Death in the Darkness
Part 1
Noah Eichelberger was the first to discover it, although he didn’t actually see it.
He had been struggling lately with a serious issue, and it was keeping him up at night. At eleven years old, he was growing up quickly, and it was only a few more years until the dawn of the new century, 1900, with new promises. Noah was at a crossroads of sorts. He wanted to be a hunter and a military man like his grandfather, but his Pa kept telling him they were Christians and that he must forego violence and spend his time in worship.
It was a perplexing problem, and he pondered it as he went to check on the cattle.
But when he got to the cattle pens, he was shocked at what he discovered. The family was at the beginnings of creating a cattle herd, which would bring some wealth to the. They had a bull, six cows and four calves. At least that was what they had yesterday.
Now, four of the cows and the calves were huddled in the lean-to provided to get out of the rain. One of the other cows lay on the ground, dead. Its throat had been torn apart. There was blood everywhere. The other cow was on the ground about six feet away. It was also dead, its rear quarter eaten away.
Noah ran to the other pen to check on the bull, Sammy. Sammy was on the ground, but he was still alive. There were long cuts across its body, and blood seeped from its wounds. HIs breathing was labored, and blood ran from his nose. What on earth, Noah wondered, could do that to a bull?
Paw prints surrounded the pens. They were larger than Noah’s hand, with four evenly spaced toe imprints. They headed off toward the forest and the mountains beyond. Noah looked toward the mountains and wondered what kind of animal could have done this.
As he strained his eyes to search the fields leading to he mountains, he thought he saw something, like a shadow, disappearing into the high grass at the end of the pasture, but he couldn’t be sure. If he had seen something, it was practically gone by the time he saw it. Noah ran back to his house to tell father what happened. Then the two of them ran back to the cattle pens.
Noah’s father never showed emotion, at he hadn’t since his mother had died, but Noah could see the stress and strain in his face.
“What did this, Pa?” Noah asked.
“I don’t know,” Noah’s Pa said, examining the bloody tracks. “But if we can’t nurse Sammy back to health, we’ll lose the farm.”
The attack at the Eichelberger farm that Summer was only the first of many. The predator attacked horses, cows, hogs, and sheep, almost always killing its quarry but not always eating it. It always struck at night, but no one ever caught sight of it.
The mountains the beast decided to call home were not the great mountains of the American West but the lower mountain ranges of the Appalachians. Plentiful rain made the forest largely impenetrable, a perfect hiding place for a predator.
The valley the beast decided to make its hunting ground was bordered to the north by the mountains the beast called home and to the south by another, small range of low lying hills. To the east and north, the Susquehanna River and the swamps along its western bank formed a barrier. The beast did not know the western boundary of the valley for it went on and on for many, many miles. It made its home in the endless mountains north of the valley.
As the predator returned night after night, Noah’s father decided that it was too dangerous for his son to stay on the family farm so close to the mountains. There was only Noah and his father — his mother had died in childbirth four years before. Now, Noah and his father lived alone. Noah’s father wanted to have his son by his side, but it was simply too dangerous. Noah would be safer with his grandparents.
Noah’s grandparents were town dwellers, people who lived off the fruits of “others’ labor”, as Noah’s father often said. Austin Taylor had been a merchant when he was still active, buying goods cheaply and then selling them at higher prices in the smaller town. From there he bought and sold houses and other parcels of land. He hadn’t worked hard like a farmer, but he had made a lot more money. The Taylors and the Eichelbergers had little in common.
Noah’s father came from a long line of farmers. Ever since the first Eichelberger had arrived in the region one hundred and fifty years before, all of them had tilled the land, producing an abundance of corn and wheat and vegetables to be taken to market. They also raised livestock, especially cattle and hogs. They were truly people of the land whose entire sense of purpose was tied to the land. Hard, physical labor who as important to them as religion, which is to say, it was everything.
Noah suspected he might have more Taylor blood in him.
It took a full day to go to his grandparents. They lived more than twenty miles away, and it was almost dusk when Noah’s father arrived. He spend the night with his in-laws but needed to get back to the farm first thing in the morning. Noah had fallen asleep in the wagon, and his father carried him to the spare room and put him in bed. Noah’s father was gone when Noah awoke the next morning.
When Noah did wake up, he found his grandfather sitting at the kitchen table, where he normally sat. His grandmother working at the counter behind them, as she normally did.
“Pappy,” Noah asked, “Would you tell me about the war?”
The war was Pappy’s favorite thing to talk about.
