Dot and Sam 8

Dorothy Philpot. Landlady of The Harbour Light pub
Sam Philpot. Drag-queen.
Billy Parkins Doorkeeper.
Jessica Merlot The town’ and county archaeologist.
Josephine MacDonald The town and county archivist.
Richard Drummond Town planning inspector
Robert Vincent. Junior planning inspector.
Georgina. (Georgie) Homeless Transgender girl.
Bobby Gay boy on the school bus.
Marty Girl on the school bus.
Jack. Marty’s twin brother (Keen runner).

On the Sunday Georgie was stretched out on a wooden steamer chair in the early evening sun doing some homework, when she suddenly sensed somebody standing some distance behind her in the low cut-away entrance of the boundary wall. She twisted her head to look and met Marty’s familiar smile while she was holding her bicycle.

“Oh! Hello, come in, no need to stand on ceremony.!

“Hi Babe’s.” Marty grinned as she stepped forward.

“D’ you want an orange juice or a cup of tea?” Georgie offered as she pushed herself up out of the chair.

“Can I?” Marty grinned expectantly.

“No prob girl, what brings you down to the old homestead then.”

“I’m just paying a social call and to say thanks for Friday’s Party.”

“Great! D’ you want one of these chairs. I’ll get one for you.”

“Yes please. Where’s Dot and Sam? I see the place is all locked up.”

“They’re out on the estuary bird-watching with some friends. This is their and my free time.”

“So you’re in charge.”

“Well, I’ve got my own bunch of keys if that’s what you mean.” Georgie explained as she unlocked the door from the bar to the personal lounge.

Marty followed her in and leant her butt against the work-top while her friend quickly made some tea. Soon they were lounging again in the steamer chairs and sharing tea and biscuits.

“What homework were you doing?

“Maths and physics.” Georgie replied as Marty nodded knowingly.

“I left Jack doing the same.”

“So why aren’t you busy?”

“Well, I am actually. I’m looking for Material for my history dissertation. I thought this archaeology site with everybody poking around in the basin might inspire me.”

“Well it’s pretty much all archaeologicalled out.” Georgie grinned. The only likely places now are the top lock where they’re putting the cofferdam in to hold back the ancient canal where the new upper lock is going in. Then they have not decided about a river lock into the basin. Historically it was simply a tidal basin with a single simple gate.”

“Are they going to dig out the two holding ponds to the stairway? I’ve looked at the plans on the website.”

“There is talk but then there’s always talk. It’s all about funding. You want to talk to Jessie and Joe and Dick and Bob.”

“Who are they?”

“The county archivist, the county archaeologist and the two town planning officers.”

“Have you got their addresses?”

“I’ve got their telephone numbers but I’ll have to clear it with them first. I’ll chat with them tomorrow.”

“Oooh please! That’d be great!”

“D’ you wanna’ look around the site?”

“Is it allowed?”

“Georgie grinned and jingled her keys causing Marty’s eyes to widen with delight.

“Let’s go and look at the holding ponds. They’re talking of making two terraces if they don’t excavate them.”

“Which would you prefer.” Marty asked.

“Oh, I think it’d be far better to excavate them. They could provide four extra berths for some residential narrowboats, provided the boats are smart and well maintained. The ponds would also boost the frequency the staircase locks can be operated each tide.”

“Crickey I’ve just had another thought.” Marty enthused.

“Whassat.” Georgie wondered.

“There’s material for my other dissertation, economic geography and tourism.”

“Worthwhile trip then.” Georgie grinned. “Come on then, let’s go and look.”

“Glad to see you remembered your wellies,” Georgie grinned as Marty opened her bicycle saddle bags.

Within minutes, the pair were scrabbling up the old staircase locks then squelching through the waterlogged depressions where to old holding ponds had lain.

“Why is the upper depression longer than the lower depression?” Marty asked.

“I dunno girl,” Georgie replied. “It’s been at least two hundred years, perhaps somebody used it as a garbage dump.”

Marty walked over the centre of the higher section and grinned as she bent her legs and caused the whole section to sag and shudder.

“It must be soft mud or something, but it’s drier than the lower bits.”

“You just be careful you don’t get sucked down; god knows what’s under there.”

“It can’t be that deep.” Marty opined. It’s only a canal and the mud is very soft.”

With these words Marty’s foot plopped downwards and Marty found her right leg up to her thigh in the slimy mud.

“Oh shit! It’s hollow. Give me a hand to get out.”

Georgie let out an instinctive bellow of laughter and asked.

“What d’ you mean hollow?”

“I mean it. My leg is pressing against a branch or something and my foot is swinging free. It’s hollow!”

“Let’s have a look.”

“Nah! Don’t come near or you could fall through. Grab that big branch and lay it by me. I can hoist myself up on that.!

Georgie did as Marty suggested and pushed the branch out to rest across the whole mound. Marty then placed both her hands on the branch then brought up her free leg to slowly extricate her buried leg.

“Ugh, this shit stinks.”

Georgie sniffed the air and concurred.

“We’d better get you cleaned up. Good job you didn’t lose your wellie.”

They left the branch to cover the hole to discourage other kids and returned to the Harbour light.

“We’d better hose you down first in the yard, then you can have a bath.”

“Thanks.”

When they got to the pub courtyard, Marty decided to save the liquid in her wellie because it was a strange purple colour and smelt disgusting. Georgie took a jam jar from Sam’s collection and they put the jar safe in full view on the courtyard wall.

“What is it,” Georgie asked as Marty held up the glass.

“I dunno’, you’re the chemist.”

While Marty was showering, Dot and Sam returned home with several of the birding friends. Georgie met them downstairs and Dot asked.

“Who’s upstairs?”

“Marty, She fell into some weird stuff up by the holding ponds. She’ll be down in a minute and I’ve lent her a change of clothes.”

