Wombat News
18-01-2004, 00:33
”Well, what did you think of that?”.
The speaker swivelled to look at his companion.
“Odd,” she replied. “A little like they didn’t know or care what was out here .. ” Her voice tailed off.
“Whatever it is, I hope it’s bloody worth it,” he replied.
The narrow ribbon of tarmac that was the road stretching off into the distance was barely visible through the haze caused by the sun hammering down onto it. Seamus O’Hack (for it is he!) concentrated grimly on the mirage of the cold beer he could see floating just before the horizon. Beside him, his new photographer, Polly Filler, sat, crumpled, idly eyeing the passing heat-battered landscape as it passed.
She turned her head slowly to look at Seamus. ”So what did Pape say again?
Seamus grunted, and wiped a hand across his forehead. The air vents in their battered old VW camper van were not coping with the heat, and sweat was pouring from him.
“He told me that he’d heard something was out here. He didn’t know what, but he said that we were the best Wombat News team for this. What he didn’t say is that we’re the only bloody team anyway near here .. the cheap bastard.”
”So what do you think it is?”
Seamus took his time before answering. ”You know, Pape and I worked together for a long time. He’s got a good nose for a story .. almost as good as mine.” Seamus had no truck with false modesty. ”I don’t know. He didn’t know. All he could tell me was to get to that place back there, fill up, and then head down this road. He’s the boss!”
Polly snorted. ”Sounds like a wind-up to me.” She grinned. ”What do we know about the area?”
”Nothing. Less than nothing. That’s just it. This road must go somewhere, or why build it? But we know every country in the world. We reported from them, we’ve got contacts in them, people tell us things. But about this area – nothing. You saw the way the people reacted back there when we asked them what was out here?!”
They fell silent as they each reviewed their memories of the little town they had stopped in to fill up in. Seamus, as was his wont, had headed straight for the local bar, leaving Polly to fill up the van before joining him for a cool drink. You could have cut the atmosphere with a knife when she walked in.
” …. out there at all.” was all she’d caught of the barman’s words.
”So why the road? Seamus had asked, but the locals had already returned to their drinks, and the barman had studiously avoided them.
Seamus had swallowed his whisky, and they’d left.
Strands of night began to blacken the sky as the sun dipped below the western horizon. As darkness fell, Seamus turned the lights of the van on, and continued to drive, staring grimly out through the windscreen.
“What the hell was down this road?” he thought to himself, the question ringing through his mind. Polly slept on, curled in her seat, as the monotonous journey continued into the gloom of night.
******************
“Whoah!”
The surprised exclamation, coupled with the rocking as the van ground to a halt, jerked Polly from her slumbers. Night still lay pooled over the land, but thin tendrils of dawn were beginning to light the eastern sky, bringing the promise of another scorching dawn.
Rubbing sleep from her eyes, she peered through the windshield into … nothing. With a gasp, she yanked herself upright.
“What the .. “
“Relax, it’s a cliff – look, you can see the sea down there.” Seamus swung the door open and hopped to the ground, stretching himself as he did so.
Polly followed gingerly, keeping one hand on the van, which was perched at the very edge of a huge cliff.
“Impressive, isn’t it? The road suddenly stops … ” It did indeed. The road ran straight to the edge of the cliff and suddenly … vanished. “Good thing that the brakes worked!” Seamus laughed, the terror of suddenly seeing the road vanish into thin air gradually fading now he had solid earth beneath his feet.
Both of them peered over the edge. The cliff-face was near vertical, and dropped hundreds of feet into the sea, where breakers beat their monotonous rhythm against its feet. Seagulls wheeled below them, crying their raucous cries like lost souls on the wing.
“Hey, what’s that?” Polly shaded her eyes against the rising sun, trying to make out what she had glimpsed. A tiny speck rode on the waves, glittering dully in the light of the new dawn.
“A boat. It’s a boat. But it looks bloody small to be out here in the middle of nowhere!”
Seamus grunted, stepped back to the van, and rummaged through the contents of his duffle bag, eventually pulling out a pair of binoculars. Focussing them on the distant speck, he gazed out to sea.
“Yep. A boat. A small open-top boat, with some guys fishing. Which means there must a village around here somewhere!”
Fat chance, he thought to himself. There’s nothing but cliff. He swept the binoculars down the length of the cliff, and back again. Nothing.
“Here, you have a look.” He slung the binoculars at Polly, who snatched them out of the air, just as it looked like they were going to fall over the edge of the cliff. Polly flung a glare at Seamus, who grinned back unrepentantly. “See if you can see where that boat’s from. I’ll back-track a little and see if there’s a path or turning I missed.”
