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From: david@f-e-mail.com (David Shaw)
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NNTP-Posting-Date: 18 May 2003 07:32:45 GMT
Subject: {ASSM} RP "THE GUNPOWDER GALS"(M+/F+: hist.; war)  By  David Shaw
Date: Sun, 18 May 2003 07:10:07 -0400
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"THE GUNPOWDER GALS"(M+/F+: hist.; war)

By

David Shaw
david@f-e-mail.com

THIS STORY IS INTENDED FOR ADULT READING ONLY

I have decided to write down my account of what happened in that
fateful year of 1864 and to deposit it in a sealed envelope with our
family's lawyers. Tomorrow is the first day of the twentieth century
and I will leave instructions with the papers that they may not be
unsealed until another hundred years has passed. My descendents may
then finally learn the strange truth about how they came to be.

There is certainly much shame in the account but perhaps matters which
seem important now will not seem so important then. Perhaps it may
even be that American men will regard American women as truly free and
equal in all human activities, even the procreative ones. Alas though,
I feel that many times a hundred years must pass before our society
can change to such an extent.

Yet although I cannot hope to know what the future holds I can at
least be sure that the great waters of the Missouri river will still
be flowing. The river was my constant companion for many years when I
grew up in Kansas, and again when I crossed the border into Missouri
state to become a teacher in the village of Stony Creek.

Lacking the gift of prophecy, all I can do is to pray on my knees
that, whatever fate may have befallen my descendents, in the year 2000
the glorious flag of our God given Union will still flutter bravely
above every settlement along the banks of the mighty Missouri. For I
remember all too well when for a day and a night the Stars and Stripes
proudly flying above Stony Creek were ursurped by the iniquitous
banner of the Southern Rebels.

It was what I did during those few strange hours that I feel I must
explain, lest dark rumors still linger about my memory. I - and the
other village women - did what we did because that was the way the
fortunes of war fell out for us. In 1861 the mad dogs of the
Confederacy dared to fire on Fort Sumter and in time their rabid bites
sent the whole country as mad as themselves. Can we be blamed for
acting out an insanity when we found ourselves trapped in an insane
situation?

Let those who wish to sit in judgement read my story first, and then
ask themselves what they would have done under the same circumstances.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

The chalk scratched on the blackboard as Miss Shilling carefully wrote
the date on it, 'October 17th, 1864'. Then, in the top center of the
board she wrote 'TRIGONOMETRY'. Finally, underneath the word, she drew
the outline of a tree. When she turned around her class was still
waiting dutifully, neither of the boys or girls daring to indulge in
any horseplay even when her back was turned.

Amanda Shilling was an imposing figure, very tall for a female, with a
full figure which caused many an admiring male eye to linger on the
generous cut of her bodice and the trim dimensions of her hips. In
fact it was widely agreed amongst the men of Clayton County that
School Ma'am Shilling was just about the beatingest thing to come down
the river in a coon's age. Selectman Jenkins had spoken for all of his
gender at the regular Saturday night cock fight a week after her
arrival: "She's a great young gal, that one. Shaped like a real woman
and as handsome as Cleopatra, you bet. Yes, sirree, she's a
huckleberry above most peoples' persimmons. Gonna be a real lucky man
that she sets her cap at."

In the weeks since her arrival Amanda had not picked out any of her
many male admirers for any special signs of favor but the general
liking for her in the village had continued to increase. Respectable
but not high-faluting, a strong disciplinarian but a well gifted
teacher, never one to flaunt her good looks but happy to be sociable
with all. In only one way had she upset some of the population of
Stony Creek, and that was in her fervent support of the Northern
cause. Yet she certainly wasn't alone in that regard because both the
secessionist and abolitionist states had their ardent supporters along
the banks of the Missouri. Like so many other settlements in the area
Stony Creek was split almost fifty-fifty between Jayhawks and
Separatists.

"Now, children, look at the word on the board. Trigonometry: it sounds
strange but all it's saying is that we're going to study triangles.
You are probably wondering what could be interesting about triangles
but they can be very useful in solving problems. For example, you've
seen the tree I've drawn on the board. Now suppose it was a very tall
tree and you wanted to measure how high it was without having to climb
it. Can anybody tell me how you could do that?"

Silence from the rows of well scrubbed faces.

"Very well." Amanda picked up a ruler. "Imagine that the sun is
shining and the tree is casting a shadow. I draw one line straight
down the side of the tree and another straight line across from it to
show how long the shadow is. When we measure the shadow of the tree we
find it is sixty feet long. But, of course, shadows get shorter and
longer depending on where the sun is in the sky, so how can that help
us?"

Again there was silence in the class room but a long drawn out howl
from a riverboat's siren called out to the village from the river.
Mildly surprised, Amanda walked across to the window and looked out at
the steam packet churning up the muddy water near the landing with its
paddle wheels. Certainly the Henrietta P. Johnson, but arriving two
days earlier than on its normal schedule, with several blue shirted
soldiers visible on the lower deck and with a large red flag flying
above the Texas deck.

"Samuel Trent".

A chair scraped behind one of the desks as a boy stood up. "Yes,
Ma'am?"

"Why is the Henrietta coming in today, Samuel?"

"Been chartered by the bluebellies - sorry, Ma'am, I mean the army.
The Union army that is." Samuel was proud of his special source of
knowledge as the wharfinger's son, as much as he was obviously
influenced by his father's Southern sympathies.

"She's carrying supplies to General Blunt's men at Lexington?"

"Supposed to be, Ma'm, but the Rebs have gotten clustered up around
Lexington like mountain men around a keg of whiskey. Ain't no way the
captain of the Henrietta is going down river to Lexington with that
powder aboard her."

"Powder?" Amanda looked around at her pupil, rising fourteen and
standing so tall he was almost eye to eye with her. "You mean
gunpowder?"

Samuel was shyly smiling at this reversal of their usual roles and
reveling in the pleasure of being a source of information to his
teacher.

"Why yes, Ma'm, twenty tons of it according to the bill of lading we
was sent. If it's on board she'll be flying a red danger flag."

"Yes, there is a red flag. There are some soldiers on board as well."

Samuel nodded knowingly: "That'll be the army fire guard, Ma'am. To
make sure nobody smokes anywhere near those powder kegs. And I daresay
my Pa will be searching every wharf rat before he lets any of them
start work unloading the Henrietta. He'll have his cudgel in his hand
and he's said he'll break the skull of any man found carrying a pipe,
'baccy or loco-focos onto the landing stage."

"Really? The gunpowder is that dangerous?"

Samuel Trent came as close to openly laughing in the classroom as he'd
ever done since Miss Shilling had arrived. "Why, Ma'am, one spark in
the wrong place and the Henrietta would get blown so high the pieces
could still be falling come Christmas. Leastways, that's what my Pa
says."

"Thank you, Samuel, you can sit down again. Now, we were talking about
how to find the height of the tree. As I said, just measuring the
shadow tells us nothing. So what we might do is to take a stick and
carefully cut off three feet of it. Then we put it in the ground,
burying it for a depth of one foot. If the stick is three feet long
and one foot is in the ground, how much would be left above the
ground? Anybody?"

There were plenty of eager hands held aloft: "Teddy Smith?"

"Two feet, Ma'am."

"Quite right. Now suppose we measured the shadow the stick was casting
and it was four feet long. Can anybody tell me what the ratio would be
between the length of the shadow and the length of the stick? Yes,
Elizabeth?"

"The shadow is twice as long, Ma'am."

"Exactly. So if we measure the tree's shadow at that very same moment
and it's sixty feet long, then how tall must the tree be?"

"Thirty feet, Ma'm."

Elizabeth Manders was almost always the first to answer any difficult
question. A pity that she was only a girl from a poor family with no
hope of ever being anything more than a village school teacher. Which
was precisely Amanda Shilling's own predestinated fate until she chose
to abandon even that modest degree of ambition by agreeing to love,
honor and obey some byre smelling, muddy booted farmer for the rest of
her life.

"Quite right. Now suppose there was a church steeple nearby and you
knew that the top of the steeple was forty feet above the ground. How
long a shadow would it be . . ."

Her lesson was abruptly interrupted by a pounding of hooves, ululating
screams, the sound of shots being fired nearby. The school marm looked
out at the window again, but this time no further than the muddy
street beside the school horse. A dozen horses were galloping down it
in a solid mass, their riders whooping and firing carbines and pistols
into the air and the few citizens of Stony Creek who were abroad
scurrying to get clear of the onrushing charge. Amanda thought at
first that she was witnessing an attempt to raid the township's bank,
until she realized the men were wearing uniforms, some of the jackets
a dull gray, others dyed buttercup brown. All of the riders also had
on kepi styled flat hats.

"Lord, save us, they're Johnny Rebs!" 

Amanda was astonished. Certainly, she'd seen plenty of Confederate
troops before - in the early days of the Rebellion the entire Missouri
state militia had enlisted in the Southern cause. But that had been
long ago, in the heady days of Rebel pride and confidence. Now General
Grant was hammering the Secessionists' homeland into ruins and the
Rebs should have had enough to worry about without making a futile
attempt to recapture lost territory along the Missouri. In any case
General Sterling's Confederate troops were supposed to be at
Lexington, just as Samuel Trent had said, and Lexington was at least a
day's ride away. This must be a small raiding party of cavalry, the
kind of lawless insurgents whom had made the border areas of Kansas
and Missouri such places of misery even before the war had begun.

"Damn their eyes!"

Amanda checked herself guilty as she realized her muttered oath might
have been heard by the tender ears of the children. What sort of
feather head was she, to swear a vile curse in her own classroom just
because of a few marauding soldiers?

"Class, pay attention. It seems that some soldiers have ridden into
village and it maybe that I shall choose to send you home early. But I
think it better that you stay here for the time being, until things
settle down. Yes, Samuel?"

"Are they Rebs, please, Ma'm?"

"I do believe so, Samuel."

The boy was clearly pleased. "Ma'm, I just bet they saw the danger
flag flying on the Henrietta and came down to grab her powder for
their own army."

"Perhaps." 

Amanda felt her legs trembling. Out of the mouths of babes and
sucklings came wisdom. It might well be that it was the sight of the
red flagged side-wheeler arriving which had bought the grayback
cavalry sweeping down to the village and towards the landing stage.
Enemy soldiers, and twenty tons of gunpowder in their hands! But there
was nothing to be done about it for the time being and the children
would be better off kept occupied in the school house until calm was
restored. Which shouldn't take long, as soon as the Confederates
discovered that the town was defenseless

"Class, please copy out the drawing on the blackboard."

The children picked up their own chalks and began drawing on their
slates. Amanda walked up the aisle between the desks, lips pursed and
teeth gritted at the chorus of squeaky, scratchy sounds which always
annoyed her so much. It would be a wonderful thing to teach in a
school which could afford paper and pens for every lesson.

Then the irritation of the slates ceased because of the sound of a
horse neighing in the street and a man's rough voice calling out:
"Hey, in the school house there, let's see your hides."

