Get Charlie Noah

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

Ben was very pleased with himself. He popped a pitted green olive into his mouth with a chunk of smoked cheese and some tinned French pate. His short cut fingernails needed a soak and a scrub to get out the grease from repairs to the diesel driven generator but at least it now worked at the flick of a switch. Connections from the generator to the bank of batteries had been cleaned and oiled. Unattended corrosion between electrical terminals was such a major problem in a variety of situations and so damn easy to rectify with a tiny bit of diligence.

The solar panels on the roof of the house were coated with mud and grime which the rain during the passing years had failed to wash away. It needed a scrubbing brush with soap to make the glass sparkle again. Getting onto the roof and back down again was more difficult for Ben than actually cleaning the solar panels.

Charlie speared another olive together with a tiny chunk of cheese and a folded slice of hot pastrami. She waved it in front of Ben. 'Do you want this or me?'

'I'll take the food.'

'What's wrong with me?'

'Nothing.'

'I want you now,' said Charlie. 'I may not want you later.'

'I know how to make me want you,' said Ben as he snatched the skewer out of her hand.

Charlie threaded another olive, piece of cheese and pastrami onto a timber skewer. 'Peter likes you.'

Ben nodded.

'The mare wasn't there, was she?'

'No,' said Ben.

'And now we have a generator that runs and solar panels that actually work. How can I ever thank you?'

'Keep alert Charlie. I can't watch you every minute of the day.'

'That's how I thank you?'

Ben took the next skewer out of her fingers. 'I've split some timber and brought it into the kitchen.'

'I saw that,' said Charlie. 'Are you thinking of making that old cooker and oven come to life?'

'I am actually.'

'It hasn't been used for over 50 years.'

'Then it's time,' said Ben.

'It's probably full of rats and cockroaches,' said Charlie.

'They'll run when I light up the kindling,' said Ben. 'I'm going to throw a bunch of fresh rosemary in with the kindling. It grows wild everywhere around here and will put a nice smell through the oven.'

'The original bushes came from Gallipoli,' said Charlie.

'That makes it even more special,' said Ben.

'I want to keep you awake all night tonight.'

'Are you going to sing or something?'

'Funny man. You know what I mean. You know what I want.'

'Well I'm not going to sing to you,' said Ben.

'I'm not normally like this,' said Charlie. 'What have you done to me?'

'I think it's the other way around,' said Ben. 'You drive me wild lady.'

'Good.'

'I'm supposed to be trying to protect you.'

'You're doing much more than just protect me,' said Charlie. 'We haven't even discussed your professional fees.'

'I'm very expensive,' said Ben.

'Whatever you cost; I'll pay it,' said Charlie. 'Do you charge extra for the meals you cook?'

'No. My fees are all inclusive.'

'Or fixing the generator and the solar panels?'

'All inclusive.'

'Why the hell weren't you around just before I married Reginald bloody Noah?'

'You wouldn't have given me a second glance,' said Ben.

'Want to bet on that?'

Roxley Burrows pulled down what was left of the torn venetian blind and sat on the hostel bed. The mattress sagged in the middle. He had covered it with a sheet so thin and worn you could actually see through it. A musty smelling blanket went over the top of the sheet which left another very thin sheet to actually cover him during the night if the air turned cool...which was probably unlikely. The blow pipe was made from two pieces of quite straight tree branch, cut in half with each piece around a metre in length. The timber had been sanded smooth and a piece of stainless steel pipe had somehow been pushed through the centre of each piece of timber so that when the two lengths were joined together, they enclosed a metal barrel almost two metres in length. The darts were made from large straight sewing needles with a tight wad of cotton wool glued to the end of each needle and coated with a smear of oil. A dart slid neatly into the metal barrel and when hit from behind with a puff of air from the mouth of the shooter, depending on the shooter's ability to generate a powerful puff, rocketed along the barrel and through the air in an extremely straight line for a considerable distance.

Roxley practiced with the device, aiming at taking out the eye of a large giraffe which featured on a full page glossy magazine page which had been pinned to the back of the door. He mastered accuracy in less than an hour.

His Mormon suit had been washed and hung over the back of a chair to drip dry. Dinner would be noodles in a big plastic cup filled with boiling water...if he could find an electric kettle somewhere...and a fork.

Roxley put down the blow pipe and picked up the bible which he had stolen from a hotel in Sydney less than two weeks before. He suddenly realised with a small degree of panic that it wasn't actually a Mormon bible but a Gideon's hotel bible. Then again, who would know the difference? He could have been carrying around a copy of Treasure Island and no one would probably know the difference.

Roxley opened the bible and looked at passages from Revelation Chapter 16. They involved the activity of seven of God's angels who He sent to the Earth to deal with the sins of man. Roxley had spent almost 10 years in prison for violating the laws of man by bashing people and taking their money but he felt that the prison food was pretty good and the cells somewhat better than the room which he now occupied. He slowly read through what God instructed the seven angels to do in order to punish man for wrongdoing. Angel one poured out a bowl of God's anger on the Earth generally and put loathsome and malignant ulcers on anyone who had sinned. The second angel poured out a bowl of God's anger on the sea and it turned to blood like a corpse and every living creature in the ocean died. The third angel poured out a bowl of God's wrath on the rivers of the earth and they all turned to blood so that no one could get any pure water to drink. The fourth angel poured out his bowl of God's anger upon the sun and the sun's reaction was to burn the crap out of anyone who had offended God. The fifth angel poured his bowl of God's anger over the throne of the Beast. Roxley had no idea what that actually meant but those who were associated with that particular type of throne, perhaps members of the world's government and parliaments were plunged into darkness and started chewing on their tongues in anguish because most of them had been caught out ripping off travel and entertainment benefits at the taxpayers' expense. The sixth angel poured out its bowl of God's anger on the biggest river in the world...just in case the third angel had misfired and that river dried up and the armies of distant enemies could now run across the dried up river bed and smash their neighbours in company with a beast who God felt should join in along with rather nasty frogs that jumped out of its mouth and ran amongst evil people who had torn off their clothes and joined unisex nudist clubs which catered for everything except extreme sunburn and attack from killer frogs. If things couldn't get any worse for mankind, the seventh angel emptied God's bowl of anger into the air and all hell was let loose including lightning, thunder and earthquakes that reduced cities to rubble. Then God in his fury, made all the islands of the world sink beneath the ocean and tipped over the mountains and dropped hailstones weighing a hundred weights (whatever that was, but probably the size of a small car) on everyone trying to run for cover.

Roxley closed the bible. He was trembling slightly. And he thought the District Court Judge who sent him to prison some years ago on charges of assault and robbery was an angry piece of work.

"****"