Survivors of the Sun

by Kingslie, Mia

  ‘Where did the river go?’ Jamie asked, and then inexplicably spluttered with laughter.

  ‘Well, as I said,’ Georgia began, ‘I think this is a back water and…,’

  ‘No,’ Deedee interrupted, ‘it’s a riddle. Where did the river go?’

  ‘Oh,’ Georgia said, ‘I don’t know, where did it go?’

  ‘It went to the bank,’ Deedee said.

  Lola snorted, and Georgia gave a little chuckle as Deedee, turned back to Jamie, ‘Go on, tell them the knock knock joke.’

  ‘Okay, Jamie said, ‘knock knock.’

  Getting into the swing of things, Lola, Rebecca and Georgia all asked, ‘Who’s there?’

  ‘Who’s where?’ Ruby asked, sounding very perplexed. ‘I can’t see anyone, it is far too dark.’

  This sent Deedee and Jamie to near howls of laughter, causing the canoe to wobbling precariously. Lola and Georgia hastily dipped their paddles to avoid a collision, as Rebecca patiently explaining to Ruby that, ‘no, there wasn’t anyone around, it was a type of joke.’

  ‘Start again Jamie,’ Deedee said.

  ‘Knock, knock.’

  ‘Who’s there?’ they repeated in unison.

  ‘Canoe.’

  ‘Canoe who?’ they chorused.

  ‘Canoe tell me where the river went?’

  Georgia couldn’t help it, she burst into laughter as did the others.

  ‘Your turn Rebecca,’ Jamie said, as they began turning the canoes and slowly paddling back the way they had come. ‘Tell us a river joke.’

  Rebecca thought about it for a moment, ‘I only know one, ‘it’s about two blondes.’

  ‘Not rude is it?’ Lola asked.

  ‘As if,’ Rebecca replied. ‘Anyway, there are two blondes, one standing on each side of a turbulent river and one blonde calls out to the other, ‘how do I get to the other side?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ the second blonde says, ‘you tell me, you are already there.’

  They continued on in this vein for some time, occasionally heading for shore, to check out suitable camp sites. It helped to pass the time, and it was, Georgia reflected, hard to remain despondent when everyone was so cheerful.

  They had just rejected another spot, when Ruby said, ‘I know a river joke. It was one my Bertie liked to tell.’

  ‘Well, go on then, share it!’ Lola exclaimed.

  ‘It’s a riddle really, but here goes. What do you call a man in the river with no arms and no legs?’

  There was a moments silence then Deedee said, ‘Give up, tell us.’

  ‘You call him Bob,’ Ruby said.

  There was a round of approval, and then Ruby added, ‘I never did find it that funny, you see I was stepping out with a young man called Bob, when I first met Bertie, and I think he was always a little bit jealous of him.’

  Finally they found the perfect site. It backed onto a cliff face and as it was heavily wooded on the two remaining sides, it was ideal. The best part, they all agreed, was that the ground was flat.

  It took some time to set up the camp. Firewood had to be gathered, back packs unpacked, the tent canopy put up, bedding set out, and sometimes if they were lucky, as they were tonight, the sleeping bags could be stuffed with pine needles and leaves.

  Once Ruby was made comfortable, and the dogs had run off steam, sniffing and exploring their surroundings, they all settled down around the fire. There was almost an air of a holiday break, somewhat similar to an unexpected snow day (except it wasn’t cold), and the mood was buoyant. They had been expecting to be in the canoes until dawn, but instead they were relaxing around a fire.

  Despite Lola’s insistence that they wait until daylight, Georgia brought out the map and studied it by the light of the fire. ‘I just can’t see anything that even remotely looks like it represents a tributary or backwater.’

  Lola and Deedee leaned in to look as well. ‘Depends where we are,’ Lola said, ‘if we are all the way down here…?’

  ‘No, if had gone that far we would have passed under the bridge where 5, crosses over Lake of the Ozarks route and I am certain we would not have missed that.’

