TC3

1

In the lofty ideals of  America's originators freedom  was the self-evident right  of  all  men, but  some  of  the  colonies imagined they depended on coerced labor so they forced an ugly compromise. "All men" was interpreted  to be  all males  with means and a certain complexion. For a human lifetime the union stumbled along under this fatal contradiction.

The sort of agriculture the southern states  had fastened upon steadily de- pleted  the soil,  so they  looked to  extend the practice to new lands in the west. But inevitably the northern states with their  sheer  numbers pre-  vailed. They chose a president who said the founders had it right all along.

Hijinks ensued. Secession led  to a  naval  blockade. Shore batteries in South Carolina opened fire upon  Old Glory flying over a fort. Virginia became two states. The Federal army spent a year assaulting the southern capital of Richmond, and failing that, withdrew back north  of the Potomac  River. Then it was Lee's turn. But a written copy of his  maneuvering orders fell into enemy hands and he was forced to abort his invasion. High water delayed  his ability  to  ford  the  river, so,  like  a cornered  animal, he  turned to  fight. What followed was  the bloodiest single day of the war.

Muskets fell like rows of  dominoes atop stone walls  built on the banks of a quiet creek. Reaching the horizontal they fired, burning eyes with the pungent smoke of spent powder. Downstream the walls  became the  rails  of  a  stone bridge. Union and Confederate soldiers  converged  on  foot,  shouting  as  they merged. The fighting deteriorated to bayonet  thrusts and even fisticuffs. The federals  had  greater  momentum  and  nearly reached the other side of the bridge before the rebels bounced them back.

The boys in blue trod  in reverse over  a layer of  bodies one deep. Some were dead, others writhed with broken bones or lead balls lodged in their innards. Some of the fallen had survived the battle of Shiloh where the war attained  the current level of savagery.

A tube loaded with canister shot lined up on  the long axis of the bridge and mowed down counterattacking rebels like grass to form a  second layer of bodies. Some of these men in gray had survived the artillery hell of Malvern Hill.

Two guns on the rebel  side of  the creek upstream  maimed the Union gun- ners with  bursting shells  and another  tube fired solid shot. The Union gun became a pile of splinters and dented steel. Then followed a Rebel counter-assault. Quickly the men in gray  gained  most  of  the bridge,  which  had  become  an abattoir.

A colonel on the Union side was shot, but to the wonder of his men he stood up again  with a lead  ball lodged in  his Bible. With this divine sanc- tion the officer led yet another attack. Men standing on  the  mounting pile  of  bodies swapped  empty muskets for loaded ones handed up to them like water in a fire bucket brigade.

In the end the rebel  infantry ran  low on gunpowder  and knew the bridge was  lost. They pulled  back their  two pieces  of artillery with fresh  troops firing in a  rearguard action. The federal general commanding the corps assaulting the bridge saw retreating gray backs. He ordered a  lieutenant  to ride  to headquarters to report a bridgehead had been se- cured.

But the junior officer tasked  to be  a messenger saw  how the bridge was stacked with  bodies and  refused to  desecrate the dead of either side. Instead he dropped to the creek  bed and splashed across the stream on foot, bypassing  all the carnage on the  bridge. In so  doing  the  officer  suffered  little hardship. After all, as the local farmers well knew, the water in the creek was only knee deep.

At the end of the day the Army of  Northern Virginia was still bottled up against a wide bend of the Potomac. All the next day the federal com- mander watched from a long slope rising north of the river  and  refused  to advance  on  Lee,  even with  a two-to-one numerical advantage. Were the numbers ten-to-one he would yet wire Washington to say he didn't have enough men.

The meetinghouse  of the  local  German  Baptist Brethren  was pressed into service as a  field hospital for the  Union army. Dried blood  and  fresh  blood  stained  the  interior  walls. Daylight intruded in beams through bullet holes  in the walls. One doctor sedated men with chloroform while another sawed off their limbs and threw them into a pile.

