Precious Cargo

Wulf, imagine you are watching this on a split screen.
While Eric is driving up, I'm laying background on his destination.
See how George is starting to come apart? Did you ever see "The Shining"? If not, you must check it out. It's a classic. Imagine Pye, the limo driver in Provincetown in the role of the cook.
And what cargo could be more precious than the 500 year old gold dubloons and the history of death that accompany them.

 

Pye awoke with a start, breathing heavily. After fifteen years, the nightmare had returned.
It was usually Benny, sometimes Boris. Limbs missing, laying in a pool of blood.
The accidents started the spring they got the contract in Somerset county. There was some fine timber to be had in the rich valleys beneath Bigelow Mountain and Flagstaff Mountain.
Some good fish came from the lake too.Then the accidents started.
Logging was a dangerous occupation and despite the most experienced men with the best training, the occasional mishap was bound to occur.
Sometimes a truck overturned in soft ground. Sometimes a chainsaw malfunctioned. But not often.
This year was different. Disaster struck swiftly when it struck. Horrendous, unexplainable disasters.
Boris was an experienced man. From a family of Russian immigrants, he had spent over thirty years in these forests, and there were none more reliable or more skilled.
Boris had his back to the road, relieving himself on a tree when the loaded truck, coming down the hill, lost it's steering.
The driver pulled the chain for the air horn so hard it came off in his hand. The steering wheel spun uselessly in his hands as the front tires turned right as the truck went into the lefthand corner.
The impact cut Boris in half and sent the driver through the windshield, sliding headfirst across the length of the hood shattering his skull as it impacted the tree trunk.
A week later, Benny was sawing through a horizontal log. Simple and routine. The recoil was blamed on a knot, but nobody ever believed it.
The chainsaw appeared to have a mind of it's own when it it bounced back, coming around in a perfect overhead arc and landing on Benny's collarbone, chain grinding away at his torso, finally stopping as it found his heart.
The nearby witnesses swear Benny's finger was off the throttle from the time the saw bounced out of the log.
Northwoods Logging Inc. lost seven men that year, all in Somerset county.
The company was forty five years old and the most deaths that had ever occured in a single year was two.

Pye's nightmare was different this time. Instead of one of his old friends or co-workers, it was the young truck driver, Eric.
And there were golden eggs scattered around his lifeless torso.
Pye called Ellen down at Chauncey's Inn.
"I need a favor sweetie. I know it's agin the rules, but could ye find that Eric feller's phone number for me from the registration form. It's really important, or I wouldn't ask."
Ellen got him Eric's cell number, but it was of no help. Pye tried the number over and over. Nothing.
After calling Ellen back and telling her he was leaving on an emergency, he was heading out route six in his old black hearse.

 

Kay was reading the pick up information just as the first fat wet snow flakes kissed the windshield.
She gave a low whistle as she got to the cargo details.
"Over two thousand dubloons. Kinda weird that they would be up here, don't ya think?"
"Why is that?" Eric replied half heartedly, focusing on the road, and hoping they could be heading back south before it became snow covered.
"I would think a collection this large would be in a museum, or in a bank vault. Not at some summer cabin in the Maine woods."
"Who the heck knows. I just hope the guy is up there. The last thing I want is to get delayed. This snow is really coming down. Did not expect this the last week of September. How about giving him another try for me, see if he picks up."
"Still no answer, house phone or cell." Kay said after trying for the third time since they left the interstate.

 

It was going into early afternoon when Eric pulled in the lot of Gurleys Party Store, which was apparently a haven for the summer fishing/boating crowd and the winter skiers.
Ice, beer, cigarettes, bait, ski rentals, life vests, gloves, DVD rentals and more.
And also a friendly sales clerk who verified that yes, Flagstaff Lake Drive was another four miles on the right.
But the sign may be down, usually is, but it is the first road past the old, closed down general store.
The friendly clerk also verified that yes, an early snowstorm has been predicted.
Probably wouldn't be a good idea to spend too much time down that road, if you expected to be able to get out.
She went on to add that while the main highway is generally plowed, mainly on account of tourist traffic, they never touch the old gravel lake road.
No need to, since there are no longer any permanent residents out there, and once the summer folk pull out, no reason to keep it clear.
Eric thanked the young lady and they took off for George's house with added urgency.
The old general store was an easily identifiable landmark. The big metal dinosaur was rust covered, rather than Sinclair green, and the Lucky Strike sign was barely legible through the cobwebbed window panes.
It had the look of an old style bait and tackle shop that probably did quite well in the decades before snow skiing came into vogue in these parts.
And before Gurleys Party Store came into being, just an eighth of a mile from the entrance to Sugarloaf Ski Lodge & Motel.
Eric came to a halt at the entrance to Flagstaff Lake Drive and was not encouraged by what he saw.
Narrow would be an understatement. Not much wider than the GMC six wheeler, it would be nearly impossible for two vehicles of any size to meet.
Tree limbs hang low and snow was accumulating. Unlike the main road, there was not a single tire track.
This George Whitcomb fellow must be the last one down here. Eric tried the phone one last time, hoping to talk him into meeting the truck up here at the highway, but no such luck.
Not because there was no answer, but because he had no signal.
"Aint nothing to do, but do it baby." He told Kay.
"You can do it Mister truck driver." she answered."Cowboy up."

Meanwhile, a hundred miles to the south, Pye was trying to call Eric and getting no result, causing him to become more anxious.
He was pushing the old hearse hard now, the big Caddy singing at ninety miles per hour.

 

George was trembling as he tried to insert his key into the door lock, finally succeeding.
He was overcome with fear as he turned into the lane, contemplating turning around and driving straight home to North Carolina.
He may have done it, had he not accepted a large deposit on the merchandise, and he felt obligated to honor the arrangement.
The house was colder than expected. The temperature had dropped drastically in the last twenty-four hours, but it wasn't that.
He felt a breeze from the back of the house. The front of the house faced the lakeshore, while the back butted up to the mountain slope.
He passed through the small living room into the family room that oversaw the rear deck and froze.
Broken glass covered the floor. The sliding glass door was obviously shattered from the outside.
George's first thought was of an intruder. He had already walked through the living room, and the kitchen was fully visible from where he stood.
That left only the two bedrooms, connected by a short hallway and the home's single bathroom.
There were no footprints on the deck, but the snow had only been sticking in the last hour, so that meant nothing.
And there were no vehicles. It was eight miles to the highway and the gravel road came to a dead end ten miles further east, at the final cabin.
Maybe the burgular is working his way down, hoping to find something of value in summer homes he knows to be abandoned.
Not bothering to search for a makeshift weapon, he slowly walked to the bathroom door. Not fully closed, he nudged it open with the toe of his shoe.
Nobody there. The same with the guest bedroom. On to the master bedroom.
Empty as well, but something was wrong. The closet door was ajar and it was the only door in the house he closed and locked religiously.
The closet contained his safe, which was bolted to a concrete slab.
The safe was open, gold coins spilled out onto the floor, but none seemed to be missing.
That made no sense. Was the burgular still in the house? Hiding outside?
An old wooden dresser stood against the wall by the closet door. There was a mirror atop the dresser.
When George looked in the mirror, he saw the figure standing behind him and he began to scream.