 |
| From London Victoria take the train to East Grinstead or from London Charing Cross take the train to Tunbridge Wells. From either town you take a taxi or ride the 291 bus to Hartfield Village, the High Street stop. At the south end of the High Street you will find Pooh Corner, where you can buy a simple map that will show you how to walk to Poohsticks Bridge. (Bring your own sticks because all the neighborhood ones have already been floated away to the Thames.) |
2. TWO OF THE FIERCER ANIMALS
I am not frightened of Fierce Animals in the ordinary way, but it is well known that if One of the Fiercer Animals is Deprived of Its Young, it becomes as fierce as Two of the Fiercer Animals.
"Tiddle a liddle, tidaliddle," the Eldest Immortal crooned to Broden as they scrambled over the checkerboard tiling of Joe's floor.
The Highlander, Prince of the Universe, Immortal Stepson of Glenfinnan's Bonny Shores, and five-to-two in the Watcher betting pool on who would remain standing when the Prize was decided, threw back his third shot and pretended he did not see either his paramour's lack of decorum or the strange little child with the ruined face.
Having spent the appropriate time in silence, Dawson nudged gently as he poured another shot out of the special two-to-one watered down bottle. "You seem tired, Buddy," he suggested.
With no gentleness at all, MacLeod ripped the leather thong out of his hair and shook his head, cascading his mane over his shoulders. He stuffed the leather in his right pocket and made a half-hearted attempt at combing the wild curls with his thick fingers.
The luxuriant waves, grown back to shoulder-length, made him look more like himself, but the usual kindness of his features was missing somehow. Joe thought it must be the subtle shadow of a constant wince at the corners of the soft brown eyes, or maybe the tight bands that ran from the razor-sharp jawline all the way up to the high cheeks. That, or the continual struggle to remain patient, everywhere apparent, from his purposefully lowered shoulders to the pause before the few words he said.
Or maybe it was only the fact that this was shot number four down the hatch at all due speed, or the way it was returned across the bar like an unspoken accusation.
Grandma Dawson's favorite child had spent his life observing and understanding, but he just didn't have enough to go on, so he finally came out and asked, "What's going on, Buddy?"
MacLeod's stern attention shifted from the shot glass to the lanky lump of limbs and laughter rolling over the floor in a happy imitation of mortal combat. The dusty checkerboard of the bar's flooring gave the two, the Immortal and the very odd child, a fairytale quality. They seemed to be playing an insane game of chess with only the pair left on the board and all the rules thrown to the winds.
"Adam didn't--," Dawson paused and refilled the shot glass, thinking Mac might need it for the answer. "He wasn't shot in the head again?"
The Highlander's face turned back toward the Tender. There was a wicked sparkle in his eyes and a twist at the edges of the full lips. "Nooooooooo," Duncan dragged the answer out in a friendly, tuneful fashion. "But if you still have that handgun in the cash drawer, I can fix that now."
"So how did the expotition fare?" Siel, all but invisible in her black turtleneck and slacks and own ebon skin, seemed to appear suddenly on the barstool beside the Scot.
An enormous shuddering tremor ran through Duncan's shoulders and all the way up his neck to his scalp, closing his eyes on the way. "Please," he said, in tones that began and ended somewhere deep in his throat.
"I told them you weren't dead," Siel waited while Dawson recovered from his fit over the handgun joke.
"That was clever," the Highlander set his broad left shoulder, leatherclad and more than substantial, between himself and the African Princess. He pushed back the shot glass, this time still full, and nodded when Dawson lifted the coffee pot.
"My English is not--clever, Duncan MacLeod?"
"Of course, Siel. One of you was bound to be right," he shrugged. "Both of you, in time," he added glumly.
Joe set the mugs before them and the honey for Siel, and the Bailey's for his own. "It's okay, Pooh. I'm not complaining. That's just how these things go," he said at the lowest register of his rich voice.
"Oh, fuck you both!"
"Well, I'm sure Siel would be glad to oblige, but I believe between the two of us you're the one who's gay," Joe didn't actually make sense, but this was fully compensated by the passion of his delivery.
"I'm--," Duncan roared.
