These guys are all accustomed to human interaction and lead pretty enviable lives outside the show ring on farms and lifestyle blocks.  None seemed unduly perturbed by proceedings, something you might be able to ascertain from the pictures we took.  Another encouraging trend was the appearance of organic drenches and insecticidal agents on the sales table; birds both wild and domestic are subject to parasites, and the fanciers' world was previously awash in hardcore toxic compounds.  It's great to see them being relegated.

Chickens come in a dizzying array of shapes and sizes with Bantams representing the smaller end of the spectrum and heavy breeds being the largest.  Confusingly, some breeds come in two size versions so a trip round the various cage lanes can make you question your relationship with the physical universe as identical birds appear to shrink and expand every time you look away.  

How big is a chicken anyway?  A small Game-type bantam may be scarcely two hands high on tiptoes and so closely-feathered and elegant that it looks more like a tiny bipedal dinosaur than a bird, while the largest breeds are huge pillowy beasts with spangled bouffant manes and massive day-glow headgear.  We'll try to name the breeds depicted here but will undoubtedly get some of this shit wrong, so apologies in advance for our ignorance.  ABOVE a fine Chinese Silkie Bantam rooster with his alluringly gelatinous lilac wattles.

ABOVE  I think this is an Old English Game Bantam.  We were impressed with the hard-feathered lizardy Bantam varieties and will possibly end up getting some for our place, something we've been procrastinating about for a couple of years now.  While researching the various breeds I came across this piece on OEG bantams, with references to the inevitable cockfighting association and the tremendous peanut-headed secret-society bullshit that surrounds this moronic practice.  There are a few lulzs to be had.  BELOW  A fabulous Sussex breeding trio.  Swaggy.

ABOVE I think these guys are Appleyard Ducks, another first for us.  They were placid and enormous.
​BELOW the highly glamorous Cayuga.  Their plumage is like opalescent moiré satin.

Another chicken interlude.  ABOVE LEFT silver Sebright Bantam.  The hand-painted effect is called lacing.
ABOVE ​RIGHT an impressive Dorking rooster.  This is an ancient, possibly Roman breed ideally possessing five toes.  His comb speaks his truth.  BELOW  not sure about this guy... some sort of bantam; a Silkie variant?

BELOW  the Leghorn.  They're an Italian laying breed; I thought they were American meat birds, lol.  Durr.
BELOW THEM a ginger Buff Orpington rooster. We were hugely impressed by this breed; so buxom and bouffant.

Pigeons, which we know even less about than we do chickens.  Or ducks for that matter.  These are the 'fancy' breeds, bred for their exaggerated lines and jewel colours.  I do know that these puffy birds directly below are Pouters.

Another Rosecomb.  Look at his comb.  Look at it.

ABOVE I think this superior creature is a lavender Orpington rooster.  He glowed with otherworldly significance under the slightly creepy tungsten hall lighting and expressed the tranquility that is a breed hallmark.

It was nice to see so many contented and highly appreciated animals.  The decline in fowl-keeping was generally attributed to people abandoning rural lifestyles and to industrial egg and meat production, but I'd like to add that the hostile demeanour of certain factions of the bird-fancying establishment has been a problem too.  We've gotten attitude from overly-proprietary stalwarts at shows in the past despite our enthusiasm; possibly not an ideal approach to recruiting interested newcomers.  So while we were too busy taking fifty thousand chicken pictures to talk to many people, it was encouraging to hear from Tenoch that the NZ Bird Association members were very friendly and helpful and represent a great resource for anyone thinking about keeping birds.  You only need to watch a few Youtube posts by chicken enthusiasts to understand how the habit takes hold.

New Zealand NZPPCB page HERE    South Island NZPPCB page HERE    Dunedin Association page HERE
​
The show definitely renewed our chicken intentions.

Vapour II
'Code-based explorations of turbulent particle systems and vivid colour transitions'

I don't really know what that means but I don't think that matters.  See more of this great series here.

ink reader

​from a recent sci-fi, fantasy and mystery collection.  See more of Victo's work here.

L2R: Nars Dolce Vita pencil, Lipstick Queen Rose (Sinner), Bite Rhubarb, MAC Hot Tahiti,
​MAC Whirl, MAC Mehr, MAC Après Chic (LE).

Dolce Vita and Whirl are true mattes, Aprés Chic is medium-glossy and you can see Rose falls somewhere between.

