William Johnstone - Butchery of the Mountain Man

There was no specific reason given for John’s being blackballed. But John knew that it was not necessary for any reason to be given. It was sufficient reason for him to be denied entry in the club if even one person made the arbitrary decision that he didn’t want John to be a member.

“I’m so sorry, John,” Phillips said, apologizing again.

John went directly from the Philadelphia Club to Ye Olde Ale House, where, despite its name, one could also buy whiskey. And that’s what John did, bought several whiskeys. It didn’t take him too long to get drunk, and the drunker he got, the more generous a tipper he became. As a result he had at least three of the ladies at the bar hanging on his every word.

“Fired! I was fired from a job any moron could do, but I can’t do it anymore because I was fired,” John said.

“Honey, any man who would fire you is a fool,” one of the young women said.

“Yeah, he musht be a fool,” John said, slurring the words. “The very idea not lettin’ me join their club. Well I din’t want to be in their damn club in the firsht place. All it is, is a bunch of old stuffed shirts sittin’ around a fireplace talkin’ real quiet so’s the devil doesn’t find out where they are ’n come get ’em.”

“Join their club? Honey, I thought we were talking about you gettin’ fired,” one of the girls said.

“My own father.”

“Your own father fired you?” the first girl asked.

“Or wouldn’t let you in the club?” a second girl asked.

“No. He’s an Episcopal priest,” John said, filling his glass and tossing it down, neat.

John was two days sober when he stepped up onto the wide, columned porch, and pulled the cord than hung alongside the door. He could hear the bell reverberating through the house. The home belonged to Swayne Manning, and it was one of the largest and most stately mansions in Chester Hill, one of Philadelphia’s most elegant neighborhoods.

The butler answered the doorbell.

“Hello, Morris,” John said as he started to step inside.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Morris said, moving to block John. “But I have been asked to prevent you from entering.”

“What? Morris, what are you talking about? What do you mean I can’t come in? Is Lucinda here?”

“Miss Lucinda is not receiving, sir.”

“Why not? Morris, is something wrong? Is she ill? Has she been in an accident? If so, I must see her.”

“No, sir, nothing like that, I’m glad to say. She asks that I give you this letter.”

Morris handed an envelope to John, who recognized at once the very small, but exceptionally neat penmanship of Lucinda Manning. He recognized it because she had sent many letters to him during the war.

“May I come in to read it?”

“No, sir, I’m afraid not.”

“Morris, you know damn well that if I really wanted to come in that there is no way you can stop me.”

“Yes, sir, I am well aware of that, Mr. Jackson. But it is my hope that you will be gentleman enough not to force your way in where you are not wanted.”

“I’m not wanted? Is that what the letter says?”

“I have no way of knowing what the letter says, sir. But, as I say, I have been asked to deny you entrance.”

“Yeah,” John said. “All right.” He turned away from the door, then drove off. He was at least a mile away when he stopped, then opened the letter.

Dear John,

This is a difficult letter for me to write, but I have been thinking of it for the entire year since you returned from the war. You have asked me many times when I would consent to marry you. Here is my answer.

I will never marry you. I know it is something that we had planned on, and though we were going to get married as soon as you graduated from college, it was you who suggested that we put it off until after the war. Of course at the time, neither of us realized how long the war would be.

I waited for you throughout the long war, I was faithful to you, and I maintained a correspondence. But I think now that you were right in suggesting that we wait, because the John Jackson who returned from the war is not the John Jackson I fell in love with.

I think it would be best, John, if we not see each other again. I wish you all the best.

Fondly,

Lucinda

Old Main Building

“Yes, the way you are describing John Jackson is certainly indicative of someone with traumatic shock,” Professor Armbruster said. “I imagine that losing his job, and his fiancée, could well drive him to come west to lose himself in the mountains.”

“Yes, but he didn’t come west right away,” Smoke said. “It was another four years before he showed up in the Rockies.”

“What did he do during those years? Did he stay in Pennsylvania?”

“No,” Smoke answered. He chuckled. “He joined the French Foreign Legion.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Paris, France—April 1867

It was a brisk day in mid-April and John stopped out front, and looked at the sign on the outside of the building.

OFFICE DE RECRUTEMENT MILITAIRE

DE LA

LÉGION ÉTRANGÈRE FRANÇAISE

He was met just inside the door by someone in the uniform of a noncommissioned officer.

“Bist du gekommen, um die Französisch Fremdenlegion?”

“I beg your pardon?” John replied.

“Oh, you are English. I thought you were German.”

“I am American.”

“American, you say? And you have come to join the Foreign Legion?”

“Yes.”

“Your name?”

John debated over whether or not to give him his right name, then decided that he may as well.

“John Jackson.”

“Your name is Jean Jourdain,” the noncommissioned officer said.

“John Jackson,” John said, speaking his name a bit louder, thinking perhaps the sergeant hadn’t heard him.

“Non. Here, we will give you a new name. Your new name is Jean Jourdain.”

The noncommissioned officer pointed to a door. “Wait in that room with the others.”

When John stepped into the other room he saw at least thirty more men, and he heard conversations being carried on in several languages.

“ Deutsch, Belge, Norsk, Español, English?” someone asked.

“American.”

“Oh, very good,” the man answered in English. “I am Hans Frey. I am Swiss, but I speak English. We can talk as we wait.”

“Is that your real name, or the name you were given?”

“It is the name that was given me by the noncommissioned officer when I reported, so now it is my real name.”

“I was given a new name as well, but if we are to be friends, I prefer to use my real name. It is John Jackson.”

“Yes, I think we will be friends,” Hans said.

“It will be good to have someone to talk to.”

“John, I have read of the terrible war in America,” Hans said. “Were you in the war?”

“Yes.”

“And yet you come to join the French Foreign Legion? You know, do you not, that the crazy French are in wars all over the world? They are in Mexico, and in Africa, and in Asia. And who do they send to fight their wars? They send the Foreign Legion.”

“Yes, so I have heard.”

“Have you a choice?” Hans asked.

“I beg your pardon?”

“I have no choice. I killed a man,” Hans said. He held up his finger. “Mind you, I am not sorry that I killed this man, for if ever a man needed to be killed, it was Max Botta. He was a most despicable person, who by his fraud and deceit, ruined the life of a good man. My father took his own life because of Max Botta.”