“He’s too tired and it won’t make any difference if he does. Relax. He’s all set. Now, here’s the deal. Things are going to get a little tight for a while, so don’t be too liberal with the food. I got to go back out in the morning. Don’t ask me why. I’ll be gone maybe two days. You know your orders.”
Then Sam Frick said, “You want we should keep Post away from the patients?”
There was silence for a few seconds. Then Drake said slowly, “I can’t see as that’s going to make any difference. Just let him wander around. He’s a funny guy. He isn’t going to give much of a damn about anything. He’ll turn out to be a good man. You’ll see.”
Post couldn’t catch the rest. They lowered their voices. After a time they left and he could hear a bird calling a hot-weather note in the trees outside. He drifted off again.
When he awoke the second time he felt more rested. The sun was out and he could tell from the slant of the rays outside the window that it was getting late. He stood up slowly and stretched. He could smell food cooking. Suddenly he realized that he was ravenously hungry—hungrier than he had been in many weeks.
He walked out the door and saw the setting sun resting on the top of the hill they had walked down. He remembered that they had told him where the kitchen was. He walked toward it. Smoke wisped out of a crazy-angled stovepipe that stuck through the roof. He found a door in the end of the building nearest the lake.
Strane looked up from the wood stove. “Sleeping Beauty awakes. Hungry?”
Post yawned again. “Yeah.”
“Sit down there at the table. I’ll eat with you in a minute.”
“Where’s Frick?”
“He’ll be in after a while. We’ll eat first.”
Post sat down by one of the enameled plates. In a few minutes Strane carried the frying pan over to the table and dished out some of the potatoes and meat. It smelled good to Post. He ate rapidly and then leaned back and lit a cigarette. Strane was still eating. He chewed with his mouth open and the cords in his neck worked. He bent low over the plate and shoveled the food in with jerky scooping motions.
He got up and shoved his chair back. “Tomorrow you can cook, Post. That’ll be all you have to do. Ever done any?”
“Camp stuff. That’s all.”
Strane left and in a few minutes Sam Frick came in. He grabbed the frying pan and heaped what was left on his own plate. He sat down and started to eat without a word. Post stared out the open door and saw that the lake blue had darkened to gray as the sun had gone further below the hills. He finished his cigarette and snapped it out the door. Frick’s head was bent low over his plate.
Suddenly Post tied two things together in his head. The two of them didn’t eat together. Strane had said they had to “hang around and kind of watch.” He realized that the two men might be guarding the exit from the lake. He wondered if he ought to risk having some fun with Frick. He felt full and strangely contented.
“I suppose you guys take turns eating first?” he asked casually.
Frick stopped chewing and looked up. His small eyes were shadowed. “What gives you the idea we take turns, chum?”
“You can’t eat together. Who’d watch the patients?”
Frick waited a few seconds and then said softly, “I don’t know what you’re driving at, Post. Maybe you better let the whole thing drop.”
Post hid a grin and stood up. He stretched and walked to the door. The lake was quiet. He walked down to the shore and sat on a flat rock. The waves lapped against the rock. Blackflies gathered around his head and he lit another cigarette to keep them off. The sky grew darker. He heard frogs grumbling in a distant marsh. He noticed that there were no boats.
He stared up the lakeshore and saw a light flicker in the thick brush. He guessed that it was a light in one of the cabins. He couldn’t see the other cabins. It had grown too dark. He could see a strange patch of sun at the peak of a mountain in the east, but in the deep valley of the lake it smelled of night.
He sat and wondered what sort of an arrangement he had dropped into. It seemed strange, somehow, but he couldn’t work up any great interest. He felt the familiar dull lethargy creeping over him. He shivered in the sudden chill that swept in from the lake. He walked to the bunkhouse and climbed into his bunk.
Just before he fell asleep, Sam Frick came in and climbed into his bunk. He lit a kerosene lamp and found his place in a ragged magazine. He didn’t speak. Post watched the sullen face for a time, watched the man’s lips moving as he read. Post fell asleep, after deciding that maybe it would be a good thing to leave. He decided he would leave without finding out what it was all about. He drove the growing curiosity down into himself and commanded it to be still.
