The Sailor, The Mohawk, & The Giant Malamute

     That night at the Gazette was like all the rest of the “get togethers” over the years except for Peter Downing. There was something towards the end that reminded him of the Apocalypse in the way it sounded like earth’s final hour. This sent Hans back to his library to research the subject and have something to talk about with Peter that hadn’t been said that night.

     On the top shelf was a smallish book simply titled “Paganism.” He lit two large candles on each side of his big stuffed chair and began reading…The presence of the Temple of Diana at Ephesus marked that city as sacred to the Mystery religion, for the Seven Wonders of the ancient world were erected to indicate the respositories of knowledge. Ephesus was the origin of Buddhistic, Zoroastrian, and Chaldean philosophy. Also the reported home of Artemis, Multimamma, the last domicile of the Virgin Mary, and the tomb of St. John the Divine. According to legend St. John did not depart from this earth in a usual manner but, selecting his vault, entered it still alive, and closing it behind him, vanished forever from mortal sight.

     The Apocalypse is by far one of the most important and least understood of Gnostic Christian writings. The authorship was disputed from the first and by the third century Dionysius of Alexandria and Eusebius declared the Revelation and the book of St. John were written by one Cerinthus who borrowed the name of the great apostle to better foist his own doctrines upon the Christians. Later Jerome, Luther, and Erasmus questioned the authorship.  

     There are three possible reasons to suspect the authorship of Revelation.

     First, the weight of the evidence of its own contents may well pronounce a pagan writing—one of the sacred books of the Eleusinian or Phrygian Mysteries, setting forth the profundities of Egyptian and Greek mysticism.

     Second, it is possible that the Book of Revelation was written to reconcile the seeming discrepancies between early Christian and pagan religious philosophies. The initiated pagans transferred their symbols to Christianity, concealing those eternal truths. The Apocalypse shows clearly the resultant fusion of pagan and Christian symbolism.

     Thirdly, is the possibility of unscrupulous members of a certain religious order to undermine Christianity by satirizing it. They hoped to show the new faith to be merely a restatement of the ancient pagan doctrines.

     In the opening chapter of the Apocalypse, St. John describes the Alpha and Omega who stood in the midst of the heavens among seven golden candlesticks, surrounded by his flaming planetary regents. The Logos-figure has snowy-white hair of Kronos (Father Time), the blazing eyes of Zeus, thw sword of Arcs, the shining face of Helios, the chiton and girdle of Aphrodite, feet of Hermes’ mercury, and the murmur of the ocean’s waves, alluding to Selene, the Moon-Goddess of the four seasons and of the waters.

The seven stars carried by this immense Being in his right hand are the Governors of the world: the flaming sword issuing from his mouth is the

Creative Fiat, or word of power, by which the illusion of material permanence is slain. Here is represented, in all his symbolic glory splendor, the hierophant of the Phrygian Mysteries. Seven priests bearing lamps are his attendants and the stars carried in his hand are the seven schools of the Mysteries whose power he administers.

     In the second and third chapters, St. John delivers to the “seven churches which are in Asia” the injunctions received by him from the Alpha and Omega. The churches are here analogous to the rungs of a Mithraic ladder, and John, being “in the spirit,” ascended through the orbits of the seven sacred planets until he reached the inner surface of the Empyrean. When related to the Eastern system of metaphysics, these churches represent the chakras, or nerve ganglia, along the human spine, the “door in heaven” being the brahmarandra, or the point in the crown of the skull (Golgotha), through which the spinal spirit fire passes to liberation. The seven churches also signify the Greek vowels, of which Alpha and Omega are the first and the last.

     The fourth and fifth chapters describes the throne of God, surrounded by 24 lesser seats of elders in white garments and crowns of gold. Out of the throne proceeded lightnings, thunderings, and voices; there were seven lamps representing the seven Spirits of God. In His right hand, a book with seven seals which no man in heaven or earth has been worthy to open. Then appeared a Lamb (Aries) which had been slain, it had seven horns (rays) and seven eyes (lights). The Lamb took the book from His right hand and four beasts and all the elders fell down and worshipped God and the Lamb. During the early centuries the lamb was universally recognized as a symbol of Christ. The Persians were the only people to put Aries at the first of the zodiac signs. The ancient pagans used the lamb as a sin offering. It has been highly venerated by Greeks, Egyptians, Scandinaviams, and used by Freemasonry as an apron symbolized by Typhon or Judas.

     The sixth through eleventh chapters are the account of the opening of the seven seals on the book held by the Lamb. When the first seal was broken, there rode a man (birth) on a white horse wearing a crown and holding a bow. When the second seal was broken, there rode a man (youth) on a red horse and in his hand a great sword. When the third seal was broken, a man (maturity) rode forth with a pair of balances in his hand. And when the fourth seal was broken there rode forth Death upon a pale horse and hell followed after him. In Eastern philosophy these horsemen signify the four yugas, or ages, of the world which, riding forth at: their appointed times, become for a certain span the rulers of creation. The first horse represents fire ether, called Jupiter had wings, very fleet, highest place in the order, body had images of the sun, moon, stars, and all the bodies of the ethereal regions. The second horse represents the element of air called Juno, The side facing the sun became luminous signifying the diurnal and nocturnal conditions of air. The third horse signifying water was Neptune, who had a heavy gait and small circle. The fourth horse signified the static element of earth called Vesta, described as immovable and at the same time champing at the bit. In the end the fiery horse of Jupiter will consume the other horses, purified by reabsorption in the fiery ether, they will come forth renewed, constituting “a new heaven and a new earth.” 

     When the fifth seal was opened St. John beheld those who had died for the word of God.

     When the sixth seal was broken there was a great earthquake, the sun became darkened, moon became like blood, the angels of the winds came forth, and another angel who sealed on their foreheads 144,000 of the children of Israel that they should be preserved against the awful day of tribulation. In the Pythagorean system of numerical philosophy, the number 144,000 is reduced to 9, the mystic symbol of man and also the number of initiation, he who passes through the nine degrees of the Mysteries receives the sign of the cross as a symbol of his regeneration and liberation from his infernal or inferior nature.

     There was a small knock at the door. Hans said to enter and Matoaka came in with a tray of food as it was lunchtime. Corn beef sandwiches, cheese, crackers, and a bottle of Zinfandel were neatly arranged with a finger bowl and napkins. He invited her to stay and he would read out loud so they could discuss the Apocalypse as he read along. She was used to discussing topics of Rebecca’s editorials and enjoyed being asked her opinion. But Rebecca was writing about the Indians most of the time and she had insight into many of the customs that were being discussed. What Hans wanted to talk about would be foreign to her for the most part. She liked Hans and since she was caught up on her duties and Rebecca wasn’t due for another few hours she said she’d be happy to join in the hunt for knowledge. He went over the previous material in a quick summary of all he had read. 

     She listened to the entire catch up session, then she said she had a myth for him. This is Iroquois. but it has universal content. In the beginning there was no earth to live on, but up above, in the Great Blue, there was a woman who dreamed dreams. One night she dreamed about a tree covered with white blossoms, a tree that brightened up the sky when its flowers opened but that brought terrible darkness when they closed again. The dream frightened her, so she went and told it to the wise old men who lived with her in their village in the sky. “Pull up this tree,” she begged them, but they did not understand. All they did was dig around its roots, to make space for more light. But the tree just fell through the hole they had made and disappeared. After that there was no light at all, only darkness. The old men grew frightened of the woman and her dreams. It was her fault that the light had disappeared forever. So they dragged her toward the hole and pushed her through as well. Down, down she fell, down toward the great emptiness. There was nothing below her but a heaving waste of water. She would surely have been smashed to pieces, this strange dreaming woman from the Great Blue, had not a fish hawk come to her aid. His feathers made a pillow for her and she drifted gently above the waves. But the fish hawk could not keep her up all on his own. He needed help. So he called out to the creatures of the deep. “We must find some firm ground for this poor woman to rest on,” he said anxiously. But there was no ground, only the swirling, endless waters. A helldiver went down, down, down to the very bottom of the sea and brought back a little bit of mud in his beak. He found a turtle, smeared the mud onto its back, and dived down again for more. Then the ducks joined in. They loved getting muddy and they too brought beaks full of the ocean floor and spread it over the turtle’s shell. The beavers helped — they were great builders — and they worked away, making the shell bigger and bigger. Everybody was very busy now and everybody was excited. This world they were making seemed to be growing enormous! The birds and the animals rushed about building countries, the continents, until, in the end, they had made the whole round earth, while all the time they sky woman was safely sitting on the turtle’s back. And the turtle holds the earth up to this very day.

     Hans listened then said he had a myth to tell her from his people on how the earth and man were created. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters. And God said, “Let there be light” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day. And God said, “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” And God made the firmament and separated the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament. And it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day. And God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good. And God said, “let the earth put forth vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, upon the earth.” And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, a third day. And God said, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to separate the day from the night; and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, and let them be lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. And God made the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light upon the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, a fourth day. And God said, “Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the firmament of the heavens.” So God  created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” And there was evening and there was morning, a fifth day. And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds, cattle and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds.” And it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds, and the cattle according to their kinds, and everything that creeps upon the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed which is upon the face of all earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, a sixth day. Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God finished his work which he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all his work which he had done in creation.

     She’d heard the Judeo-Christian myth before from Seabreeze when she first came to work for the family. But it did remind her of a Salish myth.  Old-Man-in-the-Sky created the world. Then he drained all the water off the earth and crowded it into the big salt holes now called the oceans. The land became dry except for the lakes and rivers. Old Man Coyote often became lonely and went up to the Sky World just to talk. One time he was so unhappy that he was crying. Old- Man-in-the-Sky questioned him. “Why are you so unhappy that you are crying? Have I not made much land for you to run around on? Are not Chief Beaver, Chief Otter, Chief Bear, and Chief Buffalo on the land to keep you company?” Old Man Coyote sat down and cried more tears. Old-Man-in-the-Sky became cross and began to scold him. “Foolish Old Man Coyote, you must not drop so much water down upon the land. Have I not worked many days to dry it? Soon you will have it all covered with water again. What is the trouble with you? What more do you want to make you happy?” “I am very lonely because I have no one to talk to,” he replied. “Chief Beaver, Chief Otter, Chief Bear, and Chief Buffalo are busy with their families. They do not have time to visit with me. I want people of my own, so that I may watch over them.” “Then stop this shedding of water,” said Old-Man-in-the-Sky. “If you will stop annoying me with your visits, I will make people for you. Take this parfleche. It is a bag made of rawhide. Take it some place in the mountain where there is red earth. Fill it and bring it back up to me.” Old Man Coyote took the bag made of the skin of an animal and traveled many days and nights. At last he came to a mountain where there was much red soil. He was very weary after such a long journey but he managed to fill the parfleche. Then he was sleepy. “I will lie down to sleep for a while. When I waken, I will run swiftly back to Old-Man-in-the-Sky.” He slept very soundly. After a while, Mountain Sheep came along. He saw the bag and looked to see what was in it. “The poor fool has come a long distance to get such a big load of red soil,” he said to himself. “I do not know what he wants it for, but I will have fun with him.” Mountain Sheep dumped all of the red soil out upon the mountain. He filled the lower part of the parfleche with white solid, and the upper part with red soil. Then laughing heartily, he ran to his hiding place. Soon Old Man Coyote woke up. He tied the top of the bag and hurried with it to Old-Man-in-the-Sky. When he arrived with it, the sun was going to sleep. It was so dark that the two of them could hardly see the soil in the parfleche. Old-Man-in-the-Sky took the dirt and said, “I will make this soil into the forms of two men and two women.” He did not see that half of the soil was red and the other half white. Then he said to Old Man Coyote, “Take these to the dry land below. They are your people. You can talk with them. So do not come up here to trouble me.” Then he finished shaping the two men and two women — in the darkness. Old Man Coyote put them in the parfleche and carried them down to dry land. In the morning he took them out and put breath into them. He was surprised to see that one pair was red and the other was white. “Now I know that Mountain Sheep came while I was asleep. I cannot keep these two colors together.” He thought a while. Then he carried the white ones to the land by the big salt hole. The red ones he kept in his own land so that he could visit with them. That is how Indians and white people came to the earth.