Opal looked back at Edward as though fearing he would not follow her.  She glared pointedly at the wet brick leading down into the tar-black mouth of a loading bay and waited for him to precede her.  Its sickly rust and iodine odour was born in its proximity to the waterfront at the eastern end of Avalon, amongst the unflagged fishing and smuggling fleets becalmed at the head of the tide.  He stood in the midst of the lane, gazing down at the water tonguing the bluestone.  It had always impressed him darkly that the ocean could hold black as nothing else, wholly swallowing and espousing the reflected night.  Drizzle like the exhalation from some gaping maw wafted and clung to their clothing; Opal hissed to herself and humped her way down the broken steps without him into the vault beyond, where brick walls wept slime and a tin roof admitted streams of water that soaked into snaking cracks in the concrete floor.  Two caged utility lights beamed a white circle in the midst of the warehouse, steam rising from their housing before a curve of folding silver chairs.

A refrigerator truck had deposited its cargo of hungry bodies, still clad in the filthy sweats that had crossed the Mediterranean and Atlantic with them, a few clutching knotted plastic bags and water bottles.  They were younger than the usual trade, uniformly teenaged or just beyond; three dark-clad minders kept them together, punishing intransigence with stock prods and the foaming mouths of mastiffs held on stout, clattering chains.  Catchlights flashed in the back of the animals’ eyes as their great heads snapped at the foul air, the same dull flare written on the glasses overlaying the gazes of the more circumspect trio standing aloof by the truck.  Their habiliment and manner could not have presented more of a contrast to the battered vehicle or its cargo, turned out with the heartless, faceless polish of a luxury-brand catalogue.  Opal chose a chair and Edward sat down slowly beside her as still more of her nocturnal ilk arrived, complaining of the rain.  

Siobhan descended the steps on towering wedge sandals, draped in red feathers the weather had pasted into drooping tufts, face screwed in a pinched moue of suspicion.  It spat a cackle at the back of Opal’s head as it passed behind her and was lost amid its cronies while the smuggled youths were driven to the margins of the spotlight, their handlers using the dogs to push them, blinking and reluctant, before the arc of seated observers.  With the prods they singled out the first selection, a slight young man who might have fled Khartoum or Mogadishu, his red T-shirt sporting the name of a popular softdrink in a stroke of horrible irony.

"So much better than the local garbage, my god... it all comes though Italy, apparently.  How much would you love access to this every day?" Opal murmured, unwittingly rhetorical, craning her head toward the guesting Continental procurers in the hope of conveying some sort of acknowledgement.  It was obvious to Edward that their superlative supply chain had overcome much of the loudly-stated objection to their presence, at least amongst those susceptible to the persuasion penned in the glare before them.  The leathery reek of fear and slavering dogs dragged him back to a hundred such scenes of his own remembrance, from the dust-blown, mud-walled pens of oasis towns to the black filigree cages of French and Ottoman brothels, their inmates regarding him with the same voided expression.  His own eye made a dispassionate assay of the faces beneath the lamps, imposing criteria infinitely refined by repetition.  “I’ve made some calls on your behalf." Opal remarked.  "They're more than happy to set up a meeting and I would seize that day if I were you.”

She leant out from her seat to examine a girl shoved forward for consideration.  Having fled the Caucasus, she possessed the dark-eyed parochial beauty discerning princes had once sought for their harams; one of the gangsters groped his way into the spotlight and took hold of her head, prising back her lips and revealing her teeth as evidence of her robust wellbeing.  When she kicked him and almost wrested free the guard strapped her with a short black length of hose.  Edward tasted the ground with her, knowing every inch and moment of the cut dealt to her shoulder, blinking against the tail end of the blow that lashed around and caught their faces, the cold, remembered burn turning him toward the rain that wept in the doorway.  The brindle canine lunged, seizing the girl's thigh in its mouth and wrenching her on stiff, splayed legs across the concrete, her complaints climbing into high-pitched screams.  Opal sat back and muttered beneath the gurgling laughter from Siobhan’s contingent.  