“Okay. Let’s fix some food for our guests.”

Within twenty minutes the birders were chatting around the big table about their day on the Marshes and Marty reappeared freshly changed. Then their attentions turned to the jam jar with the bright purple muck. Finally, one of the birders was an industrial chemist and he opined that it looked like some early type of vegetable dye. On concluding this, they returned to the holding pond to have a closer look. After some cautious probing and excavation of the ‘bump’ they started to expose and old canal boat with several large, stone, wide-necked amphoras. Marty’s foot had plunged straight through the decaying cover to dip into the vegetable dye.

On realising that they had found some old industrial artefacts, the group agreed not to disturb it anymore and Dot contacted Jessica and Josephine the county historians. They described what they had found and the next Morning the council team were investigating the sight.

“This place never ceases to amaze me,” Jessie enthused as the old hatch-boards of the boat were gently exposed then removed to expose about twenty glazed-ware amphoras all intact and with seemingly well-preserved contents.

The general opinion was that Dot’s chemist friend might have been right. The boat had been carrying some sort of Victorian, vegetable dyes.

When Georgie returned that afternoon from school she was intrigued to see the archaeology team carefully extricating the amphoras and packing them ready for despatch to the regional archaeology labs at the university. Knowing that Marty had expressed an interest connecting her history project to the canal, Georgie called her friend then took a series of videos of the newly opened site. Less than an hour later, Marty was visiting on her bike. The pair wasted no time exercising Georgie’s privilege to explore the site and they chatted at length with the county archaeology team.

“Yes, most of the boat is buried in the mud and relatively well preserved. We’re going to excavate it and examine its construction.” Jessie exclaimed as she smiled at the mud-streaked pair. “Now just remember every item must be carefully documented and located before it’s removed to the stable.”

“Will they preserve it like The Mary Rose or the Newport ship?” Marty asked hopefully.

“I doubt it unless it proves to be something special, but it still needs proper documentation. We’re hoping it’s mainly intact. This gloop is a good preservative.”

Marty indulged herself, feeling blindly in the mud along the submerged coaming while Georgie indulged herself by staying dry on the bank.

“I think I can feel a stem-post or stern-post; something upright anyway.”

“We think it’s the stern post.” Jennie explained, happy that Georgie’s friend was showing so much interest.

“Well if it is, it’s not very big.”

“She’s forty-nine feet so we think she just traded in the canal and around the estuary. Possibly along the coast during the summer, but not much further. She doesn’t appear to have a cabin.”

“Nor thwarts, Marty opined as she delved deeper into the sticky, soft gloop.”

“Well her construction will be revealed when we excavate. This gives us one excuse to excavate this pond even if we don’t dig out the upper.”

Georgie smiled at Jessie’s words, because she hoped the ponds would be used as narrow-boat moorings. Marty was happy that she had found a perfect project for her history dissertation with mountains of original material. She made sure that Georgie took lots of videos and stills of her probing in the gloop right up to her armpits.

“You’d better get yourself washed up girl. I’ll open the showers for you.”

“It’s alright Jess, she can hose down at the Harbour Light then shower in my room.

Content for the evening they went to hold a planning meeting back at the pub were Marty entertained them with her squeals as Georgie squirted the gobbets of gloop stuck to her arms and legs.

“You’ll have to borrow another set of my clothes,” Georgie chuckled as Marty traipsed delicately through the bar and upstairs to Georgie’s bedroom for a comfortable warm shower.

“When she returned to the table, the group was breaking up but Jessie gave Marty a schedule of the plan before she left.

“Come down any day you like. Just let the dig supervisor know when you’re on site.”

“It’ll be weekends mostly unless you find something interesting.” Marty enthused as she grabbed her bike and started home before the light failed.

“Jessie watched Marty go then turned to Georgie.”

“New friend is she?”

“School mate, but she’s doing history, geography and law for ‘A’s. This is a gift from the gods to her.” Georgie revealed as she helped Jessica load her van.

As dusk settled, Georgie started clearing the tables then went upstairs to do her homework. At dinner it was nice to chat about her day around the table with Dot and Sam and later she squirmed under her duvet with contentment as the night enveloped her.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Did you sleep well?” Dot asked as she appeared at the breakfast table.

“Yeah, once that owl quit.”

“They nest in the oak tree across the river.” Sam advised as she doled out some scrambled eggs and sausage. “Borrow my birding glasses if you want a good show. Our bedroom window is the best.”

“Nah thanks.” Georgie smiled. “I’d rather watch a lab experiment.”

“Each to their own,” Dot chuckled as the conversation ceased and they ate their food.

A few minutes later, Georgie was walking down the lane to the bus stop and twenty minutes later she was chatting to Marty on the bus.

“My brother still wants to apologise properly.” Marty advised her.

“Well not just yet but tell him I’ll agree to partner him in Chemistry to see if I can start to trust him.”

Marty’s face brightened appreciably as the bus pulled up outside the school.

“Thanks I’ll tell him right away. Will you speak to the head?”

“I’m going there anyway later, so It’ll calm the head down if it goes no further. He was terrified of the police getting involved.”

“I don’t understand you Georgie. We’ve all been groped by the boys normally we just slap their faces or scratch them. They soon learn the limits if they’re normal kids.”

“Yeah. Well for some of us, it’s a bit different. Just remember, I’m with the SS., and I’m fostered.”

“Did something bad happen?” Marty almost whispered.

“Not now.” Georgie replied as she took her lab coat out of her locker. “Someday I’ll explain.”

With these portentous words, Georgie bustled off towards the chemistry lab as Jack, still in his track-suit, met his sister. She gave a bright smile as she gave him the news.

“Your off the hook, but don’t you dare try anything, it’s strictly chemistry okay?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~