Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    A Plunder by Pilgrims
    A Plunder by Pilgrims
    A Plunder by Pilgrims
    Ebook94 pages54 minutes

    A Plunder by Pilgrims

    By Scott William Carter

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    It starts with a knock at the door – something reclusive ex-detective Garrison Gage hates. When it's his teenage neighbor, whose girlfriend has gone missing just before Thanksgiving, Gage gets reluctantly pulled back into his old line of work - and ends up facing some fears of his own in Oregon's dark woods...Includes an extended preview of THE GRAY AND GUILTY SEA, also featuring Garrison Gage.

    *****

    JACK NOLTE is the mystery and suspense pen name of award-winning writer Scott William Carter. Critics raved that The Gray and Guilty Sea, the first book featuring the crippled and curmudgeonly Garrison Gage, was "irresistible" and "a fascinating character study." Under his own name, Carter's first novel, The Last Great Getaway of the Water Balloon Boys, was hailed by Publishers Weekly as a "touching and impressive debut" and won the prestigious Oregon Book Award. Since then, he has published nine novels and over fifty short stories, his fiction spanning a wide variety of genres and styles. His most recent book for younger readers, Wooden Bones, chronicles the untold story of Pinocchio and was singled out for praise by the Junior Library Guild. He lives a stone's throw from the Oregon coast with his wife and two children. To find more information about Jack/Scott's other work, go to scottwilliamcarter.com.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherFlying Raven Press
    Release dateNov 2, 2010
    ISBN9781452389516
    A Plunder by Pilgrims
    Author

    Scott William Carter

    Scott William Carter is the author of Wooden Bones and The Last Great Getaway of the Water Balloon Boys, which was hailed by Publishers Weekly as a “touching and impressive debut.” His short stories have appeared in dozens of popular magazines and anthologies, including Analog, Ellery Queen, Realms of Fantasy, and Weird Tales. He lives in Oregon with his wife and two children. Visit him at ScottWilliamCarter.com.

    Read more from Scott William Carter

    Related to A Plunder by Pilgrims

    Related ebooks

    Mystery For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Felix Francis

      Jan 13, 2022

      Felix Francis
      6 min read

    • Article

      London Life

      Jun 2, 2021

      London Life
      3 min read

    • Article

      A Year in Reading: David Heska Wanbli Weiden

      Dec 9, 2020

      Little did I know that, in September, just two weeks after the release of my novel, I’d be sitting in my home office in Colorado giving a reading in front of a computer, and that a completely naked eighty-year-old man would appear on the screen. The

      5 min read

    • Article

      Fight For Life

      Sep 25, 2023

      by Lauren Groff (Hutchinson Heinemann, $37) As climate change wreaks havoc on our precious Earth, many writers have chosen to contemplate the end of days by imagining dystopian universes inhabited by sole survivors of the planet’s destruction. These

      3 min read

    • Article

      It’s Not On Me

      Oct 6, 2023

      It’s Not On Me
      4 min read

    • Article

      Back From The Dead

      Mar 25, 2022

      Back From The Dead
      9 min read

    • Article

      Unforgettable!

      May 12, 2023

      Unforgettable!
      4 min read

    • Article

      Inside Flynn Bloom’s $5 Billion Life!

      Jun 26, 2022

      For young Flynn Bloom, life coudn’t get more charmed. Up until he was 2, the tot happily accompanied his parents, Miranda Kerr and Orlando Bloom, between LA and the Aussie supermodel’s family home in Gunnedah, NSW. In 2013, the pair suddenly split,

      2 min read

    • Article

      ‘My Penpal Was A Serial Killer!’

      Sep 5, 2021

      It was recess when 17-year-old Nicola West checked her phone and discovered Ivan Milat had sent her a letter. “I got a text message from my mum with a picture of the envelope, and in caps: ‘HE WROTE BACK!’ I remember just freaking out. My hands were

      2 min read

    • Article

      Friend Or Foe?

