Cooper felt as though he was being dragged underwater by a cold, darkened shape and drowned. He opened his mouth and gasped for air. A second later another wave of foul smelling water hit him. He spat out the water and opened his eyes. Instead of being far out to sea, he found himself sitting on the cold, wet ground tied to a post. He looked up. In the cold, pink light of dawn, Cooper saw the man he and nicknamed the Bearded Man standing over him with an empty bucket of water. The back of his neck ached. It hurt just to turn his head.
"Hey, Colonel, the Yankee's awake!" cried out the Bearded Man.
Cooper blinked his eyes a couple of times before looking around. Aside from the Bearded Man standing over him, he saw he was alone. He took it as an omen that Hawkins had somehow managed to elude his pursuers.
Colonel Taylor, accompanied by his ever-present shadow, Moses, walked out of a cabin and strode toward Cooper. He stopped a couple of yards from his prisoner and lit a cigar.
"Do you smoke, Captain?" asked Taylor.
"Sometimes, but it's usually with friends, family, or polite company. Somehow I think you're none of that," replied Cooper.
"A whip! Do you want me to get you a whip so you can teach this Northern sinner some manners?" asked Moses.
Taylor shook his head. "No, Moses, he's just acting brave so we won't see how afraid he truly is."
"Why isn't he in with the others?" asked Cooper, looking up at Moses.
"I couldn't bring myself to kill a man who isn't in full control of his mind," replied Taylor. "Besides, my boys seem to like him, so as long as he amuses them, I can tolerate his outbursts."
"Your men? You were never a colonel in the Confederate Army. I believe you were in the army, but there's no way in hell you were an officer."
"Blasphemy!" screeched Moses. "Watch yer tongue, Yankee, or I'll get a knife and cut it out."
Taylor placed a hand on Moses' shoulder. "Why don't you go back inside and have some breakfast? Leave me to talk to the Yankee in private."
The boy nodded and dragged his feet as he walked away.
"Now, Captain, you are right. I was only ever a corporal. When most of my regiment was captured at the Battle of Shiloh, we were loaded onto a train and shipped off to a Union prisoner of war camp in Ohio to sit out the war. When my youngest brother, Henry, got sick, I asked my commanding officer to talk with the Yankee camp commander so he could arrange for Henry to be paroled and sent home to recuperate. He refused my request saying it would mean a Yankee prisoner would have to be set free and he didn't think it was a smart thing to do. I begged on my knees for him to change his mind, but he wouldn't. So that night I snuck into his tent and strangled him to death. I took his coat to give to my brother to wear. It was too little too late. Henry died less than a week later from pneumonia. Three more of my brothers and five cousins were to die in that squalid Yankee hell hole before the war ended."
Taylor took a long drag on his cigar before exhaling through his nose like a dragon. "I took to wearing the jacket after my brother was buried. Before long even the Union guards thought it was funny and were calling me colonel."
"What I don't understand is why you're killing and eating people. My God, man, it's unnatural."
Taylor smile. "Captain, have you ever been faced with the prospect of starving to death?"
Cooper shook his head. "Well, I have, as have all the men here in this camp. In the winter of 1863, around Christmas time, the men in the prison were dying by the dozens. Every morning the burial detail would go around and collect the bodies and stack them like cordwood in the back of their carts and take them to the cemetery to be buried. The problem was the ground was too frozen to dig more than a couple of feet before you gave in from exhaustion. Since we were barely getting more than scraps to eat, we decided to eat what we could find and that turned out to be the bodies of the men who had died the night before. You called it unnatural, I call it survival."
"I'm sorry for how you were treated and the loss of your brothers, but the war is over. You don't have to carry on like this."
"I disagree. Who was going to welcome us home knowing what we did to live? No one, that's who. The men in this camp may not be my brothers by birth, but each and every one lived through those horrible hardships and is closer to me than my own kinfolk. Besides, I found once you get a taste for human flesh, it's something you can't let go off. We're only taking those who won't be missed. The coloreds, criminals, the poor crop farmers, you name it. My brothers and I, we're just helping to keep things neat and tidy."