  Jamie came over, crouching next to Georgia. ‘Maybe we should check it against the compass? At least to see what direction we have been travelling in.’

  Deedee rushed off to get the compass, but it was too dark to see the direction of the needle and when they nearly set the map on fire, leaning in too close to the flames they gave that up as a bad idea. It would have to wait and hopefully they were still travelling in the right direction!

  ‘I vote we stop travelling by night,’ Lola said, as Deedee went over to the packs to put the folded map and compass away. ‘We only did that to get past Warsaw and reckon we have done that and more.’

  ‘True, but I am still worried we will be seen if we travel by day.’

  ‘Yeah, but we have our canoes, and by the time anyone catches sight of us, we will already have passed on by.’

  She was right of course. They wouldn’t be lost now if they had been travelling by daylight. There would have landmarks to compare the map too, and the compass would have been used. And once they passed that bridge, if they ever found it, the waterways became really confusing, and then if would be vital to see where they were going.

  ‘Okay,’ she said, ‘let’s go back to travelling during the day.’ This was greeting with some enthusiasm by the others, except Ruby who was peering around her feet, comb in hand, curlers scattered across her lap.

  Georgia stood up and went over to her. ‘Is everything okay?’

  ‘Can you be a dear? I seemed to have dropped some of my pins.’

  ‘Of course,’ she said as she dropped to her knees and began searching amongst the leaves. They weren’t that hard to find, seeing as they were bright orange like the curlers.

  She handed them up to Ruby and made to stand up when the old lady suddenly grasped her hand. ‘Are we on the run from the police?’ she whispered hoarsely. As she spoke she peered over at the others sitting at the far side of the fire. Clearly she did not want to be overheard.

  Georgia stared at her in surprise. ‘On the run?’ she repeated stupidly. From the police? What on earth had given her that idea?

  ‘Yes,’ Ruby went on, ‘did we rob a bank, like in the movies? It must have terribly exciting! Unfortunately I don’t seem to remember anything about it. It was only when the little girl was talking about banks earlier on that I put it all together.’

  Banks? Little girl? Oh Deedee and her ‘where did the river go?’ joke. ‘Oh good Lord, no, we are not on the run from the police, nor did we rob a bank.’

  ‘We didn’t?’ Ruby actually sounded disappointed as she held out her comb and some curlers. ‘Put these in for me dear.’

  Georgia began separating locks of hair. ‘No, we didn’t.’

  ‘Oh dear, so those bags aren’t all full of money?

  ‘No, no money. Do you remember that the power went out?’

  ‘Was that because we had no money?’

  Georgia pressed her lips together, not daring to speak for a moment, not knowing whether she would laugh or cry. Then she carefully rolled a section of hair up and round a curler and pinned it into place. Taking a couple of deep breathes, she began combing out another section.

  ‘Tell you what, it’s late, and it’s a long story, but all you need to know for now is that we all signed up for this fun filled adventure tour (which was one way of looking at it), and if you remind me in the morning, I will tell you all about it.’ And hopefully she will have forgotten by then.

  Ruby did not reply to this and by the time the last curler was in place she was worrying about the ladders in her pantyhose.

  As the fire began to die down and the others settled down for the night, Badger and Millie burrowed under the covers, Georgia and Ant found a suitable spot from where they would keep guard.

  Lola had offered, but Georgia felt far too wired to sleep. Ant snuggled down into her lap and promptly fell
asleep, snoring occasionally. The peace of the tranquil surroundings were broken only by the soft crackle of the fire, frogs croaking and the murmuring of the river. Once or twice she heard a peculiar coughing sound off in the distance. A wild pig maybe?

  For the first time in days she suddenly craved a cigarette. Holding Ant under one arm she silently retrieved the packet from the back of her pack, giving it a quick sniff as she opened it. Hallelujah, the smell of bleach had finally gone. She lit it, drawing on deeply, watching the smoke curl up and disappear into the darkness. As she smoked she thought about what Ruby had said. This all had to be so confusing for someone with dementia. It was confusing enough for her and she was of sound mind. (Mostly.)

