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Fire, Fire, Burning Bright

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written by James Rada, Jr.

A new serial fiction story for your enjoyment

6: Hot On The Trail

Rubbing his eyes and yawning, Mechanicstown Sheriff Paul Cresap rode his horse into the collier’s camp on Catoctin Mountain. This was the fourth camp he had visited today. The colliers moved their camps from time to time to stay close to lumber being cut for the Catoctin Furnace. The furnace needed 800 bushels of charcoal each day to run, and each pound of charcoal came from an acre of hardwood trees.

A couple of people in the village of Catoctin Furnace had told Paul they had heard something about one collier burning to death. Paul thought it might be the fourth arson fire, particularly if the arsonist who had burned homes in Catoctin Furnace, along Frederick Road, and on West Main Street in Mechanicstown had been setting fires as he moved west. It would make sense that there was a fire on the mountain. Paul was probably lucky the man didn’t start a forest fire.

He had had little luck finding out who had burned to death, and he was beginning to think it was just a story. As the colliers at each camp would tell him no one in their group had died, they would direct him to another camp.

Paul knew something was off about this camp as soon as he rode in. The other camps had been a collection of smoking mounds of earth or circles of charcoal that needed to be raked from the dirt. The colliers tended to sing, swear, or just cough from the wood smoke.

This camp had mounds, but only a couple were smoking. A couple of others had collapsed but hadn’t been raked out. Paul also saw what looked like had been a cabin that had been burned to the ground.

And the place was quiet. If not for the wood smoke, he would have said it was abandoned.

“Hello,” Paul called.

A man walked out from behind one stack. He was covered in soot.

“Who are you?”

“Sheriff Cresap from Mechanicstown.”

“This isn’t Mechanicstown.”

“No, but I heard that someone had been burned to death up here. Do you know anything about it?”

The man nodded. “It was my brother.”

“And who are you?”

“Abednego Hunt.”

“Can you tell me what happened? It may tie into some other things that have happened,” Paul asked.

“Meshach — that’s my brother, — was on top of a stack and it opened up under him. He fell through and burned. I couldn’t get to him in time.” Abednego shook his head. “It was horrible. The screams…”

Paul stared at the stacks. They looked like mounds of earth to him. He had seen them as the colliers built them in other camps, though. He knew there was a stack of logs beneath the earth. The dirt was used to control the amount of air that got into the stacks.

“It was an accident then?” Paul asked.

“Of course it was. Shack didn’t jump into the center of a burning stack on purpose!”

Paul held up a hand. “Sorry. That’s not what I meant. I mean, no one could have done anything to the stack to make it give way under your brother.”

Abednego thought for a moment and shook his head. “No. It’s not the first time something like that has happened. It all depends on how the logs burn.” He paused. “Why would you think someone did it to Shack on purpose?”

“I don’t, but someone set fires last night at the furnace and in my town. They are all connected. I thought the fire that killed your brother might be, too.”

“What makes you think those fires were connected?”

“They happened on the same night, and they didn’t start naturally. Whoever tried to burn the houses down, set them all up the same way.”

“Nothing like that happened here. This was an accident I wished never happened.”

Paul nodded. “Sorry for your loss.”

He looked at the ground and picked up a piece of wood that had been turned into charcoal. Then he looked over at the charred beams of what had been a cabin. They both were burned wood, but the charcoal was darker and denser. It had to be burned in a special way to become charcoal. It didn’t come from a regular fire.

“This is charcoal, isn’t it?” Paul asked, holding up the chunk he had picked up.

“That’s what we… I make here.”

“What’s the difference between this and burned wood?”

“That is burned wood. We just burn it in a certain way, so it will continue to burn and burn hotter than wood. It can’t have too much oxygen when it burns, or it won’t be of any use as charcoal, but if it has too little air, it won’t burn fully.”

Paul nodded and walked back to his horse. Abednego followed him.

“What are you going to do now?” the collier asked.

“I’ve got some thinking to do and an arsonist to catch.”

Paul headed back to his office. When he got there, he took his bottle from his desk drawer and poured himself a drink. He could concentrate better when the whiskey took the edge off the day.