A messenger arrived by  horse with orders  to get  the wounded out. The pile of amputated limbs was set ablaze. as horse-drawn ambulances carted the  wounded away. Every bump in the  road elicited screams from the men  in- side. No one who witnessed the convoy of pain and the carnage that was  left behind would again say they craved the glories of war. Certainly none of the Christian Brethren did.

Three days prior, when they first heard the sound of artillery on South Mountain,  the Brethren  thought it  prudent to  move their work horses far from  the men  of either army  who might want to  "requisition" them. Now, upon  their poor  leftover mules, they rode out to bury the dead. For this task the United States government paid  a dollar  for every  man they  laid to rest. There was a rumor going  around that one fellow,  not of the Breth-  ren, Fdropped sixty  dead men  into a dry  well and took the money.

The German Brethren found their labors to be  a hateful thing, but more bitter was  seeing their beloved  meetinghouse turned into a bullet-riddled slaughterhouse. Hundreds of bodies lay near their house of  prayer. The Long Table was  covered with blood. The east door, where  the menfolk  en- tered,  and the south door, where the  womenfolk entered,  had been  re- moved from the hinges and used as operating tables. And naturally the ex- pensive Bible gifted to the congregation  by Daniel Miller was missing.

Chief elder David Long  inspected the  meetinghouse thoroughly and said, "Do not grieve  overmuch, my friends. We  shall bury the dead  and make our  meetinghouse like new. If  the Brethren have  willing hands,  soon  all  this will  be  but an  unhappy memory."

Deacon Joshua Lange remained unmoved by Elder  Long's words of hope. He said, "Nothing will stop the same thing from happening once more, Brother David. Virginia lies just over yonder river and last month there was a second battle of Manassas."

"I can do  nothing  to remedy  that unfortunate  circumstance, Brother Joshua. This  shore happens to be an easy  place to get across the Potomac."

"We should build anew at my uncle's farm to  the north. By his leave  our  horses have  already  been  moved there  as  surety against thieves."

Elder Jacob Reichard said, "For  a decision of this  import we must let the  Lord make his will  known. So let us  pray on it, each one of us.

Long said, "Amen Brother Jacob! And there is  no prayer better than work."

After the Brethren  finished burying  the dead  soldiers Elder Long de-  clared he  would  stay  in  Maryland, as  would  the Sherrich family. Also Samuel Mumma, the man who had donated the land for their meetinghouse, was intent on restoring the family farm the  two armies  had  demolished. The deacons who  were originally deeded the  plot  for the  Mumma meetinghouse  also chose to stay.

But Daniel Miller  sold  his  corn field  for  pennies on  the dollar, as it was now little more than a battlefield cemetery. Miller and ten other families joined Lange in  seeking a quiet new life far from the threat of war, or so they hoped.

Before the battle the  horses of the  Brethren had  been taken north by five male cousins from Lange's father's  side. As the families prepared to  move the  horses were  returned. It was Joshua's cousin Joanna who brought them all back, and this she did entirely by herself.

Joanna's own horse was groomed better than she was, yet Joshua fell stone in love with her at first sight.

On the road up north when the weather turned bad Joanna let her horse have  the tent  while  she  slept  outside. At home  in Pennsylvania  she  spent  more  time cleaning  her  horse  than helping her mother clean the house. Josh- ua thought the house was a pigsty but the barn was neat as a pin.

When her mother said Joanna  needed a male companion  to quiet some of the rumors going  around she got a  stallion. Joanna's father looked askance when Joshua  began courting her  but her mother was clearly over- joyed.

One time he grew jealous at finding a strange hair on her coat but Joanna was easily able to  produce the horse to  match. At her bridal shower Joan- na  received a large number  of gifts. Most of these were actual bridles.

When the happy day finally arrived and it was  time to show up for her wedding  Joanna came in late because she  took too long cleaning the stalls. Joshua married her anyway.

The following summer the Army of Northern Virginia crossed the Poto- mac River once more,  but federal movements  in response forced the Con- federate commander to concentrate his forces at Gettysburg, which was a  dense node in  the road  network, and this brought on the biggest bat- tle of the war.