     Hans said white people were taken to Europe as well because that’s where most white come from. Matoaka said myths are like theories that explain what you can see and what you can’t. Hans enjoyed the stories but was anxious to return to his book. After a moment of silence he picked up where he had stopped when the knock at the door occurred.

     When the seventh seal was broken, there was silence for the space of half of an hour. Then came forth seven angels, each with a trumpet, and sounded the seven-lettered Name of the Logos, and great catastrophes ensued. A star, named Wormwood, fell from the heaven, thereby signifying that the secret doctrine of the ancients had been given to men who had profaned it and caused the wisdom of God to become a destructive agency. And another star fell representing the false light of human reason and to it was given a key to the bottomless pit (Nature), which it opened, causing all manner of evil creatures to issue forth. There also came a mighty angel, clothed in a cloud, with a face like the sun, feet and legs like pillars of fire, with one foot upon the waters and the other upon the land. This angel gave St. John a little book, bidding him to eat it, which he did. The little book represents the secret doctrine of the wisdom of God and the hunger of his soul was appeased.

     The twelfth chapter tells of a great wonder appearing in the heavens: a woman clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of 12 stars. The woman represents the constellation Virgo and Isis who is about to bear her child Horus who is attacked by Typhon in an attempt to slay the child predestined to destroy the Spirit of Evil. The evil dragon tried to destroy the Virgin and her son with a flood of false doctrines but the earth swallowed up the false doctrines and the Mysteries endured. 

     The thirteenth chapter describes a great beast which rose out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, the symbol of horror and destruction. The seven heads represent the seven stars in the Great Dipper, the ten horns are the ten primitive patriarchs and the ancient zodiac of ten signs. The number of the beast (Antichrist) 666 comes out to 666 no matter which analysis one uses. The Qabbalists, Greek, and Christian names for the Antichrist all come out to 666.

     The fourteenth chapter opens with the Lamb standing on Mount Zion with the 144,000 that have the name of God on their foreheads. Two angels appear; one (Perseus) on a cloud with a bright sickle to reap the initiate who has reached the point of liberation, the other (Bootes) Death with a sickle (Karma) to reap those who have lived by a false light and cast them down into the winepress of the wrath of God (the purgatorial spheres).

     The fifteenth to eighteenth chapters are the account of seven angels (the Pleiades) who pour their vials upon the earth, the contents are called the seven last plagues. Also introduced is the symbolic “harlot of Babylon”, a woman seated on a scarlet-colored beast with seven heads and ten horns, with purple and scarlet robe bedecked with gold, precious stones and pearls, holding a golden cup of abominations. This figure may be an effort to vilify Cybele, Artemis, or the Great Mother goddess of antiquity. Because the pagans venerated the Mater Deorum through symbols appropriate to the feminine generative principle the early Christians accused them of worshipping a courtesan.

     The nineteenth and twentieth chapters describe the preparation of the sacrament called the marriage of the Lamb. St. John saw the heavens open up and a white horse, and the rider (the illuminated mind) which sat upon it was called the Faithful and True. Out of his mouth issued a sharp sword and the armies of heaven followed after him. Upon the plains of heaven was fought the mystic Armageddon—the last great war between light and darkness. Evil is vanquished and the beast and the false prophet are cast into a lake if fiery brimstone. Satan is bound for a thousand years. Then the last judgment arrives, when the books will be opened, including the Book of Life. At this time the dead are judged according to their works and those whose names are not in the Book of Life are cast into the sea of fire. To the Mysteries neophyte the war was between the Persian Ahriman and the forces of good under Ahura-Mazda representing the last struggle between the flesh and the spirit when, finally overcoming the world, the illuminated soul rises to union with its spiritual Self. The judgment signifies the weighing of the soul and was borrowed from the Mysteries of Osiris. The rising of the dead represents consummation of human regeneration. The sea of fire was for those who fail in initiation and fall back into the animal world.

     The twenty-first and twenty-second chapters are telling of the new heaven and the new earth to be established at the close of Ahriman’s reign. St. John beheld the New Jerusalem descending as a bride adorned for her husband. The Holy City represents the regenerated and perfected world, the true ashlar of the Mason, for the city is a perfect cube. The foundation consisted of 144 stones in 12 rows. The transparent streets of gold are the streams of spiritual light along which an initiate travels towards the sun.  There is no temple in the city, for God and the Lamb are the temple. And St. John beheld a river, the Water of Life, which proceeded out of the throne of the Lamb. There is also a Tree of Life (the spirit) bearing 12 manner of fruit, whose leaves are for the healing of the nations. Though initiates walk the earth as ordinary mortals, they are of a world apart and through their ceaseless efforts the kingdom of God is slowly but surly being established on earth. These illuminated souls are the builders of the New Jerusalem, and their bodies are the living stones in its walls. For this reason they declare that virtuous and illuminated men, instead of ascending to heaven, will bring heaven down and establish it in the midst of the earth itself.

     Mato sat looking out the high, narrow windows with the stained glass on the top half. Although the pattern was not of anything in particular, she still saw the images in the random pieces of colored glass depicting the scene being described. Sunset threw a reddish glow on all the glass and she couldn’t pull her eyes away even when Hans had stopped reading. Hans stared at the Indian princess, she seemed to glow in the darkening room, alight surrounded her head and he felt unworthy to be in her presence.  

TO BE CONTINUED

     Hans had spent most of the day thinking about Jeddah and the stories that were told. He was looking at his foot and mentally multiplying by six to get his height, when Seabreeze came in on her way upstairs to change. She was home early for a change and he hoped she would talk to him about some of the things he had been thinking about. She asked him if he was ready to go to the Gazette Gala, that once a year extravaganza where all of Philadelphian society gathers in one place to bore each other to death as to how well they are all doing.

     He hated the thing. It was one mandatory attendance event of the year; for the founding father’s families, for Philosophical Society members, for businessmen, for charity chairpersons, for politicians of every office, and for anyone that seeks membership into “the right circles.” Now that Benjamin Franklin owned the Gazette, Rebecca was required to attend as well on her own merits as editor of the paper. She was nervous and his casualness was making it worse on her. She hurried upstairs and he fixed himself a scotch on the rocks. By the time she came down he had dressed and had another drink, holding off the real drinking until the event itself.

     They took the covered carriage with a four matched Arabians and the new driver from England with his top hat. Hans had the house crew clean up the carriage the day before, knowing they would be pulling up in front of the building and getting out in front of everyone. He gritted his teeth as they close to the street the Gazette was on. One more “sip” from his secret flask and he was ready to “arrive.”

     The street was solid with carriages, and the going was extremely slow as only one carriage was emptying at a time. He looked out the window to see what was taking so long. The side walk was jammed with gentlemen having their cigars and pipes before going in to join their wives inside. The street looked like a building was on fire considering the smoke billowing in great clouds of gray, white, and black. He pulled his head back in and told Rebecca that it will be another 10 minutes or so, they were still seven back. As they got closer Rebecca began to cough as the smoke filled the carriage from being downwind from the majority of the men outside. Finally it was their turn to get off and mount the stairs to the front door, one flight up. He got off first and helped her down, presented her his arm and stiffly led her up to the door. There Ben and his wife, Deborah, greeted them with warmth and affection. The women kissed each other on the cheek, not just “pecking” the air as they had grown fond of one another over the year. Hans shook Ben’s hand firmly and thanked him for inviting them, both knowing Ben couldn’t have done anything else. Hans for being one of the founding families and not inviting Rebecca would have seemed he didn’t support her choice of subject matter that was currently running on the Indians.

     As they entered the lobby of the five story building, second highest in the city at the time, the smell of perfume overwhelmed his senses as he fought the urge to cough and choke to go along with his watering eyes. Rebecca saw her assistant editor, Charlotte Downing, and immediately began to discuss business. This was he chance to exit to the street to the comfort of watering eyes from the manly art of cigar smoke. He told Rebecca he was withdrawing to the smoking area outside and she dismissed him with a slight wave of her hand, and he was gone, easing himself out one of the side doors he knew about. Suddenly the air was cool and breezy, he sauntered over to where small groups of men stood talking. First he took care of the mandatory conversations with men he had known since they were all boys. He got asked how retirement was going, since they all knew he sold the family business to an outsider. None of them were a bit interested at the price he had on the business, but there was still resentment that a New Yorker was now a player in the city. After a few minutes he had talked to all the men he always talked to and he was free to return to his wife’s side since he didn’t smoke. As he was starting to head to the stairway he heard the word Rosincrucian from a deep, rumbling voice. He stopped, turned, and walked closer to where he heard the word come from. 

     The owner, James Thomas, of the Performing Arts Theatre was in a heated debate with an older man Hans had never seen before. James was insisting that William Shakespeare wrote everything attributed to him. The stranger that people were calling Professor countered with, “but the Stratford actor’s name was William Shakspere. He introduced himself as such, and his scrawling, uncertain signature showed no familiarity with a pen, either he memorized it from one given to him to memorize or someone held his hand while signing his will.” The Professor went on to state that it is evident that Shakspere could not have written the immortal writings bearing his name. Stratford had no school capable of teaching at those levels of literary culture. His parents were illiterate and he possessed no well stocked library essential in producing references from ages past. James said that actors usually don’t have a lot of money but they do meet wealthy people in the theatre circles and could easily gained access to “well stocked libraries”.

     The Professor laughed and asked if those wealthy people also had time to teach him modern French, Italian, Spanish, and Danish, much less classical Latin and Greek. Then everyone standing there burst out laughing and James was left scowling at everybody. The Professor continued. “Why Sir would Shakspere’s daughter at 27 only be able to make a mark when signing? Wouldn’t the “Bard of Avon”, author of some of the best writings in history, see to the education of his daughter, so she could appreciate her father’s work?”

