Prologue
Transcription of a handwritten manuscript recovered from the ashes of a burned out farmhouse located twenty miles southeast of Fort Sill:
Dear Sister and Your Husband and Children, and My Beloved Mother:
I have received your letter of April thirteenth this year, and I send you herewith my heartiest thanks for it, for it gives me great joy to hear from you and to know that you are alive and well. I must also report briefly to you how things have been going with me recently, though I must ask you to forgive me for not having told you earlier about my fate. I do not seem to have been able to do so much as to write to you more than once or twice since arriving here in Malice, because during the time I settled here I have been witness to activities of a most strange and troubling nature that preoccupy me with thoughts of being murdered by the unholy savages who roam Shadow Valley near here. I had expected to find a prosperous mining town as was my hope in this journey to the Oklahoma territories, but the reality is that any prospector with his senses has deserted Malice in favor of greener pastures, leaving behind the rustlers of questionable character and the legends of the valley.
I must also let you know that I have on a recent occasion ventured into the valley, despite having heard many ominous accounts of the ghostly heathens there, only to have encountered them myself in a most startling incident that posed great danger for me. I was nearly killed several days ago on a prospecting venture along the pass when a pack of coyote in the distance was soon revealed to me in reality as being a group of man-like spectres adorned in animal skins. At first glance they could be mistaken for wild Indians but their demeanor was much more other-worldly. Their sudden arrival spooked my horse and I was thrown clear, striking my head upon a rock. They gave chase and uttered bloodthirsty cries in an unearthly tongue, but as I came out of the pass they stopped pursuing me and seemed to disappear, and once again I saw coyotes where the apparitions had been. God be praised, I escaped with my life, unharmed by them, and my horse came through the danger unscathed as well, but the incident has left me quite affected.
In general I must say that one or another has advised me to sell my land and leave this place, but I would rather keep it for a time yet, in the hope that some good may come of it; it is difficult to get such land again in this territory, and if you, my dear sister, would come here, you could buy it and use it and then it would not be necessary to let it fall into the hands of strangers. But I do have mixed feelings about this, given the great dangers of the area. I have had chance to speak with the Sheriff of Malice, a man of solid character who seems intent on bringing positive change where he can; perhaps he can make a difference. I have my hopes.
And now in closing I must send my very warm greetings to my unforgetable dear mother, my dearest sister and her husband and children, and in general to all my relatives, acquaintances, and friends. And may the Lord by his grace bend, direct, and govern our hearts so that we sometime with gladness may assemble with God in the eternal mansions where there will be no more partings, no sorrows, no more trials, but everlasting joy and gladness, and contentment in beholding God’s face. If this be the goal for all our endeavors through the sorrows and cares of this life, then through his grace we may hope for a blessed life hereafter, for Jesus sake.
Always your devoted,
Theodore Ambrecht
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