;P
Miss beams at John, "Oh, nothing. Talking to myself, I talk to myself every day, sometimes its the only intelligent conversation i'll have all day." She smirks at him and sticks out her tongue.
Miss beams at John, "Oh, nothing. Talking to myself, I talk to myself every day, sometimes its the only intelligent conversation i'll have all day." She smirks at him and sticks out her tongue.
John smiles in return. Then his brows furrow slightly. Then he huffs as he realizes what she said. He sticks his tongue back out at Edith just as their late night rescuer walks in. He covers his embarrassment with another forkful of food.
"Yer' Wife sets a real good breakfast sir. Much obliged for the late night delivery as well." He says, waving his fork in greeting.
Kenny adds to John's comment "I don't know what is better then breakfast or the good night's sleep I had. It's a wonder that more visitors don't come up this way."
"I am sorry to hear about the young man in town. Were you close?"
Carlotta frowns. "Like...nature worship? Paganism?"
"I'll take a plate, thank's much. Yes, she's been feeding me well for years - and its starting to show." He pats his stomach appreciatevely.
"They're pagans alright, I guess," she says, "Finish off the bacon hon. John's alway's talked of keeping away the snow. Course I always say he's failed more often than not: we get right bad snows every winter of course, and spring and fall too. And his son's been helping him, or so he says. But of course now he's dead and I don't know what John will do without him. They were always together."
"You telling them our trouble huh?" asks her husband, "You folks given thought to where you want to spend the nights? We can offer you lodgings for fifty a night per person, includes breakfast. - at least for a week and then we have some preregistered guests coming."
John looks to the others before responding.
"I'm not really the bookkeeper of the group, but that sounds reasonable to me. What do you guys think? I like it here. Nice ambiance." He says with a grin, indicating his now clean plate.
Carlotta nods. "Sounds good to me."
He takes the voice of two to have bespoken for the whole group, "Excellent."
Then he turns his attention to his food, which soon dissapears.
"So what do ya'll have planned for your stay here?" asks your hostess.
"Well, ah. Ah don't know that we had anything planned, exactly." John says with a look at Carlotta and Kenny that plainly says 'A little help here?'
"This was more of an impromptu vacation. Sort of an adventure. 'GO forth and see what kind of trouble, I mean fun, you can get into.' You know?"
JOhn pays studious attention to his plate for a few moments, but there simply isn't much left at this point, and he grabs more time to think by draining his tall glass of milk.
"You mentioned hunting last night. That's always an option for me. Hows the fishin' hereabouts? What do you catch in this neck of the woods?"
"Well we're at the tail end of our Salmon season, but trouts always good around these parts. You gotta watch where you fish though, some of the streams around here have some fish it ain't safe ta be eating."
"Really? What makes the fish unsafe to eat? You don't have a Nuclear power plant or some-such nearby do you?"
Kenny is anxious to hear about the unsafe fish. He was thinking of asking the same question that John just asked. The thought of unsafe food brings back memories of the cannibalistic buffet and the kidnaped women in Arizona.
Carlotta is silent as the men talk about fishing. "I was thinking of poking around in town, maybe meeting a few people...you know. A nice quiet day for a change..." "Maybe we can let the men go and be manly and fish and hunt and such, while we take the town?" She directs her last comment towards Miss.
Carlotta is silent as the men talk about fishing. "I was thinking of poking around in town, maybe meeting a few people...you know. A nice quiet day for a change..." "Maybe we can let the men go and be manly and fish and hunt and such, while we take the town?" She directs her last comment towards Miss.
"Indeed, this could be fun..." She smiles at Carlotta that looks as though she is holding in boisterous laughter. She turns to the men folk. "Yes, you manly men go be manly men. " She giggles and turns away.
John looks a little confused at the women. He looks to Kenny for help.
"Um. OK. Sure, sounds good."
Carlotta stands up and smiles at their hosts. "Thanks so much for your hospitality."
Apology:
"No idea what makes the fish unsafe - just some of them that swim in these streams aren't exactly normal. I caught a two headed salmon a couple of years back that I managed to sell to some guy out east over Ebay. Fool thing was still alive."
As it turns out, the group is in what passes for the center of town. Its not really a huge place, about a dozen streets all told, with the buildings well spaced.
Apology:** spoiler omitted **
"No idea what makes the fish unsafe - just some of them that swim in these streams aren't exactly normal. I caught a two headed salmon a couple of years back that I managed to sell to some guy out east over Ebay. Fool thing was still alive."