     Before James could say a word, the Professor continued with the fact that in spite of William’s admitted avarice, he seemingly made no effort during his lifetime to control or secure remuneration from the plays bearing his name, many of which were first published anonymously. Even his will, while noting his second best bed and his “broad silver gilt bowl”, makes no mention that he possessed any literary productions whatsoever. He actually brought legal action against a certain Philip Rogers for two shillings. So nothing in Shakspere’s life, including buying malt for brewing at the height of his fame, indicates that he was the author of those works. At this , James went red and said there many reasons why a man could get cheated out of his rightful due in life. Men have been killed for a lot less that immortal works of art. Silence followed so James did score at least partial credit for his response.

     The Professor, then, repeated the assertion that philosophic ideals throughout the Shakespearian plays demonstrate that the author was familiar with doctrines and tenets peculiar to Rosicrucianism, in fact, the creator would be one of the illuminati of the ages, the true author was Lord Bacon. Two men said this is where we came in, and left the circle of men, allowing Hans to move up into the inner row in front of the Professor. He challenged the group to name anyone but a Platonist, a Qabbalist, or a Pythagorean that could have written The Tempest, Macbeth, Hamlet, or The Tragedy of Cymbeline. Hans had seen Hamlet but couldn’t see the Mysteries of the Ages in the story, so he wasn’t about to argue the point for fear of being humiliated in front of the other men. The Professor seemed like the kind of man that could make a man feel like he is the dumbest man on the earth. Even James kept silent Hans thought he saw James nod his head that the story lines were so involved that ancient story lines could well be interwoven into the story.

     The headpiece from King Richard The Second, Quarto of 1597 shows light and dark A’s, long considered a Rosincrucian signature, and compare  exactly to Alciati Emblemata, as well as the title page of Anatomy of Melancholy, long considered the diary of Sir Francis Bacon. Sir Francis Bacon; Lord Verulam, legitimate son of Queen Elizabeth and the Earl of Leicester, Father of modern science, Remodeler of modern law, patron of modern democracy, quite possibly the Illustrious Father C.R.C. referred to in the Rosicrucian manifestoes, and one of the founders of modern Freemasonry was asked by King James to go through the translator’s manuscripts of what became known as the King James Version of the Bible for the presumable purpose of checking, editing, and revising the text before publication. The first edition of the King James Bible contains a cryptic Baconian headpiece, which could conceal that which he dared not put into text—the secret Rosicrucian key to mystic and Masonic Christianity. There was a general stirring in the crowd that had doubled when Hans turned around to see who was grumbling. The thought that maybe the version everyone uses to quote and read to others, could have shaped by a Freemason as to the nature of the Bible without anyone knowing was troubling to say the least.

     Other attributes of Lord Bacon that argue that he was the author was his knowledge of the law and etiquette of the court, the fact he had traveled to many of the countries that where backgrounds for various plays, his magnificent library that included stories with no English translation available, and that Bacon’s enemies were caricatured in many of the plays.

     About this time, two sometimes three men in the crowd started to argue with the Professor. One said that Lord Bacon may have been high born and well educated but why didn’t he claim authorship when it became obvious there was overwhelming acclaim for the plays. The Professor countered with either Sir Francis felt the plays would take away from his credentials of being a barrister and scientist or he felt the money wasn’t sufficient to put up with the loss of privacy that would accompany fame. Hans recognized Philip Grand say “I’ve never met a man who would put that much effort and time into a series of works over an extended period of time without wanting the world to know he did it.” The Professor looked down his nose at Philip and said, “Maybe you should upgrade the class of people you associate with.” That got everybody laughing since Philip moved in the best circles of the colonies.

     The Professor picked up where he left off since no one was pursuing an argument. Sir Francis Bacon’s cipher number is 33. In First Part of King Henry the Fourth, the word “Francis” appears 33 times upon one page, by using awkward sentences. Throughout Folios and Quartos acrostic signatures are found.

              Begun to tell me what I am, but stopt

              And left me to a bootelesse Inquisition,

              Concluding, stay: not yet.

The first letters of the first and second lines together with the first three letters of the third line form the word BACon. Similar acrostics appear frequently in Bacon’s acknowledged writings. The tenor of Shakespearian dramas politically is in harmony with the recognized viewpoints of Lord Bacon, and there are certain historical and philosophical inaccuracies common to both, such as identical misquotations from Aristotle. The word honorificabilitudinitatibus appearing in the fifth act of Love’s Labour’s Lost is a Rosicrucian signature, as its numerical equivalent (287) indicates. In Sir Francis Bacon’s New Atlantis Father Time is depicted bringing a female figure out of the darkness of a cave with the Latin inscription: “In time the secret truth shall be revealed.” There is no reasonable doubt that the Masonic Order is the direct outgrowth of the secret societies of the Middle Ages, and Freemasonry is permeated by the symbolism and mysticism of the ancient and mediaeval worlds. The crowd had thinned out as the Professor went on and on about the mysticism of ancient times. Finally ending with just two men left agreeing with the Professor the group disbands and Hans hurries up to speak with the Professor. Hans introduces himself and the Professor says his name is Peter Downing. “Is your wife…?” “Yes, my wife works as your wife’s assistant at the Gazette.” “Maybe we could get together some time and discuss the Mysteries of the Ages.” Peter looked closely at Hans through squinted eye slits and cautiously said that would be agreeable to him, knowing the social disaster to say no out of hand.

     They went up the steps together and joined their wives to be introduced formally by the women. Rebecca raised an eyebrow at the casualness her husband shook Peter’s hand, considering the usual formal manner Hans treated a new person. He saw her look and leaned over to tell her he had been listening to the Professor outside for the last half hour. She said that Peter worked for city government, but she didn’t know exactly what he did.

Charlotte never talked about him much, anymore than I discuss our lives with her, it’s not that kind of relationship—strictly business. Hans told her he was interested in pursuing some kind of relationship with the husband for intellectual reasons and would that complicate her relationship with the wife. She said she’d think about it, but she thought it would probably be alright if things didn’t get ugly between you men, where Charlotte felt she had to take her husband’s side and make things in the office awkward. Hans said he would avoid conflict at all costs, and it was settled.    

TO BE CONTINUED

     Hans walked the long way home. He wanted time to try to sort out the volumes of information Jeddah had either said or eluded to. He help but think that there were still pieces of the puzzle missing in spite of the claim that Solomon or any other man in history had mastered all the Mysteries of the Ancient World.

     The house was quiet when he arrived. He went to their library of some import and tried to look up various names and subjects to see where authors differed. Matoaka walked by and Hans asked when Rebecca was due home. Mato said she wasn’t sure but the Madame hadn’t said anything about being late. Hans was going to ask her about any symbolism she might be familiar with but decided he wasn’t ready for any more inputs yet. He watched go up the stairs in her usual gliding motion. Seabreeze had told him that Mato had on two occasions buried weapons into Big Bear in battle and lived to tell about it. Hans couldn’t imagine facing Bear in battle, he was quite sure he would run as fast as his legs would carry him away from the sight of battle, especially if he heard Big Bear was coming. He thought back to when he first saw Bear and how the sun dimmed when he arrived on the dock. Was that possible or did just seeing him cause a man to faint slightly and lose for a moment his eyesight.

     The next thing he knew, he was pulling various books off the shelving and sitting down in a huge cushioned chair by the table and picked up a book titled, “Kings of England”. It just seemed to open by itself to Henry VIII in the middle so he flipped back to the start of the article so as not to miss the part where he had someone look for documents of high interest to preserve. Born June 28, 1491, a year before Columbus discovered the Americas. Crowned just days before his eighteenth birthday he reigned until 1547, six years of which were as King of Ireland as well. He became Prince of Wales upon the death of his older brother, Arthur. A special dispensation from Pope Julius II was necessary in order to marry his brother’s widow, Catherine of Aragon, with the stipulation of non-consummation.

     Following difficulties with Rome over a divorce from Catherine, he killed his wife, married his mistress, split from the Roman Catholic Church, seized assets of the Church, formed the Church of England (Anglican Church), acted essentially as its “Pope”, and just for spite funded the printing of the Bible in English. Proud of his Welch blood, he pushed through the Act of Union of 1536 where Wales was brought under English rule. He increased the size and power of the Navy. In 1533 he introduced legislation against homosexuals with the Buggery Act, making “buggery” punishable by hanging for the next 350 years. He also was an avid gambler at dice, tables, and cards.

     Henry was also famous for his six wives. While still legally married to Catherine of Aragon, he secretly married Anne Boleyn, who bore him Elizabeth. He annulled their marriage because of not having a son, and had her executed on trumped up charges of adultery. Third wife was Jane Seymour, who gave him a sickly son and died soon after doing so. His fourth wife was the German Protestant Anne of Cleves, who he disliked from the start and another annulment. Number five, Catherine Howard, a young cousin of Anne Boleyn, who he also had executed for adultery and treason. The sixth was Catherine Parr, a twice widowed, older woman. Between the six women he left three heirs, all of whom sat on the throne, Edward VI, Mary I (“Bloody” Mary), and Elizabeth I.

     It is well known that, in later life, King Henry VIII was grossly overweight, and possibly suffered from both gout and syphilis. In his younger days he had been a very active man. At 45 he had a jousting accident and suffered a thigh wound that prevented exercising and became ulcerated and probably indirectly lead to his death 11 years later.

     Hans leaned back in his chair when he finished. There was nothing about preserving documents, but he had to admire anyone who defied the most powerful entity in the world at that time. He was somewhat surprised someone wasn’t sent to kill him for doing so. It reminded him that the world is a large place and there are pockets of power throughout the world that don’t see other powerful men as superior in any way.

     After a few minutes of rest, Hans picked up the second book, “Mythology”. Quickly turning to H, he skimmed past Hera to Hermes (HUR-meez; Roman name Mercury) and began reading with Mysteries of the Ancients in mind. Hermes, son of Zeus and a mountain nymph (Maia, daughter of Atlas and one of the Pleiades), was a messenger of the gods and guide of dead souls to the Underworld. On his first day of life, he found an empty tortoise shell, saw the possibility as a sounding chamber, strung  sinews across it, and created the first lyre. He is the god of shepherds, land travel, merchants, oratory, literature, athletics, weights and measures, and thieves.

     Hans closed the book and went upstairs to bed. He was struck on how much the Greek Gods interfered with the lives of mortal men.

     In the morning, he asked Seabreeze if she had heard of Hermes and she said of course I have. He was among other things the God of weights and measures and therefore involved with Freemasonry, why do you ask? Hans just looked at her without saying anything. 

TO BE CONTINUED

     Hans could not stay away from the Garden tavern. Somehow he knew Wisamia held the key to more understanding. That night he went and waited till she was able to come over and talk. She asked where the good father was and he said probably on the compound. She didn’t sit down but rather walked away. When she came back she had a man with her, he was around 30 with messy blonde hair and a wild look in his eyes. “This is Jeddah Smith, he lived on the ridge for years.” Hans jumped up and shook his and invited him to sit awhile. Jeddah looked around the room apparently to make sure no one he knew was there, then sat down opposite Hans timidly. Wisamia said that Jeddah knew more about the occult than any man around. He had studied with Kelpius for years as a young boy. Before Hans could engage the young man in light conversation to ease the transition to such heady topics, Jeddah started talking softly but very fast. Hans leaned over so as not to miss anything.

