Children of a New Earth Read Online Free PDF Page A

it’s inevitable.” There was a note of hysteria in her voice. “We haven’t got even half what we had at the beginning. And that was barely enough.”
    “Smoking more meat?” Isaiah Hall asked.
    “We stopped doing that years ago, for a reason,” she answered sharply. “It needs salt. We can’t get salt to preserve things anymore.”
    “So what do you suggest?” someone asked.
    “I don’t know, I don’t know,” she replied wringing her hands.
    “Leave it to the men, missy,” Liam O’Malley called. “We’ll hunt all winter, put fresh meat on your table every day.”
    Isaiah Hall scowled and glanced across the room at his daughter-in-law Jaime. A momentary silence fell. “Hunting in the dead of winter on the mountain is too dangerous,” Isaiah said coldly.
    Amy flushed, as did most in the room, at the reminder. She had been twelve the winter when Richard Hall had fallen to his death hunting bighorn sheep in the cliffs above the valley. That was the same winter her mother died.
    “Besides,” Isaiah went on, “more hunting means more ammo, and we ain’t got much of that left, either. I was hoping we could start relying on the deadfall traps this year, but I don’t relish checking them in deep winter.”
    “I remember a time when we could just run down to the Get-N-Go and buy a stack of deer slugs,” Horace said.
    “Well, why don’t you just run down and get us some then?” Liam O’Malley jeered. “And pick me up some whiskey while you’re at it.” His two sons laughed loudly at their father.
    “That may be our only option,” Amos said. “It may be time to send an expedition down to see what remains of society and find supplies.” He stood quickly. “For the moment, orders stand. Everyone gets a share of the remaining meat. Make the most of it. The council will consider this situation some more and get back to you. Remember, ladies and gentlemen, that we are still in a state of war. Keep your calm and keep your discipline. That’s all for now.” He banged the gavel again and the meeting was over.
     
    “And that is how the infidel nearly ended the centuries-long role of white man’s glorious civilization,” Minister Posch panted. He wiped ineffectively at his brow with a dull white handkerchief.
    It had been quite a lecture. Even the youngest of the children knew it well enough. They had heard it from every one of their teachers in one form or another. Their parents told them about the collapse on long, winter nights by the wood stove.
    Today, however, Posch had put an even greater zeal into it. Their current plight, coupled with the possibility of an expedition out of the valley, had no doubt fueled it. He had gone to great lengths to impress on them how corrupt society had become. Racial mingling, women’s liberation, even rights for perverts and deviants were all considered progress. Such a society sowed the seeds of its own destruction.
    The Aryan Nations had already been busy countering these menaces. They were recruiting and pulling together people ready and willing to fight for their religion, their race, and their moral values.
    Then America made its fatal mistake. It allowed itself to become involved with the infidel. Muslim states had held the United States hostage with oil for years. They had destroyed the World Trade Center in one of the worst attacks on the American people.
    Even in face of all this, America tried for peace. America fought to give the Muslim people the freedom Americans had long possessed, overthrowing dictators in Iraq and Iran. What thanks did that earn for the United States? More hatred, more terrorist attacks.
    Finally, the ultimate retribution: a nuclear bomb set off in downtown Chicago. Millions killed in one fell attack. If ever there was a time to repay hatred with hatred, it was then.
    The Nations and many others had done so. America would have been—could have been—cleansed. The dangerous element within could have been eliminated. The