      Aug 24, 2023

      Sitting on the grass beside my girlfriend Grace, I spotted a familiar face approaching from across the park. ‘Can I join you?’ Chelsea, then 17, smiled, plonking herself down. It was March 2018 and I’d been with Grace, then 16, for six months. I was

      4 min read

    • Article

      My Fight To Free My Husband

      Apr 14, 2023

      My Fight To Free My Husband
      9 min read

    • Article

      Mengele’s Babies

      Oct 26, 2021

      Mengele’s Babies
      3 min read

    • Article

      Standing In For His Mother Who Was Unable To Attend the Prince Of Wales makes History As He Reads The Queen’s Speech For The First Time At The State Opening Of Parliament

      May 16, 2022

      Standing In For His Mother Who Was Unable To Attend the Prince Of Wales makes History As He Reads The Queen’s Speech For The First Time At The State Opening Of Parliament
      2 min read

    • Article

      Secrets Of The Great Road Trips Of The Tweed

      Sep 16, 2021

      There’s farms and restaurants all over the Tweed, a part of the Northern Rivers in NSW, selling produce grown out of the rich, volcanic soil. It all starts close to the beach; begin your trip with breakfast grown out of the earth at FARM & CO in Cudg

      3 min read

    • Article

      Animals And Origami

      Oct 10, 2021

      I miss the sea breeze mussing my hair and the feel of cold sand worming between my toes. Even now, in autumn, the shoreline has its charms, like the squeals of the oystercatchers and the rhythmic ebb and flow of the tide. My dreams are of swimming in

      11 min read

    • Article

      Small Pebbles Like Raindrops

      Aug 5, 2021

      Small Pebbles Like Raindrops
      3 min read

    • Article

      LOVE, Virtually

      Feb 16, 2020

      LOVE, Virtually
      5 min read

    • Article

      Festival

      Sep 15, 2018

      My husband, who loved festivals, who was a great fan of festivals, wanted to get to the square in time for the first band at eleven o’clock. From bed, the dog and I watched him dress. He tried on various T-shirts, declaring some of them too tight and

      13 min read

    • Article

      Kings

      Jun 5, 2023

      1.Kings lie down to zip up their jeans,buy Cetaphil, candy, magazinesat Walgreens because they canwalk there unsupervised, describeblowjobs they’ve given to seniorsin cars, spend what they think of astheir own money. Home sick from school,they learn

      6 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for A Plunder by Pilgrims

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      A Plunder by Pilgrims - Scott William Carter

      A Plunder by Pilgrims

      A short story featuring Garrison Gage

      Scott William Carter

      writing as Jack Nolte

      Includes an extended preview of

      The Gray and Guilty Sea,

      the first mystery novel featuring

      Garrison Gage.

      Smashwords Edition. Electronic edition published by Flying Raven Press, November 2010. Copyright © 2010 by Jack Nolte. Republished May 2013. Copyright © 2013 by Scott William Carter.

      All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction, in whole or in part in any form. This short story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

      For more about Flying Raven Press, please visit our web site at http://www.flyingravenpress.com.

      A Plunder by Pilgrims

      IT WAS A KID, sixteen or seventeen by the looks of him, painfully thin and soaked to the bone. His short-cropped brown hair, made nearly black by the rain, was plastered against his forehead. His Stanford sweatshirt and acid wash jeans clung to his bony frame. The skin on his neck was cratered like a moonscape, the survival scars of a nasty bout with acne.

      The pounding rain made tiny white explosions on the gravel driveway, and crackled on the overgrown ferns surrounding his house. Well? Gage said. "Candy bars for the track team? A subscription to Good Housekeeping so the band can go to Disneyland?"

      No, sir, the kid said.

      You look familiar.

      I'm your neighbor, sir. Marty Kleppington. I live — um, just on the other side of that hedge.

      That explained it. The kid had just been a runt when Gage moved in five years earlier, hardly recognizable in the young man before him, but he remembered a few terse exchanges when the kid's basketball bounced through the arbor vitae. Well, congratulations, Gage said. Now if you'll excuse me—

      I'd like to hire you, sir.

