Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

YENTA, THE MATCHMAKER Angela Keller sat with her white-stockinged knees carefully together, her hands very properly folded in the skirt of her white uniform skirt, her head tilted a little the way a woman will, when something interests her. She was listening to the regular cadence of tones from the black-plastic-grilled speaker. She knew it was Morse code -- beyond that, she had to wait for the twins' yellow-painted Number Two Lead pencils to quit their busy lines and curlicues, and their results ripped free of pads maintained for that purpose, and handed to her. Angela smiled as she read this modern day transcript of a Morse code message, and part of her mind quietly appreciated that this scene had been played out more than a century before, when a man who'd worn Confederate grey, inclined a professional ear to a polished-brass sounder and interpreted a rapid series of clicks and clatters, letting the metallic racket run in his ears and out the Barlow-whittled tip of his stub of a pencil. Angela read the regular print, looking from one page to another -- even their handwriting is almost identical! she thought -- she looked up at the twins and smiled that gentle smile of hers, then she rose, knelt, opened her arms. Michael and Victoria happily embraced their big sis, delighted to have so obviously gained her approval. Angela knocked at the door, then looked down and smiled: she stepped back a little, bent slightly, looked at the round lens of a doorbell pushbutton. "Mitch?" she called. "It's Angela. Permission to come aboard!" There was a heavy, mechanical sound as the door was remotely unlocked, and Mitch's voice grinned from the rectangular doorbell, "Permission granted!" Angela straightened, pushed open the door, stepped inside: she carefully closed it behind her, smiled a little at the sound of heavy bolts driving home, securing the portal. If I rode a wheelchair for a living, she thought, I'd have a fortress too! She turned at the sound of hydraulics whining; a moment later, a panel opened and Mitch rolled toward her, grinning. He extended a hand and Angela ignored it: she bent, hugged him, giggled, and he hugged her back, laughing. "You've lost weight!" she exclaimed, and he slapped his stumps and declared firmly, "The Alfred Hitchcock method! Lose weight fast, use a knife!" -- they both laughed, for it was an old joke between them: it started out as Angela's psychic slap-in-the-face to him when she was first taking care of him, right after he'd lost both legs from being hit by that drunk driver, and Mitch seized on the phrase as a survival tool. Rotten humor, he'd told her later, was his salvation, and Angela agreed, for she'd seen that same particular tool used by the Combined Emergency Services more times than she could count. They strolled and rolled into the kitchen: "The Navy runs on coffee, and so do I!" Mitch said firmly, reaching up and turning a little carousel: "Individual packages, take-a you pick!" Angela bent, studied the selection, chose what she thought was the strongest brew: the coffee maker already had water in the reservoir, and her big mug of steaming-hot wide-awake was quickly and fragrantly produced, Mitch's right behind it, and the two of them took their places at Mitch's kitchen table. "Deborah's gone for the day," Mitch said as he slopped milk from the plastic jug into his big insulated travel mug with MITCH'S GAS TANK hand painted on the side. "How's she getting along?" Mitch set the jug down, looked very frankly at Angela. "She is the best thing that ever happened to me," he said softly, then chuckled. "I remember when we first met" -- he looked sharply at Angela, who regarded him with an innocent batting of her long, curled eyelashes over the glazed rim of her heavy white-ceramic mug -- "I'd not gotten ... the idea of not having legs anymore was just sinkin' in and it felt like an anchor pulling me to the bottom of the ocean." "I remember," Angela murmured. "You were profoundly depressed." "Yeah," Mitch said quietly, nodding, then took a sip of his steaming-fresh brew. "Then this really good looking gal in a skirt comes into the room. "Here I am, feeling all sorry for myself, I can't hardly look at her -- what woman wants half a man? -- she sat down and looked at me." His voice softened a little. "Angela, I honestly can't tell you just how surprised I was when she hiked that skirt up." Angela hid her quiet smile behind her cup, gave him those big lovely eyes to show him she was listening and listening closely. "She unbuckled her left leg, she pulled it off her stump, she took it overhead in both hands and heaved it across the room into my belly -- I caught it and I'm starin' at her like she just sprouted a third eye -- she pulls off her right leg and hauls off and heaves it across the room at me, she points that finger of hers at me and said, 'Now that I have your attention, you listen to me!' " He took a long breath, sighed it out, smiled. "That," he said softly, "was the beginning of my recovery. I have no idea why, but she stayed with me every step of the way. "We've set the date. We're getting married. She's got your invitation made out and ready to send." Angela set her mug down carefully, clapped her hands with delight, laughed. "So she got your attention!" -- her voice was sunshine and merriment, and Mitch laughed with her and nodded. "I understand you arranged for her visit," Mitch said quietly. "Thank you." "A nurse is many things," Angela said quietly. "Some are more satisfying than others" -- she leaned forward, lowered her head a bit, smiled, spoke as one old friend to another -- "but the best part is becoming Yenta, the Matchmaker!" "I was surprised when the twins asked if you could come by today." Mitch shifted a little, pushed up on the arms of his chair, resettled himself on the gel doughnut under his backside. "I was watching your traffic stop a couple days ago." Angela nodded. "That one," she admitted, "did not go quite the way I expected!" "I thought you were hurt." "No. Just the windshield and some sheet metal." Mitch set his big plastic travel mug down, leaned forward, looked intently, directly, into Angela's pale eyes. "I don't have many friends anymore," Mitch said, his voice quiet, intense: "no man can afford to throw a friend away and I don't want to lose any more." Angela watched him frown, look away, swallow, look back, and she knew what he was saying was both spontaneous, and whole cloth. "Angela, you be careful. You're the only one of you we've got." "Angela, I mean it. I had a crush on you in school and" -- his teeth clicked together as he looked away again, as if he'd let something slip he didn't mean to. "I shouldn't have said that," he muttered. Angela reached across the table, gripped his hand. "Mitch?" she almost whispered. "Thank you." Mitch looked back, nodded, then grinned. "The world has a shortage of good matchmakers," he grinned. "I don't want anything to happen to my favorite Yenta!"

