by Ron Foster
“Yea, that’s got me vexed too.” Crick said. “You got some kind of boat you ain`t been admitting to Clem? Dammit we had a boat and we had to use that old barge? What the hell did we do that for?” Crick asked as Bertha grabbed the shotgun out of Rossy’s hand and exchanged it for the pokey stick ready to lead the charge to wherever it needed to go.
“Hey now! I’ll be needin’ that! I’m ready to go along with you all as soon as I catch my breath for a second, Bertha!” Rossy Ross said breathlessly, straightening up and reaching back for her gun before David called a halt to this mad dash to nowhere without reasoning or a plan.
“Catch up if you can Crick and get you some sturdy boys to chase along with you. We got about three miles to go before we turn off at Shore Enuff Lane. I’ll wait for you there. The boatyard is about eight hundred yards from there, that’s got to be where they’re going. If’n they only got one rifle, we don’t need us no big party to do an intervention. Matter of fact, I don’t see no reason to get these folks here too upset rounding up a posse, you David, Beauregard, Ben the Bondsman and Loomis just come on now with the weapons you got and we will see about whose having who for dinner!” Clem said readying his old Mossberg 500 12-guage.
“Sounds like a plan to me!” David said before asking Loomis to go whisper in Beauregard and Ben’s ears it was time to soldier up and ask no questions but just come on along.
They would know that danger threatened but would also assume it wasn’t something bad enough to alert the whole group. Ben and Beauregard jumped up and hurried towards the group of Clem and Bertha but not without kind words and encouragement that nothing was wrong to the questioning groups as to their hurry and serious demeanors.
“What’s up guys?” Ben asked with an eye-clouding over look that was his indication of getting ready for some possible violence that needed to be addressed.
“Seems there is a party of prisoners being led through the woods about three miles from here that we need to address. Why they are prisoners we don’t know yet. But seeing how close they are to this little plantation we’re going to go have us a little look-see and maybe perform a possible intervention. Ben the way it’s been explained to me is we got one man with a rifle and some kind of strong armed professional fighting man pushing people through the woods chained together, sounds kind of funky don’t it?” David said jostling with his own shotgun like it was time to move out.
Julie grabbed her 9 mm Keltec carbine and once again got ready once again got ready and checked her extra Glock 30-round magazines to prepare for an outcome that was hopefully in their favor.
“See, she is ready! I’m ready too. Let’s go rescue them prisoner folks and their babies.” Bertha declared as the Matriarch and defender of all youngun’s and poor people in the world and was ready to set out and create what was called God’s thunder of the righteous ones.
“Settle down old girl! We’re leaving’ in a second! Why don’t you let me and Ben be the point men on this thing Clem? Dumas over three has got an AR-15 I’m gonna swap him out for and then I can bring a little firepower to this confrontation if necessary if more folks show up than we know about.” David said not waiting for any approval before heading towards Dumas.
“Dumas let me borrow your gun for a bit if you don’t mind. We got a little situation to handle, probably wont even need it but I am being extra careful just the same. ” David said, handing him his pump action shotgun as Dumas handed the Ar-15 to him trusting his friend implicitly and not pestering him with a ton of questions.
“You got it. What’s up David? You need me as part of your crew?” Dumas said apprehensively.
“Naw man, we got it. Just a little bump in the road that I’d rather go see about with a bit more firepower available. I will have it back to you shortly” David said assuring the man and hurrying back towards the soon to be rescue party.
David got about half way back to Clem and Loomis talking at each other before he had an ‘oh shit!’ moment and went back to Dumas to exchange AR magazines for a bandolier of shotgun shells.
“Where is my gun at?” Rossy Ross asked, not trusting Bertha’s old pokey stick to do much if anything in a gunfight.
“Ah hell!” Loomis said. “Give me a second gal.” He said going to BC Truck. “Lend me that ol’ over and under rifle you got I might need me a long gun as backup for appearance sake or shooting further than I am comfortable with using a pistol.” Loomis declared.