  Then she briefly wondered what Ruby had done with her life vest. She had definitely been wearing it when they first set off, they all agreed on that, but no one remembered seeing her take it off, and even though they had searched through all their possessions it had never been found. Another of life’s mysteries.

  She drew a last puff, and then carefully crushed out the cigarette, double checking that it had been extinguished. The last thing she needed was to start a bush fire. She was kind of pleased they would no longer be travelling in the dark. Everything she had ever heard about the Ozarks mentioned how beautiful it was, and now she would get to see it.

  She made a mental note that in future, they should stay closer to the right bank, in case they had to swim ashore, especially where the water ways were over a mile wide. If by misfortune they ended up on the wrong bank, and were forced to carry on by foot they would have to circle nearly three quarters of the way around the Ozarks. All that walking just to get back to the side they needed to be on. And that would add days, if not weeks to their journey.

  She reached for her water bottle and at that moment, she heard a soft crack to her left, just along the water’s edge, thirty or forty yards away. Keeping a firm grip on Ant, she cocked her head listening. The sound came again, this time a little closer, near where the canoes had been pulled ashore. She stared into the darkness, then suddenly there was the silhouette of a cat, clear against the shimmering water of the river.

  She relaxed, it was just a cat. It turned its head and for a brief second its eyes caught the firelight and they seemed to glow an ethereal yellow green. She was just taking in its rounded ears and long tail dipping down to touch the ground when she registered its size. It was way taller than the canoes! This was no sweet kitty, this was a cougar or a mountain lion, or whatever the hell they were called over here. And whatever it was called, it was no doubt as dangerous as a lion in Africa and everyone knew they mauled people to death all the time.

  She leapt to her feet, thinking about the length of its claws, the size of its teeth and just how powerful it seemed, not quite sure what to do first. Still clutching Ant, now wide awake and protesting vocally, she grabbed her shotgun. Perhaps she should fire a shot in the air to frighten it away? And probably scare Ruby to death in the process.

  Now about twenty yards away the big cat stared at her for a moment longer, clearly not the slightest bit intimidated. Georgia froze in place, barely daring to breathe and watched as it lifted its tail, rhythmically scratched at the ground with its back feet and then peed; clearly marking his territory. And from where Georgia stood, she could have sworn it pissed straight into the nearest canoe. Then with a flick of its tail, it turned and padded off into the shadows.

  Though she remained extra vigilant throughout the rest of the night it did not come back. She couldn’t believe that she had nearly mistaken the creature for a cute domestic house cat. No one had told her that there were mountain lions here. There hadn’t been any kitsch dishcloths back at River View Resort with mountain lions all over them, and she had never seen one in the wild before, so it was kind of understandable.

  She suddenly remembered the story of an old lady in the U.K. who had rung the police to say there was a big cat in her garden, and the kindly officer who had taken the call had suggested she give it a bowl of milk. It didn’t have a happy ending. The big cat had been an escaped black leopard, and the milk hadn’t been enough.

  When she had first heard that story she had wondered how anyone could mix the two up. Now, she knew. Then she wondered how bad the canoe was going to smell. She thought about it for a moment then decided she was not going to go down to check. It probably smelt just like cat pee, but a hundred times worse.

  She settled back down against her tree, cradling Ant in the crook of her arm and giving her a quick kiss on the top of her head. Tomorrow was soon enough to find out what mountain lion pee smelt like.

  Chapter Forty Eight

  August 18th, Day 39

  Three days had gone by since the sighting of the big cat and in the soft grey light of dawn that next morning, Georgia had shared her sighting of the mountain lion with the others and then taken them down to the canoe to smell for themselves. She had to admit to herself that she had been somewhat disappointed that the stench had not been quite as potent as she had expected. Certainly the canoe had smelled, but no more than if an ordinary tom cat had passed by.

  ‘Are you sure it wasn’t just a house cat gone feral?’ Lola had asked as the dogs tiptoed cautiously around the smell, and Ant sneezed.

