Man Camp (17 page)

“You
what
?”

“I hugged a bunny to death. At least I think I did. It was back in kindergarten. I hugged it and hugged it, then it went limp. Next thing I knew, Miss Atmore came over and took Fluffy away.”

“Luce?”

“Yes?”

“You do understand that these two stories are not remotely alike, right? Mine is about humiliation. Yours is about . . . well, I’m not even sure what yours is about.”

Lucy struggles to think of a better story.

“Luce?”

“Yes?”

“I’m really scared.”

“I am, too, but we’re going to be fine,” Lucy assures her. “We have plenty of water and can survive without food for a week. Besides, by now the men must know we’re missing and are looking for us.”

“We
think
they know we’re missing. What if Beatrice never told them?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Besides, Cooper knows.”

Martha hears a sound. “What was that?”

They both listen hopefully. Nothing.

Martha shrieks. “I just felt something slither against my leg.”

“Calm down. It was probably just a salamander.”

“A salamander is
not
okay,” Martha says. She’s quiet for a moment. “I’ll call my mother every day. I’ll quit smoking. I’ll go to church. I’ll stop—”

“What on earth are you doing?” Lucy says.

“Praying,” Martha says. “It’s something we lapsed Catholics do in a pinch.”

Lucy hears a noise in the distance and shushes Martha. The muffled sound of dogs barking deep in the caves echoes softly in their chamber. “I bet it’s them! We’re here!” Lucy shouts. “We’re over here.” She grabs the flashlight and turns it on.

Within moments, Tor and Tap are splashing toward them, wagging their tails.

“Good boys,” Martha says, stroking their heads. “You are such good, good boys.”

Soon after, they hear the sloshing of larger animals, and Adam and Jesse pop their heads out of a tunnel, aiming bright spotlights at them. Adam rushes over to Lucy and takes her in his arms. “Baby, I was so worried about you.”

Lucy burrows her face into his neck.

“You’re a real hero, larva,” Martha says, hugging her brother. “Who would have guessed that you’d go into a cave for me? Thank you.” She looks around to see if Cooper is part of the rescue party.

He’s not.

On the walk back to the farmhouse, Adam tells Lucy about the foreclosure sign. They are walking hand in hand, several paces ahead of Martha and Jesse. “Some serious shit’s going on,” he says. “I don’t know what, but I think it’s safe to say Cooper’s in trouble.”

Why didn’t Cooper tell me?
Lucy wonders. She looks over her shoulder at Martha, who’s walking beside her brother and looking at the ground.
This is why Cooper has been distant around
you,
Lucy realizes. She hangs back, hooks arms with her despondent friend, and pulls her aside. “I’ve found out what the problem is,” Lucy says, repeating to Martha what Adam has just told her. “It must be what’s been distracting Cooper. I bet it’s why he’s at the bank right now.”

Martha looks at her blankly.

“Don’t you get it?” Lucy says. “Your weaverbird can’t pursue you until his nest is in order.”

CHAPTER 11

“The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.”

Ann Landers

“SHAME ON YOU TWO for worrying everyone like that!” Beatrice scolds, winking slyly at Lucy and Martha when they return from the caves.

It’s past two-thirty when the group finally sits down to eat lunch and devours the ham-and-cheese sandwiches that Beatrice and Bryce prepared. The men are preoccupied with the farm’s predicament, but unable to speak openly about it in front of Beatrice. They sit in silence wondering what, if anything, they can do to help. The women are also subdued, embarrassed at needing to be rescued for real. Cooper is delayed at the bank, but calls to arrange for the campers to meet him at the Sleepy Creek Pistol Range in an hour for the target practice he promised.

“Chop, chop, ladies,” Beatrice says when the group is finished eating. “Let’s clear this table and get to work on our party.”

Martha bristles at the word
our,
and starts collecting dishes. She glares at the men, who make no move to help. At home, any one of them would get up, but here it’s as if it doesn’t occur to them, not even to her extremely well-trained brother.

“And gentlemen,” Beatrice says in a singsongy voice, “I have a little surprise for you. Tomorrow, I’m going to teach you how to two-step.” She gives a quick demonstration, gracefully two-stepping halfway around the table to a full stop behind Bryce’s chair. “In my opinion, there’s nothing more appealing than a man who knows how to dance.” She places her hands on Bryce’s shoulders. “But I’m warning you, once you get a taste for Southern belles, you’ll never go back to those Yankees again.”

Some silverware tumbles off the plate Martha’s carrying and clatters to the floor.

Beatrice smiles as if just realizing her faux pas and adds, “Present company excluded, of course.”

THE SLEEPY CREEK PISTOL RANGE is at the northernmost edge of the Manasseh Valley, a good twenty miles from Tuckington Farm, and the drive gives the campers time to talk and plan. They’ve had all day to chew on the meaning of bank meetings and foreclosure notices and now they’re eager to dust off their arsenal of high-tech gadgets—laptops, GPS devices, HP calculators, BlackBerrys, and Palm Pilots—and help. They’ll show Cooper that city boys know a thing or two.

