by Matt Drabble
“Lovely.” He grinned salaciously as he took a bite. “Sweet, just as I like them.”
She pulled back as Cooper ran his fingers through a ringlet of her hair. She suddenly felt threatened but was determined not to show it.
“If you gentlemen aren’t buying, then I must ask you to move along,” she said with as much courage as she could muster.
“Oh, don’t be like that, sweetheart. I was hoping we could be friends. Maybe you can take me and my friend here out into the woods and be real nice to us.”
“I’m sure there are plenty of women in town who would appreciate your attentions, but I’m not one of them,” she said as she pushed the man’s hand away from her shoulder.
Cooper grabbed the hand tightly and wouldn’t let it go, even when she whimpered in pain.
“You’re hurting me.”
“Oh, I’m thinking I might to do a lot worse than that.” Cooper winked.
He leaned in for a kiss and Gwendolyn tried to pull her head out of the way, but the man was too strong. He held her firmly in place, no matter how much she squirmed to be free. His breath was foul as he pressed his lips against hers and she shut her eyes tightly, trying to wish him away, and then suddenly he was gone.
She opened her eyes and at first, thought that the sun was gone, but she was just standing in a shadow, one large enough to rival an eclipse, and just a tiny part of her rejoiced as the man started to emit his own whimper of pain. But that joy was short-lived as the man’s whimpers turned into a scream of pain.
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“Oh, balls!” Caleb exclaimed as he turned the corner and saw the violent scene before him in the middle of the road.
Brother Torvan had Cooper Fox by the throat and was lifting him effortlessly off the ground. The huge man’s face was flushed red with anger and Cooper was turning blue.
Caleb accelerated up to the scene before slamming on the brakes and sending up a shower of dirt and gravel in order to make a noisy entrance and hopefully catch Torvan’s attention.
He was out of the car quickly and just had time to notice Anderson Jennings slumped on the ground nearby with a nasty-looking head wound.
“PUT HIM DOWN!” Caleb roared as he drew up close, but Torvan either couldn’t hear or wasn’t listening.
Caleb didn’t bother shouting again and instead took a run up. He dipped his not-inconsiderable shoulder and struck the giant Niner in the side.
All three of them fell sideways and landed on the ground. Both Cooper and Torvan started to cough violently and Caleb leapt back to his feet. Without a word, he grabbed hold of Cooper’s arm and dragged him clear of Torvan’s grasping range by putting himself between them.
“Stop, stop,” a woman wailed, and Caleb noticed her for the first time.
Judging by her garb she was also a Niner, but her face was creased with fear unlike her much larger brother’s.
Torvan was back on his feet and Caleb could see the uncontrollable fire burning in the man’s eyes. He found it hard to see just how the man was going to listen to reason and he prepared himself for the fight to come.
“Please,” the woman tried again, and now she put herself into the firing line.
She placed one small delicate hand on Caleb’s chest and the other on Torvan’s. For the first time, Caleb saw a flicker of humanity roll across Torvan’s face and he had hope that this wouldn’t end badly.
“Steady there,” he said to the bigger man in a warning tone. “Somebody want to tell me what happened here?”
“He attacked us, totally unprovoked,” Cooper spluttered as he massaged his red raw throat.
“Unprovoked?” Caleb asked, finding the notion hard to believe given his own knowledge of Cooper Fox and his sidekick.
“It was just a misunderstanding,” the woman pleaded. “That’s all.”
“He put his filthy hands on her,” Torvan rumbled like thunder.
“He didn’t mean anything,” the woman tried again. “Please, there’s no need for trouble here.”
“Bloody maniac wants locking up. Do your job, Constable, and throw that big bastard in jail!” Cooper yelled.
Caleb could tell that the man’s courage was back now that someone else was standing in front of him to take the first shot.
“Keep your mouth shut,” Caleb warned him, never taking his eyes off Torvan.
“Jesus Christ! Tell him, Anderson. Tell him that big ape attacked us for no good reason.”
“Well?” Caleb asked without turning around. “That how it happened, Anderson?”
“I... it happened fast,” the coward whispered, and Caleb didn’t need to see the man’s face to tell that he was looking at the ground.
“I’ll tell you what I think happened,” Caleb started, still fixing his gaze on Torvan in case the man exploded again. “You and your friend Cooper here were being your usual asshole selves and you picked on the wrong person. That about cover it?”
“You go now,” Torvan spat. “All of you. You don’t belong here. Your presence is an insult to the gods.”
“Easy now, big fella,” Caleb answered back. “Don’t you go thinking I’m a whole other person. You don’t give me orders, no matter where you’re from. Miss? Are you okay?”
“She’s fine,” Torvan answered for her.
“Well, I’m not asking you, am I? Miss?”
“I’m fine, Constable. Really.”
With that, Torvan grabbed her arm and walked briskly away.
“You really just going to let him leave?” Cooper exclaimed. “I pay your bloody wages. Do your job!”
“Cooper Fox, you haven’t paid a penny in taxes for as long as I’ve been in this job. You want his big ass hauled into jail, then why don’t you go get him? You were having great success earlier when I pulled up.”
