Chapter Two
River Rage.
I had outrun the twister. It hadn’t been so difficult. Twisters don’t actually move very fast. This one hadn’t anyway. I had been going in a different direction, some of the time and some of the time I hadn’t.
I found the diner; which to say the least was a tad scruffy. Bit of a ‘greasy spoon’ to be honest. There was a certain amount of spitting and a fight or two, nothing serious. I didn’t even bother to get out of my chair which just shows I’m not myself right now.
I make up my mind I wouldn’t be returning. I have other plans. I’m not certain they are sensible but for now; they will do. Tomorrow I intend to get supplies, I have no idea where from, and I would move myself into the solitude of the Plainsman for a week or two, maybe less, maybe longer. When I am ready; I will return to the two old railway carriages in Little Petrock that I call home.
In my late teens I had commandeered the two ancient carriages on our farm and bit by bit I had managed to fashion my own bachelor pad.
When Jennifer suddenly left me; I took young Macdonald, my tiny son and the two of us moved in. I had lived in them previously of course and over the years they have become a cosy home. I have another home down on the quayside in Camelann, The Lighthousekeeper.
The Lighthousekeeper is my pub. Right now I have no interest in it. Lenny, my life-long buddy manages the place perfectly for me. It is in safe hands. Next to the Lighthousekeeper is Lost Souls Creek. Dusty runs his Sea-Bus business from the creek and it is fast becoming rather successful. Dusty keeps an eye on Lenny for me and Lenny keeps an eye on my younger brother in the same way.
I’m not certain I will ever take back the reins of the Lighthousekeeper. Jennifer and I had built up the reputation of the place; it had been at rock-bottom when we began; but now she has gone, it can never be the same. I am just not interested. It makes money, Lenny sees to that. It pays its way.
The old bloke at the gas station, my temporary landlord is good enough company but company is something I don’t need right now. To be fair; he’s a royal pain in the arse. I don’t need that either. He gives me the feeling I have an inferiority complex but I’m almost sure it is his own. He’s just trying to pass it on to me. Maybe it’s the other way around? Anyway, one of has one and the other one doesn’t.
“You sure you ain’t had a bump on the head feller” He had enquired when I told him of my plans.
“Might have. I might even have lost my memory, how would I know?”
“Beats me. Look youngster; that place is just falling down, turning to dust. It’s a ghost town. You can’t stay there even if you do own it.”
“We’ll see, I’ll give it a try. I’ll let you know if you’re right.”
The old bloke had directed me to the store Dusty and I had visited once before. I got everything I needed and once again I was In McCarthy City’s dusty main street.
The Plainsman’s interior has changed little. More dust, more cobwebs, more broken. Other than that; it is the same.
It still smells of Aunt Renee. I don’t mean that in any disrespectful way. It just feels as though she is still here although I know her to be in the tiny cemetery. I doubt she will ever be followed. My one regret is Dusty and I did not make it to the old girl’s funeral doings.
We hadn’t known anything about her death and our inheritance until the letters started coming from a
I stow my supplies in anything resembling cupboards and leave the fishing tackle at the door. The old git had insisted I bring it for emergencies, in case I run out of food. The way I see it; if I run out of food, fishing will not help me, if last time was anything to go by. But, you never know.
For now I store my beer supplies in the darkest coldest part of the old building but I know I’ll be drinking them warm unless I do my drinking in the early hours of the morning, when the temperature might dip below seventy-five degrees for a couple of hours.
I sleep pretty well in my sleeping-bag. I fry a decent breakfast over an open fire in the hearth. I am ready for action. First plan is to make something of a cooler for my food and more importantly for my beers. The stream is a hundred yards away at a rough guess and it is here I would have any chance of preserving my food. I get to work.
It is easy enough. I gather as many small rocks as I can find and put them to one side. Next I scour around for some larger ones. Four large slabs will be enough. I stand the larger slabs up in a square against each other. There bottoms are pushed into the stream bed. I use the smaller stones to help fill any spaces and muddy up the sides until there is hardly a gap. Next I place a large plastic bag inside and push the sides out to meet the slabs. The bag being an insulated one; would surely help my food to keep longer. I throw a loose plastic cover over the top of the bag to keep the sun off. I bring my beer supplies down and just simply put it all in the stream next to my food cooler. That’s it.
