guest article two of two

GUEST ARTICLE TWO OF TWO
The Women of Nottoway




by D. Ritchey









Part 3.







I had nine miles to my next navigational aid, Lower Nottoway. I remained in a state of fear; I could feel the echoes of that LCS, its terrible growling and its gunboat escorts... Every time a fish flipped the surface, I jumped. I was having second thoughts about trying for the ocean.



I made excellent way. The wind and tide were with me, and my fear had me working at peak efficiency. I learned the dif-

ference in energy between recreational and survival canoeing. I adjusted. Several hours, and before dawn I came to the mouth of the Lower Nottoway. I pulled in to rest, breathing heavily. The sky brightened as my eyes followed the course of the Nottoway upstream, to where it narrowed, among heavily wooded banks. Farmers and fishermen had abandoned the area long ago; the land had gone back to wilderness. Those who had found another way to make a living kept their houses. The rest moved on, and they were the majority. Again, wilderness marked the destruction of the old ways, or the absence of them. I would learn that government control was exaggerated; too many incompetents populated the bureaucracies. Fear of a Bolshevik police state had been implanted in the meme grid by government propagandists. For a long time it was highly effective, but new technology broke it down with competing meme grids. And it had come to this... But I had to wonder what people might do with this wilderness who had stayed. I wondered what sort of personality could do the job. I wondered what they could make of it.





The day promised to be bright and clear, with mild temperatures. It was a pristine fall morning; it looked to be good sleeping weather, if I could stay warm. The colors were strong; the trees were an electric carpet on both shores as far as I could see. In the conditions of human desertion it was a shocking vista. But for the clearings, it looked primeval. It was hard to believe that a major city was dying fifteen miles away. I still did not know how wide the troubles were; later I would learn. I would have taken different actions had I known. But we have no choice except take the best path we can at the moment, with what we know... I clearly remember my sense that morning. The impression was one of a mystery stalking the world, an incomprehensible menace... I felt it when I left home and now again. This might be the end of the world I knew. What happened? The machine had become God, and the people forgot the world. Yes, that fit.



That was the influence of one religion. There were others, other gods, more fitting for the time--more useful for survival. I knew that the pious were dying alongside the heretics, so I might as well pick the gods I like. As the sun rose higher I grew drowsy, but I could not give up watching the river. I wondered if I dare lay in the sun. I considered the beach, the far shore. Here it was nearly two miles across. The water was gray, and where sunlight hit a wavetip, a bare green. The water danced. Stripped of human presence, it looked like the realm of serpents again, which I expected would be coursing for prey, and I thought that anything might come out of that river, out of the forest. I wished I hadn't pawned my dad's shotgun.







I did fall asleep, and gunfire woke me. As in any dream the sounds of the interior become exterior as the dreamer awakens. It took a few seconds, no more, and I was crouched and facing the sounds. It was small-arms fire with military weapons, and I smelled nitrates. I saw nothing; the woods were dense, and the combatants out of sight... I heard screams, then explosions--grenades, I thought. Then it went quiet. With the nitrate stinging my nostrils I ran for my canoe, and launched out.



It was a rabbit response to danger, without a moment of deliberation. Looking back on it I think I would have been fine staying put. Paddling away, around the spit of land, toward the interior reach of the Lower Nottoway, I thought only of making distance; my first need, cover and silence, were not on my mind so much...





Now the Lower Nottoway's broad mouth opened before me. I turned upstream; on my right was the south bank. I made my way along, hugging the bank, fearing ambush. These bluffs were twenty feet high, thick with bush, with fallen trees and mud slides. I was an easy target, so close I might be killed with a heavy rock. And from the south shore too, an observer might spot me easily. Yet, as I was remembering, the Lower Nottoway might have refuge far upstream, where I thought the woods might be extensive. The Lower Nottoway penetrated miles into the interior, away from the dense suburbs which had spread from the original core settlement, New Danzig. Barely a port any more, New Danzig was renamed Indaba City by Presidential decree. And that changed the patterns of development. So now, by using the water routes, I flanked the outer suburbs and penetrated the rural. I didn't know what I might run into out there.



