The nightmare started almost immediately after Ike McSwain closed his eyes for the night. He probably could have forced himself awake again but he really didn’t want to right then—the beginning of the terror was always so nice. He liked that part of the dream. If it could go on forever, he wouldn’t have minded one bit—in fact he’d be happy to spend the rest of his days in that part of the dream.

It always seemed funny to him, in his waking moments, how the dream had some things that were from his past—the orphanage for one, but had just as many things that were so totally wrong—but felt so right.

For one thing he had hair and more importantly a voice! Since he’d been sick long before his parents had been murdered, he wasn’t sure how either of these was possible but it really hadn’t mattered. In the dream, he was whole—and popular.

~~

His circle of friends included people who were remarkably like the other riders of the Sweetwater station even though he hadn’t known anyone but Buck Cross at the orphanage and Buck wasn’t one of the boys he had as friends in the dream. When he thought about the dream, while he was awake, he had come to think this inconsistency, like the hair and the voice, were part of his mind’s way of making the rest of the nightmare even more terrifying. He was without the one person he knew beyond question was his friend and those he thought of as friends . . . well they proved differently.

In the dream segment, Ike and the others lived as good a life as one without parents and living in an orphanage run by some of the strictest nuns in the world could live. They went to church and to classes and in these Ike found enjoyment. Being able to recite the names of the presidents or the times tables without error and earning the approval of even Sister Mary Francis Ann was something really special—something he’d not experienced in “real” life.

As the dream progressed his circle of friends had grown to include someone most of the others hadn’t liked at first. Ike felt sorry for one in particular, a boy slightly younger than the rest by the name of James Carlton.

“I remember what it was like right after my Ma and Pa and little sister got killed,” Ike informed his friends. “I was awful lonely and didn’t feel like I belonged anywhere. You guys made me feel real good and I want to do the same for James.”

After a while the others had accepted James on Ike’s say-so and he had become one of the “inner circle.” James hadn’t made it easy. He often skipped his chores, forcing the others to do them for him—or face the wrath of Sister David Mary the Mother Superior of the school. The rest of the gang had complained to Ike about James more than once but Ike always convinced them to give the boy “one more chance.”

Then Ike had found—actually was found by—the old mountain man in the cave.

~~

The legends about the old man had been whispered for years among the older children at the orphanage—and had been used to terrify those much younger. It was said that he’d been known to kidnap young boys and turn them into slaves. Those who wouldn’t work for him, those “in the know” stated emphatically, were killed and then eaten!

Will, the boy who reminded Ike of Cody, testified that a friend of his had known a boy who went missing just a few years earlier—before the others had come to the orphanage. “When the sheriff and the search party finally found Martin,” Will told them his friend had said, “he was in such a state that the sisters had had to call for the doctor to come and take him away again.” Will continued in a hushed voice, “They said he was in a hospital back East but he ain’t never spoke again—except in some kind of weird talk.”

Ike was skeptical of the stories. He couldn’t really believe that a boy-eating man lived in the woods and the sheriff had never gone out to track him down. Still none of them ever tested the theory by going into the woods alone—until the night of the big storm.

Booming thunder and daylight-bright lightning had terrified the two old horses the nuns kept in a rundown old barn behind the school. One particularly loud boom had driven the old pair into such a frenzy that they had knocked down the corral and run off.

Not considering the consequences, Ike started out to find the horses without telling anyone else he was going. What he found had been problems bigger than he could handle on his own. A bolt of lightning hit a tree in the path in front of him and, before he knew it, he was trapped under the heavy branches.

He’d tried yelling for help but the storm was still too fierce and the school too far away for anyone to help him—or so he thought.

Ike screamed again as a hulking figure came into his line of vision. Another flash of lightning had revealed the figure to be a man dressed in buckskin and carrying a pack of furs over his shoulder.

“Hush, boy, I ain’t gonna hurt ya,” a voice rusty from disuse said. The man’s face was covered with a bushy beard now soaked through from the rain. His stringy hair fell past his shoulders. In daylight he would be a frightening site but in the dark and the rain—and in the position Ike was in, the man was totally terrifying.

