Chapter 5: Miri’s Ordeal Begins

Monday May 17, 1859 Miri’s entire team disappeared. Her team was made up of Miri, Bea, Hildie and a boy named Jack Carson who was eighteen. It was determined that they had been missing for three hours. This time they felt they had a chance of catching the bastard. In three hours they had traveled just over eight miles. Men mounted their horses and galloped their back trail, then spread out in an unfortunately well practiced search pattern. Twenty minutes later three measured shots sounded and the riders rode to the spot they came from. There on the ground was Jack and Hildie, they had both been knocked unconscious by a sap, a sock filled with sand. Neither had seen their attacker. They had hung back from the other two and were sparking (kissing) when they had been hit over the head. The riders spread out searching for Miri and Bea, two of the Three Musketeers. Taking their time they found some tracks, they followed them to a small clearing where they found the body of Bea. Her neck was broken and had been raped several times, again, because there wasn’t any blood, the rape had probably happened after she was dead. There was no sign of Miri. Spreading out once more, they tried to find some kind of trail. They searched all the way back to the wagon train without finding a trail or Miri.

Bea’s parents were inconsolable, she had been the oldest of three children and was such a delightful child. She had been named after her maternal grandmother Beatrice, but they had always called her Bea. Her siblings were also distraught, the youngest at two didn’t understand what was going on but was upset because everyone else was.

Elisabeth and Jeremiah and Emily and Jack were upset but hopeful that somehow, with God’s Grace she would turn up alive and well. They prayed together in an effort to make it so.

Miri’s story;

The four of them had walked away from the train as they had been doing several times a week. Hildie and Jack wanted some alone time, they had fallen in love with each other, and Jack was going to ask Mr. Franks for permission to marry her soon. They hadn’t gone far, a hundred yards or so. Mira and Bea watched for a little while, but when the action started to get a little on the steamy side, they felt like they were being too intrusive. They walked away a short distance and sat on a log. They were watching a pair of squirrels playing in a tree when something hit Mira on the side of her head, she fell forward, landing on her side and looking up and back at Bea. She was stunned and couldn’t yell a warning when a large man with a hood covering his face and head reached out to her friend’s head and quickly jerked it in a clockwise direction. She heard a loud “Pop” and watched life fade from her friends eyes. Tears flooded her eyes, blurring her vision, but she could tell he was undressing her friend. When she was totally naked the man fumbled with something then placed Bea over the log, her head wiggling around as if she was an uncontrolled puppet. The man had dropped his pants and began to move back and forth causing Bea’s head to violently swing back and forth just as wildly. Soon the man grunted a few times then he sat on the log doing something with Bea that she was glad not to be able to see. After a few minutes the man stood behind Bea and repeated his back and forth movements, longer this time, then he repeated his grunts and once again sat down on the log.

He noticed that Miri was awake, even though she still couldn’t move. He pulled up his pants as he stood. Then he walked over to Miri and tied her hands together, then he tied her ankles together. He started to blindfold her, but mumbled “Maybe you should watch what you are going to get soon!” He then went back behind Bea, dropped his pants again and started the back and forth movement for a third time. Bea’s head continued to flop back and forth, back and forth. The movement sped up just before he grunted some more. He pulled his pants up again and sat on the log, putting his face in his hands he began to cry, mumbling “I’m sorry Bea, I can’t help myself, I’m sorry!”

Miri felt no sympathy for this monster! She felt nothing but loathing and for the first time in her life, a consuming hatred for this thing that had snuffed out the life of her friend, a beautiful girl who had been full of life, had never hurt anyone in her short life, and had looked forward to living in Oregon. Now she lay on a log, lifeless and violated. She realized that what he had said meant that she was his next victim! Perhaps Bea was lucky, she died quickly! Miri was going to die a little each hour until she too would feel his cold hands grip her head and feel the beginning of the turn of her head that would end her life too. Her tears once again ran down her face, but this time it wasn’t for her friend Bea, no, this time they were for herself!