Now the waterways were the channels for mobility. And here was the rest of the puzzle; I saw few people out here because the majority did not know the river was here. The waterways were not in the consciousness of the majority.



I had explored the Lower Nottoway only once before, years ago. What I was seeing now did not fit my memories. Now I was seeing only a few features that I recalled. On the north bank would be ruins. One was the first monastery on the coast, nearly five hundred years old now. It was called "The Sancti"--only that. Surely it had a nomen, but it was forgotten. And farther up was another ruin, of a manor from the earliest days of the tobacco colony. That fell in, too, when too many changes came.



I was watching the southern shore closely. And I didn't forget that eyes were in the sky, too ... A skilled surveilleur on the shore would be invisible to me. As far as aerial surveillance, my main comfort was that the operations centers were disarrayed, and crippled by incompetence, and I wouldn't be noticed. So I concluded that my greatest threat came from the land, and anyone was the enemy. I belonged to no one. I was on my own. There was nothing for me in the old world any more. I wished I had a shortwave or CB radio, so that I could learn what the hell was going on. But it was time to head for it. I made for the south shore.



I grew so nervous in the open that I turned around to head back. I went a few yards and stopped when I saw something bobbing a few yards ahead. It was long and dark-colored; the swells were tossing it around. Very carefully I stalked up. It was a corpse, a white man. He was face up and his eyes were open and his mouth was open, and a part of his skull had been shot away. His clothes were black in the water and his hair was light; they were waving back and forth, back and forth. I saw two bullet holes in his chest. For an instant I thought about towing him in to bury him. That was impossible now. Impossible. And then I got scared again, real scared, there in the open. Terror flooded me. I turned again and headed for the south side. I paddled for my life.





When I pulled in I fell into the deep bush. I hauled the canoe in and covered it. I rested and drank my last few ounces of water. Where could I get more? I was combing my memory of the upper creek. There was a house, on the south shore, not far up from here. Maybe a half mile. I would try it tonight. I would go find what I needed. I was soaked with sweat. After a while I turned on my radio. The batteries were weak, the audio was bad, even right at my ear. I might not get another hour from them. I heard that Indaba City was under "limited engagement" by marine and naval forces. That meant the military was killing people. It didn't bother me; the world was falling apart because of overpopulation and downward breeding, and that was the heart of the matter. So here was the result of a century of anti-eugenics policy by the government, and egalitarian laws... I let the radio play, let it fade out, as I watched all around. The sun arced toward the west. I thought about saving the battery, thought I might find a way to recharge it. I sat there, in the chilling wind of evening, weighing the battery in my hand. I threw it away, and I threw the radio away.



I slept until it was dark enough, and started off. Was I escaping, or heading towards destruction? Why was I paddling up this creek, which ended way inland? Why did I not continue to the sea? I'm still not sure; but my reasoning then is valid now, with the power of hindsight. The bigger the river went, the more I would be exposed. Bigger water hosts more traffic. Eventually I would encounter heavy naval patrols. Why not stay up here in the smaller water, where the woods were heavy? And why not hole up in the region I knew? This reasoning was sound, and I knew it beneath all the chatter and fear. I knew that the thing to do is hide. And Nottoway had it all. Nottoway was remote from the thinking of the urbanites of Indaba City, and maybe from the military commanders. They would be looking at the cities, and at the patterns of refugees and marauders. If the refugees never made it this far, this place would come under light surveillance, or maybe none. I considered the incompetent people working for the government--a majority maybe. I figured I was better off here. I might learn to snare animals. I could learn to hunt and gather wild plants until something better came along. I could catch fish easy enough, although they surely contained heavy metals, especially the bottom feeders. But the young fish might be untainted. I thought I could make it here. It felt right. As I started away again this feeling became sure. I would stay here, in this wilderness. Maybe I would run into a band of my kind. Maybe they'd allow me to join them. And if they turned out to be hostile, I would move on. There were miles of purgatory between here and the sea.