On the third day of  the conflagration Joshua Lange  walked to his new meetinghouse and found  all the pews scattered outside. Union officers were seated upon  them idly smoking  cigars and playing tic tac  toe on  them with  pocket knives. Inside the meetinghouse the Army of  the Potomac's commander  poured over maps laid on the Long Table and concluded the next hammer blow would land  on the  center. The short-tempered com-  manding general angrily demanded who he was. Joshua said, "I'm the the pastor of this church!" The general replied, "The hell you say, sir! This is the headquarters of  the Army! Now get  out of my sight, parson, or I'll put a  musket in your hand and stand you up on yonder stone--"

His tirade was interrupted by a crash as the church filled with fly- ing wood  splinters. Confederate artillery had  opened a furious  bar- rage. He ran out  of  the meetinghouse  picking splinters out of his skin and barking orders. His officers on the pews began to scatter as shells burst nearby.

Union artillery was brought up to answer  Confederate guns but Lange re- mained inside. Perhaps he thought his presence would move God to  spare the  building, but  solid shot  made gaping holes in the walls. Joshua clasped his hands and prayed, "Lord, forgive your stiff-necked servant.  Now I  know your  will was that we move west, not north!"

Two shells from the rebel's main battery burst over the roof of the church and completely demolished it with Joshua Lange still inside.

2 Travel the equator of Kemen to a point halfway between where Salem and Rumbek once lay and turn north. Then travel over the Ice to a point half- way between the equator  and pole and you will arrive at a massive vol- cano named Mount Anshar which has grown layer by layer for a million years.

Ice two miles deep moved  at an imperceptible pace,  trying to erode Anshar  into a zone of  craggy uplands should it  ever go dormant. It flowed around the  obstacle and merged  again many miles to the  south,  exposing  the only  bare  rock in  Kemen outside of the equatorial belt.

When the black  avatar of  Belial arrived  at this  small land using the numbers Lilith gave him some thirty-two hundred years prior, he saw that  the ice  was somewhat  closer than  he had observed, and the mountain was silent. Perhaps the geothermal hot spot under Anshar had cooled.

Hamon's house across the stony flat also looked different, and no wonder, when Mt. Anshar was  in eruption it no  doubt threw flaming projectiles many  miles. And Belial himself  had once burned down the house in anger after the  conception of Binah. His avatar could  sense, but  did not  take of-  fice, at  the pervasive smell of sulphur. He strode past boiling mud pots and ponds of scalding water. The ground itself  was as warm  as a planet-  dweller body. The house, hy  knew,  relied on  these thermal features to maintain a comfortable  temperature within its walls.

He walked the quarter-mile to the house and let hymself inside. It was not locked, and  why should  it be? The inhabitants of Kemen thought the northern Ice went on without end. No traveler ever stumbled onto the land of  Anshar for all the  time Kemen was populated, and now, after  the comet fell, the  Slush Belt was entirely vacant of human life.

But the house in Anshar was  not empty. A human male stood in the main  living space, fair  of skin, with black  hair cropped short and facial hair that  revealed a habit of  maintaining a clean shave, but  a habit that had been set  aside for a number of weeks.

When the man greeted the newcomer with a simple "Hello Belial" the avatar said, "You know who I am, yet you do not address me as Lord. The B'nei Elo- him  have grown less courteous of late. Where is the seraph Bat-El claimed would be waiting here?"

"I am that seraph."

"A human seraph is a contradiction in terms."

"The B'nei Elohim may refuse to speak, as you well know, but we never lie, and I am not Bat-El. Have you forgotten his warning that possessing bodies serially is fraught with peril? A seraph stands before you."

"Binah, then. Welcome to the world of meat."

"This meat goes by the name of Joshua."

"Bat-El's fears about serial possession are groundless."

"Shemhazai's possession of Rimmon diluted his original persona by  half. Bat-El  dared this  union  only with  Hamon and  even Shemhazai  refused  to take  flesh  again  after the  death  of Rimmon. I'll not merge with another world- dweller after my own death in this flesh."

"You are a fool to imagine the feeble  minds of world-dwelling apes  could ever  contaminate  the minds  of  living stars  and Shemhazai is a fool to ac- cept your argument."