I collect the rod and some bait and I am once more ready to catch any fish stupid enough to let me catch it.
While I lay here on my elbows I suddenly realise if I am lucky enough to catch something; I would be sustaining my other supplies even longer. Gradually I decide I wouldn’t mind at all getting a bite. I take a lot more notice of the piece of cork than I had yesterday.
While I wait I decide to use a tad more of the stream-bed for something useful. I search for more stones, medium sized this time. When I have enough; I use them to section off a small and shallow section of the bank. I now have somewhere to keep any fish fresh and they can’t escape once caught. All I have to do now is catch them. It could be a long day.
The inevitable happens. Somehow I knew it would, which I suppose means the same thing. I watch the tiny ripples as they meander away from the cork and I know she is here again; somewhere close behind me is ‘spittin’ woman’. And for some unknown reason; I rather like the idea.
I turn my head slowly and can see absolutely nothing. The hot sun temporarily blinds me. It doesn’t damage my hearing.
“Fish man.”
“Not me, I don’t have any yet.”
“You won’t either, Brit.”
“What makes you say that?” I am asking a question of someone I still can’t see, though I have some memory of how she looked yesterday, which means nothing. She might be an Alien and can change her appearance at any given time.
Temporary aid appears. A single cloud that must have lost its way covers the powerful rays and she is silhouetted for a moment. She steps forward and down.
She is in pink and blue. She has on a pink shirt with cowboy frills at the edges. Her short slender legs are encased in paled Levi’s. Her long sleek, dark hair is pulled through a baseball cap and forms a loose pony-tail. She speaks like Miss Ellie.
I didn’t like
The wayward cloud still blots out the sun. She still hasn’t answered my question.
“So Yank, tell me why you think I won’t be catching any fish.”
“Easy, Brit, you didn’t bait your hook.”
I pull the line from the water and find she is perfectly correct, there is nothing. “How did you know? How long have you been here?” The float and line drift out into the centre of the water as we talk.
“Long enough to stock up on Water-melon seeds.”
“Are you gonna start spitting them things at me?”
“I dunno, Brit, should I? Are you gonna be rude to me again?”
“To tell the truth darlin’, you were spitting before I was rude, don’t you remember?”
“Maybe, Brit.” I think the smile grows even wider and it has a touch of deviltry.
Now I am able to see her completely for the first time. I might have shuddered a little as I look at her fully. She has two of everything it seems and is not afraid to show them off. No, wait, I am not considering her more female accoutrements.
This young woman is resting her small hands on two of the largest hand-guns I have ever seen. Six and a quarter inch barrel Army Colts if I’m not mistaken. Actually to be fair I haven’t seen that many. One other in fact and it is still under the seat in the pick-up but I read a lot.
This woman is heavily armed. She may or may not be dangerous. In spite of the fact there are only two of us present, I don’t believe it is up to me to discover which it is to be.
For some strange reason the hard-ware resting on her thighs makes her seem larger, taller than I at first thought. I also begin to get the impression she knows how to utilise the side-arms if and when they are needed. I’m hoping the occasion won’t arise while she is here. I would do my best not to antagonise her, as I must have yesterday.
In my defence; she did begin the exchanges. I suppose spitting ‘water-melon’ seeds at a stranger is not a hanging offence. It might be but I have my doubts. What worries me now is; because we have become acquainted in some small way, does it allow her to continue as before but more so? Will I be caught up in a bombardment?
“So Brit, you look like ya’ll are staying a while.”
“Just long enough to catch my supper.”
“I didn’t mean that. I meant here, in
“I don’t know. Haven’t made up my mind.”
“Like the fish. They haven’t made up their mind to let you catch them without any bait.”
This woman is starting to annoy me a tad. She is pointing out the obvious and I don’t seem to be doing anything about it. I make up my mind and pull the line in. I attach a disgruntled worm, I guess it’s disgruntled, I don’t know for sure. I know I would be. I cast the line out again into a deeper section of the slow-running stream. The float settles itself momentarily and instantly disappears below the water’s surface.
I hear her walking away behind me and feel sure my face has dropped. I look again for the piece of cork and it is nowhere to be seen. I feel panic and I’m not sure why.
Somewhere below the water’s surface a fish is calling me to pluck it out, somewhere behind me a small, not so small to be truthful, it all depends on the beholder I suppose, woman is leaving me to deal with something I hadn’t thought about previously. The panic is building and I begin to hope the fish will suddenly lose interest and detach itself from my hook. Right now I am a tad flummoxed.
