Those Across the River by Christopher Buehlman Read Free Book Online

care. You take more’n one a anything off a plate again an I’ll . . .”
    I turned away so my worst ear was towards them, cutting off the rest. When I turned, I found that a man had come up quite close to me.
    “Looks like one little brave’s getting summoned off to powwow,” the man said, adding, “Have a drink, Mr. Nichols.”
    I recognized him; someone had pointed him out to me as the town’s taxidermist.
    He held out a glass of what looked like watered-down lemonade, and I took it. When it got near my face, however, the smell of grain alcohol rushed at me like something that had been too long in a cage. I drank gratefully, taking a good look now at the short, tough-looking man in front of me.
    “My name’s Cranmer, Martin Cranmer, taxidermist, but you already know that. I saw some of the old chickens pointing and whispering. Doubtless you’ve also learned about my cannibalism and ties to the communist party.”
    Young John Brown, I thought suddenly, struck less by the man’s hooked nose than by the drilling grey eyes that hinted at some denomination of madness. A lush but forbidding dark beard mostly hid Cranmer’s mouth and stood out in contrast to his suit, which was cream-colored, short at the wrists and crotch, and so ill-fitting generally that it might have been sent mail-order two sizes small and not returned out of indifference. It also looked innocent of professional attempts to clean it; stains on the sleeves were subtle but numerous, some of them likely dating back to Hoover.
    “Thanks for the drink,” I said, wiping my mouth with the heel of my hand. “Brother, you don’t know how long it’s been. Alright, only about ten days, but it feels like ten months.”
    “I have a still. It’s a big secret I like to tell everybody.” Cranmer didn’t have the drawl everybody else in town had. He actually said I like , not Ah lahk . What was that accent? Midwestern?
    “Did you get some squirrel?” Martin asked, indicating a plate with several small, roasted carcasses on them.
    “Not yet.”
    “Well, it might not look like much, but I peppered the little sons of bitches into a stupor, and it’s a damn sight fresher than what the butcher brought. It would kill him to give away something he could sell. I think he’s part Jew. Nothing against the Jews, except they like their money and they killed Jesus, but if they hadn’t we wouldn’t have anything to sing about on Sundays.”
    I laughed.
    Martin continued.
    “I wanted to say hello earlier but you and the young lady were having a fine old time dancing. I was sure the fiddle player would wear out before you two did. Of course, Sully only has one testicle, and it’s natural to assume a fellow in that condition would have diminished stamina, although that’s not necessarily true. Sully’s still burning up that fiddle. They say he cut one off to stay out of the war. He should have done what I did and hid in the woods. Anyway, that’s immaterial. All I meant to say is, it’s good to see people really enjoy each other.”
    “Have you met my wife?” I said.
    Did Cranmer raise his left eyebrow just a little?
    “Later,” he said. “It looks like she’s occupied.”
    Eudora was standing with Ursie and her parents, moving her hands as she spoke. She sensed my gaze and smiled brightly at me without interrupting her speech.
    “Quite a bond between you two,” Martin said. “Shines, it really does. I like that.”
    “Are you a married man?”
    “What do you think?”
    “I think a wife wouldn’t let you keep that beard.”
    “Good! An honest man. Me, too. Honesty’s why I like hookers. Have to ride a fuck-all long way on my bicycle for that, though.”
    “I haven’t done that since the war,” I said.
    “What, ride a bicycle?”
    “That either.”
    Martin chuckled, then took a tin of cigarettes out of his coat pocket, lighting two of them and passing one to me as if it were sacred. He had rolled them himself, and the tobacco was so strong