by Colin Kersey
I groaned. “Now you tell me.”
“Want to play a game?” she asked. She unfolded a blanket from the backpack she had made me carry.
“I’d rather eat.”
“Tell you what,” she said. “We can eat and play the game at the same time.”
“What’s the game?” I unwrapped a tuna, pickle and olive sandwich from the backpack and handed it to Valerie.
“The game is to describe what you see so the other person can see it. You go first.”
“Okay,” I said doubtfully. How was she going to tell me what she ‘saw?’ On the other hand, as she had proven when pruning the roses, she was quite capable of surprises.
I took a bite of sandwich and chewed as I considered how to describe where we were to someone who had no references for color or visual imagery.
“We’re in a rocky gorge,” I began hesitantly. “The rock we’re sitting on happens to be the great-granddaddy of all the other rocks. The river here is probably forty or fifty yards across. Upstream, it’s compressed into half that. The noise you hear is water smashing into the boulders that line the riverbed. Beneath this rock is a pool. The water is deep and clear and shot through with sunlight.” I paused. How could she possibly know what sunlight or clear water looked like? Hell, I wasn’t even sure why I invited her, except I felt sorry for her being stuck on the farm without a friend except for a dog. We were both clearly out of our element here—me challenged verbally and her visually.
“Go on,” Valerie urged.
“Hidden within my own shadow, I can see three large trout, maybe fifteen, eighteen inches long, sitting down there, hugging the bottom, in a holding pattern. A kingfisher— that’s a bird with a big bill for catching minnows—just swooped by, twisting, turning, skimming the water’s surface, looking for lunch. He didn’t find anything this trip. Across from us, there are trees. Cottonwood, I think. Their limbs are covered with new leaves.”
“What else?” Valerie asked. Her eyes were closed, and a smile played upon her lips.
“Below us, the river gradually fans out, becoming shallow. There’s a riffle followed by more white water.” White? This was not getting any easier.
“Anything else?”
“A tree, missing most of its bark, jutting into the river. The water beneath it is shadowed. A good place for another trout to hide maybe.”
She was silent for several seconds, listening.
“I guess ‘shadow’ is a dumb word to be using.”
“Actually,” she said, “I liked it. I have no idea what one looks like, but I know how it feels. Cool.”
“Exactly!” I said, relieved. “Now, it’s your turn.”
“Shhhh! I’m listening.”
I waited patiently as Valerie sat, eyes closed. A line of ants marched in single file across the surface of the rock and a corner of our blanket, attracted by a package of fig bars. I thought about squishing them, but there were too many.
“I see a river,” she said. “Wild as a unicorn running free, its long mane flowing behind it in the wind. You can hear the thunder of its hooves flying over the rocks as it gallops by.”
“That’s beau—” I started to say before she cut me off with a wave.
“We’re sitting upon the scarred remainder of one of the great stone battlements of a once mighty fortress from the age of giants,” she continued. “A secret cavern runs deep into the base of the mountains. Below us, watching us even now, is an ancient dragon who lies coiled beneath the water at the entrance to the cavern. His scaly skin is woven from the nightmares of children and is magical so that no one can see him except when he wants them to. He waits patiently as he has for thousands of years for people to come sit upon this rock. He overhears them chatting foolishly about their silly dreams while eating their picnic lunches. He opens first one eye, then the other, stretches out a long, razor-sharp talon.” She extended one arm. “And plucks them away, never to be seen again!”
I stuck the sandwich in my mouth and clapped.
“Shush!” She grabbed my hands. “You’ll wake the dragon.”
I removed the sandwich from my mouth. “Think he’d let us go if I gave him a few of my olives?”
“Are you kidding? Olives are his favorite snack, right after tuna fish and pickles.” Valerie tossed the rest of her sandwich into the river. “Sorry about that. It sounded better than it tasted.”
***
I leaned back on my elbows with Patsy lying beside me, feeling the sun-warmed rock beneath me, and I felt my body begin to change. It was as if the spring that held all the parts of me together was finally letting go, releasing my arms, legs, hands, and feet, even my fingers and toes. My lips tingled and I felt my face flush. For a moment, I thought I might faint. I lay on my back and grabbed a handful of Patsy’s fur for reassurance. Her coat felt like velvet, so smooth and soft, I wanted to wrap my face in it, drink in her animal smell. I might have moaned. I heard Gray ask, “Are you okay?” I felt a ridiculous grin break across my face. “I’m more than okay. I’m wonderful.”
I reached over with my left hand and sifted his soft, flannel shirt between my fingers. I only wanted one thing in the world and that was for him to make love to me. The only time I had ever been this close to a boy was a high school dance. Then I remembered what Momma said, “If you snooze, you lose.” So, I grabbed a handful of his shirt and slowly pulled his face down toward mine. His hair fell against my face as I drank in his smell and the faint odor of tuna fish on his breath. My body was still coming apart, unfolding, like a flower, and I began to shiver though I was warm.