Cooper shook his head. He couldn't believe what he was hearing. "You're mad."
Taylor shrugged. "Maybe. If I am, you're an officer and a gentleman, you and your kind made us into what we have become."
"Why the disguises?"
Taylor chuckled. "It's all a bit of fun. Pretending to be monsters has, until last night, kept people from nosing around out here. The best part is it scares the hell out of the Negroes. Our costumes were very simple to make. All you need is a pair of wooden shoes carved to leave behind the imprint of a beast and a coat made from a bear or a wolf skin and you have a creature of the night."
"You've missed your calling. You should have been an actor."
"I saw a play once when I was in the army. This fella came down from Richmond to take our minds off the war. I honestly can't recall anymore what the play was all about. All I know is I could never remember all those lines. No, acting isn't for me, blue-belly."
"I'm here because you murdered Andrew Legrand and his girlfriend, Willow. You must have known their deaths wouldn't have gone unnoticed."
"We were on our way to raid the colored quarters at the Mercy Plantation when we ran into them. It was an accident our paths crossed that night. That stupid love-struck boy tried to protect his colored Jezebel, so we killed him and cut him open. I took his innards to make a pie with. It was quite tasty and mighty filling. As for the girl, she was too skinny. There was hardly any meat on her bones, so I let our dogs have her."
Cooper couldn't comprehend the depravity of the man standing before him. He had long ago surrendered any claim to being human. He had become the monster he pretended to be. Cooper pulled at the rope binding his wrists behind his back. It was no good, whoever had tied the knot knew what he was doing. Cooper was going nowhere.
"Now, Captain, I had thought about slitting your throat and feeding you to my wild pigs, but I think making you watch as what's left of your party dies before your eyes will be reward enough for the loss of my kin."
Cooper yanked at his restraints. "Let me up and we'll settle this man to man. Surely you're not afraid to fight me?"
"Afraid? No. But I'm no fool either. I can see the murderous look in your eyes, Captain. No, you'll remain out of arm's reach until I have you cut open. I think we'll make a tasty stew using your kidneys and your heart."
In a rage, Cooper snarled, "You've got it wrong. I'm going to cut your heart from your chest and ram it down your throat."
"I doubt that. Your boy ran off and left you here to die. Trust me, Captain, you're going to die. Not today but soon enough."
A couple pairs of hands reached from behind Cooper and grabbed a hold of him. He felt his hands being untied. The next thing he knew he was hauled up to his feet.
"Hold him tight," ordered Taylor. He turned and called out, "It's time."
Cooper had no idea what that meant, nor did he want to find out. Desperate to escape, he tried yanking his arms free but found the men holding him were too strong.
Half-dressed men strolled out of the cabins and formed a loose circle around Cooper.
Taylor smiled. "Now, Captain, we have a little ritual here in our camp that we observe from time to time when a man with a lot of grit, like yourself, is brought in alive."
"And what might that be?"
"If you can kill my champion you get to go free." On cue, the men standing behind Taylor stepped aside and the man Cooper had called Tiny appeared. In his hand was a sharpened meat cleaver.
"What happens if I don't kill your man?"
"He'll take an arm or a leg, depending how he feels, and you'll be tossed in with the others until it's your turn to die."
Cooper's arms were released. The men holding him moved back with their friends.
Tiny grinned at Cooper. "Hey, Yankee, are you left or right handed?"
"Right."
"I guess yer gonna have to learn to use yer left hand to wipe yer ass from now on," said Tiny as he brought up the cleaver in his hand and took a step forward.
Cooper took a step back and bent his knees. He knew if he didn't take down his opponent fast, he would likely lose an arm and the fight. When Tiny was less than a couple of yards away, Cooper let out a cry and charged straight at the man. He hit his opponent hard in the stomach. Both men tumbled to the muddy ground.
"Get him!" hollered a man watching the fight. "Cut off that damned Yankee's arm!"