"NOT GAY!" Siel and Joe finished, in unison, the understanding (read denial) that the bray Scot maintained about his relationship with the Eldest Immortal.
Duncan's forehead hit the bar to the accompaniment of the Sigh of All Sighs.
"And we have a winner!" Joe and Sibusile slapped palms over the bar.
Mortals one, Highlander zip.
Siel's hand floated over Duncan's shoulder and settled in like the talons of a hunting hawk. "You can't spend our love like this, throwing it in our faces as if we were fools."
Duncan melted. "You are right, Siel."
"Love never runs smoothly," Dawson commented. "If you and Adam have had a bump or two--."
The Scot raised up slowly and glared at Joe, "Bumps? Bumps!"
Sibusile rose, her hand never leaving Duncan's shoulder and she moved behind him in a dark, sinuous glide, placing her other hand on his other shoulder. The Scot cringed slightly, but Siel's fingers slipped forward along his lapels and she tugged at his coat. "Do not shout. Broden will think you mean her harm. She needs no more fear in her life. She will be out of it soon enough.
"At least pretend you mean to stay with us, Lord," she waited for him to stand and move his arms back so she could take his coat off.
And disarm him, Joe thought gratefully. "Nice sweater," he managed in a benign tone. The Highlander was decked in a beautiful new erin sweater all creamy cables in soft wool. The pattern meant something, but it had been too long since Mac and Joe had done the "sweater-speak" seminar.
"Wait," Duncan reached for something in his left pocket and Dawson resisted the urge to duck.
"Here," Mac threw a bundle of papers on the bar, "that's the whole story."
"And, here," Ethel Grimes had been waiting at the office door in her stocking feet for just this entrance. She padded over and slapped the Watchers' map against MacLeod's broad chest. "That's the rest of the story. Have a nice read."
Adam and Broden stared at the "adults" and then at each other. Both shrugged. Then they had a simultaneous notion which took them to the far wall beyond the bandstand.
While the "old folks" gathered at different tables, reading and thinking in the dim, blue light from below and the soft orange glow from the second story walkway, Adam and Broden turned their attentions to green-breaking the ferocious beaste of a pipe.
The rusty old copper conveyance of water and slush sported a heart girth of two feet, and stood four feet above the floor. Here and there it sported new welds from the recent repair...
Which even the power of the shiny suits had not been able to prevent.
The snow began to fall again outside and the sun had set over Seacouver Bay, by the time that Joe's Bar--turned reading room--began to stir again. The Highlander stood up with the Watcher Map and surveyed the scene like a father standing at the study door, watching the children finish up their homework. Over by the pipe, the odd little girl lay, curled up in Adam's lap, his long fingers curved elegantly over her spare shoulders. She slept as if nothing could harm her, there in her adopted brother's arms. Adam himself was also deeply and calmly asleep--not a posture he was used to adopting much these days. The silly bangs he'd affected, the Norwegian ski sweater, the tight, faded jeans...
I hope this project of yours is over soon, Old Man, Duncan thought. I am tired of being your father.
The Highlander pulled his long coat from the chair back where Siel had hung it and glided soundlessly over to the sleeping pair to tuck them in. It was only then that he noticed the cute sweater she wore, rainbow colors and brand spanking new by the look of it as were her too-blue jeans. Probably gifts from Godmother Grimes. The good doctor had filled Mac in on Broden's sad story. He was still wondering what would happen should he have to meet her directly, which he had not done as yet. Broden had been too busy rough-housing with Adam the Lesser.
The rest of the "clan" was gathered around a table--actually they had pulled two tables together--with his wad of papers organized into six stacks. Ethel had taken charge of the Real. She'd traded her formal dark suit for one of Joe's soft flannel shirts and a cardigan that went down to her knees. Siel had dominion over the Fantasy, a bright afghan draped so artfully over her all black outfit that it seemed an ancient cape or holy robe.
And Good Old Joe was putting it all together, or trying to play--what did Granny call that white grissle in the middle of your brain that tied them together?--Ah, yes, Watcher Corpus Collosum...
