible fight between two wolves is going on inside you as you grow from a boy into a man. One is evil. He is angry, greedy, arrogant, and a liar filled with false pride, and ego. The other is good. He is filled with peace, love, compassion, kindness and truth."

"Which Great Spirit will grow inside me, Chief Red Feather?" I asked softly. I was almost afraid of what his answer might be. "Which wolf will win?"

He stood and walked over to stand over me. Then, he reached out and placed his hand on my shoulder. "The one that you feed."

I nodded in understanding.

Reaching out his hand, he laid a red feather on the pillow beside me. Then he pulled an animal skin from his shoulders and laid it across my bed.

I reached out my hand to stroke the soft fur.

"Running Deer will sleep on the panther skin to acquire the animal's strength and courage."

Out of curiosity, and thinking of Megan, I asked. "What animal skin would a girl sleep on?"

"She would sleep on the skin of a doe to make her more graceful."

I could only nod at him, knowing that I would cherish the panther skin forever.

He patted my shoulder one last time and said, "Now I must return to my people."

"Thank you for everything, Chief Red Feather," I whispered.

He nodded his head and then he was gone. Only the smell of his tobacco lingered in the air.

I couldn't go back to sleep, so I pulled a sketchpad out of my nightstand and began drawing Chief Red Feather and his horse.

I wanted something to remember them by.

Always.

The End

Be sure to read all of the books in the

Beware Series

by

Kitty Margo

Beware the Attic

Beware the Sky

Beware the River

Beware the Woods

before it gets dark.

Photos and Artwork

Cover art by

Fantasyart

at

Selfpubbookcovers.com

Photo of the

Train at Tillery

Courtesy of Matthew Irvin.

mirvin@carolina.rr.com

Indian chief sitting on a horse. A hand drawn illustration at

Shutterstock.com

About the Author

Kitty Margo grew up in a small North Carolina town nestled between the Pee Dee and Rocky Rivers. She always had a love of storytelling and kept her children entertained with the make believe characters who called the riverbank home. When she decided to put her thoughts to pen and paper, her stories evolved into a lifetime love of writing.

Kitty has three amazing sons, and five darling grandchildren.

She still lives in her small North Carolina hometown with her youngest son, a songwriting and beat making wizard, so there is never a dull, or quiet, moment.

This author loves to hear from her readers. You can contact her at kittymargo@hotmail.com or on her website at kittymargo.com. Be sure to add your name to her mailing list for notice of when the next book in the BEWARE series will be published.