      It was such a wholly unexpected thing to say that Gage actually froze — door cracked open, frigid air snaking past him into the house. I think you're confused, Gage said.

      He didn't open the door. He couldn't see the kid's face, but there was a long pause.

      I know what you do, sir, the kid said. I know—I know you were once a great detective. Garrison Gage. That's you.

      Gage bowed his head. Go home, son. The person you're looking for doesn't live here anymore.

      It's my girlfriend, the kid said, sounding desperate. Tammy. Tammy Levin. She's missing. Been almost two days. I—I need your help.

      Go to the police.

      I have. They—

      Goodbye, son.

      He closed the door. Gage was walking away, but the kid had saved the best for last. Even muffled by the door, Gage clearly heard him.

      I can pay you, sir, he said. I have five thousand dollars saved for college, and I can pay you every penny.

      * * * * *

      He gave Marty a towel, his own mug of coffee, and seated him at the kitchen table. The kid's wet hair dribbled on Gage's crossword. The blooming watermarks smeared the black ink with the blue, ruining the morning's efforts. Above them, the pounding rain sounded like somebody dropping buckets of marbles on the roof.

      How did you know about me? Gage asked.

      Instead of looking at Gage, Marty stared straight ahead. His eyes were the same color as his coffee — a deep brown, nearly black. A couple years back, I was hiding in the hedge. Heard you talking to that FBI agent.

      Gage's shoulders sagged. He'd known that helping Alex from time to time with some of his more difficult problems had been a bad idea. I really am retired, he said.

      Marty looked down into his coffee. Tendrils of steam inched past his face like long nimble fingers. Gage sighed.

      Tell you what, he said, why don't you tell me what happened. Maybe I'll have suggestions. That's all I do with my friend, by the way. Just listen and give suggestions.

      The kid dug into his front pocket. Should I pay now or—

      Talk.

      Marty nodded. He took a long, slow breath, then said, I'm not sure how much I can tell you. I talked to her on Friday at school. We—we were going to go out on Saturday night to the movies. Then a little before six on Friday night, Tammy's Mom called and wanted to know if Tammy was with me. Her mom said she'd run to the store to pick up some stuff for dinner and she hadn't come home. We've scoured the entire town, all of us. We haven't found her car or anything.

      It hasn't been very long — not even a day.

      Marty looked at him, and his eyes were much older than his years. If you knew Tammy, you wouldn't think so. She's very responsible. She puts everything in her day timer — dates with me, the tutoring she does, study times, even down to exactly when she brushes her teeth at night. People make fun of her, but she doesn't care. She's planning on going to Stanford. I am too. I mean, if I get in. I'm not as smart as her.

      Did she act at all differently lately?

      "What do you mean?'

      I mean, did you notice anything out of the ordinary? Things she said? The way she acted?

      Marty hesitated.

      Look, kid, if you don't level with me, I can't—

      I don't know, Marty said. "She was a bit moody.

      Her parents go to the police?

      Yeah, Marty said. Because she's already 18, they said they can't put out an Amber Alert, but they filed a missing persons report. They told Tammy's parents they could file the vehicle as stolen, which might help, but they didn't want her to get into trouble. I guess the police are real busy, though. They got the parade on Thursday.

      Gage grimaced. The Barnacle Bluffs Thanksgiving Day Parade was a big deal on the Oregon coast, but to Gage it just meant thousands of tourists clogging up Highway 101. How old are you? he asked.

      Seventeen. Well, almost eighteen. I'll be eighteen on Saturday.

      How'd you two get a long?

      What do you mean?

      I mean, did you fight much?

      No. We didn't fight at all.

      But there was a slight pause there — barely a pause at all, really, just a slight hitch between the words didn't and fight. Not even a little? he pressed.

      "We got along great, Marty insisted. The dull monotone was gone, his voice taking on a defensive edge. I mean, we've been—we've been dating forever. Since fourth grade practically."

      But I take it her parents don't know you've proposed to her?

      The kid looked surprised. "Proposed? I haven't — I mean, we haven't . .

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1