A glance through the nearest window showed three cavalry soldiers
outside, all looking at the schoolhouse, carbines casually resting on
their saddles and pointed at the building. Fury brewed up inside
Amanda in a red hot stream at the thought of her class being
threatened by the slave owning ruffians. A desperate desire to show
her contempt for them and their ragamuffin Rebel uniforms made her
careless of the menacing firearms. With a firm resolve she swept back
quickly down the room, her long skirts rustling against the children's
desks. Behind her own desk was the patriotic emblem of her country, a
large United States flag. She unhooked it, draped it around her, then
threw open the door and stepped out onto the verandah.

Amanda had hoped to annoy the Southerners with her impulsive action in
wearing the stars and stripes but instead of anger the response was
laughter. Especially galling as none of the Rebel soldiers seemed much
older than the oldest children in her classroom. Tired, dirty, their
horses splashed to the hocks with mud, but young and in a cheerful
mood. One of them, hardly twenty but wearing Sergeant's chevrons,
laughed openly at the sight of the flag, his eyes fastening especially
on Amanda's bosom.

"Best be careful there, Miss. We're just the boys to storm any
breastworks that have got a Federal flag flying over them."

His companions greeted his insolence with delight, slapping their legs
and laughing as if they were watching a circus performance.

"Keep a civil tongue in your head, you filthy traitor."

Again, the Sergeant appeared delighted at her response instead of
becoming angry. He was something around medium height, blue eyes set
widely apart underneath the bill of his kepi, a shaven and strong jaw
line, his face deeply tanned by the weather, handling the reins one
handed as if he'd been born on a horse's back.

"I'd have to admit we're not in our Sunday best, Ma'am, but nobody
puts on their good clothes when they're out hog killing. And back
home, when we get guests calling round, we kinda take to being polite
to them, 'stead of calling them all kinds of filthy names."

"Then I suggest you go back home immediately, wherever your log cabin
is, instead of coming where you're not wanted and terrifying decent
people."

"Well, Ma'm, first off, if living in a log cabin is a sin, I guess
you'll have to point out to me where your mansion is, 'cause this
whole village seems to me to be pretty much a collection of wooden
shacks floating on mud."

Even Amanda in the fullness of her wrath couldn't gainsay him on that
point; Stony Creek was not a picturesque sight, not even by Missouri
standards.

"Secondly, Ma'am, I'd be real delighted to go back home if'n only old
longshanks Lincoln would promise to leave me in peace once I was back
there. And thirdly, I guess you don't seem too terrified to me."

Amanda drew herself up on tiptoe, eyes flashing defiance, her hands
still clasped in the folds of the flag of the United States. "I'm not
scared of you! But you're pointing your guns at my classroom and the
children in my charge."

The Sergeant reluctantly took his eyes away from the splendid sight of
the bristling school Ma'am - whoever was her beau was sure one lucky
son of a bitch. Every window in the school house was packed tight with
curious faces - children's faces.

"OK, boys, put up your pieces. Joey, just take a glance and make sure
no men are hiding inside."

"What men are you looking for?" the teacher asked.

"All and every able bodied man in village, Ma'am. We're confining them
in the cargo deck of that steamer. We need to keep them under our eyes
and out of mischief whilst we're here. Don't worry though, nobody is
going to get hurt. We're here today and gone tomorrow."

As one of the Rebs looked around the schoolhouse Amanda saw a dozen
glum looking townsmen walking down the street, two cavalry men riding
behind the procession, carbine butts resting on their hips. One of the
soldiers was chewing like a cow on its cud and as he passed Amanda and
the Union flag a stream of tobacco stained juice spurted from his lips
and across the schoolhouse steps.

"If you're dressed for killing hogs, I think you can make a start in
your own ranks," Amanda snapped at the Sergeant.

"Don't pay no mind to Josh Chamberlain, Ma'am. He's a good soul but he
lost two brothers at Gettysburg and now just got news his home in
Atlanta's been burnt down by Sherman's men."

"Oh."

"Ma'am, I think it might be a good idea to dismiss your class for
today. Just until the ructions are over."

"That's my decision to make," Amanda flared back.

The Sergeant's grin softened into something nearer to a smile: "Look,
Ma'am, I'm paid to fight Federalist soldiers but savagerous school
marms are more than I ever reckoned on. You can do whatever you like
but it seems to me that the woman folk hereabouts would be glad to
have their children safe at home while their men folk are away. Also,
I've got an invitation for you."

"An invitation - what sort of an invitation?"

"An invitation from Lieutenant Lee, our officer. He'd be right obliged
if you'd step on board the steamer presently. He's got some news for
the village women and he needs somebody to pass it on to them. He said
to me, particular, that if I should find a lady teacher I should ask
her over, as being the best for the job. I guess if he'd known how
handsome the school marms are hereabouts he'd have asked even more
particularly."

"Dash your impudence," Amanda responded fiercely. "Are you algerines
and kidnappers like Mosby's bushwhackers?"

"No, ma'm, we're from Georgia and we treat all ladies with respect,
especially ones that look as if they like posing in front of an
audience." His companions chuckled again. "Miss, you'll be treated
honorably, my word on it. Lieutenant Lee is a fine gentleman and a
school teacher himself when he ain't soldiering in a war: he can read
Greek and Latin to beat anything. He wouldn't have asked you to call
'cept it was important."

Amanda nodded: "Very well, I'll come directly."

The Sergeant held up his hand: "No, Ma'am, no. Give us half an hour
first. We're making all the men shuck off their clothes before we put
them below decks. Can't risk having anybody down in that boat with
tools, 'baccy or any way of making fire on them. Not with the cargo
she's carrying. And I guess the gentlemen would be right shy about you
seeing them in public without their unmentionables on - though I
daresay most of them would be real happy to take them off for you in
private."

The cavalrymen guffawed again, Amanda's cheeks blushed scarlet and she
stamped a foot in fury as the Rebs swung their horses' heads around
and cantered off down Main street.

"Oh, you . . . you villains!"

With an effort she restrained her anger and went back into the
classroom, all the children guilty rushing back to their desks. Amanda
carefully rehung the flag in its place of pride and then turned to
face her class.

"Children, I'm going to dismiss you for the rest of the day. Go home
quietly and directly. I want each of you to take a message home from
me to your mothers. Tell them I'm going to speak to the Rebel officer
presently and I expect to have some news afterwards. I want all the
ladies who can to come here to the schoolhouse at one o'clock so that
I can tell them what's happening. Please make sure your mothers hear
about the meeting - here, at the schoolhouse, at one o'clock this
afternoon. Now put your things away and file out quietly."

When the classroom was empty Amanda went to the bookcase at the back
of the room and selected a volume from it: "The Life of Admiral
Horatio Nelson."

Flicking quickly through the pages she found the chapter dealing with
the Battle of the Nile. Then, with pursed lips, she carefully read the
account of what had happened when the powder magazine aboard the
French flagship 'L'Orient' had exploded. Even the passage of almost
seventy years since the battle did little to soften the horrors the
book described. It was in a very thoughtful mood that Amanda finally
put on her bonnet and walked between the street puddles towards the
landing stage.

The village seemed abandoned, save for a couple of Confederates riding
past. All the men held in the Henrietta, all the women staying at home
and not even the Rebs showing much interest in the village. But there
were a long line of cavalry horses tethered to a fence near the
landing stage. Soldiers were busy around them, some fetching buckets
of water from a nearby drinking trough, others carrying fodder from
the deck of the Henrietta and breaking the bales open for the horses
to feed on. Amanda stopped and watched, judging the weight of the
bales by the fact that two men were needed to lift each one. She also
saw how many more bales were still piled on the deck. Then she counted
the horses in the row. Fourteen and at least two more riding on patrol
inside the village. Mmmm . . .

"Ma'am." It was the Sergeant again, walking towards her. This time he
wasn't smiling but stopped in front of her and lifted his hand to his
cap in a crisp salute. "Sergeant Wade, Ma'am."

Amanda nodded her head in brief acknowledgement of the NCO's new found
civility.

"Glad you could come, Ma'am. The Lieutenant is on board, on the Texas
deck, if you'd care to follow me."

Amanda nodded again and followed him onto the landing stage and up the
gangplank. A board was set on an easel at the head of the gangplank, a
white painted board with red wording on it: "DANGER - NO SMOKING, NO
UNSHIELDED CANDLES." The teacher looked up at the two high cast iron
smokestacks towering above the Henrietta and thought that her crew
must have had a nervous trip down river.

The Sergeant led her up an outside staircase to the top deck. The sun
suddenly appeared for the first time that day and Amanda unexpectedly
felt her spirits rising in time to her ascending footsteps. The
Sergeant held open the door.

"Lieutenant Lee will see you now, Ma'am. Please go in."

The leather bound couches and chairs scattered throughout the glassed
in deck were as luxurious as Amanda remembered from the only other
time she had been aboard the Henrietta. The pile carpet just as thick,
the pictures on the walls depicting river scenes just as pleasant, the
air still redolent with the lingering aroma of fine cigars, the
spittoons just as brightly polished. But now there was no crowd of
prosperous business men, no fine ladies, no busy stewards. Just a
tall, slender young man with long blonde hair and a fine set of golden
mutton-chop whiskers, a young man who gave every appearance of having
fallen asleep in the armchair he was now lifting himself out of. Which
wouldn't have surprised Amanda because there were lines of strain
around his eyes and his uniform was as crumpled and travel strained as
any of his men's.

"Beg your pardon, Ma'am, beg your pardon. Must have nodded off
unexpectedly."

The officer juggled uncertainly with what had been resting on his lap,
a holed gray sock with a wooden darning mushroom inside it and a
needle dangling from the hole on woolen threads. He finally put the
sock down on the coffee table between them, next to a belt with a
saber scabbard attached and an open holster displaying the well oiled
butt of a revolving pistol. Then the Confederate lieutenant made a
formal bow to her. Amanda acknowledged with a stiff nod of her head,
which brought her attention to the officer's feet. No boots, and one
sock on, the left foot bare. She couldn't help smiling at the sight.

"Must apologize, Ma'am. I don't normally receive ladies in this
manner."

"The fortunes of war, Lieutenant. Please don't worry about it. May I
sit down?"

"Please do, Ma'am, please do."

Amanda settled herself in the chair opposite to his, across the coffee
table.

"My name is Amanda, Amanda Shilling. Are you any relation to the
famous General Lee?"

"Why no, Ma'am, Miss Shilling. I'm just plain James Lee, a Georgia
school teacher and noways a member of the first families of Virginia.
But I guess I didn't tell the boys that until after they'd elected me
as a company officer." He smiled - or at least she thought he did. It
was hard to tell underneath all that facial hair.

"Please call me Amanda, James. I think we have some important matters
to discuss and we should be as friendly towards each other as we can."

James huffed and blew into his whiskers, apparently distressed: "I
would surely like to be good friends with you, Miss Shilling, even if
you are a red hot Federalist, or so Sergeant Wade says. But to tell
the honest truth, there's no way I can be friends with anybody in this
township."

Amanda bent forward, picked up the sock and the darning mushroom and
looked with amusement at the typical male botch James had been making
of the simple job.

