by Ron Foster
“What’s that over there by that old barn looking thing? Looks like there might be some more old buildings or something.” Julie said pointing off in the distance at a rickety array of outbuildings and a few old whitewashed shacks.
“I don’t know. I guess we head over there first; it’s the closest thing that looks like civilization back there. This might be a plantation but I’ll be damned if anybody’s worked this part of it in years.” David said looking at fresh tire tracks in the red clay soil.
“Someone has been down here recently. A truck and a tractor have been through this way not too long ago it appears.” David said as they made their way down to the farm buildings.
“Look David, that one house over there with the porch on it looks like it has a bit of fresh paint on it compared to the others. The rest of them places look like they will be falling down pretty soon. Maybe that’s the one where Clem and Bertha live.” Julie said looking around at the ramshackle buildings.
“Shit, Julie, Crick should have said we were going to tobacco road! These damn places look like old sharecropper shacks or slave quarters from a bygone era. But evidently someone’s painted that one house in the last ten years or so.” David said looking at the disarray of buildings in front of him.
“Damn sure smells like they got farm animals around here.” Julie said testing the breeze out of the rolled down windows of the vehicle they were riding in.
“Yea, it smells like a working farm to me.” David said grinning and honking the horn to alert the people who lived there that somebody was coming for a visit.
David and Julie pulled up in front of the old wood frame tiny shotgun style house and honked the horn again looking around for any signs of its occupant’s whereabouts. They looked and listened some more and heard nothing more than a jackass braying and what sounded like a cow having itself a conniption fit about something.
“Well, they definitely got farm critters but I don’t see any vehicles around here. Doesn’t look to me like anybody’s at home at the moment Julie.” David said opening up his door and pointing his shotgun at the ready and looking around further for any signs of life at the place.
“They might be in the back. Sounds like some kind of commotion going on in that barnyard.” Julie said opening her door and holding her 20 gauge single shot shotgun in a one-handed position.
“Julie I’m going to walk around to the backyard and see if anyone’s about. You stay up here and see if anyone comes up. I’m going to walk carefully around the house and see what all that commotion is in the barnyard and you be on your guard and haul ass out of here if you have to. Now before you say it, just back the van out and haul ass out of here if you have to because I have no idea what’s going on back there.” David said admonishing her not to hang around to back him up and him having to be worried about her instead of hauling ass himself or engaging a target if he needed to.
Understanding David’s warning and his nagging at her to escape in the van if need be, warred with her own desire to want to back him up anyway, Julie agreed to stay where she was at in order to placate David and watched as he made his way surreptitiously moving from cover to cover towards the backyard to see what had riled the animals back there.
“HEY! COME HERE! I DON’T MEAN YOU ANY HARM!” David yelled when he was half way around the building after he spied a blur of faded blue jeans with holes and a worn-out blue cotton shirt running from the chicken coop.
“David are you all right?” Julie called to David’s back observing whatever it was he was hollering at.
“I’m fine! Hey, come on back here buddy! We don’t mean no harm! Are you Clem? Are you Bertha? Crick sent us!” David yelled confused as to the gender of the disappearing shadow in the woods.
David surveyed the old barn and corral that had a mule defiantly braying at him and eyeing wherever the other person had left to while a skittish cow poked her head out of the barn and occasionally mooed her dismay. A giant African fighting rooster was strutting his stuff backwards and forwards by the barn while the hens and biddies alternately pecked the ground while occasionally cocking their heads to look around nervously.
David stood up tall and watched the wood line looking for the apparition he had seen leaving the chicken coop running while he glanced around the barnyard to see what had the animals still upset.
“Hey you crazy old ana-mule, be you a Jack or Jenny to be making such a fuss? Hush now you mule! Mooo to you to cow! You need hush yourself also so I can hear what’s going on! Get back over there you danged old ugly rooster.” David was saying before a quick glance over his shoulder showed him that Julie was creeping up in back of him.
