Tag: book1

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As they leave the terrace Mrs Barr can be heard saying to her son, “they’re really nice aren’t they? And so clever! That’s what happens when you study hard!”

“Is it really your turn to pay?” asks NutJob, “I thought it was mine.”

“Empathy Dash! I didn’t want her to feel pressured the moment we sat down. You can pay, it is your turn! And maybe we should be eating at home more often. We can’t afford to keep eating out the way we do.”

She looks at him, hoping that he’s got the message. The message is the definite purpose and she has now decided that her definite purpose is a decent standard of living, and complete peace of mind … with NutJob … if he can apply his  power of thought to building a stable life together. However, she wants him to cultivate that same thought without any pressure or coercion. How can she gently guide him to making that choice of his own free will? This is going to be a real test of her patience and of her powers of communication!

He already has half an idea of what she’s thinking. In his sincere, sympathetic voice he says, “yes, we should stop spending, and start saving more.”

“Come on,” she says, “to the library, who’s going to get that book first?”

—o—

            The staff and volunteers at the Noble Coliseum are beginning to get things ready for another Saturday evening variety show. Nothing special tonight, just an ordinary OpenMike Night.

“You’re early,” says NurseCathy, “Sylvie’s still … “

Abruptly interrupting her sentence, NurseCathy looks at HayWire’s face.

“ … what happened?”

HayWire says nothing. He’s not crying, but he looks as if he might want to. He takes a deep breath and he tries to stabilise

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“And then he spends it on some of the other stuff in the shop, so the money ends up back in the till. I get my Third Sector wages, that doesn’t amount to very much, the goods get recirculated, and all the profits go to the Coliseum.”

“Mum gets first choice on all the books that come in. It’s fab!”

“And you also love reading?” asks KristalClear, “who’s your favourite author?”

“Oh, I prefer non fiction,” says Mrs Barr, “knowledge is power.”

AngryBard quickly adds, “Francis Bacon!”

“France is bacon?” responds a confused KristalClear.

“No!” says AngryBard, “Francis Bacon! He’s an author.”

Speaking in clumsy Latin, AngryBard continues “ipsa scientia potestas est, knowledge is power, knowledge is the basis for reputation, influence, and success.”

“Well remembered darling,” says Mrs Barr, before addressing her guests and saying, “I’m now reading Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich, it’s a challenging book, the power of a definite purpose, the power of thought, that sort of thing.”

KristalClear tells NutJob, “we need to read that.”

“There’s bound to be more than one copy in the library,” says Mrs Barr.

AngryBard interjects, “Mum, why aren’t we rich then?”

“There’s more to life than money, sweetie. We’re rich in other ways. I love my Third Sector job, I love reading. I love my husband and I love my son. We have enough income to live.”

“A decent standard of living, and complete peace of mind?” suggests NutJob.

“Yes. That’s a clever way of putting it,” says Mrs Barr, “we can even afford to eat at the café sometimes. But be careful with that book, it promises some secrets, I haven’t found them yet, but then again, I haven’t finished reading it! Anyway, it’s book club time, and we really must go, it’s been lovely meeting you two.”

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Sometimes it’s nice to share other peoples’ passions. Riding horses is fine by him. But he knows that he’ll never be able to chat with horses. And he knows that it’ll soon be lunchtime. He’s looking forward to getting back to town to eat at the Find Thyme Café. Then he can focus on KristalClear without having to juggle other inputs.

—o—

“Mum, look!” says AngryBard, “that’s NutJob, and there’s KristalClear .”

AngryBard gets their attention. And without really asking them, nor asking his mum, he manages to guide them to the two spare seats at his table on the terrace.

Well aware that AngryBard’s real name is Andy Barr NutJob says “Mrs Barr, how do you do? I’m Dave, and this is Kristal.”

“Please join us,” she says, “are you having lunch?”

Unsure if that was an invitation to have lunch on them, KristalClear quickly says, “we have a system, it’s my turn to pay, we’ll place an order for us, if that’s OK?”

“This place is always popular on Wednesdays,” says NutJob, “what brings you here today?”

We’re going to the library,” says AngryBard.

“He loves reading,” says Mrs Barr, “he gets it from his dad. Billy’s one of the librarians. Andy has always loved story time. Ever since he was little, his dad would read to him every night.”

“Do you work at the library too?” asks KristalClear.

“No, I work at Thrifty.”

“Thrifty?” responds NutJob, “the Noble Coliseum’s charity shop on Penny Street?”

“It’s a thrift shop rather than a charity shop”, says Mrs Barr, “it benefits everybody.”