What Caleb didn’t say out loud, of course, was that he wasn’t sure he could get the big man into custody even if he wanted to.
“Brilliant. Just brilliant,” Cooper whined.
“Yeah, brilliant,” Anderson agreed, now it was safe to do so.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Caleb asked as Cooper started to walk away.
“Whatcha gonna do? Bust me for stealing an apple? What’s the penalty these days for scrumping?”
“Ieuan Clark is missing,” Caleb said as he stared hard at Cooper, looking for any signs of a reaction.
“How’s that my problem?” Cooper shrugged.
“Because last time I saw you, you were threatening him,” Caleb announced.
“So what?”
“Well, genius, you threatened him, and now he’s missing. Where were you last night?”
“I was with Anderson, right?” he said, turning to his friend.
Caleb turned to the other man for the first time. Anderson Jennings was a man who Caleb was pretty sure had never had an original thought in his life. Men like Anderson always needed to be led around on a leash; if not, they’d simply wander off.
“Right?” Anderson replied as he looked to his friend for guidance.
“Are you asking me or telling me?” Caleb demanded.
“Telling?” Anderson said with his voice trailing upwards at the end of the word.
“Why don’t you try doing your job, Constable?” Cooper sneered. “Get rid of those religious nutters. You’re supposed to be an islander, Bowman; why don’t you try acting like it? This place is going to die unless we get rid of them.”
“What do you know about anything?” Caleb sighed.
“I know more than you think. Do your bloody job.”
With that, Cooper stomped off and Anderson looked to Caleb, unsure as to what to do next before he ran after his friend.
There had been a flash of a look across Cooper’s almost permanently guilty face at the mere mention of last night. He had covered it quickly but not quickly enough.
CHAPTER 7
Pouring the petrol
“You do this?” Quinn asked Haynes as he approached her on Main Street.
She was pointing at an obviously hastily put together flyer stuck to the large front window in Tommy O’Brien’s store front.
Her boss answered by wafting a wedge of the same flyers at her.
“Here,” he said, thrusting several into her hands. “Put these up...” He paused as he looked along the single street on the island. “...Well, put them up anywhere that I haven’t.”
Quinn looked down again at the flyers. ‘SAVE CLAYTON’ it read in bold lettering. ‘Save our town. Save our future. Save our children’ it read underneath. “Town meeting tonight. 8pm. Town Hall.”
“You don’t think this is a little..., well, a little over the top?” she asked delicately. “I mean, we’ve only had one meeting with Solomon.”
“Trust me, my dear. If there’s one thing I know, it’s people. That old goat will never sell, no matter what I offer him. This deal’s dead before it gets started.”
“So what then?”
“Now we activate Plan B.”
“Which is?”
But Haynes didn’t answer. Instead, he just smiled unnervingly.
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“You heard about the town meeting?” Dottie asked Caleb the second he walked through the door.
“I’ve just seen the flyers,” he said, nodding.
“Going to get a lot of folks riled up,” she mused without looking up from her crossword.
“I know, I know. Any word on Ieuan?”
“Nothing. No one’s heard from Taylor Cole either.”
Caleb went to his chair and sat down thoughtfully.
The office was an old store and wasn’t much of a police station. There was a secondary room that had been a storage space which had been converted into a makeshift cell.
The furniture was sparse with only a large desk and two chairs. There were a couple of framed photographs on the walls, artistic shots of the island.
Life on the island meant that Caleb preferred to spend his time outside of these walls while Dottie was ensconced at the desk, splitting her time between knitting and crossword puzzles.
Caleb leaned back in the chair as it creaked under his bulk. His talents as an officer of the law barely raised above giving menacing glances at those foolish enough to challenge his authority, but now he had a real case on his hands.
He was starting to think about a search party for Ieuan, maybe even for Taylor as well. There had been a handful of disappearances in Clayton down the years.
Occasionally, someone wandered off into the woods, never to be seen again. The coast path could be treacherous, especially in winter, and it wasn’t unheard of for someone to lose their footing. Likewise, the sea could be an unforgiving mistress and several boats had been lost down the years.
A handful of the youngsters had also left to seek a better life, sometimes leaving notes and sometimes not. Clayton offered little in the way of excitement or even a life for the young. Some eventually found their way home when the mainland lost its appeal but some never returned.
Now, however, this was different. He could easily picture Taylor Cole wandering off drunk into the woods and meeting his end. Maybe he fell, maybe he fell asleep and died from exposure. It was a lot harder, though, to imagine Ieuan being just as careless.
“Ieuan Clark?” Dottie asked as if reading his mind.
Caleb nodded.
“Lot of people going to this meeting tonight,” she added.
“Hmm?”
“Lot of men and women in one place; good way to scare up a posse.”
Caleb couldn’t help but smile at the woman’s ability to read his thoughts. Since his own mother’s passing, Dottie had become a surrogate figure to him, regardless of the fact that he was in his forties.
“I’m guessing one woman in particular though,” she continued.
“Easy there,” he jokingly warned her. “Some parts of my life are still private.”
“Not in Clayton, dear. Nothing’s private for long here. You should know that by now.”
