Rivers West
Chapter One
A ghost trail, a dark trail, a trail endlessly winding. A dark cavern under enormous trees, down which blew a cold wind that skimmed the pools with ice. A corduroy road made from logs laid side by side, logs slippery with rotting vegetation from the swamp.
Here and there a log had sunk deep, leaving a cleft into which a suddenly plunged foot could mean a broken leg, and on either side of the swamp ... well, some said it was bottomless. Horses had sunk there, never to be seen again-and men, also.
My father's house lay several days behind me, back of a shoulder on the Quebec shore above the Gulf of St. Lawrence. For days I had been walking southward. An owl glided past with great, slow wings, and out in the swamp some unseen creature moved, seemed to pause, listen.
Was that a step behind me?
Astride a gap between logs, I paused, half turned to look.
Nothing. I must have been mistaken. Yet, I had heard something.
My shoulders ached from the burden of my tools. Straining my eyes in hte darkness, I looked for a place to stop, any place which to rest, if ever so briefly. &nbs ... read full excerpt from: RIVERS WEST (E-BK) ebook
