Book of Shadows

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Authors: Marc Olden
on the rail, pointed ashore.
    “Oh my God!” whispered Jack Lyle, and the urgency in his voice was enough to chill Marisa’s blood.
    “My fault,” said Lyle. “I wasn’t thinkin’. Jesus, I wasn’t thinkin’. I just ’ope I’m not too late. Jesus God I ’ope I’m not too late.”
    He turned from Marisa and climbed over the rail, leaped ashore and ran into the growing darkness.
    Ellie said, “What was that all about?”
    “I don’t know,” said Marisa. “Something about it being his fault and he hoped he wasn’t too late.”
    “Strange man. This is turning into a trip to remember. Have you ever eaten Larry’s cooking before?”
    Ellie had to repeat the question. Marisa was staring off into the dark woods after Jack Lyle.
    Robert walked fast, forcing Nat Shields to keep up with him. Surrounded on all sides by trees and tall bushes, the two men headed further away from the boat. Behind them a red-orange sun was sinking below the horizon, casting long shadows among gnarled tree trunks. Robert, in a foul mood, quickened the pace, while an out-of-breath Nat wondered why the two of them were racing through a strange forest and Nat in white shoes, no less.
    Suddenly Robert left the woods and pushed his way through waist-high bushes. Nat heard him say, “Damn, damn, damn,” and keep rushing forward. Nat was about to call out to him when Robert stopped near a huge boulder, leaned on it with both hands flat against the rock, and shook his head as though trying to clear it.
    Nat, breathing hard and glad to stop, said, “What’s bugging you?”
    “Everything. And nothing.”
    “That narrows it down, somewhat. There was a point on this trip when I actually thought you were enjoying yourself.”
    Robert unzipped his fly and walked behind the huge rock. “A hell of a place to park a big rock. Now comes the most exciting moment of my current travels, boys and girls.” He began to urinate.
    Nat said, “Is there a problem between you and Marisa? I don’t mean to pry—”
    “Then don’t.”
    “Robert, life is—”
    “Life is. What is life? Life is a magazine. Go on, Nat. You were about to soothe my troubled mind.”
    Nat shivered in the damp chill of evening. “Marisa’s trying, Robert. I know she is. You’ve got to try as well. Nothing runs smoothly all the time. You have to start with that and go on from there.”
    “Moral uplift in God’s green woodland. Spare me, please.”
    Nat shook his head. “You’re spared.”
    Robert zipped up his fly, then removed his wristwatch and began to wind it. The watch slipped from his fingers and when he bent down to pick it up, he stayed close to the ground.
    He picked up something and rolled it around between thumb and forefinger. “That’s odd.”
    “What?”
    “A piece of cloth out here in the middle of nowhere.”
    “Let me see.”
    Robert handed it to Nat, but stayed down, eyes peering into the thick bushes around him.
    Nat said, “Wish I had my glasses with me. Christ, it’s too dark to tell much, but I think—yes, it’s hand woven. Amazing.”
    “There’s a path leading into the bushes. You can’t see it standing up, but when you’re down like this—”
    Nat squatted beside him. “I’m getting too old for this sort of thing, Robert. You’re going to have to help me up. Where’s the path and who cares?”
    Robert pointed. “There. What the rock doesn’t hide, the bushes do.”
    “That it does. This rock is half the size of a city bus.”
    “The bushes hide most of the path. See, it’s just inches wide and it leads back through the bushes and into those trees straight ahead.”
    “As the youth of America are wont to say, big fucking deal.”
    Robert stood up. “You’re not a writer, Nat, which means you’re not curious enough.”
    Nat said, “I don’t know, Robert. Fact is, I’m not even sure I want to know. Let’s get back to the boat, assuming we can find our way back.”
    “My sense of direction is excellent. We’ll find our

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