“I'm sure you're aware the police are looking for Ms Frost as we speak over the small matter of mordida failure, in addition to the recent disappearance of her manager...”  Her eyes puckered into slits.  "Astonishingly stupid of you at this point in time.  So, to recap... dump the callgirl in a waste station somewhere, issue your brother with a trespass order and I want you to get rid of that maid... I don't like the eyes on that one.  She was a mistake."  Edward did not have to speak over the look he gave her, and Opal shook her head.  “That’s a shame for you, it really will be.  Expensive, too.  I've never liked the police... they're so difficult to manage once they're involved in anything... but sometimes we must do evil to effect good."

He stood and drew his coat together.  

"Don't ever come to the house again." he told her.  Glancing at Siobhan as the latter strove for a better view of their dispute, he departed alone, glad of the empty night that met him in the lane outside.
​
CONTINUED NEXT WEEK
© céili o'keefe  do not reproduce

We have agreed routines and I am not permitted to deviate.

Felix has the most discernment of any dog I've ever encountered.  He can tell the time to within about 5 minutes, knows exactly which of my thousand items of essentially featureless black clothing mean I'm staying home or going out, and if going out, which ones mean he will be coming with us.  Walking through the kitchen a certain way means I am going out into the exciting dog-positive garden and not just hanging boring washing.  A weekend is two days; three is extra and different.  

Most curiously of all, he seems to know the difference between visitors who are a one-off occurrence and those who are likely to be more regular, right from their first visit, treating the former casually but immediately engaging the latter in a far more considered program of study, ranking and approval.  Which reminds me how socially sophisticated an intelligent dog really is; their perception of subtle cues is far better than our own.  It must be difficult to accept the preeminence of our oafish verbal modus. 

I've only recently noticed the really nuanced range of glances he uses to try and direct our attention; the disparity in our height makes it difficult, I suppose.  The other day while we were minding Hamish (my mother's dog), I asked Felix where he was, and he led me down from the upper garden past the house, glancing briefly, but quite pointedly, at the kitchen door on his way to the front gate (where he was planning to bark at someone).  Hamish was inside on the couch.  It struck me that these indicative looks were in fact his primary means of communication, that he could tell me exactly where Hamish was in passing without taking me directly to him, as is our stupidly literal, anthropocentric expectation.

Placing too much emphasis on the wrong cues is a difficult habit to shake, but I think it might be an extremely valuable lesson.  Thanks, Foofy.

L2R: Beet, Stone, Nightmoth, Auburn, Soar, Magenta, Vino, Cherry, Brick warm sunlight

His interpretation of the 2016 year of the flaming monkey from the Chinese zodiac.

Zodiacs are bullshit but I'll always brake for flaming primates.

see more of his work here.

The orchard shivered with darting, olive-green birds and a loose mist of bees as Susan sauntered toward it with a bucket and a pair of scissors she had discovered in the garage.  The afternoon was hotter than she had anticipated though she was not especially inclined to return to the house for a hat.  Edward had made a generous, if hardly self-abnegatory offer of residence to Lilian and the two had passed the first half of the day relocating her few belongings, the process drawn out by delays that occurred both in his suite and in the shuttered garage.  It had been Susan’s resolution to find flowers for her rooms; so engrossed was she in the pursuit that she almost walked into a stranger while rounding the trees at the edge of the orchard.  Stepping back off the man’s shoes, she exclaimed and leant down to retrieve her bucket.  

“Nathaniel Shaw, Trident Security.” he told her, producing a tanned and manicured hand at which she stared, still struggling with his improbability.  "You’re...?”

“Susan.” she replied.

“Susan...?”  Her expression altered again at his use of her name, its kindred vowels afforded fulsome treatment.

“Susan the housekeeper.”

His smile broadened, full of handsome geniality.

​“Oh okay... good to finally meet you."  He set his hands on his hips and looked around them, nodding to himself.  "Interesting place... don’t get too many like this.  Been out here long?”
​
“I don't really know... you lose track of time.” she admitted.  He smiled so easily that the expression had been relieved of some of its effect despite its pulchritude.  “Why do we need a guard all of a sudden?”

His gaze shifted back toward the pool.

“I’m just walking the perimeter right now."  He watched her frown develop as she looked down at the grass.  "Keeping you all safe, I guess."  She shook her head at the gum he offered her.  "Can’t be easy, trying to keep a place like this square.  What part of England are you from?”

“You wouldn’t know it.”

