Siege Fall (Siege of New Hampshire Book 2)

by Mic Roland

  It would take a good half an hour for his night vision to recover from the flashlight beam. He sat on a wood pallet near the shed. He could barely make out the silhouette of the house against the starry sky. He closed his eyes to concentrate on hearing night sounds and to not dwell on Adam.

  Slowly, the quiet sounds of the night drained away his anger. A pair of barred owls, one near, one far, debated who-cooks-for-you. Another night bird of some kind was making soft pip-pip sounds from the trees lining Baldwin’s meadow. A faint clank or bang would waft in with its own semi-echo that signaled it had come from far away. A door slammed. The way sound carried in the cold night air, it could have been a couple miles away. The night was quiet. Martin liked it that way.

  At breakfast, Dustin was excited to work on Tin Man again. He got so carried away describing his next steps that little spatters of cream-of-wheat trailed down his chin. Margaret smiled. Susan did too. Martin pretended not to see it. Finally, when Judy saw it and was horrified that her very own husband would look like that. She took a napkin and wiped his chin. Dustin did not notice. He kept talking.

  Dustin kept talking while he and Martin walked out to the driveway. He was convinced that the failure to light the jet was from stoking too small of a fire or not letting it get hot enough. His theory was that the white smoke was mostly moisture in the wood cooking off: steam, basically.

  They both stopped when they saw Tin Man.

  “Aw, maaannn,” Dustin whined. “I was gonna make up a nose-cone thing so it would look like a rocket, but she went and drew a face on the can.” He pointed with both hands. “I can’t make it look like a rocket now. He’s got a head…and a face…with little eyes….awww maaannn.” Martin stifled a chuckle.

  Martin lit the fire in the burn chamber. Dustin spun the flywheel to get the draft going. White smoke began to flow out of the jet. Dustin wanted to be patient, but it was not easy. Ten long minutes was a long time to keep the fan’s flywheel spinning. Slowly the smoke began to change from white to gray, then blue.

  Dustin held the lighter to the blue smoke. It puffed a couple of times, but finally caught. A nearly invisible jet of pale blue flame crackled at the end of the copper jet. Dustin shouted and jumped around in a happy-dance, at least, as much as he could while still spinning the flywheel. They had succeeded in extracting combustible gas from wood chips.

  Martin was excited too. He was happy that Susan was not around, or he might erupt into uncontrollable shouting of ‘combustible gasses, combustible gasses…’

  Margaret came to see what all the whooping was about. She got a happy-son one-armed hug. Judy smiled, partially in embarrassment with her husband’s boyish excitement. Susan was amused. Martin made sure not to speak. The Dunans came to see what all the noise was about. Adam avoided eye contact with Martin, but that suited Martin just fine. Margaret brought everyone a celebratory apple wedge.

  The next step would be crucial: hooking Tin Man up to the engine of the generator. It was one thing to make some blue smoke burn. It was quite another to make a four-stroke engine run. The successful burn gave Martin and Dustin enough enthusiasm to overlook how little they had figured out for the next steps. Small engine carburetors are fussy things compared to pop-riveted sealcoat cans and tailpipes. The work was slow.

  They took a break for lunch. Dustin continued to talk all through lunch too. The women all gave each other little sideways glances and knowing smiles — a shared feminine burden of enduring long bursts of ‘guy talk’ about carburetors, intake strokes, valves and such. Dustin did not notice.

  While Dustin fabricated piping to connect Tin Man to the generator, Martin set up for another round of target practice. The ice broken, this session was advertised as focusing on technique. Martin was not all that concerned about their technique yet. He simply wanted them to be more comfortable shooting. Hitting the bulls-eye would come later.

  Adam was quiet through the practice. He took his shots and got most of his hits on the paper. He left the practice as soon as he was done, disappearing in the house.

  Judy continued to struggle. The morality was not letting go of her. Martin set her up an alternate target. She was happier shooting at a tin can that sat near one of the legs of the backstop. The paper target may have symbolized the center of a human being too much for her. Intentionally aiming somewhere else came easier. She hit the can once, which spawned a broad smile. She sounded disappointed that Margaret called her in to help with the bread. Martin took that as a good sign — a very small step, but a good sign.

  Martin stood a step farther away from Susan as she practiced. Her face showed a grim resolve. Martin gave her a few tips with his hands in his pockets. She acknowledged with a nod, but not making eye contact. Her aim improved. She was getting six inch groups.

  Trish took her turn enthusiastically. Her first two shots were respectably closer to the dot than the edge of the paper. Her next two shots were wild.

  “Ow,” Trish said. “Something hurt my hand!”

  “You have your free hand too far forward,” said Martin. “Wrap your fingers tighter around your trigger hand.”

  “Like this?”

  Martin slumped. “No. That’s worse. Interweave. Lay the top fingers into the valleys of…”

  “I can’t get it. What do you mean, ‘valleys’?”

  “The spaces between…Oh here. I’ll show you.” Martin stepped over and placed her fingers in the gaps of her trigger hand. How hard was that to understand? he thought. She already had it once.

