[More to come—most likely.]"Oi, there--help, please. Show charity for a poor old man what's lost his way." His voice squeaked and quavered with what seemed weakness, and he was thin and dirty and beggarly-looking--an unpleasant sight.
I slowly approached on Brownie, stopping beside but staying mounted.
"What would you have me do, sir?"
"Just lets he..." He struggled to his feet, clambering up the tree--a spiny one that must have pricked his skin. "If you guides him to a road or track..."
He rested one hand on my saddle skirt, then grasped my leg--fingers sinking in, his expression going from meek to fierce in a blink. I screamed and kicked but his grip held iron-strong.
"Silence! Silence all," he rasped. "You has another choice, but not a good one."
A knife appeared in his other hand. Though rusted and nicked, I'd no doubt it would still do its work. Without thinking long I decided to soothe him, waiting for my chance to escape.
"Now, younker," he said, "you takes him to some place of shelter and safety I'm sure, for Abel don't likes to cut a lad, but he'll do what he must."
I turned for home, my horse ambling and him stumbling alongside, muttering to me or maybe to himself, always in third person.
"He's got the key, does Abel, and none other. He knows, he does. But there's them what thinks they deserves it. No, no--twon't be, not while he's got life in him."
And much more I hardly recall. His voice caught in his throat, and he cackled from time to time. He had nothing but the clothes he wore and cracked, worn boots--all in poor shape. On his back a blanket roll, and at his waist a drooping sack. Aye, only those and the knife, which seemed bigger by the minute as we went toward home--a long ride and a longer walk for someone in his condition. Yet he made it.
At our blockhouse he ate sparingly as though accustomed to short rations by a long siege of starvation, but drank enough for two or three men--always demanding beer, and looking on water as little more than poison, whether applied internally or without. He slept and lay on his bedroll in the stable, rarely rising except for calls of nature, content with the company of horses and ponies.
"He must get his powers back--his strengths up. Then we'll see, won't we? Beer, blast you! Must he die of thirst?"
His mind would wander a bit before all began again.
"Twas dry out there, by Ecol, and but a sip of dew for him to get by on, and the sun with no pity. Rain? Aye, he'd be rained upon, and snowed or hailed on, too, like as not. For you see, er... Val-boy, the weather it likes to be contrary, and when he was wet twould make him wetter, and cold, colder, and when dry... Ah, that were worst of all. Beer, if you pleases, now. Help old Abel get his consitooshun going again."
Inside a fortnight he was dead--a hard death, with him wild and carrying on about his map and riches. What traps he had remained in our hands as payment for care of him--and the map, too, little though we could make of it.
Life is never simple.
Received a phonecall the other day from Thomas Harrigan of the DEA, badge #849361, who needed to talk to my wife. No, he couldn't explain to me--it was a confidential matter.
Any contact with a government agency can be threatening, but I advised my wife it was probably an attempt to pin something on one of her doctors regarding improper prescription of narcotics, and I suggested she simply give them the facts.
But no. My wife, Harrigan explained to her, was in big trouble, as was her drug provider, RightSource. She must immediately fork over $1800--within the hour--or face the possibility of jail. He had an arrest order from the Secretary of State. (I dunno, possibly the Attorney General was busy, and the federal courts tied up.) But since she was in hospital at the time he reduced it to $900, and also told her that once they had successfully prosecuted RightSource the money would be returned. He also made it easy by letting her deposit the money locally rather than go to a DEA office. Decent fellow.
She referred the matter to me. Had to be a scam, of course, but having run into previous government errors--a mistaken tax lien on our property, for instance--I checked with our lawyer just to be certain. Obtaining his confirmation, I set about playing Mr Harrigan, phone 240-949-2585, posing as a thoroughly cowed doofus. His English, by the way, was perfect except for a curiously staccato delivery. His male phone-receptionist, however, had a slight Latino accent.
Again being helpful, Harrigan arranged for me to go to a local location, a grocery store with a Western Union terminal, where I was to pay the nine-hundred dollars plus a ninety dollar fee via an International Money Transfer, then call him with the confirmation number. Payment was to be made to Logan Rodriguez, the attorney handling the RightSource case, at 33 Kennedy Avenue in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. Harrigan neglected to clarify whether Rodriguez was on vacation or overseas following a foreign lead.
He insisted I take a cell phone with me, apparently so he could monitor my movements at all times. "But I don't have a cell," I pleaded, so he let me off.
After a suitable period I called Harrigan with the ten-digit confirmation number, but he insisted it couldn't be correct. Not too surprising, for I had pulled it out of the air. He demanded I read from the receipt.
"Receipt? What receipt."
"You didn't get a receipt!"
Since I was a doofus he had to let it pass. But after checking, he informed me the payment hadn't come through.
I assured him I'd done everything correctly, but no go. I would have to call Western Union, he told me, and straighten out the matter. Sensing a growing suspicion, I now sang the Harrigan song to him: "H-A, double R-I, G-A-N spells Harrigan." I hadn't reached the second A before the line went dead.
So what's with all the scams?
First, of course, Americans are rich--and Nigerians, South Africans, Dominicans and what-have-you need our money worse than we do.
Second, email and cell phones make long-distance fraud convenient and relatively safe. Our law enforcement agencies don't so much as bother to take reports on these scams.
Third, Americans are used to honesty. We're trusting souls, and when someone contacts us on an emergency matter we tend to believe him. Not so in other countries, where the first response will be skepticism.
This one was easy to deal with. But think of the call when your son or daughter vacationing in Westofnowherestan has been hit by a car and taken to a clinic, and the doctors need five-thousand dollars or they won't operate!
How clearly will you be thinking when that call comes through?