The last thing I expected to find in the woods of New Hampshire was a beautiful seductress. Jim Haines had persuaded me to go hunting and as a New York City psychiatrist with too many clients and not enough time, it seemed the perfect escape.
It was October and leaves were turning. I had forgotten autumn in New England and was glad I came. Frankly, I had no intention of shooting anything, but was sorely in need of companionship. A weekend filled with nature’s beauty, card playing and male bonding seemed the perfect tonic for what ailed me. I wallowed too long in the ennui of city life.
Jim and his friends left me a compass and GPS tracker and set off over the ridge hunting deer. I wished them luck, all the while crossing my fingers their trek would prove fruitless, and the harmless creatures of the earth be spared.
For my part, I planned on hiking an hour in the opposite direction, then doubling back and putting feet to the fire. The woods were lovely, filled with warm earth scents and ablaze with colours of yellow, orange and red—I felt I was walking the surface of the Sun.
About thirty minutes in, I lost my GPS. I was wearing a heavy wool lumberjack coat and somehow the device slipped out. Damn! I was useless with a compass. I dated a country girl in university who was into orienteering, but managed to get us both lost in a huge Conservation area. Needless to say, it was a last date.
I decided to walk on using the sun as guide and proceeded this way to exert myself for another half hour, till I ended sitting on a rocky outcrop sweating and out of breath. My throat felt parched and I foolishly neglected to bring a water bottle—an absent-minded move on my part. The prospect of walking back semi-dehydrated was not appealing.
Then I noticed an old fence line in the underbrush. Perhaps, I stumbled onto a farmer’s field.
Where there was a farmhouse, there would be water. I climbed the fence and headed up a slope to get a better view—at the crest, I surveyed my surroundings and noticed, in the distance, a small cabin.
As I approached, I spotted a nearby well. I was planning to take a closer look, when I heard the unmistakable sound of a rifle being loaded.
“Stop right there!”
I raised both hands instinctively and tried not to breathe.
“You’re on private property.” It was a woman’s voice, stern and business-like.
“I was hiking and got lost. I’m parched from thirst—saw your well and figured I could get a drink. I’ll gladly pay for your trouble.”
She uncocked the gun. “No need for that. You can put your hands down now.”
I turned to look at her and my breath caught—she was the most beautiful woman I ever saw.
She was dark…blacker than night and her long hair cascaded like a dark cloud tangled round the Moon. She had a haunting beauty and a wistful smile that drew out my soul. She reminded me of a painting I saw of a mermaid, her face and hair striking as the figurehead of a ship.
She gazed at me, amused.
“Do you have a name?”
“James Richards,” I stammered.
“Lilli Naiades, “ she smiled. “Pleased to meet you.”
She must have thought me mad. I was trying hard not to stare, but each time I looked away I felt a masochistic thrill that compelled me to look back. I wanted to drown in her eyes.
I have sat for hours in my office helping the affairs of ordinary people came to light. I have coaxed up from the depths of their unconscious unsettling images of darkness and disgust. I have even exorcised phantasmagoric nightmares and whitewashed polluted minds, but I have never experienced the sinuosity of sin and its serpentine turnings till I looked into that face.
Now I knew why men cheated and threw away their lives. I would gladly do the same.
