“Nelson?”
“Yeah, he was a bad-ass. He wouldn't be taking this shit.”
“That's true,” I said. “You know your history then?”
“Yeah, I used to love all that stuff in school. Now that bullshit I did listen to.”
We drove on across the better roads that hadn't blistered and split with time. It may have been the reason the US decided to build their Fort here but I couldn't be sure. The land on either side was overgrown and almost jungle-like as roots, creepers and thick bushes of weeds strangled brickwork and steel piping, pulling it millimetre by imperceptible millimetre down into the dirt. Riley seemed to stare at it through her superfluous sunglasses.
“There really is nothing left,” she muttered to herself. “What a fucking mess.”
“It depends on your point of view,” I said, turning off the road into a rutted path that ran parallel to it. Here the tarmac ended where one of the warheads had landed slap-bang in the centre of the road and made a crater that could swallow the Land Rover whole.
Often we drove in silence which I suspected was a new concept to Riley as she seemed to find it difficult to sit still. She spent most the time tapping the screen of her small tablet, scrolling down various new feeds that came to her from the US satellites above. At times she giggled to herself, at others she put in headphones and listened to something, looking out of the window as the ruined country sailed past. I was fine with that. It meant I could listen to the rumbling of the wheels turning underneath me, the growling of the engine as it ate up the miles and the empty silence that came after the chaos of a mini apocalypse.
When we were about half an hour from home, she packed away her gear and sighed.
“Why is it we can make tanks and helicopters that move by themselves but we can't make fucking batteries that last more than 24 hours?” she said.
“I don't know. It's always been a mystery to me.”
“It's a fucking joke. I hope you have power in this house of yours, I’ve got a lot of shit to charge.”
“Like I said, I have a generator that should do you.”
“Don't take this the wrong way but I'm not really expecting much so you'll forgive me if I struggle to believe you.”
“What are you expecting?” I asked.
“When they told me about you my first thought was 'oh my God - he's a fucking hobo'. I could see you living in some wooden shack that was about to fall down, brewing moonshine and walking round in long johns, the kind with the button flap at the back for taking a crap in.”
“Thanks. And now?”
“You're younger than I thought you were, but I haven't seen the house yet so I'm reserving my judgement. You could still be a tramp and have long johns under your clothes there.”
“That's true enough I guess.”
So when we turned the corner into the long country road that would take us to my Father's house, I kept a close eye on her expression. When the tall pine forests parted and the land around the house opened up before us she gasped and her jaw dropped.
“Is this it?” she asked.
“Yep. I brew my moonshine over there and sit on my porch with a shotgun over there.”
“It's a fucking mansion!” she cried.
The three storey game keepers house sat just off centre of a grass covered clearing where a few wild sheep roamed around, nibbling here and there. It was built of a creamy coloured brick and roofed in slate that had paled slightly over time. Black cast iron guttering edged the hard faces and corners and two large bay windows with white frames faced northwards. On the western side of the main building there was a small courtyard with a lone orange tree growing in the centre with bronzed benches circling it and many creepers spreading across the ageing brick walls like hundreds of tiny fingers. On the eastern side were several long poly-tunnels surrounded by a wire fence with wooden posts where troughs of potatoes were lined up in orderly rows.
I drove around the long, winding driveway to show her the eight oddly shaped huts that had been built in a line at one end of the clearing. Here there were picnic benches in military rows and a little further along was a work-out station with pull up bars and benches and climbing walls, none showing the slightest sign of weathering.
“That's where the students would live. Each of those pods has four bunks inside with running water and electricity,” I explained. “It all comes from that building over there. My Dad had power generating stoves installed and the students had to organise fire duty to keep it burning. The power they made was stored in batteries and used to operate the pumps for water and the sockets for charging.”
“This isn't what I expected at all,” said Riley.
“Well, for bullshit it isn't too bad, is it?” She looked at me, nodded a kind of apology and grinned.
I drove to the main house and parked the Land Rover near my garage where I kept my supplies. Then I climbed down and took a deep breath. It was the Colonel's offer which had suddenly given me a pang of panic in my gut and I took a moment of staring at my land to get it out of my system. I began to realise then that my home, the one that had been passed on to my by my Dad was under threat. Thoughts about what the NSU might do suddenly washed over me and I struggled to push them away.
“Can I take a look around?” asked Riley, breaking my attention away from my own self interest.
“Sure,” I replied, opening the back of the 'Rover. “The still is over that way, to the right of the student pods. On your way back bring a bottle of wine from the cellar.”
“You have a wine cellar?”
“Go and have a look.”
She slung her rifle over her shoulder and set off at an excited pace. I took her bags and carried them into the hallway, dumping them at the foot of the stairs. Then I emptied the 'Rover of supplies, carrying the boxes into the garage one by one and laying them in a neat pile near the entrance. When I was done I went and parked the vehicle in the carport around the corner, pulling down the scrim netting over the entrance and pocketing the keys. When I looked at the shelter I'd built to hide the 'Rover I stopped for a minute and stared. I'd knocked the structure together when me and Dad had seen the first NSU drones flying overhead with their heat detecting cameras. I remembered the day we'd gone and torn down the fences that kept the wild sheep and cows off the land, letting them wander at will, their heat signatures masking our own.
