The Spirit Keeper: A Novel - Softcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

K. B. Laugheed grew up near the site of the Battle of Tippecanoe, and now tends her gardens and woods in Arcadia, Indiana. This is her first novel.

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1

This is the account of Katie O’Toole, late of Lancaster Co., Pennsylvania, removed from her family by savages on March the 2nd in the year of Our Lord 1747.

I wish I could say this is a true and honest account, but I see no way the likes of me can make such a claim. Still, I’ve no reason to lie in the pages of this ledger and plenty of reason to unburden my guilty soul. Mine is such a surpassing strange story. I honestly hope by writing it all down I’ll somehow see the truth of it.

I feared at first I might disremember how to write, especially in a language I no longer speak, but now that I’ve begun, I find my fears unfounded, as fears so oft prove to be. I wonder—?­what use is fear in a world where the worst catastrophes are those you ne’er see coming?

Ah, well—?­I’m too practiced a storyteller to fall prey to my own impatience. I’ll tell my tale apace, withholding my conclusions ’til the end.

I was the thirteenth child my mother conceived—?­a circumstance of some significance for her, I believe, as she took great pleasure in reminding me thirteen was the number of Christ’s betrayer. Her belief that I was an unlucky child was routinely cited as justification for beatings, and I grew to envy those children of hers who ne’er breathed air, believing they were, indeed, the lucky ones. Our home was always too full for comfort and there was ne’er enough of ­nothing—?­food nor clothing nor compassion—?­to go ’round.

By the time I reached my seventeenth year, my elder siblings had all married, thereby adding more children and chaos to our already o’erflowing household. On the morning of the attack, I was in the loft with a mob of children, readying them for the day. I cannot recall how many children were with me nor e’en which ones they were, but I recall with crystal clarity the shrill scream we heard in the distance.

At that moment all feuding and fussing stopt, and we stared at one another in stunned silence.

I peeked through the shutters and saw savages everywhere. Now I knew why various of our countrymen had warned against settling in this territory, the proprietorship of which is still in dis­pute, but no one ne’er could tell my father nothing, especially when he was liquored up, which he was, alas, every day I knew him.

When I was small, my gran told tales of how Father had been the son of a lord back in Ireland, how rich he was, and wanton, due to inherit the earth or such like. In trembling whispers, Gran de­scribed how her comely daughter schemed to advance herself by catching the young nobleman’s eye, only to cause the ruin of them both. Instead of becoming gentrified, Gran suddenly found herself the hapless chaperon of the exiled couple as they struggled to find a place for themselves in the crude colonies across the sea.

Gran was truly happy only when recounting the many miser­able failures of my father’s life. Unfit for any sort of honest labor, he had, she complained, worn out his welcome in at least a dozen em­ployments in three different colonies, eventually dragging us all into the wilderness of the Pennsylvania frontier. This, he said, was where he would at last restore his fame and fortune. For my part, I ne’er stopt longing to return to Philadelphia, where my brother James remained with his wife and children. I determined to find my way back there at the first opportunity.

Throughout my childhood, I listened wistfully to Gran’s tales of the Old World—?­the ancient cities with stone castles, shining cathe­drals, and cobblestone streets—?­but the only world I knew was filled with filth and toil and strife and turmoil. We siblings fought furi­ously o’er every scrap of food or cloth, except during those occasions when Father had a notion to school us. Then we must all sit together, boys and girls, reading as he instructed from the Bible or other books. No matter how poor we were, we always had piles of books. We soon memorized Father’s favorite passages, for if any of us made a mistake, he would deny supper to us all and drink himself to sleep, grumbling o’er our shortcomings as saliva dribbled from his lips.

If liquor made our father sloppy, endless labors and disappoint­ments made our mother cruel. I remember not a single gentle word from her lips, and the abundance of babies with which she had been blessed merely provided her with targets for her frustrations and rage. We girls were set to work from infancy, cooking, sewing, and tending to the younger ones. If we spilt a drop of stew or dropt a stitch or allowed a child to cry in Mother’s presence, she immedi­ately reached for her switch. Once when I let the cook-­fire die, I ended up curled in a ball on the floor, blood seeping from the switch-­cuts on my back and arms. Gran finally grabbed my moth­er’s hand and shouted, “D’ye mean to kill that child?” But e’en with that intervention, I must still wash the blood from my shift and sew it back together myself.

After Gran died, I oft dreamt of running away to the Old World and living amongst the castles and cathedrals, but I had no means to achieve such a purpose. Instead, once my monthlies were establisht, my parents bade me follow in the footsteps of my sisters and find a husband who could save them the trouble of providing for me. The very suggestion made me shudder. Having been ill-­used by men in the past, I desired no further dalliance, and e’en if I could stomach the notion of being pawed and slobbered o’er by a grunting lout, the pickings were slim in our remote community. My father spoke of wedding me off to a backwoodsman, in hopes of expanding trade opportunities for himself, but the fellow was ’round too rarely for arrangements to be made. My mother was much more interested in the bid offered by an innkeeper downriver who required a new wife to share the household burdens of his daughters, both of whom were older than I.

Determined not to be enslaved at a frontier trading post for the rest of my days, I tucked my few possessions into a leather bag, strapt a wool blanket beneath, hid this bundle under one of the beds in the loft, and prepared to run for Philadelphia upon the spring thaw. But before I could accomplish my flight, the children and I heard the aforementioned scream, and the long-­feared Indian at­tack was under way.

Through the crackt shutter of the loft, I saw a savage knock my father on the head with a stone club and fall upon him to rip off his ragged scalp. I had not a moment to mourn because I could hear my mother and sisters struggling to secure the doors and windows down below. Encouraged thus to prepare my own defense, I latcht the shutter and snatcht the boys’ musket from its hook. The weapon was useless, being old and missing several mechanisms, but I hoped it might serve ’til I could find something better. I then reached un­der the bed for my pack, but e’en as I drew the leather strap ’round my head and shoulder, I heard thuds from down below—?­wood splintering, screams, and scuffling. When whimpering children crowded ’round me, I pushed them into the darkest corner, hissing at them to be absolutely still or they would surely die. All grew quiet below as everyone was dragged outside. A long moment passed be­fore we heard another round of scuffling, a muffled cry, another thud. The children and I waited and waited in breathless silence.

Then we heard the creak of a riser on the stairs.

I raised the musket to my shoulder as I had seen the boys do a hundred times, but my trembling disallowed me to hold the...