"May I?" She began drawing the needle neatly back and forth across the
heel of the sock.

James seemed astonished and then even more upset: "Miss Shilling,
please don't do that. It's right civil of you but where I come from we
kind of think it's important to return civility with civility and I
can't do that - not here and not now."

"Mmmm." Amanda looked up from the sock. "You're talking about the
gunpowder, aren't you?"

"Yes, Ma'am. To tell the truth I was only supposed to take my patrol
up river on a reconnaissance mission. But when we saw a side-wheeler
flying a gunpowder warning flag and putting into a village under our
noses without hardly a Yankee soldier in sight, well, I guess we just
had to up and take our chance. So here we are."

"Yes, so here you are. And what happens next?"

"Today and tonight we rest ourselves and our horses, water them, and
feed them on the forage we found aboard. We'll fill our saddlebags
from the US army rations here as well. Then, tomorrow morning, we'll
turn your men folk loose and tell them to step lively out of the
village as quick as ever they can. And thirty minutes later we'll have
to set fire to this fine boat."

Amanda nodded in calm understanding. "And when all the gunpowder in
the hold explodes half of our houses will get flattened. And all those
bales of fodder will get blown into the air, most of them on fire I
suppose, and crash down on the roofs of the rest of the village like a
shower of burning comets. I doubt that a house in the entire
settlement won't get blown over or burnt to the ground. A fine way to
make war, Lieutenant."

"Miss Shilling, if I were to leave the powder intact, it could be used
to kill hundreds of Confederate soldiers. My own troopers would
probably hang me if I were to leave here without getting rid of it.
And there's no way they'll care overmuch about what happens to your
village. Talk about the horrors of war to Grant, to Sherman, to the
folks in Atlanta, but don't waste your breath talking about them to my
boys. They know only too well what your blue belly armies are doing
down South."

Amanda nodded, rotated the mushroom in her fingers and began cross
weaving the wool across the hole.

"Suppose you were to bore some holes in the bottom of the Henrietta
and set her adrift. She'd sink and your job would be done, wouldn't
it?"


"Ma'am, if you were to come out onto the bridge with me I could show
you a dozen mud banks in sight of this landing stage. Were I to push
the boat out into the current it's as likely as not she'd run up onto
the mud somewhere and stay there high and dry. Maybe she'd never steam
again but the Yankee army would soon salvage the powder and all the
other supplies on board."

"Set a powder train to explode the powder and then let the Henrietta
drift away."

"Ma'am, Miss Shilling, powder trains are dangerous and not very
reliable. The only way I can be sure of doing the job is to start a
fire myself in the lower cabins, a fire I know can't be put out, and
then jump on my horse and gallop away as quickly as I can. That's why
I asked you to come here. I want you to explain to the women folk
hereabouts how things stand and to tell them get what valuables they
can out of their houses before dawn tomorrow."

"Without the men to help us, we couldn't move much at all. Not that
the collection of oldsters and loafers you've imprisoned here on the
Henrietta would amount to much help anyway - all the real men are away
fighting in the war on one side or the other. Besides, what's the use
of moving out valuables if we're left with no roofs over our heads?"

A dimple appeared in James's chin as he set it firmly against her
blandishments: "Ma'am, I'm plumb sorry, but a warning is the best I
can do for you."

"Mmmmm . . ." Amanda lifted up her eyes again, fastening them directly
on the officer's. "But suppose you started the fire and then had the
Henrietta poled out away from the wharf? There'd at least be a chance
she'd drift far enough away so as not to damage the village when she
exploded."

"Ma'am! Ma'am!" James pulled on his whiskers with exasperation. "Can't
you see how dangerous such a thing would be? I've nineteen men here
and it would need every one of them to pole out a boat this size
smartly enough to stand a chance of getting it away and down river
before the fire reached the powder barrels. I'd be risking my entire
command just to save some civilians' houses. The boys would think I
was as mad as a meat axe if I was to suggest such a thing to them. I'm
sorry, but this isn't the kind of war with any chivalry left in it.
Maybe it started out like that but all the gallant knights in blue and
gray have been buried at Bull Run and Sharpsburg and a thousand other
places. Nowadays there's nothing left but spite and dirty dealings."

"Alright, James, let's talk about dirty dealings then. By the by, have
you got a pair of scissors?"

The Southerner blinked in surprise at her words, then reached out to a
small roll of canvas on the coffee table and spread it out. From one
of the pockets inside the roll he withdrew a small pair of scissors.
Amanda took them from his fingers and neatly clipped off the threads
from the sock.

"There. Now, suppose your men were to agree to take the risk of poling
out the Henrietta when she was on fire. Would that change matters?"

The officer shook his head in despair at her stubbornness: "Miss
Shilling, they plain won't, and even if they did, I wouldn't let them.
Losing men in a war is bad enough, but getting them killed just in
trying to save a few houses would be plumb crazy."

"Mmmm. . ." Amanda stood up, still holding the repaired sock. "James,
why don't you stretch yourself out on that couch. Put your feet up on
the arm rest and I'll see if that other sock needs darning as well."

James blinked, his blue eyes puzzled: "What?"

"Please lie down on the couch, Lieutenant. I've got some more things
to say to you yet. In the meantime, I'll take a look at that other
sock. Now don't be shy and just spread yourself out." She walked over
and patted the red tinged cowhide back of the couch. "Come on, James,
relax. You've earned it. And whilst you're resting we'll discuss a
very ancient legend. Believe me, you'll find it interesting."

James had stood up when she had but was still hesitating: "What legend
would that be, Miss Shilling?"

"The legend about the rape of the Sabine Women, Lieutenant Lee, sir." 

He was still confused, but certainly interested. At least she had no
doubt now that the Lieutenant was a man with a normal man's interest
in women. "What?"

"If you want to hear the story you must lie down like a good boy."
Amanda's coyness tempted him, his feet moved across the carpet. Then a
sudden suspicious thought turned his head towards the coffee table and
the belt on it. Amanda smiled as she followed his thoughts.

"Don't worry, Lieutenant, I've no intention of playing the Charlotte
Corday to your Marat. I'm not going to try to shoot you with your
pistol or stab you with your own saber."

The officer smiled in embarrassment, more so as the school teacher
picked up two cushions from a chair and put them down on one end of
the couch. She patted them invitingly and smiled again. The Lieutenant
found the invitation irresistible. He stretched out on the couch and
rested his head on the cushions. Yet his arms remained stiffly by his
side as he watched Amanda. She bent over him and tweaked the cushions
a little, smiling at him.

"You remember the legend about the Sabine women, James?"

"Yes. The story goes that when Rome was first founded the city didn't
have enough women and so they tried to buy some brides from a nearby
tribe called the Sabines. But the tribe wouldn't sell them any, so the
Romans kidnapped the women they wanted."

"That's right, Lieutenant, that's right."

She straightened again and walked around the couch until she was at
the other end of it, looking down at his face. He trembled in surprise
as he felt her fingers stroke the soles of his feet, one bare, the
other still with a sock on it. Then his eyes widened further as she
knelt down and rubbed his feet harder.

"Oh dear, James, I'm afraid this is another holy sock to match your
boot's sole. I'd better take it off as well."

She felt his leg quivering as she ran her fingernails over it, gently
drawing off the strongly smelling sock. In truth, although the stench
was strong touching the man's foot was making her catch her breath in
excitement. She was astonished to find herself acting so brazenly and
even enjoying it.

"Miss Shilling, this ain't right. You shouldn't be doing that and I
know I stink like a polecat because I've hardly been out of my saddle
for a week 'cept to sleep."

"My name is Amanda, Lieutenant, and that's what you must call me.
Amanda."

She leaned forward and brushed her lips against his instep, his left
one. Then she did the same to the right one.

"Is this what you get your slave girls in Georgia to do for you,
James?"

The Southerner gave a bark of laughter: "School teachers can't afford
slaves, Amanda. You should know that. Especially not slave girls."

"But if you did have them, would you like them to do this to you?"
This time she put out her tongue and flicked it over the bottom of his
feet.

"Yes, I guess I would at that, Amanda."  His voice was deeper, almost
grunting.

"Do you think the Romans made the Sabine women do this for them after
they'd stolen them? Before they got down to the serious business of
turning them from virgins into wives?"

James gasped in astonishment: "By crackey, you sure are the boldest
school marm that ever I've met!"

"One of those houses out there is mine, James. Every cent I've got in
the world is invested in it. I guess this is a time when I need to be
bold."

She ran her tongue along the toes on his right foot as if she was
drawing a paint brush along a picket fence. The officer stirred again
and lifted his hands to cover the growing bulge in his pants.

"Leave it be, James. I like seeing it standing up so proud. Are you
thinking about using it as if you were my husband?"

"Lord, Amanda, I'd love to but I've told you the truth. The men
wouldn't let me risk their lives to save this village, no matter how
much you pleasured me."

Amanda stood up again, smiling: "I know you're telling the truth,
James, and I respect you for it. But do you remember the last part of
the legend? How the Sabine men came to fight to get their women back
but then the women themselves stepped in and said they were living
happily in Rome and wanted peace?"

"I remember." 

"Good."

Amanda spread out her skirts and knelt down again, by his side. She
undid her bonnet ribbons, carefully took off the hat and put it aside.
Her right hand settled as gently as a humming bird on the fork of the
thick army pants, her palm lying on the obvious sign of his aroused
manhood.

"Suppose your soldiers were offered a bargain, James? That they could
do whatever they liked with all the good looking women in this village
for tonight, if only they'd agree to try to save the village tomorrow
morning. Not much of a peace, but one long enough to try to push this
steamer way from the wharf once it's on fire." Her fingers closed
around his shaft and rubbed it gently. "If they'd agree to a bargain
like that, would you agree as well?"

"I - I don't know."

Amanda's fingers undid the belt around his pants, loosening it and
then pulling it apart.

"Think about it, James. For one night you could be another Caeser.
Rows of helpless women chained and kneeling in front of you, begging
for mercy. Do you think you'll ever get another chance like that in
your entire life? Shall I tell you what sort of a play I'm planning on
staging for you?"

Amanda plucked open the top button of the uniform pants as she was
speaking. If the secret of talking to a mule was to get its attention,
there was no doubt that Lieutenant Lee's ears were as pricked as much
as any mule's could be. And that sure wasn't the only place he was
pricked up.

She turned her head and smiled at him: "If you'll listen to me I'll
undo all these buttons for you."

"Do tell, Amanda, do tell!"

"What you should do is search the Henrietta and I daresay you'll find
plenty of chains and neck irons on her someplace. Nobody is ever going
to transport another coffle of slaves down this river but the packet
captains won't believe that until the South finally surrenders. So you
find all the chains and neck irons you can, and you tell your boys to
leave them down in the main saloon."

She bent to her task again and eased open another button. "OK, so far,
Lieutenant?"

"Fine, just fine."

"Then tell them that each man is to leave a shirt in the saloon as
well. And each man is to write down his name on a piece of paper and
leave it in one of his shirt pockets."