“It’s great!” says AngryBard, “I take my old toys there, they sell them. I get half the money, and they keep the other half.”

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not have enough people to be able to support a recreational equestrian centre.

Generally, people don’t spend a lot of money on leisure. Going to the book club at the library is cheap. So is playing cricket, or playing Scrabble. Music and amateur dramatics are highly popular, and no matter what Mr Rafone says, OpenMike Night rarely struggles to find acts.

« Presence. She has presence. »

« Sorry Handsome, what was that? »

« You know, presence! Having an impressive persona, complete self assurance, the ability to command respect simply by being there, having an immediacy and a breadth of character which creates a fully charged atmosphere. »

« Yes! I wasn’t looking for a definition of presence! What are we actually talking about? »

« Romeo and I were talking about Commander Crush. She has presence. She just has to walk into a room and everybody takes notice and pays attention. »

Romeo adds, « you know how some people can walk into your stable and you don’t even notice they’re there. Not Commander Crush though, she has presence. »

Vocally, so that she can bring NutJob into the conversation, KristalClear says, “yes, we know that feeling.”

Having a demi-psychic girlfriend is something that NutJob is getting used to. He has no idea yet what the conversation is all about, but he’s sure that he’s going to be brought up to speed just by the way she looks at him.

“When Mr Rafone walks into the room,” says KristalClear, “everybody notices, he has presence too! Not like some teachers. You don’t notice some teachers when they walk in. Some kids don’t even notice some teachers when they start speaking. They might as well be invisible! That would never happen with Mr Rafone. Nor Commander Crush.”

“Mr Rafone is a diamond,” says NutJob, keeping his comments short, knowing that he can’t chat with Handsome or Romeo directly.

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Chapter 36
Sympathy and Patience

Handsome and Romeo, are out for a gentle amble around the countryside, taking KristalClear and NutJob along with them for the ride. Of course, that’s not how the humans see it.

KristalClear thought it might be fun to take NutJob on a relaxing ride and then canter through the dales. She wants to show him what recreational horse riding is like, in contrast to the routine of a trip to Skipton and back.

Secretly she’s trying to imagine what life might be like when school ends next month. What will the next year hold for them? What will the next five years or the next ten years be like. The Garrison is taking her on full time as a stable hand. That’ll be fine for a while, but ultimately? She doesn’t want to be a marine, that’s for sure. Nor is she quite certain about NutJob yet. He’s weird and charming, and he’s extremely kind, but is he the right person to settle down with?

NutJob has regular work lined up too, at The Lancastrian. Although it’s not as simple as saying “full time” or “part time”. A handyman is needed when things need fixing. Preventative maintenance is all well and good, but can Franklin and Faraday actually afford an extra full timer? They probably can.

Faraday is getting old. He’s anxious to build new presses before he retires. It’s all about money. Running a newspaper is a stable business, but according to them, it’s not overburdened with cash!

In an ideal world, KristalClear would love to be running her own stable and stud, or even running one of those recreational equestrian centres that they used to have hundreds of years ago.

However, life is not easy. Most people don’t have spare cash to play with. It’s only because she’s friends with CandiCrush that she can access military horses for free. Without that, she and NutJob couldn’t afford to hire horses just to enjoy a ride and a canter through the dales. Lancaster does

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“This one is always eager and active, and look at the way her eyes shine,” says KristalClear “she’s called BrightStar. I like her, we’re building a rapport already.”

“And the paler one is much more calm and mellow. She’s easy to communicate with. We’re calling her MarshMallow.”

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“All of the above,” says KristalClear, “OK, this is what we’ll do.”

“Cash first. Next, NutJob can be our watch expert, and Max can sell the sizzle. I’m going to try to tune in to their thinking if I can. If we need a back up plan then it’s going to be wind turbines. NutJob the engineer has that covered too. And finally if it comes down to pedigree horses I will lead the discussion.”

“No matter which bait they like the look of, Max is going to tell them how it will lead to a decent standard of living, and complete peace of mind.”

“Focussed? That’s not a question,” smiles KristalClear, “that’s an order! Focussed!”

Once again, the lady is in charge of her own dominion, and everybody else’s.

With an outline plan in place, the boys head out to explore Newsholme a little, “we, won’t be long, just a short walk up and down the High Street.

With a pot of freshly prepared tea, CandiCrush and KristalClear start to compare notes.

“Well, Max was on form today wasn’t he?” says CandiCrush, “when OtherErik stepped out of line.”

“I wasn’t worried about the two Eriks,” says KristalClear, “not as much as Dash and Max were. What worried me was that Max might stop the whole deal dead in its tracks!”

“He stood up for you,” says CandiCrush, “and he said I was married! He hardly even knows me!”