“I’ll give it to you Loomis. What’s up? Need any help?” BC said searching in his pack for his two-shot survival rifle.
“Mild confrontation, no problem, won’t require any lead I don’t think. Give it back to you in an hour or so.” Loomis said and went and handed it and some extra ammo to a very pleased Rossi.
“Something’s up and I want in on it. “ Rod said and he and LowBuck wandered over towards the milling group checking weapons.
“I’m in too!” Neal declared wandering up and reminding them that he was their number one tree rat eliminator with his 22 cal Rough Rider pistol and he thought it would suffice if he had to deal with any two legged rats.
“Ah hell! This is taking way too long as ya’ll decide which weapons you want to tote, cripes sake as far we know its just one old man and a rifle we have to worry about. We don’t need no more guns nor no more people, let’s just go!” Clem said as Rossy Ross was pulling on his shirttails to get this posse moving.
“We going to take my truck most of the way truck but it’s about a mile, mile and a half back in to where I’m thinking PD is at, ain`t that right, darlin’?” Clem said.
“Yea soon as we get to the big old sweet gum next to the buzzard tree, we go about a quarter mile to the left and that’s where I seen him at. But Clem we got to go now! Took me almost an hour and a half to run back here and get ya’ll and there ain`t no tellin’ if them folks are still safe or not! Punch Drunk was hollering at them and poking them like no tomorrow and the old man with the rifle wasn’t being too easy with them either.” Rossy Ross said exasperated as to how long it was taking them to rearm, equip and get on the trail to rescue those prisoners.
“David!” Julie said pulling him off to the side for a moment to speak. “You have enough backup and guns going already to resolve this situation. Someone however needs to stay around here and organize these bedraggled folks and get them on over to the plantation! I can get LowBuck and Kat to help me get everyone moving and setting up tents before the rain comes that Bertha insists her old weather chicken told us was on the way.”
“That is a good idea, Julie. Someone’s got to help these poor souls get some better directions about moving in here and we were kind of foolish to be just charging off and forgetting about them. Now if anything happens to us, which I doubt, there’s got to be other voices to help everyone get a grip on surviving here and working on some kind of reconstruction.” David said thanking Julie for thinking ahead and helping to guide and assist our fellow preppers move in.
“Let me get the keys for the tractor from Crick before ya’ll go and we can use it to pull one of the hay wagons to transport them all back to the plantation. I don’t know if Bertha’s ole mule will cooperate to pull the other wagon but if she will, we can double up and carry everyone and the gear back up before the rain hits.” Julie said, trying to look ahead and give the preppers some support while the others took care of their new rescue mission.
Crick handed the keys to Julie with some relief that caring for and organizing the preppers would be taken care of while they ran their mission. Julie gave David a quick kiss and they exchanged knowing looks that things would be all right somehow.
“Let’s load up and head on out. Come on now, times a wasting!’” Bertha declared with two spread arms kind of engulfing everybody with her wide girth and hustling them towards Clem’s blue and white pickup truck to get them all moving at once.
“Bertha, you got to ride in the back. You let David sit up here with that army rifle and let me know what’s going on
and let Rossy guide the way. We going to fix their chittlings momentarily.” Clem declared as the ever present who-gets-to ride where in this pickup decision carried on.
