Read Online Ghost Moon by John Wilson - Free Book Online

of the small animals dropped off a tree branch. What right did this ignorant old man have to attack my heroes?
    The old man shakes with laughter.
    â€œYou Americanos and your stories. You do not listen. You just believe the first thing you hear that fits with what you wish to believe.”
    â€œI’m Canadian,” I say crossly. My companion shrugs as if my distinction makes no difference to him. Without asking, he pours himself another drink. “Davy Crockett was a brave man,” I add defensively.
    â€œHow do you know what happened to this brave man inside the walls of the mission at San Antonio de Bexar? Were you there?”
    â€œNo, I wasn’t there. I read about it.”
    â€œAnd the man who wrote the book you read, was he there at the Alamo?”
    â€œOf course not,” I reply angrily. “No one survived the Alamo.”
    â€œNo one?”
    â€œI think the women and children were spared, but all the fighters were killed in the battle.” I’m becoming confused about why this old man keeps harping on about this.
    â€œAll the Americanos.”
    â€œYes, but…” I stutter to a stop as I realize what he means.
    â€œRather than reading books by men who sit in New York and make things up to sell for a dime each, would it not be better to ask one who was there?” The old man is grinning from ear to ear as he fills his glass once more.
    â€œOf course,” I say hesitantly, embarrassed at being caught out in my one-sided assumptions. “But how would I do that?”
    â€œAsk away.” The old man spreads his arms wide in invitation.
    It takes me a minute to grasp what he means. “You!” He nods. “You were there?”
    â€œThat is how I acquired my limp,” he says and slaps his thigh. “I was a boy, no older than you are now. A drummer in General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna’s army. Our motto was, ‘Never one step backward.’”
    Is the old man telling the truth? I have no reason to doubt him. If so, he has a story to tell. I look at him with new eyes. Maybe this man saw Davy Crockett or Jim Bowie.
    â€œYou say you want to know, and yet when you get the chance, you sit with your mouth open like a fish stranded on the riverbank.”
    I snap my mouth closed.
    â€œWhat was it like?” I ask weakly.
    â€œIt was like war,” he says. “It was dirty and chaotic. We were frightened and we were brave all at once. There was dust and blood and noise and death, but do you not wish to know about your hero, Crockett?”
    â€œYes, and Bowie,” I add hastily.
    â€œBowie I did not see,” my companion says. My heart leaps because this implies that he did see Davy Crockett. “You understand everything happened very fast. It was all over in less than half an hour, although it seemed like a lifetime to us. I was in the third attack, the one that swarmed over the north wall. Those inside turned their cannon on us. The guns were filled with anything they could find—door hinges, rocks, pieces of horseshoes. They caused some hideous wounds and gave me my limp. I was hit in the leg by some Texian’s heavy belt buckle. It broke the bone, and I played no further part in the fight but sat against the wall and watched the killing.
    â€œThe cannons didn’t stop us. There was no time to reload, and our blood was up. My comrades killed all the Texians at the guns and anyone they found in the compound.
    â€œI did not see Bowie, but I heard after he was found sick in a cot in a room by the wall, not far from where I sat. He shot the first man through the door, but the others bayoneted him as he lay there. He was a brave man. Sick as he was, he never tried to surrender. Not that it would have made any difference.”
    The old man falls silent. As he has talked, his gaze has moved away from me and his eyes focus more and more on the far distance, as if, behind me, he can see the drama of the Alamo