Saddlehorn

It is midnight on Crows Crossing Road near the place the local’s call turn twenty three, delivery truck driver Mason Briggs knows all too well about the history of this well traveled road, and usually he tries to avoid it at all cost. He has heard too many people tell too many tales about the woods and the goings on there along the entire length of this particular road. This night Mason Briggs travels it alone, and he travels it only because he is behind schedule, and he has to make up valuable time. Near the turn Mason hears a slight thumping noise and can feel the steering wheel of the delivery truck pulling to the right. He has a flat tire and is forced off of the road onto the shoulder. When he gets out of the truck the cold frosty air and the thick fog laying in the trees immediately take hold of his imagination, and he sees of all things two young children standing silently at the edge of the woods, he grabs a flashlight from the cab and calls to them, but they do not respond. They turn instead, and walk back into the woods, and against his better judgment, he follows them. After this night Mason Briggs will have his own tale to tell. If he should survive it.

At Quicks Crossing.




It is the late fall of nineteen hundred and thirty four, and along the banks of the Saddle Horn river lye’s the small settlement at Quick’s crossing. America and much of the world have fallen into the great depression, but the simple folks at Quick’s have barely noticed, there are seven small families here, and they mostly live off of the land, while the rest of the world seems too busy struggling with failing economies to even notice them. The children here are home schooled and life is simple, the fathers hunt and kill small game to feed their families while the mothers all tend to the children’s education and the chores. Avery Tuttle has recently lost his wife to illness and is left to raise their two daughters alone, and although the other mothers help with their schooling and others chores when they can, he is forced to do most of it by himself, it is on a Saturday morning when Avery heads down the winding path that leads to the Saddle Horn, he is off to catch fish for the days meals and has left his two daughters in the care of neighbors. He arrives at the Saddle Horn at about seven thirty in the morning and begins to fish, one half an hour later he begins to notice the already dangerous currents of the Saddle Horn picking up speed, the first storm clouds roll in at about eight am and Avery can feel it in his bones, that this will be no ordinary storm. Before he can get half way back up the trail a total downpour ensues and he hurries himself to get back to the settlement to check on his daughters, something doesn’t feel right. And when he returns he finds that an argument about having too many children already to care for, has ensued between the neighboring husband and wife and Avery’s daughters have wandered off in the commotion to try and find their father. And are now lost in the storm.

Now Panic stricken the entire settlement is searching in and around every building for the two lost children, but they are no where to be seen. Minutes turn into the first hour, and Avery decides to head into the woods in the middle of the storm to try and find them, while the rest of the settlement keeps searching in the local area. He travels back down the path towards the Saddle Horn to see if they are there, but the angry river is rising over its banks and is quickly growing into a raging flood zone. When he is almost to the end of the trail he finds one of the girls dolls that they had with them when he left for fishing that morning, and Avery feels his heart sinking, as his panic rises.. He begins yelling out the girls names but receives no answer in return. He moves closer to the rivers edge hoping against hope that he will find them safe, but the very spot that he stood fishing a short while ago is now completely under water and he sees nothing but the downpour of rain as the angry Saddle Horn continues to crest the top of its banks. Avery Tuttle and his two children are never seen again. Throughout the years that follow, many have sworn to have seen the two girls wandering the woods looking for their father, lost almost frightened and alone, while others that have braved these woods along the now peaceful Saddle Horn have said that they have seen Avery himself tirelessly searching for his lost children.. Stories evolve about people following the children into the deep woods and they themselves becoming lost, never again to be seen by human eyes, some say the children lead them to the river and the people fall victim to the Saddle Horn and its treacherous under currents. Leaving the children and Avery to wander the woods, tirelessly awaiting the day, when they are reunited.


Having realized that he has witnessed something that his rational mind could not begin to explain, Mason Briggs runs from the woods scared senseless, thirty feet from his delivery truck he stumbles and falls, it is when he sees light in the sky that he realizes that it is almost dawn and he has been in the woods for nearly seven hours. When he returns to the delivery truck he finds that his flat tire is no longer flat, and the spare has been removed and replaced with the blown out tire, a lug wrench lays on the road near the back of the truck, and as the frightened truck driver gets in the cab he sees at the edge of the woods the form of a man who stands silently watching him leave, before disappearing back into the woods. Mason Briggs now has his own tale to tell, yet another ghost story for the growing collection, here on Crows Crossing Road.

SCRATCH...© Copyright A.B.T. 2006