Kenny gags at the mentionof the two headed fish.
"Uh..that sounds interesting. I'd love to see a fish with two heads. Do you remember the name of the guy you sold the other fish to? A guy I met once told me he saw one but I thought he was just putting me on."
John raises both heavy eyebrows at the mention of two-headed fish.
"Well, at least at two-fer-one you get your moneys worth." He shrugs.
He just shakes his head with a grin at Carlotta. "Just like my sister." He mumbles. John also thanks his hosts (Again, in the case of the wife/chef!) and grabs his coat and backpack in preparation for looking for something to do. Or take a picture of.
Carlotta also has a visible reaction to the mention of the two headed fish, paling slightly and starting.
She raises her eyebrows back at John. "Really, now?" she adds an infectious grin.
"Well, lets head out and see what we can find." She grabs her bag and starts out the door with Miss.
Moments later, the group finds themselves standing on the porch of the bed and breakfast, an impressive covered porch complete with tables and chairs.
The mountains are plainly visible to the south. The road in front of the building is paved, and there are several vehicles in the driveway. The various buildings along the street are well spaced and large pine trees grow between all the houses.
"So where could we hire a boat around here?"
John takes a deep breath of the morning air.
"Boat? That's a good idea. Long as you don't plan on waterskiin'. I don't fancy a swim in this water!" He says with a shudder.
"Why don't we just take a quick tour of the town? Get the lay of the land, so to speak. Then we can decide where to go from there?"
Emmet walks onto the porch behind them, "You can get a boat to fish the river if you wants, there's a place at the docks where Rick does a trade in that sort of thing. If you want to walk around town, it ain't big. You'll soon see all the sights."
"Meanwhile, I'm going to head on out and be a good neighbor 'n pay my respects to the family of the departed."
"Is the waterfront within walking distance?"
"Anything's within walking distance if you've got enough time," says Emmet heading towards his car, "But the rivers about a mile south of here."
"Ah think AH'll walk" John drawls, a little more heavily accented than usual. "We've got the time, an' Ah'll git to see the whole town that way. Yew comin'?" HE asks the group, stretching to enjoy the feeling of his full belly before getting his coat buttoned up.
"Absolutely, I think a nice walk would be great. We could take in the scenery and meet the nice folks around here."
"Ma'am, it has been a pleasure", Kenny says to the proprietor as he cleans his place at the table.
The town is really pretty sparsely populated. There's a few people out on the streets, in the yards, and what not, but the buildings are not that close to each other (big yards) and there's not a lot of traffic on the road.
Those few who you do see all wave.
About two blocks from the river (you can see it from where you are, a nice placid looking thing), one of the townsfolks finally makes a move towards talking. He's a pleasant looking chap, with a neatly trimmed grey beard, a little short, but not really what you would call heavy set. In fact he looks almost distinguished, despite his old jeans and worn flannel shirt.
"You good looking folks wouldn't be the ones staying over at Emmet's would you? Glad to have you with us. Sorry it has to be on such an unpleasant day as this. I'm 'Lias Kilmet. What brings you folks to town?"
"Pleased to meet you, Lias. I'm Kenny and this is John and we are here checking out Alaska. Personally, I am really interested in these two-headed fish that I heard about."
"It's a pleasure Lias." John says, shaking the man's hand.
"Yeah, sorry to hear about your neighbor. Sad thing. My condolences. We're just sort of out on an adventure. No real goals other than to have some excitement! (ANd we a little of that on the way in.) Though we have heard of a couple of things that sound interesting. That two-headed fish for one." He says, pointing his thumb at Kenny.
"How 'bout you sir? What do you do?" He asks.
"I'm the mayor," says the man pleasantly, "But I mainly run the general store down the block. Emmet tell you about that fish huh? Real interesting thing to catch, though it ain't the first, just he was the first to keep one. Still, we tend to fish further downstream where the fish are more normal."
"Are there any chemical plants or things like that which might be dumping waste in the water? How long have people been catching two-headed fish?"
"Ever since the town was established I think, not that I'm the local historian here. For that you would have to talk to Walt Luzier. But we don't have much industry around here. None, actually."
After a bit more polite conversation, the mayor makes some apoligies and goes on his way. It seems he is going to go pay his respects to the father of the recently departed.
John smiles and waves goodbye to the mayor, then promptly writes 'Walt Luzier-town historian' in a small battered notepad pulled from his backpack.