“Let’s start with what we know,” Adam says, surveying the truck’s occupants. “We have a businessman, a news producer, a historian, an advertising executive, and”—he pauses for a moment when his eyes land on Jesse—“a children’s book editor. And the problem at hand seems to be that—”

“Look, if we don’t move more quickly,” Kurt interrupts, “Cooper will lose his home by the time we assess the situation.”

“Well, let’s dive in then,” Adam says, looking into the backseat, where Simon and Walter and Bryce are squished together, various electronic devices on their laps. “Simon, you did research before coming down here. Tell us everything you know about dairy farming.”

Pleased to be called upon first, Simon clears his throat and announces that the history of dairy farming in the country is not an uplifting story. “Most small farmers have been driven out of business, thanks to a set of antiquated rules and regulations.” He shuts his eyes and launches into a lengthy explanation of how a Byzantine milk-pricing system developed by the federal government in the 1930s, coupled with a thirty-year freeze on the wholesale price of milk, have made it impossible for most family farms to stay in business.

“How have any farms kept afloat if that’s the case?” Jesse asks.

“The usual stuff,” Simon answers. “Government subsidies, growth, economies of scale.”

Jesse’s not sure what any of that means.

Adam jots down a note:
Would expanding operations increase profit
margins?

“Despite our country’s impressive population growth,” Simon continues, in full lecture mode, “there are fewer farmers now than there were at the time of the Civil War. In fact, it’s accurate to say that they’ve become a statistically insignificant number.”

Kurt rolls his eyes. “I don’t see how this relates to the crisis at hand.”

“Well, it could be helpful to know if Cooper’s milking the same number of cows as his father and grandfather did, for instance,” Adam says.

Kurt passes a small truck. “I’m all for due diligence,” he says tersely, “but Tuckington Farm is under
siege
here and we need to take action. We’re leaving on Saturday, and there’s no way we’re going to become experts on the dairy-farming industry by then. What we need to do is get Cooper to explain what led to the foreclosure notices and how much time the bank is giving him. Next, we need to see his books and figure out a plan.”

“But Cooper hasn’t even let us know that there’s a problem,” Adam says. “How do you propose we get him to open up?”

“We just tell him we know he’s fucked and that we’re ready to help. Hell, as you said, there’s some pretty impressive brain-power in this truck.” Kurt glances at his reflection in the rearview mirror. “Just because some small-town bank lobbed a bomb his way doesn’t mean we can’t send up a few missiles of our own.”

“My feeling is that we have to approach Cooper with care,” Adam cautions. “If he wanted our help he’d have asked for it.”

“The man’s whole world is about to implode. What he needs is straight talk, not kid gloves,” Kurt insists, gripping the wheel tightly. “And we can’t help him without the facts.”

Jesse, sitting between Kurt and Adam, can’t take the tension and starts rummaging through the glove box, where, amid the usual debris of maps, receipts, and registrations, he finds a cow-bell and a photo of a young Cooper holding his father’s hand.

Adam takes the photo from Jesse and studies it closely. Cooper is about seven and he and his father are standing in front of the Cow Palace, both looking incredibly proud. The inscription on the back reads:
Cooper’s first milking, 1972.

“I have an idea,” Bryce says from the backseat. “To get our creative juices flowing, let’s brainstorm!”

Kurt slaps a palm to his forehead.

“We do this in advertising all the time,” Bryce tells the men. “Just free-associate. Be open and nonjudgmental.”

“This isn’t a game,” Kurt yells.

“Come on,” Bryce says. “Anyone? Just toss out the first crazy idea that pops into your head.”

“How about Walter gets NBC to do a special on Tuckington Farm?” Simon suggests.

“Right,” Kurt guffaws. “The headline: ‘Tuckington Farm Exists.’
60 Minutes
will be pissed they didn’t break the story.”

“Ignore him,” Bryce says.

“What about creating an adjunct business, like a bed-and-breakfast or dude ranch?” Jesse suggests.

“Great!” Simon says. “And I’m sure we could tie it to any number of historically significant Civil War battles fought in the vicinity. That might even dissuade developers from trying to build.”

“Or Lucy could find an endangered bird,” Jesse says.

“Loosen up a bit more,” Bryce says. “Think outside the box.”

Walter pokes at his BlackBerry. “How about harvesting bull semen and selling it over the Internet? Is Pinckney a pedigree?”

“This is ridiculous,” Kurt says. “Haven’t any of you
ever
run a business? A lemonade stand even? The rule for profit is simple: raise production, lower costs.”

“That’s not all there is to it,” Bryce says. “Production is only half the game; selling is the other half. In advertising, you have to find what we call the ‘unique selling proposition’ of a product.”

