She is called Mad, her given name is Madelyn. At age six, her parents were killed in an Indian raid just after they settled in an unnamed Oklahoma township. They had a small farm outside the community. There was no protection against Indian raids, a band of renegade Indians came in the early dawn and attacked. Mad's parents hid her in the farm's camouflaged root cellar; the Indians never found her. Her mother left the cellar to join the fight and the massacre was soon over.

A couple of nasty vagrant brothers had found her while searching the burned out farm for anything that would be of use to them. The two boys were young homeless teenagers traveling around by themselves, surviving as best they could. The Civil War had taken their parents in General Sherman's march through the South. Their family was Hillbilly, they had no schooling at all and were totally ignorant of ciphering and reading. Mad was educationally much better off. Her parents had taught her how to read and write at the age of four and read many books out loud. She really missed the books her parents had in their book shelves.

Mad's life had been a living hell, with the brothers having their way with her from the time after they picked her out of the cellar. They made her do unspeakable things to them. She was literally their sex and work slave. When she rebelled against them they beat and tortured her until she had to do what they required or die.

Soon she was so cowed that they began to trust her. Mad learned how to get people's attention while her "brothers" stole from them. They successfully pilfered homes and shops they came upon in their travels. For some reason, probably fear, the brothers never used guns to get what they stole. One day, they came to a ranch house. It was a nice place and the owners had probably gone to a nearby city for the day. They found all kinds of valuable things in the huge cabin. They stole jewelry and other small articles and loaded it up in some nice saddlebags that they came upon. As Mad was looking through a bedroom, she found a double revolver and holster set. She strapped them on under her coat and picked up many boxes of bullets that were sitting by them. She thought that they would be valuable.

Going outside she found that the boys had saddled up some sleek horses they had found in the huge barn. They had a pack mule loaded up with their loot and were ready to leave. Leaving their old tired horses at the ranch, they rode out of there quickly. She now had a nice horse for herself; she had always ridden double with one of the boys.

They rode into the hills for two days, only stopping now and then to let the horses graze a bit and get water. Finally they stopped, Jeb, the oldest boy, said, "Wa'll camp ere fer th' night." The sun was just setting in the rugged mountains they'd entered. Mad hid her guns under her new bedroll. They were hers and she would keep them a secret as long as possible. The boys were too beat to mess with her that night.

As Mad lay down; her head hit the hidden guns under the bedroll. She thought, 'I hate them. I'm going to kill them'. She reached under the bedroll feeling the comforting presence of the pistols and fell asleep.

The next morning Jeb and his younger brother Andy had their nasty way with her. She vowed that is was the last time. Of course she was their cook, camp cleaner, fire watcher, and washer woman. As always, the boys played as she worked her fingers to the bone. Somehow she managed to keep her secret of the side arms.

They continued heading west crossing over into Louisiana. The next day they came upon a town. "Holt on ere, we all can't go rid'n in thar on these ere hosses." Jeb told them. They were resting on a high hill looking down into the valley at the small town.

"What'er we gon'ta do, Jeb? " Andy asked his brother.

"We need coffee, flour, bacon, jerky, and regular meal stuff." Mad told them.

"Ya, I knowd. Ya'll been complainen and naggin about thet fer days." Jeb shook his long mess of hair and beard.

"Wall, what'er we gonna do?" Andy whined, picking at his nose.

"Shet yer trap! I be thinken on it." Jeb was silent a moment scratching under his beard. Then he turned to Mad, "Yer jus gonna hav ta stay with th hosses." He looked at his brother. "We'll go down yonder to thet town and git us some vittles." With that they both climbed down from their mounts and gave the rains to Mad. They left, trudging down the hill. Jeb was fingering some of the cash in his pocket that they had stolen from the ranch.

Mad watched them until they were out of sight. She sighed as she dismounted and led the horses to a grove of oak trees to graze on the fallen acorns below them.

She had been resting, watching the horses almost an hour, when she had a sudden thought, 'What the heck am I doing? I have the horses and the guns. I can just light out of here. I am done being their slave.' Mad gathered the horses and hitched a rope on each of them. She loaded the gear from the mule to the boy's horses and shooed the mule away. Mounting her horse,leading the others, she headed out across the hills away from the town and her tormentors. Heading northwest and riding all day, she kept her trail hidden by keeping her horses on game paths and walking them in streams when she came upon them. The next day she was off early and continued as before covering her tracks as much as possible. Whenever she got to a hill top, she studied her back trail constantly looking to see if anybody was following her. No one appeared to be on her trail.

On the third day Mad came to a small lake. She decided to set up camp. "Well, I better learn how to use these guns." She strapped the double holsters around her waist. She filled up the belt with bullets and checked the pistols to see if their spin bullet chambers were loaded. They were the newest revolving six-bullet 44/40 repeaters.

Mad had come across plenty of game in her travel. "I guess that I'll have to shoot my dinner. I'm tired of this old jerky." She talked aloud a lot, keeping herself company. She had never let herself fall into the hillbilly slang of the brothers. She always spoke in the good and proper English that her parents had taught her. That was probably one of the reasons that Jeb and Andy had treated her so cruelly. They had told her many times, "Yer was jest uppity and y'all er' too good fer the likes of usuns." They were right. She laughed at the thought.