However, Ike wasn’t stupid. He knew he needed help and, right at that moment, the man was the only source of help in sight. “I’m stuck,” he whimpered.

“I kin see that, boy,” the man replied. “Ya think anythin’ is broke?”

“Don’t think so,” Ike admitted. “But I can’t move my legs.”

“Tha’s cuz ya got this here big tree on ‘em.”

The man contemplated the tree for a few minutes, then moved out of Ike’s sight. Ike whimpered again, fearful that the man had decided to leave him behind. Relief flooded through him as the shadow returned, this time carrying a length of tree branch that was used to lift the tree and free his legs.

~~

At this point the dream seems to fast-forward a bit. One minute it’s raining and he’s trapped, the next it’s months later and he and the old man are fast friends. Bret, as the old man asked to be called, had made only one request of Ike. He made him promise never to tell anyone about their friendship—ever!

Ike had sworn his agreement and had been true to his word but as the months progressed he had convinced Bret to at least let him tell a few of his friends about the man. “They’re my best friends. You can trust them, Bret,” he’d promised. “They won’t ever give you away.”

The old man considered the idea carefully. He knew how hard it was for the boy to keep his secret. He also knew how much he’d come to enjoy the boy’s companionship. “Ah shoot, boy, I know ya’d like for your friends to come with ya but, dang it, Ike, I kinda like my privacy. Ya know what I mean?”

Noticing the boy’s disappointed look, Bret relented a bit. “Tell ya what, ya kin tell ‘em you met me if ya think they can be trusted, but don’t go telling ‘em where I am.” He continued giving just a little more. “I’ll teach ya things and ya kin teach ‘em to your friends.”

Ike agreed readily. Bret was his friend and he had given his word—a word he would never break—but secretly he was hopeful, as time passed, Bret would agree to meet with his friends and teach them directly.

His friends were amazed but believed Ike when he told them about Bret. They didn’t quite understand why they couldn’t meet with the old man but trusted their friend and agreed to never tell anyone anything unless they were told it was okay.

Ike brought James into the “teaching” group with them even though the others tried to convince him that the boy wouldn’t be able to keep quiet and they didn’t want him to ruin anything. “He’s my friend, too,” Ike reminded them. “Just like you guys are. I trust him.”

~~

A bout of influenza in the early winter brought a new batch of orphans to the school. James struck up friendship with a couple of the new boys. Before long they were very close—so close that Ike began to reconsider his trust in the younger boy. By then it was too late to go back though so Ike could only hope James would keep his word.

As usual, the story of the murderous mountain man made the rounds in the darkened dormitory. One of the older new kids, a boy named Charles, had scoffed at the notion.

“I saw him once,” he declared.

Startled, Ike had almost given away his carefully held secret. “When’d you meet B . . . him?” he asked Charles.

“Uhhh, it was a long time ago,” the boy responded. “I was just a little kid. I got lost in the woods and just when I thought I was gonna be lost forever this old man scares the livin’ daylights outa me. He chased me through the woods till I thought my legs was going to fall off. But I outrun him.”

Looking around carefully, Charles checked to see that everyone was paying attention to him. “My Pa reported him to the sheriff but by the time they got back to where I was, he was gone and no one could track him.”

He gave the others a chance to absorb what he had said and then concluded in a hushed whisper. “I’m gonna find him again one of these days,” he vowed.

“You really think you can find him if the sheriff couldn’t? Especially if he don’t want you to find him?” Ike asked. Something about Charles’ story didn’t seem right. The man he spoke of sounded nothing like the Bret Ike knew.

“I’m gonna find him,” Charles declared.

~~

The dream fast-forwarded again to spring. Throughout the winter months Ike hadn’t had a chance to spend any time with Bret. He was afraid he might leave tracks in the snow and that Charles would follow them.

As soon as the trail cleared of snow, Ike set off alone to find his friend. They spent most of the afternoon together sharing tails of the events of the past winter.

Working up his courage, Ike finally asked Bret about Charles. “He says you chased him through the woods but he was able to run faster than you.”

