Our End Of The Lake: Surviving After The 2012 Solar Storm (Prepper Trilogy) (45 page)

Boudreaux was happily ordering everyone about to fill his kettle full of water and hook up his propane etc. While he took a giant syringe and was injecting one of the turkeys saved for him full of some concoction he said was also good for growing hair on your chest. I noticed they had a couple of those steel camp grills getting fired up too where they were going to cook some venison steaks and someone had a pit made in the ground with a fire burning down in it that I guess they were going to slow cook the roasts like you do when cooking a hog in the ground.

I saw Donnie engaged in a deep conversation with several people and he had some small stacks of silver coins in front of him that he would point to occasionally.

I guess he is trading or banking so I won’t go meet those folks just yet I thought

Seems everyone knows my name but the occasional quick introductions left a jumble of names in my head that I hadn’t associated with the faces yet. Seems most were related in some way and that southern way of giving you the lineage of the person with a couple names before getting to the persons real name just got me confused. This is Michael’s son that favors his momma side Juliet’s Cousin Trevor boy Monroe, his name is Billy or some such introduction would just leave me saying pleased to meet you and not remembering his name at all 5 minutes later.

I knew the women would remember every last detail so if I had a question about somebody I would get clarification of who’s who later.

I went over to where Boudreaux was pulling the feathers out of his turkey with a vengeance after dipping it in the boiling water. I hate the smell of feathers after that process and got on the upwind side of him.

” I hear you staying in Bernie’s place and he sort of gifted it to you all “Boudreaux said and had me help him get the kettle of water off the fire and proceeding to singe the pin feathers off the turkey which smelled worse for the dipping process.

“You know Bernie? Small world isn’t it” I said to him and proceeded to tell him how I come to know him and Roland.

“When you going up to visit them again? I got two horses up there on Roland’s place I would like to get. Well my horse and Beverly’s, we board them up on his place and go riding and stay in that pond cabin sometimes” Boudreaux said dumping the water out of his kettle and then refilling it with oil.

“Well depending on this party’s outcome, I might do it in a day or two. I got some business to discuss with them maybe” I offered.

“I heard about your lowering the prices thing, I don’t think it will work but I agree we got to establish someway to trade some hard money around here. I understand the part if you said gas was ten cents silver, that would be about $2.50 a gallon based on melt value, but I think you want to make gas 4 cents a gallon? Or at least that’s what that old shyster you got working the crowd is trying to do or explain it that way. Anyway he is offering 20 cents for 5 gallons which seems too cheap to me; course up here silver is rarer than gas, so maybe there is a point to it all.” Boudreaux said and we went to get a glass of the joy juice Jack and I had mixed up that was in the cooler next to where Donnie was still trying to explain our banking structure.

“Get Donnie to explain it in more detail to you later, I got to go through the same song and dance with Roland and Bernie if he gets everyone in agreement” I told him not wanting to try to wrap my head around how complex it was just to get started on my plan at this moment.

“Let’s go check how much time they got left on those garbage can birds. A lot of watches don’t work these days and I want to know how they’re timing them.” I told Boudreaux as I walked over to where Frank and Jeremy were standing watch on them.

“Hey Frank. Who is official time keeper on cooking those birds?” I said watching the heat waves coming off the cans.

“I guess that would be Jeremy, there an old wind up alarm clock he has over on the table there set to go off at an hour and a half. Its the only working time piece we got and we are not sure its even right, He set it by the sun at high noon one day and that’s been official time over on this end of the lake ever since. I am guessing we got about 15 minutes or so until we have our first look see.” He said and asked Jeremy to go check the time.

“Hey David we don’t have but a few old silver coins on this side of the lake. We got some old gold jewelry that the women folk may or may not give up and I haven’t had time to sit down with Donnie and figure out what the hell a Bernie buck is yet, sounds like a scam to me.” Frank said regarding me and watching Boudreaux acting like he was trying to use x-ray vision to see the baking turkeys.