The double holsters were heavy and they kept slipping down her thin hips. Finally she took them off and put one Colt 44 in her big coat pocket. She wanted some fresh meat. Her mouth watered at the thought of it. She made sure the horses were tied up. Then she started her hunt. Watching the boys when they hunted, she'd leaned to walk quietly. She spotted a cottontail rabbit. Pulling out her pistol Mad aimed and then pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. She looked at the pistol. She pointed the gun away from her and pulled at the trigger several times with the same results. It wouldn't fire. Mad examined it carefully. Then she remembered that the boys had to cock their hunting rifles to fire them. She had never been allowed to fire the rifles.

Spying another rabbit Mad pulled the hammer back with her left hand while aiming and pulling the trigger with her right. BANG! She found herself laying on her butt from the recoil of the weapon! Her ears were ringing from the loud explosion of the pistol going off. She began to stand up, as she did so, the automatic cocking mechanism that worked on recoil went into action and she accidentally pulled the trigger again. BANG! This time dropping the gun. It landed on the ground at her feet without going off.

Mad bent down and picked it up. She noticed that the hammer was cocked. She kept her finger off the trigger as she didn't want it going off accidentally. Mad thought about it a moment and carefully put her thumb on the hammer handle. Nothing happened. She held the pistol pointing at the ground and balanced it in her left hand with her finger in the trigger guard. She held the hammer in with her right hand and pulled the trigger. She felt the mechanism release and slowly put the hammer back down without the bullet going off. "Whew, that was scary," she told herself.

Mad looked up for the first time to see if she had hit the rabbit; she had closed her eyes in reflex when the pistol first went off. She saw a bloody mess. She walked over and looked down at her kill. She had blown the rabbit's head to bits! Mad picked up the dead animal and took it back to her camp keeping it away from her clothing. She didn't want blood on her already dirty cloths. Thinking of this she was glad the camp was by the little lake.

Quickly finding a hunting knife in the camp cooking gear she skinned, cleaned, and cut the rabbit up for cooking. She put wood on the fire and placed a frying pan with some lard in it and began to cook a breakfast of fried rabbit. The sun was shining warmly and she shed the big coat. Keeping an eye on the cooking rabbit, she pulled the pistol from the coat's pocket and put it back in its holster. Then she remembered to reload the bullets that had been used and put it back fully loaded into its holster.

The aroma of the cooking rabbit was making her mouth water. Turning the rabbit over in the pan, Mad found that it was almost fully cooked. She let it cook a moment more and then took the pan off the fire. Taking a pinch of salt from the salt bag, Mad sprinkled her cooked meat. She sat back against a large rock that was near the lake and started eating from the pan. Finishing the meal she threw the bones into the lake. She smiled and lay back in the warm autumn sun. Mad closed her eyes in satisfaction and fell asleep.

It was about noon when Mad opened her eyes. She rose stiffly to her feet and stretched to get the kinks out. She looked at the horses. "I have to let you guys graze." She walked over to them. Untying them Mad led them to the water and let them drink their fill. Then putting them each on a rope she let them graze on the nice green grass of the lake's bank. They began to munch hungrily. She stretched her arms over her head and sniffed, "Boy, I stink". She stripped and went down into the mountain water. "Burrrrrrr" it was shockingly cold. Mad enjoyed splashing around and rubbed her self down, bathing in the lake. She came out and ran about in the warm sun drying her body off. She grabbed her dirty cloths and ran back into the lake and began scrubbing them. "I'll have to get some soap," she told herself as she worked cleaning her clothing. She came back on the shore and spread her clothing out on the grass to dry.

Mad found her only other set of pants and shirt. Just as she was about to put them on she realized that Mother Nature called. She took care of that business and got dressed quickly. She didn't have underwear to bother putting on.

She went back to the holsters and took both pistols out of them. Mad began to work on the belt to make it fit her and took the hunting knife and put another hole where it was needed. Mad buckled it back on her small hips and it fit. She put the pistols back in their holsters. "Boy, these are heavy." They slapped against her legs as she walked. Mad looked down and saw the leather strings hanging from them. She tied the holster bottoms to her legs. "I wondered what they were for." She walked around getting used to the heavy holsters on her hips. Somehow they began to feel comfortable. She felt good wearing them. She went over and turned over the drying clothes.

The next thing she did was check out the baggage that the horses had been carrying. She finally got it all laid out on the grass. "Holy cow, there is a lot of stuff here". There was a sack that had been quit heavy. She opened it and whistled as she dumped out gold coins and several rolls of hundred dollar bills. "Wow!" She shouted as and began excitedly to count the loot. "FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS!" She screamed jumping to her feet dancing around in joy.

There was another bag with jewelry there. She dumped it out and found gold, and silver jewel necklaces and rings. Mad tried them on. The rings were too big for her small fingers. She put on some earrings and a shining necklace. Then went over and picked up a hand mirror that was in the stuff. Gazing into it she saw how thin and bony her face was. Her blond hair was matted and stringy. But the jewelry was pretty as it sparkled in the late sun. She went back to the loot and picked up a hair brush and began brushing out her hair. These were some of the things that she had stuffed in the bag from the upstairs bedroom. Mad didn't know at the time why she took them, now glad she had.

Suddenly there was a shout a guy stepped quickly out of the woods! "Woowee!" He screamed running wildly towards her. She quickly grabbed a pistol from her holster, bracing herself against the recoil, she pulled back the hammer. He almost reached her when she shot him in the face! He dropped dead at her feet. She stepped quickly back from the bloody mess. She had killed her first man! Mad was only eleven years old.