     The builders existed before the Deluge (biblical flood), and its members were employed in the building of the Tower of Babel. The Masonic Constitution of 1701 gives an account of the origin of the sciences. In Genesis Chapter four a man called Lameck with two wives, Adah and Zillah. Adah had two sons, Jaball and Juball. Zillah had a son Tubal-cain and a daughter Naamah. They found Two Pillars of stone with the four sciences ascribed on them. The first stone called Marbell, that cannot burn, the other Laturus, that cannot drown in water. One of these pillars was later discovered by Hermes, son of Zeus, who communicated to mankind the secrets thereon. Adam forewarned his descendents that sinful humanity would be destroyed by a deluge. The patriarch Enoch, who lived to 365 years of age, constructed an underground temple consisting of nine vaults, one under the other. In the deepest vault he placed a triangular tablet of gold bearing the absolute Name of Deity. He also made two Deltas, one he placed on the altar in the deepest vault, the other he gave to his son Methuseleh. In form and arrangement these vaults epitomized the nine spheres of the Ancient Mysteries and the nine sacred strata of the earth through which the initiate must pass to reach the flaming Spirit dwelling in its central core. Enoch, fearing that all knowledge of the sacred Mysteries would be lost when the deluge came, erected two columns with allegorical symbols of the Great Knowledge. After ages an initiate builder while laying the foundation for another temple to the Great Architect of the Universe, discovered the long-lost vaults and the secrets contained within.

     Henry VIII had archives of important character to be copied. One was the history of Peter Gower, a Greek who traveled for knowledge, in Egypt, Syria, anywhere the Phoenicians had planted Masonry. Peter Gower is the Anglicized form of Pythagoras, thus a link is made between the Mysteries of Greece and mediaeval Freemasonry, which had its origin in the East.

     By 1000 B.C. Dionysiac Architects made their appearance and were considered the best craftsmen in the world. Extreme measures were taken to keep the secrets safe from the outside world. They were entrusted to build the most enduring builds in the western world. Even Solomon employed them in the building of the temple. Their work spread to all of Asia Minor , even to India. One of the most illustrious was Vitruvius, the great architect, who revealed some of the ancient knowledge of symmetry. Without proportion no temple can be designed. The human body for example has proportions of symmetry. The face, from the chin to the top of the forehead where the lowest roots of the hair line is the same length as from the wrist to the tip of the middle finger. This length is 1/10 of the total height of the person. The head, from chin to the crown, is 1/8. From the middle of the breast to the crown is ¼. The length of the foot is 1/6. The forearm and breadth of the breast is ¼. At this point Hans was busy holding his palm up to his face and trying to line up his forearm with the width of his chest. Jeddah paused in his narration as he was used to people checking the validity of these symmetries. Wisamia got up to check in with her supervisor, the barkeep, to make sure there was nothing she had to do right then. When she returned a few minutes later Hans was finished with his verification process. Jeddah continued where he had left off.

     Each chamber in the Mysteries through which the candidate passed had its own peculiar acoustics. In one chamber the voice of the priest was amplified until his words caused the room to vibrate, while in another the voice was diminished and softened to a degree that it sounded like distant tinkling of silver bells. Likewise, in some chambers shouting would barely be audible and in others whispering generated echoes a hundred times over. The supreme ambition of the Dionysiac Architects was to construct buildings that would reflect their purposes, that using straight lines and curves to create any desired attitude or emotion. The Ark of the Covenant had specifically designed chambers, so attuned to the vibrations of the invisible world that they caught and amplified the voices of the ages imprinted upon and eternally existent in the substance of the astral light.

     Unskilled in these ancient subtleties of their profession, modern architects often create architectural absurdities, ignorant of the symbolic importance. So banks, office buildings and department stores end up with phallic symbols as adornments. Christian churches can end up with Brahmin or Mohammedan domes or styled like Jewish synagogues or a Greek temple in honor of Pluto. Although stigmatized as pagans, Dionysiac craftmen were almost universally employed in the erection of Christian abbeys and cathedrals, whose stones to this day carry distinguishing marks and symbols of their builders, to the point of having squares and compasses in the hands of the saints and prophets. The checkerboard floor pattern is the old tracing board for masons from the beginning. Dionysians influenced early Islamic culture and their interlaced triangles (Seal of Solomon) can be seen conspicuously in Mohammedan mosques. They gave us a legacy of the unfinished Temple of Civilization, a vast, invisible structure that initiates have labored continuously since the inception of the fraternity, of which the temple on the brow of Mount Moriah was but an impermanent symbol. They believed that immortality could be achieved by becoming a part of the creative agencies of Nature.

     Hans stopped Jeddah to ask how it is that a Rosicrucian is so well versed in Freemasonry. Jeddah looked at him as if it should quite obvious the ties between the two. Hans looked back at him, showing no sign of understanding the connection. Jeddah asked Hans to state the main theme of the Rosicrucians. Hans said it was the duality of man. When Jeddah asked Hans to explain Hans just said Adam was both man and woman before the fall, where he insisted in knowing carnally a woman and lost his ability to create new beings and worlds just by speaking. Jeddah then asked Hans to say what the main focus of Freemasonry was. Hans said it was that the universe had exact proportion to it and knowing those sacred measurements and their relationship to each other was the key to all knowledge. The connection still didn’t leap into mind, so Hans asked again what is the connection between the two. Jeddah either because he wasn’t sure himself, he wanted Hans to figure it out, or he didn’t want to admit that all he knew he was told; did not answer Hans. Hans became frustrated and asked that they meet again tomorrow at the same time to further discuss the subjects at hand. Jeddah said that would be agreeable to him and the two men left. 

    When Hans got home, Rebecca was in the drawing room writing. She looked up briefly and noticed Hans had a frown on his face. She asked him what was on his mind. He told her about the Rosicrucians on the rim of the gorge, alchemy, Freemasonry, and scores of other stories he had been told in the last few days. Seabreeze listened quietly until he was done then asked him if he was able to place everything into a newly formed ideology of his making yet. He said he wasn’t even close to doing so. She laughed and said that men have spent lifetimes putting the pieces together so they fit and are internally true and reasonable in a given belief system for centuries. She asked Hans how he expected to divine the truth of the Kabbala, Freemasonry, Atlantis, Islam, and a half dozen other major schools of thought into a neat concise two sentence summary, then dismiss all of them to pursue some new knowledge. Hans said he didn’t expect to tie it up in a neat little package, he would be happy if he could just get past feeling inadequate and dim witted. He went on to tell her the kinds of questions he’d like to ask plainly of someone and have answered in a straightforward fashion that made sense. But before he could get started she asked if they could do it some other time when she was caught up on her articles. He said she was never caught up on her writing and turned and went upstairs without another word. She knew she should have spent some time with him but was afraid that the whole evening would go by and she would not have helped him work through any of the difficult ideas and would expose her disinterest in ever finding out the “truth.” She knew they were drifting apart but had neither the interest nor desire to stop it from getting any worse. Hans felt it too and didn’t know how to get her back involved in their marriage, at least, he had this new thirst for knowledge to occupy his time. It wasn’t like he didn’t love her anymore because he did and he was reasonably sure she looked him too. As Hans was falling asleep he thought about the initiate that found Enoch’s tablets of allegorical symbols while building a new temple and wondered if the initiate didn’t rediscover the wisdom of the ages at all, but merely assigned his own meanings to the symbols he saw.

     The next morning, he awoke with all the nagging doubts that he took to bed the night before. Did the sons of Seth really start the sciences and did these sciences have eternal truths in them that gave mortal man a true glimpse of the One God? Do all belief systems show a person just one facet of the truth that has thousands of facets but only one true essence? Do all men of knowledge really think they have all the answers? Was there really an Atlantis and were there ever really Gods like the Greeks and the Romans perceived them? Are legends more than just fancy stories that seem to tell an eternal truth about man or the Gods? Do the heavens hold the truth about the origin of man and God? Isn’t every belief system merely an explanation of all things around us? Is there one truth with hundreds of partial truths around it? Hans finally quit thinking altogether and rested up for the afternoon meeting with Jeddah. He thought Jeddah’s eyes made him look as if he went diving for the Philosopher’s Stone in the river and found it.

     Jeddah was on time, and the two men sat down and Jeddah began immediately his recitation. The name Solomon can be divided into three syllables, SOL-OM-ON, symbolizing light, glory, and truth. The Temple of Solomon is, therefore, first of all “the House of Everlasting Light”. According to the Mystery teachings, there are three Temples of Solomon—as there are three Grand Masters, three Witnesses, and three Tabernacles of the Transfiguration. The first temple is the Grand House of the Universe, in the middle sits the sun (SOL), surrounded by the twelve signs of the zodiac, and illuminated by three lights (stellar, solar, and lunar). The second house is symbolic of the human body. Apostle Paul wrote, “Know ye not, that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” The third symbolic house is the Soular House, an invisible structure, the comprehension of which is a supreme Freemasonic secret. The mystery of this intangible edifice is concealed in the allegory of the Wedding Garment described by St. Paul, the Robes of Glory of the High Priest of Israel, the Yellow Robe of the Buddhist monk, and Albert Pike’s Robe of Blue and Gold in his Symbolism.

     According to ancient Rabbins, Solomon was an initiate of the Mystery schools and the temple which he built was actually a house of initiation containing amass of pagan philosophic and phallic emblems. The pomegranates, the palm-headed columns, the Pillars before the door, the Babylonian cherubim, and the arrangement of the chambers all indicate that they were patterned after the sanctuaries of Egypt and Atlantis.

     Masonry came to Northern Africa and Asia Minor from the lost continent of Atlantis, not under the name Masonry but under the general designation Sun and Fire Worship. The ancient mysteries did not cease to exist when Christianity became the most powerful religion, they simply assumed the symbolism of the new faith, perpetuating through its emblems and allegories the same truths that have always existed. Without the mysterious keys carried by the Egyptian, Brahmin, and Persian cults the gates of Wisdom cannot be opened.

     According to Jewish law (Talmud), Solomon understood the mysteries of the Qabbalah, as well as alchemy and necromancy. He could control daemons and used the invisible worlds to gain his wisdom. According to Josephus, Solomon was in no way inferior to the Egyptians in magic and in the art of expelling daemons. Mediaeval alchemists were convinced that King Solomon understood the secret processes of Hermes where it is possible to multiply metals. He called upon the invisible world to supply him with vast amounts of gold and silver which most people believe were mined by natural methods.

     The mysteries of the Islamic faith are now in the keeping of the dervishes-men. Jelaluddin, the great Persian poet and philosopher is accredited with founding the Order of Mevlevi, or the “dancing dervishes.”  The movements signify the motions of the celestial bodies and result in a rhythm which stimulates the centers of spiritual consciousness within the dancer’s body.