He climbed out of bed when the air was still chill. Strane was asleep, a nasal snore rattling in his throat. Frick’s bed was empty. He wandered across to the kitchen and looked around. He decided to wait until either Frick or Strane could show him where to find the supplies. He wondered how they kept the food cool. He walked down to the lake and skipped flat stones out over the still water. His aches and stiffness were gone.
After a time Strane came out and showed him where the food supplies were kept. They used a crude windlass to lower supplies which had to be kept cool down into a narrow hole that appeared to be at least twenty feet deep. The butter was hard and the eggs were fresh.
He cooked the breakfast and they ate it separately, without comment. After he had cleaned up, Strane came in and made up two baskets of food supplies to take to the two cabins. Post walked over to the bunkhouse and picked up his suitcase. He walked out of the building and toward the entrance to the trail. He decided to walk slowly and enjoy the morning.
He hadn’t gone more than twenty feet up the trail when Sam Frick suddenly stepped in front of him.
“What’s the matter, Post? Don’t like cooking?”
“Cooking’s okay. I just don’t like the setup. I’m leaving.”
Frick didn’t move out of the narrow path. He put his big hands on his hips and turned to a bush and said in a mincing way, “Mr. Post doesn’t like it here. He’s leaving.” Then he turned back to Post. “Get on back there, sucker. You love it here. Besides, you told the boss you’d work. If you want to quit, you got to talk to him.”
“They keep telling me it’s a free country. How about getting out of the way?”
In answer, Frick put his big hand against Post’s chest and shoved. Frick was on higher ground. Post tumbled backward onto his side and rolled into a bush. His suitcase snapped open and the clothes slid out onto the dirt.
Post got to his feet. Frick still stood above him, a half smile on his face. He said, almost kindly, “Get on back, Post. You’re not in shape for this sort of thing. Don’t make me hang one on you and drag you down. Let’s keep it pleasant, hey?”
Post stood and looked at the broad chest, the thick wrists. He thought of how quickly the man had moved when he had pushed against his chest. The smile faded from the heavy face and Post knew that the man would move again in a few seconds. He knelt in the trail and gathered his clothes back into the suitcase. He turned and walked back down the trail. He walked into the bunkhouse and slid his bag under his bunk. He sat on the edge of the bunk and lit a cigarette. His hand trembled. He felt angry and vaguely frightened. He tried to retreat back into the calm of indifference, but he couldn’t do it. He knew that they weren’t going to let him leave.
He wondered what kind of a chance he would stand with either Frick or Strane. He peeled off his shirt and tried to look at himself in the battered steel mirror hanging on one of the bunk posts. He could see flashes of white flesh, of a roll of fat around his waist. His arms looked soft and formless.
Within a half hour he was standing out beyond the kitchen stripped to the waist. He could feel where the axe handle was going to raise blisters. Sweat was soaking him around the waist of his trousers. He set another chunk on the block and split it cleanly through the middle with the double-bit
ted axe. It was as easy as a problem in addition. He could sense trouble ahead, and for some reason he wanted to be ready for it. The better shape he could get into, the better chance he would have. He stopped and wondered why he wanted a better chance. He stared out across the small lake. Maybe he just didn’t want to be pushed around. He set another chunk on the block and imagined that it was Sam Frick’s hard head. He sunk the blade so deeply into the block that he had to smack the handle up with the heel of his hand to loosen it.
After he had split a sizable pile, he sat on the block to rest for a few minutes. The sun felt warm on his shoulders. He heard footsteps behind him and glanced around. A soft fat man, with crisp curling black hair and white jowls that sagged below his chin, stood with his plump hands on his hips and stared down at Post. He wore a tan sports shirt and flowered shorts. His hairless legs were scarred with a hundred insect bites.
“So there’s another one of you guys, hah? What’s he running, an army?”
“Are you Mr. Burke or Mr. Benderson?”