FORTRESS FORD AND BATTLESHIP BUICK Mitch didn't get out much, at least not like his peers. He did quite a bit of traveling, most of it through an old-fashioned telegraph key. Jacob Keller got him started in ham radio, right after the drunk driver took Mitch's legs: Mitch threw himself into learning Morse code and radio theory, antenna theory and propagation, he studied with a single minded focus: when he sat for his exams, he paid his money to take the Technician exam, then for no extra cost, he immediately took (and passed) the Extra and the Advanced as well. When his set began an urgent set of tones, he drove his powered wheelchair over to his shack bench, frowned, reached for the key and sent a quick burst, then went to his window and picked up a set of binoculars. He had a bay window that afforded him 270 degrees of view; as he was well up on the mountainside, he had a grand vista ahead of him, none of which he saw. He turned the focus wheel, leaned forward, watched for several long moments, then backed his chair, turned it, gripped the key again and sent one word: ALIVE Angela's Gammaw still taught, in spite of her being dead for a lot of years now. Angela's Gammaw videotaped a variety of presentations for the Academy, and Angela watched every last one of them, from early childhood to the present day. Willamina could convey an idea fast, clearly, concisely, and did: she taught her troops that there is no such thing as routine patrol, and there is sure as hell no such thing as a routine traffic stop, and she set up a variety of realistic scenarios based on actual stops gone bad. Angela called in a plate, pulled over a vehicle: she'd not come to a full stop behind the subject vehicle when the driver's door flew open, the driver came out, running toward her, shooting. Angela dumped the shifter in Go Backwards gear and quite honestly mashed the throttle: her cruiser screamed backwards, the driver ran back into his car, he started to jackrabbit out of there, until Angela rammed his rear quarter panel, PIT-ing him, hard, when he was barely moving. She backed up, yanked the shifter savagely into gear: the driver started moving again and Angela rammed him again, hard, just behind the driver's door, shoving him sideways and into the ditch. She just honestly bulldozed him off the roadway and over on his side. Angela backed again, made a quick sweep of her mirrors: she reached up, hit the release, shouldered her own door open and stepped out, using her engine block and front wheel for cover. She jacked a round of genuine US Military 00 Buck into her Ithaca, dropped the barrel level, glared through the ghost ring peep, and waited. Her tan cruiser's big block engine whispered mechanical secrets to itself, patiently waiting for the next demand upon its services; her red-and-blue LED bar, and the other pretty little lights Weenkeeng and Bleenkeeng fore, aft and on running boards and mirrors, were silent; Angela waited, knowing the other driver's only exit was through his driver's-side door, unless he kicked his windshield out -- which would give her well more than enough advance warning, to line up a killing shot if need be. Michael and Victoria sat side by side at what used to be Jacob's ham radio desk. It now belonged to the twins. Victoria had the enlarged map on display; she'd placed rectangular markers to show the positions of Angela's cruiser, and as best they could estimate, location of the subject vehicle. It was too far away for them to intervene, and they knew better than to interfere with a law enforcement matter, but both knew the moment Angela's windshield starburst with the first hostile gunshot, and both sprinted upstairs, to where the scanner patiently ran the bands, and their natural affinity for things electronic enabled them to play back radio traffic, and they heard Angela's professional voice -- she sounded different when she spoke professionally -- call in the plate number and location, then they heard the sound of bullet strikes, the squall of tires, the sound of the well-muffled engine's protest and Angela's clipped, "Shots fired, taking evasive, backup, NOW!" Michael consulted another map, turned an antenna's directional control: a Yagi-Uda swung obediently in response to his safecracker's touch on the directional knob, then he gripped the straight key and tapped out a message to a set of ears he knew would be listening. Mitch watched, shocked, as the tan Sheriff's cruiser rammed the vehicle, turning it: his mouth opened in surprise as he saw the cruiser, like a bull, lower its head and ram the stopped car in the side, pushing it off the roadway and into the ditch, where it rocked once and stayed. He made a mental note to rig a relay so he could run a key from his chair, while here in his overwatch, and kicked himself for not thinking of it sooner. He pulled back and sent Michael a one word reply, then rolled back into his bay window, glass glued to his eyes, watching. Angela waited for backup, then took a ballistic shield, jumped the ditch, walked around the car and tapped on its underside. "Anybody home?" she called. The reply from within was less than kindly in nature. "Tell you what," Angela called, and she smiled as she did: "Roll down your window, throw out your gun and we'll get you out of there!" The reply was to fire a half-dozen rounds through the bottom of the car. "I thought you might say that," Angela muttered: she went to the back of the car, smacked the back glass with a glass breaker, dropped the pointy nosed hammerhead. She pulled the pin on a tear dust grenade, drove its end into the roof of the car, then tossed the can inside. A muted detonation, a cloud: blinded, unable to breathe, the driver fought his way out the back and through what used to be his rear window, where he was cheerfully dogpiled and cuffed. Mitch waited until the rescue truck unspooled a compressed air line and blew the excess tear dust off the prisoner and out of his hair, then rolled back to his key and sent a brief reply to Michael. Victoria's eyes met her twin's and they smiled a quiet smile of satisfaction as they heard the all-well, as they listened to Angela requesting a shots-fired team to help process the scene. Michael and Victoria were as accustomed to watching their Gammaw's training videos as was their older sister. They watched as their Gammaw's voice narrated the scene as a driver stepped out of a simulated stopped vehicle and charged the camera, firing paintballs as he came: splats of red blasted against the windshield and Willamina's voice said "Congratulations, you're dead. Now let's see how else we might handle this." Pale eyed twins watched and listened as the stopped vehicle's driver's door flew open, as the driver emerged weapon in hand, as the camera's vehicle accelerated hard in reverse. "Distance is your friend, and your vehicle provides some cover," Willamina's voice said. "Your vehicle gives you speed, mobility and protection. It runs faster than you can, it hits harder than you can. The vehicle itself is a weapon and can be used to counter deadly force." The scene changed, melted, coalesced into an attractive woman with Marine-short hair and a tailored suit dress, behind a podium, in front of the now-blank projector screen behind her. "Remember, boys and girls," she smiled, "when you are behind the wheel, on duty or off, you are driving Fortress Ford, and Battleship Buick!"

... trying to think of something intelligent, educational, informative, supportive, actually useful and at least a little entertaining, and the mind just went blank! As I suffer a terrible condition -- you might've heard of it, Hoof In Mouth syndrome -- might be I'd be wise just to stay hush! What was it the wise man admonished me? ... "a closed mouth gathers no foot ..." Looking forward to your after action report! Safe travels, enjoy yourself!

Me dear Pappy would get a cardboard can of "Flowers of Sulfur" (powdered sulfur) at the drug store. We'd dust our pants cuffs with sulfur to keep off ticks. Looking at your reversed tape dodge ... can't argue with results ... I'll give that a try, and thank you for it!

MEANWHILE, IN THE BACK STAIRWAY Sarah Lynne McKenna gripped Jacob Keller's hand, turned her head, looked at him. "He doesn't realize we're both his woods colts, you know." "I know." "Mama suspects. I think your Mama does too." "Reckon so." "Mama implied he found a family Bible, but she stopped talking when she saw I was looking at her and listening closely." "That's where you get it." "Get what?" Jacob grinned. "Little Sis," he said quietly, for the back stairway was hushed, and the softest voice was plainly heard, "your Mama can listen to someone talking and she can just fade into the wall and not be seen!" Sarah swatted at his shoulder: "Who you calling little sis, little brother?" Jacob let it pass: they knew early that they were the get of that pale eyed lawman, even if he didn't seem to realize it; there was doubt as to Jacob's actual age, and of Sarah's, though Bonnie implied that Sarah's birthday would be found out. "Sarah, when you're with people, you have the gift of disappearing," Jacob said, his voice suddenly serious. "That's a gift and that's how to find things out, just listen and don't be noticed." "I know." Her hand tightened on his. "I'm glad you're here, Jacob." "So am I." She felt him take a deep breath, saw him turn his head and grin. "It feels good to have family." Sarah's hand tightened in his. "Yes," she agreed. "Yes, it does." Sarah's eyes drifted down to the landing, rested on a varnished wood panel. "I used to hide in there," she said softly. Jacob looked at her, looked at the several wood panels, all varnished, all identical. "The Silver Jewel wasn't ... respectable then." Jacob nodded. "Mama was ... upstairs ... and when my Daddy came in he'd get drunk and beat the working girls. If he wasn't hurting me he was ignoring me, and they ... the girls ... they would bath me and patch my dress and fix my hair and put a ribbon in it ... they said I was the only sunshine in their lives." Sarah's voice was haunted, her eyes distant and filled with ghosts. Jacob ran his arm around his half-sister's shoulders, pulled her close: she laid her head over on his shoulder, shivered. "I'm glad you're here, Jacob." "I am too." Sarah sighed. "Jacob?" "Hm?" "Angela was asking me why bad men wanted to do bad things to her Daddy." Jacob turned his head toward her a little, listening closely. "She didn't want to talk about it with her Mama so she talked with me." "Pa said it is" -- he hesitated, lifted his chin, pale eyes searching the opposite wall for the right words -- "a mark of significant trust," he quoted with a smile, looked back at Sarah -- "for a little child to confide in us." Sarah smiled -- it was a soul-deep smile, the kind that shines from within -- "Jacob," she whispered, "you sound just like him!" Jacob shrugged. "Can't imagine why." "What did you tell her?" "When she asked me why bad men wanted to do bad things to her Daddy?" Sarah took a long breath, sighed it out: she looked sadly at Jacob. "I told her that ... when you put someone in prison, they don't forget you, and their families do not forget you, and their partners do not forget you." Jacob raised an eyebrow, nodded. "What did she say?" "She looked surprised -- like the thought honestly never occurred to her -- she said 'Oh,' and that seemed to satisfy her." Jacob nodded, chewed on his bottom lip. "Jacob, what is she like? At home, as a sister?" Jacob smiled, just a little. "It's like living with a glowing sunflower," he almost whispered. "She's never still, she's always smiling, she'll run up and give me a big hug, or she'll be talking nonstop to The Bear Killer while they're walking ..." Sarah saw the memories shine inside him, and she smiled to see them. "I'm glad you have her." "Me too." Silence, then: "Jacob, what's this I hear about a man killed with an ax?" Jacob was quiet for a long moment, his jaw slid out as he considered -- just like his father! Sarah thought. "You said something about not bein' forgot when you send someone to prison." Sarah nodded, her eyes big. "I heard a fellow talkin' quiet, how he figured to backshoot Pa. "I followed him, watched him ... he tried two or three places and he settled on one, and a good place for bush whack it was." "And you killed him." "Damn right." Jacob's eyes were a shade more pale now. "He was layin' for my Pa. "I didn't want to up and shoot him -- I could have, I could've blowed the eyeballs out of his skull from behind -- Pa said he kilt men durin' the War with an ax an' one was handy. "I saw Pa comin' along and I faded back and eased attair broad ax out of its chunk and I waited. "He fetched up his rifle and didn't have it fair to shoulder when I stepped up behint where he was down on one knee, and I clove him from crown to teeth. "He never twitched. "I taken his rifle and his proud-ofs, I unsaddled his horse and took his saddle bags." "Won't they blame whoever owned the ax?" "Place is abandoned. Nobody's been there for a year. I'm surprised that ax was still stuck in the chunk." "Did you know the man?" "Only that Pa sent him off to prison an' he'd made his brags he was gonna kill that pale eyed son of a sheepherder for sendin' him away." " 'Son of a sheepherder?' " she quoted, shaking her head. "Jacob, if he's going to say that about our Papa, I'm glad you killed him!"

GET OUTTA HERE NOW The Sheriff was not a trusting man. He’d been lied to often enough and badly enough that he trusted very few individuals: those of his inner circle were trusted implicitly and without hesitation, but those who were not part of that inner circle … weren’t. When word came to him that three men with lready stained reputations wished him harm, he considered the information was probably correct … though it could be just hot air, bluster, bragging, the way men will in careless moments. When two of those men came riding toward him, the Sheriff looked at the lay of the land, gigged his stallion in the ribs, ran on ahead to where he’d have the advantage of terrain. The pair saw him and reacted, and the three ended up a mile or so distant, playing cat-and-mouse with each other, until one disappeared and the Sheriff had no idea where he was. His stallion stood, sleepy-looking as was his habit: the Sheriff knew his golden Palomino was anything but drowsy, and when an ear swung to the right, horse and rider both spun and surged forward. “DON’T!” the Sheriff yelled as his left hand Colt came to full cock. One of the men he was after had his rifle in hand, and halfway raised: the stallion’s head started to move. Linn never remembered drawing his right hand revolver, only that his left hand Colt fired, his stallion spun under him and he fired a second round from the engraved, gold-inlaid, left-hand Colt. Part of his mind, sitting well behind his eyes, stood on the quarterdeck of a sailing-ship, wearing a Captain’s hat and watching the enemy’s ship: he heard his own voice, distant and faint, “Fire as they come to bear!” – and his left-hand Colt did just that as his stallion completed his surging turn. Linn gigged his stallion into a gallop, he dropped into a gully, stopped, turned. They’ll expect me to ride downhill, under cover, he thought. Yonder’s where they’ll expect me to come up. He turned the Palomino’s head upstream, walked him quickly, then gigged him into a jump and he was back up on the flat, a revolver in each hand, ready – One horse stood looking at him, ears swinging, the other was a quarter mile distant and still moving. Two men lay on the ground, face down. Linn holstered his unfired, right-hand revolver, kicked out the fired hulls and reloaded the other: he holstered, walked his stallion over to the watching horse, looked down. As there was a bloody hole out the back of the man’s head, he concluded there was little threat to be had from this one, and walked Rey del Sol over to the other unmoving form. The saddled gelding followed him, apparently anxious for the company. Linn swung down. Don’t see any holes out his back. “You alive?” he asked uncharitably. The other outlaw made no reply. The Sheriff squatted, picked up the dropped pistol. “Be damned,” he muttered as he checked the loads, then