Chapter 4

Seamus and Rocky made it back to the cabin in a few minutes, although Rocky did whine to be carried when they left the blackberry thicket that almost completely closed off the downstream outlet off the small valley where the cabin was situated. His mother kept him busy with reading and 'around-the-cabin' chores until the children woke up and began to drift, like sad and silent ghosts, toward the smell of cooking that was emanating from the kitchen.

Seamus' mother handed each of them a slice of bread and some water. When they started to whine about it she said, "You'll get more in a bit."

That seemed to settle the children who made the food disappear as quickly as they could get it down. The smallest, Seamus wasn't sure if the child was a boy or girl, looked more than a bit green a few minutes after wolfing the bread. He was somewhat surprised when Rocky, who had come into the room very quietly, butted the child with her head. The child looked down at the dog and for the first time since they had arrived Seamus saw a ghost of a smile on the face of one of the children. The distraction or attention from Rocky seemed to settle the child enough to prevent an attack of vomiting.

"Nice doggy," the child said, the first words that Seamus had heard from any of them.

"What's your name?" Seamus asked hoping for an answer that would tell him if the jeans and t-shirt wearing child was a boy or girl.

"Not tell strangers," the child said.

"Oh, well I'm Seamus, though my mom sometimes calls me Jamie," Seamus said.

The child just shook its head and refused to speak. "I think his name is Manny," said a larger child that Seamus thought might be a girl because of the long hair that 'she?' had. As if anticipating his question the child said, "I'm Laura; I guess you're gonna be our family since the bad men made everyone dead?"

"Indeed we will be, I expect." Seamus' mother said, "My name is Siobhan, but if that is too hard you can call me by my middle name which is Marie."

"Shvan?" Laura tried the name out, "I've never heard of anyone with a name like that."

"I don't suppose you have. I was a wee lassie when me mum and da came to America from Ireland," Siobhan said broadening her accent.

"You sound funny!" Laura giggled and then blushed, putting her hand over her mouth. Laura's giggle and embarrassment seemed to encourage the other children as they all cracked small smiles.

"I expect so," she said. Then put her hand on the head of a dark haired girl and asked, "¿Coma se llama niñita?"

"Huh?" the girl asked.

"What's your name?"

"Nita."

"Nita, did your parents teach you to speak Spanish?"

"Oh, yeah but no one used formal words like that," she answered.

"But you do understand how people from different places can sound different?" Siobhan asked.

The girl nodded but didn't say anything else. "How long has it been since you ate before getting here?" she asked the children in general rather than focusing on Nita.

They all shrugged, and then Laura said, "Richard gave us a little to eat this morning before he started back here."

Siobhan nodded and said, "Laura, I'm going to show you the bath tub, do you think you can organize a bath for all the girls?"

"I guess so; I'd like more to eat though."

Siobhan gave each of the children a bit more bread and when they had wolfed it down she said, "Seamus I want you to go back out and see if anyone tries to follow your father in here."

Seamus nodded. The dirty faces and frightened eyes of the children his father had brought in convinced him, as little else might have, that something was wrong. That the world as he had known it had ended, as some people thought it would, in an orgy of killing. "Don't just back track along the way your father came in," she said, "that would be a good way for you to end up dead if someone hostile came along."

Seamus nodded as he picked up the crossbow he had been carrying earlier. "Take a rifle as well," Siobhan said.

"Are you sure mom?"

"Yes, just be sure of what you're shooting at if you do decide to use either the rifle or the crossbow."

Seamus paused a moment to pick up the rifle that his mother had not yet returned to storage, then left the cabin. 'Shit, ' he thought, 'I know that everything has gone crazy. First we were hiding like mice from cats and now it's like we've suddenly become the cats!'

Still, he carefully avoided the trail that had been trampled down earlier in the day by the arrival of the herd of animals that his father had brought. 'No sense in not practicing a bit of woodcraft if mom and dad are right, ' he thought.

As he looked back toward the cabin he was somewhat surprised to see Rocky limping along in his wake, or rather on the far side of the trail he was going to watch from hiding. 'Huh, ' he thought, 'no one can tell me that Rocky is stupid after today!' He also reminded himself to be extra careful where he shot; if he felt that he needed to shoot at anything. 'I wouldn't want to shoot Rocky after all, she's helping me!' he thought.

Seamus got to a spot that he thought was far enough from the cabin and settled in to watch what happened. It was not very long until he saw and heard the wildlife in the area going back to its normal routine. 'Well, that is something I'm going to have to practice, ' he promised himself.