...Magnus, Duncan added. Dawson was dressed in his Joe's Clothes: soft, long-sleeved tops (sweaters, shirts, it didn't matter) and loose slacks or jeans, two sizes too big, so the harness wouldn't be so obvious, and that thick leather belt that probably used to be another color, but was so old now that even the belt didn't remember.
For all his studied dowdiness, Joe always looked liked he belonged where he was--anywhere he was. No one would mistake him for a stranger, and many strangers had mistakenly taken him for family.
In this case, however, Duncan mused, It is no mistake. "Joe?"
Dawson looked up, surprised to see the Highlander had moved from his place in the far booth. "Yes?"
MacLeod put the Watcher's map down on the table in front of the Watcher. "Here," he reached his hand out to Joe.
Dawson stared at him, trying to gauge his mood, and then put his hand into the Scot's.
Very gently, Duncan folded all Joe's fingers inside his own hand, leaving only the index finger sticking out. He moved Joe's finger over the map, tracing the route from Central Park to the Donnel Library, to Washington Square, to the Twin Towers.
Then he let go Dawson's hand and moved his own up to cradle the side of the Watcher's face. The Highlander's mouth began to frame another apology, but the lips crushed together in a sad smile and the dark eyes filled. Duncan shook his head back and forth, but his gaze never shied from the Watcher's face.
"It's okay, Buddy," Dawson could say this now, because it finally was okay. "I know you must have had your reasons."
"Not my reasons, Joe. Not mine. So sorry, so, so..."
Joe took Duncan's hand in his own. "Figured as much," he glanced at the paper piles on the table, "This is so not your kind of itinerary.
"How close did you get?" Joe asked.
"Give my regards," Duncan shrugged. "As far as I made it before the second tower went."
"You were in the second tower when the first tower fell?" Ethel asked incredulously.
"No, Doctor, I was at Washington Square Park. It was a long run and it was against the current all the way," Duncan pulled up a chair, in preparation for explaining what had gone on in the missing year, what the papers meant. "Probably couldn't have done anything, but I had to try, and there was enough to do after the second tower fell. It was a lot like the field after battle."
"My regards," Siel murmurred. "Oh, yes, you were at Broadway. But, Duncan that runs just to the east of the World Trade. Oh." The Princess came around to Duncan's side of the table and folded effortlessly into his lap. "When the first tower fell, you ran towards the towers."
Duncan stared at her as if she were speaking Swahili, her native tongue. "What else would I have done?"
"Frigging BoyScout," Adam mumbled in his sleep.
Wherever I am, there's always Pooh,
There's always Pooh and Me.
Whatever I do, he wants to do,
"Where are you going today?" says Pooh:
"Well, that's very odd 'cos I was too.
Let's go together," says Pooh, says he.
"Let's go together," says Pooh."What's twice eleven?" I said to Pooh.
("Twice what?" said Pooh to Me.)
"I think it ought to be twenty-two."
"Just what I think myself," said Pooh.
"It wasn't an easy sum to do,
But that's what it is," said Pooh, said he.
"That's what it is," said Pooh.
"Let's look for dragons," I said to Pooh.
"Yes, let's," said Pooh to Me.
We crossed the river and found a few-
"Yes, those are dragons all right," said Pooh.
"As soon as I saw their beaks I knew.
That's what they are," said Pooh, said he.
"That's what they are," said Pooh."Let's frighten the dragons," I said to Pooh.
"That's right," said Pooh to Me.
"I'm not afraid," I said to Pooh,
And I held his paw and I shouted "Shoo!
Silly old dragons!"- and off they flew.
"I wasn't afraid," said Pooh, said he,
"I'm never afraid with you."So wherever I am, there's always Pooh,
There's always Pooh and Me.
"What would I do?" I said to Pooh,
"If it wasn't for you," and Pooh said: "True,
It isn't much fun for One, but Two,
Can stick together, says Pooh, says he.
"That's how it is," says Pooh.Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod, fearless in battle, a little-less-so in love, proceeded to read from Siel's copy of When We Were Very Young. "This is what started this whole--" Duncan paused, the word curdled on his tongue, "Expotition."
"After Adam's last transfusion for the arsenic poisoning," MacLeod began, sorting through the papers and pulling out the oldest airline ticket stub. "We disembarked--."