I had to do was stay to the southern shore, where the channel was. And why should I be concerned in a canoe? I needed eight inches of water to make my way--less if I shucked some gear. I brought my prow around; I remembered that old house, and it was down this way. It was a living house, but very old. It was of brick and possessed massive chimneys, two on each end, in the early colonial design.





And in that brief video from my memory were several figures floating across the lawn. Close enough, I made them out to be women. And everything else, every component, fit oddly with the others.... The place felt insular--and nothing was insular anymore. That had been my impression years ago, and now this was my recollection. I did not know where I got it; but now it helped. But how many years ago was that? I wasn't sure, as I paddled along; I could not say anything; I was alone at the time. My wife had gone off on her mission, and I was alone. So that was but a few years ago. And why hadn't I recalled being here in more detail if it was so short ago? I didn't know... I was tired of paddling; I tried to bring my effort out of my stomach to ease up my arms. That helped, that worked, so long as I did it consciously. But I failed to sustain it; my mind kept pulling off into the fantasying memory, and again and again this four second video from my mind's eye. Oddity, that's what I remembered. The long dresses on the women; the shabby appearance of everything--not unclean, but shabby. Controlled decomposition--I might say elegant decomposition.



If my memory was accurate, their place would be about a thousand feet ahead, just downstream of the sand islands and flats. I closed to one hundred feet of the shore and paralleled it slowly. I held my following stroke for five seconds or so, listening. This made my progress a crawl, something like a bottle on the tide. I didn't imagine how much darkness remained, or who might be observing me. I had forgotten all that for the moment. The house was on my mind, and silence was on my mind, and staying alive, and that was all. I cleanly remember that was my mental state. I was extremely vulnerable, being tunnel-minded. But it came on me and I didn't know it, and there was nothing I could do. To the house, then. And what? Say hello? Steal their chickens? I didn't know.



I must be on it now. I stopped, and drifted, listening. I saw no lights. There was a vehicle parked to the side, near the clotheslines. The house was leaning, and stately. Enormous locust trees flanked it. A little farther out, the forest hemmed in. Its outlines looked woolly, soft, despite the chill and the dropping leaves--and very dark, nearly a black of the sort you see only in deep places at night. I realized this was a grave convergence.





A dog started barking. I didn't know whether to flee or... Or what? So I sat there, listening in place. The waves lapped the hull of my canoe, and washed the shore. I saw water-trees rocking in the surf, waving. The house, the ancient hulk, a hundred yards away. In colonial days the shoreline was farther out. Four hundred fifty years had taken half away, carried it to the sea. I paused, scanning the estate. Shadows and outbuildings--and where is the dog? I listened, scanned, but the night was a nightmare, and better to let it come to you if Fate wills you meet. I didn't see the dog. I pulled in to shore.









I could see enough, just enough, to avoid the big noise. I hauled the canoe up and went down on a knee. I sat there, listening. I thought about taking off my shoes so I could feel vibrations in the earth. I decided not. I crept into the bush and waited again. And I was calm. I sat cross-legged and felt comfortable. I watched and listened. The dog barked furiously a few more times, and went quiet. Then the deepest silence I had ever heard descended. It was more than my ears could apprehend; I felt it by other means, the way a hunted animal feels a shift. Something, I can't call it anything else, something pulled out. I mean pulled out of the world. Something withdrew from the structure of the world I had known. A thinness closed in over everything. The stars looked different. That's what I call it now--a thinness. The world was less dense. It might have been this: I was apprehending the reduction of chatter. If you look at the human species as an entity, here is a theory: every human is no more than a cell among billions of others; each is interconnected. But now, with fewer cells, less radiation. So I could apply this theory to my sensation of moments before, where I felt something leave the world. The entity was shedding cells. The entity does not make mistakes. I knew it then and today I know it is the supreme law.