There was a moment when I felt him resist and I was afraid. I so desperately wanted Gray to respond. Then, to my joy, he brought his soft lips to mine. I could not help myself as we mashed our lips together and I forced my tongue between his lips to taste him like the romantic stories I had read. I reached for his jeans and fumbled with his zipper and I could not stop quivering, like there was electricity running through my veins instead of blood. Then he lay down on me and I opened my legs.
I felt the sun on my face and a breeze blew softly across my cheek and I heard every note the river and the trees and the breeze made, like some enormous celestial orchestra, as Gray moved inside me.
Afterwards, I curled my body next to his and lay my head in the crook of his shoulder. We lay like that for a while, nobody saying anything. I heard him drift into sleep and tears ran down my cheeks and it was almost like the forest heard me and wept with the sweet joy and incredible sadness of it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
I’m sorry, Heide. I do not know what I was thinking. In fact, I am pretty sure I was not thinking at all. Just reacting. Surprised that a young, beautiful woman, blind since birth, wanted to make love with me for the first time, lying on an enormous rock in the sun by a roaring river. With me. On a rock. Can you imagine? We didn’t even manage to take off all our clothes.
In her shyness, Valerie had fought to keep my eyes from viewing her nakedness. Or so I believed.
Valerie was still smiling the next morning. Vonda noticed.
“What’s with you this morning?” she asked.
“Nothing,” Valerie answered before darting away before anyone could ask more questions.
Later, when she brought my lunch out to where I was working, she grasped me by the arm and pulled me to her.
“Is anybody watching?”
“Not that I can see.”
“Good.”
We made out like teenagers in a dark closet. Her lips missed mine initially by a country mile, but she had tenacity. She also had fervor. They may have heard us in Everett.
“Maybe I can sneak down to see you tonight after everyone’s asleep,” she said as she was leaving.
“What if you get caught?”
“Yeah.” She smiled. “What if?”
***
Later that afternoon, I was cutting grass with the Bull, the clippings flying up behind from the three gangs of spinning blades, when I sa
w the thin, shark-like figure in the dark suit and white shirt, waiting up by the road. The temperature suddenly seemed to drop thirty degrees. It was late in the day and a breeze had come up that was bowing the limbs on the alder trees and fluttering their leaves. I parked the mower several feet away, shutting the engine off before I approached the other man standing just on the other side of the fence.
“How’d you find me?”
“It looks like you’ve healed pretty well,” Catania said.
I glanced down at the angry, puckered scar that bloomed among the muscles of my side.
“Once again, how’d you find me?”
“Well, there was the money.”
I frowned, thinking the FBI agent thought I knew where the $100 million was hidden.
“Took us a while,” Catania said. “What was it? A camera you bought at Tom’s Antiques?”
“You’re kidding.” I studied the other man for several seconds, trying to make sense of it. And then I understood. “You did something to the bills in my wallet.”
Catania nodded. “In addition to the serial numbers, there was a tiny amount of radioactive ink invisible to the naked eye added to the bills. They finally turned up, and we were able to track them to the bank and then to where you made your purchase. When we showed him your photo, the owner had no problem in remembering you. Frankly, I had given up. I figured you would have spent that cash within a couple of days—not weeks. But computers, bless their little digital hearts, they never give up.”
“All that money out there—millions and billions being spent every day—and you were able to spot my three 20s and a 5?”
“When it comes to cash, it’s not really millions and billions. You would be surprised how few people handle cash today. Most transactions are handled by debit or credit cards and the rest of it checks.”
“Then there was the license plate search by your local sheriff’s department,” Catania added. “Someone there must not have anything better to do.” He smiled and shook his head. “By the way, that was highly illegal, but very clever swapping your truck for a gardener’s pickup on your way out of town. Took us almost two days to figure out what you’d done.”
“What brings you up here?”
Catania rested a manicured hand on the top rail of the white-washed fence. “I thought it was worth a trip to see what you were up to. Make sure you weren’t driving a red Ferrari convertible. Or maybe sipping martinis on a yacht in Anacortes.”
“Like I told you before, my wife said the money is in a bank in the Cayman Islands. I don’t have a clue which one.” Lying, I had discovered, was becoming surprisingly easy. Almost easier than the truth.
“Yeah,” Catania said. “I can see that.”
“They’re not safe, you know,” he added, nodding toward the house. “If our people can find you, they can find you.”
“You’re telling me I can’t stay.”
“Not if you care about these people.”
“Don’t they have better things to do than hunt for me?” I protested. “Besides, what happens if I leave and they show up after I’m gone?
“Leave some breadcrumbs somewhere for them to follow,” Catania said, “but not too close.”
“Breadcrumbs?”
“Like a speeding ticket in Boise.”
I snorted. “I couldn’t get a speeding ticket in that leaf hauler if I drove it off a cliff.”
“You’ll figure something out. Just don’t wait too long.”
I turned away so Catania wouldn’t see my anguish.
“Hey,” Catania said. “You found this place. Maybe you’ll find another.”
***
Stu was waiting for me when I drove the Bull into the barn, a toothpick in the corner of his mouth.
“Who was the suit you were talking to?” he asked after I turned off the Bull’s engine.
“Real estate agent. I told him to give you a call.”
Like I said, lying gets easier the more you do it.
