“They’re trying to make shore.”
“Yep.” The couple had lost control of the canoe, so it was a toss-up whether they would land on Ace’s and Clara’s side of the river. Though the current was swift, Ace was willing to ford the river if necessary. After all, God had sent along the canoe, and who was Ace to insult God by not taking advantage of opportunity?
Their features were difficult to discern due to the distance and the soft morning haze that hung over the water. The couple wore goggles that masked their faces and combined with their slick helmets to give them the appearance of insects. The canoe hit a swell and dipped, tossing a thin geyser off the bow. The paddler in front pitched forward and the craft spun out of control, bouncing off a protruding boulder. The person in the rear dug a paddle against the rock and pushed off, propelling the canoe into a shallow, milder eddy. The one in front jumped overboard into knee-deep water and led the canoe toward shore.
Toward Ace. Sometimes, God made things easy.
“Get your stuff,” he said to Clara. “We got a boat to catch.”
By the time the two people had wrestled the canoe onto dry land, Ace had nearly reached them. He hid behind the bleached bones of a fallen tree and tucked the gun in the back pocket of his camouflage pants, not wanting to scare the couple. They knelt, gasping and heaving, trying to catch their breaths, exhausted from their fight against the current. One of them peeled off goggles and shook her head, freeing damp and curly locks of brown hair.
“Jesus, Pete,” she said. “Didn’t you see the fucking rock?”
“I was port and you were starboard, remember?” said Pete. “You have to stroke on the opposite side of the direction you want to go.”
New Joy-zee. Probably Jews to boot. Ace hated Yankees on general principles, not just because he’d been born in a slave state. He hated Jews because he was supposed to, though he never understood that part about Jesus being a Jew. How could you hate Jews but worship Jesus?
As Ace watched from his hidden vantage point, Pete unsnapped the chin strap that held his helmet in place. The helmet fell away, revealing a balding head. Pete appeared to be about forty, pink-faced, with a longshoreman’s belly and a stock broker’s upper arms. His companion, probably a wife or girlfriend, was having none of his explanations, though Pete made perfect sense to Ace. The bitch slammed her paddle against the wet rocks.
“Getting in touch with nature, my ass,” she said. “Why couldn’t we have done Atlantic City like I wanted? Fresh seafood, slot machines, gin and tonics, you could have gone fishing on the dock if you wanted to get wet.”
“Please, Jenny,” Pete said. “We’re doing fine. Let’s just rest a minute.”
The bitch called Jenny sat on a rock, removing her orange padded vest. She had nice tits. Used them to get her way more often than not, most likely. It’s a wonder Pete had talked her out of Atlantic City. “What now, Cap’n Ahab?” she said.
“We’re only a mile from the falls. We can eat lunch there.”
“We just started,” Jenny-bitch whined. “We’ll never get back to the car at this rate.”
Ace felt sorry for poor old Pete. He hoped Jenny was good in the sack, at least. She had to have something going for her, besides the tits or else why would Pete put up with her? Except, for some guys, tits was reason enough.
Ace would have probably backhanded the bitch by now. He glanced back at Clara, who was still busy gathering the clothes she’d put out on the rock to dry.
“Mother Mary on a crutch,” Pete said. “Canoe’s dented. They’ll probably keep my deposit.”
“Two hundred bucks. I could have stretched that into three days at the slots.”
“There’s life outside New Jersey, you know.”
Give her hell, Ace cheered silently. Let her know who’s boss. Woman was made slave to man. No shame in it. That’s just the way God set it up.
“Like, this is life?” Jenny’s voice grew shrill, tits shaking in her excitement. “This is life? This is a backache and wet clothes and mosquitoes and we could have gotten killed out there while you played Ranger Rick with a three-inch dick.”
She was pouring it on, and Pete didn’t have the balls to rise to the occasion. Pussy-whipped or worse. She probably had the biggest dick in this couple. Old Pete probably bent over for her.
Pete looked at the canoe, which sported a bushel-sized dent near the bow. “You’re right, honeybunch. What do you want to do? Break for lunch? You can have a dry pair of socks if you want.”
Ace’s blood pressure jumped. First, he’d felt bad for Pete, hooking up with such a bitch. But now he felt anger, because Pete was letting her walk all over him. Enough was fucking enough. He needed a boat, but even worse, he needed to show these people what was what.
Ace stepped over the fallen tree. “Howdy, folks,” he said, trying to be polite, though his voice quivered just a little. Yankees expected Southerners to be polite.
“Hey,” Pete said, instantly wary. Jenny drew up, folding her arms across her chest.
“Looks like you had a little trouble.”
“Yeah.” Pete gave a weak attempt at a laugh. “Water’s up this morning.”
Ace nodded. “Running hard, all right. Not usually so wild this time of year.”
“We’re not from around here, you know.”
“Never would have figured it.”
Jenny-bitch was letting Pete do all the talking now, for probably the first time ever. Pete’s eyes shifted from side to side. “Are you canoeing it? Or kayaking?”
“I flew in from heaven on the red-eye.”
“Listen, are you going to mug us? This isn’t Central Park, and… ”
Pete glanced at the backpacks strapped in the canoe, no doubt wondering if they contained any valuables that weren’t insured against theft. Ace smiled, letting his dark, chipped teeth make the answer.
“We don’t have any money,” Jenny said, the bitchiness gone from her tone, now just another scared cunt as she edged over to hide behind Pete. “Honest. We’re on vacation.”
Remember that, Petey, next time you’re giving it to her hard and dry and hurting. Remember she deserves it.
“I don’t want no money,” Ace said. He was many things, but he was only a liar when necessary, and right now it wasn’t necessary. “What good is money out here in the sticks?”
“Jesus,” said Jenny under her breath before shifting into what could only be a high-pitched mockery of Pete. “‘Appalachian Mountains,’ he says. ‘Get in touch with nature.’ Nature, my fanny. Like this is some dreamland. Like you don’t touch anything but yourself these days.”
Pete defensively raised the paddle and aimed it toward Ace, playing hero, keyboard-honed muscles already straining. “We’re registered with the Park Service. They have my driver’s license.”
Ace looked around, made a big show of a shrug. “Who needs a driver’s license out here? And I don’t see no Park Service.”
“Look, we don’t want any trouble.”
“Don’t matter what you want,” Ace said, enjoying this a little more than he thought he would. “Trouble found you anyway.”
Clara came out of the thick hedge of underbrush that skirted the branch-cluttered shore. “Ace, what are you doing?”
“These nice folks here said we could borrow their boat,” he said. “Once I explained to them about your sick aunt, o’ course, and how we had to get there before the hospital turned off the machines.”
“I don’t have a sick aunt,” Clara said.
Ace made another big shrug. He sure knew how to pick them. Well, between her and Jenny and a dozen other women, put them all together and maybe you’d get enough brains to do a three-piece jigsaw puzzle.
Fuck it. Time’s a-wasting.
He pulled out the Colt revolver.
“Mother Mary,” Pete said, no longer pink-faced.
“I knew it,” Jenny wailed. “He’s going to rape me.”
“I don’t do nothing to a woman against her will,” Ace said. “Just ask my sweetheart.”
“He won’t hurt you unless he has to,” Clara concurred.