She touched another button, pressing down on it against the pressure
of the rising flesh beneath to get enough room to wriggle it free. The
Reb's ardor was pushing up a fold of his shirt like a tent post. The
school Ma'am put her hand on it and squeezed it gently. James'
whiskers quivered as if he were feeling the heat of a branding iron
being held against his body.

"I guess this must be the horn of plenty I've heard so much about,
sir," Amanda giggled. "A true cornucopia."

"Lordy, Amanda, lordy!" The Lieutenant was almost whimpering with
pleasure.

"Now, I plan to bring all the ladies down to the boat for their
working bee about seven o'clock. We'll all be carrying food and we'll
tell anybody who asks afterwards that we were ordered to cook the
victuals and bring them down to the boat for you. But what we'll
really be doing is taking off our clothes in the saloon and making
ourselves up into coffles with the chains. Then we'll each put on a
soldier's shirt and come up here to the Texas deck, where the village
men down below can't hear anything."

Her nimble fingers undid the last button and opened the pants as
widely as she could, wriggling the top of his pants down around the
Southerner's narrow hips. She giggled again when she discovered there
was nothing worn beneath the pants but the bottom of James' shirt,
still draping a column which reared up amid the officer's rumpled
clothing as if were an inflated balloon. But when she touched it
through the fabric her fingers found a hardness they couldn't
compress.

"Is this what a husband looks like, Lieutenant? Can I see it?"

Reueben groaned and nodded, his glazed eyes fastened on her as if she
was the most fascinating thing he'd ever encountered.

"Alright, but let me tell you first what's going to happen tonight.
We'll all get down on our hands and knees and kiss the men's feet to
show how we're submitting to them and begging for mercy. Then you'll
pick a woman at random and get her to read out the name in her pocket.
Then she has to take off the shirt and give it back to the man it
belongs to."

Amanda lifted up James's own shirt, staring at what she had revealed.
"Is all this really you? Landsakes, I've never seen a body change so
much."

She lowered the shirt on the far side of the shaft and plucked gently
at the black curls clustered around the bottom of it: "I surely never
saw one as big as this on my illustrations of Greek statutes, but I
have seen these before."

Her fingertips juggled his balls lightly, and she watched in
fascination as the man jerked as though she was hitting him instead of
barely stroking the taut skinned eggs of his testicles. "James, can
you feel that?"

"Yes, yes!"

"Fine - fine. So what I'm planning is that whenever a woman is claimed
by a man she has to do whatever he says. Whether with him or with his
friends as well, and with the other girls in that coffle helping out.
Do you think a game like that would make your soldiers happy?"

"God, yes!"

"And you'll agree to tell your men about the suggestion and let them
decide? The women for tonight to save the village tomorrow?"

"Yes! I'll tell them!"

"Alright, James. Now, just as a matter of interest, if you were a
Roman and I was one of the Sabine women, what would you make me do for
you right now?"

His hands reached out, one gripping her hair, the other seizing her
behind the neck in a vice-tight hold. "Open your mouth, slave." He
bent her head forward, close to the top of his swollen organ. "OK,
Amanda, let's see you fire off my cannon."

She squealed - quietly. Her jaw hung open as he positioned her where
he wished, then pressed her head down onto his rampant prick. He felt
her lips slide around him, the dampness of her tongue against and
around the side of his cock. Far from resisting him, her head began to
bob up and down on his shaft as smartly as a feeding duck dipping
below the water.

It was unbelievable, it couldn't be happening. He could hear his men
calling and chaffing to each other out on the wharf, hear one of them
singing:

"Sitting by the road-side on a summer's day,
Chatting with my messmates, passing time away."

There were shadows stretching out across the smart saloon, sunlight
glinting off bottles behind the bar, and this fine looking young
school Ma'am snorting and snuffling into his lap as she sucked him
with enthusiasm - amateur enthusiasm perhaps but a thousand times more
enjoyable because of that than being performed on by a paid whore from
Hooker's Headquarters or Mother Russel's Bake House. She was right -
never, ever, would a chance like this come along again. And if the
other woman in the village would really perform like this school
teacher . . . Oh Lordy, what a night was a-coming!

"Lying in the shadow underneath the trees,
Goodness, how delicious, eating goober peas!
Peas! peas! peas! peas! Eating goober peas!
Goodness, how delicious, eating goober peas!

The officer felt the woman's giggles coming from deep within her
throat and through the tingling nerve endings of his organ as both of
them heard the song. His fingers looped around the silk hair net
holding the chignon of fair hair at the nape of her neck: clutching it
firmly he bent her further forward yet to her work until she was
snorting for breath and the locket hanging around her neck was resting
on his hip.

Long fingernails scratched lightly against one of James's legs, others
across his stomach. Then one of her hands was holding the bottom of
his cock to steady it as her lips slid further and further down the
swollen shaft. It seemed incredible to him that any respectable woman
could have succeeded so quickly in taking him so deeply into her
throat. She was submitting as much as she possibly could to his size,
even glorying in it, her jaws stretched so widely apart that her teeth
were barely scraping over his rampant flesh.  The fingernails which
had been running up and down his legs moved underneath and behind his
balls, every light scratch making him shudder in delight. The officer
bellowed in triumph, feeling himself ready to spurt forth into the
school Marm's throat, holding her immobile and unable to move an inch
to escape her fate.

Then the dam broke, the pressure was released, his seed came shooting
out of him like steam from the boat's boiler, a whistle of utter
satisfaction from between his clenched lips as Amanda choked, snorted,
writhed, continued to jerk her head up and down on his lap to mark his
final ecstasy with the ultimate feminine submission. When he was
finally spent he watched in fascination as the girl calmly patted her
lips with her handkerchief, sucking in her cheeks with her eyes
closed, as if draining the last drop of sweet taste from a piece of
honeycomb. Incredibly, there seemed some expression of smugness on her
face - as if pleased with herself.

Later still, she was sitting in one of the armchairs, a smile still
hovering on her lips as she sipped a glass of ginger beer that James
had brought her from the bar. He was leaning back in an armchair with
his bare feet on the coffee table, drawing in with deep satisfaction
from a long nine cigar taken into Confederate service from the boat's
humidor.

"Well, Lieutenant, was that a satisfactory token of good faith?"

"Indeed it was, Amanda." There was a pause as James wondered whether
to speak aloud of his curiosity about her behavior. "May I be
permitted to inquire as to how you came to be aware of that particular
practice? Of course it's none of my business but you do seem to be a
very  . . . a very worldly-wise lady for one in your profession."

Amanda smiled disarmingly, looking like a teenage miss caught with a
hand in the cookie jar.

"Oh dear, must I hold a candle to my shames? Very well then, James.
The teacher before me in Stony Creek was an elderly man of European
origins who died very suddenly from a chill. Since he had no relatives
the school board put aside all his books in case some of them might be
useful for the school. But I suppose they never examined them very
closely because when I went through them I discovered a German volume
called <i>'Gestohlen Fraun'.</i> My German is very weak but apparently
that means <i>'Stolen Women'.</i> It's of no matter about the words
anyway as the book is full of skilfully executed drawings of the most
lascivious kind. In fact it was the drawings which gave me the idea of
approaching you."

"Really?"

"Yes. The story appears to be about two sisters of the Italian
aristocracy and their maids whom are captured by bandits and taken to
a mountain lair where they are subjected to every whim of the bandits.
The illustrations show many of the .  .  .  the activities in a most
life like way. They certainly give the impression that the men
involved are greatly enjoying themselves."

James grinned and blew onto the glowing tip of the cigar: "It sure
sounds like hot stuff for a demure village school teacher. The good
people of Stony Creek would probably burn you at the stake as a witch
if they knew what their school marm was studying."

Amanda blushed prettily: "Very well, I will confess that ever since I
found the book a month ago I have indeed been studying it very closely
- more perhaps than is good for me. I fear it has indeed aroused some
regrets about my own unmarried state and a lack of a male partner to
help me experiment with some of the activities shown in the
illustrations."

"But now you've cast aside your scruples?"

Amanda's smile became as inscrutable as the Mona Lisa's. "Why, sir, it
seems that fate has conspired to make a virtue out of desire by
forcing me to cast them aside. But did I really do it properly? I was
fearful that you would start laughing at my efforts."

James spluttered and tugged at his whiskers to regain a measure of
self control: "No, Amanda, I didn't feel at all like laughing. You
were very good, I do assure you."

Amanda bowed her head in appreciation: "Oh, thank you so much for
saying so. Do you think I might crave your indulgence in helping my
education further in these matters?"

"I'll be - I'd be delighted, Amanda. What have you in mind?"

"Well, Lieutenant, I daresay all the other ladies whom might come to
this evening's social even are already married - or, at least, they've
acted the part in the past. I, however, am still - what shall I say -
uncharted territory? And I would much prefer that my situation should
be altered before this evening's public performance. Do you think you
might possibly visit the schoolhouse about three o'clock this
afternoon? I have a meeting scheduled there with the village ladies
earlier but I daresay our business will be concluded by then. So I
shall know then whether the ladies are agreeable to the arrangement
and if I will need your assistance."

"My assistance?" He thought he understood what she was asking yet
still couldn't accept the reality of it.

"Why yes, James. In fully introducing me to those of your gender. In
playing the role of a founding father. Surely you know what I mean?"

James coughed as if he'd swallowed a piece of burning tobacco.

"Lord, Amanda, I'm exfluncticated, tetotaciously exfluncticated. I
haven't ever had such a day for cutting up didoes, nor never even
dreamed of such a one. But you can bet I'll be there on time, with my
hair in a braid."

"Thank you, kind sir. And now I must go before your men wonder what's
keeping me up here for such a time."

He helped her down the boat's steps, he escorted her back onto the
rough hewn planks of the landing stage, he walked along it with her
and reluctantly parted company with Amanda by the line of horses. Both
of them pretended not to notice the wide grins on the faces of the
Rebel troops. Perhaps Amanda was genuinely unaware of them the
Lieutenant thought. He, wiser in the way of soldiers, would not have
been at all surprised to learn that his men had already got a pretty
good idea of what had happened on the Texas deck. Perhaps they'd even
guessed somehow about Amanda's shameless offering up of the village's
women - an offer he was now convinced she was likely to be on her own
in making. Certainly none of the respectable wives of Stony Creek
would consider such hellfire and brimstone behavior; of that at least
he was sure.

Personally, he didn't care at all about any other women as long as he
could only find a way of getting the school teacher stretched out
across her own desk, sans crinoline, drawers and all her other
clothing. The very thought of such a scene was vividly exciting - too
exciting. All the way back to the paddle steamer he could only retain
control of an involuntary arousal by digging his nails into the palms
of his hands, feeling as ready to explode at any second as the barrels
of gunpowder stored in the Henrietta's hold. And three words he
whispered repeatedly under his breath:"Veni, vidi, vici".

Amanda was right. He did feel like Caesar and like a conqueror. Or
perhaps more like a Mark Antony, matched against a queen defending her
own territory with remarkable powers of courage, cunning and
wantonness.