     Freemasonry is more ancient than any of the world’s living religions. Its symbolism lies hidden in the Pyramids of Egypt, the crumbled ancient sanctuaries of Brahmin’s Vedas, the temples of Thebes and Karnak, and in ancient Greek buildings. Glimpses have been offered up to mankind by Zoroaster, Hermes, Pythagoras, Plato and Aristotle. Men have sought true knowledge since time began and those secrets await those with the courage and will power to unlock the Mysteries of the Ages.

     As suddenly as Jeddah had started talking, he quit talking and just sat there staring into the distance. Hans didn’t say anything for fear of disturbing the young man, but after a few minutes he had to say something even if it started another string of stories. He asked if Rosicrucian beliefs were in line with Freemasonry. Jeddah just kept staring and finally Hans got up and left, not looking back once. 

TO BE CONTINUED

    Hans was no stranger to the good life. Before Rebecca, there had been many women and much drinking of rum in the taverns and brothels of Philadelphia. He had taken the easy road at every turn and, now mid-40s, he lacked the knowledge of the world to choose a path of interest to him. Mere repeating drunken exploits of previous years seemed boring and mundane. Still he was drawn to one particular house of ill repute that also provided gambling in the back rooms for men of means. They had exotic women from around the world to help men pass the night away, but they were not the draw for Hans. The sale of the family business had put considerable funds in his grasp and he was determined to parlay that fortune into preeminence in the city.

     The Garden, as it was called, was a “tippling house”, an unlicensed tavern providing strong drink and strong entertainment. The clientele was mainly sailors, stevedores, and stewbums. Hans choose this tavern to avoid the members of society he would find in the Indian King or City Tavern where the revolution was discussed nightly. Hans had always gambled and knew the history of gambling.

     Sometimes, gambling played an important part in history. In 1020 A.D., King Olaf of Norway and King Olaf of Sweden met to decide the ownership of an isolated district of Hising. The history of dice however goes back to ancient Egyptian rulers and ancient Greeks as well. The original dice were bones and teeth of animals. Romans were especially notorious at cheating; Augustus, Nero, and Caligula all happened to be prolific dice cheaters. Dicing, by the tenth century, was so popular that the Crusader army leaders had to prohibit dice gambling among the lower ranks of troops so as to prevent the soldiers from gambling out their possessions entirely.

     Playing cards were used in Europe back in the 13^th century. Chinese Turkestan used them in the 11^th century, probably the first to do so since they invented paper to begin with. When two of the guards showed up that had been sent with Bill to help protect Aphra on the voyage to Europe, having been sent back, they brought with them the game of “vingt et un” or “twenty one”. The name “Blackjack” came from the early version of the game in which the player received a payoff of 10 to 1 if he had a black jack of spades and a black ace of spades. It was this version that excited Hans in that he needed huge sums of money to rise in the ranks of the wealthy of Philadelphia. He showed the gamblers in the back room the game and everyone thought it was a good one but the amount of money that the players could bet was limited to the wages they had on them. This would not help his wealth accumulation and he used the Garden for recreational purposes only. It was the recreational side of his life where he met Wisamia.

     It was the second or third time he was in the Garden.  At this point, he was gambling more than drinking until he figured out the gambling would have to be done elsewhere. He first noticed her at one of the side tables with a sailor and began to look closer that the Indian maiden. She was tall for an Indian and graceful in her movements. He couldn’t tell from her bone structure which tribe she came from. The following night he found himself walking over to her to talk some of the day’s events and see if she was as interesting as she looked. Sitting down he expected an immediate flow of giggles or non-stop babble of some sort or another. Instead she sat quietly and watched him intently as if she was tying to figure him out. She knew he was different from the usual customers, but couldn’t quite guess what he was doing there in that particular tavern. Neither spook until the point when it would be awkward to talk at which point she asked him if he was there for the gambling, drinking or women. He laughed and said three days ago I would have said the gambling of course but now the drinking and women appealed to him. She looked around and said there were plenty of women to choose from why her. He looked into her eyes and said she already knew the answer in her heart. She looked away and softly said she had no heart left, that it had died a hundred times since she was young. He looked closer at her eyes and did not see the glaze of a dead soul in them. He said he didn’t believe her but it was her decision whether or not to open herself up to a customer. She looked at him again for the first time and wondered why he was interested in her. His eyes were still clear and it was obvious that rum was not loosening his tongue and that he interest was a sober one. Satisfied that he was genuine in his interest she proceeded to tell her story stopping every so often to make sure he wasn’t just being polite and appearing to listen.

     Her people had migrated from the west. Her early ancestors had been more civilized than the descendants, according to the oral history of her people. The Muhheconnuk, or Stonebridge Indians, name meant “great waters or sea,  which are constantly in motion, either flowing or ebbing” which speaks to a much earlier homeland to the west. There was a great famine which forced them to go east over the Bering Strait to seek a new home.

     Before they were Mohican, they were Delaware. Long after the eastward migration, the Mohicans intermarried and had become “a detached body, mixing two languages together, and coming up with a dialect of their own. The Shawnee contributed to the new dialect. They asked the Shawnee for permission to settle the Ohio River region. The new territory of the Mohicans was surrounded completely by water.

     A typical Mohican village was built on a hill with 20 to 30 longhouses. Families belonged to one of three clans, the bear, wolf, and turtle. Descendancy and clan affiliation were determined by the mother and sachems inherited their positions through the maternal lines of the bear clan. Women, however, did not possess political clout like Iroquois women and were not permitted to attend counsels. War with the Iroquois, especially the Mohawk, was frequent. Both the Mohicans and the Mohawk were respected and feared as fierce, aggressive tribes.  When the Dutch arrived in 1609 the Mohicans (Mahicans-Dutch spelling) were awash in European goods, including firearms which put the Mohawk at a temporary disadvantage. As beaver disappeared from the Hudson valley, the French asked the Mohicans to arrange trade with the northern Indians of the St. Lawrence region, the Algonkin and Montagnais. These tribes were allies of the French and more importantly enemies of the Mohawk. This started a four year war between the tribes with Connecticut Valley Indians and the Dutch fighting on the Mohican side. 1628 marked the high point of the Mohican tribe in terms of wealth and power. In 1672 Governor Lovelace of Massachusetts successfully arranged a lasting truce between the two nations by having the Mohicans surrender their sovereignty to avoid extinction, thus becoming the first member of the Iroquois “Covenant Chain”. Except for an incident when their sachem Minichque was murdered by four free black men in 1702, they remained loyal to England and an ally to the Mohawk. The year of my birth, 1710, my grandfather chief Etowaukaum in a final attempt to salvage any dignity for the Mohican tribe went with chief Hendrick to England to meet and charm Queen Anne. While they were there they brought up missionaries in an attempt to gain favor with the English and to gain favor with the English god which had helped the English to dominate the new world.

     Wisamia went on to describe an ongoing collapse of conditions in the tribe, now well under 500, counting men, women, and children. It had been a hundred years since a Mohican could be proud and she had left the village two years ago at 17 to seek her fortune in the white man’s world. At that point she laughed when she said fortune because it was obvious she had not found a fortune at all, instead she had ended up being used by white men and now had a distrust for them all of them including Hans who somehow looked like all the rest all of a sudden. He saw the change in her face and sat back waiting for what comes next. She looked away and he was a little relieved for the break in the emotions that were coming to the surface.

     Then, out of the silence, she asked him if he had heard of Wissahickon Creek, of course he had but in another context entirely. He asked why she asked him that and she went on to tell him that was the first place she stayed after leaving the village. A group calling themselves Rosicrucians had invited her to stay with them until she decided what she was going to do with her life. Johannes Kelpius had established the group just before 1700 basing the tenants on the Rosicrucianism and Kabbalistically flavored mysticism of Jacob Boehme. Later in 1720 the German mystic and Pietist Johann Conrad Beissel had sought to join the group then moving to Lanchaster and founding the Ephrata. Hans looked at her with one question on his mind. He asked her if she studied the mystic arts or did she just stay there with them. She told him she had spent a year in study but last year decided to leave since it was not either what she thought it was or what she wanted for her life. But whether he was ready or not he got a brief history lesson as she reeled off some of the main ideas she learned.

     Aurum nostrum no est aurum vulgi  (“Our gold is not vulgar gold”). Alchemy’s medieval dictum expressed the fact that alchemy was more than producing gold from lesser elements. Historic foundations of alchemy nurtured the early mystical roots of Kabbalah. Albertus Magnus (1193-1280) authored numerous alchemy works. Thomas Aquinas, the great student of Albertus, suggested the philosophical and religious tenor of alchemical thought. As the Age of Reason dawned, Isaac Newton, Robert Boyle, and John Locke secretly delved into alchemy’s occult mysteries; Newton known to have written more than a million words on the great Art. At the core of alchemy was the declaration Tabula smaragdina : That which is below is above, that above is also below. It asserts, in the face of Christian dogma, that matter was eternal and uncreated. Its core image, complexio oppositorum, expressed by dualities such as “light and dark”, “wet and dry”, “material and spiritual”, is seeking transformative, creative union. By 1600 there was an alternative to the Reformation and Counter-Reformation madness that bathed Europe in blood. A noble, secret, and ancient brotherhood calling itself the fraternity of the Rose Cross, founded by Christian Rosencreutz, born in 1378. He had traveled to the East as a sixteen-year-old boy, wise men received him as one that was expected and showed him an important book known only as “the book M”. Johann Valentin Andreae authored three manifestos of Rosicrucian mythos between 1604 and 1616: Fama Fraternitatis, Confessio Fraternitatis, and The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosencreutz. The first was more of an allegory than actual history, the second repeated the message of the first, interpreting and intensifying the first, and added a powerful and apocalyptic and prophetic note: a great millennial reformation was at hand, and with it, a return to an Adamic knowledge revealed by God. Knorr von Rosenroth’s translation into Latin of several key Kabbalistic works, including large sections of the Zohar fermented a high spiritual quest for ultimate, individual knowledge of God. Reigning over all the occult hieroglyphic emblems of this period was the “All-Seeing Eye” of God, mankind’s single, unfailing light. Hans had heard of the all seeing eye of God but thought it was the eye of Isis image where fertility rights were involved. He told her he was impressed with her knowledge of alchemy but he had to go and maybe they could talk again of such things. She seems distant as if something she had said was still in her mind and dismissed him with a nod like some queen dismissing an attendant that was waiting on them. Walking back to his home he thought of all the things she had said. It was the first time he had had the basic beliefs of the Rosicrucians explained so he could understand what was being said. But the concepts were troubling. It was as if everything was its opposite and nothing made any sense to bother labeling if all was its opposite. He spent the rest of the evening thinking about how it all made sense. The next night Rebecca came home early.

     He asked her what she knew of Rosicrucian mysticism. She thought the first night she had come home early in months would have him asking why she was home early. Happy that he was even in a talkative mood after months of fretting over the sale of the business, she went into her version of the subject.