“OK, Sam. Twenty minutes, and then you’d better bloody come back for me.” Polly glared at Seamus, who shot her a grin and a wave of acknowledgement.
Dawn was fully broken by now, as Seamus swung back into his seat. With a laborious crunching of gears, and much cursing, he managed to make a sixteen point turn on the narrow road, and set off slowly back the way he came, leaving Polly alone on the edge of the cliff.
Looking around, she spotted a convenient boulder to rest her back against, and sat down against it. She brought the binoculars up to here eyes, and looked out at the boat.
Yeah, she thought to herself. Small fishing boat, no cover. Where do you go at night? Panning the binoculars along the cliffs, she could see nothing. She continued for a few minutes before putting them down beside her and letting her eyes close and her mind go blank. Leave it to Sam. He’ll figure it out.
*********************
She heard the van before she saw it. Seamus was beeping the little horn wildly as he came trundling across the last rise before the drop, and crunched to a halt.
“Got it, got it” he yelled exuberantly, as he leapt from the van. “There’s a little dirt track down the road a ways that leads off to the east – there must be something down there. I could make out tracks in the dirt. Hey, where’d the boat go?”
Polly looked around. “It’s right ther … hey, where’d it go?”
“What d’ya mean – weren’t you watching it?
“Well, yeah, but … ” Polly trailed off. “I kinda shut my eyes for a moment – I must have fallen asleep!”
“Shit, you are a daft cow! You were supposed to keep an eye on it to see which way it went! It would have lead us right to the village – even if we had to go cross-country. Polly looked sceptical at this – cross country in a VW camper van .. get real, Sam!
“OK, OK. Never mind. It probably just got sucked down by the big sea monsters out there!!” Seamus grinned. He could just imagine the old maps of the areas with pictures of mythical beasts and warnings of “Here Be Dragons” printed all over them. “Come on, Pol. Let’s go see where the track goes.”
*******************
Bumpy and narrow as it was, the dirt track that Seamus had found wasn’t too bad. There had been a hairy moment when it seemed to run off the cliff altogether as well, but it hadn’t, continuing to cling to the cliff-side as it went ever eastward, following the line of the cliffs.
As the sun climbed higher into the sky, and started once more to hammer down on the earth below, the temperature sky-rocketed, and Seamus and Polly’s nerves became more and more frayed until, wonder of wonders, the track passed into what had to be a man-made tunnel. Driving slowly into this, they continued to follow the track as it emerged into a channel cut in the side of the cliff-face, angling ever downwards. Seamus started to worry. There was no room to turn, and he wasn’t sure he could reverse up the track all the way.
“There – look!” The relief in Polly’s voice was audible. “Wow. Great location!!”
The village was nestled into a gash in the cliff that looked like the Holy Wombat had got a sword and smashed it into the earth. A little village, all whitewashed walls, and red tiled roofs, fringed with substantial trees and set in terraces running back into the gloom of the rent in the cliff, sitting above a short beach of white-gold sand. A number of small fishing boats were pulled up on the beach, and they could make out men mending nets at one end of the beach. They continued down the track as it curved away and down to the edge of the village.
“Thank the Holy Wombat,” breathed Seamus. He grinned at Polly. “Pol, what say we find the local taverna and get ourselves a good drink and a bite to eat?”
“Sounds good, Sam.”
They eased into the village, and the battered old van coughed and spluttered to a halt in what seemed to be the central square. The square was empty. Come to think of it,[i] thought Seamus, [i]the street - if you could call it that – was empty too. Faces appeared and vanished at windows, and they could hear doors slamming shut.
Heh, thought Seamus. And they don’t even know we’re journalists yet!
Seamus and Polly climbed out of the van, and stretched in the sun, looking warily around. Curtains twitched in windows, but not a soul was to be seen.
“Bloody hell,” muttered Polly. “What’s with these folks?”
Seamus nodded his head in the direction of a building. “That’s the local bar – let’s ask in there.”
“Shit, Sam, how do you know that?”
“Aw, come on, Pol. It’s the only place where the door’s still open, and .. well .. experience, OK?”
Polly trailed along behind Seamus as he sauntered across the square, and into the gloom of the building. Stopping to let her eyes adjust to the darkness inside, she saw that Seamus was right again. How does he do it, she thought to herself.
