Chapter 9: Sisters

I was wandering in the barrens of Long Island, thoroughly lost after barely escaping destruction with the Maryland Line that terrible August. There's a fight I cannot forget. We were rear guard after the Line stood off the Hessians time after time so the rest of the army could flee and then charged when it was obviously hopeless. Sterling was either mad or foolishly brave, perhaps both. But had he not stood and had the Maryland Line not stood, the revolt might well have ended there and then. After that I was always proud to say I was a Marylander.

The screams came in twos at first and then just a single voice cried out for mercy and for help. I dismounted, tethered my horse, checked my weapon and discovered that a small group of Hessians was in the process of raping two females in a forest clearing. After some quick and careful study as the cries continued, I counted six men and decided that the two girls were almost past the point of rescuing.

One was tied to a tree with her arms stretched above her and had bright blood running down her chin, along one small breast and on the inside of her thighs. The other young woman was being buggered and doing most of the yelling despite the fact that the man on her was beating her head into the dirt. The girl on the tree might have been unconscious or dead, but the man pawing at her and getting ready to prong her did not seem to care. She seemed oblivious to everything. The soldiers had started the small campfire and the girls had been stripped nearly naked.

I poured a handful of heavy buckshot into the muzzle of my piece and worked my way around until the women were almost completely covered by the bodies of their hulking attackers. I got as close as I could, knelt and let fly at about twenty paces. The German nearest me screamed and fell atop the woman he had been abusing and another twisted in agony near the fire with his hands to his face as I charged into the camp and skewered the man who had been raping the girl stretched out on the tree. He died on my blade, arms flung wide, as I turned to face a soldier with a straight sword coming at me, an officer I supposed, a sergeant it turned out. I hit him in the face with the butt of my gun and charged toward the place where two men were retrieving their weapons from a stack near the fire.

I stuck one in the back and dumped him atop the muskets as the other lunged at me, missed and fell on his face when I threw my hip into his charge. I pinned him to the ground with my big blade as I heard someone yell, "Look out." The man I had knocked down was leveling his musket from less than ten feet. Suddenly a small woman jumped on his back and his weapon fired into the air harmlessly. I was on him almost at once, pulled the naked girl aside and tore his throat apart.

The naked girl stood panting beside the dead German and pointed, "He's getting up," she said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

I turned and saw that one of the men I had shot was up and charging at me, bayonet lowered and blood streaming down his face from a ruined eye. I parried his thrust, knocked his weapon aside and then stuck him in the chest. He cried out and held my musket with both hands until I kicked him away, spurting blood and clawing at his spilling guts.

I checked each body carefully, found the non-com near the sword still alive, dispatched him with a thrust and then cut the girl down with my broad bayonet. She fell in a heap but soon revived with her sister's help, moaning and then crying. The two nearly naked and harshly abused young women held each other and looked at me, wild-eyed. I pulled two of the less-bloody jackets from the dead men and gave them the coats to cover themselves.

While I searched the bodies and pocketed two light purses, the young women sat under the tree where one had been tied and watched me. Six dead in less than a minute or two was reasonably gut shaking and very bloody. Finally I came and sat beside the shivering girls with a shirt I had found in one man's knapsack and a piece of sausage. I offered my canteen.

"Where do you live?" I asked, wiping blood from my arms.

The older one, the one who had saved my hide with her brave charge, pointed west while the younger girl put on the shirt. She was very thin and barely nubile with teeth marks on her small breast. "Just over that ridge," she said. "They killed our folks, burnt our place."

"This your sister?"

"Yes," she said, "she was a virgin. I been raped before. This was the third time."

"You got any kin?" I wondered how she had survived.

"Uncle, ten miles south, cousin or two."

I patted the younger girl's soft hair. "You all right?" I asked.

"No," she moaned. "They poked me. I hurt, hurt bad."

"Let's get away from here," I said, helping them to their feet. They followed me without protest although I had no idea where to go or what to do. We walked to my horse and I had them both mount and then led the animal to the creek I had recently passed.

The young women bathed by squatting in the stream and then sat with me and shared what little food I had including the German's sausage. "I suppose we can camp here," I said, noticing that the sun was fast disappearing. "We've got a couple of miles between us and those Hessians' bodies."