Hudson’s crew played bowls in the dell. Friend, they were wasted. They pounded their keg, ale after ale, a spent barrel slept in a ditch next to the live one. Somehow Van Winkle was there too. He lay passed out cold under an elm with daisies strewn about his head and body haphazardly like they were torn from the ground and dumped on him by a drunk person, which, of course, they were.

His hound, curled next to him and pressed against his thigh, snored through the racket of the tiny men. They stood the height of children but filled their breeches and waistcoats like full-grown men. They wore an air of malice. I feared a chance to encounter them alone on the lane late at night after last call. They sang bawdy songs about lasses and stockades and quarter-horses. Those songs could make a soldier blush.

In the fast-fading twilight, in the glade brightened by lanterns, they began to brawl. Someone cheated at bowls or offered some slight, meant in jest or maybe with the intention of this reaction. Possibly the men just liked to fight. Four or five of them jumped two others. The rest quickly joined in. Hands and feet swung, Bones cracked, and the wounded cursed. I worried someone might die.

I rose from my hiding place and shouted “Stop!” A bright flash stunned my eyes and the world disappeared. I heard no sounds, no cussing, no moaning from the injured, the bugs and birds fell silent. As my eyes reacclimated to the dark, I saw the lanterns, the men, the kegs, even Van Winkle and his dog were gone. I stood alone in the dark. A stench of sulfur filled the air.  

The next day, Van Winkle didn’t show up at church, and he wasn’t at home either. When he failed to open his shop on Monday, his brother rounded up men to search the mountain. “Possibly his flintlock backfired, and ol’ Rip lay injured in the woods.” I feigned illness knowing they wasted their time.

No one ever found Rip, his dog, or any trace of a gathering in the dell. That was ten years ago. Van Winkle never turned up. He’s gone from this world. I never told my story. I know how blame gets misplaced when the facts don’t add up. I doubted anyone would believe the enchanted story from my night on the mountain.

~ ~ ~

Last week at my writers’ group, the assigned prompt was to write a story about a ‘colonial monster’ such as the Headless Horseman. A well-drawn and well-written adaptation of Rip Van Winkle was one of my kids’ favorite bedtime stories growing up. I wanted to pay tribute to the tale with my own take on the story.

Original photo by August Phlieger on Unsplash