“I ‘member a boy gettin’ lost a few years back,” Bret mused. “He tripped on somethin’ and knocked hisself right out. I carried him back to the edge of the woods and waited until someone come and found him. He couldn’ta run from me cuz he wasn’t even awake.”

~~

“What’re you doin’ here?” Charles asked, meeting Ike as he came out of the forest.

“None of your business,” Ike replied shouldering his way past the other boy.

“He’s probably looking for the mountain man,” one of the other boys snickered.

The group followed him back to the orphanage, taunting him all the way.

“You better watch out Ike,” one boy teased. “There ain’t enough meat on your bones to make much of a meal.”

“Yeah,” another added. “But the old man is probably hungry after a long winter!”

~~

Over the next few days, Charles and his pals took delight in harassing Ike at every opportunity. Surprisingly—to Ike at least—James and his new friends sided with Charles. The other boys Ike had trusted with his secret wanted him to put an end to it by just telling the bullies that he not only knew Bret but knew he wasn’t the way they thought.

Ike, however, decided he had to keep his word to Bret—no matter what else happened. He ignored the boys and their taunts but grew angrier as the days went by. He didn’t dare go back to talk to Bret, he was never let alone long enough to slip away and didn’t want to lead the others to his friend.

Finally one day he’d had enough. A remark from Charles about how that old mountain man must be mighty hungry since none of the boys had been in the woods for a long time triggered an angry retort.

“Bret isn’t a killer and he never chased you!” he yelled at the other boy. “You knocked yourself out and if Bret hadn’t found you, you’d have died! He saved your life!”

Charles was stunned for a moment but recovered quickly. “You don’t know nothin’ ‘bout nothin’,” he shouted back. “I was there and you don’t know what happened so just shut your mouth!”

“How’d you know his name is Bret?” James asked with a feigned innocence.

“He saved my life last fall in that big thunderstorm,” Ike retorted. “We’ve been friends ever since.”

“Anyone else seen this ‘Bret’?” Charles countered, looking at Ike’s friends.

Regretfully they all shook their heads. “But he taught Ike how to do things and Ike showed us,” one told them. “Ike wouldn’t know how to do them by himself so Bret must have taught him.”

“But we don’t know that for sure,” James protested. “He could have figured it out somehow before he taught us. He doesn’t have to have known the mountain man to do some of the things he showed us.”

~~

That’s when the dream turns full swing to a nightmare. One after another the boys start yelling for Ike to give them proof that Bret was real and that he knew him. They surrounded him pushing him from one side to the other and demanding answers. Even his best friends either joined in or backed away completely, leaving Ike to his tormentors.

“TELL US!” they screamed. “PROVE IT, LIAR!!”

James began the chant, “Ike is a liar!” and soon the others joined in.

Ike shook his head in denial. “I’m not a liar!” he shouted.

~~

“Ike!?” Buck shook him gently. “Wake up, Ike.”

Ike woke with a start, his hands automatically coming up to protect himself. I’m not a liar! he signed rapidly.

“Who said you were a liar?” Buck demanded.

Ike shook himself completely awake. Buck waited patiently until his friend gathered himself together.

“Who said you were a liar?” the Kiowa repeated softly.

It’s nothing, Ike responded. I was just having a nightmare.

Buck sat with his friend until Ike had his emotions under control again.

“Want to talk about it?” he asked.

Ike hesitated. Finally, with encouragement from Buck, he told the story of his dream.

“Too bad I wasn’t in the dream,” Buck told him confidently. “I’d have believed you!”

I don’t think so, Ike signed sadly. None of my friends did.

“Then they weren’t really your friends,” Buck declared. “I am. And I always will be.”

Deep down Ike knew it was true. No matter what, he knew he could count on Buck to be there when everyone else turned away. He only hoped he could show the same level of friendship in return.

The pair sat side by side until Ike decided he would try to sleep again.

Thank you, he signed.

“For what?” Buck asked. “You’d do the same for me—wouldn’t you?” he teased.

In a heartbeat! Ike signed solemnly. In a heartbeat.

~~