■ ■ ■
The day was proving to be mild, a break from the lengthy heat wave, which Jake Withers appreciated given that he was called into Skootch’s abode. An airless cabin on a hot day, an A-frame without insulation. In the winter he kept the stove burning wood nonstop, while in the summer his guests broiled. Skootch didn’t seem to mind. As skinny as a greyhound, he wore scant clothing. He perspired as anyone else did but heat never seemed to bother him. The windows of his A-frame were left wide open and yet only the bugs entered—Skootch believed that humankind should live at peace with Mother Nature’s creatures, including the blackfly and the mosquito—while fresh air stayed outside. The last time he was inside the cabin Jake Withers believed that he might melt, then be poured into a jug. This time, he guessed that he could survive okay.
The smoke didn’t help, though. Skootch toked up as Jake entered.
He wore war paint. That’s what it looked like to Jake. One broad black stripe between his nipples, and a second line under his eyes that slipped over the bridge of his nose. At first, Jake uttered a small laugh, believing that that might be appropriate. When Skootch seemed to not share in the humour, he censored himself, and sat on the floor across from the other man. Smokes, one of tobacco laced with hashish, another the grass that Jake peddled now, lay between them.
He crossed his legs in front of him and sat on a blanket on the floor.
“I thought we might have a powwow,” Skootch said. “Talk things over.”
“Sure, Skootch. Is something wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong, Jake. Do you think I’d invite you into my house if something was wrong? If something was wrong I’d invite you into the woods. Tie you to a tree. Stuff a rock down your throat. Scrub your cock and balls with poison ivy. Then release you. Watch you scratch the itch.”
In alluding only to a potential threat, Skootch sharply heightened Jake’s wariness and fear. “I just want to know if I did something wrong is all.”
“You mean those errors? Reduce them. Get lower to the ball. Bend your knees. You’ve let yourself get stiff. As for your hitting, I’ve seen some signs. Your swing is loosening up. Contact will come, then the hits.”
When Skootch passed the joint across to him, Jake accepted the tobacco and hash. He didn’t do this stuff on his own, but he was polite, and rarely turned down these friendly gestures. He’d been raised to be polite, first and foremost. The tobacco scalded his tongue.
“Business-wise, your sales have been good, Jake. I have good reports on you. You’re punctual. People have told me that. They like you. But I thought it was time that we chewed the fat a little. Y’know?”
“Sure, Skootch.” The compliments made him nervous.
His host took a long drag, then exhaled slowly. When he finally evacuated his lungs, Jake received the smoke in his face.
“I’m going to increase your territory. Did you know that?”
“No,” Jake said. “I didn’t know that. Thanks.”
“Someday I’ll reduce it. That’s the life of a salesman. You do well, your territory is reduced. Forces you to take blood from a stone to make things happen. Get me?”
Jake thought about it. “You mean, since my territory is increasing, that’s a bad thing?”
“You’re a rookie. You’re just getting started. So I start you off small in case you don’t work out. You get to cause less damage that way. But you’re doing fine, no damage done, so I’m increasing your territory for now. Then, when you’re making too much money and getting too big for your britches, I’ll make you work with less. See if you can make more with less. Test your mettle that way, do you see?”
“I guess so. Yeah.”
“Good,” Skootch said. “Good. I run this ship like IBM runs theirs. Did you know that? Here’s the thing, kid. I need you to keep your car.”
“I’m keeping it, Skootch. It’s running like a charm.”
Skootch nodded, smoking, and closed his eyes while he inhaled. “Keep it that way. Invest in maintenance, Jake. This is my primary message today. Invest in maintenance. You’re doing okay, Jake my boy, but you’re going to make more money than your eyeballs can count. I don’t want you driving around town in some Porsche or Alfa Romeo, picking up chicks. You don’t want to pick up those chicks. Do that and we’re dead. You’ll be dead, anyway, but I won’t let you take me down with you. You want a car like that? Keep it in some foreign country. But here, invest in maintenance. Your car is your disguise. Your disguise is your eternal salvation.”
Jake nodded with some evident enthusiasm. “You don’t have to worry about that. I know how to get around.”
“That’s important, Jake. I’m not sure there’s anything more important than knowing how to get around.”
Skootch opened up an aluminium case. Jake half expected him to take out something he would not like, such as a gun or a hypodermic for hard drugs. Hard drugs scared him. So did guns. But Skootch kept a variety of finger paints inside the case, and he twisted off the top of the orange into which he dipped the index and middle fingers of his right hand.
He traced twin tracks of orange across his brow.
“What are you doing?” Jake asked.
“What does it look like I’m doing?”
“I don’t know,” Jake said. “Putting on paint?”
“War paint,” Skootch acknowledged.
“Yeah? We’re at war now?”
“Yes, Jake,” Skootch said. “We’re at war now. That’s another reason I don’t want you driving around in some BMW or Lexus. Because we’re at war. The Old Orange Shitbox keeps you safe. No Audi will do that for you.”
Jake Withers waited awhile and then asked, “What war? Who with?”