“Always wanted to get over there one day... guess I never get the time.  So these guys... they’re okay?  I just found a new place out this way, so I don’t want to hear that they put you out for nothing...”  Susan bent slightly at the knees, looking through the orchard. 
“I couldn't really tell you... it’s a job and a place to doss.”  He held onto her gaze in the hope that he could stay her, but she had already entered into a move to pass him.
“What do you do for fun around here?”
“I’ll let you know when I find out.” she sighed.  Shaw stepped out of her way and turned with her, meeting the glance she aimed over her shoulder as she walked on toward the trees.

Having gained the orchard she turned south along an avenue of hornbeams that had once formed a pleached walk between the fruit trees and specimen plantings.  It had long since thrown off all constraint and sent its muscular boughs across the lane, casting a shade that cowed the grass and sheltered stands of ferny, speckled hemlock.  That someone had preceded her was apparent in the herbage crushed by careless feet and Susan followed them until the avenue opened into a clearing ringed by lemon-green magnolias, their quilted crimson fruit poised upon the fingers of their mannered branches.  Amid them crouched a large and rotund silver structure, its thick skin creased at the seams with the pressure of the air that held its turrets and spandrels aloft in bulbous association.  William lay on his back on the mattress-like floor, hair hanging over the edge while he read from a handwritten page.  She stood with her mouth open.

“Where did you get a bouncy castle?" she demanded, dropping the bucket. 

“Stoner party hire guy... four weeks for a short pound.” he confessed.  Beside him lay a chunk of drooling caramel-brown honeycomb on a platter of leaves.  “Don’t tell Ed... he hates plastic.  I had them push it over the wall.”  

She approached, wide-eyed, and smoothed both hands over the plump edifice, bending to inhale the evocative smell of its rubberized compounds.  William tucked the letter into his trousers.  

"Is it your birthday or something?" she laughed.
“This is my fortress of solitude.”  
“Oh...”  Susan straightened up as though to leave.
“My fortresses of solitude visiting hours are from one a.m to twelve fifty-nine a.m daily.” he laughed.  “Anything’s better than sharing a floor with the beast with two backs.”  

She shuddered.  

​"I just want to hide in a corner with a blanket over my head.”  

Smiling at the description, he made a gesture of invitation with both hands.

“Girls ride free.”

She clambered up, careful not to disturb his honeycomb.

“I just ran into a security guard.”   
"Mr Shaw...” he smirked.  “Nice piece.  Observant, conscientious... keeps it tight for the ladies.”
“Nosey.” she added, wrinkling her nose.  “Did you think he was fit?”  He lifted his brow and nodded as he sucked the honey sticking to his fingers.  “I suppose he is... I just hate security guards... wherever I’ve worked, they're the ones you need security from.  I’m so used to them being completely dodgy.”
“His vanilla doesn’t make you crazy for him?”  She shook her head.  “His lack of dodginess is... dodgy?  ¡Mierda, Christabel!  You're a hard woman to please.”
“I know.  Anyway...”  Susan clenched both fists and sucked in her lower lip, looking down at him and making a small humming noise of coiled anticipation.  

William sighed, rolling over, and they chuckled as they retired to either side of the castle, then launched themselves into the air, alternating landfalls pushing them higher until they began to surpass the walls and gain rolling views of the trees outside, arms out to expedite their ascents.  For a while they were content with moderate altitude and its various permutations, seeking them conscientiously with each other's aid, her flights floating the flesh loose from her bones at their weightless apex.  Susan flung herself against a wall then down onto her back, innards looping as he bounced her onto her feet; she shoved him face-first into the southern turret and lost control of her own trajectory, catching his shirt and exchanging it for his hands as he used his weight to draw them higher.  Her dress flew up around them in a china-blue flare.  On looking down she saw the floor drop so far away that she cried out, grasping his arms tightly.

"Tourner!" he laughed, letting her go and turning in a circle; she did the same, shrieking again through her hair as the garden reclined in a swooping curve, the sun's especial brilliance allowing her heart to stay behind amid the empty air as she descended.  Three times more she flew skyward, arms spread wide, her eyes streaming, the air a sugared pink inside her chest until she could endure it no more and threw herself down in a state of collapse, lying gasping on the pillowed silver.  William smiled and stalled himself, flipping down from the edge of the castle to reclaim the detritus scattered from his pockets.  His letter flapped beneath her arm and she shaded her eyes to glance at the diminutive, handwritten French in pale blue ink before handing it back to him.  He stepped over her and lay down.