“I thought we agreed that you were supposed to stay in the car and leave out of here post haste if there was any trouble.” David said halfheartedly as Julie carefully approached his position with her gun at the ready all the while looking about and listening to the farm creatures complaining about something.
“I don’t know what these animals are complaining so much about yet, but whoever was here a few minutes ago has hightailed it for the woods and I can’t tell you very much about them except they move awful dang quick.” David said still looking in the general direction towards the area that he had seen they had disappeared to.
“I caught a glimpse of a leg going into that thicket of bushes but that’s about all David.” Julie said not letting her guard or her weapon down.
“So what should we do now David? Who do you think that it was anyway?” Julie asked glancing at David nervously.
“I guess it was whoever owns the damn place or whoever lives here. I know they should have heard my horn as we were coming in earlier, why they didn’t stand their ground and holler back to us I have no idea. I don’t even know if we’re on the right piece of land or not. This looks like it was some kind of old timey plantation or sharecropper set up in the past I guess. Damn Crick was kind of sparse on his description of the place he wanted to meet us at. Let’s go back up to the front porch and check the house and I guess we sit around and wait until whoever that was gets their nerve up and comes back or decides we’re safe and hollers up to us from the woods.” David said turning and walking back towards the front of the house with Julie.
“That road keeps going a ways it looks like David. Do you think that Crick might be staying further down this road and we haven’t arrived at where we’re supposed to be at yet? “Julie questioned looking at the well-worn tire ruts in the red clay and gray gravel road leading away.
“Hell I don’t know. That idea does make some sense though I think, not much we can do sitting around here but wait on who knows what. Yea come on Julie let’s go ahead and ride on up there and check out what we find at its end, we can always comeback here. We definitely scared off whoever that was from this place. I still can’t figure it out. Crick said Clem and Bertha would be expecting us, just for us to be aware of them toting guns so we didn’t scare them or ourselves I guess. But whoever that was didn’t even take any time to stop and be sociable or look like they had a mind to be defending their property for that matter.” David said still narrowly all the while eyeing the fringes of the woods for any kind of suggestion of movement.
David and Julie got back in the van with several wary looks around and then slowly backed out to proceed on down the road towards a hill that looked like it had other outbuildings and structures on it.
David stopped the car on the top of the hill and eyed a dilapidated couple of houses with one more recently painted one that looked a lot more habitable than the rest.
“Same thing here for a lay out, just one house a little better than the rest and the others looking like they’re about to fall down. Somebody’s is definitely living over here however; the same as the last place but this house looks a lot bigger. Hopefully they’re not as skittish about receiving guests.” David said once more honking his horn in announcement of his pending arrival as he headed toward the larger house with a big wrap around rail sided porch with a
huge old weathered barn in the back.
“Doesn’t appear to be anybody at home at this place either, this is kind of freaky to me David.” Julie said looking for any movement or signs of life around the place.
“I am thinking the same thing Julie. I’ll go to the door and knock first this time and you can hang back and go back to the barn with me later.” David said shrugging and wondering exactly what was going on and where in the hell exactly was everybody at that lived around here.
A firmly locked and unanswered door greeted him and his quick perusal of the property gave him no more indications than some tire tracks coming and going in the direction they had already traveled.
Julie and he went back to the porch and sat down on two old white steel garden chairs in silence for a moment, occasionally glancing around curiously at the untilled and overgrown pastures and row crop fields.
“Well Julie I have no idea where Crick and crew are at, I guess we just sit here and wait until someone makes an appearance. Maybe who ever that was I glimpsed at that other house will go find the residents around here and come to greet us as a group eventually.” David said pondering the odd disappearance of the raggedy figure he had seen running for the woods.
“Yea that was pretty strange of whoever that was just to up and disappearing like that without a word. You would think if it was someone who was expecting us that they wouldn’t have got scared off like that.” Julie said speculatively.