He pulled the piece of charcoal out and set it on the desk in front of him. He had found charcoal around each of the houses that had been burned. It couldn’t have been left over from the fire, according to Abednego. Also, while it wouldn’t have been unusual to find it at the ironmaster’s house, it would have been odd to find it at the other two houses. People around here used firewood in their stoves. It was abundant and cheaper than charcoal.

It would have required a lot of charcoal to build a fire around three houses if it was used for that. Whoever had started the fires had access to a lot of charcoal and knew how to use it.

Then there was how the logs that were used in the fire were laid upright against the houses rather than being piled in one spot or lengthwise along the houses. Colliers stacked wood that way and also had access to charcoal.

Things were pointing to a collier as the arsonist, but there were a couple dozen of them on the mountain.

Which one would have wanted to start the fires and why? Paul fell asleep trying to figure this out. He woke up coughing. He sat up and quickly doubled over as his coughing continued. He opened his eyes, but they watered. When he finally opened his eyes, he saw the room was filled with smoke.

He ran to the door. He reached out to open it, but when he put his hand on the doorknob, it felt hot. He jerked his hand away.

He hurried to the window and looked out. He saw flames.

He coughed and fell to his knees. The air near the floor was clearer. He took a few deep gulps of air and stood up. He ran to a side window and saw more flames.

The arsonist had set his office on fire.

How was he going to get out of here?

He ran to the side door and wasn’t surprised to feel the doorknob was also hot. He looked around, trying to find a way out. He wondered if he could get onto the roof and go over the flames, but there was no way onto the roof.

He ran back to the cell and grabbed the straw mattress off the metal frame. Back at the side door, he laid on the floor to catch his breath again. Then he stood up, pulled his shirt sleeve down over his hand, and opened the door.

He had to push hard because logs were leaning against it, which he expected. Flames rushed in, singeing him. He threw the mattress down, which momentarily created a clear path for him. He ran outside and a few yards from the building.

A crowd had already started forming a bucket brigade, but Paul could see it was too late. The fire had caught the roof on fire. The building would collapse soon.

He looked around and saw a familiar face in the crowd, someone who shouldn’t be there. It was Abednego Hunt. Paul started toward him, but the collier disappeared into the crowd.

…to be continued next month

Fire, Fire, Burning Bright

By On · Add Comment · In Arts & Entertainment

written by James Rada, Jr.

A new serial fiction story for your enjoyment

5: Home Fire Burning

Paul Cresap woke with his head throbbing and someone pounding on the door. He tried to open his eyes, but they were crusted over.

He rubbed his eyelashes to break up the crust. Even then, he would have preferred to keep his eyes closed.

Someone knocked on the door to the office again. “Sheriff! Sheriff!”

Paul sat up. “Wait a minute! I need to dress.”

He stood up slowly and pulled his suspenders over his shoulders. He walked out of the single cell that Mechanicstown had. Since it also served as Paul’s bedroom more often than not, it meant he had little incentive to arrest anyone. He didn’t want to lose his bedroom.

He walked out of the cell and across the office. He opened the door and saw Tom Weller. He owned a dry goods store on Church Street. Paul often bought his coffee beans there.

“Sheriff, there’s been another fire,” Tom said. He was out of breath, and Paul guessed he had run from his home above his store.

“Another fire?”

“Didn’t you hear the fire bell ringing earlier?”

Paul shook his head. He wasn’t about to tell Tom that he had been passed out drunk and wouldn’t have heard a black powder explosion if it had gone off under his bed.

Paul said, “Apparently not. Besides, fires aren’t my jurisdiction.” Two of them hadn’t even been in Mechanicstown. The ironmaster’s home in Catoctin Furnace had burned earlier this evening. Then Rev. John Clark Hoyle’s home had burned down sometime. That house had been on Frederick Road, not far from the church he presided over in Catoctin Furnace.

Someone had told Paul about both of them, but he hadn’t done anything because they were outside of the town limits.

“But three fires!” Tom said. “That can’t be coincidence. Something needs to be done.”