     It all started with the age of enlightenment when the occult made a come back in a big way in England. The first secret Masonic lodge was formed by some highly informed men including Elias Ashmole a founding member of the Royal Society. He had copied the Rosicrucian manifestos by hand. From 1646 to 1717 when the first Grand Mason Lodge was formed there were many gradual changes in the formation of occult brotherhoods and societies, culminating the beginnings of “speculative Masonry”. At this point Hans admitted he was lost when it came to defining the movement precisely. Seabreeze was surprised at this new found interest in the occult of his but tried to summarize for him.

     Common threads of a specific mythos weave through these movements and societies, even if they are not of one common cloth. The recurrent theme is restoration: restoration of a more perfect, ancient order; of a forgotten priesthood; of secret mysteries and rituals; and of lost occult words and powers. Man is intrinsically and eternally imbued with uncreated divine intelligence and thus can restore Zion upon the earth. It is a Hermetic-Kabbalistic mythos, deeply admixed with alchemy, reformed by Rosicrucianism, and cojoined with a Mason’s compass and square. At its esoteric core there shone a distant Gnostic spark. Although they generally use the Christian vocabulary, the intentions they fostered can appear antithetical to orthodox Christianity. It combines the practical examination of nature with a spiritual view of the universe as an intelligent hierarchy of beings; which draws it wisdom from all possible sources, and which sees the proper end of man as the direct knowledge of God. This belief underlies the Rosicrucian manifestos, alchemy, the more esoteric aspects of Freemasonry, and underlies the millennial aspiration for a new Adamic restoration on earth.

     Hans loved his wife and always was amazed at her broad knowledge base and today was no exception. He wasn’t quite sure what everything meant she was saying but he was sure that she had the details straight in her mind. He asked her if she thought that the truth lay on their side of the world’s ideas or do the Christians have the truth all bottled up on their side. She said that truth and the true essence of things is best left to the experts. If you want a cosmic reading on the matter, talk to Father de Brebeuf in the Philadelphian Jesuit compound.

     Hans went the next morning to the compound of the Jesuits to find the father. After hours of discussion of the occult and walking without a destination in mind, they ended up in front of the Garden tavern. Jean de Breheuf was not familiar with the tavern, but knew what was inside by reputation. Hans quickly went inside, assuming Jean would follow, which he did reluctantly. The main floor was smoky as usual as they made their way to the far side where it was less noisy and smoky. There by an open window, Jean continued with the last person noteworthy of the discussion. Hans seemed distracted as he looked around the room, looking for Wisamia. Jean asked if they were meeting someone and Hans admitted he was looking for a girl that had spent some time with Rosicrucians in the gorge. When Hans said the word gorge Jean’s eyes widened just a bit, enough to show a reaction.

     Hans was just about to ask what Jean knew of the gorge when he felt someone standing next to him. He looked up and there stood Wisamia with a puzzled look on her face as she studied Jean sitting across the table. Then in an attempt to be funny she accused Hans of being so shook up after their discussion that he felt compelled to run to a priest to feel safe again. Jean laughed out loud and Hans only managed a slight smile, more of a grimace really. Hans introduced Wisamia to Father de Breheuf in as formal manner as possible given the joke that was just had at his expense. He asked her to sit down and she did so in a calm, cool manner. Jean tried to excuse himself from the table with the line he had to get back to the compound, but Hans cut him off with the fact he still had Johannes Kelpius to tell about. Jean relaxed and continued.

     In 1673, he was born Johann Kelp in Transylvania near the village of Sighisoara, the birthplace of the infamous Vlad the Impaler. By the age of 16, he graduated with a doctorate in liberal arts and philosophy from Bavaria’s University of Altdorf, one of Europe’s most respected institutions. While at the university he became acquainted with the Pietist religious movement.

     One of the most charismatic figures in German Pietism was Johann Jacob Zimmerman, a brilliant mathematician, astronomer, and cleric. Zimmerman had been dismissed from the Lutheran Church for preaching that the Lutheran Church was the Anti-Christ. He formed the Chapter of Perfection which believed that a new spiritual age was dawning—their version of the 1,000 year rule of the returned Christ—and it was necessary to prepare for it. In 1692 the Chapter was offered free land and passage to Pennsylvania, but Zimmerman died just prior departure. Kelpius took over as spiritual leader, determined to fulfill Zimmerman’s vision, he led his group to a ridge above the Wissahickon gorge, one of the oldest geologic formations in North America. To avoid conflict with other groups and religions in the area they chose not to go by any name or tenets. They were often collectively referred to as “The Woman in the Wilderness.” For ten years they flourished, but the inherent conflict between a desire for spiritual seclusion and a desire to serve their fellow man proved to undermine their focus. Many of the members left and joined the burgeoning population of nearby Germantown. Kelpius contracted tuberculosis and finally died around 1708 at the age of 35, a small stone marker beside a cave once thought to be a meditation cell of his claims him to be “America’s first Rosicrucian Master.”

     Kelpius left behind a collection of original hymns, a journal that included many of his correspondences, and the authorship of a book on prayer and meditation.

     Jean stopped to catch his breath. Hans immediately noted that unlike Boehme, Spener, Huss, Francke, Hauge, Labadie, or Zimmerman, Kelpius (Kelp) was here in the Philadelphia area not that long ago. Wisamia said that most of the followers that still lived on the ridge talk about him as if he was still their leader and quote him constantly. Some still go to the cave to meditate and recite the prayers he left behind. Hans asked if she could remember any of the prayers but she was not an initiate and therefore not allowed to study either the prayers or the specific meditations. Jean said around a year ago there was a story about Kelpius that he possession of the legendary Philosopher’s Stone, the mythical element that can cure all human ills. Wisamia said it was true, he had cured members of several kinds of diseases, many of the people he cured were still on the ridge when she arrived. She said she knew two people that watched while the mysterious “box” was thrown into the deep waters where the Wissahickon Creek empties into the Schuylkill River. They swear that when the box struck the water there was a deafening explosion with “flashes of lightning arcing into the sky and rolling thunder claps.”

     Jean said he had heard the story as well. Then without a chance for Hans to stop him with a question or any other device, Jean excused himself from the table and left by an exit door close at hand. Hans looked back at Wisamia and said it must have been something we said. They both laughed and began to discuss the Rosicrucian premise of “what is above is below, and what is below is above.” It was late when Hans drug his drunken, tired body into bed. Rebecca rolled over and asked if Hans had gotten the Father drunk learning about the occult. NO, but after hearing about the history of the occult I needed a few drinks.    

TO BE CONTINUED

     It was dawn when the war wagon slowly pulled into the courtyard of the Jesuit compound in Versailles. Word had already arrived that Paris was in flames and army of escaped convicts and local criminals had attacked and killed many in the King’s Navy. 100,000 ducats to the man that can point out a certain William Seaworthy of Boston, another 100,000 for the man that can show authorities to a 12 foot tall Indian Warrior that uses a cannon like most men use a pistol. Aphra was restless waiting for her grandfather to show up so she and Manny could get back to family in the colonies.

     Manny ran over to Bear to check for holes that weren’t there the day before. Aphra ran to Bill, who was quiet and pulled back when she reached for him. Bill for the moment was sorry he had chased the bet money so hard. They would have had a lot easier time going home without the entire country of France trying to get rich fast by finding William Seaworthy or a giant colonial Indian with a cannon on his gun belt, how hard could they be to find? Once again it looked like Elizabeth would be safer away from Bill than with him, because of all the men that were after him. But he couldn’t send Klondike and Effa and John with her. Manny would be the main guarantee of Elizabeth reaching Philadelphia in good condition. He could just hear the Buerer family going on and on about Bill letting some Indian girl protect Aphra while the family pays the Mohawk tribe support at no small expense. Bill would just have to make this ocean crossing work for everyone, together.

     By noon, the wagon was ready, whether all the men were was another question. The carpenter had added bracing for two hammocks to hang high inside the main wagon area, but still under the thick canvas that was stretched across the top of the wagon. Railings on top held everyone’s personal belongings and some of the food supplies. Additional guard posts were armored on top, where two more shooters could fire from. Inside the wagon was a small, portable oven, powder kegs, bullets, cannon balls, food containers, medicine box, whale oil lamps, and a small desk for Bill’s papers. Below the floorboards welded inside a deep dish container lay almost a million ducats. Only Bill and Bear knew how much money was inside the welded tank in the bottom of the wagon, a tank that had a release mechanism up away from view that would allow a man to pull the tank off the wagon.

     Just before Bill climbed up on the wagon, one of the senor priests leaned over to Bill and said the Jesuits would put a good word in for him and Bear and remind Louis XV that William Seaworthy was reported to have had something to do with the death of the crime boss in Marseille who refused to pay the crown taxes that were due. Bill welcomed the idea of Jesuits talking to a Catholic King, but he suspected that killing an entire ship full of sailors would override any other argument for mercy. Bill figured he could never return to France.

     Bill counted the people on board the wagon: Elizabeth, Manniakuni, Bear, Louis, Francis, Dogman, two priests and a cook. Ten people in a wagon best manned with six, which is all the sleeping places there were. Now with the hammocks for the women and the top where two to four could sleep comfortably he figured they were set for the trip to Brest. The top sagged from the extra water and food stored on top because they had run out of room inside the wagon. The final pistols were reloaded and three young priests jumped out of the back and said the guns are ready. One of the horses had been shot and was replaced with a fresh horse.

     Bill and Bear spoke about Marseille, as their port of call for getting passage to the Americas. They talked about how the wagon would be somewhat lighter with water and food consumed getting to the mountain passes. Now that everyone was sure they were heading south, Bill turned a quarter mile down the road to the west and headed for le Mans, some 65 kilometers away. No one asked why the change in plans, Aphra never questioned Bill’s thinking when it came to strategy and saw this change a smart one in case someone wanted 100,000 more than they worried about Bill and Bear hunting them down later. Bill worried that when it came time to secure passage to New England there would be the risks of the crew knowing and telling the officials.

     Timing was good for an Atlantic crossing, springtime, while there were some prevailing winds to help get off the European coast. Springtime is also a rainy season and the first day of travel was one of those rain storms. All ten people were crowded in the wagon and the roads were muddy. The horses, while trained for battle, were also incredibly strong and made good time while lesser animals would have bogged down in the mud.

     Just outside Le Mans, Bill decided to approach a farm house and ask if some of his group could spend the night in their barn. The farmer was nice enough and his wife asked if any needed any extra blankets. The women were invited to sleep in the farm house where there would be more privacy. Manny couldn’t sleep and saw the farmer leering at Aphra while she slept. He reached his hand towards Aphra’s face when Manny said, “another inch and you won’t have use of that arm ever again.” He yanked his arm back and retired to the back of the house as quickly as he could. Louis was picked for guard duty till midnight to be followed by Dogman till three and Francis to go till dawn. The cook and the two priests were given the barn and the rest settled in the wagon. Louis chose the farmhouse for a station so he could keep an eye on the women with the women safely bolted inside the wagon. The night passed too quickly as the rooster started his work earlier than usual.

