Chapter 5

We had a bunch of women who had lost husbands, brothers, fathers or whatever. They had little in the way of training and less in goods. We had rounded up most of Kepler's horses but found little else worth having. He was not thinking about long term at all. I guess that made sense in light of what happened to him and his men.

I looked at our maps and decided to head north to Allentown and then turn east to New York City. From New Jersey on in, I was worried about the area. It was large, paved and had had many, many people living there before the Day. Many of those people surviving would have nowhere that they would think to go and no skills to help them survive in the long run. The possibility of looting travelers had to be considered particularly in light of our recent experience.

We moved our slow way up to Allentown. Mark and Cindy and Doreen were the only ones I really wanted to have join us. The other women were of no use, either from the abuse or from their natural inclinations. Wendy subscribed to the latter line of thought and she had had much more contact with them than I had. Wendy's thinking was that those who didn't join fairly willingly into Kepler's band were killed and some of the women suggested the same to her. She felt those were, over time, possible additions to our group. I decided not to have an opinion bowing to her thinking in this matter.

As we approached Allentown, we scouted ahead and found an armed settlement that, if not flourishing, was surviving. Once they were comfortable that we not part of Kepler's band, they welcomed us though still reservedly. I didn't blame them. Kepler would put a damper on anyone's thoughts of hospitality.

They had a few more men than women and were willing to accept most of Kepler's women into their group. That helped a lot. We still had twenty-five or thirty women from Kepler who had been terribly abused and who didn't really know how to live. Wendy was working with them along with Doreen. They thought that, with time, most of them would recover to some extent. Mark and Cindy decided to stay with the Allentown group as they could use his skills and it kept them close to the part of the country that they knew. Doreen wanted to stay with us and become part of the Woods.

The Allentown group could tell us little about New Jersey and nothing about New York City. They didn't go there needing all their manpower to protect themselves from Kepler. Now that Kepler was out of the way, farmland was to the west and that was their thinking. They were democratic in nature though more argumentative than we are from the Woods. Mark felt he could get radios going for them and would be in contact with us as we continued to travel as well as with the Woods. Wendy and I would miss him and Cindy.

We parted company and moved eastward on I-78. We stopped off for a few days in a little park called Round Valley. It gave us some time to rest up and let Arnie finish his healing. I had missed his scouting. His mind was and is keen. We started back up and went through Newark planning to go to Liberty State Park staying on I-78. We found no one. We had found an old convenience store and picked up more detailed maps that we needed. We were now equipped with maps of New York and the city area as well as tourist brochures. When we stopped for the evening, we all went over the maps and the brochures to determine what we wanted to see and how we should get there.

When we had looked more closely at maps, we verified that the Statute of Liberty and Ellis Island were more in New Jersey than in New York. Since we were headed in that direction before turning north to the city, those became our first sights to target. Taking I-78 east would bring us very close to Liberty State Park which would be our first destination. We would have to find a safe place for the horses and wagons, find a boat or boats and go look.

Working with our maps, we entered Liberty State Park. It was pretty though overgrown. We clopped slowly down streets looking at the Statute out over the water. We could see Ellis Island further up and followed along the shore as best we could in that direction. We continued in that direction toward the Liberty Island Marina just beyond Ellis Island. As we went by Ellis Island, it appeared that there had been a bridge to it from where we were. The weather over eight years with no maintenance did not do it any favors. We stopped the horses and tied them while we looked, We decided we could almost make it on foot but a boat would be a better choice.

We came back to our wagons and moved north toward the marina. As we went, Wendy and I talked.

"Let's find a base point where we can put the wagons and have the horses be safe. Then, we can look for boats and what items we will need to use the boats." Wendy said.

"That sounds like a good plan. Now, we just have to find what we want in this concrete jungle. We knew that this would be an issue. I just hadn't think about how much of an issue."

"Jim, we can put out water and feed and keep the horses and wagons inside one of those big storage buildings."

"You're right, Wendy. It's either use one of them or stay outside where we could be seen pretty easily."

"Yes, after seeing some of those people in Washington and meeting Kepler, I think we need to be somewhat cautious."

We found the dry storage for the marina and pulled into it closing the door behind us. It wasn't the best solution but it kept our party out of the sight of prying eyes. We unhitched the horses. Finding some large tubs, we filled them with water which seemed to be still good. Water seemed to be the last public service to fail. Power was off though I checked just in case. We picked more smaller tubs and placed some hay and oats in them. We barricaded the doors ajar to keep the horses inside but let the air blow through. We went out a small side door that we could close and latch. A small group of us went through the docks on foot. There were plenty of motor boats but none of us had any hopes that they could be started or fueled. We started looking at the sailboats. That looked more hopeful. I noticed that they had small outboards which could be hand cranked. We started looking at them and picked a medium sized boat with a motor that could be controlled from the tiller of the boat itself. None of us knew enough about sailing to trust our luck with the sails. We had not seen another boat or person thus far. Wendy suggested that I give the motor a try. I cranked on it a few times and it would turn over but not fire. We had determined that not everyone wanted to go sightseeing. That meant that this boat would be big enough if it could be used.

We found some tools and one of our mechanical guys tried to remember what little he knew about such engines. Wendy went into the storage and work areas and returned with a manual. We started checking each thing in the trouble-shooting list. We replaced the plugs and the motor fired up. We breathed a sigh of relief though were a bit surprised that the gas worked. I found an empty bottle of stabilizer which helped explain that. We engaged the engine slowly and let it pull the boat against the mooring lines. We tested the wheel and figured out the kill switch procedure. With that, we cut the engine and got out. We had a boat! We would set up our base better including guards and go over the boat during what remained of the afternoon. Those desiring to go sightseeing would leave in the morning after breakfast.

We checked on the horses and they seemed satisfied. We cooked a group supper and prepared sandwiches for tomorrow's trip. We then found some chairs and set them up outside so we could see the skyline of New York City. It was imposing. We noted that there were no lights so the power was off there. I wondered if there were people at Central Park. I also wondered if I were being too cautious. I thought I was thinking silently until Arnie said, "No, Jim, you aren't being too cautious. The idea is to explore and return. Our insights and information will help our people for many years and we must be careful. It's up to us to try to see everything we can but also to return." He had the right of it.

Next morning was clear and comfortable temperature-wise. We went over to our chosen boat and checked it out one last time. We had plenty of gas in the tank, life jackets, food, and water. There was even a small rowboat if we needed it. We had pistols and rifles with ammo. That had become a habit. Even without threats from people, wild animals including dogs were an occasional issue.