sniffed the muzzle: “You got a shot off!” Part of his mind reminded him his earlobe was stinging just a little. He reached up, brushed it with the back of his finger, and it came away wet and red. Well, hell, he thought, I’m gettin’ my coat bloody! He grabbed the outlaw, rolled him over, ready for an arm to punch up, ready for a close-held pistol to come to bear – The Sheriff grunted. The man’s life was soaked out into the sandy ground. One hole in, no holes out. He looked up, looked around, squinting a little against the sun’s glaring brightness. He put two fingers to his lips, whistled, a high, shimmering note, the kind that carried well in the thin, high air. He reached into a pocket and drew out a plug of molasses twist tobacker and shaved off several generous curls, bribed the dead outlaw’s horse into coming closer: once he had hands on its reins, the horse followed docilely. His whistle brought the departing equine’s head up: the Sheriff saw it coming back toward him, as he’d hoped it would. “Daddy,” Angela said, her big blue eyes wide and innocent, “did you get hurt?” Linn smiled at his little girl, squatted. “No, Princess, why would you ask that?” “Your ear’s bloody.” “Yeah, I kinda scraped it on something.” “Ow,” Angela grimaced sympathetically, then turned and looked at two carcasses bent over their saddles. She looked at her pale eyed Daddy and said skeptically, “Daddy, are you sure you’re not hurt?” Linn’s voice was gentle as he nodded. “I’m sure, Princess.” Five year old Angela Keller drew herself up to her full frilly frocked height and shook her little pink Mommy-finger at her Daddy and scolded, “Daddy, if you gets hurted real bad an’ killed, I’ll never speak to you again!” Hard men remain hard men when they are faced with danger, with enemies, with confrontation. Hard men will not infrequently melt like butter on a hot skillet when a pretty little girl shakes her little pink Mommy-finger and admonishes her Daddy in a high, sincere, little-girl voice: Sheriff Linn Keller laughed quietly, went to one knee, wrapped his little girl in a big comforting Daddy-hug and murmured gently in her little pink ear, “I’ll keep that in mind, Princess,” then she felt him change and he released her, leaned back. The Sheriff rose, his eyes hard and his voice matched his eyes. “Get out of here, now,” he said, his voice low, urgent. Angela was Daddy’s Little Girl. Angela was a blue-eyed child of the Kentucky mountains, orphaned in a train wreck. Angela had been Linn and Esther’s daughter for just over one year, and in that one year, as children often do, she was a highly observant, extremely attentive, sponge. Angela knew her Daddy’s voice and her Daddy’s hands and she knew when her Daddy said to scoot, it was time to scoot! – and she did. Her Daddy stood and her Daddy’s coat was open and Angela twisted between her Daddy and the front of the Sheriff’s office, she ran a-scamper to the end of the boardwalk and jumped, landed flat footed and ducked to the right. She was halfway down the alley before she realized she’d just heard two gunshots, sudden, shocking, slapping at her as they echoed down the alley between Digger’s funeral parlor and the Sheriff’s log fortress. Angela kept running, turned right again, skidded a little as she came to her Daddy’s little bitty stable behind the Sheriff’s office. Angela stopped, looked down the alley. A man was just falling off his horse – limp, boneless, he fell and hit the ground like a sack of sawdust and just laid there, his foot falling from the stirrup as his horse danced sideways, eyes walling. Angela ran to the mouth of the alley, looked around, then she strutted out in the middle of the street, her little pink hand extended: “Come here, horsie,” she cooed in her little-girl’s voice: “ ’Mere, horsie.” The horse’s nostrils were flared, its ears laid back, but at the approach of this little frilly creature with a gentle voice, the horse stretched its neck, snuffing loudly at the little pink hand. Angela giggled and gathered the reins in her hands, reached up and stroked the horsie’s damp pink nose, chattering quietly to it the way a fearless little girl will do. Angela was enamored with the snuffy horsie, so much so that she honestly did not see running men, curious onlookers: it wasn’t until she heard the clatter of Digger’s dead wagon that she looked up and realized the fellow who fell from the horsie was picked up from behind her, and loaded into the dead wagon. Angela looked up, all bright eyes and white teeth, smiled as Esther dipped her knees, gripped her daughter’s shoulders with motherly hands, regarded her with wide, frightened eyes. “Hi, Mommy,” Angela laughed. “I founded me a horsie!” An empty brass hull fell to the boardwalk. The Sheriff did not hear it hit through the red ringing in his ears, but he felt the impact of the brass rim hitting the weathered, warped, dusty board through his bootsole. He replaced the fired round and holstered his engraved Colt. He looked at his wife and at his little girl, and he was flat forevermore grateful that when he told her to get out of here ... she did.

My wife started this some long time ago with intent to have it finished by my birthday. It's a little late but I am sitting here just plainly devouring it with my eyes! She ordered a plastic model and spent an unholy amount of time and effort (and holding her breath!) to detail this to her satisfaction!

