The Later Journeys - 11. Setback

                         
Previous chapter

Whoever he might really be, Ben had me worried. He sat umoving in his seat, staring absently ahead. No tears fell, but he was no less upset as the house came back into view, than he had been half an hour before. Trevor and I seemed to be communicating telepathically because neither of us spoke a word; nonetheless, we felt each other’s concern. Both of us were wondering What next?

Warren seemed to catch the mood, too. Once we reached the drive, he slowed the horses, trying not to jostle the carriage. He hopped down promptly and put up the steps next to the carriage door. I saw his face as he peered in and offered Ben a hand out. We all watched Franklin navigate the steps slowly, haltingly, nearly stumbling as he reached the ground. Warren hurried, fumbling for his keys, and opened the front door of the house for Ben as quickly as possible. Ben proceeded through at a march, not stopping until he was down the hall and into his room, decisively shutting the door behind himself. The rest of us weren’t even in the house yet.

“Let me get the horses squared away,” Warren murmured, leaving us in order to drive the carriage back to the stable. Trevor and I went in, standing in the foyer, starting to remove scarves and gloves, but not showing any purpose in our movements.

We drifted toward the kitchen. My first target was the decanter of Madeira from the night before. I got out three goblets. We all needed it. Not only had the vacant inn been unexpected, the atmosphere around the place had been creepy and unnerving. Ben’s reaction had us all concerned.

Warren came through the back door about a quarter-hour later. The temperature outside had dropped, which reinforced the mood we were now in. I poured him a glass of wine and he took it with a nod.

“I didn’t expect that,” he said. “Ben was right -- that place was jumping when we picked him up the other night. No way it could just shut down in three days and look like it’d been abandoned for three years.”

“Do you think Gerry had something to do with it?” I asked. “Maybe he thought it would work, feed the effect, if...”

We sat lost in thought for awhile. Trevor reached into the deep pocket of his tweed coat and retrieved a cell phone. “Charged it last night. Sooner or later we’re gonna talk about this anyway, and he’s in his room, so...” Warren and I said nothing as Trevor found Gerry’s number on the screen and tapped it. From the phone came the faint sound of ringing and then a male voice answered.

“Hang on, buddy, I’m putting you on speaker,” said Trevor, his voice low. He tapped the screen and adjusted the volume control so the sound would cover the table but not extend into Ben's room.  “Okay, can you hear me all right?”

“Yep,” said Gerry, his voice clear and utterly familiar. “How’d your road trip go?”

Trevor said “Lemme ask you a question, and no bullshit, okay?”

“Yeah, sure. What?”

“Is that inn still operating?”

A brief pause. “The Pine Branch? It better be. What’s going on?”

“Closed up tight. Nobody there. No lights, signs down, like they’ve been lying there since last winter. It sure didn’t look like that Thursday.”

“Well fuck,” Gerry said. “That’s not right. That place is open, man. I just finished renovating it, and hired a new manager. Let me get him and find out what’s the story.” He paused. “What did Ben have to say?”

“Uh, he was upset. We came back here and now he’s in his room.”

“Okay,” said Gerry. “Just give me a minute and let me check.”

Trevor hung up and we sat waiting, sipping the wine. I suddenly felt very tired, and the guys looked the same.

“Weird,” was all Warren had to say.

About five minutes later, Trevor felt his phone vibrate and picked up, once again hitting the speaker icon so we could hear everything.

“Well, the place is closed, all right. Robby didn’t have much explanation. I don’t get it. He said ‘They shut it down. No more business.’ ‘No more business?’ I said ‘Who shut it down?’. I spent months putting it back into shape, I installed the communication system myself, calls were coming in, I figured once this thing is over, I’d have a good source of income. I’m gonna have to check and find out what the hell went on. I placed ads online!” Gerry was getting worked up. Unless he was playacting, I couldn’t blame him. I remembered how enthusiastic he’d been about the Pine Branch, wanting to see it succeed in its new incarnation. Trevor asked him a few more questions but there seemed to be no logical answers forthcoming.

“Okay, well, let me get off here. As I said, Ben seemed like he’d gotten a huge shock. I don’t know what he had in mind, to go back to the inn and maybe find a wormhole back to 1785 or what, but I didn’t like the looks of him. We’re gonna go check on him now. Talk to you soon, Gerry.” Trevor stood up, shut the phone off and absent-mindedly stashed it in a bottom kitchen drawer, under some towels. He looked at Warren and jerked his head toward the hall. “C’mon.”

I stayed put, absently wandering, trying to firm up plans for the next meal. We’d been thinking about bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwiches, not sure if Ben was familiar with that staple, but figuring he might well be. Everyone was eating sumptuously at breakfast; we alternated “dinner and supper,” as lunch and dinner were historically called, so as not to end every day with a heavy meal. We figured it wouldn’t hurt Ben to eat more lightly than he had in his own time; it might give him more energy and ease the gout. I was about to hike over to the ice house when Trevor came back. “We have something for a headache?”

“I’ve got everything,” I said. “You know me.” I hesitated. “Wow, we’d better think this through. My first choice would be aspirin, since it’s the most natural. It’s made from willow bark and I’ll bet they used that in the 1800s. But then you hear about Reye’s Syndrome. What if he had a viral infection, like the flu or something -- aspirin could mess him up badly. Let’s try him on one regular-strength Tylenol and see how he does with that, okay? Bet it’ll knock him out cold for a while.”

We went down the hall to my bedroom, and I fished my purse out from a corner under the bed. Rummaged through and found the Tylenol. Checked the expiration date. Handed one tablet to Trevor. He stepped into the bathroom to get a cup of water and disappeared back into the guest room. Through the open door, I saw Warren standing looking out the window, next to the bed where Ben lay back against the pillows.

I was getting hungry, so I went back to the kitchen and busied myself with what little prep was necessary to fix sandwiches. We had everything ready to go except reheating the bacon, and of course there was no mayonnaise. I used butter as a condiment, and also found some beans that were still good, so I worked on reheating those. For the millionth time, I found myself craving a 21st-century kitchen, with a microwave and a fridge full of goodies. I idly speculated about what present-day snacks Ben would like. I knew he'd be at least familiar with popcorn, since that dated back a few thousand years and it was eaten in the colonies.

Trevor and Warren came back to the kitchen.

“How is he?”

“Asleep, or nearly,” said Warren.

“Poor guy. Hope he’s all right.”

We fixed our own sandwiches and ate semi-ravenously. We were all upset to one degree or another - for Ben, for ourselves, and for Gerry. Something had gone wrong, but we couldn’t put our finger on just what it was.

As we were finishing, I looked at my two friends. “Hey,” I said. “Let’s get this nonsense off our heads, shall we?” That elicited the first smiles I’d seen on their faces most of the day. They reached up almost simultaneously and snatched the powdered wigs off their heads.

“Do I at least get to keep my jaunty tricorn hat?” asked Warren.

“Don’t leave home without it!” I answered, and we all laughed quietly together.

Thanks for reading! Comments welcome. Here's the next chapter.