The barman was nowhere to be seen as they pulled up two stools to the countertop. “Shop,” called Seamus, the echoes ringing round the empty room. “Hello?”
They heard a muffled crunch from outside, and turned as the daylight was blotted from the door. Silhouetted against the day was one of the largest women either of them had ever seen. Holding a gun. A very large gun. With two barrels. And pointing at them.
“Ah, hello.” Polly swallowed nervously. “We’re lost. Can we get directions here?”
“Who are you?” rasped a voice behind them.
Their heads snapped round. Standing behind the bar was another massive woman, holding a butcher’s cleaver in her meaty hands.
“We’re jou ..”
“We’re just travellers,” interrupted Seamus. “We took a wrong turn and ended up on the cliff at the end of the road, and stumbled across the track that leads here. We’re looking for somewhere to get some petrol ..”
Polly shot him a glance.
“… and to get a bite to eat, and to sleep for the night. I’m Sam and this is my fiancée, Pol.”
This time the glance was venomous, and boded ill for Seamus. Polly was not happy!
“There’s nothing here for you outlanders. You’d better get back in the van and get going. We don’t hold with strangers around here.” The woman behind the bar lifted the cleaver menacingly. Chills ran down Seamus and Polly’s backs.
“Now look here,” started Polly, nervously.
A deep laugh boomed out from the doorway. “Oh, come on, Ethel. Can’t you see these folks are lost? Where’s your charity, lass? Here, I’m Gladys. Settle yourselves, and I’ll have a drink with ye. Ethel here has rooms, don’t you Ethel?”
Ethel grimaced, but nodded and laid the cleaver under the counter.
“There, all sorted. Now, Ethel, a pint of your dark for me, and for our new friends?”
“He’ll have a bottle of gin, and I’ll have a small Pernod, please? Polly was still feeling snippy about the fiancée crack. Gladys’ laugh boomed out again.
“Likes his drink, does he? I like a man who likes his drink! But can he take it, eh?” she chortled.
Seamus smiled. “With a little bit of tonic, Mistress Gladys, if you please – I do need to keep up appearances!”
Ethel set to preparing the drinks, as Gladys settled into a chair at the end of the bar, propping the shot-gun against the counter.
“So, lost your way, did you? Why did you follow that track and not turn back for the town?”
Ethel stopped to hear the answer.
“Well,” replied Seamus. [i]“We’re just wandering around with no particular goal. It seemed like a good idea, at the time, but I must admit you put the fear of the Holy Wombat into me when you both appeared like that!”
“And me,” chimed in Polly.
Here’s yer drinks. Sorry about the fright. Don’t see much in the way of strangers round these parts. We didn’t know what to make of ye,” Ethel harrumped and started to wipe the counter-top.
Seamus swept up his mug of gin, and with a flourish, drained it at a gulp. “Ah, pure nectar, Mistress Ethel. Another, if you please. And, please, join us!”
*******************
Day turned to night, the men came back from the boats, and were joined by their wives and families. The bar turned out to be the social centre of the village, and everyone wanted to meet the strangers. Seamus noted a group of men, however, in a corner, muttering amongst themselves. His instincts aroused, he left Polly to the tender mercies of the ladies of the village who all wanted to know what the latest fashions were (which subject Polly abhorred), and siddled across the bar until he could hear what was going on.
“… I tell you, he was too good a skipper to go out towards the Dark. And now these strangers turn up. It’s not right, it isn’t, and … ”
“Hush, Nat. We know. But he should be long back by now. Did he mention anything to anyone about where he was headed this morning?”
Muttered negatives rose from all the men. One of them glanced up, and noticing Seamus’ approach hushed the others up. They all cast dark looks his way, and he retreated to Polly’s side.
**********************
”Shh not fair .. shee spikt my drinksh .. ” Seamus weaved groggily up the stairs, leaning heavily on Polly.
“Come on, you drunken git. Let’s get you to bed. We’ll carry on tomorrow.” Polly heaved him up the remainder of the stairs and across the landing to the door of his room. “Come on, now. There’s a good hack. Yes, that’s right. On the bed. No, I’m not joining you. Yes, I know you love me. No, you bastard!! I won’t!!” He slumped onto the bed as Polly, her ears burning red at what Seamus had just suggested, shut the door. One room, and the bastard had to get drunk and make lurid suggestions. She would give him hell tomorrow. Oh, the bastard would pay! Snores roared from the bed where Seamus had crashed, flat out, fully-dressed and fast asleep. Ah, well, she thought as she resignedly tugged a blanket and pillow from under him, and made up a bed on the sofa. At least it’s only one night!