"Something you said just now: 'Welcome to the  world of meat.' In the  join- ing with  Joshua I, as a  star, knew the  meat as though born to it." But Belial seemed to be of one mind on this so Joshua  let the  matter  drop. Instead, he said,  "Bat-El thought you might wish to meet  a new seraph before I return to Earth."

"And why do you take upon yourself planet-dweller flesh in this time?"

Joshua answered, "It is to  alter things  on Earth more  to my liking, in the same way Hamon  once ordered Kemen to hyz liking in the days of the dragon."

"And all for  nought. Shemhazai  tired of  the experiment  and allowed the co- met to come."

"Belial, if he  really  tired  of the  experiment  why did  he command  a select  few to  take refuge  in the  ice and  lay up supplies? A  generation later when  the Slush Belt  thawed they found a  world cleansed of  their rivals, but also  cleansed of every form of life Bat-El  imported from Earth. Only the native flora persisted  and it  killed your surviving  Adanites faster than  they could  breed. Shemhazai  must have  forgotten how  a steady flow of humans were imported  from Earth just to get the original colony started on this world."

"In the end he brought the Adanites to this place."

"Oh, I know," said  Joshua, "I've seen  the bones.  There's no soil in An- shar. No way to grow any food."

"Now you will teach the humans  of Earth to reach  the stars," "said Belial. But you must not!"

"I owe you nothing, Belial. We have no covenant, you and I. Nor am I will-  ing  to make  a  covenant with  you  or any  other criminal. Every moment of my isolation compounds your crime."

"You know that by our ancient covenant Bat-El  is permitted to listen to the chatter of El  Elyon, but never to speak to them. I, however, will grant to you full access to the City of Stars, to  both listen  and speak,  if you  agree to  be silent  about certain things."

"Allow me to make a  counteroffer, father. Abrogate  the First Covenant. Grant  to both myself and  Bat-El unencumbered access to our kind immedi- ately, and we will present the discovery of the Students with no mention of the many centuries Bat-El and I were held silent."

Belial shook his head. "It is well you took this opportunity to converse with me, Binah,  but you  have been  a disappointment from the instant you began to exist."

Joshua said, 'The offer I made to you just now was sincere. But I would have been surprised to hear your acceptance."

Belial said,  "I  must  admit   the  offer  is  tempting.  But announcing the Stu- dents, even under the terms you offer, will bring a level of scrutiny from  the Watchers that neither I nor Shemhazai will ever be prepared to accept."

"Then we have nothing more to say to one another," said Joshua.

"What I will do instead is press one advantage  I do have. You fear serial lives? Very well! I  can add a complication to your plan to become a teacher to your students."

One of Belial's hands changed shape to become a black sword.

But Joshua cried, "God shall give his angels  charge over you. They shall  bear you up in  their hands, lest your  foot strike against a stone!'

He bent backwards over the wooden  rail of the upper  level. A ball of water a meter in diameter appeared, floating in midair. The water overflowed the sphere and the excess poured straight down to the floor. It was Bi- nah's business to make sure the ball intercepted Joshua as he fell with arms and legs tucked in close.

Belial screamed wih rage because he knew what was coming and he could only watch it come. Joshua cannonballed into the sphere of water, which then snapped out of existence with  a loud pop and a splash that left  the wa- ter  ankle deep on  the ground floor of the house.

Left alone Belial could only vent his range by burning Hamon's house to the foundation once more.

3

No one among the Brethren disputed the house of  prayer of the Five Corners Free  Congregation was  demolished by  two shells that burst overhead  while  Joshua Lange  huddled within. But after he crawled out from  the pile and  told them it  was the will of God to lead his flock away to settle  far in the west, many of the Brethren  came to  believe some  of the  timber in their ruined  Meetinghouse had perhaps fallen  on Elder Lange's head.

As for   Joanna  Lange,   Joshua's  wife,  she   believed  him absolutely. There was, for example, the matter of a large scar in his back, over one of  his kidneys, that hadn't  been there before the battle. And another piece of convincing evidence was the bump at the back of  her own head the  grew and eventually pierced the skin. By imperceptible degrees it opened like the petals of a flower to become a little bone cup in the shape of the letter "D" with dozens of black pins inside.

