Chapter Five
Sophie shook her head. “I’ve heard of this supposed treasure all my life but I never heard how it got here in the first place. And how it's tied to our family.”
Smokey snorted, then he sat forward in his chair, telling her the story of the old pirate and the family, “Shortly after we first came here, we found out the land here was taken over by pirates for a time. You know, like buccaneer stuff.” He shrugged, then said, “But sweet Jesus, we came here thirty years ago, me and four other guys. When we settled here, we dismissed all the rumors as just that...rumors. I figured that even though there could have been pirates docking at the coast here, our land isn’t necessarily where they were or where they kept treasure either. ”
Samson chuckled. “Yeah, then we found some old pictures on the net showing us that this place had an old house and outbuildings. It was called The Nest.”
Asa nodded. “Yeah, what a fucking silly name. We kept most of that and built our clubhouse here. Then every so often those rumors would circulate again and some people actually came here looking for some long-lost Russian treasure that they figured they could cash in on.”
Sophie looked around the room. “But who kept those rumors alive for so long?”
Asa snorted. “There’s only one man that remembered them and that would be our town’s historian, Amos Litchner. He thought he knew everything there was to know about Boondock Creek. Hell, he probably even remembered how this little hole in the wall got its name.”
Sophie looked over at Miss Amy and whispered, “Your Amos?”
Miss Amy looked disgusted and nodded her head. “Yes, that Amos. He came here looking for the treasure but he never found it. He would go on what he said were round-about walks every so often. But these trips were his way of searching the entire mountain, looking for the damn gold.”
Asa glanced at Mad Dog then back to Miss Amy.
“He even took Miss Amy’s last name Litchner, so he could claim the gold if he ever found it.
We came to learn only recently that he also used her name to hide out from people coming after him for his other business.
The one where he conned people. His real name is Amos Blackwell and he’s wanted in several other states for playing his games with the courts. ”
Smokey cleared his throat and said, “You might not know it but the family’s real last name of Litchnerkoff.
But that’s the name old Oleg was born under, he changed it to Litchner when he tried to set this place up.
People were still looking for the old pirate and he couldn’t exactly tell him who he was, could he?
He would have to answer for the deaths aboard his ship and he skipped out on that part when he came here.
That old man docked in South Carolina about a hundred fifty years ago and then disappeared with the treasure he was bringing over from the homeland near Mosco, Russia.
He was bringing over a high society family named Mrishnakov, some shirttail relation to the Tzar Nickolas.
The only thing is once the boat left Russia, the Mrishnakov family never made it to the New World’s shores.
There were rumors that the family was murdered on the high seas, but there were also rumors they fell ill with fever and they all died on the Litchnerkoff ship.
Oleg Litchnerkoff knew he couldn’t answer for what happened, so he left his ship in the dock at South Carolina.
Then he took a smaller boat and disappeared into the mountains. No one ever found the treasure or him.”
Sophie frowned and asked, “And how do you know all that?”
Smokey smiled. “There’s a lot to those rumors and there are people in this town that still look for that Russian treasure.
It had been what led the Hell’s Sinners here again.
We did find out that’s what brought them here in the first place, twenty something years ago.
” He shook his head, “We found out later that after all this time, Amos was the one that started those rumors time and time again, hoping to spark someone into looking for the treasure. Then of course, he was going to swoop in and claim it after the fact.”
“He was responsible for the deaths of my men when the Hell’s Sinners MC attacked us that first time.” Asa growled. “Then he set us again twenty years later. And he didn’t get what he wanted either time.”
Smokey sighed and shook his head. “He caused the deaths of more than just our men. Like Cheyenne’s mother.
They believed she knew where that treasure was and they killed her because she wouldn’t tell them anything.
To those looking for it, it is very real and just the hint of gold is something that fires their blood with the hope of real wealth unlike anything they have ever known before.
I read up on this bit of history years back before the internet was such a big deal.