“Bad news?” she asked, still breathless.  He nodded.  “I don’t even know what my friends are doing... I haven’t called anyone since I came over here... don’t know why.”

“Separation tranquility.” he suggested.  The phrase pleased her and she nodded to herself.  The sun lifted the loamy walnut scent of the shaded earth beneath them, the living leaves glowing a hundred greens and diaphanous cellophane golds, Susan losing herself entirely in contemplation of them.  William wished that he could share in her pellucid mood, his own thoughts poisoned by the missive that had come to him so full of the despair consuming its author, her bleak sentiments recorded in the strokes of her anachronistic hand.

His ruminations were disturbed by a bee that began to bumble around the castle, circling close to Susan and seemingly intent upon alighting in her hair.

“Get away!  It’s going to nip me!” she cried, rolling sideways.  He held out his hand and began to speak in a purring tone; the insect buzzed aimlessly for a moment before settling on his wrist and sitting still, wings shivering.  She wrinkled up her nose, regarding the furry miscreant’s apparent master with as much suspicion as the insect itself.  “What are you, king of bees?  Where did you learn that?”

“In Kham, when I was young."  Her naked disbelief solicited him further.  "If you want honey in the mountains, you have to climb up great big ladders made of vines and hair and hang off the sides of the cliffs, where the wild bees have their hives.  They’re the biggest, baddest bees on the planet... big as a baby’s arm... attention deficit bees, and they know you’re coming... you hang upside down with an axe and hack away while all these giant angry bees come out and sting the everliving shit out of you, so you either come down looking like a sausage with smallpox, or you learn to speak nicely to them.”  He pushed the comb toward her, watching her eye the broken, oozing mess doubtfully.  “You do like it... you just don’t know it yet.” 

Susan turned over onto her side and leant on her elbow, breaking off a piece for herself and attempting to blow off the grass adhering to it, before putting the whole thing in her mouth.  The strongly floral flavour of the honey melted into sweetness on her tongue and a perfume in her nose, redolent of lilac blooms and chapel candles, its waxy structures collapsing between her teeth.  She leant forward, letting a wad of wax drop over the side of the castle and helping herself to more.  William ate his own from the tips of his fingers, watching it fall from her chin and darken the front of her dress as she lost control of the piece in her hand.  

“Did your family leave when the Chinese came?” she asked.  He seemed puzzled.  "Tibet or wherever..."  William shook his head.  “So... they’re still there?”
“I don't know.”
"I can not for the life of me imagine your parents.” she smiled.  He shrugged and looked out into the trees.
“I only remember my mother.”
“You don’t speak to her?”
“No.”
“So... it really is just you and Edward...”  Susan was surprised to see him struggling so visibly with her questions, his softly-spoken monosyllables fending if not extinguishing her curiosity, and she became concerned that she had traded felicity for contention.  Reaching down into his jeans he took out the letter and handed it to her in a strange, autonomic concession.  “God no, William... it’s your business, not mine.” she assured him.  “It’s not that I don’t ever snoop or anything, but... I'm not that sort of nutter yet."  He returned it to his pocket.  "But since we’re on the subject of nutters, have you heard from Rache...”  The vehemence of his expression almost deterred her from continuing.  “I was just saying that you seem to have done a good job of putting her off.”  

He suppressed a smile.

​“He might never get work at a daycare facility, but Ed's death ray is a special fucking thing of beauty."  In her enthusiasm she had left a large blob of honey on the side of her face; he reached out and caught it with his finger, smoothing it in a salve over the bridge of her nose.  Her skin was hot with developing sunburn as he put the hand to her cheek.  “You’re burnt.” he smiled, adding another daub to the pink skin of her forehead.  “It stops blisters coming.”  She touched her face, still staring at his own, and confirmed his diagnosis absently, inclining her cheek against the coolness of his hand.
“Freckles.” she sighed.
"I love freckles."
"Because you haven't got any."

He leant toward her and licked a bead of honey from her chin, his lips meeting the corner of her mouth.         

​"Come out with me Christabel or I don't know what I'll do.” he told her, the words breeze-blown in her ear.  "I'll probably die and go straight to one-star hell, and you don't want that on your conscience... while we live, let us live."  

A shadow fell across them.  Lilian held out a telephone.

“For you.  Some foreign guy with a dirty voice.” she advised.  He accepted it and climbed to his feet, walking to the back of the castle to conduct the conversation in French.  The intruder studied the inflatable structure and then his companion with a frown.  “You got honey on your face.” she added.

