Chapter 18: Mirror Lake and Dawn on Still Waters

The horse I rode into the mountains was called 'Peggy', short for Pegasus, which was quite appropriate as it was the name of the flying horse on the Parachute Regiment's badge. Peggy was a docile comfortable mount, and over time must have been ridden by many inexperienced riders, as she didn't rear or buck, not that we met anything that would cause her to do any of those things, but of course horses have a habit of seeing and hearing things that humans don't.
As we rode Eddy told me about the cabin we were heading for, and that the two girls would be examining plant specimens – and hopefully some of their time would be spent examining us two boys.

The University of Alberta owned a dozen cabins scattered across the Province, and they were predominantly research facilities rather than recreational, although the two activities were often combined. Every cabin had solar panels and wind turbines to provide electricity, with a diesel generator as emergency back-up. The cabins were of different sizes, and the one where we were heading for had four bedrooms; kitchen /dining room; two showers; a lounge, and most importantly a laboratory, where the two girls would be able to scientifically examine the plant species that had been gathered.
Oh, and I should mention the cabin also had a kharzy. It was one of those environmentally friendly types, where you take a dump on to a pile of straw then leave it to fester into compost–eventually. Naturally it was situated outside of the living quarters.
"What are the girls actually looking for?" I asked as we rode up through magnificent mountain scenery, so different to that I had been used to for the last 3 months.
"Some sort of grass. I'm not sure exactly what, but the girls will tell us before we go out looking." Eddy replied. "I know it is something they are both excited about, and hope to write a thesis regarding it."
My mind flew back to Phillipa Goddard, and how absorbed she had been when writing her thesis, and I quickly lowered the probability of me of having sex with Dawn Stillwaters from 50% to 0%.

The cabin was situated by Mirror Lake, which was a good six hours ride from the stables, and by the time we reached it I was extremely saddle sore, and my thighs and calves ached as if I had been on a ten mile speed march. I groaned as I dismounted and Eddy looked over at me. "Dawn will get the stresses and strains from your body, Des; she trained as a masseuse before becoming a botanist."
Dawn gave me a shy smile. "When you have showered and eaten I will see what I can do to ease your muscles, Flying Horse." She said it without any sign of double meaning, and I don't think she implied anything sexual, but John Thomas stirred at her words.
I had to eat standing up, but a hot shower had eased some of my aches and pains.

Later that evening there was a quiet tap on my bedroom door, and at my invitation Dawn entered. She held a jar of ointment in her hand.
"I will apply this to your buttocks, and it will sooth the pain. Please lie face down on the bed." I undid the large towel I was wearing around my waist and lay down; with my bare, burning, bum on full view to a girl I had met only the day before. Dawn applied the jollop from the jar, and it was wonderful. The palms of her hands gently smeared the ointment over both buttocks, and the fiery red glow, and the pain, diminished instantly. "That's wonderful stuff, what is it?"
Dawn explained that it was a concoction she had made using a Blackfoot recipe, with added plant material that she knew had anti-inflammatory properties. By now the pain had disappeared from my arse but my thighs and calves still ached. Dawn stopped applying the ointment.
"I'll get the oil for the muscle rub. I'll be back directly."
It was just as well that she left when she did. John Thomas had rising to full stretch as her gentle palms had glided over my posterior, and I was in danger of pinning myself to the bed. I got up and hastily pulled on some pants, with quite a bit of difficulty, but with my Calvin Klein's keeping a firm control on John Thomas I felt I could now face Dawn with some degree of comfort, and modesty.
When she re-entered the room with the muscle rub I was sitting on the bed, nonchalantly reading a magazine that had been left by a previous guest. She knelt in front of me and rubbed the oil into my calves, and then her fingers kneaded and relaxed my taut muscles with practised skill. I felt the sinews and muscles loosening almost at once, and groaned, silently, in pleasure. She had kept her head down while carrying out her ministrations, her eyes fixed on my lower legs, which was just as well as John Thomas was making his presence known by tenting my Calvin Klein's, at what would have been at eye level had she been looking straight ahead.
"Now your thighs – lie face down on the bed again, please." She spoke with firm authority, and I meekly obeyed. The oil slid sinuously over my inner thigh, and her hands slipped and slithered, giving the muscles the same treatment she had with my calves. If having my backside rubbed by an attractive young woman was a turn on, having a pair of oil soft female hands sliding and stroking over my inner thighs was a mega turn on, and once again John Thomas started to drill for oil through the mattress. I groaned loudly, in sheer delight, but tried to disguise it as a groan of pain.
She stopped immediately, and asked anxiously. "Did I hurt you? I'm very sorry, but you have an area of hard knotted muscle which I must manipulate firmly to loosen."
A hard knotted muscle was bloody right – John Thomas was now fully extended, and I was in danger of being lifted off the bed by hydraulic action. Somehow I managed to restrain any further expansion of my prick, and I thanked my lucky stars I had thought to put on my Calvin Klein's because had I kept the towel it would now be fluttering from my flagpole. Eventually the sweet torture finished, and Dawn left the room. She stopped at the door and turned to face me.
"You will be much easier in your movement tomorrow, Flying Horse, but I will give you another massage should you require it."