“The 'Rover. That's a dead give-away,” he'd said. “We need to hide it when it's here.”
We'd gotten some advice from our students about how to hide it and built it straight away. We also limited its use to rescue missions only, choosing to walk at any other times. We were just thankful that we'd always insisted that the students navigate their own way to the house as part of their outdoor survival training, leaving the gas-guzzling military vehicles at Washington.
I'd always been under threat. We both had. What was different now, I wondered? Perhaps because soon I'd be forced to deal with that threat instead of finding ways to hide from it.
4.
Riley returned half an hour or so later as I was organising the new supplies onto my rows of steel shelving. While I was doing that I was also looking at what was already there, hoping it'd be enough for the coming winter. Growing your own food, being self-sufficient, it was all well and good when your life didn't depend on it, when there was always a safety net. But now that net was flying back to the States. Did I have it in me to pull it off?
“I'm in here,” I called out. She came through the door with two bottles in her hands.
“I got a white and a red. I wasn't sure which you wanted. I’ve gotta say, this place is fucking awesome. You've got a smoking house back there too! My Granddad used to have one of those to make his own jerky with. He'd do all kinds of jerky. Had a special flavouring method too but he never told me what it was. Tasted like hot barbecue or something.”
I finished what I was doing and she looked at the shelves whilst she waited. Then I took the bottles from her and led
her outside and into the main house through the door. She noticed her things piled up at the bottom of the stairs.
“Where do you want me to bunk down?” she asked. “If you want me in those little huts out there, I don't mind. They look quite cosy.” The hardened Ranger looked nervous as she stared around the tidy hallway with the varnished panelled flooring and the ornate table that stood to her right. I went through a door off to the left and went into the kitchen, taking down two wine glasses and giving them a rinse with water from the 25 litre water barrel on the worktop. I used the corkscrew on my pocket knife to open the bottle and left it breathing on the counter with the glasses.
“It's not mine,” I said, pointing to the table. “None of it. Dad said that I'd have been too young to remember coming here, but after the Panic he'd found this house abandoned. At first he'd hung his hammock at the bottom of the field and waited to see if the owners ever came back. After a few weeks of living off the land he decided that he'd move in and look after it until they did.”
“I'm guessing they never did,” said Riley.
“Not yet, but you never know. Pretty soon a US hummer pulled up on that drive and Dad thought the game was up. But once he'd identified himself the guy in charge asked if he wouldn't mind offering some training to his Special Forces units who were based nearby and using England as a staging ground.”
“I bet he didn't refuse.”
“How could he?” I said. “The soldier knew right away that it wasn't our house but once he realised who my Dad was he saw a chance for both of them to benefit from it.”
“And here we are,” she said.
“And here we are. It was ex-English forces who first walked here from Fort Washington. They'd offered themselves to the US when they'd come back from overseas to find the country in ruins. They'd built the pods and the US supplied the equipment. The rest was added to it as time went on.”
“How long did your Dad do this? Training, I mean.”
“Up until he died. He was in his 20's when he came here, I must have only just been born then.”
“It must have been hard for him, doing it by himself.”
“Yeah, it must have been tough. Another lesson in survival, I guess.”
I realised she was stood on the rug just behind the door and hadn't moved off it. She was still looking at the size of the house in awe and although I'd seen much bigger on my travels she seemed fixed to the floor, unable to move.
“It was Dad's way,” I said, gesturing to the overly-clean halls, feeling the heat rising in my cheeks. “Where ever you are, if it's tidy, it's organised and more conducive to survival. It also keeps you pretty sane.”
“Oh,” she said, looking awkward.
“Take your boots off if you prefer. I don't mind a bit of mud on the floor though.”
She quickly bent over and began unlacing her high black combat boots. Then she slipped out of them and stood on the wood floor in her socks. “I don't mind stopping in the huts you know.”
“I know. But you're a guest. Follow me.”
I led her up the first flight of stairs and into one of three rooms that looked out over the land and towards the huts. It had a double bed, unmade, a set of oak drawers made to look rough-carved, a tall cupboard of the same kind and a wash basin of white porcelain. The floor was the same as the rest of the house but there was a circular rug in the middle of the room which had been woven with intricate Arabian patterns.
“Is this okay?” I asked.
“It's... great. Thanks.”
“Bring your gear up and get settled whilst I make us some tea, the bedding is in the drawers over there.”
“I thought we were having wine?” she asked.
“It's a long story, but round here the evening meal is called 'tea'.”
“Do you have tea with it?” she asked.
“No.”
“Then why...” I held up a hand.
“It's a long story.”