A MOUNTAIN, A BLANKET, A SKY Two hands found one another: one larger and callused, the other smaller, softer. Two souls merged with this simple joining of the hands. "Mr. Keller?" Esther whispered. "Yes, Mrs. Keller?" Linn whispered back. "Mr. Keller, you are an old romantic, you know that." Sheriff Linn Keller smiled a little, just a little, the softening of his expression hidden beneath his waxed handlebar mustache and the nighttime darkness. "Specially for you," he whispered back, and felt her quick squeeze in reply. Overhead, instead of a night-dark bedroom ceiling, they beheld the blazing glory of the Universe itself. The moon was only just set; the stars, relieved of its silvery glare, blazed defiance, each competing with its neighbor for prominence. Pale eyes automatically picked out the Dipper, the North Star; he looked for that red star he'd seen now and again, and couldn't find it ... but with this many stars in view, it would be pretty hard to find anyhow. "Mr. Keller?" "Dearest?" Esther smiled, tightened her hand again: her husband was a man of short temper and mighty strength, he'd picked men up by the neck and pinned them against the side of a building just to get their attention, and he was known to donate miscreants to the nearest horse trough on occasion, and the thought of such a hard man's lips positively caressing her with the word "Dearest" send a wickedly delicious shiver through her. "Mr. Keller, what does it all mean?" Linn lay on the blanket he'd spread for himself: he'd brought up a rolled tick for his wife's recumbence, that, and another heavy blanket: he'd planned this night's outing because he remembered a night, back East, when he and his new bride lay together and stared up at the starry-decked firmament, and honestly marveled at this glorious, almost wasteful beauty, spread out for their joy and delight. "Mrs. Keller, what does all what mean?" "This," Esther whispered, staring childlike at the shining glory overhead. Linn considered the night sky, turned his head slightly, regarded its expanse, contemplated its depth. "I reckon," he said quietly, "God Almighty wants us to be happy." He rolled up on his side, laid his arm carefully across his wife's belly. "That's why He lays such beauty before us, so we can see the joy of Creation, and take that joy in each other." "Mr. Keller," Esther whispered, laying her hand on his, "are you suggesting that you have improper thoughts now that we are alone?" Esther shivered, stifled a giggle as her husband nuzzled under her jaw with his mustache, kissed the fragrant softness of her neck, just under her earlobe. "Mrs. Keller," he whispered, lifting his head and placing his lips gently on hers, "whatever gave you such an idea?" Conversation was suspended for a significant length of time afterward; a huge, black guardian and a shining-gold stallion were the only witnesses: disinterested in such human activities, they returned to their observation of the surrounding night. Marnie Keller lay on her back on a field-blanket, its insulated layers separated by a two-fingers-thick force field that served as an efficient cushion against the cold Martian sands beneath. She lay flat on her back, looking up at the incredible, star-blazing sky, made all the more brilliant by the absolutely BLACK of their background. She'd consulted the Valkyries' observations, compared relative velocities and projected trajectories, and she and her husband slipped away from their cozy quarters to come out here, onto the nighttime surface, to spread their blankets and lay side by side, holding hands, their personal protective fields merging: when they held hands, no energy barrier separated them as it otherwise would have. "What are we looking for?" John asked quietly: his voice did not go through the usual transmission protocol, but was rather air conducted. Marnie smiled just a little. "I have a surprise for you," she whispered. Dr. John Greenlees Jr rolled up on his side, laid his hand carefully splay-fingered, on his wife's belly. "Marnie," he whispered, "is there something you want to tell me?" Marnie giggled, laid her hand on his, pressed affectionately. "No, Doctor," she sighed, "in spite of your best efforts here of late, I am not with child again." She turned and smiled lasciviously at her husband. "At least not yet, you naughty boy!" John gave his wife a long look, smiled just a little, then rolled back over on his back, his hand finding hers. "I never get tired of this," Marnie sighed. "Almost nobody comes out to see the stars anymore." "Damn shame -- look!" A silver streak blazed through the thin Martian atmosphere. "Be damned," John swore softly. "I didn't know they'd --" Two more blazing silver slashes lacerated the sky above them. "Just watch," Marnie breathed, and suddenly a half-dozen, in close proximity to one another, as if a young squadron of silvery knives were trying to slice open the thin envelope of Martian atmosphere. "Marnie," John asked, his voice quietly serious, "are we in danger?" Marnie lifted her free arm, consulted a small panel on the back of her wrist, tapped the screen, sat up. "Yes we are," she said briskly. "Inside!" Husband and wife seized their insulating field-blankets, rolled over onto their knees, pushed up to their feet, sprinted awkwardly for the airlock: they usually lived and worked in one-and-a-quarter Earth gravities to keep their bodies in shape, to keep their bones from decalcifying, to prevent the agonies of kidney stones that was the consequence of calcium leaching out of the bones and into the blood (not to mention the concomitant cardiac conduction problems it caused!) -- and their adrenalized sprint, Mars-normal gravity, was awkward, stumbling and almost comical. They flattened themselves against the airlock door as Marnie slapped her palm against the Open Sesame button, they nearly fell at the door's immediate response: outside, they saw three small geysers of sandy dust as meteors hit the ground, not far from where they'd lain, watching the show overhead. Marnie Keller hugged her husband, let her field blanket hit the floor: it rolled up automatically, waited patiently for someone to step on it or trip over it, as it usually did: John tossed his atop his wife's, and the two tight-rolled survival tools lay side by side as husband and wife hugged each other and laughed. John kissed his wife, picked her up, hoist her to eye level: like his father, John Jr was tall and lean, and Marnie giggled, for her big strong Daddy used to pick her up when she was a little girl, and he'd draw her in close and twiddle his handlebar mustache against her nose, and she'd giggle. "John," Marnie smiled, her pale eyes level with his hazel orbs, "have you ever thought of growing a mustache?"

