No Good or Bad Men or Women

No Good or Bad Men or Women

       By Ribbon Ribeye Reimer

                  Nettie noffered ninety ninja's nookie
               Celia kindly curried Krajek's cookie
               Brian bindled Betty Bradford's bootie
               Sammy sail-surfed Summer's scented spoonie


So sang Lewis to Demi one day by the river Thames where he had taken the girls to enjoy a picnic on a brilliant summer’s day. Their parents were not there to hear him and that was good. Demi hardly understood anything but she understood that and that was bad. Because she liked it and wanted to try her hand at all the implieds. Not only her hand. She was precocious. That was a good word for her. Simply precocious. You cannot call a canary stupid for not reading Sarte. You may not claim with any credulity Fido’s ignorance because he resists barking out versions of Mozart’s more difficult numbers. Neither have you the right to make any logical connections between the sleepiness of cats and the general state of their intelligence. All of the above are forbidden anyone with a sense of purpose and direction in this western world. But you would have been right to call Demi not only mildly unresponsive to cognitive stimuli, but profoundly immobilized by that particular manifestation of energy. She excelled at stretches, naps, scratches, shut-eyes, lie-downs, zees, massages, sheet-foldings, languidities, Lazy-boys, lawn-sprawls, lap-lays, head-rests, rubbings, tubbings and many other sorts of easy-goingness the practice of and so even a mild perfection at an even slightly ambitious individual would have shunned. She, not being one of these latter, however, did excel at and did practice all of them both.

       On the given day Lewis ventured forth with his wallet slung over his shoulder, a nutting crook in hand, old clothes (husbanded at his mother’s insistence) and a mysterious something or other tucked into the pockets of his large overcoat. He wore an overcoat because of the weather that, coming down straight from the Bay of Biscayne, tempered anyone walking on the moors. Tempered: that is, put into a bad temper if that particular subject of a hypothetical scrutiny had forgotten to throw on a warmer wrap of the sort with which the truculent and thoughtful Lewis had provided himself. Straight away as he stepped out of the small cottage on Lady Cherry’s Downs, not far from the same pub at which Blind Bill gave to the Captain the black spot, a black cat moseyed mildly from the neighbour’s hedge and slipped indifferently across the road at Lewis’s feet. Lewis said not a word but picked up a stone and threw it into the bushes to startle the feline and let it know that he was not a soul to be tampered with. He personally would have none of this fear of black cats. Lo and behold, the stone went through the neighbour’s pantry window. Lewis heard it crash. He glanced neither quickly left nor right to see if anyone had noticed. He retained his composure entirely, compromising his dignity only to the extent of tucking down and picking up his pace to take advantage of the effect of distance between his person and that of the offended.  

       Travelling thus with unusual alacrity Lewis shortly arrived at the door of his charges. He found them ready and waiting, huzzaed loudly toward the treetops, and with a flourish and a wave at no one in particular he and his two consorts kicked off their adventure, conscious only a little of a mile and a half of ground to cover before the grass received and comforted their tired bottoms. The girls chattered as brightly as the grackles above them. They called out riddles to their guardian as they walked and then sang a song for a few minutes or more, suddenly turning to pick wild flowers that they imposed on Lewis to carry for them, if nowhere else then in his lapel button they said, winking and smiling, tucking them in and running off after some new pursuit. After which they hurried far ahead and sat waiting under a tree in the shade or by a knoll with a shady side, for it was hot and the sun already beat down, early as it was. When he caught them up they implored him to lie down a minute or two and offered their laps to rest his head. He relented invariably, and not only for a minute, but for five or ten. 

       When they reached the river in an hour or so the day had declared it necessary to open their lunch basket to discover its insides. There they found the most splendid repast. Bread, freshly baked by Cookie herself! Cheeses of three or four scented varieties, one decidedly ancient, passed nose to nose with laughter and pointings. A small spice cake announced its deliciousness so sharply that they all had to keep each other from reaching for it. Sandwiches wedged about, cut in triangles of the sort that girls especially enjoy. Ah, and two bottles of wine lay red and dark, cooled in wet linen, the corks already loosened by a thoughtful kitchen maid. And other small delights tickled, enough to keep them happy for all of the many hours of daylight left to them.

       They fell to with not a single thought of restraint. They tasted viands, cracked nuts, knacked sausage, sampled drink, slurped jellies and sauces, spooned up jams, tilted tankards, snuck tidbits, tapped bottles, and then really began to dig in and help themselves. They feasted till they could eat and drink no more and leaving the remains of their dinner to fend for themselves for now, they thought over what should come next. Demi felt sleepy at once and said so. She insisted quite certainly that she would consider nothing else until that appetite, too, had been allayed. Placing her curls and forehead down on Lewis’s lap, she fell asleep, small snores emanating from her nosthrils. He stroked her hair and lightly patted her shoulder with a similar attention he would have allowed his cat, Simms. Demi’s sister, Cynthia, younger, more vivacious and energetic, and petulant for only a forgivable minute, hurried off down the bank to watch the waves. Her skirt blew and flew in the breeze as she ran from them. Her legs painted each bush she passed with sunlight. Lewis, taking quite seriously his guardianship of the sleeping damsel, resisted sleep himself, nodded his head, shook his head, and then, finally, when he could bear no more, laid down, too, beside the girl. His arm encircled her waist and even before his head had settled he slept.

       When he awoke it was already late and the birds had stopped singing. The girls were both lying on the blanket sound asleep, one behind him with her arm cast over his shoulder, the other before him with his arm over her. He roused them, calling out how late it was. 

“We must leave for home at once,” he said, beginning to gather their things. The girls obeyed unwillingly, but soon they all set out. Before long, taking less time for stops and larking, they reached Mumford Grange where they parted company. Next, he got to the hedge where the cat had startled him. Soon after, he made his own cottage that, he saw to his utter amazement, had burned to the ground in his absence. Only the smoking ruins of the chimney and an old steel cupboard still stood. The rest resembled a sand castle in downpour.