“That right?” Stu nodded, but sounded skeptical. “He’s likely a day late and a dollar short. Bob Halonen is coming up this weekend to look the place over, maybe make an offer.”
In my despair, I could think of nothing to say. Even my sarcasm had temporarily abandoned me.
“Guess you’ll need to think about where you’re going to go next,” Stu said.
“What makes you so sure Virgil wants to sell? He didn’t sound that happy when you and Vonda brought up the idea.”
Stu removed the toothpick and flicked it out the barn door. “Tell you the truth, I don’t know that he does want to sell. Yet.” He smiled. “Once I show him how bad this place has been burning money these past few years, I think he might feel different. Fact is, I am pretty sure of it. You’d be amazed what property taxes are these days.”
I pulled a t-shirt on. “That ought to make you and Vonda happy. What about Valerie?”
“Don’t be too worried about Valerie. Virgil will likely buy a house with an acre of land somewhere. Unless he has been taking cooking classes that I do not know about, he will need Valerie to take care of things, just as she does now.”
“Anyone ever consider what Valerie would like?”
“Not me,” Stu said. “But then it doesn’t really matter what she wants. She’ll get by as long as Virgil is around.”
Disgusted, I turned to leave.
“Before you go,” Stu said, “it looks like I might need your marketing skills after all. You still have those signs and the artwork for that ad you ran?”
I stared at him. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Got an idea for a fishing derby from the owner of the local auto parts store. He’s willing to pay for the ad and put up money for the grand prize.”
“What’s the grand prize?”
“Catch Moses and win a thousand bucks.”
CHAPTER THIRTY
Unable to sleep, I tossed and turned as I considered possibilities for an eight-digit password. Each time I shifted to one side or the other of the narrow cot, its springs would protest loudly.
Earlier, I had persuaded a clearly disappointed Valerie that tonight was not going to work for our planned rendezvous. If Catania was right, I might only have a few days before the cartel showed up. Starting a relationship now could be a death sentence. But I could not tell her that without blowing my cover, so I faked having a migraine.
Over the past few weeks, I had already reviewed dozens of password possibilities, but nothing that felt right, or even close. I needed to find another place off the grid to hide before the bad guys and girls arrived. The odds were stacked against me, but if I could crack the bank security, it might make the difference between being homeless in Portland or living on a small vineyard in Portugal.
Sometime during the night, a heavy fog rolled in, enveloping the farm. I lay listening to the intermittent plops of condensation falling from the cabin roof and striking the deck. There were other noises, too. Strange noises like footsteps. At first, I thought it was Valerie. Then my overactive imagination kicked in. As the minutes ticked by, I grew certain I was being surrounded by gunmen from the cartel.
I opened the door to discover that the rest of the world had disappeared. The farm lay hidden beneath a heavy mist on a windless early morning. Other than the drips and those mysterious footsteps, there wasn’t a sound.
Patsy arrived a few minutes later. Instead of entering the cabin as was her custom, she remained on the porch, staring off to the east. When I finished dressing, I joined her.
“What is it, girl?” I heard a rumble deep in her throat and the ruff of fur around her neck stood up stiff as a brush. “Stay.”
I tiptoed across the deck and walked softly in the direction Patsy’s nose was pointing, my hands balled into fists. Visibility was virtually zero. The fog thickened the further I went from the cabin. The air was supersaturated with moisture so that my cheeks were slick and my eyelashes heavy with dew. Even my clothes were becoming water-logged.
The grunt, coming as it did so near and sounding unlike anything I had ever heard, made me jump. While I waited for the pounding of my heart to subside, I listened for another sound as I strained to peer through the veil of mist. Pawing and heavy breathing sounded off to my right. I crept forward, wondering if a neighbor’s horse had jumped a fence and wandered onto the trout farm.
Beneath the shelter of a large cedar tree, the fog thinned, and I spotted five animals, all staring calmly at me. At first, I thought they were deer. Then I saw the male with its immense rack of antlers and massive shoulders. I watched in awe as the huge creatures stripped berries and leaves from huckleberry bushes.
That night, as we were doing dishes, I told Valerie about the elk herd.
“I missed seeing you last night.” A smile flitted across her face.
I noticed that she had chewed her fingernails down to the quick. “Momma told us about them. She said they migrate down from the mountains. They are always long gone by hunting season. But, as far as I know, they have never visited our place since she died. Stu said he’d fill the freezer with venison if they did.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The Gordon’s Auto Parts Fishing Derby had been well underway for several hours when the appointed time for my lunch arrived. A breeze had sprung up. It rippled the surface of the water and whispered among the trees. I noticed an empty plastic bottle and soda cans lying in the grass. A paper wrapper tumbled past. I would need to pick up trash before tomorrow morning. I made a note to mention the need for another litter barrel. Judging from the length of the line, we could also use another port-a-potty as well. That was unless someone caught Moses. Then the crowds would likely thin as soon as the word got out.
As I jogged up to the house, I could hear Valerie practicing the viola. I had not heard her play music since hurting her hand. Now, unlike the lyrical quality I remembered from earlier, her playing sounded disjointed and almost angry. She stopped playing when she heard me enter.