Brushing herself off, Susan slid down and excused herself, stooping to collect her bucket.  Lilian turned to watch her go, waiting for William to conclude the discussion that had degenerated quickly into conflict.

"That looked pretty fucking chaste.  What gives, frankenslut?" she inquired.
"What's it to you, interruptingcow?  Are you all done in there now?  Need a medivac or should I just move out and leave you to it?"

Lilian took the phone from him and started back along the shaded lane.

​CONTINUED NEXT WEEK
© céili o'keefe  do not reproduce

Four birds, three wires.
I had a dream about them a while ago.

ice age

from a group of recent personal drawings.  See more of Reno's work here

A striped air bed repaired with aged tyre patches sank slowly beneath Susan in the middle of the pool, and she rolled off it, squinting into the sunlight rafting on the water.  She swam to the edge and began mining corn chips from the packet on the tiles, smiling at Lilian as the latter crossed the grass toward her in brief black underwear, pale hair knotted atop her head, frowning at the pheasants dozing like outlandish teapot cozies in their small, sun-struck conclave.  Dragging the lounge closer to the pool, she took out her cigarettes and sat down.  Susan was reminded by its proximity of something and smiled again.

“Did you hear about Rachelle the other night?  One of the bar girls said the whole place saw her having it away with William by the pool.  I was downstairs... I miss everything.”  

Nodding briefly, Lilian lifted a hand to shade her eyes.

“Don’t take it personally... Lamb and that crackhead stalker.  That shit’s not anything.”  Susan felt a warm, discomforting conclusion burning in her cheeks while she hauled out and sat on the stone, kicking her calves through the water.  “He’s into this whole other piece.”  Her companion looked over at her with an obscurely mocking expression.  "I’m not saying it’s not weird.... he doesn’t usually stop to like, emote on his way up a skirt.”

“He's... it's nothing." Susan sighed, rolling up the bag of chips and smoothing the plastic across her leg.  "He does it to everyone.  We get on alright, but there’s... I don't know... so much...”

“Irregularity?” Lilian suggested.  “Once you go freak, you don't go back, but then you’re stuck with all the fucking freaks in freakytown.  Lucky the sex is great, because there's no fucking utilities." she added, dropping her chin as she frowned at the house.  “But fuck it... I'm not gonna sell you someone who cage-fights for drug money.”  Susan’s mouth fell open.  “Google El Resto del Mundo... that’s his cage name." Lilian smirked.  She settled back into the lounge.  “Regularity is fine... don’t sweat it.  I'll get him to quit humping your leg.”   

The notion that Lilian had taken her dismay somehow to heart crept up on Susan and she qualified it cautiously, chipping at the blue polish on her thumbnail.

“It’s not... I do like him.  He's... strangely lovely, actually.  But I don't think I should, for some reason.  I just... I don't know."

Lilian shrugged.

​"Who the hell does?"


​
“Oh yeah... there she is, it’s the blonde...” Trent related, peering into the rear portion of the Lamb estate with field glasses as Lilian lay back on the lounge.  A stridulating cicada swung low over Josephine’s head, weaving through the air that weltered above them in a desperate attempt to elude a squad of sparrows.  She scratched at her neck where the heat worked on the crisp new fibres of her shirt collar.  “What she don’t know aint hurting her." he snorted to her silent disapproval.  "The tech guys got a wire on the beamer... they say the dark one puts her over the hood and gives it to her eight ways to fuckin Sunday.”  He waved the flies away from his face.  "Wouldn't mind a piece of that myself."  

Josephine looked up from the intercepts she had been studying as Nathaniel Shaw climbed the hill and came to a halt in the shade of the Range Rover, taking a moment to adjust his watch.  

"Shaw... Trent." she murmured, by way of introduction.  The two men looked one another over with a similar degree of distaste.

"You're..?"

​"What y' might call a consultant." Trent assured him.  "Fuckin Admin, and fuckin O'Connor."  He leant out to spit onto the ground beside Shaw's calfskin derbies.  "Shiny-assed bastard.  He's the dipshit who fired off that unit that got chunked in France... unsupported, no intel... guess I called that one right.  Fuckin orangutan could've called it." he sneered to himself.

“We need an ID on the women." Josephine informed them.

