Author Description

Picture a steamboat plowing down the Missouri River in the dead of night, a full moon above and artillery shells bursting close alongside: This is the Mary Ann, a rebel steamboat loaded with a secret shipment of gold to help finance the South's war against the Union. Sadly for the Rebel cause, she takes a direct hit and explodes in a cloud of super-heated steam. The crux of the story is that history knew nothing about the gold, until an old diary was unearthed 150 years later. With possibility of gold revealed, the search for the Mary Ann took on the character of an old-time gold rush. Well, what else would you expect? What no one did expect was the ghost of the little ten-year-old girl who went down with the boat. Ah yes, life is full of surprises. Likewise, the story's ending.