“Like I said before, he’s a really nice guy at heart, and he looks after the people he cares about.”

—o—

“They’re a bit lively aren’t they,” says HayWire.

“Are you sure this is safe?” he asks.

« Don’t invade my personal space! »

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enough to be valuable. How many watches and clocks have we seen in the Pennines?”

“Good point,” says CandiCrush, “let’s have a look around tomorrow, before we sit down.”

“So it would help if HayWire was here,” reiterates MaxChaos “or his GuildMaster. What about wind turbines? How many of them do they have, or how many can they use?”

“And horses? Same questions!” says NutJob, “we just don’t know these answers. Is there anybody in Wolfland who knows about Pennite civic society?”

NutJob and KristalClear look at each other, and they both instantly say, “Mr Rafone!”

“That would be good!” muses KristalClear, “but we don’t know if even he knows much about the Pennites. What’s that thing he’s always banging on about?”

 

‘What do you want, do you really, really want?’

 

‘A decent standard of living, and

complete peace of mind.’

 

“That’s it then,” says CandiCrush, “we focus on watches and clocks, and we try to sell them a decent standard of living, and complete peace of mind.”

“Sell the sizzle not the sausage,” adds MaxChaos.

They all stare at him. He rarely says anything that poetic.

“Don’t ask me,” he says, “I hear it a lot down the docks. It’s something about saying …

 

‘wouldn’t you enjoy the exquisite taste and the

delicate texture of a freshly caught herring?’

 

… rather than trying to sell them by saying …

 

‘we’ve got herrings, buy some’

 

… it’s marketing speak apparently!”

“And we could try just offering more hard cash,” suggests CandiCrush.

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medical services, and banking. These types of services can’t be exported without also exporting the people, or training other people locally. It’s impossible to export complete hydro electric power stations. Teams of people actually have to go along somewhere and build one on site.

“So tell me about tangible exports,” says CandiCrush.

MaxChaos looks puzzled.

She clarifies, “tangible exports, I mean proper exports, things, stuff you can send as cargo.”

“This is what I know from working alongside Lancastrian Lines and InfiniDash,” he says, “ please write this down.”

He said ‘please’! That makes a change. MaxChaos would normally be more direct. His character is definitely becoming more cultured. Briefly discussing all the items so far, NutJob jots down a comprehensive list of the main Wolfland exports.

1. Ships
2. Wind turbines & hydro electric power stations
3. Watches & clocks
4. Horses
5. Weaponry
6. Wolfskin

“But,” says MaxChaos, “ships are out right away! Nobody on the North Sea coast would buy a ship from Lancaster. They’d have them made locally.”

KristalClear remarks, “and the Pennites in the hills wouldn’t want ships anyway! Wolfskin is no good to them either, they already have plenty of that .”

“Weaponry is out,” says CandiCrush, “we only export weapons to territories where we have diplomatic accords in place already.”

“That leaves wind turbines, watches, and horses,” says KristalClear.

“Offer all three,” says NutJob “though focus on watches and clocks. Small enough to transport easily, and sophisticated

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“We have a number of ferocious live animals,” says CandiCrush, “we call them marines!”

“Very funny!” says KristalClear, “seriously though, we’ll need a big wagon and two strong Shires. I know which ones I’d choose, I’ll talk to them.”

Settling in to the common room back at the barracks, the four of them have time to think. And they have some tea. Something called NAAFI tea. Not the best stuff around, but it seems to be traditional in the Garrison.

“What we don’t have is something to offer the trappers that isn’t cash,” says CandiCrush.

“We need HayWire here,” says MaxChaos, “and business leaders with goods to trade.”

“We can work out something now, between us,” insists NutJob, “what we have to do is second guess what it equates to in Sovereigns, four hundred Sovereigns they said, can we get that price down?”

“They probably can’t conceptualise what a pile of two thousand YorkCrowns actually looks like,” says CandiCrush, “it’s just a number they picked out of thin air.”

“I think,” says KristalClear, “that three or four years of wolf farming will deliver thousands of Sovereigns and that an up front price like four hundred would be recouped fairly easily.”

“That’ll please HopAlong and EarlyBird,” says NutJob.

“We should focus on the things that Wolfland exports, and narrow it down,” says MaxChaos.

MaxChaos is the one who’s had the toughest life. The Garrison doesn’t run a business and doesn’t have to turn a profit. The two schoolkids don’t have to worry about household finances, not the way he does. As a casual labourer he knows that if he works more he gets paid more, he understands the value of money.

Wolfland has a lot of commerce, though much of it is in the service industries, things like freighting, legal services,

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