"Ran away like thieves in the night," Ethel corrected.
"Blew the popsicle stand," Joe added.
"Split like a cheap suit," Siel enjoined in a nearly serious tone.
"Departed," Duncan finished the round. "We hiked through the woods to the northern shore, stole a boat and made our way--." The Scot ignored their corporate disbelief that he would do such a thing. "We made our way to a port north of San Francisco and took a plane to New York...
"As it turns out we came full circle," he laughed. "Well, let's see," Duncan picked up more ticket stubs. "We started sanely enough with a trip to Paris--Adam thought it would amuse him to hide right under Watcher Central's nose. Turned out he knew more about noses than he did about Central. They started following us the second week, then the third we picked up the non-tattooed, buzzier sorts and took a flight to the Netherlands. That's where Adam got his new sweater. Well, I got the sweater because he wouldn't stop borrowing mine. I bought it in Copenhagen and started borrowing it from him. After a while, he took it back, and I haven't worn it since."
"He likes your smell," Ethel commented.
"More like Hercules wearing the lion's skin after he'd beaten the poor bugger to death," Duncan grumbled. "Where was I? Amsterdam, Geneva--" he paused and the look on his face said Geneva had been very, very special. "Then we landed at Heathrow," Duncan stumbled to cover the lapse.
Heathrow had obviously been as awful as Geneva had been wonderful.
"So what ended the honeymoon, Buddy?"
"Adam was bored. He went wandering off and two hours later, when I found him," the Scot turned around in his chair and looked at the Eldest Immortal. "It sounded like such a silly notion, maybe even fun, like play. It was at first.
"Adam was so ashamed of his childhood, his time in Egypt as a catamite, a slave. His injury, taking up with that sadist, Gabriel, even, even our times together--they all brought this back--this serpent thing--the Hurt," as he said this, Duncan felt how very dear these people were to him. It would be impossible to speak of this with any others than these fine friends. "Anyway, Adam decided to make a decent childhood for himself. Now.
"He decided that this book would be his pattern, his bible," the Highlander ran his rough palm across the cover of Siel's first book.
"There are worse, Lord," Siel offered.
"Yes, well, you didn't have to go on Pilgrimage to the Holy Land, or you wouldn't say that so fast, Princess." Duncan rustled through the Siel's Fantasy stack and began ordering them, side-by-side, with Ethel's Real, and his own recollections.
"I was wandering around the Terminal 3 arrival lounge, waiting for the traffic to thin. Grumpy, disoriented people everywhere and Adam sprawled over three chairs, snoring like the drums of doom. I went to ask at the Port Authority if we could dispense with the luggage matching since we had no luggage, really, just our duffles, some clothes...
"And I'd like to declare Theodore M. Nash, our ward. He is too young for his own passport, but he is included in mine, there, seated on my lap." Duncan acted this out digging through the Real pile and slapping the counterfeit passports on the table top before Dawson.
"Well," Duncan continued, "when I reached for Teds, he wasn't in my inside pocket. I told the PA that Master Nash was napping in the lounge with his nanny. I think he was happy enough to clear me through."
"I was wondering if Patches was still with you," Dawson levered in his chair to a less uncomfortable position. He chuckled, "Pat's gone all EuroTed on us. Imagine that."
Ethel and Siel went to gather Provisions. Crusty bread and honey seemed appropriate and little tea Samwiches with cheese and ham, some with horseradish and some not, and a lovely large jar of big black olives, and icy mugs of pale beer, and also pretzels, just in case.
They made a lot of noise when they got back and there was laughing and clinking of mugs, but Adam and Broden slept on as the Highlander spun his tale.
I waited for Adam to wake up and clear customs, but the crowd thinned and the next plane landed. No Adam.
These days, they won't let you back into the Arrival Lounge once you've cleared, and I thought he might not answer--or wake up to--the alias he'd chosen, so I waylaid a luggage handler about my size, traded clothes and snuck back into the lounge, after I stowed my gear in a locker.
Again, no Adam.
Dame Someone-Too-Important-For-The-Likes-Of-You, just back from the Colonies with five steamer trunks, kept me busy for an hour.