Cooper grabbed Tiny's right arm and bashed it on the ground trying to dislodge the knife from his hand. Try as he might, it was pointless. His adversary chuckled at Cooper's efforts, reached over and took a hold of his shirt collar, and pulled him off Tiny. The next thing Cooper knew a fist struck him hard on the side of his head. He saw stars flash in front of his eyes. His feet buckled underneath him as Cooper struggled not to black out from the blow.
Tiny laughed before pushing Cooper facedown into the mud. He stood up, smiling. Loud cheers erupted all around him. With his left hand, Tiny reached down and grabbed Cooper's shirt and flipped him over so he could look down into the face of his beaten opponent.
Waves of nausea rippled through Cooper's stomach. He was seconds away from being sick. He opened his eyes and saw Tiny drop to one knee beside him with his cleaver held high in the air. In desperation, Cooper rolled toward his attacker and shot a fist as hard as he could into the man's groin.
Tiny let out a pained moan and dropped down on all fours. He reached back and put a hand on his bruised groin.
Cooper scrambled to his feet and before anyone could stop him, he sent his right foot into the big man's side, knocking him over. He took a step forward and shot his foot at his opponent's head, breaking his nose. Blood gushed down from Tiny's nose to his muddy face like a bright red river. Cooper saw the meat cleaver lying on the ground and made a move to grab it.
A shot rang out.
Cooper froze. He looked up to see who had fired the shot.
Taylor stood there with his pistol aimed up in the air. "Don't try for the blade, Yankee. The fight is over. I guess you're a lot tougher than I thought."
Tiny sat up, holding a hand to his nose. "I could have killed him, Colonel."
"If I hadn't ended the fight, you'd be dead with your cleaver sticking out of your head right now. Get on your feet and get cleaned up."
The man Cooper had called Red stepped forward and helped Tiny to his feet.
"Put him with the others," ordered Taylor.
A couple of men grabbed Cooper's arms and pulled them behind his back. "Come on, boy," said one of the men. His breath stank from the pieces of smoked flesh still stuck between his yellow teeth.
The man nicknamed Blondie, helped by a couple of other men, pulled back the pit's wooden cover. "See you in a few days," said Blondie, chuckling to himself as Cooper was thrown into the hole.
With a wet thud, Cooper landed on his side at the bottom of the mud-filled pit.
"Are you alright, Captain?" asked the pastor as he bent down to help Cooper sit up.
"I'm okay," replied Cooper. A disgusting odor filled the air. "My God, what's that awful stench?"
"There's nowhere to go to the bathroom down here."
"Oh." Cooper wiped the mud from his mouth, stood up, and looked at the faces of the people trapped with him. The pastor and his wife were caked in mud, as were Joe and Francis. He turned his head and saw the walls of their prison were taller than the height of two men standing on one another's shoulders. To make matters worse, there was barely enough room for the five of them to stand around in.
"Captain, is help coming?" asked Rose.
Cooper shook his head. He wished it were otherwise, but he wasn't about to lie to them. "Sergeant Hawkins and I tried to get you out of here but as you can see we failed miserably. I'm a prisoner like you and Hawkins had to run for his life."
"Did he done get away?" asked Francis.
"Yes, I think so."
Joe asked, "Did he go for help?"
"No, he'd never leave us here. He's probably hiding somewhere in the woods trying to figure a way to get us out of here."
"Captain, I want to apologize for my behavior back at the trapper's cabin," said Melancon. "I let fear take hold of my heart and my mind. I never should have said those things about Sheriff Owens, and now he's dead. I'll never forgive myself for how I behaved."
"I suggest you don't dwell on the past. There's nothing you can do to change it. The best anyone can do is learn from their mistakes and try not to repeat them."
"You're right. At least Sergeant Hawkins is safe. There's still hope for salvation."
"Our options are limited. Either Hawkins rescues us or we'll be killed one by one and eaten by these monsters."
"Captain, I thought you said there were no monsters," said Rose.
"I was wrong. There are and they're far more horrible than some child's tale. These ones are real and as Madame Toussaint pointed out, they won't stop until they are all dead."
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