Sun Kissed Innsmouth
Part Thirty Nine
A good deal of Felecia’s sleepless nights surrounded vague nightmare versions of that all too real, final conversation with her mother. The sickness lasted nearly another week after that meeting. The medicine helped and the herb bread was shared around at Felecia’s insistence. Emma was the only real cook in Rotary house, it was one of her loafs to be sure and therefore, worthy of being passed around. Felecia spent nearly a month recovering from sickness and injuries before she could manage long walks around Phillip’s property line. The villagers didn’t dare to come around, there were no torch lit, pitchfork wielding mobs to come and finish the job.
No one came by at all except for mother until Felecia was already on the mend and resting on the porch one afternoon.
The rifle!
Felecia was still stuck on the cot next to the hearth, unable to turn or lift herself up, still wheezing and coughing when she asked about it. No one on the property except for father had guns and father was oddly solemn about explaining that fact to Felecia during one of their many game nights.
“Ever since we Conway’s settled this land and mixed with the local tribes, back before the split with merry old England, the master of the estate has kept the entire armory here, locked up in Rotary house. Five generations now, Fee, and eventually it will pass onto your brother Clarence, and do you want to know a secret?”
That ridiculous family pet name aside, of course Felecia had nodded, she was nine and her rare times with father, alone and late at night were the only good times to be had beside stealing into Emma’s kitchen.
“Our estate armory is nothing more than four ancient flintlocks from your great grandfather’s time, a bird hunting shotgun that your grandfather bought and never used, and my service piece from the war. That’s it. A true testament to us Conway’s. Ten or so families on this island became twenty and twenty became forty and so on, but us Conway’s we were always smarter than the rest of them. We always had better ways to solve our problems than with gun play. The sea trade didn’t hurt, sure, but we have always been resourceful beyond our means. I imagine Clarence will ignore any warning I give him about wielding weapons at the simple folk we harbor and employ in the village, so I need you to do something for me, Fee. When the time comes for him to take over the armory, I need you to take that dusty shotgun and my service piece and toss them into the sea. I’ll be gone and those guns should see the ocean bottom with me. Your brother would be better served by dull butter knives and the need to settle down and read books before he decides to get his blood up.”
Felecia let her father’s words and warnings soak in and she remembered when he told her where in his vast study the cabinet for the armory was held. Near a season came and went between when the news of her father’s disappearance at sea as well as the death of her brother Bartholomew reached them and when Felecia finally managed to convey her father’s wishes regarding the estate armory.
Felecia was far too young to attempt to make good on her father’s request to her directly. Instead, she went to the one person in the house who had the power to do anything. Nana had Josephine collect the contents of the armory and had the whole lot taken into town to be sold off. Clarence was away the whole time and Nana handled him when he returned like she always had, she plied him with booze until he shut up about it and then harped at him until he was back on another voyage before he had time to do any real damage, either at the estate or down in the village.