“Well,” the old man said, “I’m sure I’ve told you all my stories. It was a long time ago. Nobody cares anyhow.”
“Oh Pappy, please tell me.”
“Well,” Pappy said, “have I told you about Yellow Tavern?”
Pappy had told Noah about Yellow Tavern a dozen times, but Noah looked him straight in the eye and said “No.”
“Well, it was May of ’64, and General Sheridan led 10,000 of us cavalry men into the heart of the of that nest of traitors. We were headed for Richmond. We were operating alone, without infantry. The generals decided to do this so that we could move more quickly and destroy those traitorous slavers. I was a sergeant by then, and I had a black horse. He was a gelding and a good horse. We had all been given Spencer repeating rifles. I carried a revolver and a saber as well because I was a sergeant.
“The traitorous bastards. . .”
“Now Austin,” Grandma interrupted, “watch your language around the boy.”
Pappy ignored her. “. . .moved to block our advance. As we approached their lines, I looked to my left and to my right. There were blue cavalry as far as the eye could see. We moved forward in a solid, unstoppable line. My colonel was close by, and for a moment, he signaled for us to stop.
“I signaled for my men to stop as well. The colonel was dressing the line to make sure we hit those scoundrels all at one time. He was a great officer. We stopped and waited for the signal.
“As I watched, my colonel drew his sword from the scabbard. He looked over and caught my eye. I was ready. With that, the colonel signaled the charge with his sword. At the same time, the bugler sounded the charge. The colonel touched his spurs to the black stallion he rode, and it leapt forward like it was shot from a gun. I kicked my horse to follow, and we all rode as hard as we could. I had my pistol in one hand, my saber in the other, and the horse’s reins in my teeth. My horse surged forward. He hated those rebels as much as I did.
“The traitors formed up to stop us, but we crashed into them in a solid line. Bullets whizzed by my head. I could hear them. A guy I knew from York tumbled from his horse. Other men I didn’t know went down, but we pressed forward. The crack of rifles, the clash of blades. I can’t even describe it. The smoke from the back powder hung in the air making it difficult to see. There were a thousand individual fights. I stuck my saber into the belly of a rebel and shot another in the face. He was only an arm’s length away.
“And then they broke. It had only taken ten minutes, but they were turning and running. They killed a lot of good men, but as traitors always will, they turned and ran. They were cowards used to abusing their slaves, but they couldn’t stand up to real men.
“The bugler sounded the charge again, and we chased them until our horses were too tired to go any further.
“We destroyed them that day. Their famous general, JEB Stuart died that day. . .” The old man’s voice faded as he withdrew into himself, remembering the glory days of his youth.
“Pappy,” Noah asked, “What do you think is killing all of the livestock?”
“Well,” the old man said, “No one asks for my opinions any more, but it seems to me that it must be a panther. I shot a panther once, back in ’74.”
“They’re saying there are no panthers. They’re saying that panthers haven’t been around in decades. One woman at a meeting Pa took me to said it was some form of witchcraft. There is a Spanish family that moved in down by Byers’ hollow. They have a fourteen-year-old daughter that they say is strange. The woman at the meeting said the girl is a witch.”
There was a twinkle in Pappy’s eye. “Well,” he said, “that area has always been known for witches.” Pappy paused for a minute and looked at Grandma, who had her back to him, before looking back at me.
“Noah, you must never become involved with a witch. Do you know how to tell if a woman is a witch?”
“No Grandpa.”
“They have brown eyes and brown hair.”
With that Grandma spun around and looked at Pappy. “Austin,” she said, “you know I have brown eyes and had brown hair before it turned white.”
“I know,” Pappy chuckled.
Noah enjoyed the joke but thought it unwise to laugh at his grandmother. He turned the attention back to animal that had been killing the livestock.
“Some people are saying it was a wampus. What’s a wampus?”
Pappy looked at Austin. “Noah,” he said, “a wampus is an imaginary creature that weak-minded and superstitious people made up. They say it’s an large black cat with magical powers, but they don’t exist. Never have.”
“How do you know?” Noah asked.
“Because, Noah, I believe in facts and in science, and science says no such animal exists. My colonel was a man of science. Sometime at night around the campfire, he would talk to us about the latest scientific discoveries.
“Did I ever tell you that the colonel lost his arm at Yellow Tavern?”
“No Grandpa,” Noah answered.
“He was a great man.”
Meanwhile, a murderous beast prowled the edges of the valley every night. Almost every morning, it left behind dead livestock. A couple of people reported hearing a low growl, but when they went to investigate, there was nothing there.