The speaker swivelled to look at his companion.
“Odd,” she replied. “A little like they didn’t know or care what was out here .. ” Her voice tailed off.
“Whatever it is, I hope it’s bloody worth it,” he replied.
The narrow ribbon of tarmac that was the road stretching off into the distance was barely visible through the haze caused by the sun hammering down onto it. Seamus O’Hack (for it is he!) concentrated grimly on the mirage of the cold beer he could see floating just before the horizon. Beside him, his new photographer, Polly Filler, sat, crumpled, idly eyeing the passing heat-battered landscape as it passed.
She turned her head slowly to look at Seamus. ”So what did Pape say again?
Seamus grunted, and wiped a hand across his forehead. The air vents in their battered old VW camper van were not coping with the heat, and sweat was pouring from him.
“He told me that he’d heard something was out here. He didn’t know what, but he said that we were the best Wombat News team for this. What he didn’t say is that we’re the only bloody team anyway near here .. the cheap bastard.”
”So what do you think it is?”
Seamus took his time before answering. ”You know, Pape and I worked together for a long time. He’s got a good nose for a story .. almost as good as mine.” Seamus had no truck with false modesty. ”I don’t know. He didn’t know. All he could tell me was to get to that place back there, fill up, and then head down this road. He’s the boss!”
Polly snorted. ”Sounds like a wind-up to me.” She grinned. ”What do we know about the area?”
”Nothing. Less than nothing. That’s just it. This road must go somewhere, or why build it? But we know every country in the world. We reported from them, we’ve got contacts in them, people tell us things. But about this area – nothing. You saw the way the people reacted back there when we asked them what was out here?!”
They fell silent as they each reviewed their memories of the little town they had stopped in to fill up in. Seamus, as was his wont, had headed straight for the local bar, leaving Polly to fill up the van before joining him for a cool drink. You could have cut the atmosphere with a knife when she walked in.
” …. out there at all.” was all she’d caught of the barman’s words.
”So why the road? Seamus had asked, but the locals had already returned to their drinks, and the barman had studiously avoided them.
Seamus had swallowed his whisky, and they’d left.
Strands of night began to blacken the sky as the sun dipped below the western horizon. As darkness fell, Seamus turned the lights of the van on, and continued to drive, staring grimly out through the windscreen.
“What the hell was down this road?” he thought to himself, the question ringing through his mind. Polly slept on, curled in her seat, as the monotonous journey continued into the gloom of night.
******************
“Whoah!”
The surprised exclamation, coupled with the rocking as the van ground to a halt, jerked Polly from her slumbers. Night still lay pooled over the land, but thin tendrils of dawn were beginning to light the eastern sky, bringing the promise of another scorching dawn.
Rubbing sleep from her eyes, she peered through the windshield into … nothing. With a gasp, she yanked herself upright.
“What the .. “
“Relax, it’s a cliff – look, you can see the sea down there.” Seamus swung the door open and hopped to the ground, stretching himself as he did so.
Polly followed gingerly, keeping one hand on the van, which was perched at the very edge of a huge cliff.
“Impressive, isn’t it? The road suddenly stops … ” It did indeed. The road ran straight to the edge of the cliff and suddenly … vanished. “Good thing that the brakes worked!” Seamus laughed, the terror of suddenly seeing the road vanish into thin air gradually fading now he had solid earth beneath his feet.
Both of them peered over the edge. The cliff-face was near vertical, and dropped hundreds of feet into the sea, where breakers beat their monotonous rhythm against its feet. Seagulls wheeled below them, crying their raucous cries like lost souls on the wing.
“Hey, what’s that?” Polly shaded her eyes against the rising sun, trying to make out what she had glimpsed. A tiny speck rode on the waves, glittering dully in the light of the new dawn.
“A boat. It’s a boat. But it looks bloody small to be out here in the middle of nowhere!”
Seamus grunted, stepped back to the van, and rummaged through the contents of his duffle bag, eventually pulling out a pair of binoculars. Focussing them on the distant speck, he gazed out to sea.
“Yep. A boat. A small open-top boat, with some guys fishing. Which means there must a village around here somewhere!”
Fat chance, he thought to himself. There’s nothing but cliff. He swept the binoculars down the length of the cliff, and back again. Nothing.
“Here, you have a look.” He slung the binoculars at Polly, who snatched them out of the air, just as it looked like they were going to fall over the edge of the cliff. Polly flung a glare at Seamus, who grinned back unrepentantly. “See if you can see where that boat’s from. I’ll back-track a little and see if there’s a path or turning I missed.”