  “Like this?” Trish leaned toward him slightly and made a slow little tilt of her head, as if trying to rub her cheek against his. It reminded Martin of how Pudge used to rub his cheek against table legs or door jambs, especially when it was close to supper time.

  Martin pulled his head back. Her hair tickled his nose. What an odd move, he thought. Maybe her coat felt bunched up, or something, and she had to shift to get it to hang better. “Um. Yeah. Try it now.”

  Trish fired two more rounds. Both landed near the dot. “Oh Martin, you are such a good teacher,” Trish said breathily. “I’m sure that if you keep teaching me, I can be really good.”

  She put the revolver on the table. “I have to go inside and change out of these clothes.” She glanced at his eyes. “My turn for watch is coming up soon. I need to put on something warmer. I don’t like being cold.” She walked up the hill with more twisting to her gait than Martin remembered. Maybe her coat really doesn’t fit well.

  “What was THAT all about?” said Susan in a half-whisper. Her tone was accusing: her eyes narrow.

  “What was what all about?” Martin wondered if Susan noticed the ill fit of Trish’s coat too. Women notice clothing things faster than guys do.

  “That whole ‘I don’t know where to put my hands’ thing.” Susan mocked Trish’s tone.

  “She said the shots hurt her hands.” Martin had recent events in mental rewind, searching for what Susan thought ‘that’ was.

  Susan leveled a stare at Martin, her eyes narrower still. “Are you telling me you didn’t see what she was doing?”

  “See what? What did she do?” Martin was trying to remember how Trish held her hands. None of Susan’s line of questions made any sense to Martin.

  She stared hard into his eyes. He wondered if he was supposed to say something, but forgot what it was. It was a pop quiz and he was totally unprepared.

  “What?” he asked again.

  Her face relaxed, only to take on that sad-puzzled look again. “You really don’t know, do you?”

  “Know what?” Martin was getting flustered. “You need to use some nouns and verbs. This feels like that Abbott and Costello routine. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  She shook her head, like a teacher handing back yet another F paper. “Oh Martin.”

  Susan went on to shoot a three inch group. She seemed surprised and pleased.

  “Wow. You did really well.” Martin was impressed.

  “I ki
nda did. Maybe I just needed a little motivation.”

  “Huh?”

  “Never mind, Martin. I’m going to stop here, before I mess up and ruin it. Here. I’ll help you carry in all this stuff.”

  Martin took the 10/22 out into the woods to see if that supper-squirrel was still frolicking in the leaves. He had to check on his snares anyhow. The woods seemed particularly quiet. His first snare looked like it had been ravaged by Visigoths. The wire was torn away and peanut butter licked off the bark. He shook his head as he coiled up the tangle of wire.

  The second snare had not been touched, but the peanut butter was gone. He had neglected to bring more with him. He would only have to make another trip out to re-bait them and reset his first snare. He wondered if there was something in the woods much larger than a squirrel that was eating bait and savaging his wire snares. He cast a wary eye through the naked trees.

  Approaching his third snare, his heart leapt with joy. Hanging from his lean-pole was a gray squirrel. So, I got you after all! I’ll bet that’s why the woods are so quiet today, eh? There’s probably just enough time before dark to get you cleaned up for the pot. He disengaged the stiff squirrel. The wire could be straightened and reset, but he still had no fresh bait. The prospect of second trip into the woods did not seem as much of a failure now. He was coming home as the successful hunter. He also wondered if the woods were so quiet because he had taken the last squirrel. He shook off the thought. There had to be others. They were just someplace else at the moment.

  On his way back, Martin stopped at the beech trees. He set his half of flatbread on the leaves and covered it with the drip tray of a flower pot. He worried that he was only feeding a stray dog, but was too soft-hearted not to.

  “Soup.” said Adam flatly. “A little break from rice and beans, I guess.” He stirred his bowl. “Mostly broth,” he said to himself.

  “You guys have chickens,” said Trish, taking her seat. “You probably make a lot of chicken soup, right?”

  Margaret simply smiled. Martin passed around the platter of flatbread. One disk per person.

  “Their chicken soup can be really special, sometimes,” Susan said with a piercing look at Martin. “Is this…?”

  “Yes. This is one of the special ones,” Martin said with a half wink.

  “Oh.” Susan sighed and fished around the bowl with her spoon.

  “Great. I’m starved,” added Dustin. “Can I say the prayer tonight?” Martin nodded. It was the typical short prayer of an impatient hungry young man.

  “So, I took the little radio up on the meadow hill today,” Dustin said between noisy slurps. “I could get a couple stations up there. One was out of Manchester, I think. It was kinda weak. They were talking about police areas or zones, or something. I didn’t get it. It faded out.

  “The Mass station was clearer. They were talking about some hang-up on shipments of aid. The trucks that were supposed to come to Salem, Nashua and Manchester yesterday are held up by some transportation snafu or something. They should be able to get that cleared up, though. Sounds like trucks have been arriving in Worcester and Lowell every other day or so. Think that Ohio thing is part of the problem.”

  “Could be,“ said Martin.