“Burke, and I always thought I was a smart operator until I walked into this with my stupid eyes wide open. Where’s your boss? I want to talk to him now.”
“Not around.”
The man turned and looked toward the cabins. A tall tanned blonde in a yellow playsuit stepped carefully across the uneven ground. She looked blankly at Burke and Post. Her face was puffy. Her eyes were wide, brown and dull.
“Millie, this new guy says the boss is away. When’ll he be back, fella?”
“Don’t know.”
Millie pouted. Post saw that the roots of her bright hair were streaked with black. “Gee, Burky, I got to get outa here. All the time you keep telling me to wait. I got other things to do. Maybe they’ll let me go now.”
“You shut your face and get back to that cabin. You’re not getting out until I do.”
They walked back toward the cabins. Burke tried to grab her wrist but she twisted away from him. Burke raised his fat clenched fist and then let it drop wearily at his side. He stopped just before he was out of sight, bent over and vigorously scratched both legs.
He didn’t meet the others until late afternoon. When his hands were too blistered to continue chopping wood, he found Strane on the trail. The lanky man was leaning against a tree peeling the bark from a slim stick.
“You guys got any objection to me walking around the lake before we eat?”
“Why should we care? Go ahead. Only don’t make us wait supper.”
He circled the lake, walking along the north side first. The brush was so thick that at times he had to splash through the shallow water. Once he stumbled and soaked himself to the hips. But he made better time than he expected. As he came back along the south shore, he found the walking easier. There were long stretches of flat gray rock slanting down toward the water. The slant wasn’t so steep that he couldn’t walk across it.
Finally he saw the gray buildings of the camp ahead of him. He looked up into the brush and saw a small gray cabin. It was surrounded with half-grown spruce. Beyond it he could see a part of the roof of a second cabin.
As he stood and stared, he caught a flash of movement down on the rocks. He turned. A slim girl was stretched out on her back in the sun. She was wearing a scanty white bathing suit laced with red. She had a book, sunglasses and a bottle of white lotion. The sun had turned her the soft brown of coffee with cream.
She raised her head. He was standing ten feet from her.
“Hello, there,” she said. He recognized the flat clear accent of Beacon Hill. He walked over to her, and because it seemed awkward to stand above her, he sat down and wrapped his arms around his knees.
She stared at him with calm appraisal. Her face was a shade too narrow with the brown skin tight over the high delicate cheekbones. Her eyes were gray and her eyebrows thick and black. She made him think of the women in the fashion magazines that Ruth used to buy. He sensed breeding, money and chill selfish charm.
“I’m Nan Benderson. I imagine you’re one of the men who work here.”
“That’s right. Walker Post.”
She rested her dark head back on the rocks and shut her eyes against the sun’s glare. “Tell Mr. Drake that Dad would like to see him. Dad is much better. He hasn’t had so much rest and quiet in years. I haven’t told him how bored I’m getting.”
“I’ll tell him.”
Suddenly she braced herself on one elbow and looked at him. “Mr. Post, are you certain Mr. Burke is entirely safe? Mr. Drake told us about his delusions of persecution, but he comes to our cabin and says strange things in such a wild manner.”
Post wondered what he should say. Burke didn’t act like a man with delusions. He acted like a man who was trapped and knew it. He shrugged. “Far as I know, he’s harmless.”
She continued to stare at him. “You’re an odd one!”
He started. Then he shrugged and looked away. He couldn’t permit himself the luxury of being curious. He looked back at her. She still stared and suddenly she looked away.
“That was rude, wasn’t it? I’m sorry. But your face looks … so dead. As though you … I can’t explain it. You look hurt and glum, like a whipped child, only there’s something more. I don’t know why I’m talking like this. I guess it’s just being alone so much up here and having time to think. Don’t pay any attention to me.”
He got to his feet and looked down at her. He looked into her eyes for a few seconds. “It’s okay, Miss Benderson. Don’t think about it.” He walked along the shore. He began to wonder what he could find to cook for supper. There wasn’t much food left on the platform lowered deep into the ground.