Your second update looks encouraging. Still standing up on my knees for the three of you!

Likely I'd say something really intelligent -- something like "W'al I'll be damned!" -- but I'd have to winch my jaw up from belt buckle level first!

Many thanks for this! Passed this along to the group Snub Noir, the new home of Gats and Hats!

BOOKMARK "William." "Yes, sir?" "William, would you read tonight, please." "Yes, sir." "The place is marked." "Yes, sir." William took his father's Bible, turned a little and sat, so as to get the best light across the page. William looked up at his father. "Second Kings, sir?" Jacob closed his eyes, rocking a little, the youngest curled up on his lap, cuddled into his shirt front: he nodded, just a little, his arms protectively around a blanket wrapped infant, and William wished he had one of those camera things he'd heard about, for this moment -- where his Pa had that quiet smile -- was something he wished to remember forever. William opened the Book, looked at the bookmark. It was grey wool, and quite old: rectangular, neatly hemmed at the edges, and in the center, what looked like a bullet hole. He'd seen it a thousand time and more -- at least, his eyes beheld it -- but he never really saw it. He looked up at his Pa and saw Jacob's eyes were on him, those knowing eyes of a father who remembered what it was to be young. "There is a question in your eyes," Jacob said quietly. "Yes, sir." Annette smiled a little, rocking as she sewed: there were always repairs to be made, and though the hired girl did an outstanding job, Annette worked hard to keep a proper household for her husband, for her family: she had a sock on a darning egg and was busy weaving a repair across the hole. Her fingers knew the work; she looked up at her son, at her husband, with the knowing eyes of a wife, of a mother, who knew that Second Kings was going to be somewhat delayed. "That used to be part of a blanket that belonged to your Granddad," Jacob explained, his voice gentle, reassuring, for the infant he held was asleep, or near to it. "Sir?" Jacob smiled, just a little, as he rocked, slowly, thoughtfully. "Pa was headed West. He'd been in that damned War, he'd been a lawman back East, he'd got the Fiddle Foot" -- Jacob looked at his wife, who smiled indulgently: her brother had the Fiddle Foot, and never stayed in one place more than a couple of months -- "when he finally told a dirty little Kansas town he'd not be cheated out of his pay, he knocked the Dog Stuffing out of Mayor and Council, he took his wages from the Mayor's wallet -- I think there was the small matter of having smacked the man across the back of the head with a chair or something of the kind --" Jacob managed to look innocent as he described the event -- "your Granddad always did have a way of getting his ideas, understood." William smiled, then grinned. "Yes, sir," he agreed, "he still does!" "You mean the horse trough thing?" Jacob chuckled. "I reckon he give that young fellow a bath so he'd not get so hot under the collar as to set his hair afire!" "Yes, sir." "Now about that blanket." "Yes, sir?" "That good old blanket ..." Jacob's voice trailed off and he got a distant look about him, as if he was looking at a memory, and William waited, knowing his Pa was likely looking at something through his own father's eyes. "Pa had damn little when he come West. I don't recall if he'd found gold in that streambed yet or not. I do know he was asleep under that same blanket when some fellow snuck up and tried to steal his Sam-horse." William frowned a little. Horse theft was a serious matter, and he'd seen men hung for the crime. "Your Grampa fetched up his Navy colt and fired one shot." "Yes, sir?" "Trouble was, 'twas under the blanket yet when he fired." "Yes, sir?" "He did not miss, William, but he was distressed that he'd set his blanket afire." "Sir?" "Oh, it didn't catch fire, wool doesn't burn easy at all, but that much smoke under a wool blanket would likely look like 'twas a-smolder somethin' fierce!" "Don't get any ideas," Annette cautioned her son as she saw an idea dance across his young eyes. "No ma'am," William replied, his ears reddening, which told the perceptive Annette that their son did indeed have thoughts of replicating the event as an experiment, to see just how smokey such a blanket would look. "That blanket got kind of thin and worn with time," Jacob continued, rocking slowly, gently, the weight of their sleeping infant warm and reassuring on his front, in his arms. "It got cut apart and re-used, re-sewn -- you recall how your Mama split that worn bedsheet and sewed the sides together to form the new center." "Yes, sir." "Your Granddad is a thrifty man, William. He wastes nothing. He's known privation and he's known a slim pocketbook. He's still that way. I reckon if he was rich as them steel barons back East, he'd be just as thrifty." "Yes, sir." "That bookmark" -- Jacob nodded toward the open Book -- "is about all that's left of that blanket. That, and an oiled gunrag I keep in my office." William grinned, slowly, broadly, for he remembered using that selfsame oily rag for that very purpose. William considered the bookmark, frowned a little, looked up at his Pa. "Sir, is there a significance to tonight's reading?" "There is, William." Jacob looked at his wife, who gave him a warning look. "You see, not long after your Mama and I took up house keepin' -- you probably don't remember, but you were ringbearer at our weddin', and your little sister was flower girl --" "JACOB!" Annette hissed, shocked. "Well, maybe that ain't quite what happened," Jacob said innocently. "No, y'see, shortly after we taken up housekeepin' an bein' man and wife, I asked her why I ought to be doin' dishes, y'see." Jacob gave his wife an innocent look as she hefted the darning egg, clearly debating whether she could bounce it off his skull without hitting their sleeping child. "Your Mama is an educated woman, and she knows her Scripture. She quoted me from Second Kings when I asked why I'd ought to be doin' them supper dishes, and she quoted from the Book. You'll find it right there directly, that part where God says He will wipe Jerusalem like a man washes a bowl, wipes it out with a rag and turns it over." Annette resumed her darning, rocking as she did: something went *pop!* in their cast iron stove, and William paged forward a little, scanning, stopped, smiled. "William, if that old book mark passes itself on to your hands, remember where it came from." "Yes, sir." "And remember that God said men-folk can warsh dishes too." William grinned, chuckled quietly. "Yes, sir." He looked at the open page, began to read.