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“This can’t be good,” Anderson Jennings whined as he read the flyer.
“On the contrary.” Cooper smiled. “It could be perfect.”
“How’s that? I mean, if the Niners get booted out, what happens to Tunstall and our deal?”
“It gets better,” Cooper replied, his face contorted with thought as though it was an unnatural process for his mind to be going through.
“Huh?”
“Think about it, Anderson. If the Niners go, then we’re better off.”
“Huh?”
“We get Tunstall to hand over his recipe. No Niners - no Tunstall. No Tunstall - no splitting the cash.”
“If he hands over his recipe. I mean, what if he doesn’t? I don’t much like the idea of falling short with Morrison’s order. That guy will bury us both if we let him down.”
The mention of the drug dealer’s name was enough to give Cooper pause for a moment, but only for a moment.
“Don’t worry. If the Niners are forced out, then Tunstall will have to leave with them. He wants the money as much as we do, so we’ll string him along, promise him that we’ll still split the cash. He’ll give us what we need to grow the mushrooms on the island.”
“So we’ll still split the cash with him?”
“No, you idiot. Of course not. But once he’s off the island, what can he do? Besides, think about the nice things you can buy little Miss Quinn. She’s been on the mainland for a long time now. I bet she’s got used to the finer things.”
“What if he won’t show us how to grow them?”
“Oh, he’ll show us.” Cooper grinned unpleasantly. “He’ll show us.”
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The flyers went up quickly and the word spread faster. Soon the whole island was buzzing with a mixture of angst, worry and anger. The arrival of the newcomer had supposed to be their saving and yet it was already clear that there was a large barrier standing in the way.
Bernard Hale argued with Sam Cartwright yet again about the rights of ownership of the island. There had been a time when Cartwright’s anger towards the Niners had been in the minority, but Bernard had sensed a change in the winds for some time now, and it was one that worried him.
Pearl Christenson, owner of the local cafe, held sway in her establishment as usual. She was a loud and proud detractor of the monastery and today her audience were with her. Locals were angry at what they saw as preferential treatment of the Niners. Now, the brothers and sisters were standing in the way of progress - progress and the money that Pearl thought she could make.
Casey Parker swigged whiskey direct from the bottle. She had very little feelings towards the Niners. They never caused her any trouble. She couldn’t ever remember a single one of them venturing into her bar. Her clientele were sufficient for her needs: hard-drinking men, fishermen and loggers who spent their days on the sea and the nights in her bar. The idea of a bunch of mainlanders clogging up her bar demanding clean glasses made her sick to her stomach.
Tommy O’Brien was happy to put up flyers in his window. The general store was the only one on the island and he was positively drooling about the thought of a huge influx of visitors, all forced to use his business. No more chasing islanders for payment, no more credit, no more broke losers; mainlanders had money in their pockets and he wanted some of it.
Dale Clayton read the flyer with anger. He scrunched the piece of paper up into his fist before throwing it into the bin. It wasn’t the meeting that was causing his insides to churn; it was the fact that he hadn’t thought of it.
Word about the town meeting reached the monastery and Solomon Abel’s ears before long. He had expected as much but had hoped for better. Word was already spreading throughout the brothers and sisters, and while some were unmoved, others - led by Torvan, no doubt - were starting to worry. Torvan had become adept at positioning himself as the man they turned to when their blood was up. His son was fast becoming a lightning rod and it troubled him great
ly. His greatest fear was that the town meeting was going to galvanise Clayton and Torvan in equal measure. There was a storm brewing, one that threatened to become big enough to swallow them all.
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The town hall was packed as people came in from all corners of the island. Those who lived close to town were now seeing those who lived out in the wilderness and never ventured into Clayton itself if they could help it.
All of the local businesses were represented with most leaning towards to expansion and investment as it suited their own needs.
Parents were similarly inclined as they were concerned about their children’s futures with the lack of opportunities on the island and they feared the exodus to the mainland.
The loggers were the most insistent with the mill closing down no longer even a debate. Angry men, who had seen their jobs stolen along with their dignity. Fathers and husbands no longer able to provide for their families.
There was also a large smattering of opposition to Haynes’s plan. Some locals feared change and saw his expansion as an invasion, one to take their homes from them and to alter their land forever.
The only thing that everyone seemed to have in common was that they yelled their opinions.
“Good turnout,” Quinn said in Caleb’s ear as she joined him at the back of the room.
“I’d have thought you’d be up on stage with your boss.”
“To be honest, I think he’s forgotten I’m here,” she conceded. “He brought me here to act as an emissary between him and the island, but I don’t think he needs me now.”
“There’s a lot of feeling in this room. This could get out of control easily.”
“No shit, Sherlock,” she agreed.
“Heard you saw your dad; how’d that go?”
Quinn could only shrug in reply.
“Well... fathers can be tricky,” he tried.
“Fathers can be assholes.”
“That too. Look..., if you know..., you want to talk about it,” he said uncomfortably “You can, you know, talk to me, if you want.”
Quinn was touched by his awkward offer and gave his elbow a light squeeze.
“People, people,” Clayton said up on stage as he flapped his arms out over the crowd, trying to get them to settle.