As we collected our gear and our horses, I decided it would be best to make the two day trek back home and use the truck for the trip to Oregon and check out this clan. On horseback such a distance would take a week each way and if the Indians spoke true there was no one in the territory between them and Klamath Falls. So a trip by truck up the central highway would be safe.
After our return Beth asked why I didn’t propose the idea of joining with the tribe we met. I had to explain to her that it wasn’t just finding any humans and hooking up with them, our goal was to find like-minded people to merge with. I told her the two hour conference wasn’t that cordial. Imagine trying to live your whole life in a company that made you always uncomfortable. I could tell from the start that these Indians just wanted to be left alone and out of a deep respect for them, I’d honor that.
I set out the next morning, once again with May and June, but this time all of us in hiking attire and with backpacks, mostly to hide our guns. Our plan was to park the truck some ten miles from our destination and hike the rest through hills and trees. We were there in six hours and did find a tree line that bordered on deserted and long neglected farm fields.
As we crossed a few more miles I noticed that some of the fields looked like they’d been tilled in the last few years. Then we came upon several in obvious use and a cluster of houses and barns on the far side of them. It was growing dusk and a perfect time to spy.
Most of these fields were recently planted and offered no cover. But there was one of corn some four feet tall already. We left our packs in the trees and with one handgun and binoculars proceeded to crawl through the corn like snakes, on our elbows until we reached the edge. From here we had a fine view of the group of houses. There was a church not far off because I heard its bell ring and then saw people walking toward it. My heart sank as I focused my glasses on them and saw their outfits. The men were all wearing dark pants and blue shirts with suspenders and straw hats. The women were all in black dresses and white bonnets, the children, male and female, perfect miniatures of their elders.
It was a community of Amish or something of that sort, and one more strike against us in hopes of forming any possible union we could live with. They were just as alien to us as the Indians were, perhaps more so. We retreated back to the trees.
It was near dark and we hiked what I thought to be about a mile into this woods and set up our tent for the night. We built a small campfire. June and May cooked a fine dinner while I sat on a log nearby looking dismal, mulling over this disappointing development. As we ate I tried to explain my feelings but they were at a loss to understand why I wasn’t happy. After the meal I brewed a pot of coffee which we all enjoyed and I began a long explanation of just what sort of people these were, good people but holding a set of beliefs and rituals which I could never share or they change.
It was hard to explain to May and June that there was something wrong with a religious cult because the hive from which they’d come was an exact replica. They saw nothing wrong with an organized and regimented routine from which no deviation was allowed, only exclusion and banishment. That’s why they all wore the same clothes, I told them. It was an outward symbol of mental conformity. They still couldn’t quite grasp my objections but I wanted them to, desperately. I brewed two more pots of coffee and kept arguing on, quoting famous leaders, the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, the right to dress and to think as we pleased, each of us differently but equal in freedom, which was our only sacred gift. It was a long declamation and sometimes a little heated and loud and I saw that even if they didn’t grasp my concepts that night, I won their sympathies and hearts with my eloquence. We were just about to retire to bed and sweet sex when Dora informed me there were people in the brush nearby, coming toward us.