  Chapter 11: Seeing Red

  Dustin and Martin had Tin Man and the generator positioned near the shed to take advantage of a sunbeam. The warmer air was nicer for working on small parts without gloves. They looked up from their work on Tin Man. The sound of a Harley was coming down their road. Pastor John turned in, still pulling his plywood trailer.

  “Good morning,” John said with less cheer than usual. “How are you all getting on out here? Ruby settling in okay? Not too many stories?”

  Martin and Dustin looked at each other. “Actually, she died Wednesday night. We think she had a stroke.”

  “Oh,” what thin congeniality John had mustered, faded away. “Sorry to hear that.”

  “Pastor John!” Margaret called cheerily. That is, until she saw the somber faces. “Oh, did Martin tell you about Ruby?”

  John nodded. “I’ve brought some similar news of my own. Elise died, maybe Thursday. I found her yesterday.”

  “Oh no.”

  “I visited her last Sunday, while making my rounds. She kinda knew she might not make it long. She only had a couple more days of her medications left. I asked around, to see if anyone had her kind of heart pills, but no one did. She made her peace, and all. We prayed together. She said that I should give you this.” He took a music box from the trailer and handed it to Margaret. “She said you always smiled when it played. She wanted you to remember her and smile again.”

  “So,” John tried to lighten the mood and change the topic. “How many do you have out here with you, Martin?”

  “Me and Margaret, Dustin and Judy, a woman named Susan — that’s her out by the woods there. She’s on watch. Then just recently, another young couple from town here who had to abandon their house: Adam and Trish.”

  “Hmm. Kind of a full house. Everyone getting along okay?”

  Martin hesitated. There was too much to say to even start, so he did not. “Pretty much, yeah.”

  “That’s good. That’s good. The Hamiltons…well, they aren’t doing so well,” said John. “I think the stress of trying to get by… And I don’t know what happened to the Boisverts. There was nobody home, no note, nothing. They’re just gone. Connie and Rick have taken in a couple strangers. Things are still dicey with the people around Indian Lakes. Guess they’ve been getting bolder.”

  Margaret returned with a few canned goods and a box of pasta. “These are for the Hamiltons. Tell them we’re praying for them, okay? Tell them they can make it, just hang in there.“ She placed the food in the mostly empty trailer, then looked up suddenly and waved.

  “Lance! Miri!” She waved to an old couple walking in the road. She gestured for them to come over and talk.

  “Thanks guys,” said John. “I see you have company, I’d better go. Listen, this might be my last visit until we can figure something else out. We’re getting really low on gasoline. Take care and remember that we’re always in His hands.” He slipped on his helmet, cranked the big Harley to life and rode off.

  Lance and Miri stepped over the driveway flower bed, trimmed back for winter. Miri carried a cardboard box.

  “What’s in the box?” Margaret asked.

  “Oh, just some of our canned peaches.” Miri handed Margaret the box. “A little thank you for all your help getting our wood stove working again.”

  “You didn’t have to do that,” said Margaret with recipient reflex. “But, come on in. Sit a spell. We don’t get guests anymore. I have a little coffee left. I’ll brew up a pot.” The three of them chatted all the way up to the front door.

  “That worked out kinda neat,” said Martin. “She gives away three cans of veggies, and gets three jars of peach. A net wash for the food supplies. Good thing too, when we’re trying to make it last.”

  “Yeah, um…about that,” said Dustin. “I overheard the Dunan’s last night complaining about the small portions. I don’t think they knew I was in the next room.”

  “They’ll just have to get used to it. Your mother’s got it all figured out and I have no reason to question her charts and schedules.”

  “I know, but just a heads up that they’re grumbling. But hey, that’s enough about them. I want to get Tin Man going today. I’m beyond excited!”

  “You just called it Tin Man. Have you given up on making it look like a rocket?”

  “Yeah. Now that she pointed out the arms and legs thing, I can’t help but see a little tin man. Why fight it? Now,” Dustin rubbed his hands together. “I figure we’re going to need some springs and things. I had a box of junk under my bed from when I took apart my…” Dustin’s voice trailed off.

  “I knew you took apart your RC car and train set. You thought I wouldn’t notice they were gone?”

  Dustin smiled a guilty smile. “Hehe, ye
ah, I suppose not, huh. I really thought a remote control train without rails would have been totally awesome…but…Well, anyhow, there’s some good little springs and stuff in there. I’m gonna go rummage for buried treasure. Back in a bit!” Dustin ran up the front walk.

  “Judy’s on patrol now,” said Susan. “Thought you and Dustin might want some help. Where’s he going in such a hurry?”

  “He’s looking for some junk, some buried treasure under his old bed. Want to go on a treasure hunt yourself?” Martin asked.

  “You mean look for more junk, don’t you?”

  “Hehe, You’re onto me. In the shed, on a shelf somewhere, there’s a couple boxes of plumbing junk: copper pipe scraps, elbows, fittings, old valves and stuff like that. I’m pretty sure that in one of those boxes, I had a big ball valve. It’ll be a hunk of bronze about this big, with flat handle on one side, probably with red rubber on it. Might be yellow. I don’t remember.”