The Scribbler by Iain Maitland (life changing books txt) 📕

She answered them, after a moment or two’s thought. “I’m going to sit here and pray this doesn’t bring all of the police to our door. I don’t know what we’ll do if …” she stopped for a second, seeming lost for words. “Go,” she added angrily.

The smart brother nodded as she moved to sit down in a kitchen chair. Slipping the gun into his pocket, he left through the kitchen door, leaving it ajar for his brother.

The slow brother reached to lift Carrie, her head hanging back over his arms. He looked at the old woman, as if to say something more, some simple words of regret and sorrow, but she had already sat down, her head bowed, and ignored him as he followed his brother out into the yard.

The old woman sat there, in an ancient, high-backed corner chair, thinking things through in her mind. Eventually, she sat up and spoke out loud as if someone were there listening to her, “Those who bring trouble on their families will have nothing.” She shook her head sorrowfully. “And nor will I …” she added sadly and then sobbed.

* * *

The slow brother walked, with Carrie in his arms, away from the farmhouse and up towards the main outbuilding and fields. He knew what he had to do but did not want to. Not really.

This is not right, he thought, what his brother had just done. What he was now doing. What Mother had told them to do. It was not right at all.

They were super-heroes. They killed bad men. They saved little children. They did not hurt ladies.

He stopped on the other side of the outbuilding with the cesspit and looked down at the lady. She was a pretty lady, he thought. She had a kind and friendly face. He laid Carrie out, gently and respectfully, on a grassy stretch of ground and then straightened her legs and folded her arms neatly across her chest. He said a few words quietly to himself and then added, “Amen”.

The slow brother wanted to think about things. He sat down next to the body and reached into his pocket for his tin of tobacco, papers and matches. There were no ready-made cigarettes left so he carefully took out a piece of rolling paper and dropped tobacco into it, rubbing it back and forward with his big clumsy hands.

He knew he wasn’t very good at this, the rolling of hand-made cigarettes. It wasn’t his fault, his brother had said. He had what his brother called sausage fingers. Like Father. His brother had slim fingers, like Mother. He wished he had thinner fingers. It would make it easier to roll a cigarette. One end would always be fatter than the other. His brother was better at it. Always was, always will be.

The slow brother finally managed to get the tobacco spread as evenly as he could. He lifted the cigarette to his lips, running his tongue along the edge of the paper, half on the paper, half on his fingers. They tasted sharp and bitter. He did not know why. He lit the cigarette and inhaled the smoke. He liked this part the most, tasting the smoke for the first time, feeling it in his mouth and then blowing it out. His brother could blow smoke through his nose and make smoke rings, too. He could not. He wished he could.

He looked around as he sat there, thinking about where he was going to put the body.

He did not want to put it in the cesspit with the bad men. That would be a horrible thing to do. It would not be respectful.

He wanted to put her somewhere nice and clean. He searched for the word he meant … special. Yes, that was it. A special place for a lady.

He thought about this as he smoked his cigarette. He did not want to put her in among the trees. He knew that next year when the men came to chop down the next lines of trees, they might come across the mound of earth. He did not want to put her in the fields behind the trees and out towards the forest. That was not right in the wind and the rain. And he knew what the animals of the forest would do.

The farm had other unused, rundown buildings from when Father was alive. A cow milking shed full of old machinery. Two storage buildings that were once a sawmill and a workshop. Two barns, one larger, one smaller. An air-raid shelter from the Second World War. He had not been in some of them for years and wondered whether they’d now be over-run by mice or rats, maybe even foxes.

He wished he had the gun on him that he had given to his brother. He liked to shoot vermin. Knew he was good at it. He was what was called a sharp shooter. The best, his brother had said. The sharpest shot in town. When he went back to the farmhouse to get the shovel, he thought he’d get the old spare gun from the upstairs cupboard at the same time. Keep that on him so he could use it later.

He decided, as he finished his cigarette and pinched the tip with his fingers, that he would put the lady in the smaller barn. He had always liked the small one. It was, what was the word, ‘cosy’. Yes, that was it, cosy. He would lay her down on any straw that might still be in there. He would clean the barn up and make it nice for her. He would then come back down and get the shovel and the gun and, well, he would do what needed to be done. He did not like the thought of it. Not with a lady. A nice, good lady.

The slow brother looked up as he heard the sound of a car engine.

At first revving and then more steadily, more slowly.

The smart brother