“It’s
milk,
Bryce,” Kurt says. “There’s nothing unique about it.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Bryce says. “Think Starbucks. Why do we pay four bucks for something we could buy elsewhere for one? Or two bucks for bottled water when tap water is free? It’s about quality and branding and targeting your market.” He draws a quick sketch of an old-fashioned milk bottle with a smiling cow on the label. “Tell me city folks won’t pay out the wazoo for milk in fancy glass bottles,” he says, presenting his illustration to them. “Slap on a label that says ‘Fresh from Tuckington Farm,’ and
ka-ching.
”

Jesse tries to estimate how much he spends on organic produce at Whole Foods, a store so expensive that his sister calls it Whole Paycheck. “Bryce has a point.”

“Gentlemen,” Adam says, trying to diffuse the tension, “I don’t think these approaches are mutually exclusive.”

“Come on, Kurt,” Bryce says. “Throw out an idea.”

“I’m afraid I can only think inside the box on this one,” he says. “I’d like to get some accurate numbers from Cooper, spend a little time with my calculator, and get my banker to secure some kind of short-term low-interest loan or sale-and-lease-back plan that would give Cooper an infusion of cash up front and get him back on his feet.”

Kurt’s realism silences the men.

“Then we figure out what needs to be done differently around here,” he adds.

Adam stares out the window. The sun is making its afternoon journey and its light slants across the hills, giving them a yellow glow. He lets his eyes relax and his mind wander, and tries to connect the dots and develop a behavioral-economy model that would explain Tuckington Farm’s failure.

Kurt takes the Clover Hollow exit off the state road and says, “Where to now?”

Jesse studies the directions. “I’m not sure,” he says, getting fidgety again. “Cooper’s directions don’t make any sense. ‘Exit at Clover Hollow and drive five miles past where the
old
Same station
used
to be. Then hang a left onto Lee Street, just beyond the frame house that once
was
the Hitching Post. From there, take a right into the
old
Farber’s Pharmacy and park in the lot behind it.’ ”

Adam makes another note:
Could the crisis at the farm relate to
Cooper’s being stuck in the past?

In Clover Hollow, they get directions to the pistol range and soon are where they’re supposed to be, parked beside Cooper’s truck in front of a nondescript beige warehouse. They enter the range through a long corridor bordered by glass cases filled with pistols and ammunition, at the end of which is Cooper, engaged in an animated conversation with the burly old man behind the register. On the counter in front of him are half a dozen guns, headphones, goggles, and a stack of human-silhouette targets.

Cooper sees the men and waves them over. “You guys are going to love pistol practice. There are few things that relieve stress more than shooting up one of these,” he says cheerily, holding up the target, a poster of a blue block person, round head atop rectangular body, five concentric ovals dissecting its torso. “These demarcate the kill zone,” he tells them, using his gun as a pointer. “Hit anywhere in here and you do some major damage to vital organs, chances are, killing your victim.” He gestures to the areas outside the circles. “Hit out here and you only wound your man; he can still shoot you back.”

Adam wonders how Cooper can be so cavalier, given the gravity of the situation at the farm, and concludes that this, too, must be part of the problem.

The campers don their goggles and headphones, and follow Cooper into the range, where they pass alleys with older couples, men with their girlfriends, even whole families.

“Just another wholesome afternoon of teaching little Bobby how to kill,” Bryce jokes.

The majority of the lanes, however, are filled with lone men shooting rapid-fire at targets sporting real images: Osama bin Laden, Hillary Clinton, Dr. Phil. Three men shoot .44 Magnums, guns so powerful that the campers’ headphones compress against their ears when rounds are fired.

“Serial killer, serial killer, serial killer,” Adam whispers as he passes these guys.

The gear is slightly disorienting, especially the headphones, which amplify voices one moment and turn off entirely the next to protect them from sudden loud sounds; it’s the audio equivalent of a strobe light. The guns feel heavy and cold in their hands.

Settling into the alley farthest from the entrance, Cooper clips one of the blue silhouette sheets onto a pulley system and flips a switch that sends the target down the alley. “You hold the gun like so,” he says, clutching it in his right hand with his arm extended almost straight. “And you lock your left hand around your right. Then relax, release the safety, square your target in the sight, and squeeze the trigger.” Cooper squeezes and squeezes and squeezes, firing every round in his magazine with brass shell casings ejecting in all directions, ricocheting off the walls. Finally, he stops, lowers his gun, and flips the switch, bringing the target forward. Fifteen holes are tightly clustered in the two centermost rings.

Kurt lets out a whistle. “Damn, that’s some shooting.”

Cooper grins. “Not too bad, if I do say so myself. I’m going to unload another magazine and then set you guys up in your own alleys.”

The campers nod, but only politely, and when Cooper turns his back to shoot again, they look at Adam to initiate the conversation.