Beware the River

by Kitty Margo

  “I’m going with BJ. Where did you think I was going?” was Billy’s startling reply. Then he turned to me. “I’m sorry for not believing you, man. You have to admit this is some pretty crazy stuff. I guess it’s one of those things you have to see with your own eyes to believe.”

  “Yeah, I know. I probably wouldn’t have believed me either.”

  “You’re going (HICCUP) (HICCUP) to do (HICCUP) what?” James screeched, greatly alarmed by this sudden turn of events. “Seriously? Are you (HICCUP) crazy? I am not about (HICCUP) (HICCUP) to stay here (HICCUP) alone, while you two go gallivanting (HICCUP) (HICCUP) after a ghost (HICCUP) (HICCUP) in the middle of the night.”

  “Well, make a quick decision James,” Billy said. “Because you are either going or staying here alone.”

  “This is (HICCUP) insane!” James cried, as he began changing his underwear. “Why are (HICCUP) (HICCUP) you going? BJ is (HICCUP) the only one he wants. Isn’t that right, BJ? There is no (HICCUP) (HICCUP) logical reason for us to go trailing (HICCUP) along. He’ll probably (HICCUP) kill us just to get us (HICCUP) (HICCUP) out of the way!”

  “I’m not going to let BJ go alone, James! Have you lost what little mind you had to begin with? There’s no telling where that buffalo might lead him.”

  “You certainly have had a change of heart in the last few minutes.” I said. “What happened?”

  “I’ll admit that when I first saw this….this…” he motioned toward the buffalo’s back side, “my first reaction was to run fast and far.” He reached up to feel his hair. “Is my hair white?”

  “No, why?”

  “You know, sometimes you watch a horror movie where the person gets so scared their hair turns white. Just checking. Anyway, like you said if he was here to harm us he would have done so by now. And let’s face it there is no denying that he is here or that he is real. So, since James is convinced that he’s here for a reason, I say we follow him. We can’t hide from him. We can all agree on that, right? Anyway, what I am trying to say is if he takes you he takes me too. What about you, James?”

  “If he takes you he takes me,” James mimicked, looking like he was mad enough to chew nails and spit bullets. He hated sounding so lily livered while Billy came off smelling like a rose. “You are so (HICCUP) worried about BJ now. (HICCUP) (HICCUP) If I remember correctly (HICCUP) you were making fun of him earlier. Telling him that people (HICCUP) would think he was psycho (HICCUP) if he told the truth when I (HICCUP) believed him all along. What do (HICCUP) (HICCUP) you think now?”

  “I think you had better shut up and get dressed or you’ll be staying here by your lonesome in these dark woods, because I am going with BJ.”

  The words achieved their purpose and James was fully dressed in seconds. When everyone was dressed I took a deep, encouraging breath and slowly inched my way behind the huge beast. “Okay, let’s do this.” I eased open the door, praying all the while that he wouldn’t kick me upside the head with a gigantic hoof when I turned my back on him.

  “I wonder how (hiccup) (hiccup) he got in with the door locked?” James asked as we exited the cabin in a tight little huddle.

  “How do you think he got in you moron?” Billy whispered back. “You know James, to be so book smart you ain’t got a lick of common sense.”

  We followed the buffalo down the steps. Each time his huge hooves fell on the wooden stairs it sounded like thunder echoing in the stillness of the quiet night, but he never stumbled.

  “I’m surprised all this noise didn’t wake us (HICCUP) when he was coming up the steps.” Billy and I both turned and looked at him like he had just announced his purchase of season tickets for the Charlotte Symphony. Then sudden realization dawned on him and he went pale all over again. (HICCUP) “Oh,” (HICCUP) right.”

  The moon was so bright we had no trouble seeing as we followed the buffalo down the path, down the steep muddy bank, and out onto the rock bed where he turned left and started up the river. I couldn’t imagine where he was leading us. Over the years, I had walked up this river hundreds of times when it was dry and never noticed anything out of the ordinary. Certainly nothing spectacular enough to bring a buffalo back from the grave to show me. Obviously he thought otherwise.