Joshua explained the matter to her,  and set her mind  at ease that she was in no danger, but she did start  to wear her hair in a  bun to  cover  the  pro-  trusion. Eventually, all  the caucasian members of Joshua's flock would also wear  a bun, in imitation of  Joanna, whether they  had a  bone cup to  hide or not.

For the time being the matter of making a pilgrimmage west was set aside. The Brethren were  preoccupied  with burying  the fallen soldiers of both armies, as they had done once before in Maryland. They were adequately compensated by the United States for their labor, if not for the loss of much of their farm land to many hundreds of burial plots.

The following Sunday when the  Brethren met  in a tent  on the grounds of their ruined meetinghouse Joshua read  aloud from a hand-written  book  he  called the  Printer's  Manuscript. The Sunkel, Clark, and Martin families decided he was trying create new scripture from his own mind. A new bible was something they simply could not accept. These three families re-  turned to Sharpsburg, Maryland where Elder  David Long welcomed them home as prodigal sons and daughters.

After the work of  burying the fallen  soldiers of  both sides had been  completed the  nine  families  who remained  in  the congregation made prepa- rations to sojourn west. Some of them sold their homes outright, while others deeded them to kin who would remain behind. It took until the end of the war for the Porters, Bergins, Henrys,  Zinters, Hillings,  and Krauses  to rovision themselves for the pilgrimage. But the Savitts and the Brannens dwindled in  their  ardor. After Atlanta fell,  just before the presidential election, they deemed it safe to return to Maryland, and this they promptly did.

Joshua Lange  took  his  flock  first  to  the  state  capital in Harrisburg, a  little  to  the northeat,  and  thence by  a hodgepodge of  rail lines across the  Appalachian Mountains all the way to Pittsburgh. These railroads were laid  of wrought iron, and the  maximum  speed  permitted on  them  was a  mere twenty-five miles per hour, lest they wore out in just one year rather than ten. And setting aside the fact the mountains were a barrier to east-west travel in general, there were many stops along the way. It took most of the night and the better part of the next morning to cross Pennsylvania.

At Pittsburgh the congregation switched from rail to steamboat, which, despite moving with the current down  the upper reaches of the Ohio River, made no better speed than a sustained brisk walk. But unlike the train, there were staterooms to occupy on the  upper  deck. The ladies  were  segregated to  the  stern. Lange's group was  not  so  destitute as  to  be relegated  to sleeping on the  first deck amid the bales of  cotton and other cargo, as many of the walk-ons did while the steamboat made its way downriver.

From their rooms the members of Lange's flock  looked out with contentment upon the ever-changing scene along the river as it sliced  through  the  forested  hills. They spent  three  days steaming first north, then south and west, stopping at times to board and disembark passengers or to take on  firewood for the boiler that churned, ever so precariously, it  seemed to them, under the very flammable decks.

At Cincinnati  Joshua  Lange's   group  disembarked  from  the steamboat and again took to rail, as they had  come to the end of the mountains and had passed  through an odd corner  of the country where terrain and circum- stance had not yet conspired to make the  railroad  network complete. But again, at  East St. Louis, after  crossing the  states of  Ohio, Indiana,  and Illinois, they briefly took  to the water  once more. At that time the only bridge lay far to the north in Davenport, Iowa.

Once the travelers and their luggage were safely on the western shore of the Mississippi River  they resumed riding  rail once more. The track  in  Missouri was  laid  of  Bessemer  steel, permitting travel at a breakneck forty-five miles per hour. The line going  west  came  to  an  end  just  a  few  miles  past Independence, Missouri.

And Joshua Lange, glancing at the train platform  even as they were roll- ing to a stop, saw two  extraordinarly tall figures he recognized waiting for them. Zarall and Anael, yen both of them and natives of Kemen. He raced up to greet them as soon as he disembarked. Each of them sank to a knee to  greet Joshua, which thing astonished his followers

Joshua begged  them  to  rise,  and in  their  own  tongue  he commanded them to  treat him with less formality  than his rank of seraph was traditionally accorded, lest  his followers come to a misunderstanding.