Amanda herself returned to her home feeling well content with her
efforts. At least she'd succeeded in making an ally of the Rebel
officer. Nor did she have much doubt that he was an honorable man who
would stick to any bargain that he made. As for his men, the promised
treat ought to seal the deal which would save the village. The only
people whom needed to be canvassed now were the women. Of course she
couldn't predict their reaction but at least they'd surely listen
seriously to any idea at all for saving their homes from certain
destruction. Then they would have to make their own choices.

Not that it was going to be easy to just up and tell the ladies the
story. Before she went to her pre-arranged meeting Amanda had several
nips from a small stone bottle of applejack discretely hidden away in
the bedroom of her small home. From an even more discreet hiding place
she withdrew her yellow covered German volume and weighed it in her
hands for some time, her face a study in concentration.

Eventually she dropped the book into a basket to take to the
schoolhouse with her. Perhaps this was a time when a book could be
worth a thousand embarrassing words. Maybe the applejack would help as
well.

There was certainly no shortage in the way of an audience. There must
have been thirty women waiting outside the schoolhouse for her to
unlock the door. All of them looking deeply concerned. Some tried to
question Amanda as soon as she appeared but she said nothing until the
school room was full, all those present standing. With crinolines and
bustles at the height of fashion it was quite impossible for any
respectably dressed female to have attempted to sit down at the
pupils' desks.

Amanda went to her usual place in front of the blackboard and
explained the situation in a few simple sentences. The Henrietta was
loaded with gunpowder and had been captured by the Confederate
cavalry. The Reb officer was determined that the powder would never
reach the Union army and was going to set fire to the vessel at dawn.
The only possible way of saving the village from certain destruction
was for the burning boat to be poled out from the wharf and into the
river current before it exploded. Only the Confederate soldiers had
the strength and discipline to stand a chance of managing the feat.
The Rebs were not going to risk their lives to save the village of
Stony Creek without some special reward being offered.

"Now, ladies. Having heard all this I suspect that most of you have
reached an understanding of what I might be talking about. There are
only three things which men will risk anything for. We've got no
choice but to feed them and we don't have enough money to tempt them
into risking their lives for us. The third male imperative is making
love to as many women as they can. And that's our only bargaining
chip."

Amanda picked up her basket: "Any of you whom choose to leave right
now can of course do so. I suggest you make arrangements to get your
most valuable possessions out of the village as soon as possible. If
any of you are willing to make the sacrifice necessary to save our
homes, please stay."

Euphemia Fitzpatrick stepped forward. She was short and well rounded,
normally with a bright smile for everybody. The district midwife, with
a strong personality and thus of great influence on the other women.

"Well . . . well, Amanda, for land sakes! Have you spoken to the Reb
officer about this?"

"Yes, he's certainly agreeable."

"I just bet he is!" Euphemia giggled, relaxing the tension. Some of
the other women also smiled.

"But what exactly did you say to him?"

"We agreed on an arrangement I suggested. But perhaps there is no need
to discuss that until we've sorted out the wheat from the chaff - if
you'll pardon me for using such an expression. What happened was that
the officer showed me a book of his and lent it to me. A German book
with some drawings in it."

Amanda wondered if there was a recording angel up in heaven writing
down this blatant falsehood against her name. Her sins certainly
seemed to be accumulating at an alarming rate. She laid the German
volume on her desk, opening it at the bookmark. There was writing on
one page, a detailed drawing filled the other one. A drawing which
she'd spent hours looking at, a masterpiece of composition and
depravity.

"Ladies, this is the book I'm talking about. Classical students would
describe it as a pornographic work, which means that it deals with
sexual matters in a totally uninhibited way. As I understand it, the
story is about some ladies kidnapped by brigands and thereafter used
in the most shameless way. One of the scenes in the story is depicted
on the illustration on the opened page. It was made quite clear to me
that the Rebs intend to act out the roles of the kidnappers and we are
to become their helpless captives. What that means is, I think, made
quite clear by this illustration. Those of you who wish to may step
forward and take a look. Thereafter you may stay or go, again as you
wish. But I repeat what I've already said: if some of us at least
don't agree to submit to the Reb's demands tonight then our whole
village will be a heap of smoking ashes by breakfast time tomorrow.

"I've just one other thing to say. If any of you want to get up into a
pulpit and lecture me on my wickedness, I'll bear your reproaches
without argument. I just hope that the first lady to cast a stone will
still be in the same way of thinking tomorrow when she's trying to
make a wickiup for her family out of branches and blankets."

A chorus of dissent came from her audience and Euphemia shook her head
sharply: "No, no way is anybody here going to say against you, Amanda.
I reckon you've been smart enough to see straight off the only way
there might be out of this mess. Aye, and determined enough to do what
has to be done. There's only question I guess I'd like to ask you
right now, if you don't mind."

"Go ahead."

"Well, what about you? You're single, with your good name to lose. If
the worst came to the worst at least you could make up your baggage
tonight and move back into Kansas with the next upriver boat. So are
you fixing to be at the Reb party tonight or not?"

Amanda lifted up her head and stared straight back: "I'm intending to
do whatever I need to do to save my home. As for my good name, I guess
it wouldn't pay anybody to start talking about this business. Not
unless they want to cause a whole peck of trouble for themselves and
the entire village."

The teacher was astonished when there was a spontaneous ripple of hand
clapping inside the school house. She'd been half expecting to be run
out of town on a rail by outraged matrons when they got the drift of
her notions but things were turning out more like a school prize
giving ceremony. There was a sudden movement in the audience and an
old lady limped out, her hand resting on a walking stick. The widow
Dawson, from the oldest established family in Stony Creek, and the
richest. The widow owned both the tavern and the tannery.

"Amanda, I want to say to you that I surely admire your spirit and
good sense. Now I guess I'm not able to be one of your recruits, but I
want to tell you that I'll stand behind you and any other gal that
helps to save my property. I'll also take care of any blabbering bitch
by seeing to it that her ears get notched. So, tomorrow, you give me
the names of those that have done the deeds and I'll put two hundred
dollars in cash in each lady's hand as a mark of gratitude."

Amanda was almost reeling. She seemed to be making as successful a
speech as a Senate candidate arriving on the village green with a
barrel of free beer. Although it was true that the widow's promise of
a bounty for successful sinning drew far more applause than Amanda's
words had received.

"Just one thing, Amanda. Before I leave, can I take a look at the book
that Reb gave you? Just to satisfy my curiosity."

The teacher nodded and waved her hand towards the desk. The widow
limped over to it and bent over the book, fiddling with the spectacles
perched on her nose. She stared down at the pages, then gasped aloud.
Amanda felt her own cheeks burning, every line of the illustration
etched on her own memory. The artist's viewpoint was that of an
observer standing by a large spoked wagon wheel mounted flatways and
waist high on a post. Four women were around the wheel, each of them
chained by the neck to a spoke. And around each of the women were men
- men with long hair and long beards, but covered with very little
else. And the women were in the same condition, their clothing removed
and dropped on the floor or thrown across the wheel.

One of the women was also thrown down over it, each hand gripping a
spoke, only her legs and feet still clad in silk stockings and court
shoes. The rest of her body was totally bare, a shamelessly exposed
plump derriere lifted high for all to see. More than that, the largest
brigand of all was standing directly behind her, his beard plaited
into two halves and his hand guiding his manhood into her cave of
Venus. The pen which had rendered the drawing had shown remarkable
skill in not only depicting his victim's expression of pop-eyed
surprise at this violation but her equal astonishment at the size of
the interloper she was being required to find accommodation for.

Across the wheel another woman was on her back, wedged between two
spokes, nothing left to protect her modesty save the ribbons in her
hair. Two men were holding her legs up and widely apart, two more of
their fellows had stood up between the spokes, each one claiming a
prominent breast to fondle. Between her splayed out thighs yet another
bearded brigand was kneeling, applying his tongue into her innermost
recesses to the laughing approval of his fellows. As for his victim,
her head was tilted back, lips and tongue showing in a long drawn out
cry as her hands apparently joined those of the male malefactor's in
playing with her own bosom, to their evident delight.

Another prisoner, a shapely girl with long black hair, was in much the
same position, each of her hands scratching the backs of the men
holding firmly onto her teats, but her eyes fastened on the bandit who
was holding her hips as he cleaved her open with his masculine
scepter, a sport which several of the other felons were clearly eager
to partake in as soon as this lucky pioneer had slaked his desire and
quitted the promised land. In the meantime several other outlaws were
crowded around the last of their booty, the oldest of the women, with
high piled, disordered hair and still wearing a corset from which twin
piles of flesh had overflowed. Kneeling on the floor her arms were
lifted up as if to shield off the heads of attacking snakes which
threatened her, but apparently in fact placating them with strokes and
pats as she dealt with the closest one by giving it a place of refuge
within her mouth.

At least, Amanda thought, at least that is one part of the picture
which I now understand better than I did before. But what is widow
Dawson going to say?

At first the widow kept on staring at the page, apparently taking in
every detail. Then her shoulders heaved as if in distress at the
sight. Amanda got ready to rush forward and support the old woman
should she collapse. A strange sound came from the frail body - like
the sound of a barn owl hunting. The widow was hooting with laughter!
When she finally turned away from the book her hand was up to her
eyes, dabbing away tears of mirth.

"Oh dear, Amanda, that's sure some pumpkins. I've been of steady
habits all my creation and maybe I missed out on some real interesting
experiences because of it. Well, I guess I'd better go and take all
the other un's that are too long in retiracy for these sort of games.
But don't you go giving that book back to those Georgia boys - it's
too good for those goober grabbers. Come on Violet, come on Mabel,
come on Keziah, come on Lydia. Let's go back to our homes and pray for
these ladies' good works tonight. Even if we're all too much of a age
to get down on our knees, we can still pray for our homes to be
spared."

The widow began hustling out the other old ladies in the school room
like a flock of geese. All of them very respectable, all part of the
backbone of the village congregation, and all looking mournfully over
their shoulders as the widow drove them away from the open book.
Seeing the righteous being led forcefully away from temptation was a
cause of satisfaction to many in the audience, especially the more
unrighteous of the village women who were finding a refreshing change
in sinning suddenly becoming a civic virtue.

Amanda let out a deep breath and took out the stone bottle she'd put
inside the basket. "OK, ladies, I guess you can step up in your own
time and take a look. Anyone of you who feels she might need
fortifying first is welcome to take a taste of anti-fogmatic."

It was an offer which received plenty of takers. In fact there was
quite a hint of discreet pushing and shoving for a taste of the
liquor, but nowhere as steady a demand as there was to take a look at
the book. In fact within seconds it was picked up and being passed
around from hand to hand, from one cluster of examiners to another
knot of lowered heads and gasped exclamations: "Lord a'mercy! I never
seen the like in all creation!" "Would never have believed to see such
carrying-on all on one stick!" "Those sure are European ways, I
guess!"

And mixed in with the expressions of surprise and the rapidly draining
applejack were giggles, straight out laughter, and long married woman
nudging each other in the ribs as if they were young wenches flirting
with the boys at a hoe-down. It was two of these red cheeked titters
whom finally approached the school teacher.