The Mrishnakov family was very real and as second cousins to the Tzar of old Russia they would have been very wealthy.
Then having to start over in the New World, they would have brought their jewels, gold and any kind of luxury items they had with them.
” He crossed his arms over his chest. “And that’s what brought Amos Blackwell to our little part of the world and he’d been setting up any kind of trap to find that gold all these years. ”
Miss Amy nodded. “So now you know that the gold doesn’t really belong to the family. We can’t lay claim to something that doesn’t belong to us.”
Sophie shook her head. “Yes, I get that but dad will never believe this story.”
“He doesn’t have to believe it,” Miss Amy said, shaking her head.
“That’s just the history of how the gold supposedly ended up here in the first place.
No one else has ever found any part of that treasure though.
” Miss Amy looked over at Cheyenne and shook her head, “Except maybe one woman. Cheyenne’s mom found a piece of it but like Smokey told you, it cost her life.
” She sighed hard. “Twenty years ago, when Amos told that dirty MC about the gold, they came here to run these men out of the home they had built here. Asa had a woman back then. Her name was Georgia. She used to walk this mountain with her dog most days after work. She didn’t hurt anything and as long as the dog was with her, Asa knew she was safe.
One day, she brought something back with her and she knew she had to keep it hidden.
That was the day the other MC came here looking for trouble. ”
“They found it, didn't they?” Asa shook his head then turned and told Sophie, “They found trouble but so did we. We fought for our home and we lost four men but the Hell’s Sinners lost nine. They retreated and didn’t come back, well not until recently that is.
Amos kept going to bars in nearby towns talking about the treasure again and that brought the Sinners back to cause more trouble.
He told them the gold was right here under our feet.
They came back and again, tried to take this place from us but we were able to stop them cold this time.
Then we caught Amos and he finally ran out of places to hide.
We brought in the cops and they were finally able to find records of everything he’d done wrong.
That old man will die behind bars for his crimes now and rightly so.
Justice will finally hold his dumb ass accountable. ”
Sophie sat quietly for a moment then she looked over at Miss Amy. “This is so unreal, isn’t it? The whole family has gone nuts over something they believe belongs to us because some ancestor of ours might have stolen it from someone else.”
Miss Amy nodded. Our grandfather tried to tell Simon that years ago but he didn’t hear it, wouldn’t hear it because he wanted that gold more than he wanted his family.
To Simon, the old pirate did the right thing when he stole that other family’s wealth.
He figured the old pirate did the right thing back then by bringing the gold here and claiming it for himself.
But he didn’t reason the old pirate had to lie and cheat to get that gold and he never realized that even if he got that gold he couldn’t spend it.
That gold is a national treasure to the whole of Russia.
If it is here, it belongs to them not us and if he started living rich and the gold was traced back to him, he would have to answer for having it.
That would bring the world to his front door and Simon never would have answered for what he did.
If he tried to cash in on that treasure, he would have found himself sitting in a cell anyway. ”
Sophie shook her head. “Dad always chased the get rich schemes rather than put in the work to get an honest job and work for a living. Neither him or Emma worked a job in their lives. He made my mom work while he sat home on his dumb ass and as soon as Emma could, she got married and had Patsy. Her daughter gave her the excuse she needed to stay home while her husband worked his fingers to the bone to afford her kept lifestyle. When he finally had enough, he walked out on her and left Patsy behind. Yes, she made him pay child support alright but he only paid until that girl was eighteen. Then he was finally free to live his own life. Emma wanted him to pay alimony for the rest of her life but the judge saw right through that too. He paid her thousands for the first year, then she had to get a job to pay her own way.” She shook her head.
“I had to find work when I was fourteen to help mom pay the bills. Back then, I had to hand him half my check, but when I was seventeen, Mom died and after that, he took every penny.”
“Well, those days are over now.” Miss Amy patted her hand. “Now your dad and your sister are behind bars and I have a feeling they won’t be out anytime soon.”
“Thank God for that,” Jolene commented.