“With the forces that are arrayed against the world, Jake. We’re at war with our enemies. Who else? We are at war against the evil in our midst.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Parallel purple stripes went down each side of his face, from high on the temple to just under the jawline. A slash of pure white was drawn from Skootch’s lower lip, down under his chin, and over his Adam’s apple to the base of his neck.
“Lean in, Jake,” Skootch invited. “I’ll paint you up.”
“Yeah?” Jake said, tentative still. “What for?”
“For battle. Jake, come on, if you’re going to war, look the part.”
“I thought I’d make some deliveries today.”
“Forget it. The roads are too dangerous for you now, Jake. Somebody might mistake you for a logger. Or worse. A tree hugger. Which is what you are.”
Skootch painted the bridge of Jake’s nose green then asked him to smile.
“Show us those pearly whites.”
Jake did so.
“Hold that pose.” Skootch fished out his cell phone from a scant pile of clothing on the floor and held it up to take Jake’s picture. “There’s plenty of girls here, Jake. I don’t want you dating in town. I’m told you’re not going with anybody from here.”
“Come on. That’s not really your business.”
“Isn’t it? Have you ever kissed a man, Jake? I mean, really kissed a man?”
“No.” He was uncomfortable with this turn. “I’m not going to either.”
“Good,” Skootch said, then took his picture, then examined the result. “Then go out with girls from around here, Jake, so we can keep our eye on you, you know? Unless you want to go back to selling pavement.”
Jake Withers was aware of the change forecast by this conversation. He considered his choices, what he should do. He accepted that the way things were going right now suited him, that even though he was not completely happy with the arrangement he could go along with Skootch. “What do you want me to do?” he asked. A query that indicated his compliance.
“Put on your war paint, Jake. Smear your face, your chest, your
arms, your neck. I want to see what you look like in full battle regalia. Let me see my new young warrior. Then we shall study war, Jake. We shall devise tactics, our battle plan.”
Jake hesitated, then he asked, “You mean like for baseball?”
This time, Skootch indicated that he did not mean that, but he did not say what he meant.
He watched as Jake applied paint to his skin. He nodded approval. He seemed to appreciate his natural artistry.
“Looking good. When you’re done, I’m taking you for a long run through the woods. I’ve got some things to show you. I’ll find someone who’s superb with a needle. What you need is a loincloth. For today, you can wear one of mine. We have to toughen you up for battle, Jake. Understand me? We need to make a warrior out of you.”
“I don’t think I’m much of a warrior,” Jake Withers demurred.
“Not yet,” Skootch agreed. “Slip out of those clothes. Let’s see what fits.”
■ ■ ■
A dilemma.
Willis Howard sold a pie to Alex O’Farrell, forgoing the desire to shove it back in his face. He told himself that if it was a cream pie he’d do just that, but he knew that he was only kidding himself. He lacked the courage, and calculated that a man like Alex getting a pie in the face from a man like him would probably result in receiving a knuckle sandwich in return. As old as the elder O’Farrell might be, a blow from that man probably would kill him.
Anyway, he didn’t have a cream pie so that was that.
The situation become more testy for him when he learned that Tara sold her first grandfather clock and that Alex O’Farrell was the buyer. He found the development difficult. She convinced him that she could outsell him when it came to the big-ticket items, and she just proved that to be true. He told her he sold one a year but hadn’t actually sold one in over two years. He just liked having them around because they gave the store a sense of class. His supplier was willing to wait before he took the clocks back as he had more returns than he could handle anyway. So both the manufacturer and the shopkeeper conspired to pretend that they sold grandfather clocks for anywhere from seventeen hundred dollars to a little over four thousand. O’Farrell’s purchase pretty much split the difference, costing just under thirty-one hundred. As well, she hadn’t offered terms, which Willis never liked to do with the elderly as they often expired before their contracts, and put the whole thing on his credit card.
Amazing.
A fine development for his store, he just regretted that Alex O’Farrell was the purchaser.
“I thought you’d be more surprised,” Tara said in response to his confounding attitude.
“His son—”
“Be careful now. I’m dating him.”
“Not that son.”
“—burnt the bridge, some say. I know.”
“That family is not in my good graces right now.”
Tara gave him a couple of taps on his left shoulder, which he found a tad condescending. “Two things, Willis. Innocent until proven guilty—”
“—everybody knows—”
“—and nobody is saying that Alex has anything to do with it. I haven’t met Denny O’Farrell—well, briefly, in a storm—but he’s a grown man. Are you going to blame the fathers for the sins of the children now? Isn’t that ass-backwards?”
“What’s ass-backwards is you dating Ryan.”
“Excuse me?”
Sometimes he said more than he ever meant to release when in her company. She made him the opposite of tongue-tied. As if she oiled his larynx.
“Yeah. Okay. Sorry. Date whomever you want, it’s no skin off my nose. But I don’t know what he’s going to do now. If he doesn’t arrest his own brother, I can guarantee you the shit will hit the fan.”
“You can guarantee that? And you won’t have anything to do with pushing the issue either, is that fair to say, Willis?”
He yielded to a compulsion to open the cash register at that moment, just to hear it ring.
“Willis?”
She crossed her arms, awaiting a reply. He imagined that she was tapping a toe. Willis punched the drawer shut.
