The Fourth Life of Sean Donoghue by Trish Hanan (children's books read aloud .txt) 📕

two men and everyone was sad, the men got together and discussed the possibility that the Keetiks might just be moving east because an outside force might be driving them. No one wanted that.
“Or it could just be that the strangeness of the white man has worn off and they’ve decided that we’re weaker than they are and therefore fair game,” Sean suggested. Mike nodded and someone in the back snorted.
“Oh, that’s great, we just got rid of the bastard Hamish and now we got the crazy Keetiks,” he spat. A few people grinned. Todd stood up.
“Well, we wiped out the Blackeyes and we got rid of the Hamish, I say we just march in there and take care of those bastard Keetiks before they start taking care of us,” he said and a few men thought that was a good idea. Sean nodded.
“That sounds good except we don’t know exactly how many Keetiks we’re dealing with,” he told them. “What if we show up with four thousand men only to find out they have ten thousand warriors, we’re going to look pretty stupid?” Everyone looked stunned.
“Well, what do you suggest General?” Mike asked him. Everyone looked at Sean who shrugged.
“I think I should take a group of men, probably about a hundred or so, good reliable men who know the forest and won’t have any trouble sneaking around and scout out the territory a bit and investigate a bit before we rush in there,” he suggested. A lot of people looked shocked.
“Who would be stupid enough to volunteer for that?” Pete Jamison asked. Young Sean stood up.
“I’ll go with you, Granddad,” he said. Immediately two hundred men stood up.
“I’ll go,” they all shouted. Sean grinned and looked at Pete.
“I think that answers your question, lad,” he said and Mike and Ben laughed.
Sean picked out a hundred men, mostly level-headed men in their late twenties that he had fought Indians with before. And to everyone’s surprise he didn’t take all of his family who volunteered. He only took half.
“If we run into a thousand Keetiks and get our hearts eaten, then the women will never forgive me if we all go and die, so only half of you can go,” he informed them and they all grinned. “So we’re going to have a lottery. He put thirty grains of brown rice in a can and thirty grains of white rice and the ones who picked the brown rice got to go. Everyone wanted the brown rice. Young Sean jumped for joy when he opened his hand to reveal brown.
“You’re not leaving me behind this time, Granddad,” he shouted and everyone laughed. Sean just shook his head.
“Lad, I can’t decided if you’re brave or stupid,” he teased him and Sean just saluted him.
“Captain Sean Donoghue reporting for duty, General,” he said smartly while his wife a Malweenah named Emily smiled proudly.
The hundred men left early the next morning. Sean kissed his wife and son goodbye and told his grandsons to watch out for them.
“Don’t be telling the wee lad any of your cannibal stories while I’m gone, Ryan, or I’ll spank you when I return,” he teased him. Ryan laughed.
“You’re the one out chasing heart-eating savages, I’ll be sitting on the front porch with my brother thank you very much,” he said primly and everyone laughed. He put his arm around Danny and they both grinned. Sean waved goodbye and felt his heart swell, he really was the luckiest man.
They entered the forest and kept to the well traveled trails for the first couple of hours. Sean spread them out over the trail like he had when they had been fighting the Blackeyes and his eyes continually scanned the trees. He noticed more than a few men looking at the trees too and knew they remembered the Blackeyes battles also. The first night they made small fires, heated coffee, put them immediately after and slept in shifts. Sean slept near Sir William because he knew that the horse would warn him if any strange men or bears approached. Young Sean and the others followed his example; they figured he knew what he was doing.
The next day he spread his men out even more and just for the hell of it, he had them wrap pieces of blankets over the horses shoes and legs so that the clink-clank noise the shoes made on the ground wasn’t so loud. Everyone looked at him with amazement, they would have never thought of that.
“General Donoghue is a very clever man,” Bill Tate whispered to his friend Peter Brown. Both men approved of this new thing. It would be easier to sneak up on the enemy if they couldn’t hear you coming.
They didn’t see any Keetiks that day or the next when Sean had them wrap their leather harness so that they didn’t jiggle and make noise. Later that day all that silence paid off when a group of about fifty braves rode right past where they were standing, and didn’t hear them. Everyone held their breaths and watched the fierce warriors, who made almost no noise as they rode on their horses with no saddles into the forest ahead of them. Sean waited about twenty minutes and then set off after them, following the tracks they made and riding very slowly.