     The farmer’s wife had started breakfast, and the Jesuit cook joined in the preparing of the food. The horses were rubbed down and watered, then fresh oats were put in the feed bags and all were eating soon after. The farmer was, as most farmers, a poor one. So the meat the cook fried up was a real treat for them and it was obvious, as they wolfed down their breakfast. Bill wanted to get going so he became impatient and short with people around him. Aphra stayed away knowing how he was when he gets irritable.

     Back on the road, Bill felt better that they were making some good time and should get in to Rennes by nightfall. Lunch was fried potatoes and beef jerky with a nice red wine. Bill went on into town and found the wanted posters in the town square. Bear’s picture was nondescript but Bill’s looked like him when he was young, undoubtedly a picture from when he was Boston Billy and wanted for questions in several ports of call all over the world. This meant that Brest had the wanted notices also and that one of the men would have to do the negotiating with the captains for passage for 7 people to the colonies. By now it would be obvious that the party did not go south leaving the northern sea ports as the next most likely place for their escape.

     Louis was chosen to negotiate the passage. He and Francis went ship to ship asking the destination of the vessel. Finally they found a run down ship named “Seawitch” that was headed for Boston harbor. The captain, Homer Bastug, was suspicious of setting a price on seven people when only two were standing there in front of him. Finally the total for seven people was set at 3500 ducats a good price for any season or ship. Louis told the captain that the whole party wouldn’t be able to board until the next day quite late. The captain was still uncomfortable but couldn’t think of a legitimate reason to back out of the deal and signed the paperwork without another word.

     The next night, everyone but Bill and Bear boarded the Seawitch around midnight with Aphra in charge of the money tank. They were all stowed away in the hold close to the captain’s quarters and settling in for the night. Aphra went up on deck with Manny to wait for Bill and Bear to board. Aphra regretted not being able to bring the sea chests with their hidden compartments and water proof casings. The dock was being watched by untold number of men waiting for a glimpse of Bill or Bear, all anxious to collect the rewards that were posted at every corner.

TO BE CONTINUED

     770,000 ducats to go. Bill thought it would be a miracle. He and Bear had already collected 110,000 and killed a criminal boss in the deal. The others would be assuming they are going to have to pay their share of the losses. Most bosses had connections in the police and local government. Bill thought it was strange that no authorities had come to the compound regarding the last episode in Paris.

     Aphra had come to Bill and said she was homesick for Philadelphia. She said she was 18, now, and she felt she should be with her mother and preparing to start a family. Bill laughed at the idea of preparing to start a family, but cut it off abruptly with her immediate frown. He asked for time to think about it, it was an understanding that she would stay for three years or four years with the Parisian Jesuits. It had only been 22 months. He asked her about her schooling to which she said that the priests would be happy to see me shorten my stay, that way they could ask more questions and get more answers. He laughed again at the thought of Elizabeth using up the time in class to fill in the blanks that occurred, when something new was said in class.

     Bill spent the entire next day thinking about going home. The Mohawk tribe had been committed 5 years worth of support as a minimum. If they left immediately, they would get back in less than three years. Hans would have something to say and other members of the Burer family that had to economize some with the contract the way it was written. Still, it didn’t make sense to stay when she had other things on her mind. Maybe he could talk with Bear and come to some kind of agreement to stop the payments with Bear’s return the tribe.

     Bill hadn’t thought about going home much since they left the colonies. Now that Aphra wanted to go home, there would be arrangements to make. He decided that the money he would be carrying would require a war wagon like the Jesuits had.

     The first conversation he had, once he had a general plan, was to get an understanding regarding the tribal payments. Bear didn’t have a problem with the discontinuance of Mohawk payments, he had accumulated a fortune of his own while in Europe. Bear thought they would need at least three good men to help with night guard duty and battles they might get into. Bill had a palace guard in mind, Louis Bonaventure, one of the best fighting men Bill had ever seen, to say nothing of introducing Bill to every beautiful woman in the court of Louis XV. He liked Louis and had partied well into the night with him. Bill was ready to go home he had become soft in the French court and he knew Bear was not happy sitting around waiting for things to happen.

     Bill and Bear arranged for the competition for the other two spots. Several palace guards showed up after hearing that 20,000 ducats was the payday in Philadelphia. Many wanted to see New Orleans in the south and Montreal in the north. Dozens of men were shooting at small targets and throwing knives at even smaller targets that moved irregularly across the courtyard. At the end of three days of competition, six men stood there champions in every sense. The final test was to stay conscious after Bear hit them with a punch to their head. Bill figured that any man that could fight after Bear hit them would be able to fight after being shot or hit with a club or run over by a loaded carriage or wagon.

     The following morning would be the day with Bear. Only five showed up. Bear was, as usual, inpatient to begin and began pacing long before 7:00 am. Instead of starting in a standing position to begin, Bear wanted them to charge one another from the ends of the parade field. This would more closely show an actual battle situation, except for not being armed.

     The first man ran towards Bear then just before they collided, the man slid on the ground flat on his back with his feet coming at Bear. Bear jumped up into the air, kicked his legs to the left and brought his right fist to the right just inches above the ground. Before the sliding man could bring his arm up to block the swing, Bear landed a blow to the man’s left jaw that grossly distorted his face before snapping back to a somewhat same look of horror he had just before Bear fist landed. Bear rolled to his feet, spun and turned to the first man. The man didn’t move, he just laid there twisted on the ground, his face in the dirt. Two priests ran out and carried him off the center arena by his arms and legs.

     The second man came up to the gate, after having watched the first man’s attempt to avoid Bear’s fist. He decided that a well timed drop-kick would put even a man of Bear’s size on the ground. As the two men closed in on each other, the Guard got ready and went airborne when they were twenty feet apart. Bear saw the leap start and quickly went into the air as well. Being much taller Bear ended up kicking downward when they met. The kick was enough to stop the Guard’s forward movement instantly and at the same begin a backward fall that left the guard skidding along the ground for 10-12 feet. The second man laid there not moving, again two priests ran out and carried the man off the parade grounds.

     The third man came running out, but several feet before they would engage, he stopped and waited for bear to come closer. As Bear slowed, he backed off some. Soon, they were standing six feet apart looking at each other waiting for one to make a definite move. Bear got impatient and charged forward, the man drifted backward careful to keep just enough distance between them to look like an engagement is going on, though a cautious one to say the least. Whenever Bear would swing at the man, he would fall backwards or duck to the side. This went on for several minutes, and it became obvious the man wasn’t about to let Bear smash his face in to get the job. Bear quit trying to get to the man and looked over to Bill with a questioning look as if to say, “what do you want me to do with this one, he’s very quick and way too smart to allow me a good shot.”  Bill shrugged his shoulders and the man asked his name. “Francis.” “Francis who?” “Just Francis.” Bill asked the man to come over and sit with Louis.

     Two men were left to compete for the final spot. Bill decided that they should fight each other to determine the winner. The fight was short and sweet. The larger man took one swing and cold-cocked the other. The man came over and sat down with the others. “What do they call you?” To which the man barked and pointed to his mouth while shaking his head. Bill figured that he was dumb but could hear just fine. At least, there wouldn’t be any annoying questions when the plans change. Bill decided to call him Dogman and there was no frown or any other indication that the name displeased his third fighter.

     Bill gathered the men together and told them to have seven days worth of clothes and at least seven weapons with which they were familiar. The departure date would be told them individually, soon, and was to be kept secret at all costs. Payment for their services would not be paid until Philadelphia, but transportation and food would be taken care of by Bill and Bear. The three men seemed happy to be going and began to sing and dance in a circle while they fantasized about the 20,000 at the end of the road. Although, they all seemed glad to be going, each worried that there would be a heavy price to pay to get that kind of money.

     Next, Bill went to the Jesuits to negotiate use of the war wagon to Marseille where he would hire a ship to take everyone to the colonies. Bill offered 10,000 for one month of borrowing along with two warriors and a cook to help in battle getting there and to bring the wagon back. There would also be food for two weeks on board to feed 12 people. The agreement was reached quickly and Bill was satisfied that all was in order.

     Arrangements were mostly in place when Effa approached Bill to inform him of a recent decision. The compound was all alive with conversations in hallways and dining hall about the Seaworthys finally leaving for their Americas. Two in particular would not be missed, the granddaughter of the Patriarch and that forbidding Mohawk Indian Chief. At first Bill was distracted when Effa started but by the time she said, “so John and I are staying in Paris” it was obvious Effa wasn’t coming back with them. Bill asked if she was sure and she told him John would never be accepted in her old circles of society, not that she was with her peculiar habit of fencing with men and beating them. This was considered most unladylike in Philadelphian society. Bill asked her what they were going to do. She said that the Jesuits in Paris had asked her and John to come live in the compound and teach the martial arts. Bill was pleased that a member of his party was good enough to train some of the most feared knights in the world. He wished her well and spent the rest of the day going over what she wanted him to say to the Burer family. Effa had already sent word for monies to be transferred to the Banke of Paris. Bill suddenly thought about Seafoam and the fact she needed a woman to be with her where Bill couldn’t watch out for her. Effa was such a great person to have along since she could fight off an attack of several men unassisted. Manniakuni was a perfect replacement since she also could fight off multiple attackers. Bill smiled about how well things were working out. Manny and Aphra were inseparable these days. Bill knew Manny wanted to return to her Delaware Turtle clan along the coast, she must be missed as all warrior princesses are. Since the Delaware still pay tribute to the Mohawk, Bill wondered what will happen when Bear returns with a Delaware for his bride, maybe less tribute for starters. Bear when he returns will have even more power in the Mohawk nation than when he left.

     Bill and Bear were, now, able to discuss whether they wanted to go back and collect on the original bet before they left France. They decided that they would do so on their way out of town. Word had already got back to them that the remaining bosses had pressured the authorities to agree to arrest Bill and Bear if they showed up again to collect on the outstanding debt. Bill decided to pick Manny and Seafoam up as well as the priests and cook on the way out of the area. It would give their new guards a chance to show their worth before leaving and getting on the road where replacements would be difficult to find.

     After two days of searching Paris for the right gunsmith, they found a blacksmith with experience in explosives. He was a small skinny man with hands that shook all the time. He was a Norwegian named Victor Haas and he wouldn’t talk to them at first but repeated visits finally broke down the initial reluctance. Bill asked if Victor could make cannon balls that exploded on contact with a diameter of exactly 2.995”, just enough to allow the ball to travel unimpeded down the barrel. The explosive was from China, a new powder at three times the power of previous gunpowder. The first ball Bear fired at a wall in the industrial part of Paris and it blew a six foot hole in a double brick wall as well as causing crumbling along the wall to a building it was attached to. Bill and Bear both smiled at once when they saw the destructive power of the cannon balls. Bill said they would need 200 balls by a week from the day they agreed to the sale price of 50 ducats each. Victor said three weeks best case. Two weeks was the final agreement.

     Bill and Bear rounded up Louis, Francis with no last name, and Dogman. Bill thought it would be best if they tried a run on the bosses to see how much of the 770,000 they could collect. It was decided that Louis and Francis would stay in the war wagon while they went for the money.