“Give me that, Brit.”
She has returned. She glares at me but in her impatience there is still a hint of the smile. She snatches at my rod and pulls a large flapping fish clear of the water. I hear a sound that reminds me of the Cathedral at Notre Dame. My ears are ringing. The large fish lies on the sandy ground below me. There is a space where its head should be and it is still flapping but less so. I turn to face her as she holsters the still smoking; right-hand pistol.
“You shot my bleddy fish!”
“My fish, Brit. I caught it. Anyway, it’s better than bashing it with a rock, don’t you think?”
I don’t know what to think. I do wonder if she has recently escaped from some local mad-house. “My fish. It’s my bleddy stream so it’s my bleddy fish.”
“I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about, Brit but I caught the fish and I shot the fish. That makes it my fish.” She pats the pistol menacingly. At least I feel it is menacingly, I can’t be certain. I don’t want to be certain.
“Okay, okay, you can have the fish. You can have its head too, if you can find it.” I feel discretion is the better part of valour. And I’m chicken. Sarcasm doesn’t count.
“I don’t want the darn fish. I caught it for you, Brit. You were making a mess of it and I helped you out is all.”
“Right and you made a smaller mess of it after you helped it out of the water.”
“Maybe, but its head had to come off anyway, unless you were gonna throw it back and not eat tonight. Either way, I don’t care.”
Damn and bugger. Once again she has made me feel as though my bottom lip should be quivering. I hoped it isn’t. Why did she have to say; ‘I don’t care’? On second thoughts; why should it bother me that she had? I didn’t know the answer to either question. I did know it bothered me but I didn’t know why.
I look down at my beer supply; languishing in the water and consider downing it all in one early evening attempt at drunkenness. I put the plan on hold.
“We could share it.” Now I know I sound like a whining schoolgirl.
“Ain’t that up to me, Brit? You just now gave me the fish back, didn’t ya?”
For a second I consider snatching one of her pistols and blowing a hole in my own head. This female, this girl or woman is here to make me crazy, I just know it. Someone is after my town and they have sent her out here to get me sectioned. Once I’m out of the way, job done. I wonder how much she’s getting paid.
“Okay, half each.” I look down at the remains and the fish is still a good size without its head. It was bigger earlier.
“You cook, Brit?”
“I went to catering college.”
“You went to catering college just so you could cook a fish?”
“No, I went to catering college just so I could cook.”
“Thank the lord for small mercies.”
“Why do you say that?”
She begins to walk away again. “Simple, I don’t cook.”
She is already searching for something and I have no idea what. She soon returns with two handfuls of dried sticks and one or two larger broken tree limbs.
“Dig us a hole, Brit. Need to get a fire burning unless you like Sushi?”
I do as she orders. I scoop out a shallow pit and she arranges the twigs and the thicker pieces. I watch her as she spears the fish with a stronger twig after pulling out its insides and sets it gently on two uprights. I consider this is some strange woman and then I remember; she’s a Yank. For the first time I have the chance to study her in greater detail.
The smile I already know is permanent. The clothes are smart but look as if they have seen hard work at times. The shape of her body is classical. She isn’t tall, quite short but her litheness allows for some misinterpretation. She is easy on the eye. Her hair still cascades from a red, white and blue baseball cap and she is wearing tight-fitting good quality leather boots with Cuban heels. Lastly she has the wide leather gun belt which pulls in her waist and to be honest; everything she has makes her what she is and it frightens me more than a tad.
“Brit, do you have anything to eat with down here?”
Her calm voice snaps my imagination out of its wondering nature at exactly the right time. I am certain it is about to become almost indecent. If I said this is the farthest thought from my mind; I would be wrong, it is fast becoming the closest and I do not want that.
I am here in
I don’t want or need a very nice American Lady to get in my way right now and somehow; it makes me just a little bit sad.
“Nope, just these!” I point a finger inside my mouth.
“Fingers then.”
Cutlery, the girl meant cutlery.
It is so peculiar, I can’t decide her age. Her voice is mature, like a mother, a grandmother even. Her body is that of a woman almost in her prime. Her effervescent smile is that of a child and it never fades. I feel I am getting into trouble and I don’t know how to get out of it.
There is just one way.