'The Mad Scott'

Seventeen year old Vinnie Ferretti looked at the serious, determined and, in his mind at least, beautiful face of sixteen year old Becky Lansdowne --- who he had been in love with since the fifth grade --- and decided that he finally needed to assert himself. "And I say that time is important! We have to bring help as soon as possible! So, we should head straight up the Canadian Shore and then south through the gap between Grindstone and Wolf Island and right into Grant's place at Smuggler's Bay."

Becky, wearing her foul weather jacket and PFD because the wind had picked up and it had started to rain, merely sat by the tiller and looked at Vinnie as though he was a brainless idiot. "No, it's too dangerous. We'll cross the river between Wellesley and Grenadier Islands and head up the US shore. Yes, it's a bit longer, but it will keep us away from Howe Island and that 'Bad Santa' guy."

Vinnie had heard all about 'Bad Santa' from his older brother Christopher. Chris and his buddies got their drugs from a guy that worked for Bad Santa', or as Chris and his 'homies' called him, 'St. Nick'. Vinnie didn't use drugs himself, but knew that his older brother sold some 'on the side' to other kids in and around Mohawk. Plucking up more bravado than he felt, Vinnie made his case for sticking to the Canadian shore. "You don't have to worry about that 'Bad Santa' dude," Vinnie said as nonchalantly as he could with rainwater running off his nose. "My brother Chris told me he's just some fat biker that sells weed."

"Ya, and your druggie brother would know all about that, right?" she said with all the disdain that only a teenager girl can muster.

"My brother's not a druggie!" Vinnie said loudly, inwardly worried that what Becky said was true. "He mainly just sells the stuff."

"Ya, right," Becky said as she pushed the tiller to the right and headed south across the river. "We're going up the US side. There's better wind in the main channel --- and hopefully no drug dealers!" Vinnie frowned and adjusted the smaller foresail and jib while Becky handled the main.

The two men Sam had sent along 'for protection' were in the small cabin, their deer rifles close at hand. One was middle-aged Harry Flood, the town's barber; a tall, quiet man that was more content to let others talk than to speak himself.

The older man, Alastair McPherson --- called by most either 'Old Al' or 'The Mad Scott' --- was said to be 'a little touched in the head' even before the Pandemic. After it most thought him a complete loon. No real threat to anyone, just a solitary old coot who always had a strange little smile on his bearded face that made many think that he was laughing either at the world in general or them in particular. Old Al lived in a wooden shack out past the edge of town and made his living trading the deer meat he harvested for whatever other 'things' that he might need; liquor, pipe tobacco and shells for his old rifle being at the top of a very short list. A book too as well, for Old Al was a bit of a history buff.

The Pandemic had killed off well over half of the human race, the result being that most of the other creatures on the planet, including deer, had increased greatly --- a fact that hunters like Alistair McPherson took full advantage of. Sam and a few other solitary types seemed to be his only real friends.

Once or twice a month he would venture into town for supplies and a drink or two at Mohawk's Royal Canadian Legion, where, after a few pints he would usually hold forth on his own rather radical, semi-religious view of the Pandemic.

'Now don't take me wrong lads' he'd begin, a mug in one hand and his pipe in the other: 'the Great Plague was a terrible thing, especially for those in the big cities n' even you here in the smaller towns. N' you'll no hear me say it wasn't! Billions o' souls, young n' old, snuffed out in under a year be a terrible thing indeed! But --- for a long retired old woodsman like meself, with no real kith nor kin to speak of, it could be seen as a blessing. A dark n' dire one to be sure; yet not unlike the Great Flood that God Himself sent long ago to cleans the earth o' its many sinners."

He'd usually pause then for a puff on his pipe, a drink from his mug and once again sallied forth to 'enlighten the non-believers'. 'N' who here can deny that the world wasn`t once again a wicked, sinful place in dire need o' another good scrubbin'?! So, for me at least, the Great Plague be yet another chance for all o' us that remain to reset the clock n' start afresh!'

Needless to say The Mad Scott's point of view was not a very popular one in and around Mohawk, though he did have those that agreed with him. Vinnie Ferretti, like most people, thought McPherson as mad as a March hare. Sam however was not of that opinion --- and neither apparently was Becky Lansdowne. On the long, starboard tack up the US shore, she and the old Scott struck up a strange kind of friendship, with him asking her all about sailing and her asking him about hunting, trapping and all things Scottish.

"I've been reading all about Scottish history in a book I found in my mother's room," Becky said as she casually reset the mainsail after yet another tack up river. Vinnie was in the bow handling the jib and foresail and frowning back at her, wishing she'd smile at him the way she was at that crazy old coot!

"Have ye indeed, lass?" Old Al asked. "Readin' all about our great heroes Robert the Bruce n' William Wallace have ye? Or perhaps that great fool o' a mahn, Charles Edward Stewart?"

"You mean Bonnie Prince Charlie?" she asked. "He's in the book --- but he seemed like a bit of a dork."

"Dork you say? If by 'dork' you mean that he was a pompous, blatherin' boobie, why then ye have the right o' it, lass!"

Becky smiled at the old man, liking him for a number of reasons: his strange words, his strong Scottish accent and the fact that he treated her like a grown-up. He reminded her of a character in her book: Column McKenzie; the gruff, bearded warrior chieftain of Castle Leoch.