You would think that after Dawn has massaged my arse and inner thighs the next step would be for the two of us to jump into bed, and for me to give her an internal massage. However I was mindful of what Eddy had said, that she wasn't on the trip primarily as my blanket companion, and she had said and done nothing that had given me any indication that she would want me as a lover. The massage had been carried out by a trained masseuse, in a professional manner.

Mirror Lake was exactly as it said on the label. A complete reflection in its placid water of the towering, snow-capped, mountain peaks that surrounded the area. Not a ripple disturbed the serene water except when a fish jumped. Eddy was a keen fisherman, and had dragged me from the cabin at first light, leaving the two girls warm and sleepy in their beds. I have never been a maggot thrasher; the only fishing I like is where the chippy dredges a nice piece of battered cod from the fish fryer before dousing it in salt and vinegar. However I accompanied him and watched him casting – and waiting – then casting again – and waiting again. Actually, Eddy did quite well and caught enough fish for our breakfast.
Just sitting there on the side of the lake, hearing the birdsong, breathing the fine, wine-like, mountain air and listening to the silence, I could feel the tension and stress oozing from me. Eddy didn't speak while he was fishing, but it was a companionable silence that lay between us. After about an hour, with our breakfast safe in his keep net, Eddy talked about the life his forebears had lived, and how, in order to get one's head straight we all needed to get away from civilization and get back to nature. To smell the earth; to hear silence; to see stillness; to watch the sky during the day with the clouds, and at night with the stars.
"When I first arrived in Edmonton I thought I would go crazy with the noise and bustle, after the backwater of Ralston," he said ruefully. "Coming up here with Jade saves my sanity, and strengthens my soul. I can see that you need some solace; your heart is heavy with sorrow and sadness, Des Flying Horse."
How is it that Indians talk like – well, like Indians? All that 'heart is heavy' stuff – but of course Eddy Two Bears was right on the button. I had been having flashbacks of Bosnia, Kenya and the Falklands, with the added horror of seeing Miriam's face on those I had killed and had seen murdered, even when I was at BATUS, which put two fingers up to that trick cyclist Captain Livingstone, who had said that when in a close, cohesive, group I shouldn't suffer PTSD, although what I suffer from is guilt. But since arriving in the mountains I had enjoyed a peaceful night sleep, without any nightmares or flashbacks, so maybe this back to nature thing was doing the trick, and easing my mind.

That evening, not long after I had retired to my room, there was a quiet tapping on my bedroom door. I was in bed, listening to some Mozart on the CD player, and, thinking that it was Eddy come to warn me of an early start the next morning, said, 'Come in'. I was surprised, but delighted, to see that it was Dawn, wearing a thick fur robe which covered her completely from shoulders to ankles.
"I heard the music," she explained. "It's wonderful; what is it?"
I was quite surprised that she had never heard the piece; it was Piano Concerto No 21, known as 'Elvira Madigan', a well-known and well-loved composition. I told her the title, and she sat on the edge of the bed and listened intently, with a slight smile on her face. As the piece finished she gave a great sigh.
"I don't think I've heard anything so beautiful; have you any more for me to listen to?"
I loaded the CD player with the Prague Concerto, then after she had heard that I played her Beethoven's Violin Concerto in D major, with Pinchas Zukerman as soloist, one of my favourite recordings. I could see that she was blown away by it, and I wondered where she had been, music wise, not to have heard these well-known classics before. Finally, as the notes of the last cadenza faded away into silence, she looked at me and said.
"Des Flying Horse, that was a most wonderful gift to have given me. Now I have one for you." With that she shrugged off her robe and slid naked into bed alongside me.

I am not going to give you a blow by blow account of what we did to each other. You are all adults who have done the business, so I will leave it to your imaginations. But I will tell you that I didn't plunge into her, as would have been my usual practise after waiting so long before getting my leg over. Instead, I entered her slowly and gently, immersing myself in her as if into a bath of warm, scented, silky, welcoming water. And that was how it was with Dawn on Still Waters. Total immersion; in someone who comforted, calmed and cosseted me. Like being baptised in the River Jordan I re-emerged cleansed, contented, succoured and saved.
I know that sounds ridiculous, but that is how it was, and I can only describe how I felt. It wasn't exactly a religious experience, but it was certainly a phenomenon that I had never enjoyed before, as the guilt and shame for what I did in the Falklands, Bosnia, Kenya, and yes in Richmond too, was washed away, and lifted from my conscience. I also participated in one of the most exquisite episodes of love making that has ever been my pleasure to enjoy.

It wasn't just the sex with Dawn that refreshed, revitalised me and made me feel that life was one hugely marvellous place. She was a wonderful companion, and we seemed to be on the same wavelength from day one, or rather from night two. We didn't do a lot of talking; First Nation people are not particularly loquacious, and the same can be said for the English, well, certainly in my case. We did seem to pick up on the body language of each other, and in any slight movement of eyes or mouth, which conveyed a whole lot more information than just talking. Our minds and emotions had connected as completely and as satisfyingly as we had joined our bodies, although I'm sure we would have still had an emotional bond with each other even if we hadn't enjoyed a physical union.