  As he strode up the river, sailing over slippery moss covered rocks that we practically had to crawl across on all fours, I wondered what could be this important. Evidently, James was wondering the same thing.

  “BJ, I have a really bad feeling about all of this. Sort of like a premonition of impending doom or something. I mean, nothing good can come of this. Right? I’ll be surprised if any of us are alive to see the sun come up in the morning. The man in the painting warned you to ‘beware the river’. I mean for crying out loud, that was a sign if I ever heard one! And here we are right smack in the middle of the river. This is suicidal.”

  “That shows what you know.” Billy had a smug expression on his face. “You know, the more I think about this the more I’m convinced that this old buffalo isn’t so bad after all. I don’t know what got into me back there in the cabin, but I’m man enough to admit that I almost lost my Doritos when I first saw him. And that’s still considerably less than you lost, James.”

  He cut his eyes at James, daring him to dispute his words, lest he be forced to remind him of his rapid change of underwear. When no rebuttal was forthcoming, he continued. “Heck, that thing up there could make Freddie Krueger chew his nails down to the quick. But do you want to know what I think?”

  “Pray tell,” was James’s unenthusiastic reply.

  “I am convinced the buffalo is leading us to a buried treasure. Haven’t you ever heard that if you follow a ghost it will lead you to a pot of gold?”

  “No,” I answered. “I can’t say that I have.”

  “That’s a leprechaun, retard,” James mumbled.

  I pressed the button to illuminate my watch and saw that it was 10 minutes after 1:00 in the morning. Somehow I knew Billy was way off base on this one. “That’s not where this ghost is leading us.” I was certain the buffalo had returned for a reason far greater than money. I was positive of that. Nevertheless, what that reason was, I couldn’t even begin to figure out as I concentrated on keeping my footing on the slippery rocks.

  * * * * *

  About halfway between the cabin and the dam are the decaying remains of an old ferry. Grandpa said the ferry was widely used in the 1700’s as a means to cross the river before the bridge was built in front of the dam connecting Stanly and Montgomery counties.

  On our side of the river is a tall oak tree near the sight where the ferry landing used to be. Shelves had been built inside the hollow cavity of the tree long ago to store candy and knick-knacks that the ferry conductor had sold to his customers.

  As we approached what remained of the ferry the buffalo paused, looked around as if he were debating his options, then slowly made a left turn and headed toward the riverbank. Finally, I thought, maybe he’s about to show us what this madness is all about – or as James phrased it, what he came skipping from so far away to show me. Perhaps then my life could return to normal and we could enjoy what remained of our last summer weekend.

  The buffalo came to a halt on the part of the river where the bank was the steepest. It was at least 15 feet straight up of slippery, slimy, nasty smelling mud.

  “I think whatever he wants to show you is probably at the top, BJ.” Billy grimaced. “But I have one question. How are we supposed to get up there?”

  “Yeah, how do you suppose we scale that embankment, BJ?” James scowled, rummaging in his pocket for his hand sanitizer at the mere thought of the mud touching his skin.

  “Beats me.” Why did I always have to be the group problem solver anyway? “I guess we start looking for roots or something to pull ourselves up with.”

  With him being several pounds overweight I knew that suggestion would strike a nerve with James. It did. Rolling his eyes he huffed and put his hands on his hips. “Yeah, why not just gra
b a vine and swing up, Tarzan.”

  While I was busy searching through the gooey mud for a handhold we heard the buffalo snort directly above us. We all stared in stunned disbelief.

  “How the heck did he do that?” James whispered, looking up to where the buffalo stood waiting at the top.

  “You figure it out, Einstein,” Billy mumbled.

  Before the words were out of his mouth the buffalo looked straight at me, snorted again and tossed his great head, motioning upward.