After supper he thought he would try to exercise, to harden himself more. It suddenly seemed pointless. He watched Sam Frick stand on the shore, stoop and lift an immense boulder. He held it high in the air and then shoved it from him. It landed in the shallow water, throwing a sheet of water high in the air to sparkle in the last rays of the sun. Post stood silently for a few minutes.
Then he got the axe and cut a short thick club. It fit his hand nicely. He wondered idly why they let him use an axe. An axe can be used as a weapon. He hid the club carefully. He guessed that Frick and Strane were probably armed. It seemed logical to him that they would be.
Drake didn’t return the next day—or the next. They were reduced to tinned foods. Post spent the long quiet days sitting in his bunk. He circled the lake once each day. The first day, he saw the girl out on the rocks again. She didn’t lift her head. He stepped by quietly.
Burke came down to complain about the food. He didn’t bring Millie with him. Frick and Strane ignored him. He stomped back toward his cabin, anger showing even in the lines of his back as he walked away.
Post felt a definite tension in the air. He couldn’t reason it out and he shrugged it off. He ate and slept and watched the lake. He knew that nothing was mending inside of him. And it didn’t matter.
Drake returned on the third day at eight in the morning. He had a small man with him. Post watched them walk across the clearing. The stranger staggered and swayed. His eyes were almost shut and his face was slack. Drake walked behind him, shoving him in the back with his left hand. In his right hand he carried a light rifle. Drake’s dark face was twisted. He pushed the man through the open door of the bunkhouse. The man tripped and sprawled face down on the floor. He was breathing heavily. He didn’t try to get up.
“Frick. Toss him on one of the bunks. You don’t have to watch him. There’s enough stuff in him to keep him out for hours. He won’t remember how he got here.”
Frick gathered the man up and held him in his arms like a sleeping child. Post noticed that the stranger’s clothes were ragged, his face unshaven. Frick stepped over to one of the bunks and tossed the man onto a top bunk. His head and heels thumped against the wooden slats.
Drake sat on a bunk and wiped his head. “What a job, getting that joe through the woods. I bet he fell a hundred times.” He handed the rifle
to Frick, who balanced it in a corner. “How are things?”
Frick didn’t answer. He sat down on a bunk across from Drake and jerked his thumb at Post, his eyebrows raised.
“Go ahead. Mr. Walker Post isn’t in the way.”
“If you say so. Burke has been yapping about the food and about getting out of here. His dish wants me to ask you if she can go even if Burke can’t. She’s talking about appointments she’s got.”
“She stays. Pay no attention to Burke. We’ll let him steam for a while longer.”
“Right. Benderson and the daughter are still in the clouds. She’s bored. He’s getting healthy. No attempt to get out. He wants to talk to you. She’s worried about Burke. Wonders if he’s dangerous.”
“I’ll talk to them. Anything else?”
“Yeah. Strong and silent here tried to leave with his stuff a few days back. I stopped him on the trail and I had to push him around. He hasn’t said much since. I told him he had to see you.”
Drake looked at Post. His dark eyes were full of amusement. “Restless, hey? I wouldn’t have expected that of you, Post. I thought you didn’t care where you were. Why try to leave? The work too hard?”
“I suppose you want the truth.”
“Why not?”
“These two big clowns of yours got on my nerves. They both handed me smart talk about this place. I don’t know what you’re doing here, but I can see it isn’t kosher. Just tell me what it’s all about. I don’t care what you’re doing. I just don’t like not having a question answered when I feel like asking it.”
Drake turned to Frick. “Take the panel job and go after the food. I’ll have Rob help you pack it in after you get back. Same place.” Frick strolled out.
The unconscious man in the top bunk moaned softly. Drake picked at his teeth with a fingernail. He studied Post. Post looked back at him without expression.
“You remember, I told you that I’m an amateur psychiatrist? Well, this place is an experiment in applied psychiatry. Science at work. You can’t have outside factors intruding in a controlled experiment. So I’ve made it tough to get in or out.
More Good Old Stuff Page 21