Clem hauled ass in a cloud of dust and a hang-on to what you got mode as the pickup truck barreled down the dusty road with no further explanation to the gathered people at the boat landing. As they were driving along, Clem said “I guess explanations are in order, but I’ll be gol durned if I want to tell them to you now David, but I guess I have too. You see Rossy Ross found herself a treasure ship; well that’s what we call it anyways. I guess you could say that’s it’s been nigh on about five or six years ago when she discovered it. What happened was there was this big casino barge that busted its moorings last hurricane flood near on 20 years ago give or take and its owners never found it and gave it up for sunk... Well anyway, you know the owner of this land, Mc Cloud, had the last overseer before me staying in the house with that old crazy boy that had the wrestling ring around the bed? Well they needed them a bit of money and that crazy boy of his bumped into this prize fighter and handler at one of them matches. Well, during that time, old PD, I call him PD but we also call him Punch Drunk when he is not around because he been in over 60 hardcore professional fighting matches and I guess it might have jiggled his brain a mite like some of them old boxers. That’s who Rossy’s talking about, see he comes down here once a year to look over the land he owns and that old scum-gully owner of the McCloud plantation and his son set themselves up some kind of hunting and fishing camp for the tourists with him that never took off. See one day Rossy Ross was out there doing her casing the area thing and come up on this old casino barge that was stuck on the end of a mud flat. Now I ain`t quite sure how it got down that way I think it was the flood but when they built them dams that old barge got left up high and dry up on the bank. Now I spent me a month of Sundays trying to figure out maritime law and how it works for many reasons. The main thing I knows is that if you find an unsecured boat in high water that has no crew on it the law of the sea says it yours and you have the right to salvage it. I knows you can sell it, claim it or do what you want with it because it’s abandoned.” Clem said as profound as he could.
“Now what’s got me vexed and concerned is that boat was adrift at one time. The original owners moored that old casino boat built on that giant barge about forty miles out of Birmingham way back when to start gambling on the Alabama River right after Prohibition because it was said that according to the court of law anyway at that time, that waterways were free and unregulated kinda like if you go offshore so far you can gamble because the laws of the land don’t apply. Now you got to follow me on this for a moment. See ol’ Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum they had them a scheme going on. That old P.D. had ‘em some money from winning all those fights he been in and that ol’ manager of his that should have been retired a long time ago but still takes care of him because he don’t have too much sense sometimes was in on it also. And I’m telling you now, Loomis, Crick, PD don’t look like too much now but he can whip any man standing that I know. Anyway Dilbert, the boy that owned the bed with the picture of Mad Moolah on the wall had convinced him to buy that property off of the guy that owned the plantation. And you might say he was double dipping because he knew that man wanted to invest, his boss wanted to sell and he was going to profit out of it the most. So what they were going to have them was this hunting and fishing club that was soon as they could figures out how to get some extra money to do it up right. Well by luck or fate, when the storm come that old barge made its way down here and nobody could find it. Then Rossy tripped across it one day all grown up with muscadine, jungle vines and a bit of poison ivy that had obscured it for years. When she finally got around to telling me about it and I said for us to let’s go see it, I got to thinking to myself that there must be some value in keeping it a secret and trying to profit from it. Like I said folks, it’s a boat and if nobody’s got their hands on it, it’s fair game. But it’s kinda stuck on land now so maybe it belongs to the landowner, maybe not. Now me not having any extra money for no sailor lawyer nor being friends very much for business dealings with both sides of that backwoods delta, I told her leave it be and we could ponder on it to see how we could make the best nickel off of it. Now it come to pass that when Rossy was exploring on it to take little things from it we might could use like some silverware or cloth Bertha could make some hat underwear out of that she stepped on this loose board one day. Well low and behold, wait a minute now, Crick, I got to swear you to secrecy on this, you got to swear on your Momma’s grave that you won’t be talking about this to no one, you swear on the grave now because what I’m going’ to tell you is the most important thing I reckon I ever said.” Clem said adjusting his shotgun and staring sternly at David.
“You said you wouldn’t tell! Do we really have to Clem?” Rossy said poking her head in through the sliding window in the back of the truck’s cab.
“Yes darlin’ it’s that important, we needs to talk about it now that the cats out of the bag. I’m sorry sweetie, if he promises not to tell no one, I guarantee you old Clem will protect it for you and I think David is a man of his word and can keep his yap shut.” Clem said waiting for David’s solemn oath that he would not reveal the secrets he was about to be told in strictest confidence.