"Come on, Amanda, tell us what you've got planned for tonight. What
sort of shines are we going to be cutting?"

A sudden silence fell over the crowded room, the question spoken loud
enough to be heard and clearly falling on interested ears. Amanda felt
herself blushing as she became the center of attention again.

"That's right," Euphemia urged. "Give us the whole story, Amanda."

Instinctively the teacher moved behind her desk before she began
speaking. And for the second time that day she heard unexpected hoof
beats approaching the school house. Meaningful looks were exchanged
between the assembled females - the only people who could be riding in
Stony Creek today were Johnny Rebs. Euphemia looked through a window.

"It's the Sergeant. And four other Rebs."

Amanda joined her: yes, Sergeant Wade, with four other graybacks as an
escort. What was happening?

The soldiers dismounted, secured their bridles, then knocked on the
door even as Amanda was opening it. Sergeant Wade smiled at her, the
other men hanging back, all four of them trying to look through the
school house windows without being too obvious in their curiosity.
Surprised as she was herself about this unexpected meeting, Amanda
knew the important thing to do was to somehow keep the negotiations
going.

"Come in Sergeant, gentlemen, come in, please."

It seemed strange to be talking as if this was a social occasion for
coffee and cakes. And only the Sergeant accepted the invitation to
enter the classroom, smiling widely around him as the women of Stony
Creek displayed unconcealed interest in this representative of their
anticipated ravishers.

"Thank you, Miss Shilling. I'm sorry the Lieutenant hasn't come but he
seems to be having a real good sleep. Guess something must have tired
him out."

Amanda wondered whether Wade knew about her assignation with James.
Was he planning to do something his officer wouldn't have allowed if
he was awake? The NCO's boyish face looker older as he leered
knowingly at Amanda. His eyes passed around the nearest women to him
and quickly returned to Helen Smith, a tall rangy brunette beauty
standing nearby, a woman married to a long absent Confederate soldier.
Amanda wondered if Wade somehow knew of Helen's weakness for spending
a lot of time in company with any handsome male strangers visiting
Stony Creek - or was the Sergeant one of those lucky men who could
spot a sporting filly with the unerring eye of a Gypsy horse coper?

"The men asked me to come and speak to you, Ma'am. As their man of
business, you might say. In fact, we have a message for the ladies.
You see, we found a whole heap of general cargo on that side-wheeler
we could unload now, rather than leave it to be burnt tomorrow. The
ladies who are agreeable to coming along to the wing-ding tonight
could visit the boat during the day, say hello and take their pick,
and I guess my boys would be happy to give them a hand to carry the
fixings back home. Got the manifest here if you'd like me to read it
out. Would sure be a pity to waste all this good stuff. Ma'am, shall I
read out a list of what's on offer?"

"Mmmm . . . well, ladies, you've heard all that I've got to say and
you've heard what the Sergeant has said. Would all of you who like him
to continue speaking please raise your hands."

The soldier watched in satisfaction as the hands came up. Some
quickly, others slowly, but in the end all of them. "Motion seems to
be carried almost unanimously. What about you, Miss Shilling?"

Amanda looked into his hard blue eyes and put her right hand up in the
air. The Sergeant grinned, turned again momentarily from a dominating
warrior into a naughty school boy. "That's your style, school
teacher," he said approvingly.

For a second Amanda opened her mouth to reprove his familiarity, then
realized the silliness of any such action. She thought it odd that the
Sergeant should seem so much at ease in such a situation. Hard eyed
from hard service though and full of confidence, as evident from his
ready tongue. Still, the NCO looked so young, especially with being
clean shaven, such an unusual thing for any American male past
boyhood.

The Sergeant took a piece of paper from his pocket. 

"OK, my lovelies, this is for you if'n you want it. We got salt,
spices, sugar, molasses, raisins, fruits, vegetables, cheese, eggs,
butter, salted meats and fish, tea, coffee, and chocolate. We've beer
and vinegar and bushels of dried peas. Plenty of pickles and crackers,
and a whole slew of canned beans in tomato sauce. We've even got a
barrel of Monongahela whiskey for those of you with refined tastes."

He winked at Helen Smith again, setting her to putting her hand to her
mouth as she tried to control a burst of laughter. Helen's eyes
flickered sideways as she looked slantindicular at the opened book.
The Sergeant saw the direction of her glance and moved over to the
desk. He studied the pages for a moment or two, then whistled in
surprise before turning around to face his embarrassed audience.

"Ladies, you can string me up for gander pulling if ever I saw the
like. And to think that all you good women would be studying something
as inspirational as this. Getting yourselves all fired up for your
good works amongst the needy, I guess. Well, I do thank you kindly for
your thoughts because me and the boys sure are in genuine need of some
female company. Just you watch and see."

He picked up the book, walked over to a window and tapped on it. A
full beard topped by a sharp nose and beady eyes appeared behind the
glass. Wade held up the opened book, showing the illustration to the
soldier. "Hey, Jubel, you want to see what they teach in Northern
school houses?"

The beady eyes nearly popped out of their sockets and an opening
appeared in the black depths of the beard as the man's mouth fell
open. In a second all four of the soldiers had their faces pressed
against the glass in a full blown parody of boys at a sweet shop
window. The Sergeant laughed and opened the window, handing the volume
through it.

"There you go, lads, never say the Army of the South neglects your
schooling. And if you get any ideas about improving your education
here and now, why I guess you'll never get a better chance."

The NCO strutted back into the middle of the room and clapped his
hands together in a movement of spontaneous joy before starting off on
some more of his peddler hustling.

"OK, especially for you good looking gals, we've got all sorts of
notions. Fashionable calicoes, French work collars and capes, elegant
milk pans and Harrison skimmers. Patent pills to cure anything that
ails you. Shaker yarbs, essences, wintergreen and lobely. Tapes,
needles, hooks and eyes, broaches and bracelets, smelling bottles and
castor oil. Corn-plasters, mustard, gardening seeds, silver spoons,
teapots and green tea to put in them. Song-books and tracts, thimbles
and baby whistles, playing cards, pudding sticks and baskets and
wooden bowls. There's powder and shot as well but I guess we need that
more than you do. There's also a crate of female preventatives which
we sure don't have any use for but you're all welcome to dip into - if
you're willing to step up and say you want them."

The village woman were looking stunned, then cautiously pleased. What
with widow Dawson's offer and now this unexpected bonus the wages of
sin were starting to come along nicely. Not that most of them would
ever have dreamt normally of stealing as much as a handkerchief, but
if it was all going to be burnt if they didn't take it - well,
wastefulness was a wicked thing too, everybody knew that. Mean time
some other brand of wickedness was brewing out on the verandah right
now, to judge by the bellows of coarse laughter coming from outside
the school house. The soldiers were finding the German volume every
bit as interesting as the Sergeant had predicted. Nor was any woman in
the school house surprised when the door opened and a thick set
corporal walked in. His craggy face was flushed red with excitement,
the tips of his straggly brown mustache quivering.

"Permission requested to speak to you outside, Sergeant."

Wade smiled: "Why, what's on your mind, Patrick?"

"Sure, Sergeant, and aren't we fighting the devil himself outside and
all his works, and every man jack of us losing hand over fist?
Sergeant, will you not come outside and organize a prayer meeting so
we can decide what's to be done for salvation's sake?"

Wade's lips quivered in amusement: "Well, I guess this might be a
right opportune time to thank the Lord for all his gifts. Excuse us
for a moment, ladies."

The two NCO's left the room. As soon as they were gone a buzz of
excited conversation ran around the school house.

Euphemia leaned over to whisper to Amanda: "I'm sure that soaplock of
a Sergeant is planning on some devilment, my dear. I could see it in
his eyes. I guess you know what I mean?"

Helen was also listening, her cheeks flushed and well filled out bosom
heaving: "Oh, there's going to be some larks, you can lay to that. I
feel all-overish, and then some. Can I take another drink, Amanda?"

"Not until I've had one." 

Amanda picked up the jug and took a swallow from it that set her
throat burning. As she was passing it to Helen she heard a round of
raucous laughter from the verandah, then sudden overriding bursts of
conversation as if all the men were trying to talk at once, each
trying to get the others to listen to his ideas

"Land's sakes! Somebody's going to catch it, you mark my words," Helen
prophesied darkly.

The door opened and Sergeant Wade sauntered back in. Behind him came
the other four Rebs, all looking around them like foxes that had found
an unguarded chicken run and didn't know where to start feeding. Wade
smiled as happily as a railroad speculator at a depot opening.

"Well, ladies, we've decided on a text for today: 'Whom the Lord
loves, he chastises'. So first of all we'll do some chastising, and
then some loving. We'll need some room to work in though."

He nodded to the other men set to work with hasty impatience. The
desks were picked up and carried to the end of the schoolroom, leaving
the other two thirds of the room empty. Then Amanda's desk was set
down in the middle of the open space.

"You two ladies, come here." 

Wade pointed at Yvonne Folland, a skinny long nosed woman married to
the local cooper, then at Gwenneth McAlistair, a rather pretty little
dark eyed lass whose husband was in the Union army. They both looked
around as if unable to believe that their fate was to be the first.

"Relax ladies. All I want you to do is to take down that flag on the
wall and hold it up directly behind the teacher's desk. One of you at
each end and stretch it out."

Once the graybacks had finished moving the table they began searching
through the school cupboards. One of them gave a cry of satisfaction
and held up his discovery - the birch, the bundle of twigs used to
discipline naughty children. The Sergeant took it and beckoned to
Euphemia.

"Right. Ma'am, you can be my standard bearer. The master at arms. You
carry this and follow me wherever I go, and when I tell you to use it,
you lay on with a will - or else."

The Sergeant had stopped smiling. He watched as Yvonne and Gwenneth
held up the flag for his inspection. "That's the ticket, girls. Keep
the bottom about level with the desk. Now, Amanda, you go and stand
behind it and look towards your friends."

The teacher did as she was bid. She wondered what it was exactly that
Wade was planning to do. Her cheeks began to burn as some of the
possibilities occurred to her.

"Surely did like the look of you this morning, School Ma'am, with that
flag around you. But I guess it would have looked even better if that
was all you'd been wearing. Seems to me though that's a big enough
flag for another lady to be company with you in hiding her modesty
behind it. Yes sirree, what we want is another right charmer."

His eyes swung around the room, from woman to woman, a half smile on
his lips. Until they finally reached Helen Smith: "And what might your
name be. Ma'am?"

Helen told him.

"Helen, hey? You know something Helen, I think Miss Shilling might be
a genuine cold back but you're a married lady. So I think you might be
just the one to go and stand behind the flag with the teacher. She
won't be so nervous if she's teamed up with a mare that's already been
well broken in."

Helen gasped at his directness, putting her fingers to her lips and
blushing as she'd just made a involuntary rude sound in church. The
Sergeant pointed to the birch and then the flag. "Would you like to
hold your hands out to be smacked, Ma'am, or would you rather do as
you're told?"