“OK, Sam. Twenty minutes, and then you’d better bloody come back for me.” Polly glared at Seamus, who shot her a grin and a wave of acknowledgement.
Dawn was fully broken by now, as Seamus swung back into his seat. With a laborious crunching of gears, and much cursing, he managed to make a sixteen point turn on the narrow road, and set off slowly back the way he came, leaving Polly alone on the edge of the cliff.
Looking around, she spotted a convenient boulder to rest her back against, and sat down against it. She brought the binoculars up to here eyes, and looked out at the boat.
Yeah, she thought to herself. Small fishing boat, no cover. Where do you go at night? Panning the binoculars along the cliffs, she could see nothing. She continued for a few minutes before putting them down beside her and letting her eyes close and her mind go blank. Leave it to Sam. He’ll figure it out.
*********************
She heard the van before she saw it. Seamus was beeping the little horn wildly as he came trundling across the last rise before the drop, and crunched to a halt.
“Got it, got it” he yelled exuberantly, as he leapt from the van. “There’s a little dirt track down the road a ways that leads off to the east – there must be something down there. I could make out tracks in the dirt. Hey, where’d the boat go?”
Polly looked around. “It’s right ther … hey, where’d it go?”
“What d’ya mean – weren’t you watching it?
“Well, yeah, but … ” Polly trailed off. “I kinda shut my eyes for a moment – I must have fallen asleep!”
“Shit, you are a daft cow! You were supposed to keep an eye on it to see which way it went! It would have lead us right to the village – even if we had to go cross-country. Polly looked sceptical at this – cross country in a VW camper van .. get real, Sam!
“OK, OK. Never mind. It probably just got sucked down by the big sea monsters out there!!” Seamus grinned. He could just imagine the old maps of the areas with pictures of mythical beasts and warnings of “Here Be Dragons” printed all over them. “Come on, Pol. Let’s go see where the track goes.”
*******************
Bumpy and narrow as it was, the dirt track that Seamus had found wasn’t too bad. There had been a hairy moment when it seemed to run off the cliff altogether as well, but it hadn’t, continuing to cling to the cliff-side as it went ever eastward, following the line of the cliffs.
As the sun climbed higher into the sky, and started once more to hammer down on the earth below, the temperature sky-rocketed, and Seamus and Polly’s nerves became more and more frayed until, wonder of wonders, the track passed into what had to be a man-made tunnel. Driving slowly into this, they continued to follow the track as it emerged into a channel cut in the side of the cliff-face, angling ever downwards. Seamus started to worry. There was no room to turn, and he wasn’t sure he could reverse up the track all the way.
“There – look!” The relief in Polly’s voice was audible. “Wow. Great location!!”
The village was nestled into a gash in the cliff that looked like the Holy Wombat had got a sword and smashed it into the earth. A little village, all whitewashed walls, and red tiled roofs, fringed with substantial trees and set in terraces running back into the gloom of the rent in the cliff, sitting above a short beach of white-gold sand. A number of small fishing boats were pulled up on the beach, and they could make out men mending nets at one end of the beach. They continued down the track as it curved away and down to the edge of the village.
“Thank the Holy Wombat,” breathed Seamus. He grinned at Polly. “Pol, what say we find the local taverna and get ourselves a good drink and a bite to eat?”
“Sounds good, Sam.”
They eased into the village, and the battered old van coughed and spluttered to a halt in what seemed to be the central square. The square was empty. Come to think of it,[i] thought Seamus, [i]the street - if you could call it that – was empty too. Faces appeared and vanished at windows, and they could hear doors slamming shut.
Heh, thought Seamus. And they don’t even know we’re journalists yet!
Seamus and Polly climbed out of the van, and stretched in the sun, looking warily around. Curtains twitched in windows, but not a soul was to be seen.
“Bloody hell,” muttered Polly. “What’s with these folks?”
Seamus nodded his head in the direction of a building. “That’s the local bar – let’s ask in there.”
“Shit, Sam, how do you know that?”
“Aw, come on, Pol. It’s the only place where the door’s still open, and .. well .. experience, OK?”
Polly trailed along behind Seamus as he sauntered across the square, and into the gloom of the building. Stopping to let her eyes adjust to the darkness inside, she saw that Seamus was right again. How does he do it, she thought to herself.
The barman was nowhere to be seen as they pulled up two stools to the countertop. “Shop,” called Seamus, the echoes ringing round the empty room. “Hello?”