Miri became aware that the monster was approaching her, in his hand he carried part of Bea’s pantalettes, he forced her mouth open and stuffed her mouth full of them. Then he used a scarf of some type to bind the pantalettes in her mouth. Then a hood without eye holes was placed over her head. Then she was trussed up with her knees on her chest, and her feet touching her buttocks. She then felt a tow sack being roughly pulled over and under her body with her shoulders on the bottom. Something was placed on her buttocks that was wet and smelled of blood. The coppery smell was sickening, but if she threw up she knew that she could drown in her own vomit.

He picked her up and started walking, an hour later she began to hear voices, familiar voices. She couldn’t yell or wiggle or do anything that would draw attention to herself. A voice she recognized as belonging to the Wagonmaster said,

“I see you’ve bagged a deer, good job, we’ll eat well for dinner! Since you’ve been hunting you haven’t heard that another girl has been raped and murdered, both eight years, old Bea Wilson was her name, and Miri Johnson is missing and presumed to be kidnapped.”

The response from this monster was “That’s a shame, I’ll keep my eyes out for any sign of her!”

That’s when Miri knew without any doubt who the monster was, it was the man who did most of the hunting for the train, a man by the name of Grady Wilks. He had been a mountain man, and lived with the Indians up in the mountains of Utah and Wyoming. For some reason he hadn’t explained the Indians turned on him, Miri thought she knew exactly why they had turned on him. She wondered how many girls, Indian and white that he had killed then raped, or maybe he started out raping, then killing them. Perhaps the native tribes heard the screams of one of his victims and they almost caught him, so now he kills them first. Grady was a huge ugly man, somewhere around six and a half feet tall, he weighed at least three hundred pounds. His face had scars made by a grizzly bear when he was nineteen years old. They were mostly covered by his full beard, but a deep nasty looking scar on his forehead and missing half of his right ear, was enough to illustrate the fact that he was ugly as sin. Perhaps that was why he was raping and killing girls, but that didn’t explain why they were so young. Maybe some other incident in his past could explain that.

Here she was, a girl only eight years old developing ideas developed by Sigmund Freud, he wasn’t much older than the three years old at that moment having been born in 1856. If only she could survive, what else could she think up?

Miri grunted when her tow sack was dropped onto the ground. She remembered that he would dress his kills, (that was an ugly thought), on the outside of the last ring of the wagon circle. He had told everyone that he hadn’t wanted to disturb the women and children with the skinning and scraping of the hides. It’s possible that he has been getting girls from other places, towns and farms or ranches along our route. How many victims did he have?

She listened as he began cutting up a deer that must have been hidden before he attacked us. Legs, deer legs were what was thrust on top of her she thought. Tied together with the hooves sticking out the top of the tow sack would be a very convincing subterfuge. Kill a deer, hide the carcass in some concealed place close by his wagon, cut the legs off and he just had to follow the victim or maybe lure her away from the train in some way. Only do it occasionally, with no set pattern. Unless he makes a really bad mistake, he could get away with it for years, and maybe he already has. He has been on trips with Buck Allen before, could he be in on it? He hasn’t mentioned that this has happened before. But why would he?

Miri realized that only she knew where she was. Only she knew for sure that she was even alive. Only she knew who the monster was. Only she could save herself. Only she could stop the monster from doing this to more girls! She made a promise to herself that she would do whatever it took, even at the cost of her own life, to stop this monster. She couldn’t stand the thought of the monster doing what he had done to Bea, to any other girl, especially her sister Emily.

She was jolted from her mental commitments when the monster untied the sack and removed the legs. Soon after the bag was lifted and she was thrown into the back of his wagon. The tow sack was removed then the ropes binding her together were also untied. The pain of stretching out her legs was excruciating, having been bound for over two hours. He removed the sack over her head, she wished he hadn’t. He was leering at her with his scared face, but even more terrifying was the large Bowie knife he held in his hand. But he only started cutting away her clothes, being very careful not to hurt her, at least with the knife. After removing her clothing he just looked at her, like she was a steak dinner, but just looked.