So Anael rose and spoke to Lange otherwise than sha wished, but calling him a mere pastor was a step too far. It was Anael who first applied the title Prophet to the leader of this remnant. Sha said, "We meet again, Prophet Lange, and this time in much better circumstances than  the first! I trust  your journey has so far gone well?"

Joshua said, "Very well indeed, Anael. And Zarall,  it is good to  see you  again as  well. I  thank you  both for  meeting us here."

By this time all  of Joshua's  followers had  gathered around, marveling that  these tall  strangers  knew  their pastor  and marveling that they called him Prophet. These were the nucleus of hardcore believers who never wa- vered in  their faith, yet it was  comforting to  have  confirmation  of what  Lange  had frequently told them. Still, they were  dismayed to  find the strangers wore a  decorative headdress  with white  horns that curved to form a kind of bifurcated halo. It seemed heathenish.

Zarall said to Joshua's little flock, "Did you  fear you would reach the end of the line and find yourselves to be castaways?"

Joshua's beloved wife Joanna said, "I admit, I dreaded the hard looks and harder questions that  would come, should  we arrive here with no  one to greet us.  Perhaps I feared it  would be a sore test of their faith, and my own."

"The journey you just made was the test of your faith," Zarall said, "and that you are here, all of you, says everything. But the simple  truth is that Anael  and I have been  working since dawn bringing all  these mud-wag- ons here, and  riding back by turns to bring more."

Joanna asked, "Are there, then, only the two of you?"

Anael nodded. "Just we two. And I hope these seven wagons will suffice  for  you and  all  your  people,  and of  course  your luggage.  Come, ride  with me  with  your husband  in the  lead coach. I  will speak of  the place that  will be your  home for this fall and winter."

The lower valley  of  the  Blue River,  where  it dumped  into the Missouri  River, divided  Kansas  City  from the  town  of Independence. Anael and Zarall led  Joshua Lang and  his flock seven miles from the train  station up the Blue  River valley, past many small farms, crossing the river now and again, until they were come to a large structure snuggled  hard against the west side of the valley. The building was a single-story pile of large  interlocking  limestone  brick,  built  without  the necessity for mor- tar.

Anael said che hemself had assembled the twelve foot high walls and Lange did not doubt hem  for an instant. The building did look sound, with a good  roof, but  Lange thought it  could do with a  coat of whitewash. It lay inside a larger  fenced area with a small herd of oxen. The animals had grazed the grass to nubbins and now subsisted on bales of hay.

Led by Zarall, and assisted  by Joanna  Lange and the  men and older boys, the fourteen horses that had been used to drive the pilgrims to this place were unharnessed from the mud-wagons and led into  this area  to  mingle  with  the  oxen and  feed  on alfalfa, which was spread out  just for the steeds. The animals considered it to be candy.

Anael gestured at the oxen and said, "Here are the beasts that will  pull your  wagons,  Joshua.  At least  for  part of  your journey. Alas for them, they will  go no farther west than Fort Kearny.  After that  the  poor worn-out  things  will head  for somebody's dinner table."

Following Zarall the thirty-six  pilgrims stepped  through the double doors to look inside the structure. They saw a large bay with ten prairie schooners under assembly. The hoops for their bonnets reached nearly to the ceiling. At one end of the bay was a common  dining area. Along the walls were  set private rooms of diverse sizes for each of the seven fami- lies.

Zarall said, "I welcome every one  of you to this  place which has been prepared to carry out the will of God Most High. There is much yet to do, and much  for you to learn to do, before you will be ready to finish your journey. But by then it will be, I think,  too  late  in  the  year for  you  to  arrive  at  your destination with time to make ready before winter sets in.

Anael said, "Zarall and I have been granted  the privilege and the honor to help you make all the necessary preparations. Take no thought of money! This room and board, these animals and the wagons they will pull are all gifts of the B'nei Elohim, freely given."

Joanna, like many  Americans,  was almost  allergic to  taking charity. Speak- ing for all of Lange's followers, she said, "We are not entirely des- titute."