"I'll take a run at both females as soon as there's a solid window.  Has there been a decision about letting the local PD in on the two plantation Does?” Shaw inquired.

“O’Connor don’t want to risk it.  They were a few weeks dead anyway, one had his head just about popped right off, the other might’ve been female but they couldn’t say from lookin at it...” Trent related from behind the binoculars.  "These assholes don't get pinched anyways.”

Josephine lifted a bottle of water to her lips, its contents heated to an unpleasant degree and tainted by the taste of plastic, closing her eyes against the glare.  

"Anything more I should know?" the newcomer asked.

​“Sub One comes and goes, jumps the country on twelve different IDs, goes through the hubs then we lose him.  He's back, three to eight days later.  That's what he did in town, that's what he's doing now.  Sub Two's interactions look like buckshot at thirty metres... too many unknowns, far more than we could ever watch, so whatever he's doing is still his own business."

Shaw raised his own binoculars to his face, completing a sweep of the park with its great spread of tranquil deciduous shade and glittering pool.  Another woman appeared from behind the corner of the building, taking a seat on the grass beside the sun lounge with a bag of convenience food.  She wore a short dress in a faded cotton print over the dark, damp underwear that she had swum in and her posture devolved into careless repose.  Trent trained his scope on her.

“Who we got here?  Nice titties.”
“Resident maid.” Josephine stated, looking back to Shaw, who had finally removed his sunglasses.  She saw that his eyes were a lucky shade of dappled olive, and that he used them strategically.
"Anything worthwhile?"
"Related chatter." she admitted.
"Encrypted?"  Her hand rose to the edge of the laptop screen in an instinctive desire to close it against his inspection.
"They don't get into much on the wire and it's Sanskrit when they do."
"You can read that?"  Shaw chuckled as he walked out into the sunlight, shaking his head to himself.  “I’ll be dropping updates three times a day.”  He offered his hand and she shook it without looking back at him.

“Better get your ass up and go check in. ” Trent reminded him.  “You don’t get to un-fuck shit like this.”

Shaw replaced his glasses and began checking his phone messages, condemning Trent's injunction to oblivion before heading off down the access trail toward his own concealed vehicle.  They followed him with their binoculars to his park on the verge east of the gates, the blameless ease of his admission steeped in unreality.  Almost with Shaw’s removal around the far side of the house, the red Jaguar convertible departed the drive with two of its habitués.  

"The dark one’s come casual." Trent grunted.  "Redhead always looks like some crazy shitbird, but he don’t.  Something’s up.”  Josephine lifted her glasses once more from the hood, but the Jaguar slid out of sight around a bend.


​
​
William leant back against the slim trunk of the fir he had ascended, his bare feet gripping the branch he had entrusted with his weight, and peered down from the crown of the hill where the sombre plantation trees met the scrubby wilding growth clothing its margins.  They had settled some hundred yards uphill from the party clustered about the Range Rover, having climbed to the position on foot.  In a neighbouring tree his brother found his own vantage while William surveyed their surveyors with a number of abstracted frowns and head-turns, attempting to catch what they were saying on the breeze.

“She’s right about not being able to evaluate us against a simple deviant human model.” Edward remarked.  
“Tweedle Dum thinks we’re undead beatnik homersexual dope fiends.” 
“Sounds like they're tapping your car.”  

William smiled across at him.

“Where'd you put Orb?  You're fucking lucky Frost can keep her mouth shut.”
“Her intellect defies the cognitive paucity generally attributed to individuals of her particular tonsorial orientation.”  
"Lo siento, no hablo pendejo."  The furniture-polish scent of the foliage beneath them was broadcast by the afternoon, lending its colour to the cicadas' song.  “Christabel found blood in the kitchen again, but she’s cool about it... I told her it was a hipster fight.”
“You're lucky too.” said Edward.
“Why?”
“If she continues to mind her own business you won't have to drive her out to the plantation.”  
“How can you be so evil on a day like this?  And fuck you about Susan... if you’ve dragged Frost back to the swamp, I get to have a girlfriend too.”  The lack of audible response annoyed him.  “A whole few weeks with you and she’s into federal heat... what’s it going to be for your six month anniversary?  Home invasion bloodbath?  Three day SWAT siege?” he complained, extricating the sleeve of his T-shirt from a snagging twig.  “You should have parted out that shitty pimp before he swung at her.”

