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eBook Category: Historical Fiction
eBook Description: Historical fiction based on a real event. Ever hike across a frozen lake, naked? These men did.

eBook Publisher: Fictionwise.com, Published: Portland Monthly Magazine, 2000
Fictionwise Release Date: January 2003

8 Reader Ratings: Great Good OK Poor

Available eBook Formats [MultiFormat - What's this?]: Adobe Acrobat (PDF) [514 KB], eReader (PDB) [31 KB], Palm Doc (PDB) [11 KB], Rocket/REB1100 (RB) [11 KB], Microsoft Reader (LIT) [102 KB] - PocketPC 1.0+ Compatible, Franklin eBookMan (FUB) [81 KB], hiebook (KML) [92 KB], Sony Reader (LRF) [94 KB], iSilo (PDB) [9 KB], Mobipocket (PRC) [12 KB], Kindle Compatible (MOBI) [72 KB], OEBFF Format (IMP) [19 KB]
Words: 3565
Reading time: 10-14 min.
Microsoft Reader (LIT) Format: Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud ENABLED
Adobe Acrobat (PDF) Format:  Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud DISABLED
All Other formats: Printing DISABLED, Read-aloud DISABLED

Well, my name is Simon, and Simon says listen.

I'll tell you a story about how a watch saved our lives; a watch and one Edwin Reed that is. The first time I saw that watch, I was right behind Edwin who was breaking trail for us on the way to Medway, Maine. The snow was waist deep and crystal hard, melting during the day, but freezing each night, you could almost walk on it. Almost.

I was right behind Edwin, when he pulled out that solid steel pocket watch and checked the time. We were taking turns breaking trail, with each man's turn to last one hour. I saw the numbers on the watch was ten minutes to the hour and Edwin hollers out, "Next." I thought I knew him for what he was right then; a liar and a cheat, a lazy man on a job that swallowed lazy men and a few unlucky enough to be standing too close when it happened.

It was 20 April and we were racing the clock. Any day, the sky would open with rain. When it did, the way would become impassable and a hundred thousand dollars worth of timber would never get downstream. Edwin's father, the good Mr. Reed, would be out a pile of money and we would've never got paid so we were racing, and here was this kid not taking his full turn. Kid ... he was thirty-one years old, but even those younger than him thought of him as a kid.

I was sent to watch him, and teach him, but I kept my mouth shut for the time and allowed Jacque Boullie to take the lead. Just then the snow started. Spring snow, loaded with water. Each flake landed on your head with a plop loud enough to hear. The water it held washed right down the neck under your clothes, and we shivered. We hunched our heads, raised our shoulders, and plodded on. I was grateful for Jacque right then, because I knew that he would quicken the pace.

The sun went down with miles to go, and what warmth there was went with it. Our beards, caps, and shoulders were soon covered with ice. We could hear branches breaking in the woods all around us from the weight. The only drops that didn't freeze was the ones that got under our clothes, and sucked the heat right out of you like tiny wet leaches.

I thought Edwin might have been crying, but couldn't tell because of the wetness. I remembered what his father said to me before we left. He said, "I can't have my boy telling men what to do, until he knows full, what he is sending them to do." He said, "You teach him, Simon, and make sure he don't kill nobody." Now when a father says that, you know the boy has no confidence to start with. So I had my work cut out, and not just the work I loved.