“You see when David when Rossy Ross disturbed that loose board down in the hold, we found ourselves a big iron safe. Now I don’t know what’s in that safe and I been beating and badgering on it every chance I get for five or six years to get in the dad gum thing but I ain`t had no luck yet. Me and Bertha and Rossy Ross agreed we all got ourselves some shares in it together but Rossy gets the most seeing that she found it and all. we weren’t goin’ to tell no one about it ever but times and circumstances are changed and we find ourselves needing some help to get in it as well as protect it. Now I know you city bloods got more legal sense and attorneys than we got out here in these backwoods, but this here Mister Bowman has got himself plenty of walking around sense about how to deal with y’all and maybe I got a proposition for you to consider. I told Rossy we would keep it our own little private secret, but seeing how everything has to come out in the open now I need you all siding with me. Hell there might be nothing in there or then again there might be a fortune. I told Rossi if there was a treasure we might be able to do her a big coming out party like them rich Cotillion girls or maybe it might be her dowry someday. Some way or another I told her if something good was in it we would use it to be her fresh start in life and her way off of this river and the retired sharecropper plantation life. The way the years are passing me and Bertha might not be around much longer but hopefully if that safe contains something it could make our lives easier and give her the means to have a better one. Now I been studying if that safe is empty, it’s a big behemoth of a thing; looks like a back porch freezer it might still have value. The chances of it having a big treasure in it are probably slim to none but she got her hopes up and believes in fairytales and kings and treasures. I guess that’s my fault, I reads to her sometimes and have been known to tell her a whopper or two. Anyway I learned a new thing or you might call it an old thing about selling off some of this plantation`s Knick knacks over the years that some things are worth more than I can imagine and some things that I wouldn’t give you a penny for, got ready buyers if you gets in front of the right person. Why I saw a man coming down from New York bought an old scythe that Bertha’s granddaddy probably swung out in the fields a hundred years ago for a hundred dollars one time because he said it was “antique” and would look good on the wall of his house. Now back in my day, you leave farm implements out in the barn where it belongs and if it’s old rusty crap you leave it alone or sell it for scrap metal if it’s not useful for its original purpose. But after that visit my boss man had me going out looking around old barns and cabins for the most old and useless stuff to sell and I been getting good prices for it! So I went to the library and started looking at prices of this stu
ff and learned me a new word called ’connoisseur’ and I am a connoisseur of old things I get to charge more for that are worthless to me or the boss and not fit to do a day’s lick of work ! Some dealer even hired Bertha as an expert once! They gave her $50 just to look at an old quilt and to tell them if it was done and stitched right and about when it was made. And that’s what I got is old knowledge! I thought I wasn’t worth no more than two hoots in hell for anything else except dying and trying to keep trespassers off this land, but now I see I need what ya’ll know and hey! I been dirt poor all my life so I plan to take advantage of it!” Clem said, chuckling. “Look here now, that boat is very valuable even if that safe don’t have any treasure in it. That boat is a treasure in itself because you don’t find old heart of pine boards made like they did back in the day. If a board got worn holes and blued with age, I wouldn’t give you anything for it but the house renovators pay top dollar for them and that’s how that dog hunts! Man, there got to be at least 28,000 board feet of useable lumber in that thing and probably another 100,000 pounds or so of scrap iron in that thing that I could help Rossy Ross salvage and pay her way out of this plantation situation of scrabbling in the dirt trying to make a living or a meal.” Clem said with a protective and calming pat to Rossy Ross’s arm snaking in the window.
“ I sent Rossy down to the boat today to see if all this flooding we have had lately somehow refloated it or pushed it further back up on the land. Anyway, looks like we has a showdown to go to, first thing is what’s up with them prisoners and secondly reinforce my claim on that casino barge. Could be David that we should try to refloat that thing and bring it back to my boat landing. That way nobody could say it ain`t mine. Tell you what, with a bit of fixing on it we could use it like a hotel for them preppers temporarily like they did with them cruise ships down in Mobile when the refugees from hurricane Katrina come in from Louisiana.” Clem said.