"I ... I," Helen looked around her, at the audience, then at the twigs
and at Euphemia. "Oh Lord. If Henry was ever to find out ... "

"It's alright, Helen," the midwife reassured her. "Nobody is going to
tell on you. And you wouldn't want Henry coming back and finding his
home all blowed away, would you? We womenfolk have got to stick
together on this, just like Amanda says - - one for all, and all for
one."

Helen nodded to show her understanding and walked over to the table,
joining Amanda so they were elbow to elbow behind the flag. Sergeant
Wade laughed and clapped his hands.

"OK, ladies. Now I need another volunteer. The one who squeals most
get the job."

He walked along the row of females. The first he selected was Madeline
Masefield, married to the town butcher. She was built on generous
lines, with wide hips and a more than ample bosom, and she didn't
squeal she certainly gave several loud gasps as the Sergeant grabbed
both of her plumpers and fondled her roughly. Her hands came up to
fend him off, only to be caught and restrained by the women alongside
her.

"It's alright, Madeline, it'll be the same for all of us, by and by,"
one of them said. Madeline blushed like a babe in a bath tub, closed
her eyes and stood still as the Sergeant took his liberties.

"OK, you'll do Ma'am. Go over there and start taking off Helen's
clothes. Bring them back here piece by piece. The boys will reward you
for each trip, the same way as I just have. Off you go." He pushed
Madeline in the back and sent her tottering towards the table.

"Now, have we got another outstanding pair of titties in the room?
Yes, the lady in the back in the blue bonnet. Step forward and let's
take a look at you."

It was Gertrude Rohrer he'd selected, taller than himself, her homely
blushing face framed with blonde plaits, her eyes cast down towards
the bulges in the front of her dress which had been the reason for her
choice for public shame. Then she peeked up again and blanched as she
saw the hands held up ready for her. She must have been thinking about
many things, especially about her husband, away down river on a scow.
But the other village women around her plucked at her sleeves as
others behind pushed her forward..

"Go to it, Gertie. Madeline stood it."

"That's right, Gertie, you won't let us down, will you?"

Gertrude set her jaw and took the last two steps which delivered her
into Wade's grasp. She went even redder than before and gave out a low
moan of outrage as he took his time in squeezing through the layers of
fabric covering her breasts. She lowered her eyes, then lifted them
again and stared into the NCO's face, her tongue licking nervously
around her lips.

"You'll do for our boys, Gertie. Go over and start stripping off
Amanda. Every piece of clothing on the floor back here and we'll set
you up on your toes for every return trip."

The rest of the graybacks nudged each other and guffawed, thinking it
a great game. As it went on that opinion seemed to strengthen. Not
once did Madeline or Gertrude came back with a item of discarded
feminine clothing without each of the five men openly saluting her
with stroking palms and busy fingers. Quick movements, for they had no
intention of holding up either lady in her errands, but effective
ones. Gertrude was snorting deep in her throat presently each time she
became the brief center of the grayback's attention, although she
still tried to avoid the eyes of anybody in the audience. Madeline, on
the contrary, kept on looking around and giggling each time her gang
of admirers crowded around her to openly perform their lewd caresses.

Amanda and Helen could see all this as they looked over the top of the
flag, their need for protection behind the square of fabric becoming
more urgent with each trip. It was a blessing that they were both of
the same height but even so to keep the flag down to a decent level at
the table top meant that an awful lot had to be revealed above the top
of the emblem. Emma felt as if she was in the lowest cut gown
imaginable and the eyes of the men a few paces away examined her
freckle topped swellings as if they were golden treasures. Helen's
white globes were also receiving as much attention whenever the men
glanced in their direction. Although it was true that much of their
attention was distracted by Gertrude and Madeline. And, presently,
whenever both of those ladies were away, another was seized on as a
temporary substitute.

The Sergeant began to make a game out of it by using a dunce's cap
he'd taken from the corner, and also the stool that was there. The
stool was set down by the growing pile of clothes, the cap on it and
then Wade took a woman and sat her on the stool. She was then obliged
to put the tall conical paper hat on her head and hold it there as the
men paid their admiration to each seated victim's soft curves with
their stroking palms and grabbing fingers.

Then the game was changed again by the Sergeant. The next woman was
accompanied by two more of the audience. They stood on her sides, each
one with a hand balancing the hat, and directed to use their other
hand to stroke the front of the soldiers' pants. The seated woman was
also required to use her hands in the same service.

"Oh, Amanda, I'm so sorry," Gertrude whispered as she knelt and drew
down the teacher's last garment, the untied drawers piling up in a
pile of white linen around her ankles.

"Nothing to be done about it," the teacher replied. "Lordie, I'm
frightened though."

"It's OK, Amanda," Helen reassured her in a low voice. "You're only
going to get what you would have got on your wedding night anyway.
These are good old boys and they ain't drunk  -  as soon as they've
had the spunk drawn out of them they'll be as quiet as lambs."

Well, they were quiet just then, watching intently as Amanda stepped
out of her drawers.  Then the quivering movements in her breasts
brought whistles of appreciation from the Reb soldiers. More whistles
greeted the sight of the nether garments being brought forward to be
added to the piles of discarded clothing. Tension snapped and crackled
in the muggy air as the two women behind the desk were both perceived
to be as naked as Eve before the fall. The men lost interest in the
games they'd been playing and gathered around the desk. Wade bent a
little and whispered in Euphemia's ear. The midwife nodded in
understanding, gave a look of mute regret to Helen and Amanda and then
walked around behind them, the birch still held firmly in her right
hand.

"Well, ladies, the boys had a meeting outside and decided that what
they'd always wanted to see when they were at school was a mettlesome
young school marm bent over her own desk without a stitch to her name.
I guess none of them thought they'd ever see such a sight, but here it
is. So, you two ladies holding the flag, you get ready to let go of it
when I clap my hands. And Helen and Amanda, you put your hands up and
gone behind your necks."

Helen obeyed him immediately, Amanda slowly following suit until Ward
pointed to her and clicked his fingers. She yelped and dropped her
hands again, onto her bottom, stinging from a blow from the birch.
Euphemia had delivered the stroke with enough strength for the impact
to be heard right around the classroom, all the other woman watching
with the mouths in tightened up into ovals of surprise. The Rebs
glanced at each other in delight, eyes alight with excitement. The
NCO's left finger lifted up towards Amanda again, thumb and finger
pressed together on his right hand ready to give another signal to
Euphemia for a punishment stroke.

Instantly grasping the situation, Amanda laced her fingers together
underneath the chignon at the back of her neck. Incredibly, it hadn't
been more than an hour or so since Lieutenant Lee's fingers had been
in the same place, giving her first experience of love making. It
didn't seem as if he was going to provide her second one though, the
damned fool, snoring his head off whilst his Sergeant was behaving
like a Viking ravisher. Wade chuckled and spread his fingers out and
hands close together, ready to slap one palm against another. The
other men tensed, as if bracing themselves to start a foot race.
Behind them the village woman seemed completely fascinated by the
tableau, none of them averting their eyes from the scene. The only
other obvious response was the way the flag was trembling in Gwenneth
and Yvonne's nervous hands.

Wade smiled: "Here we go, boys. The best sight of the war, a
Federalist flag going down in surrender."

His palms smacked together and the flag fell first from Gwenneth's
grasp, then from Yvonne's. The upper portion landed on top of the
desk, then slithered down on the floor as the weight of the bottom
half pulled it down. The Rebs grunted and whistled in appreciation at
the unveiling, female gasps counter pointing the deeper male sounds.
There was the sound of fingers snapping and the smack of twigs against
flesh. Amanda looked sideways and saw that the Corporal pointing
towards Helen, having made the same punishment signal that Wade had
used.

"Keep your hands where they are girlie," the Corporal commanded in his
thick brogue.

Helen whimpered, lifted up her hands again and squirmed around without
moving her feet. The men chuckled. There was Blackbeard and the
Corporal, over on the left, Sergeant Wade in the middle. The other two
men looked like tap room brawlers, men who'd muscled their way into
the party by their brute strength. One was the tallest man in the
room, broad shouldered, a large piece missing from his left ear,
probably bitten off in some drunken melee. Much of his face was
obscured by a straggly brown mustache and his skin was as swarthy as
an Indian's. For some unexplainable reason Amanda immediately decided
that ear-bitten was a butcher or a slaughterer in his own town. The
last of the Rebs was stocky with arms like a blacksmith and a face
framed by long ginger hair and ginger sideburns. Ginger's face was
dominated by glittering blue eyes set close together above a large
nose. Small pox scars pitted his cheeks and chin and it seemed strange
he hadn't grown a beard over the disfiguring marks. All the soldiers
were armed, naturally, but the ginger haired one had three large
knives in his belt as well as a pistol.

All in all any one of the Rebs could have been pencilled into the
illustrations of the book as one of the bandits and fitted the part
perfectly - except the boyish looking Sergeant. But so far he'd shown
more devilment than the others put together. Yet that was changing, as
Amanda learnt when bitten-ear pointed at her and clicked his fingers.
There was a dreadful pause as Euphemia changed her position, and then
a stinging impact on Amanda's already tingling seat had the teacher
wriggling around like Helen and on the verge of weeping. This was
hurtful and demeaning, especially the way she couldn't help whimpering
after the blow.

"God save us, look at the pussies on those two," the Corporal
declared. "One fair and one dark and both as fuckable as any I've ever
seen. Let's be getting started hey, Billy boy?"

Wade laughed: "Never thought I'd ever have so much fun in a school
house, that's for sure. OK, ladies, bend forward over the desk, onto
your elbows. And let's see those asses high up in the air."

Both of the women obeyed. Amanda's weight rested on her forearms, her
naked nipples almost touching the desk blotter, the familiar planks of
the floor looking the same as they always did but a draft of cold air
blowing over her sore bottom to prove this was nothing like a normal
day. Beside her Helen's bare arm was almost touching her own.

"Brace those legs, get your butts up."

Amanda hastened to obey the Sergeant, hearing the gloating pleasure in
his voice as he controlled them both with his voice, like a pair of
obedient dogs.

"OK, boys, if'n you ever wanted to give a school marm a taste of her
own medicine, this is your chance. I wouldn't be using that birch
though, or you'll be taking the girl's minds off what they should be
thinking about. Use your hands and not too hard or too soft, that's
the way to bring them along. Like this."

He came around behind the desk. Amanda trembled in anticipation,
giving out a little gasp as his fingers gently stroked her rounded
rump instead of landing a blow. Then she gasped again as his roughened
palm did come down sharply on her. The slap didn't hurt anywhere near
as much as the birch but it was enough to make her wriggle her
buttocks, which she instantly found had an immediate effect on the
watching men.

"God almighty," Ginger hair whispered. "I've never seen the like. Let
me at it!"

He shot around the desk and settled into giving Helen a spanking as
well. Like Amanda she started crying out immediately and heaving
around in a lascivious style, flaunting her bottom to the soldiers'
eyes.  Amanda clung to the edge of the desk and rolled her head from
side to side. The men were all around her and Helen now, taking turns
at slapping the blushing derrieres at their mercy. Not only that, but
relentless male fingers were also reaching underneath each of the
helpless females to pinch and tug at the plump breasts hanging
underneath them. Helen was yelping in protest at the rough handling,
with Amanda echoing her cries.