“That’s just what I am thinking. Crick’s note warned us to expect the residents of this place to maybe be pointing a gun in our direction and whoever that was just beat feet and didn’t even bother to look back over their shoulder. Evidently they just had nothing but escape on their minds, might even have been a prowler or a thief you think Julie?” David said evidencing his concerns and probably wanting to go back to the other house for a further look see.
“That thought had crossed my mind David, but do you think maybe that it could be that they were just either plain scared, or possibly they could have been rushing to go inform somebody that strangers were about the place. What do you want to do now David? Stay here or should we go on back to the other house?” Julie said anticipating David’s decision to return to the other house and try to solve the mystery in order to look around the grounds and barnyard a bit more for signs of mischief or a break in at the main residence.
“Let’s just sit ourselves down here for a bit longer Julie and wait awhile to talk things out a bit more before we start heading back down there so soon. It’s so weird operating under these conditions, I am dying to try all the doorknobs and windows to see if any of these houses are open or not and get a quick look around to see if I can see any signs of Crick or Loomis but on the same note I don’t want to start out on the wrong foot with anyone around here by assuming I can just walk in a door or climb in a window without a proper invitation. Folks could be sitting off in the woods right now watching us and seeing how we act with other folk’s property when no one else is present you know.’ David said warningly and then began once again carefully scanning the wood line in front and to the sides of him as well as keeping an eye on the road leading here.
“Shit David, I see your point of caution but you didn’t have to go and give me the hebee jeebies now about worrying about the idea that their maybe watchers in the woods. Crick said we were invited to this place and that we would be expected by its residents so I was happy that we had finally arrived and I could relax some and quit being so much on edge with all you’re reminding me of a battle drill we needed to be thinking on. I am tired David, damn tired and more than a bit afraid of all this unknown we are living through. I know why we came here and I totally agree with you that we needed to come to this place, but I can’t help thinking for the life of me that we should of never left our home to begin with and stayed at home where it was safer.” Julie said a bit emotionally and welcomed David’s hug of reassurance and love that things would turn out all right somehow.
“It will be alright Julie, we just got to hang in here and wait. I am guessing Crick and his friends are down by the river somewhere working on a rescue of some kind but I will be danged if I know what he might have dreamed up to accomplish one or what his plans are after he gets done doing it. I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t think of anything better to do than kickback and have myself a drink while waiting on him to show up. You want one Julie, a little toddy for the body darlin?” David said rising and heading for the van and supplies to make one.
“No, not for me David, you go ahead, it’s still a bit early in the day and the very thought of that batch of shine you cooked up doesn’t sound so good to me at this particular moment. I might take you up on one later though to help maybe settle my nerves a bit however.” Julie said as she watched David fix himself some shine and coke and remembering that this stuff was more potent than normal as he had redistilled the batch many times to up its alcohol content and make it the equivalent of gasohol if he ever needed to pour it in the gas tank to get home instead of drinking it.
A 50/50 mixture of ethanol alcohol or in David’s case, what he had made which was some basically home brewed triple distilled top shelf vodka run back through the still and taken to the state that it could be mixed with gasoline to run any vehicle built after 1983. It was also good for dewatering fuels in gas tanks or making a maltov cocktail should some obscure need arise.
“Whoo! Hoo! This stuff sure isn’t Ancient age sipping whiskey. It has a pretty good bite to it I mean to tell you.” David said grimacing as the raw alcohol concoction hit his throat and had him exhaling as loudly as he could with pursed lips.
Julie didn’t scold him or giggle too much at him for his antics and his indulgence. That was just David’s way sometimes, he was going to do it regardless and she had seen him take one drink and put it down to handle a task and never finish it as well as have many more after the first until the sun come down and was working on coming up again to party with an old friend. . It was his crutch to lean upon to ponder upon a point until inspiration or a answer was decided upon at other times. Dumbed him down and let him think he was quoted to say. He could not drink anything alcoholic for a month if he was busy on a project that had his interest or he might arbitrarily decide that this was a party month and he would just think on something. You never could tell what he had decided on when he hollered that it was “ Five o`clock somewhere! He even had a big clock on his wall that was stopped a few minutes after 5 to evidence that fact if it needed pointing to.
