Markwildyr.com, Post #248
The Singaporeans are still with
us. So far they’ve checked out the site 3,300 times in the first half of this
month alone. Keep it up, guys. \
This week, I want to return to my Cut
Hand series novels, and selected the prologue to my third novel in the series,
Echoes of the Flute. I find it a powerful tool to set up the tone of the novel.
In this third novel, John Strobaw, who becomes better known later as Medicine
Hair, was the grandson of Cut Hand, last chief of the Yanube tiospaye,
although oral family history has him the grandson of Billy Strobaw, Cut Hand’s lover.
At any rate, here’s the offering for
this time.
* * * *
“Be civilized and prosper.”
Yet fortune never smiles. Only wretched pain.
Warriors, forced into trousers and called by alien names.
Drums remind of yesteryear.
Flutes lament what was.
Stanza from the
poem “Echoes of the Flute” by Mark Wildyr
PROLOGUE
Dakota Territory, June 1878
A mob surged across the wooden bridge like a primordial organism in
search of food. Torchlight punched flickering holes in the black night as people
with the look of farmers and merchants and housewives and mothers churned restlessly
in front of a cabin on the north bank of the crick. Moments later, a white-stockinged
blue roan pulled a buckboard into their midst.
A hook-nosed man, clad in black, bellowed from the driver’s bench, “Come
out, sinners. Atone to these good people and the Lord God Almighty!” Despite a
thin frame, his voice was deep and sonorous.
The cabin door opened, flooding the porch with lantern glow.
A tall man with thumbs hooked into his braces walked out to face the group.
“What’s going on here? Why’re you tromping around in my yard this time of
night? You there, get out of that flower bed.”
“You are abominations in the sight of God!” the man in the
buckboard thundered. “The judgment of Leviticus 20:13 shall be upon you this
night.”
“I have sinned against no one, Preacher. Your words are
farts in the wind.”
“Did you hear? Profanity! Yes, you have sinned, brother.
Grievously. ‘Mankind shall not lie with mankind as he lieth with womankind,’”
the Preacher intoned. “Confess and beg forgiveness lest the Almighty rain fire
and brimstone upon us all.”
“Stop acting the fool and get out of here. Go home and
leave me in peace.” He turned and started back into the cabin.
“He’s goin’ for a gun!” someone yelled.
As the man turned to protest, a bullet caught him in the chest.
He stumbled against the doorjamb. A second slug broke his shoulder and propelled
him through the cabin’s threshold. He managed to close the door and drop the
bar to barricade it behind him before collapsing onto the floor.
When demands to fire the building rose, the black-frocked preacher
flicked his reins and turned the rig around, scattering members of his flock. Torches
hurled against the cabin walls had little effect, but brands landing on the
roof kindled a hungry fire.
A pinto charged out of the tree line into the pack, the rider
yelling and firing his rifle into the air. After a shocked silence, the mob
rushed the newcomer. Hands snatched him from the saddle before he could bring
his weapon to bear.
By the time the maddened horde hoisted a rope over a
cottonwood branch and left the horseman kicking and gasping his life away, the buckboard
raced for Yanube City.
*.*.*.*.
This mindless
mob action, promoted by the bitter preacher in black, ignites events that will
test the Strobaw family’s ability to survive and prosper and results in young
John Strobaw taking the road that will eventually earn him the names of Night
Sky Hair and Medicine Hair. Ultimately, he is awarded the name of American
Killer by one Lakota chieftain.
Website and blog: markwildyr.com
Email:
markwildyr@aol.com
Facebook:
www.facebook.com/mark.wildyr
Twitter: @markwildyr
Now my
mantra: Keep on reading. Keep on writing.
You have something to say, so say it!
See you later.
No comments:
Post a Comment