I left her to it and went downstairs, into the kitchen. I lit the stove with tinder from a box on the shelf, added kindling that I kept stocked up in a bucket next to it, then went out of the back door to the wood shed. Here I stored short logs of seasoned pine I'd cut last year as well as some building timber I'd looted from a Carpenter's shop in the local village. The air was thick with the smell of oozing resin from this years logs that were drying out for the following year. I grabbed what I wanted and piled them up next to the stove. Then I set about preparing a meal.
I'd been taught to cook from an early age and as soon as I was old enough I was made to cook tea every other night, taking it in turns with Dad. My first attempts had been less than successful but it had paid off in the end. I knew most simple English meals that could be made from either fresh ingredients or from food I'd put into storage such as dried veg and meat.
By the time Riley came down there was a large pan of stew on the boil with the last of this years fresh crop in it. I'd also made a few bread rolls that were turning golden brown in the oven.
“That smells good,” she said, walking into the kitchen in a pair of light jogging bottoms and a black tee shirt that said 'US RANGERS' in bold white letters across the front. She was barefoot but in her hand were a pair of running shoes. Her hair, now free from the woolly hat, was tied back into a tight pony tail with only a few strands managing to escape onto her forehead.
“Beef stew with dumplings for main,” I said, stirring the thick, chunky liquid with an enormous wooden spoon. “Served with fresh bread and my own chilli sauce.”
“Canned beef?” she joked.
“No, reasonably fresh. I slaughtered it last week and dried the rest for winter. This is made from the last two cuts I had in the cold stores. They needed eating.”
“Fucking awesome,” she said and I felt the tension snap. For Riley I was beginning to learn that her language was her thermometer. If things were getting too tense she clammed up, the swearing stopped and she became Claudia. Or Miss. Riley. But this was US Ranger Riley now and she looked a little less on edge, a little more comfortable.
“I'm going for a jog,” she said, dropping the shoes and stuffing short sports socks onto her feet. “I like to know the perimeter, so to speak.”
“Be my guest. There's a bell just outside the door - you'll hear it ring when food is up.”
“So I'm a student now?”
“Yeah, the class is bullshit 101.”
“You're not going to let me forget that, are you?” she said, grinning.
“Nope. If you jump the fence watch out for the hornets nests in the woods. I stepped on one last summer.”
“Gee, sounds nice. See you,”
She went out through the door and slammed it shut behind her sending a deafening blast through the house and most of my bones. I stole a glance out of the small window over the counter and saw her set off at an easy pace, anti-clockwise around the fenced off side of the woods. She reached the huts and disappeared out of my view.
I poured myself a glass of the red wine and leaned back against the worktop, sipping gently and letting the tastes evaporate on my tongue. The stew bubbled and spat on the stove. I checked on he bread, then sat on a stool and stared out of the window, thinking about what it would be like to have someone sleeping in the house again. There hadn't been anyone here since Dad died, especially not one as attractive as Claudia Riley. It made me feel keenly aware of my failings and I found myself trying to flatten my wild hair or straighten my weather-worn clothes.
Before a full hour was up I rang the bell several times and waited. A few minutes later she appeared, sweating and panting for breath. When she was close enough I looked down for a moment, looked at her white running shoes and saw they were still white.
“Well?” I asked.
“That's a hell of a piece of land you got,” she said, breathing heavily but within control, the kind of control a serious exerciser perfected over repeated sessions.
“Did you get as far as the top where the fence h
as caved in?” I asked.
“Yeah,” she said though hesitating a little. “What the fuck did that?”
“A bull wanting to take the short cut to the cows that you see roaming around. I wouldn't mind but I only put the fence back up to stop them trampling the students. The rest we left open to 'em but they're still not happy.” She laughed and kicked off her clean shoes, dropping to the step to sit down. “I'll plate up tea. We can eat it over there,” I said, pointing to the two chairs and a table I'd set up in the courtyard, facing the lonely tree.
She nodded and began walking over. Before she got too far, I handed her a full glass of red and the bottle along with a small wooden box that had the cutlery in. Then I went inside and spooned the stew into two bowels I'd put on a serving tray along with the bread and the pots of chilli sauce. I took the tray out to the table and passed her a bowl.
“Thanks,” she said. I'd turned the chairs so that they faced the tree but were side-on to the table. It meant we could eat off our laps and make it feel less like a candle lit dinner for two. The evening was nice with a reasonably clear sky but for a few wispy stragglers making their way east. The sun was setting on the other side of the building but the glow managed to reach us a little bit.
Riley was sat forward, her bowl in one hand and the bread in the other, dipping and eating whilst staring straight ahead of her. She ate at a fast pace and was half-way done by the time I'd finished the roll.
“This is good shit,” she said. “I didn't think the chilli would work, but it does.”
“Glad you like it,” I said. “MRE lemon pudding for desert.”
“Seriously? Man, that's my favourite. I’ve not had any of that for an age.”
“I have three in the cupboard and they've been there since the first lot of students arrived. I’ve never had the stomach to eat one.”
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