“That’s better I think, but next one is coming out of Crick’s whiskey I brought with me. As for what I am going to do at the moment is I am just going to sit right here and pretend that I am having another one just like the other one in a honky-tonk bar somewhere with Crick sitting alongside and figure out what he might be thinking about this situation if I can.” David said adding more coke to dilute the fire and take the edge off his 16 ounce drink and then he settled back in his chair with a satisfied smile. He and Crick had pondered the problems of the world and prepping in general over such libations a many a time and he sort of knew how the man’s head worked.
“Now then Mr. Crick you old prepper we have had this little conversation before , what do you think I am going to do in this situation and what do I think you might do.” David mused before Julie reminded him to watch his drinking and pay more attention to the present.
“Watch out that extra strong stuff doesn’t sneak up on you David. I take it that you’re not too worried about who ever that was you were hollering at earlier?” Julie said warning David not to get too buzzed off the over potent joy juice and wondering if she should be looking out more for whoever that might of been if David seemed to be getting too unduly distracted or possibly a bit drunker than he imagined he was later.
“Nah darling, I am not too worried much about that raggedy scoundrel much at all at the moment. Who ever that was is probably still running. But, don’t you worry; I AM still thinking about them. The back
of that khaki kind of floppy fishing hat of theirs and the white fluff from the holes in the jeans was about all I saw in a blur as for any details that I can remember. I can’t even tell you what color their skin was or how much they weighed exactly. It was just whoosh, zip and a glimpse of them going around the corner of the chicken coop and off into the woods. I am assuming by the way that they were dressed that they got to be a local person and not to well off at that. Or for that matter they were not any kind of a hunter or woodsman just happening by because of the choice of clothes they had on to be out tromping in the woods. Otherwise we would have seen a bit of camouflage. Maybe it was a neighbor from around here somewhere that came to see Clem and Bertha to borrow some eggs or something?” David said and then made exaggerated head shaking motions and squinchy eyes after another sip of his drink that he hadn’t quite put enough coke in yet to tone down the fiery fumes of the white liquor in his red solo cup.
“I didn’t even see half that much of them David so I really can’t help you form any kind of a true description for them, about all I saw were a leg and a shoe going around a tree and that was it.” Julie declared.
“You didn’t happen to notice what kind of shoes they had on or the type of tread on them did you? Slick bottoms, tennis shoe soles or hiking boot treads would be a good thing to know.” David said looking at her intently hoping she had noticed some detail to give him another definitive clue.
“Well no, not really I am sorry to say. I couldn’t tell you if they were wearing boots or regular shoes, seems to me about all that I saw a wisp of faded brown. I don’t think I would say they had on tennis shoes over wearing leather ones, no it was just too quick to say what I saw.” Julie said searching her memory of the brief mental image she tried to pull up in her head.
“Well they certainly appeared scared enough whatever it was they were wearing and that is worrisome, because scared people don’t think straight and you never know there real motives or reasoning sometimes until it’s too late. If someone was messing around out stealing eggs or a chicken then they would have certainly hightailed it out of here like that. I tell you what, oh well, damn it never mind, we may as well go back there. Darn it, I thought I was going to be able to sit here for a bit and enjoy this drink in peace for a moment but it appears now we need to go on a mission. The answer to this little quandary we are discussing is probably as simple as just going back and looking into that chicken coop a bit closer. I should have taken the time and done it while I was all ready there. If we found a forgotten or discarded wicker basket or maybe a gunny sack left on the floor that could have told me a lot. This ain`t the kind of drink I want to hurry up chug on down if I can help it and I think it might still be best to wait a bit before going back so if you don’t mind indulge me in some more conversation before we go back there and play detective.” David said knowing Julie would be mentally evaluating his decision and reasoning to wait something out instead of charging over to check it out might mean something other than he just wanted to sit around and finish his booze.