“ Its not a scam, we can call the currency that our silver backs whatever you all want, that’s just a name we picked for it to kind of honor Bernie for all his help to us. Look I tell you what; here is a five dollar roll of mercury dimes. You are now the treasurer on this side of the lake for now. That represents 13 Bernie bucks that the underlying roll of silver backs or 130 hours of labor or equivalent trade goods. The going rate on Bernie Bucks is 1 hour of labor for 10 cents redeemable in silver when ever called for. No leveraging your Bernie Bucks. There has got to be enough silver on hand at all times to back them up. If you need more hours of work or trade goods, then you have to come to our bank so we can create it. The bank makes a fee on that but it will be nominal. You take those $5.00 worth of dimes and distribute them equally to the heads of the households represented here if they want some credit to buy that beef Donnie brought with him. Write their names down in a book what they owe in Bernie Bucks and trade them amongst yourselves or whatever. Donnie will tell you the details” I said while Donnie looked at the roll of coins unsure if he wanted to get involved in my scheme.

“How much is your beef?” Boudreaux asked

“ 20 cents a pound in Bernie bucks which equals two hours work or say 4 cans of tomatoes or whatever we decide they are worth” I said still trying to figure out an easier way to do this.

“So to cash in my Bernie bucks for 1 silver dime how much is it?” Boudreaux asked making me scratch my head for a minute much to his amusement

“Uh 2.6 hours I make it. Let’s see 5.00 silver equals 130 hours work, divide that by 50 coins in a roll. Yea that’s right” I told Boudreaux

“There has got to be an easier way to figure this” Frank said

“I know, I agree with you, but we are limited to the cash we can circulate around here and still make things affordable. Today lets eat and we figure it out later.” I told them totally frazzled by the conversation.

Donnie wandered over and said it was just too complicated to do things with the Bernie bucks and said we were probably just going to have to say 10cents an hour was 10 cents an hour silver and be done with it. I said I agreed but wanted to talk about it more. And was glad the alarm clock went off signaling the turkeys were done.

We pulled the cans off the birds and saw that they were cooked to perfection. Tender and juicy and about falling off the bone while giving off a wonderful aroma. The unveiling of the birds made everyone come over and stare at the sumptuous spectacle. We transferred the turkeys via garbage can lids to a sheet plastic covered concrete table and the ladies of the assembled groups organized a line that swung by the turkey table and over to the other table holding the fixings that went with it they had prepared and after a man named Samuel lead a little prayer of Thanksgiving for today and tomorrow, we all dug into the feast as Boudreaux wandered around eating off his plate and telling everyone to leave room for his Cajun fried turkey but his words feel on deaf ears as everyone wolfed down the meal that was unforeseeable until today.

“I got to go get Jack, and swap out the duty” I told Sherry

”I hate you gotta go so soon ,they say they going to play some music later and we can stay with them overnight if we want to and they would make a place for us” Sherry replied wanting to stick with the festivities for the evening.

“I don’t want you to be trying to sail that boat at night so stay over if you want. I will make Jack spell me later on and comeback for a bit, so save a dance for me, if you will. If you don’t mind, will you fix Jack a plate, while I say my farewells?” I told her and went to check on my mom.

“David, I’d just soon sleep on my side of the inlet tonight unless everyone is staying and Lois feels the same way” Mom said to me and getting weary from the heat and all the activity.

“That’s fine, Jack will be coming back to swap out with me in a few hours or you can come back home with me now if you feel like it.” I said thinking it would be best if she just came on with me.

“If Jack only stays a few hours, I just soon stay here a bit longer and get to know everybody better, these are some really nice folks David.” she said having missed talking with new people since our group departure from Montgomery.

“I am sure he will go along with that, I am sure Lois will want to settle in by then too. Well have a good time.” I told her and gave her a kiss on the cheek to make her happy.

“Boudreaux, save me some of that special turkey you are fixing, I am going after my chow hound buddy. Are you staying the evening or are you needing to get home tonight?’ I asked him trying to coordinate my shuttle service.