There were outbuildings. I chose the one farthest from the house, a small barn it looked to be. "Hide the paddle," I told myself. I could see my feet. I moved carefully through dying high grass and weeds towards the treeline, and lucky it was damp. I made little noise. Every few feet down on one knee, soldier ears. Like in the books. Then I'd move on. The old house never breathed. Nothing moved, or called, or swooped or scampered. I saw the stars and I couldn't name one. And so I didn't know where the moon was nor what it would be if it arrived. I was a dethroned man, remoted from my instincts by technology. And there was no way out of that--except something like this. But I had gained enough knowledge by way of being a miscast; thus I had brought myself this far. And this was farther than ninety percent of the human population would ever go, until the next cycle.





I used the paddle to part branches. I had lost my club. I made it to the woodline and stepped into its shadows. I was familiar with this sort of woods. I made my way, and quietly enough. The damp was on my side. But I came along, pausing and listening, watching the house, tense for the vibration of discovery. When I came to the barn I had to cross a small clearing, back of it, to reach it. Down on one knee in the woodline, and I watched. The barn had the old swinging doors, and they were barely in square. I did not discern a lock. How convenient. I stayed put, refusing the bait. I waited and watched, losing heat and finally suffering chill again. The night was thin; nothing had arrived to replace what had gone away. I felt this horrible thinness; the only myth that connected is the concept of purgatory, a place of probation. That was before I became a Pagan. Now I know what it was: indifference.



I wanted to move. I had to move, but I still didn't trust the scene. Shivering now, I weighed the value of my idea of showing myself. I watched the house. I obserrved the sky, and what I could see of Nottoway Creek. I listened. The chill spread into my knees and my feet and up my spine. I waited. My heart was beating.



I hid the paddle in a tree and I came out of the woods. I crossed directly to the doors. A nail was bent through the hasp holding the doors shut. I couldn't budge it. I took out my sheath knife and went to work on it. I had little light. I cut myself lightly. I used a thin branch to bend the nail out. Finally I got the thing off. I made a racket; I expected an arrow or bullet any time. But I had no good alternative for a shelter, no moonlight to see my way through the forest. I might build a debris hut, like I saw on survival TV. But I couldn't see. Slowly, slowly I opened the door. It was dark, very dark. I pulled the door behind me. I saw rafters and partitions--a horse barn. I smelled no dung, and just a hint of hay. I saw no tack, no tools, no grooming station. The place was stripped. Down on one knee by the wall and listening. I heard nothing. My eyes adjusted and I saw the place was clear. It was a three horse barn, what you would expect on a declining plantation. This looked to be about one hundred fifty years old. I saw several hay bales at one end. I stepped into the stalls; in each the hay was decomposed to near dust. The bales were heavy with wet. I pulled one down into a stall and cut the wire and found the hay still dry in the centers. Making little enough noise, and with one ear cocked towards the outside, I cut all the bales loose and made myself a nest.





I burrowed in and soon enough my cocoon was warm. I could see out between the boards. I was looking directly at the old house. I knew a bit about architecture; this style went out about the year 1700; I was looking at four hundred years of endurance. What had the owners been about? To keep such a place through the upheavals would have required skill, and shrewd detachment from political trash. So who were they? I continued watching, listening. The house and the environment were dead still. It was horrible to a man close to death. There was no animation, no vibration, no breathing. And where was that dog? The trees were living, but shadows and no more to me. The scene was like a psychotic painting, a Van Gogh. It was more powerful than any photo or computer image. It was an entity, dormant, gestating. So my thoughts ran until sleep took me under.







A voice woke me. It was morning and I heard a voice as I saw more light, as I opened my eyes. The barn door was open and a woman was standing in the square of light. The light hurt my eyes. It was dead-on east, and the rising sun was burning my eyes. The woman was a dark figure in a long dress; the sun was blazing behind her. Her hair was long, and she was holding her hands in front of her. A dog was at her side, watching me.



"Who are you?" she said.









TO BE CONTINUED.