Zarall replied, "Yet  if I  am  not mistaken,  your have  only brought such clothing  and family heirlooms you  could not bear to  leave behind.  Therefore you  will, over  the next  several months, make many overnight trips  to Kan- sas City to purchase whatsoever new items you may need."

Privately Joshua thought the people who had come to that place needed a less awkward name to  know them by than  to just call them "Lange's follow- ers". In the weeks to come a child among them named Linda Bergin  would learn that  some oxen  were not easily turned by the touch of a pole. They were called "stiff of  neck" and  this was  the source  for many  refer- ences  in the  Bible  which referred  to  the  children  of Israel  as  a stiff-necked people. Anael said such stubbornness was really a good  thing if  it was  desired to  move toward  a single  goal without turning to one side or the other. Linda took to calling all the pilgrims "Stiffnecks" and it quickly caught on.

The Stiffnecks, then, grew larger by two individuals while they win- tered over near  Westport. The first to arrive  was baby Megan, born to Gary and Marge Bergin in the  fall of 1865. The second was  Miss Tamara  Brannen,  who  arrived by  rail  from Maryland to be wed to  Lee Henry in  the twilight days  of the same year. But it wasn't until the following spring before the roads, knee-high in mud, had become solid enough  to begin the pil- grimage west.

It was a Sunday when the Sticknecks spent their  last full day with Zarall and Anael, and  for the  final time the  two B'nei Elohim worshiped with them, though they both found the practice to be odd and had frequently commented to that effect. Some of the Stiffnecks remarked in  turn how  this ojection  made them appear even more heathenish.

But Anael said to them, "Have we not shared our meals together three times  each day, and  offered praise and  thanksgiving to God? Such a communal meal is the only thing resembling services Yeshua ever conduct- ed with his disciples."

At the end of  the worship  service Zarall rose  to say  a few words from his heart to the people sha had lived with an served for nearly a year. "Have no illusions. This will the the most difficult  thing you  have ever  done.  But do  not be  afraid! Yeshua came to teach men to  live together in peace, and in the beginning it  was so. With  God willing, your labors  will make the Lord's aspiration present in the world once more."

It took all the next morning  for the oxen to  toil just three miles up a  ravine feeding  the  Blue River  to intersect  the infant Oregon  Trail running  south  from  Raytown. There the twenty oxen pulling  the  wagons were  re-  leased from  their burdens, and the twenty beasts that made a  leisurely walk out of the Blue River valley were put under harness. After another eight miles the Oregon Trail bent sharply to the  west, and in another half mile they stopped.

Whenever the wagon train  stopped for the  evening it  was the responsibili- ty of the head of each family to raise his wagon with a jack, remove one wheel, and paint the hub with a mix of pine tar  and tallow carried  in a  bucket slung from  the rear axle, as they were solemnly instructed by Oriel. This they were to do as though it were a ritual, before  they even took their evening meal, on a revolving basis, one wheel per night.

When they crossed  into  the state  of  Kansas the  Stiffnecks dipped into the stash of salt pork stored under  a false floor in their wagons, and ate them with dried peaches.

To cross rivers the bottoms of the wagons were painted with tar to make them waterproof and they were floated across after the animals were  safely on  the  other  side. But sometimes  the pilgrims were brought to a halt by a severe afternoon rainstorm and had to huddle inside their wag- ons.

Still, everyone remained in good spirits. Most of the younger children had ridden  by pairs  on  the backs  of the  fourteen horses, while the adults  and older children  switched between riding in the  wagons or  walk- ing  on foot  beside the  oxen pulling them to lead  them along  the track  at a  stately two miles per hour. Breakfast frequently featured eggs laid by the chickens the people had brought along, but on  Sundays some of these chickens were slaughtered and roasted for a midday feast.

They reached  the  eastern  edge of  the  regions  crossed  by migrating  bison. Ida Porter, Roy  Hilling, and  Robert Krause began collecting buffalo chips to use as cooking fuel, and they made it seem so fun the  other children pitched in. When they reached streams or  rivers Alfred  Porter and  his son  George angled for catfish and  caught enough for  everyone to  have a baked fish for lunch the next day.

