The River Burns Read Free

out here to play third base.”
    â€œI wanted this meeting because stories are making the rounds. Call them rumours. But truth flies around wherever it flies. Out of the mouths of babes or out of the mouths of babbling idiots sometimes, you just never know. If it’s true, it’s true. If not, then no harm is done if I give you a heads-up anyway.”
    â€œGo on.”
    â€œLike I said, it’s your brother. Denny’s one hothead mother.”
    â€œI’m not sure that he is.”
    â€œSome loose talk gets spun. People say he might take matters into his own hands. Commit an act of veritable destruction, something of that nature.”
    â€œSkootch—”
    â€œWhy would I tell you this, Ryan, if I didn’t have our own best interests at heart? Yours and mine, both? I’ve got nothing against Denny. You know that. I’m partly squealing on him for his sake. So he can be stopped. I believe he needs to be stopped. I don’t like it that you put my third baseman away—”
    â€œYour reserve outfielder, actually.”
    â€œSame difference. I need a third baseman now because of it. You know what team I’m playing this week, couldn’t you have waited? Anyway, I don’t like what you did but this is not about that. It’s about Denny. All I’m saying is what you already know. If he shoves, there will be some push back. It might not be insignificant. You know what I’m talking about, Ryan.”
    That’s all that the policeman needed this summer, a running battle between loggers and conservationists with his own brother at the forefront. Ryan took the other man seriously.
    â€œSo you’re hearing that this is about Denny. Reliable sources?”
    â€œAt first I wasn’t so keen to believe it myself. But word has a way of going around until it sounds convincing. Various sources. You know that I move in mysterious ways. I keep strange company.”
    The man skipped down the steep slope into the ditch and righted his bike. He pushed it up the embankment so that he emerged on the road just in front of the police car. He lifted a leg over and seated himself, the bike looking ridiculously small for a man with such long legs. He scratched his dribble of chin whiskers.
    â€œHow about,” he asked, “if you leave my ball club alone for a while? You’ve done your damage. Now leave us alone until the season’s over. As a favour to me, who’s just done a favour for you. Anyway, you’ve got worse things to think about now than my team’s record.”
    â€œI don’t have a clue what it is, nor do I care.”
    â€œLike I believe you. But you’ve got a bigger problem to think about now and I’d appreciate it if you concentrate on that, for all our sakes, and for more goddamn reasons than baseball. I’m trying to keep the peace here, Ryan. Just like you. I’ll see you around, okay? Thanks for the visit. It’s been a slice.”
    He paddled the bike with his feet awhile before he raised them onto the pedals, then he was soon zipping off down a hill and out of sight.
    Ryan watched him go, then stared off into the dark woods. The sun was coming up warm. He returned to his car, started her up, did a three-point turn, and drove back to town and another day on the job, feeling uneasy.

2
    S o, too, was wizened old chirpy Mrs. McCracken an early riser. Townsfolk assumed her good habit had formed through forty years of getting up early to teach children the geography of their planet, and Mrs. McCracken willingly suffered that perception. Privately, went her theory, as long as people remained sufficiently gullible to believe that load of bull roar she was spared further embarrassment. Following the terribly premature death of her husband, Mrs. McCracken started waking up an hour earlier each morning than her previous custom. Schoolwork had nothing to do with that. Four decades later and within the month