"OK, boys, that'll do for that. Now let's get them purring."

Amanda heard something clink and looked up. The Sergeant had
apparently glanced inside the pantry cupboard and seen the loaves of
bread which were the children's usual midday meal. Wade had reached
into the water dish beside the loaves and taken out the butter crock
which was standing in the cool water. He put two fingers inside the
jar and lifted out a pat of butter.

"No better cure for a spanking than this. All it needs is to be well
rubbed in. How about you,  teacher, would you like some nice fresh
butter rubbed all over your big beautiful butt?"

As compared to more spanking it was an easy choice. She nodded her
head.

"Can't hear you teacher - - can't hear you!"

"Yes, please . . . rub it in for me!"

"My pleasure, Ma'am. Somebody should have rubbed it into you
interfering federalists years ago."

The Rebs laughed at Wade's joke as he came back to the desk and put
the butter crock down on it. Then he moved back behind the table and
began to massage the butter into Amanda's trembling rump. Gently but
firmly, with flat palms and outsretched fingers: as the palms rotated
in larger and larger circles the fingers explored widening areas of
her still stinging skin, the nails beginning to brush against the
clump of hair between her legs. At the same time the other men were
scooping out yellow blotches from the crock. Some of it was spread on
Helen, other hands crept in underneath Amanda to smear greasy patches
across her nipples, then to work the grease into and around the
tightening points. A lingering moan of desire slipped past her lips,
her bottom involuntarily rose higher, offering her private parts up to
the Sergeant's touch.

"We're going to fuck you, school marm, we're going to fuck you but
good." She wasn't sure, she thought it was the Corporal making the
promise. Somebody else was saying something, she couldn't catch it,
there was more movement in the room.

When she squinted up she saw Blackbeard, surrounded by women.
Gertrude, Madeline, Yvonne: they were taking his uniform off. Gwenneth
McAlistair was kneeling in front of him, unlacing the man's boots.
Amanda heard Sergeant Wade laugh as his greasy fingertips began to
trace the cleft of her womanhood. When one of the fingers found the
swollen rosebud hidden within it and deftly tweaked the spot Amanda
writhed as if she was being Indian tortured over a slow fire - yet
this was a fire smoldering and spurting into flame in her own vitals,
and it was the worst kind of torture, one she didn't want stopped. Her
leg muscles tensed and she went up on her toes, then cried out in
something of the same manner as the soldiers had done when they
stormed into the village.

"Ha, we'll make a Reb out of her yet. When she's got enough Southern
spunk in her to know the difference." It might have been the Sergeant
speaking, she wasn't sure. Helen was making enough noise on her own to
make everything sound confused.

The Corporal was coming back, stark naked, his bare shaft bobbing and
up down at every step like a canoe riding over waves. He lifted up the
butter crock with one hand and used the other to guide the top of his
male member in a wiping motion around the interior of the lip of the
pot. Amanda made a mental note that she'd have to get another one,
none of the mothers would want their children eating from it in
future. A pity, it was a nice piece of pottery with violets and roses
on it she'd carefully hand painted herself. Then the Reb held his
butter decorated shaft up to her lips.

"Lick this off, teacher, before it melts, or I'll shove that birch up
your ass!"

If he thought that he was going to get any kind of fearful, tearful
refusal he was about two hours too late. Amanda immediately reached
out and held the NCO's red flushed cock steady, then wriggled forward
to do as the man wanted. There were cries of approval from around the
desk. But her hips were tightly seized and she was hauled back again.

"Oh no you don't, Patrick. You get the other 'un to do that for you.
The School Ma'am's going to get my bit between her teeth first. Jubal,
you take over here."

Jubal's hands had none of the gentleness or timing of the Sergeant's.
But he knew just as well how to excite a girl and his busy fingers
combined with the continual massaging of her slippery breasts brought
Amanda to a state of near hysteria, especially when she looked
sideways and saw the Corporal holding onto Helen's hair as he moved
himself against her, filling her mouth with his column of flesh and
then pulling it back to let her squeal and gulp in air. Amanda was
acutely aware that but for the Sergeant's intervention she would now
be in Helen's situation herself, and certainly would be sharing the
same fate when Sergeant Wade returned. Not only that, the female
spectators at the other end of the room were moving closer to the desk
to view the men's actions, edging closer in cautious groups like
feeding crows. The Sergeant suddenly appeared in the front rank,
wearing nothing but his kepi hat, Getrude and Madeline on each side of
him, his arms around both of their ample waistlines.

The trio stopped in front of the desk, in front of Amanda, and she saw
the fullness of the sergeant's upthrusting member, red flushed all
over and twitching like a hound dog's nose. "Butter me up, girls," he
chuckled.

Gertrude took a dab of butter out of the jar and spread it over the
waiting cock, with Madeline's hand joining in the task. Sergeant Wade
groaned with pleasure as Madeline took a grip around his shaft, then
worked her hand up and down the glistening skin which looked as if it
was going to split open at any second because of the pressure trapped
inside it. The Reb NCO didn't seem to be feeling any pain though,
although he let out a shuddering gasp as Gertude scratched the hard
lumps underneath his protruding ram.

"OK, School Marm, now you lick the butter off, real delicate."

Amanda lifted up her head, opened her mouth and put out her tongue.
Madeline and Gertrude both steadied the cock by gripping it at the
bottom and guiding the tip of it onto her tongue. The teacher lapped
at the hot, incredibly smooth flesh and then nearly flew off the desk
as she felt Jubal's beard press in between her thighs. She wondered
for a moment what was happening, felt his tongue licking her mound,
remembered the illustration in the book and then the beard was
scratching her as if she was straddling a hedgerow and the Reb's
tongue had found her clitoris. Amanda called out in astonished joy as
if she was a ship's lookout sighting a new land, a new world. The
Sergeant's hand twined into her hair and held her head steady as his
salty butter tasting cock pushed forcefully past her lips and over her
tongue. The teacher closed her eyes and despaired of being able to
fully satisfy the man and to breathe at the same time. As for what
Jubal was doing, her pussy was dissolving into a pool of shimmering
white hot mercury which the rest of her body was bound to slide into
and melt out of existence.

Yet it was the Sergeant's cock which was suddenly gone from her mouth,
and Jubal's tongue which was taken away from his target. Amanda
blinked and fully opened her eyes again, then gasped. Another man had
appeared by the desk, fully dressed, even to the saber hanging from
his belt. James Lee, and sounding very angry.

"You men take your fun further down the room. The teacher stays here,
on her desk."

Amanda tried to catch up on the situation. The Sergeant and the other
soldiers seemed to be doing as they were ordered, because Amanda felt
the desk move as Helen was lifted off it and dragged away. She saw the
gray pants she remembered so well moving behind the desk.

"Would you ladies mind moving a little closer? Get your skirts around
the table, please."

Amanda heard something fall on the floor - the saber probably, and the
belt it was on to, she guessed, and presumably the pants the belt had
been holding up. All around it was like being in a curtained off
little room, because so many of the village woman were standing right
up against the desk, shielding it with their skirts. Hands horny from
holding reins seized her buttocks, squeezed them passionately. She
moaned with desire and looked around. James was directly behind her,
naked from the waist down and Euphemia was standing next to him, her
fingers running up and down James's stiffening erection, apparently as
skillfully as Gertrude and Madeline had dealt with Sergeant Wade's,
like a musician tapping the stop holes on a flute. Amanda's friends
seemed to have skills she would never have suspected. On the other
side of the skirts a female voice was calling out and then giving a
scream of pure pleasure. But Amanda had no time to worry about what
was happening to any other woman while Euphemia was positioning the
head of James' cock into the center of the wet patch Jubal had left
behind.

"She's yours, Lieutenant. Start tupping her!"

Amanda had a crazy thought that if James made her pregnant and
Euphemia delivered the baby she'd be duty bound to  make the midwife
the child's Godmother - after all she'd certainly have had a hand at
both ends of the conception. Then she felt her body parted like the
Red Sea by God's unstoppable will and James was inside her, part of
her, and the pain of it was like the tumbling of Jericho's walls,
triumphant trumpet calls mingling in with her yelps of protest.
Protests which died away into long drawn out moans of contentment,
other woman holding her hands in comfort as if she was giving birth,
more women calling out down the room and Rebel yells echoing around
the schoolhouse.

"Fuck her -   fuck her -  fuck her!"

It was Euphemia saying that? Yes, it was, and the audience around the
desk were joining in the chant as Reuben's strokes carried him into
Amanda's inner temple, where everything in her body and soul was
falling and worshipping the appearance of this long promised godhead.
Her body went into convulsive spasms, muscles never before used
clutching at the flesh which had been shaped perfectly by nature to
fit into her like a fish had been formed to swim in water.

"Fuck her -  fuck her - fuck her!" 

It was impossible, it was a chant in unison, as though the excited
women were calling out the timing for a tug-of-war team at a church
picnic. Oh God, the Lord himself would surely raise the muddy waters
of the Missouri to wash away Stony Creek and all its unexpected
wickedness!

Somehow the crowd parted for a moment and between a brown dress and a
black one Amanda saw a row of desks, a naked woman kneeling on the
sloping lid of each one, booted feet braced against the back rests,
arms down by their sides. Gertrude and Madeline, wide eyed and
gasping, huge breasts hanging and banging together like the teats on
cows being driven into a milking shed. The soldiers behind them were
ruthlessly spearing the women on their cocks, Sergeant Wade coupling
with Gertrude, the Corporal with Madeline. Pretty little Gwenneth had
been press ganged as well, stripped and mounted on a desk, then
mounted from behind by the eager Jubel. Nothing else was visible in
the gap, except for a pair of boots pointing up towards the roof with
their owner flat on her back, her skirts piled up around her head and
a naked Reb on top of her.

Perhaps James saw the scene as well, for he began to gasp for air as
though he was being hung on a rope's end and his strokes grew more
frantic yet, plunging into her stretched cunt like hammer blows
drawing out red metal on an anvil.

 "Fuck her - fuck her - fuck her." They were witches all of them,
underneath their usually respectable fronts. Witches - - MacBeth - -
'I'll drain him as dry as hay'.  Was she going to drain James? If she
did she'd truly be a woman now!

Amanda heard her man bellow, felt a boiling in her depths, and then
her eyelids were clamped shut as the end of the world and the Jubilee
hit her together and she went flying up into the sky on a rocket
blowing off stars and sparks. She supposed the gunpowder had suddenly
exploded for some reason and what St Peter would say when the female
villagers of Stony Creek appeared outside the gates of Heaven in their
present circumstances hardly bore thinking about. He'd probably send
all of them straight down to Hell, or back to Missouri.

 THE END 

(More good stories at www.fiction4adults.com, many of them fully
illustrated)

-- 
Pursuant to the Berne Convention, this work is copyright with all rights
reserved by its author unless explicitly indicated.
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