A family living in  a farmhouse  sold the  pilgrims a  meal of boiled  beans and  chipped beef,  served with  fresh bread  and topped off with oven baked pies. But on most days the pilgrims had begun open their cans of cheese and sardines, and consumed these with hardtack bread and  tea. But when they reached the Hollenberg farm there were nine boarding  rooms available. The men among  the  Stiffnecks  were  glad  for  the  change  from sleeping outdoors on the ground. Breakfast was bacon, eggs, and gooseberry cobbler.

A war party of some two hundred Pawnees crossed the trail from the south, passing Lange's group quite by chance. Most of the plains Indians knew  settlers on  the Oregon  Trail were  just passing through  and in  the  main  they  did  not go  out  of their way  to antagonize  them, lest  it brought  down unwanted retaliation from the United States Army.

"Make no threatening  moves," Lange  cautioned his  followers. "Touch no rifle. Trust the Lord to protect us."

The Pawnees swarmed around their wagons out of pure curiosity, in- specting the hatchets  and mallets  they found  within and took turns to  lie on  the feather-bed  mattresses one-by-one. They took no  food or  tobacco,  and eyed  the weapons  stored inside but let them be. Some of them took a very close look at the women, perhaps the first  white females they had ever seen, but they kept  their hands  to  themselves. If such were  the orders of their chief they were a very disciplined force at the very least.

When they had mounted their horses once more the chief scanned the whole scene, drew himself  up in his full  battle regalia, crinkled his face, and plugged his nose. All the braves broke into laughter, then they all rode away. When it was clear they would not return, Lange led his con- gregation in  a prayer of thanksgiving to God.

When there was  no  local water  for the  oxen  and horse  the pilgrims watered the animals from cisterns in the wagon. One of the oxen in the trailing  wagon had thrown  a shoe and  no one could guess how far back along  the trail it might  be. Joanna Lange applied to the ox's  injured hoof. He was released from pulling the wagon and two of the horses were set in his place.

After passing the future location  of Kenesaw, the  trail drew near to the Platte River in another seven miles, with the smell of cottonwood trees in the air. The water was silty, but let still in a bucket for an hour it grew clear. The oxen were less discerning.

At length the Stiffnecks reached Fort Kearney, the last outpost of civi- lization they would  find until they built  their own settlement. They telegraphed messages  to family  members left behind in Gettysburg  and  trad- ed  their  worn-out oxen  for rested ones. At the general store they ob- tained more chickens and many of the sundries  they had  consumed on the  trek, but prices were dear.

Two days   were  spent  at   the  fort. Taking  their  rest, they witnessed several  other  wagon  trails passing  through. Blacksmiths willing to la- bor on Sunday put new iron shoes on the horses and oxen. Lange's money was depleted that much more.

During the following week the  Stiffnecks passed south  of the future townsite of North Platte. Had they left Gettysburg only two years after they did North Platte would be the western rail terminus and they could have begun their  pilgrimage that much closer to their final destination.

Joshua Lange led the wagon train off the Oregon Trail entirely. They struck north, cross-country,  to reach a  vast wilderness called the Ne- braska Sandhills. This is a sea of  sand dunes anchored by grass and dotted with innumerable small freshwater lakes. There was plenty of  green  stuff for  the animals  to graze, but  the going was  slow. No sooner did someone wonder, aloud, where the water came  from than they were  inundated by the first  of frequent  rainstorms that  slowed their  as- sage even more.

The way twisted between the hills but sometimes a ridge twenty miles long and two hundred feet high lay directly across their path and they were compelled to  go over it. Other times they would reach brush in draws which had to be cleared by men using axes and scythes. The Stiffnecks were to  spend as  many days traveling off the Oregon Trail as they had  spent traveling on it.

It seemed they had entered a purgatory and only Joshua Lange's regular additions  to the  Printer's Manuscript  prevented them from losing track of the days. But at last they reached what Joshua Lange knew to be the Squaw River and the pilgrims turned west to follow it toward its source.