  I was just about to get tired of this furry behemoth ordering me around. “Okay, chill out!” I shouted. “Can’t you see I’m trying?” I stuck one hand in the seriously nasty mud and cold chills ran up my arms as I searched for anything to grab hold of. “Why me?” I mumbled as my hand closed over a tree root that felt strong enough to support my weight. “Out of all the kids you could have chosen. Why me?”

  “What did you say, BJ?” Billy asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “You know what they say,” James whispered to Billy out of the side of his mouth. “It’s okay to talk to yourself. It’s when you start answering yourself that you have a problem.”

  “I said, why me?”

  “Yeah,” Billy agreed. “I’ve been asking myself that same question. Why you?”

  “I have no clue why a ghost would choose you to haunt, BJ.” James was trying to keep his balance and shake a rock out of his shoe at the same time. “But I have a sinking suspicion we’ll find out before this night is over.” He put his shoe back on and rubbed his stomach.

  “Man, I wish I had a Snicker bar.”

  “You just ate three fourths of a chicken, about a dozen ears of corn and a box of Moon Pies.” Billy reminded him. “You cannot still be hungry.”

  “Even though that was a slight exaggeration of my midnight snack, you know water always makes me hungry.” He put his hands on his hips and glared at Billy. “Plus, I am a nervous eater.”

  “Well, you might want to see about getting a prescription for some nerve pills because…”

  The buffalo stopped their ribbing from escalating into a full fledged argument with a loud snort and a toss of his head. “You better get going, BJ,” James urged.

  I tugged on the root with my right hand and reached up searching for another with my left hand. While doing this, the entire front portion of my body was buried in the cold stinking mud.

  I kept plunging my hands into the squishy slime over and over until my muscles were on fire. Each time I was able to move up a step I had to dig my shoes into the mud to keep from falling back down. It wasn’t long before my arms were dead weight and felt like they would fall from my shoulders.

  Chapter 11

  After what seemed like a three-hour climb, but was actually about fifteen minutes, I finally pulled myself to the top covered from head to toe with foul smelling slime.

  As I was crawling over the edge, the buffalo turned and casually walked the other way. “You didn’t think I could make it did you?” I yelled to his retreating back, fed up with his bullying ways. “I guess I showed you, huh?” Then I looked at James and Billy below and told a little white lie. Well, actually a great big whopper. “Okay, it’s not that bad. Come on up.”

  But before they even had to stick one little pinky into the disgusting gunk the buffalo trotted over to a nearby dead tree. He glanced at me and then snorted loudly, to get our attention I think, as he placed his massive head against the trunk of the tree. I could only stare, speechless, as he sent it crashing to the riverbed below. He turned and looked at me and I swear I saw laughter in his coal black eyes as if he were saying, “I guess I showed you, huh?”

  “Gee thanks!” Billy laughed as he and James scooted up the tree. “Man, I sure wasn’t eager to wallow in that slime.”

  Okay, this entire episode was really starting to tick me off! Why was I the only one being abused? “Why didn’t you push the tree down when I was struggling to climb up? Huh!” I stormed, running to where the evil creature stood. “You wanted to see me wade through that nasty mud, didn’t you? You think it’s funny, don’t you? The more you can do to make my life miserable, the happier you are. Right? Well, I am fed up! Do you hear? Fed up to the gills!”

  Completely ignoring my tirade, the buffalo walked over to the decaying remains of the old hollowed out tree, raised his gigantic hoof and scratched what appeared to be an X in the bark. Then he turned and without a care for our baffled expressions strolled down the fallen tree to the riverbed below.

  I couldn’t believe it. “Hey, hold up!” I shouted, running down the tree behind him, slipping and almost falling headfirst onto the rock bed below. “Was that all you had to show us? An old rotten tree that I have seen at least a hundred times already? This is some sort of sick, twisted joke right? Well, believe me when I tell you that no one is laughing!”

  Once again, the beast completely ignored me and continued up the river. This buffalo had filled me with heart stopping terror for two days. For this! An X on an old tree! No freaking way! I was going to end this charade here and now!

