“Prentice Elmore Dashwood, one of Sir Frank's many descendants, left England in 1921. He opened a haberdashery in Albany, New York, made bundles of money, and eventually retired.”
“That's it?”
“During his years in America, Dashwood wrote and self-published dozens of pamphlets, one of which recounted tales of his great-great-great-something, Sir Francis Dashwood the Second.”
“And the other pamphlets?” If I didn't ask, this would take forever.
“You name it. The song lines of the Australian Aboriginals. The oral traditions of the Cherokee. Camping. Fly- fishing. Greek mythology. A brief ethnography of the Carib Indians. Prentice was quite the Renaissance man. He penned three booklets and several articles that focused exclusively on the Appalachian Trail. Apparently Big P was a real mover in getting the trail started back in the twenties.”
Oh? A mecca for hikers and trekkers, the AT starts at Mount Katahdin in Maine and runs along the Appalachian ridgeline to Springer Mountain in Georgia. Much of the trail lies in the Great Smoky Mountains. Including Swain County.
“Are you still there?”
“I'm here. Did Dashwood spend time here in North Carolina?”
“He wrote five pamphlets on the Great Smokies.” I heard paper rustle. “Trees. Flowers. Fauna. Folklore. Geology.”
I remembered Anne's tale of her visit to West Wycombe, pictured the caves under the H&F house.
“What else did you find out about Prentice Dashwood?”
“Not a thing. But I can tell you that old Uncle Francis hung with a wild crowd back in the eighteenth century. Called themselves the Monks of Medmenham. Listen to the list. Lord Sandwich, who at one point commanded the Royal Navy, John Wilkes—”
“The politician?”
“Yep. William Hogarth, the painter, and poets Paul Whitehead, Charles Churchill, and Robert Lloyd.”
“Impressive roster.”
“Very. Everyone was a member of Parliament or the House of Lords. Or a poet or whatever. Our own Ben Franklin dropped in now and then, though he was never an official member.”
“What did these guys do?”
“Some accounts claim they engaged in satanic rites. According to the current Sir Francis, author of the booklet we picked up on our trip, the monks were just jolly fellows who got together to celebrate Venus and Bacchus. I take that to mean women and wine.”
“They held wild parties in the caves?”
“And at Medmenham Abbey. The current Sir Francis admits to his ancestor's sexual frolics but denies the devil worship. He suggests the satanism rumor came from the boys' somewhat irreverent attitude toward Christianity. They also referred to themselves as the Knights of Saint Francis, for example.”
I could hear her biting an apple, then chewing.
“Everyone else called them the Hell Fire Club.”
The name hit me like a sledgehammer.
“What did you say?”
“The Hell Fire Club. Big in Ireland in the 1730s and 1740s. Same deal. Overprivileged devos mocking religion and getting drunk and laid.”
Anne had a way of cutting to the quick.
“There were attempts to suppress the clubs, but they weren't effective. When Dashwood gathered his little group of philanderers, the label Hell Fire naturally transferred.”
Hell Fire. H&F.
I swallowed.
“How long is this booklet?”
“Thirty-four pages.”
“Can you fax me a copy?”
“Sure. I can get two pages on one sheet.”
I gave her the number and went back to my report, forcing myself to concentrate. Within minutes the fax rang, screeched, and bonged, then began to spit out pages. I stayed with my description of Edna Farrell's facial trauma. Some time later the machine reengaged. Again, I resisted the impulse to rush to it and gather Anne's pages.
When I'd completed the Farrell report, I began another, a million thoughts screaming for ascendancy. Though I tried to focus, images broke through again and again.
Primrose Hobbs. Parker Davenport. Prentice Dashwood. Sir Francis. The Hell Fire Club. H&F. Was anything connected? The evidence was growing. There must be a connection.
Had Prentice Dashwood rekindled his ancestor's idea of an elitistboys' club here in the Carolina mountains? Had the members been more than hedonistic dilettantes? How much more? I pictured the cut marks, suppressed a
