The Writer (18 page)

“I didn’t get it finished,
and I admit, I’m not really sure about it. I think I need to redo
the whole thing. I have some new ideas I want to try.”

“That’s good. New ideas are
good.”

“I met a man I thought I
could trust,” Sophie said and then wished she hadn’t have blurted
that out. Not to Miss Hudson, anyway. She would be better off
telling Ginger.

“Trust?” she returned like a
raw nerve had been struck. “You can’t trust any of them. You should
know that. I hope you told him to go take a hike. You tell him
that, my girl. Don’t be taken in or flattered. They’re all the
same.”

“I did. I did exactly that,
Miss Hudson. I told him I wasn’t interested. And Gendry has some
good hikes for him to go on, too,” she added with a
laugh.

“I’m so happy you see it the
same as me. You ask me, we just don’t have need of any men ruining
our lives.”

Miss Hudson was pleased with
her and while it meant that the two would continue to be friends,
and Ginger will be watched again in the future, Sophie wondered if
she might be looking into a mirror of herself in fifty years time.
If she continued to have the same idea then she might end up being
exactly the same, alone and old, and hating all men on account of
meeting one or two bad ones. Then she wondered again if she was far
too hard on Craigfield and she should have taken the chance with
him. Perhaps the only real fault to him was that she didn’t know
much about him, since what she did know was probably
invented.

When the boards under his
feet groaned with each step Max knew that he was in a genuine small
town. Sal’s had a big veranda next to the door and each and every
single board creaked when he walked on it. Two small wooden doors,
both dented and worn, formed the main entrance. They swung open
with just a light touch. The dim light inside contrasted against
the bright sun so much that at first Max could hardly see a thing.
He stood there in the doorway, expecting that everyone in there was
looking him over to see if he was a friend or foe, a local or a
tourist. Once he could see enough to walk further in, he went over
to the long counter. There were three old men sitting at the far
end. They had been talking with a large woman behind the counter
but now all four were staring at him.

“Hello,” he greeted them as
he sat on one of the nearest bar stools and placed his crutch
across two vacant seats. “My name is Max Marshall. You might have
heard of me. I’m a writer. I’m visiting Gendry, doing some
research. Looking to get a feel for the place, hear what the people
are thinking, that kind of thing.”

Sal slowly walked down to
him, never in a hurry. “What do you want to do that for?” she asked
with a puzzled expression.

“For my book. I want to set
the story here, in Gendry.”

“Why, have you run out of
better places?” called one of the three old guys, to the amusement
of the others.

“Ease up on him, Elbow,” Sal
rebuked. “If he wants to put Gendry on his map then I say we don’t
interfere.”

“No, leave it off his map,
or any map,” said Elbow. “I like it the way it is, good and
unknown. How do you think we can have a peaceful town if people
start knowing about it? First thing that goes is the peace, and
it’s going on a journey where it’s never coming back.”

Max had no idea if they were
joking or being serious. Whatever it was, no one was laughing. “How
did you get the name Elbow?” he asked politely.

“You’d like to know,” Elbow
replied bluntly as he made his way slowly off the stool and then
walked outside with very quick strides. He seemed to be making a
show of it.

“I would, actually,” Max
said to him with a smile, but it didn’t stop Elbow from
leaving.

“He’s not normally about
that,” said the older of the two remaining. He had a smooth voice
and might have been trying to apologise for his friend, but Max
couldn’t tell. “Leave him be. For my part, I’d be honoured to
feature in your story. I take it you want it to be accurate;
otherwise why come all the way up here? My name’s Gene Best, and
this is Sam Hendersen, but we know him as Two-Tooth. I have the
honour of the title of retired mayor of Gendry. Although I still
consider myself to have another term left in me. But honestly, I’d
be more convinced about that if I was just a little bit younger.
Tell me, are you planning on moving up here? Been a lot of city
people move here, last few years. If you do, I’d like you to
consider my favour come election time.”

“I’m just here for research,
I’m sorry. How old are you, Gene, if you don’t mind my
asking?”

“Eighty-one in two weeks,”
he said, proud to admit it.

“Forget it, you’re too old,”
Two-Tooth said to him as he gave Max a hard stare. He sounded to
Max like he was the gruffest of the three. “Elbow’s right, we don’t
want news of our town spreading. Bring in too many more city
people. No offence to you, son, but we’ve already lost a good man
to city people, and far as I can see, that won’t be the last. Chose
for yourself another town, if you don’t mind.”

“You can’t blame what
happened on all the city folk,” Gene said to Two-Tooth. “Sophie’s
from the city, remember?”

Elbow then came back in, and
walked with the same quick strides back to his stool. “Too hot out
there,” he told his friends as he reached for his half-filled beer
glass.

“Who’s Sophie?” asked
Max.

“Susan’s granddaughter,”
said Gene, “and a fine looking girl she is.”

“She’s a writer too,” said
Sal. “Gone back to the city now. You might know her, Max, since
you’re a writer. Didn’t you say you’re a writer?”

“Yes, and actually,” said
Max, “I think I’m staying in her room.”

“Look at that,” said
Two-Tooth, “one leaves and one takes his place. Can’t
win.”

“Better than that other one
who was housed there,” said Elbow, “that murderer.”

“I’m sorry, did you say
‘murderer’?” asked Max.

“Gendry’s very own genuine
murderer,” Elbow said like he was proud of it. “Fellow from the
city, he was, and friendly with young Sophie too. Girl was lucky,
if you ask me, that she didn’t get too close and cosy with
him.”

“Did he kill someone here?”
asked Max. “A local?”