They heard a muffled crunch from outside, and turned as the daylight was blotted from the door. Silhouetted against the day was one of the largest women either of them had ever seen. Holding a gun. A very large gun. With two barrels. And pointing at them.
“Ah, hello.” Polly swallowed nervously. “We’re lost. Can we get directions here?”
“Who are you?” rasped a voice behind them.
Their heads snapped round. Standing behind the bar was another massive woman, holding a butcher’s cleaver in her meaty hands.
“We’re jou ..”
“We’re just travellers,” interrupted Seamus. “We took a wrong turn and ended up on the cliff at the end of the road, and stumbled across the track that leads here. We’re looking for somewhere to get some petrol ..”
Polly shot him a glance.
“… and to get a bite to eat, and to sleep for the night. I’m Sam and this is my fiancée, Pol.”
This time the glance was venomous, and boded ill for Seamus. Polly was not happy!
“There’s nothing here for you outlanders. You’d better get back in the van and get going. We don’t hold with strangers around here.” The woman behind the bar lifted the cleaver menacingly. Chills ran down Seamus and Polly’s backs.
“Now look here,” started Polly, nervously.
A deep laugh boomed out from the doorway. “Oh, come on, Ethel. Can’t you see these folks are lost? Where’s your charity, lass? Here, I’m Gladys. Settle yourselves, and I’ll have a drink with ye. Ethel here has rooms, don’t you Ethel?”
Ethel grimaced, but nodded and laid the cleaver under the counter.
“There, all sorted. Now, Ethel, a pint of your dark for me, and for our new friends?”
“He’ll have a bottle of gin, and I’ll have a small Pernod, please? Polly was still feeling snippy about the fiancée crack. Gladys’ laugh boomed out again.
“Likes his drink, does he? I like a man who likes his drink! But can he take it, eh?” she chortled.
Seamus smiled. “With a little bit of tonic, Mistress Gladys, if you please – I do need to keep up appearances!”
Ethel set to preparing the drinks, as Gladys settled into a chair at the end of the bar, propping the shot-gun against the counter.
“So, lost your way, did you? Why did you follow that track and not turn back for the town?”
Ethel stopped to hear the answer.
“Well,” replied Seamus. [i]“We’re just wandering around with no particular goal. It seemed like a good idea, at the time, but I must admit you put the fear of the Holy Wombat into me when you both appeared like that!”
“And me,” chimed in Polly.
Here’s yer drinks. Sorry about the fright. Don’t see much in the way of strangers round these parts. We didn’t know what to make of ye,” Ethel harrumped and started to wipe the counter-top.
Seamus swept up his mug of gin, and with a flourish, drained it at a gulp. “Ah, pure nectar, Mistress Ethel. Another, if you please. And, please, join us!”
*******************
Day turned to night, the men came back from the boats, and were joined by their wives and families. The bar turned out to be the social centre of the village, and everyone wanted to meet the strangers. Seamus noted a group of men, however, in a corner, muttering amongst themselves. His instincts aroused, he left Polly to the tender mercies of the ladies of the village who all wanted to know what the latest fashions were (which subject Polly abhorred), and siddled across the bar until he could hear what was going on.
“… I tell you, he was too good a skipper to go out towards the Dark. And now these strangers turn up. It’s not right, it isn’t, and … ”
“Hush, Nat. We know. But he should be long back by now. Did he mention anything to anyone about where he was headed this morning?”
Muttered negatives rose from all the men. One of them glanced up, and noticing Seamus’ approach hushed the others up. They all cast dark looks his way, and he retreated to Polly’s side.
**********************
”Shh not fair .. shee spikt my drinksh .. ” Seamus weaved groggily up the stairs, leaning heavily on Polly.
“Come on, you drunken git. Let’s get you to bed. We’ll carry on tomorrow.” Polly heaved him up the remainder of the stairs and across the landing to the door of his room. “Come on, now. There’s a good hack. Yes, that’s right. On the bed. No, I’m not joining you. Yes, I know you love me. No, you bastard!! I won’t!!” He slumped onto the bed as Polly, her ears burning red at what Seamus had just suggested, shut the door. One room, and the bastard had to get drunk and make lurid suggestions. She would give him hell tomorrow. Oh, the bastard would pay! Snores roared from the bed where Seamus had crashed, flat out, fully-dressed and fast asleep. Ah, well, she thought as she resignedly tugged a blanket and pillow from under him, and made up a bed on the sofa. At least it’s only one night!