“I’m a citizen, Tara. I have my responsibilities. Everybody does.”
“Responsibilities. That’s a word. So is meddling. Are you sure you know the difference?”
Now she was mad, and did not wait for a reply. Willis was surprised when she bolted, returning to her alcove.
They remained separated for a while. A few tourists came and went. Finally, Willis went across to her space and leaned his hip against the doorjamb. “Listen,” he said. “It’s a really good sale. Congratulations. We’ll have to agree to disagree on the other matter, but selling the clock, that’s well done. Over the years he’s been in this store probably fifty times. I think his biggest purchase was a ukulele.”
“A what?”
“I’m serious.”
Tara shrugged, accepting his willingness to heal their wounds. “It’s a start. I hope to sell more clocks.” Even when he was apologizing Tara found him creepy, and wished he’d go. “Anyway, you sold him a pie. If he was supposed to be persona non grata in here, why did you sell him a pie?”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I was out of line. By the way, that was also a good sale.”
She wasn’t following his thread.
“Someone buys a pie and then you help him eat it. And carve me a slice. Good one. We can sell more pies that way.”
She knew that he was trying very hard to be funny, and ingratiating, but she chose to make this difficult for him and let his apology go by, only vaguely accepted. Just then, though, she saw her way out of this discussion.
“She’s here. Look. Mrs. McCracken. With fresh pies!”
Willis glanced out the window, through and around the plethora of merchandise, as the older woman parked her Vespa.
“I’m surprised,” he allowed. “I thought she’d be in mourning for the rest of her life.”
Finally, they could agree on something. “Me, too,” Tara said, but unlike Willis she was curious, rather than merely accepting, of this change in the woman’s temper. The old lady bounded into the store as though she was celebrating.
“Do you know what the tourists are doing?” she exclaimed as she carried in a pair of lemon meringues that looked incredibly fluffy and light. She didn’t wait for a reply. “They got off the train and went straight to where the bridge used to be. They’re snapping pictures! Like never before. Basically, they’re taking pictures of a hole. They’ll go home and say to their friends, ‘You’ll never guess what used to be here.’”
“Why are you so chipper?” Tara asked. The leap from her misery the previous night did not seem either real or healthy. Tara felt then that she should not leave her side, eventually walking Mrs. McCracken home and staying on for a late-night cup of tea. The revolving lights of assorted emergency vehicles intermittently flashed on the windows of her home while they sat together.
“Willis, do you understand what you must do?” Mrs. McCracken demanded, ignoring Tara a moment. “Sell everything bridge. Postcards—triple their price—T-shirts and those, what do you call them? Hoodies! Dreadful word. Anything with a bridge on it, they’ll buy.”
“If they ever show,” he complained.
“Oh, they’ll show. You can’t look at nothing forever.”
“Anyway, it’s only for a day or two. The novelty will wear off. With no bridge there will be no tourists.”
“Exactly! So let’s change that.”
“Mrs. McCracken—” Tara attempted to intrude.
“Oh, don’t look at me that way, I have not lost my senses. I am overcome, overcome I will say, with a thought. I have been enlightened, sweet girl, and now fate and I daresay my legacy awaits.”
Her spirit was so infectious that Tara was not only sporting a smile but she and Wi
llis managed to share a laugh together. Her indefatigable presence somehow dissolved their spat.
“Okay. So what gives?”
“We won’t give up!” Mrs. McCracken looked from the man to the woman and raised her hands in a gesture that was meant to indicate that the mysterious was nothing if not obvious.
“On—what?” Tara asked.
“The bridge!” Mrs. McCracken kept looking from one to the other as though they were drawn into a contest and her job was to anoint the winner. She feigned impatience, when neither came through, and smacked her lips. “The old bridge is to be rebuilt. We will have a new old bridge!”
“Seriously, Mrs. McCracken,” Willis Howard said, “and I’ve never asked this question of you before—although once or twice I might have been tempted—but have you been drinking?”
“Oh, don’t be an idiot! Four o’clock is my hour, not a moment before!”
“The covered bridge is gone, Mrs. McCracken. It’s not coming back. The government will now build the fast highway bridge the loggers want and that’s the end of it.”
“That’s not the end of it!” she fought on.
“I have to agree with Willis,” Tara put in.
“Oh, goodness, you’re both as idiotic as my grade ones! Of course, the government will build the highway bridge, and it will be ugly and it will be a monstrosity and there’s nothing to be done about that.”
Tara was on the verge of interrupting her, but settled for a puzzled look as Mrs. McCracken carried on.
“The government will not build a new covered bridge. They can’t afford it. They don’t have the expertise. Neither the loggers nor the highway department will be in favour. But we, ladies and gentlemen, good citizens of Wakefield, we shall build a new old covered bridge all by ourselves.”
Both Tara and Willis Howard were loath to burst her bubble, and so delayed, but Tara soon ventured, “And how do we do this without, oh, I don’t know . . . money?”
“We raise it!” Mrs. McCracken beamed.
“With bake sales, I suppose,” Willis deduced with evident scepticism.
The River Burns Page 23
