Subdivided We Stand Meets Marathon Man

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Twenty-Two

The sky was alight with colors and shapes, planets with rings. The sparks tailed off in all directions, some seeming to fall directly on top of the pathways and the trees as Robby made his way up from the beach. He was careful to avoid contact with anyone, ducking behind a tree when a family approached carting a wagon with beach chairs. He crossed the street in front of Carrington’s house and snaked through the palmetto trees, figuring to make up the time on the front end.

His heartbeat raced and the buzzing that he felt inside his head propelled him onward. Had there been time enough, he wondered? Time enough for Carrington to get back, get himself settled before the fireworks. They hadn’t ironed out the details any further since they spoke, preferring and agreeing to keep distant from each other. There was trust there. Trust that Carrington had that Robby would carry through.

(Continue reading Chapter Twenty-Two of Blacksmith's Girl.)

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Twenty-One

Night came and Robby could hear the din of voices all the way from his guesthouse. The voices and the spotlights from the TV crews. He’d let his beard grow out in the last week to try to provide a bit of a disguise. Let his hair grow out a bit too. To try to stay anonymous. This would be the first night out for him among the crowds since he came down to Charleston. An exciting night of doubt and nervousness and indecision.

Partiers gathered in the pavilion. Charleston high society. TV cameras. Caterers. Guests with gloriously colored cocktails.

Robby decided he’d need some. He’d need a handful of those.

(Continue Chapter Twenty-One of Blacksmith's Girl.)

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Twenty

Pop Hairston was close to legend in this part of South Carolina for his smithy works. He kept at the craft past the time when it was necessary, perhaps, but he had a sense that the art would still be desired. Maybe he just wasn't inclined to practice another trade. Old stylings in the houses along the Battery in Charleston from the colonial era, early federal period, historic homes with the iron works and railings that were rusted or were in need of repair, Pop was there to replace them. Heating and stoking the fire in his forge with his old bellows, he did things the old way, turning the iron with his mallets on the anvil.

He’d be in greater demand now, it was true, with the new money pouring into Charleston to revive old properties. Pop’d have to bring on apprentices, something he never felt inclined to do. That was a fatal flaw in Pop’s worldview. You should always leave something of yourself behind, if you’ve got something worth leaving behind, by teaching somebody else. But Pop started his own fires, and kept them burning, and swept up his own floors, and turned the red-hot metal, hammering his designs alone. When he went there was no one left to carry on.

(Continue reading Chapter Twenty of Blacksmith's Girl.)

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Nineteen

The shade beneath the giant hanging limbs of the great tree brought a welcome cool relief from the stillness of the heat that surrounded them as Robby and Cynthia stepped out of the sunlight. Little changed in the twenty years, a mere blip in the thousands of years this tree had lingered there. A living thing set inland from the coast and the tidepools and the marshlands. An isolated tree with its thick branches flying outward like its name suggested, like an angel’s wings. It still inspired awe after all the years away for Robby. Worth the pilgrimage to pay respects as if it was an old woman or old man that deserved your honor.

(Continue reading Chapter Nineteen of Blacksmith's Girl...with new installments appearing on Wednesdays on this here old blog o' love.)

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Eighteen

The marshes. A tidal pool snaked through the back of the Carrington big house and along the golf course passing the old plantation estate and eventually wending away to the intercoastal waterway that separated Cypress Point Plantation island from the other barrier islands. These marsh streams that lined the golf courses are where the alligators nested.

(Continue reading Chapter Eighteen of Blacksmith's Girl.)

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Seventeen

“Night just like tonight,” Carrington told Robby.

Out on the water, that night long ago, back when they were both in college together and Carrington spent the summers up in Charleston. They were drunker than fish out on the crab boat with their summer league coach, Coach Cal.

Coach Cal Whelan was an intense guy for sure. Late 40s, early 50s maybe. He looked older sometimes, from the smoking and the blood pressure. He was a long time assistant coach at South Carolina, but had a gig for years as the manager of a well-known summer league team that attracted top flight high school and college players in the region. They played games during the weekends and worked the beach resorts during most days and nights.

There was another reason they played for Coach Cal besides the access to the scouts he knew and drank with.

(Continue reading Chapter Seventeen of Blacksmith's Girl.)

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Sixteen

Fading light on the ocean. The beach faced the south, so the light that streamed from behind still gave the sky a pinkish tint against the deep blue; not the burning red of the western sky. They stood side by side on the wooden planks. They were deep into what was becoming their common ritual state. Drunk. Drinking rum from a bottle that they shared.

“Then you’re not dying,” Robby slurred.

“Yes, I am,” Carrington said defensively. They’d been through this part of the discussion now already, but Robby either wasn’t buying it or comprehending it.

(Continue reading Chapter Sixteen of Blacksmith's Girl.)

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Fifteen

Here’s the dilemma. If you go out in the mid-day sun to play a round down south, you’ll bake yourself and have to bring along two changes of clothing. On the other hand if you go out early, just after the sprinklers have shut off and get your round in before mid-day, you might have to curtail your night before.

And the beer girl might not be around to greet you as you make the turn at 5, if you swing early.

(Continue reading Chapter Fifteen of Blacksmith's Girl.)

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Fourteen

When we last left Robby Cochran, sweaty and drunk and passed out in a sweltering hot night in the plantation resort guesthouse, with the broken AC, there was a scream in the night, there was a gun and case of money in the attic, there was a sharp denial from the lovely Cynthia about her ex-con brother Mateen, a finger pointed at her rich husband. And there were two sharply dressed guys driving a Town Car from Georgia who were snapping photos of the camera-shy Robby, and spinning the tires and kicking up the stones.

The trapdoor came down with a screech and the ladder tumbled out, sliding down into Robby’s hands. Catching it, he gave Mateen the look that said, “See what you made me do?”

“Why is it always the black man?” Mateen said. “Tell me? So there’s a suitcase full of cash. A gun. You immediately jump to the conclusion that the black guy did it.”

(Continue reading Chapter 14 of the serial Blacksmith's Girl.)

Blacksmith's Girl: Chapter Thirteen

Robby didn’t feel squirmy about touching and fingering the gun on the table of the guesthouse, with the red suitcase full of cash open beside him in the mid-morning light.

He scanned the money and put it back in its place, roughly counting out anywhere from 25,000 to 30,000 in bills. Mostly 100s. In the case. Not a ransom figure, but a get away, get out of Dodge amount of loot. The money was one thing; the gun was another. That altered any scenario you looked at.

(Continue Chapter Thirteen of Blacksmith's Girl.)

The continuing saga of Robby and Cynthia and Carrington and Mateen and Russ Venable...and the rest...will return in three weeks, on Thursday, August 23, after the Kellys return from a trip to Ireland and Scotland!  Catch up with the story, and like Bob does, suggest words to plug in!  Perhaps not in Yiddish, though, okay Bob? Tough to reconcile in the Lowcountry.