“No one knows for sure and
no one can prove he killed anyone,” Gene said, trying to calm
everyone down. “These are just wild rumours. Forget about it. No,
just forget about it. Nothing’s been proven, but leave it to old
has-beens at Sal’s to speculate. Worst thing you can do, son, is to
listen to us.”

Sal leaned close to Max.
“That’s the only true thing I’ve ever heard him say all day,” she
whispered before she then went back to the cash
register.

Max looked at her and then
them, not knowing what to think. Then Sal started laughing and the
three old guys followed, and offered Max a free drink on the house.
He realised that he was now accepted in the town. Not only did he
have the blessing of Gene and possibly his two old friends, but
also of Sal. He ordered the next round of drinks for them too, and
that helped him find answers to as many questions as he could think
of.

After two hours of hearty
socialising, Two-Tooth abruptly changed his tone. He looked at Max
without speaking for a good two minutes before Max
noticed.

“City folks,” Two-Tooth said
when everyone quietened for him, “should stick with city folks.
Just my opinion, but Gendry folks aren’t city folks and never will
be. You and others like you come from the city trying to live with
us, but you never fit in. You say you’re just here to write a story
about us. Okay, write your story for the city folks to read. Gendry
folks won’t read it, since they know you’re not from Gendry. Only
someone from Gendry can write about Gendry.”

“Are you suggesting that I
should only write about the city, since that’s where I’m from?”
asked Max.

“All I’m saying,” Two-Tooth
said as he focused on his almost-empty glass, “is you can never
understand us and there’s no point in trying.”

“I don’t understand city
folks either,” said Max. “Where does that leave me?”

They all agreed, including
Two-Tooth, and made some jokes at Max’s expense. Max was not
pleased, however, to think that this man was right. Some old and
probably alcoholic small-town waste of space, who saw more of his
glass than anything else in his life, could take one look at Max
and see everything he needed to. Max had nothing to offer back to
him, and for the first time in his life he realised that he didn’t
have to. He didn’t have to prove himself to anyone. Yes, he agreed
that he didn’t understand people as well as maybe he should, and
that his life was incredibly uninteresting, and he had nothing to
offer. But in the long run none of that really mattered. He didn’t
know how he got to where he was, or why nothing had turned out very
well for him, and why no one seemed to take him seriously. All he
knew is that he just wanted to write, and that was what he loved
more than anything else.

Having been back in the city
for two weeks, Sophie needed nothing less than another holiday.
Perhaps this time somewhere peaceful. Or perhaps the Gendry she
knew as a child. Right from the first hour of the first day back at
her job she started dreaming that she was still in the old Gendry.
The birds were singing, the trout biting, children running amuck,
the town was whispering about bad people from the city, and Susan
was trying to find men for her to marry. It saddened her to realise
that those things would still be going on without her
there.

While it was true that her
own bed and pillow were the two best things in her world, and her
friends continued to give her more than enough gossip, and watching
her soap opera television shows were so much better when she was
alone in her pyjamas with a bowl of popcorn and too much butter,
nothing could replace the easy-going and friendly world of Gendry.
What was worse was in thinking how out-of-place she felt there. It
was her home town and yet it wasn’t. She had outgrown
it.

During one lunch break, on
another cold and overcast day, when the city’s smog seemed to
always be at its worst, when she went to see if she could find some
new clothes at one of the sales, she saw a familiar face in the
crowd. At first the face only registered as someone she knew,
before she had a name to go with it. When she realised who it was
she could not help but say his name.

“Craigfield.”

He had seen her before she
saw him and he was standing still on the other side of the road,
waiting for her to see him. He was dressed in a long black leather
jacket and he had a briefcase tucked against his chest. His
expression was impassive, and he was not moving, just standing near
to the street and forcing people to walk around him.

Sophie decided to keep
walking but then looked back and saw that he was still there, but
now he wasn’t looking at her. Shrugging off her own instincts, or
fear, she crossed the road and approached him.

“So you
are
stalking
me?” she asked, feeling safe on the street with the lunchtime
crowds.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he
said evenly, not showing her any emotion. “I’m just passing you by
on the street when I saw you, or can’t I do that either? I do
happen to live in the city too, you know. You’ve probably walked
past me on other occasions, but since you didn’t know me you took
no notice. And what about all these other people, also passing you
by in the street, are you accusing them too? No you’re not, since
you don’t know any of them.”

“If it means anything to
you,” she said with growing nervousness, not really wanting to
apologise but knowing that she should, “I was a little hasty in
thinking you were lying, when you were in Gendry, the last time we
spoke. I did send the twins out to follow you; that’s true. But I
never thought they would leave town and go into the city. And thank
you for bringing them back; I don’t think I managed to tell you
that. It was very nice of you. So, thank you.”

“What’s this?” he asked with
the slightest of sneers. “You’re being nice to me now?”

She started to back off. “I
can understand if you just want to go on your way, and go wherever
you’re going, and not stay and talk some more. I wasn’t very nice
to you back in Gendry, and that wasn’t fair. I know that now. If it
means anything to you, I’m sorry.”

He seemed to relax at that
and Sophie noticed sadness in his eyes. She then saw that he looked
different; calmer and more natural. That was the way he was when
she met him at Sal’s, and why she was willing to walk and talk with
him.

She shuffled from foot to
foot, and gingerly asked, “So, are you married or not? I don’t
remember what you said about that.”

“Not,” he said with a
natural smile getting warmer.

“So,” Sophie asked
awkwardly, “did you want to start over?”

He took a breath and then
couldn’t stop breaking out a big smile. “Can’t see why not. Perhaps
if we could forget everything that happened back in
Gendry.”

“Would make it easier,”
Sophie agreed. “Not like this place has anything to remind us of
that place.”