And no tip.
And still, no Adam.
I stopped at the Wendy's, thinking he might go there, given his appetite and his fondness for chili, but the Foot and Mouth and the Mad Cow's pretty much limited their menu to chips and eggs. No bangers this trip.
I had him paged under his new name, Feagen. No answer. I searched Heathrow for the rest of the morning. Finally at midday, I found him, in the lower level Express Tube tunnel, sitting on his duffle, Ted at his side, reading That Book. He was sitting under--I swear to God--an advert for "Angel Escort Service."
"Have you read this?" says he.
No "Terribly sorry for all the trouble." Not a "By your leave."
He's off up the stairs in a flash, bag over his shoulder, Teds under one arm and Book in hand. When I caught up with him, he was just wandering around the upper concourse, shoving Book into people's faces and saying "Where?" as if he didn't speak English or were retarded.
And the hell of it was, it got him directions, of a sort: one East Sussex, one Cotchford, an Ashdown Preserve, and three little girls, all in sailor suits, who simply pointed south.
I caught up with him finally and tried to convince him that even though he was headed toward Hartfield, he would only end up at Terminal 4 and not at Pooh, or Piglet either.
I'm explaining about catching the Grinstead train at Victoria Station, and how if he hadn't made me spend all morning looking for him, we might have caught the courtesy coach to Gatwich. Adam would nod and smile...
...and the minute I turned my back, he was off again, due south.
A sight, for sure, the two of us walking through the middle of Heathrow. I got my cell phone in one hand, the other knotted around the back of Adam's belt, while he babbles on in "Moth-talk" and keeps trying to break away for Terminal 4. I book a room for us at Chequers Inn in Forest Row and then drag him to the car rentals. I just couldn't see repeating the performance at Victoria Station. I would be a century living it down.
Well, the short of it was, I have kept Adam in the car, only by threatening to kill him should he try the door handle even one more time. There suddenly appears a construction detour off the airport roundabout--. One thing leads on to another and, and...I got lost and we ended up in Gravesend and had to work our way back south and the car is all the while threatening to run out of petrol and Adam is still doing his best impression of No Help At All.
We made Forest Row at sunset. Adam behaved himself, but I proceeded to order us up supper in our room and we kipped in early.
I woke at sunrise and...
Again--no Adam.
"There's a Wendy's in Heathrow?" Ethel asked.
"Isn't it surprising how you know three ways to get there and where to stay besides," Siel smiled.
"Six," Joe interjected, putting his pen down.
Duncan stopped mid-swallow and stared, with Ethel and Siel, at the Watcher and his cryptic remark.
A nefarious set of very long fingers swiped the rest of his Samwich-with-the-crusts-off and handed half of it to Broden. "And you're not telling it right, in any case," Adam complained around a mouthful of ham. "Six what?"
"Tenses," Dawson looked up from his notes, jerking back a bit from the intensity of their combined stares. "I'd never noticed it before, that's all." Joe shrugged. "Pluperfect, present, past, past-perfect, present progressive, future--and sometimes all in the same sentence. Are you time-impaired, Mac, or is that just an Immortal thing?"
"Then I suppose you won't be wanting to hear the rest of the story," Duncan replied indignantly.
"He wasn't telling it right, anyway," Adam bent over double and whispered soto voce into Broden's ear.
"Have it your way, Winnie Wizard," the Highlander sputtered. "Tell them yourself."
"All right, then," Adam responded gleefully, "Now we have begun to get somewhere." He pulled Master Teddy out from under his sweater.
"Present perfect," Joe said.
"Not perfect, Joe," Adam pushed the snacking things down the table and climbed up to sit, cross-legged on the table top, with Broden on one knee and the MacLeod tartan bear on the other. "Not perfect...
"...only moderately wonderful."
previous home next
POOHSTICKS THE TOUR "Rule 10. People who play Poohsticks are usually nice people. When you arrive at the bridge and there are other people already playing Poohsticks - don't worry. They may ask you to join in but remember, sooner or later, they will run out of sticks." Official POOH CORNER RULES for playingPOOHSTICKS - M.C.Ridley Personality Quiz...Whose Pooh's 'R Youse?