  I ran ahead of the buffalo, then stopped and turned around to face him. He didn’t seem the least bit concerned by my small show of courage. In fact, he kept coming toward me so fast I thought he intended to plow right over me. I was about to jump out of his way when he finally stopped with his big wet nose touching mine.

  Suddenly, I didn’t feel quite as brave as I had only seconds earlier. Now that I was face to face with the enormous creature, I was quick to realize that if he wanted to go to all this trouble to show me a dead tree, hey, who was I to argue?

  Evidently he had drawn the same conclusion and wanted me out of his way, because he snorted at me. Only this time he pushed a gob of what I can only describe as nasal secretions out of his nose and into my face. Snot for lack of a better word!

  I gagged and wiped at the sticky, gelatinous, gooey mess with the back of my hand, which only smeared it across my face. I didn’t open my mouth to say a word, too afraid his mucus would get in. I quickly jumped out of his way and dove into one of the deep holes of water to scrub every inch of my face. But his snot clung to my skin like Elmer’s glue. I dove back under and scooping up a handful of sand off the bottom rubbed my face until it was raw and stinging like fire.

  “James, are you… alright, man,” I heard Billy asking as I broke the surface of the water. James was gagging, making some really uncomfortable noises and losing his midnight snack. Billy was dry heaving and sounding almost as bad. I glanced upriver and saw that the buffalo was on the move again. In fact, he had walked about one hundred yards upriver and just stood there waiting. Evidently it wasn’t over after all. There was more he wanted me to see.

  On the other hand, I should just turn around and go back. I didn’t have to take this kind of abuse from any old dead buffalo. What could he do to me anyway?

  Plenty!

  This was just a small sampling of his temper. No telling what he might do if he really got mad.

  Still, he could have found a way of convincing me without having to be so gross about it. I mean who clears their nasal passages on somebody? As Gram would say, “It just isn’t done in polite society.”

  “Go on, BJ,” James said with a quivering voice. “We’ll be right behind you. And for the love of God don’t say anything stupid and get him angry again. That was some pretty nasty… ah…stuff …that came out of his nose.”

  “Snot, James. It was snot! Just say it.”

  He swallowed, covered his mouth and looked like he might hurl again. “Man, if we live through this night I doubt I’ll be able to eat for a month after seeing that.”

  “Yeah,” Billy mumbled in agreement. “I know what you mean. Let’s go. And BJ, you might want to consider keeping your big mouth shut before he decides to spray you from the other end!”

  * * * * *

  Much later, when I was so tired that just the thought of placing one foot in front of the other required way too much effort, James a
sked, “Where do you think he’s taking us?” No one answered. We just kept walking and walking. I wondered how much longer any of us could hold out. Glancing at my watch I saw that it was 3:25 am.

  It stood to reason that if I was this exhausted from walking for hours, slipping and sliding over moss covered rocks, being ever alert for water moccasins, and worrying if they might release water from the dam at any minute, then poor James must be on the verge of collapsing. We heard him squeal every few minutes when a bat swooped too close to his head.

  Finally, just as I was about to ignore the buffalo’s hair trigger temper and demand that we be allowed to rest, we turned a bend in the river and saw lights. “If he keeps walking he’ll run right into the dam. And why do you think he insists on walking up the river? We could have easily covered the same distance in half the time if we had walked on the riverbank.”

  “No argument here.” Billy looked like he was ready to drop as he constantly swatted at a bloodthirsty mosquito that was determined to have him for his evening meal. “If we are supposed to ‘beware the river’ then why is he making us walk in it? I’m not going to suggest it though, are you? Just the thought of him blowing his nose in my face makes my skin crawl.”

  The buffalo continued walking while we half crawled and half walked for what seemed like hours. He would occasionally glance back and snort or beat one of his huge hooves on a rock if we slowed to a crawl or even considered sitting down on a rock for a much needed break. When he did the sound echoed off the rocks filling the night air with vibrations, and making the eerie moonlit night even creepier than it already was.

  The lights from the dam were becoming clearer. It was just up ahead. I could see the bridge and the railroad trestle in front of it. According to my watch it was 4:00am.