“You should have cleared putting Opal out with me.” 

“She was about to suplex Christabel in the coolstore.  I made an executive decision.” William muttered, knowing his brother would not defend such a fundamental breach of his own hospitality.  “And you can tell that hoary trout if she darkens the fucking door again it’s chick chick boom o’clock.”
“That doesn’t get you off the hook for inviting nightcrawlers to her show.”
“I didn’t... they were Siobhan’s peeps.  It's vampiro en vampiro, chico... they're all spitting on La Rue's grave and angry dancing over her sucking up to the Prague gestapo.  Didn't you get the why no other bloodsack can ever cockblock me or tell me what the fuck to do speech down at the Moth?  I’ve been getting it for six months.”

They fell silent, watching the pair below.  Edward was puzzled by the man’s concerted interest in the rear of the house, unable to see past its gable.  William had a better angle.

“You’re not going to like this.  Frost’s gone commando by the pool.”  He looked back at Edward with a smile until the latter reached out and attempted to dislodge him, tugging the crown of the tree toward himself and threatening William with violence.  He laughed as he clung to the listing fir with both hands.  "I've seen it all before anyway."
“Avert your eyes.”
“Like I’m going to do that.”  William scooted around the tree and stood out of reach, putting his hands together and making a winding motion that hoisted a middle finger; Edward let go of the branch and it whipped back hard into his brother's face.



​
Trent lingered over the enticing panorama until he set down his glasses and reached for a camera case, shouldering the kit and setting off down the hill.  Josephine was forced to jog to catch him up.
“I can’t leave my post.” she complained.
“I’m gonna get myself some shots.” he chuckled.  “Some of the intel guys got a OFP website and this shit here’s gold.”  He jumped down onto the tarmac across the road from the estate.


​

Brushing off his jeans as he emerged from the saplings, William still chuckled to himself, staggering sideways when Edward pushed past toward the back of the unmanned vehicle.  Its twin doors proved not only unsecured but ajar; William made for the front seat, where he yanked open the glove box.  They passed a short while in their respective inquiries.

“They’ve got a trace on my car.” Edward muttered.  

“I don't know how long someone can monitor your activities before needing to throw themselves off a fucking bridge, but they must be getting close. ” William smiled.  "I thought the hot guy was sweeping our rides."

"Hand-held units won't pick up this system."  His brother appeared beside him and reached under the seat, pulling out the laptop and resting it on the floor of the foot well, where he brought up the recent files.

“Anything in the house?” 

“Nothing monitored from here.”  They sat in critical silence while Edward made progress through the data.  “They’ve got audio.” he said slowly.

“You’re shitting me.  Where?”  His companion's expression gave him a clue.  “Oh.  Ohhh...” William smirked. "Awkward.  If you’re going to abuse the beamer, maybe turn the radio up first.”

“Music kills the mood.” Edward murmured, taking the computer to the rear of the vehicle.  William emitted a small shriek of horror.

​"If I never hear those words again it'll be too soon.  But what the fuck about Opal?  I know she’s been jumping on your neck about those euroturds and their ghetto masterplan... what are you going to do when they roll in?  Let her negotiate a package?”

“What do you suggest?  A single-idiot defensive initiative?” 

“How about not playing for the evil empire just because it's paying out?"  William launched into an impassioned denunciation, condemning everyone involved with such vehemence that he did not perceive Edward shaking his head slowly at his vituperation.  “You sneaky shaitan." he declared, interrupting himself.  "You fucking had me going.”

“Talk to Auberjonois about them.  How is Papa Gâteau?"

“I don’t want to call him.  We’re sort of... not cool.”

“Who do I have to thank for shutting the other up?”

​"Elif air ab tizak.  Hey woah... code brown.”  Pausing upon opening a binder full of photographs, William discovered it contained a reference image of every visitor to the estate since their occupation, some taken during the current round of surveillance, others gleaned from police and immigration files.  "Putain... they’ve got everyone."  They looked at each other through the seating.  “What do we do?”

Edward returned the rear doors of the car to their former position, setting them carefully against each other.

“When in doubt, he is a wise man who does nothing.”
“And verily he is often an incarcerated man, or a fucking dead one.”
“They’re on their way back, so feel free to stay and test the theory.  I’ll wait in the car.”

​CONTINUED NEXT WEEK
​© céili o'keefe  do not reproduce