     Everyone was quiet on the way into Paris. Louis began a pistol by pistol check of every gun in the wagon. Francis, while driving, checked the rifles up front. Dogman was sharpening his throwing knives till he couldn’t see the edge. Bear was checking the hatchet for dents. Bill was lost in thought. He had everyone that was going on the road bring their things to the west gate and wait for the wagon that would be coming in a hurry after the final attempt for collection. Bill figured he would only get one more chance because after this run their would be enough financial loss to justify sending the military after them since local authorities would be no match for an armored war wagon so well equipped as the one the Jesuits had built. He had even given up on the element of surprise, fearing someone would recognize him. And once they go through Paris with abducted crime bosses in toe forcing them to take they to their hidden stashes of treasure, there wouldn’t be a safe place in Europe for Bill and Bear to hide in. Bill even thought the repercussions could follow them all the way back to the colonies, but the bet was a fair one and these men would have to pay up and settle the bet as agreed. Bill knew he was right to force payment since none of the bosses seem to make any effort to pay up that night or later for that matter.

     Bear woke him from his thoughts with the question, “Shouldn’t we leave the wagon here and go the rest on foot?” Bear was right the cage was a block away and the hidden door for the walkway under the pier was less than 50 feet away. The plan was a good one and they had gone over it so many times all could say it in their sleep and did.

     The four Arabian stallions were restless.  They knew they would called upon to pull a heavily armored wagon through the streets of Paris and basically run over anything or anyone that gets in front of them. 18 hands and weighing well over a ton, each horse was covered with a leaded blanket which covered his chest, flanks, and rear. Even the thick, muscled legs were wrapped down to the hooves of steel. Bill had watched the last time this wagon went into action. The men the horses killed were falling to the side so fast they formed a double path of bodies along the street as they went forward.

     Bill, Louis, and Dogman would wait outside the door for the bosses to come out fleeing the cage and the destruction Bear was spreading over every inch of the pier, with Francis loading the cannon so Bear could concentrate on firing and aiming the cannon. Francis was also to make sure Bear was aware of every potential threat to the two of them so Bear didn’t get too distracted in blowing up the cage and everything associated with it. Bill was to stay close to the wagon and let Louis and Dogman bring the bosses to be tied up for the money roundup.

     Francis followed Bear out the back of the wagon carrying 30 balls in a special sack that spread the weight of the cannon balls over the entire back, some 120 pounds. Bear had a full pack on his back as well. Francis stooped, as the weight hit him upon landing on the ground, he straightened up as best he could after seeing Bear take off with what had to be 400 pounds of powder, grape shot bags, and regular cannon balls neatly packed in Bear’s pack. That didn’t count the double thick armor and sixty pound 3” cannon mounted on his shoulder. Right behind them came Louis and Dogman to get into their position.

     Francis struggled to keep up with the Mohawk. Bear had grape-hot loaded for the first shot. He rounded the corner, and there at the end of the pier, was the cage, containing two men inside fighting with knives. The crowd was fairly large, 300 or so, watching and cheering on their bets. Bear stopped took a sight on the tables where the bosses sit or their pit chief taking the money and posting the current odds on each fight.

     The first firing of the cannon changed the action in the cage area. Bear had told to make the first four reloads grape-shot, so without looking at what the first firing had done to the large crowd, Francis busied himself with making no errors while reloading. He concentrated on opening the breech, swinging the assembly to one side, pushing the grape-shot down the barrel of the cannon, then quickly following that with a load of powder, that looked like a small sock, packed tight. Francis couldn’t see anything happening around the cage, Bear took up all the viewing area. He could hear the cursing, screaming, and sporadic return gunfire.

     The first round of grape-shot thudded into the solid mass of bodies with no warning. Twenty men died out right with hits to the heart and some into brains. Another ten were seriously hurt and each wounded man required at least two men to carry them out of harm’s way. Many more were wounded but could move on their own. The initial reaction was one of confusion, no one seemed to know where the shot came from, much less why. Everyone was down on the decking on their bellies trying to see where the shot had come from, even the caliber sound it made was confusing, too big for a rifle, too small for a cannon. The second round took out almost everyone around the betting tables. The third was for the small group of men ducking around the steel wall heading for the hidden walkway under the docks. Once everyone saw that a giant man at curbside with some shoulder held cannon is systematically killing everyone on the pier, men were jumping off the pier into the cold water 30’ below.

     There was return-fire by those who were carrying guns, but even when they hit Bear, it didn’t seem to stop him at all. Francis felt as safe as a baby in its mother’s arms. Bear stood there, tall as the clouds that hung over the pier, the pier was quiet as Bear looked at the remaining pack of 100 or so. The crouching huddle of men began to grumble and curse the giant Indian. Then the silence was broken as 112 men charged Bear from 100 feet away. When the fourth and fifth rounds stopped echoing in the streets, less than a dozen men were still charging, the rest were dead or wounded to the point they couldn’t get up. Not wanting to waste a whole round of grape-shot Bear lifted his cannon off the mounting hole, set it on the ground and picked up his hatchet and charged the men, now only 30 feet away. Bear picked the point where four men were closely packed and went air born after a couple speed steps. The Mohawk war cry froze every single man on the pier in fright, including Francis. When Bear landed the hatchet had already started the arc that would carry the blade through all four men from the waist up. The gun fire from the other men came right after as each man tried to hit Bear in the heart or his head, not worrying about hitting one of their men on the opposite side of Bear. As the smoke slowly billowed away, there was Bear bending over man after man as he slid his scalping knife under the slab of skin with the man’s hair on it. Francis sat on the ground staring at the sight of the Mohawk taking scalps and quickly stringing them on a line hooked to his belt.

     Neither Bill, Bear, or anyone else had noticed the ship in the harbor just off the end of the pier behind the cage. A French Man-of-War sitting still in the water off the pier. The first volley of cannon fire from the gunship turned the sidewalk into a storm of blowing rocks and dirt. Francis with no last name yelled at Bear in the middle of the bombardment, “No one said anything about fighting the French Navy.” Bear said, “go back to the wagon, now.” Francis needed no further instructions, he ran for the wagon like life depended on getting there, which it did. It was at least 200 yards back to the wagon so he was glad to see Bear running for the end of the dock, away from his route to the wagon. The second round of fire hit all around Bear, as he continued to ran towards the ship just beyond the cage. Some pieces of shrapnel would occasional hit Bear but the armor absorbed the stray pieces of metal with a tinging sound. By the time Bear reached the end of the pier, mere feet from the side of the ship he had loaded a “chinaball”. The first shot he took was the captain’s deck, he could clearly see it jammed with officers of every rank, admiring the accuracy of the deck cannon crews.

     Bill had his hands full as well. With all the cannon fire, the bosses had ducked into the hidden walkway with some of their most trusted men. Three bosses and nine of their men ended up running along the walkway towards the secret door on the street behind some small trees against a building front. Bill had gone over the plan two more times as they waited for the action to start. Louis and Dogman would follow the small groups as they split up by boss until they were sure who the boss was, then kill his men quickly while at the same time securing the boss, then drag the boss back to the wagon as quickly as possible. Bill suggested shooting the men in the head and the boss in the legs to stop him from running too far away. The first group out the door didn’t stop to even look around as they burst through the door and headed for their house they meet at before and after an outing on the town. There were four of them and Louis picked out the boss immediately. Three doors down Louis had the two trailing guards throats cut and closing in on the boss in the next two steps. He grabbed the boss and pulled him to the ground just as he cried out for help. Then shot the third guard in the middle of the back of the head before he couldn’t turn his head to see why his boss was crying out. The boss was cracked over the top of his head by Louis’ pistol, rendering him unconscious instantly and Louis began to drag the boss back to the wagon some 40 feet away.

     The second group was three men. Dogman waited a bit longer because the three were walking shoulder to shoulder and talking like they were all friends, he paused a second thinking maybe they are all friends and he should stop and help with some other group. At one block Dogman shouted out, “Boss, wait for me.” Without thinking the man in the middle said to hurry up and something about him being an idiot. Suddenly Dogman didn’t care if the guy in the middle was a boss or not he was going back to the wagon. Dogman had, as a boy been taunted by other kids because he didn’t learn so fast, they had called him idiot over and over. He was going to enjoy torturing this man into confessing to being a boss and finishing him off after the money is secured.

     The last group was the easiest, as far as figuring out who the boss was. Bill saw four men come out of the doorway with a shrived-up old man in the center of them. They looked in every direction and then proceeded to head for the center of the city. Bill picked off each guard from his perch in a tree directly above the men. Three pistols, three dead men on the street. Bill jumped down to the sidewalk and started to chase the two remaining men, which wasn’t that difficult since one was limping from old age. As he ran along he thought about what if there had been four or five bosses and even more men, there would have been bosses that would have gotten away since this was the last collection night. The last guard did get a good shot off but Bill’s armor expertly took care of it without a sound. Bill brought out a throwing knife and the next thing the guard knew he had a piece if blade sticking out of his spinal cord and his legs went out from under him. It wasn’t hard to catch up to the old man and knock him out with a single swing of his fist. Even though it was only a block the old man seemed awful heavy for such an old man. Just before he heaved the old guy into the wagon, he slipped the big bag off the old man’s shoulders, it was what was so heavy. The bag was stuffed with coin and ducats. Louis followed closely with his boss and they could see Dogman in the distance with a man on his back.

     The men were securing the three bosses and watching for any more trouble when Francis burst through the back door all winded and trying to tell them something through the gasping. Bill looked behind him but Bear was not in view. Finally Francis told them there was a French gunship just behind the cage and Bear was in the middle of engaging the Man-of-War right now. Bill’s heart stopped, as he thought of Bear all alone facing the best gunship France has to talk about with 200 soldiers to assault him. The night went white over the entire sky as the first “chinaball” impacted the deck of the ship. Bill was a little surprised with how bright the flash was, they hadn’t fired it at night yet. Bill was torn between running to catch up to Bear and be part of the battle with the French Navy, and staying put so if Bear gets to the wagon Bill wouldn’t be trying to find him in the billowing clouds of smoke,        now dense along the waterway. Bill decided to stay where he was and hope Bear arrived soon, there was still the matter of collecting money from these bosses of the underworld.

     Bear could see the “chinaball” land in the stomach of the captain as it exploded, and the captain along with all the bodies in a ten foot circle blew outward into the night with the largest piece in flight only four inches across. One of these larger pieces hit Bear in the helmet, and the blood splattered making it hard to see out of his left eye visor. His second “chinaball” was for the gunnery sergeant in the middle of the ship, who was barking orders to adjust cannon for point blank range since bear was under 20 feet away. Bear looked him in the eye just before firing and the man just stood there unflinching, a true military man to the end which was quite spectacular. The explosion took the officer, two of his second in command, and at least four cannon with their powder mounds next to them. The white light nearly blinded all in the area and the main mast was heard cracking from the force. Soon men were scrambling to get away from the falling mast. Chaos was everywhere as other gun crews came running to help the dying.

     The third was aime