"Me own da was a great one for history," McPherson continued as he puffed away on his pipe. "Back when I was a lad every two or three years he'd take us all on a trip back to the Heelands. His brother still ran the family farm there, ye ken, n' when I got older the pair of 'em took me along on their 'grand adventures'. We'd go traipsin' over the hills huntin' the wild roe for a week or two. Then we'd dress up old time-like in kilt n' bonnet for the Battle o' Culloden held yearly at Inverness."

Becky's eyes widened. "That's the name of the battle in my book! Culloden! Bonnie Prince Charlie and the Scottish clans fighting the British, right?! I forget the name of the English general, but he was not a very nice man!"

"No lass," Old Al said with some feeling: "The Duke o' Bloody Cumberland was no a nice mahn indeed! They called the bastard 'Fat Willie'!"

"That was back in 1740 something?" Becky put in.

"April o' Forty-five, lass. A dark day for Scotland to be sure."

"He made you all give up wearing the kilt, didn't he?"

"Aye, that he did. N' many other things as well! The playin' o' the pipes, the carrying o' a claymore n' the owning o' a musket --- the whole damn heeland way o' life!"

Becky saw that the memory of the long ago event was still painful, so she wisely changed the subject. "The book is really a historical romance. It's about a young World War Two nurse named Clair that went to Scotland on her honeymoon and got swept into the past while visiting some ancient stones. It's very exciting and even kind of, ah, you know --- sexy." Despite her wind-blown, tanned face, Becky blushed at that.

Old Al smiled at her. "I ken the book now, lass. Though I've never read it, I saw the TV series they made --- back in the day when there was TV."

"My father told me he'd seen it as well. My mother was a big fan of the show. I was still watching cartoons back then."

"I take it you're mother's gone then, lass?"

Becky nodded. "During the first year of the Pandemic. The rest of my family as well. My dad is all I have left."

Old Al nodded and took something out of his wallet and handing it to Becky. "That was taken back in the 1970's."

"Wow!! That's waaay cool!" Becky said looking at the battered old photo, while apart of her wondered how Vinnie would look dressed in a kilt and a Scotch bonnet. The thought made her smile even wider.

"That's me da with the musket n' his brother beside him with the sword," McPherson said, his voice suddenly rough with emotion. "I'm the wee gomeral in the background between 'em. I was about your age then. It was all fun n' games, ye ken?" The muskets fired blanks n' the swords were blunted n' only waved around --- but it was bloody good fun all the same!"

"Did you have a musket?" Becky asked.

"Good Lord, no, lass. Nor a sword neither! My da was afeared that I'd do myself harm, ye ken? I had an old hoe with a dull blade n' da told me to keep the rusty part up in the air."

"When I was much younger we all went to Upper Canada Village to see a re-enactment. There were painted Indians and men with redcoats and funny hats --- but I was more interested in the cows and the ducks."

"As a young lassie should be," McPherson put in as he turned from the wind to try and relight his pipe. They settled into silently watching the wide river swirl by, with the distant buildings of Alexandria Bay on the US shore, the thick trees of Wellesley Island on the right and the towering span of the International Bridge looming ahead upriver.

"Sail up ahead!" Vinnie yelled out from up near the mast. "A modern fibreglass hull with a Bermuda rig. Moving in to Alexandria Bay."

Both McPherson and the barber, Harry Flood grasped their rifles and peered at the distant boat, but Vinnie had been correct, whoever it was didn't seem interested in them and was heading into the US town. They saw several smaller motor boats putting around the shore, but they also paid them no mind.

"Nothing to worry about. Probably just local fisherman," Vinnie put in sagely, eager to show his 'vast knowledge' of watercraft to the two older hunters.

An hour later however, with the US town of Clayton off to the south and passing Grindstone Island to the north, Vinnie's much younger eyes spotted two fast moving motor boats coming through the gap between Grindstone and distant Wolf Island --- and heading directly towards them!

***

"What do you see, lad?" Old Al asked as Vinnie lowered the binoculars he had been looking through.

"Two fast boats coming right at us. Two men in each, the ones up from have guns."

"One to drive n' one to shoot," the Scotsman said. "Well, you young'ns stay low. It looks like Harry n' me could have our work cut out for us!"

As though to prove MacPherson's point, the two rapidly approaching motorboats split right and left and raced around the sailboat, both men in front brandishing their weapons in the air.

"Heave to and down sail!" the gunman in the white boat called out as he whizzed by. The gunman in the red boat simply fired his gun in the air and grinned.

"What do we do?!" Vinnie nervously asked. "They've got machineguns!"

"Stay calm, laddie. Harry N' me know our trade, don't we Harry?"

"I'm a barber, MacPherson, not a bloody marine!" Harry Flood replied from just inside the companionway hatch.

"Yes but you're also a rare, fine shot, Harry! Took second place in last year's turkey shoot, didn't you? Beat all those young lads with their fancy scopes."

Harry barked out a laugh and stepped onto the deck. "Ya, but you still took first place. What is it now? Three years running?"

"Four, Harry, but I'm not one to brag, you ken?"MacPherson turned to Becky and winked. "Now, captain, if you can just hold the craft steady, Harry n' me will do our best to discourage these rude fellows. Harry lad, you take the shooter in the white boat n' I'll handle the lad in the red one." This was followed by another wink in Becky's direction. "I'll pretend he's 'Fat Willie' in a big red coat!"

Becky nodded and heeled the boat over to cut across the driving wind. As the two motor boats raced around again the pair of deer hunters opened fire.

***