  ‘I am sure, believe me it was huge.’

  She could tell Lola hadn’t really believed her, but then Deedee found paw prints in the mud along the river’s edge and Lola, after staring at the evidence for a full minute, had decided they should pack up and leave. Right then and there. ‘We can have breakfast somewhere else.’

  Within an hour of leaving Big Cat Camp, they had found where they had taken a wrong turn, and it had been a complete mystery to all of them how they had managed to go so badly wrong. Back on the main river, they had used the compass, double checking everything. Measure twice and cut once.

  It had been very sobering to discover that while they were lost, they had been going in the opposite direction! Thank goodness it had only been a backwater, they couldn’t even begin to imagine how far they might have travelled otherwise. Finally the landmarks had begun matching up with those shown on the map, removing any lingering doubts that they were back on track.

  They had travelled twenty eight miles since then, camping the last two nights without incident, and passing safely under the bridge where Route-5 crosses over Lake of the Ozarks. There was a marked difference in their surroundings. Now the waterways were less defined, the still waters stretching off into the distance, becoming a series of interconnected lakes.

  It amazed all of them just how densely built up this area was. What they had taken as rock faces in the dim moonlight when they had still been travelling at night, had in fact, been houses. They had been passing house after house, many of them built out over the water. Now she could see that some of them were inhabited. Occasionally they caught a quick glimpse of someone watching through a window, the twitch of a curtain, or a figure slipping away round the side of a house. Once or twice dogs barked in the distance, enthusiastically answered by Badger and Millie. Ant did not bother, instead she just peered over the top of her bag and then curled right back up.

  The only problem with canoeing Georgia decided, was that it left a lot of time for thinking, as sitting in the stern of a canoe facing the backs of your companions did not really lend itself to deep conversation. Occasionally Team Lola, as they had taken to referring to Lola, Jamie and Deedee’s canoe, would glide alongside and they would discuss the next leg of the journey or whether they should take a break. But mostly Team Lola trailed a little behind, following Georgia’s lead

  Yes, she decided, canoeing left a lot of time for thinking, and worrying. The constant worry about dwindling food supplies, and what they would find once they reached Glaize Grand Arms. She prayed that it would not be mountainous terrain. As it was, having Ruby with them was going to slow them down badly, even if the way was easy. Not that she regretted bringing her with them, the thought never even crossed her mind, it was
just another thing that they would have to contend with.

  Nothing was simple and one thing she had learned over the last weeks was that getting down to Bethel wasn’t just a matter of travelling so many miles a day. They constantly had to stop to hunt and forage and it all took time, time that they did not have. While they were fine for now with the warm weather (unbearably hot in fact), it would not stay that way. And travelling by foot across a harsh winter landscape with inadequate clothing, the dogs and an old lady with arthritis and bordering on senility, was a terrifying prospect. She shook her head, she had to stop stressing, stop obsessing about the same issues over and over and concentrate on the here and now and getting through one day at a time.

  ‘Hey Rebecca,’ Georgia called, we should probably move in a little closer to shore,’

  Rebecca gave her a thumbs up to let her know she had heard and they began changing direction. Droplets from their paddles sparkled in the early morning sunlight as they dipped and lifted and sent water swirling and spiraling along the sides of the canoes as they sped across the lake.

  Just ahead of them, a flock of Mallards hastened out of their way, flapping their wings against the water and leaving v shaped ripples in the water behind them as they soared skywards. She sighed, despite everything, it was so beautiful here, so tranquil. Then she felt her throat tighten, Nathan would have thought so too. If only she had known about this place. By car it would have been so close that they could have come down here for a weekend. By car no less! It seemed almost unimaginable now. The whole concept of driving everywhere or anywhere was already feeling like the stuff of science fiction.

  Behind her she heard Lola call out, ‘are we going ashore then?’

  Georgia and Rebecca stopped paddling, watching the mallards, now tiny dots, disappear out of sight as they waited for the other canoe to catch up.