“Beverly and I are going to use one of the vacant houses over here for the night, I saved your buddy some crawdads he said passing me a Ziploc. Look at that dog over there, he loves kids but I don’t think he can keep up anymore.” He said pointing to the hound who had his tongue lolling out of his mouth sitting in the shade watching the youngsters who like most kids of their age had boundless energy for running around in any kind of weather.

“I will take you back in the morning and see you a bit later on this evening. You can tell me where you caught those crawfish, I am not familiar with what is creek and what is lake around here” I told him and grimaced at the amount of red pepper he had seasoned them with as I stole one of Jacks crayfish.

“You need me, I be there.” he said and held up his 30-30 to make a point.

“I appreciate that Boudreaux, all the best” I responded and headed down to the dock and cast off and headed for the compound.

Jack must have been looking my way with the binoculars because he was Johnny on the spot waiting for me on the pier by the time I got to the center of the inlet waiting on me.

“How goes it! You got everything all cooked yet?” Jack said catching my bow line.

“Yeah, everything’s done and lots of it, I got you a plate Sherry fixed for you and a bag of crawdads that a man called Boudreaux fixed especially for you if you want to tie on the feed bag before you get there.” I said passing him the chow I brought.

“ I will sit with you for a minute” he said and took a seat at the umbrella table we had out on the dock and pulled the foil off his plate and opened his bag of crawfish.’

“Go get me a fork or something, if you don’t mind, that is if you didn’t bring one already” he said starting to peel a crawdad and looking hungry.

“Oh here,” I said retrieving one of those little utility packs everyone saves from takeouts.

“Damn that’s some spicy crawdads, taste good though. What else did he season them with besides the pepper?” Jack said trying to identify the underlying flavors.

“I don’t know, he has a bunch of “File`” (sassafras) in it though, I recognize the taste, something citric but I don’t know what it might be” I replied watching him grabbing a bit of turkey with his hand next and forgoing for the fork he had asked for.

“This Turkey is good! You weren’t kidding about how tender it would be.” He said and finally opened his utensils from the package and grabbed a fork, Yum I like these beans too, what kind of meat they got in them?” he said going after the molasses heavy pile in front of him.

“Sherry chopped up some of the backstrap off that deer in them for you. I tell you what; everywhere you look over there somebody is working on cooking something. It’s a shame we don’t have any refrigeration because there is going to be leftovers a plenty even with you coming for a visit” I told him while watching him doing a magic trick by making the food disappear almost before I got done talking.

“This is the best we had in I don’t know when” Jack said ready to be off and get some more.

“Hey Lois and Mom want to come back home in a few hours, you got any problem cutting your time off short? Also I was thinking about staying the night over there” I said for him to consider being the all night security for the compound.

“Alcohol must be flowing free over there; sure I’ll stay no problem.” Jack said grinning and jumping into the boat.

“I appreciate it Jack, go have a good time and find someone named Beverly who is hanging out with that Cajun, she has some peaches that she put up that are as sweet as honey” I told him and he cranked the motor and looked like he was in a race to get to the other side of the lake.

I need to enlist Boudreaux to teach me how to navigate this lake. I know there are several small towns I can get to by water and possibly do some bartering at, but I don’t have a clue what condition I will find them in. Maybe I could just trade at different parts of the lake and not bother with getting too close to what might be dangerous territory I debated with myself
.

I better start my patrol now and walk my perimeter a bit I decided and grabbed my AR and started wandering the shoreline. I was careful to keep an eye on the water so I could spot the perch and little bass moving about so I could get a feel for their behavior patterns when next I went fishing. I saw a big bass jump out in the channel and it always bugged me we couldn’t cast out that far. That light on the end of our pier now should help matters some. I probably ought to think about turning it on tonight as a boat guide but it was pretty early yet and wouldn’t even get dark until about 7.30. It’s been a good day all things considered.