Even in his drunken state, Paul realized Tom was probably right. Mechanicstown might have a fire a month, usually from sparks escaping a fireplace, but three in one night? It probably wasn’t accidental.

“Where is this fire?” Paul asked.

“It’s the Worthy place on Water Street.”

That home was in Mechanicstown. The people in town would expect Paul to check it out. “Is the fire out?” Paul asked.

Tom nodded. “Just about.”

First, the ironmaster’s mansion, then the reverend’s home on Frederick Street, and now a house on Water Street.

“Who owns the Worthy Place?” Paul asked.

“Jonah Worthy. He owns the general store in Catoctin Furnace,” Tom told him.

It was like someone was making his way from the furnace and up the mountain. Paul also realized that for three fires to burn in one night, they had to be started fairly quickly. Each fire would divert people to it. There probably hadn’t been too many people left to form the bucket brigade at Jonah Worthy’s house. People might still be at the fire on Frederick Road.

“I’ll go out to the Worthy place shortly,” Paul said.

He went back into his office and picked up the bucket. He walked out back to fill it with water from the pump and relieve himself in the outhouse. He walked back inside to wash himself off and dress. He combed his hair to make himself look presentable.

Then, he saddled his horse and rode out to the West Main Street. Then he turned south on Water Street. The Worthy place was just a shell of blackened timbers by the time Paul reached it. It was still smoking. He saw the Worthys rummaging through the remains, seeing if there was anything they could salvage. He wished them luck and hoped they would find something to help them rebuild their lives.

Paul hadn’t been so lucky. He had lost his family and his farm. Of course, it hadn’t been a fire that took them away. He’d been too drunk most of the time to run his farm, and he had fallen behind on the taxes. The county took the farm, and then his wife and daughter left him to go live with her parents.

It surprised him that the townspeople elected him sheriff. Paul had run because he needed the work. He was lucky no one else wanted the job, or he would still be looking for work.

Paul walked over to Jonah Worthy, who stopped what he was doing.

“Did everyone get out all right, Jonah?”

Jonah Worthy looked like he had been in a fight. His clothing was torn. His face was covered in dirt, and he looked despondent. “Mary was just getting up to start the morning fires in the stove when she saw the flames.”

“Where did it start?”

“That’s just it, Sheriff. She said the flames were all around the house. They worked their way in. We gathered the children and used blankets to get through the fires at the back door.”

Paul patted the older man on the shoulder. Then he walked around the edge of the house. He could see pieces of logs all around the perimeter. These weren’t boards, but logs the size of firewood.

He scratched at his beard and considered what he was seeing. He didn’t like it. He didn’t like it at all.

He mounted his horse and rode his horse further south to Rev. Hoyle’s house on Frederick Road. It looked much the same as the Worthy house, although the fire hadn’t destroyed it entirely because the house had been constructed of stone. The walls were standing, but the roof had collapsed.

Paul walked to the edge of the house and saw pieces of logs all along the sides where there shouldn’t be wood.

He suspected he was dealing with an arsonist, but why would someone even try to burn a stone building down. Certainly he had damaged it, but the reverend could gut the interior and rebuilt the roof. It wasn’t a total loss like the Worthy house, which is what Paul would have thought an arsonist would have wanted.

So, if complete destruction wasn’t the goal, what was? Did the arsonist know the people who lived in the houses? This house belonged to the reverend at Harriet Church. Jonah Worthy owned the store in Catoctin Furnace, and the iron company owned the ironmaster’s mansion.

Paul nodded slowly. So, all three owners had connections to the iron company, but was that enough of a connection? He could understand someone being angry with the iron company, and maybe even the owner of the store, but a reverend? Paul had met Rev. Hoyle. He was as nice as they came.

Honestly, it surprised Paul there weren’t more fires at the furnace. They kept the furnace fires hot enough to turn iron into liquid. Imagine what damage it could do if some of that molten iron was thrown on a house? This all looked like was it was the work of a well-set wood fire, though.

Paul suspected this was the work of an arsonist because the two houses he had seen had been burned from all around the outside inward, and he suspected he would find the same thing at the ironmaster’s mansion. Paul was in over his head. He was just a farmer, and a drunk one at that.