“He’s following them back to their village,” Peter whispered to Bill who nodded. Suddenly up a head Sean came to a stop and indicated that they all should fall back. They fell back about a half mile and then they crept forward by foot until they came to the top of a mountain rise and looked out over the most beautiful valley they had ever seen.
“Holy shit, how many Keetiks do you think are down there?” Young Sean whispered. Sean took out his binoculars and looked around.
It was a beautiful valley, long and wide, with the highest mountains he had ever seen in Anamylia on two sides and a long river running down the middle. A huge waterfall fell to the left side flowing into the river made him think of the Fairie River back home in Hamish. On the right side of the river was the Keetik village, a beautiful place with all of the houses made out of some kind of stone. There were gardens everywhere. How did these people get from this nice place to eating the hearts of their enemies? He sighed and turned to his grandson.
“I’d say about five thousand, give or take a hundred,” he estimated. Everyone gasped. Then the General grinned and gave the order to fall back.
When they were back at their horses, they mounted up and as quickly and quietly as they could they made their way home.
Once home they called a meeting of the Ridge leaders. Sean told everyone what he had found in the Keetik valley.
“I don’t know if we want another Indian war,” Chester Lamanski tried to talk them out of it. Ivan Ferguson glared at him.
“We’ve been fighting the bastards for years, my Ridge is closer to them than yours, you haven’t seen what they do to a man, they cut the heart right out and then they take it home to that precious valley of theirs and eat it,” he informed him and Chester’s face paled. Everyone got silent. Sean stood up.
“I don’t see where we have any choice,” he told them. “The attacks are starting out small but eventually they’re going to come at us with more than just five or six braves. Do we want to risk the lives of our wives and children to these monsters?” he asked them. Every man shook his head.
The next day the leaders and General Donoghue and his men left for Jamestown to talk to the President. They couldn’t declare war on the Keetiks without his permission.
“What do you need from me?” Henry asked when they were finished. Sean grinned.
“Actually all we need is a few more cannons, we have enough men on the Ridge to take care of a few thousand Indians and of course we’d like to put them on a reservation in St. Charles when we’re done with them,” he informed him. John laughed.
“Those priests are going to love you,” he declared. “What the hell, it gives them something to do besides preach about this Messiah they’re still waiting for,” he said and they all laughed.
General York was happy to lend him three of his cannons and the men to operate them, and Colonel Johnson in Portsmyth lent him three more with men of course. They were happy to fire them again and didn’t mind the trip through the forest. The Malweenahs volunteered their two so Sean and his men took nine cannons with them to the Keetik valley. They wrapped the wheels in blankets and surrounded the village. The cannons could fire up to four hundred yards and they pointed them down towards the village. Sean waited until daybreak to give the order to fire. He had four thousand men with rifles surrounding the village.
“Fire,” he shouted and the cannons blasted in the day. The explosion blasted the valley away and houses and the ground exploded. People screamed, dogs barked and horses ran off. The cannons were quickly reloaded and fired again. The Keetiks ran around not knowing where to run to escape the explosions. The cannons roared again and the men on the mountain top flinched as a cannonball hit a group of people and blasted them into piece.
“That’s gotta hurt,” Todd said to Lonnie who shrugged.
“I’m sure it hurt a lot when they cut Bill Patterson heart out of his chest,” he remarked casually. Some of the men who had started to feel sorry for the Indians below stopped.
As the Indians came racing up the mountainside the white men began to fire their rifles and pick them off. Sean gave the order to just hit the men and round up the women and children until the women or children tried to kill them and then to defend themselves. A few of them actually did, pulling out knives or throwing spears so they got dead very quickly. The rest were gathered up and tied to trees so they couldn’t stab anyone in the back or run off.
Six hours later the village was empty and they walked around to survey the damage.
“We sure did make a mess of this place,” Young Sean observed. His Granddad nodded.
“It’s nothing that can’t be cleaned up when we move in,” he informed him. The others were surprised.
“What do you mean move in, Granddad?” Todd asked him and scratched his head. Sean grinned at them.
“Isn’t it real pretty here, with that waterfall?” he asked them and they nodded. “The Ridge is getting real crowded and we have to go a long distance any more for game. I think we should call this place the Donoghue Valley and this village should be called Sweetwater because that’s a really pretty waterfall, just like the one I grew up with back in Sweetwater in Hamish,” he explained. They all grinned.
“Donoghue Valley, I like the sound of that,” Young Sean declared.
They escorted what was left of the Keetiks to St. Charles and turned them over to the priests. Sean gave