"What'cha think Kenny? SHall we try to find this Walt guy? From the looks of it, he;s probably headed to pay his respects like the rest of the town. We could probably find him there, talk to after he leaves?" He asks his fellow investigator.
"At least we won't get lost. We can just follow EVERYone else in town!" He adds softly, indicating the people all headed in the same general direction at various speeds.
"That seems like the best way to go about this."
"At some point we might have to tell people where we work. This does not always go over so well but in a place this isolated I am more concerned that I would usually be. What do you think about claiming that we are freelancers who just happened to be here because of the two-headed fish? Carlotta and I actually saw some and took photos of them in Virginia about a year ago so that might help give us some cover."
John nods slowly. Kenny begins to realize that John isn't slow, or even bashful, but appears to try and take his time thinking through a question before jumping in with an answer.
"I agree. You lot have got experience over me on this, so I'll follow yer lead fer now. But I do think that we should maybe 'discover' the real story we're after, and tell 'em we were following the 'freak-fish' angle once we tell'em we're reporters. Seems less likely we'll get stonewalled that way."
There is exactly one store in town, a combination grocery store/general store with a full set of catalogs. In the course of walking through the town, it is also soon discovered there is no wireless signal. Most of the buildings have multiple satellites attached to them, for both television and internet.
"Hm. One store. And the girls will STILL spend more time in there than we will walking from the wake to the river and back." John grumbles good-naturedly with a small hint of a grin. John checks his cell phone with a frown, and eyes the satellite dishes on almost every building with an experts eye.
"Looks like there is no blanket coverage here. I hope you guys aren't heavy texters. If we need to contact someone via email or something, I can probably get out without too much trouble. I doubt that half of these systems are passworded. But it'll be time consuming." He shakes his head.
"Right! So. We're looking for 'Walt', right?" He asks Ken once more, already heading down the street once more.
"Yes, Walt it is. Meeting at a time of mourning will probably be awkward."
"Hmph. Try meeting over an IED in the sandbox from h@!!,..." John mutters, not exactly disagreeing with Kenny's statement,...
He does slow his walk however, and looks less eager to hurry to their destination.
There is one store. Its a large warehouse type structure with food, clothes, and sundry household supplies. It also has a large counter full of catalogs, most of which don't look much used.
As the girls walk in, a young lady, perhaps seventeen or eighteen, looks up brifly from her comfortable chair behind the register, where she is reading, smiles, and then returns to her book.
Following the mayor, the two guys soon see him entering into a large, two story wooden house built in much the same style as the one they just spent the night in. Large trees in the front yard of the house are covered with antlers, skulls and feather totems. In the large garage to the left rear corner of the house, one can spy a big truck with monster wheels, a snow-mobile and a motorcycle. There is another vehicle, a pickup, parked outside the garage and behind it is the vehicle of their host the previous night. There do not appear to be quite as many people here as one might suppose.
The Mayor knocks politely and after waiting a couple of minutes, he is allowed in by a large man with a heavy grey beard.
"Hmph. Not nearly as crowded as I had hoped. I wuz kind of hoping to be able to mingle in with the crowd, not stand out too much. WHat do you think Kenny? Do we risk going on up there now and hope they don't mind strangers butting into a distressing time? Or wait for 'Walt' to leave?" John asks his new friend, obviously thinking he already knows the sensible answer. (But possibly hoping that Kenny will try the insensible one anyway?)
He points towards the truck of their nighttime rescuer/host visible behind other vehicles.
"Or maybe we can just ask our host if we can join and offer our condolences? This is big deal for a town like this. Might not be surprised that we want to join in?" He asks, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.
"In a small town like this I think our presence would make folks even more guarded than usual. Let's wait for Walt. When people come out of an emotional event like this it makes them more likely to talk, as long as they are alone. It's a way to take their minds off of the dead person."
"Let's wait for Walt to leave. The presnce of two strangers at a wake would be odd; people would be more guarded than usual. I say we wait for him to come out. If he is by himself he will probably be more likely to talk. Emotional events have that effect on people. He might see us as a way to take his mind off of the deceased."
JOhn glances sideways at Kenny. Not as if disagreeing with him, more like trying to figure him out. As if Kenny;s comments might make sense, but John never thought of them in that way. The bigger man shrugs slightly, barely noticeable in his heavy coat.
"SOunds ok to me. Maybe we can get a cup of coffee while we wait, pick up some more gossip. ANything beats freezing out here waiting for the party to break up!" JOhn adds, looking around for a restaurant, coffee shop or something nearby,...