Just read your update. Still talking to God about it!

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED Mr. Baxter waited until the Hard Hand of Doom descended on two boys’ shoulders. “You boys,” the Sheriff said quietly, “oughtn’t try that.” The two were caught, and fairly so: they’d tried cutting up barbershop trimmin’s short and with paste and subterfuge, tried fabricating some facial hair in an effort to patronize the bar. “Now was I to run you boys in,” the Sheriff continued quietly, “I’d have to turn you over to your Pa’s custody. How do you reckon he’d like hearin’ you were expected in court for a case you’d not win?” Two boys felt all hope drain out of their very marrow. “Tell you what.” Two boys dared not breathe, let alone move. “I might let you both go if you’d do somethin’ for me.” Two pale, sweating boys with hair stuck to their faces, assented. “I might need a favor sometime. ‘Ginst I do, I’ll let ye know. Deal?” Two boys nodded; their dual “Yes, sir’s” hovered in the air behind them as they fled down the hallway, past Daisy’s kitchen and out the back door. Sheriff William Keller looked up at Mr. Baxter, grinned that contagious grin this young Mr. Baxter remembered seeing on William’s pa’s face, back when William’s father Jacob was still Sheriff. “Boys,” Mr. Baxter sighed, shaking his head and polishing the bar. “Don’t they realize drink’s been outlawed?” “God help us,” William muttered. “Prohibition will be the ruin of us all!” “Tell your wife I do admire her piano playin’,” Mr. Baxter called as the Sheriff strolled to the front of the saloon, and out the front doors: he nodded to a pair of well dressed strangers: “Gentlemen.” Mr. Baxter looked up as the pair came in, looked around, looked pointedly at the nearly empty shelves behind the bar. “What do you have for two thirsty travelers?” one asked. Mr. Baxter considered these two strangers in suits and Fedoras, two men who were obviously more at home in the big city than clear out here. Mr. Baxter looked left, looked right, leaned closer and said quietly, “I rigged up a little pump to run good cold wellwater in a tub.” “Oh?” He winked. “Been cooling a couple bottles, if you’re interested.” The two strangers looked at one another, looked at the pomaded barkeep. “Sounds like just what we want.” Mr. Baxter reached under the bar, picked up a bottle – it was an old-fashioned, heavy-glass bottle, with a wire bail and cork arrangement – he brought down a tall glass, another: they heard a *pop* and the hissing gurgle of something carbonated being decanted. Mr. Baxter straightened, placed two brimming glasses on the gleaming mahogany bar. Two men looked at one another, picked up their glass, took a drink. They both recoiled, surprised. “Sarsaparilla!” one exclaimed, as the other swallowed, coughed, grimaced. “Good and cold, too,” Mr. Baxter nodded. “Nothing but the best for men of your quality!” “I was hoping for a beer,” came the disappointed response. “Wouldn’t we all,” Mr. Baxter sighed. The Silver Jewel was barely making expenses with the restaurant trade, thanks to the railroad and the nearby mines; Mr. Baxter waited until the pair were gone, until after he dropped their coin in the till and muttered, “Damned dry dicks!” “Revenue agents?” William asked, and Mr. Baxter jumped: “Jehosophat, Sheriff, don’t sneak up on a man like that!” William grinned again: “Yeah, but I’m good at it!” “Yeah, they were Revenuers, all right. Thought they’d found me out until they took a good cold slug of genuine high powered Sarsaparilla!” “Did they say where they were headed next?” “Nope. Didn’t see which way they went, either.” “They headed on toward Carbon Hill.” Sheriff William Keller paused, leaned across the bar a little and said quietly, “I let Carbon know, too!” Michael Keller stood in his Pa’s study and took a long, thoughtful look at a pair of framed portraits. Both were of truly beautiful women. He knew one was his Gammaw: she wore her usual tailored suit dress and heels, she was standing in her office, under the framed revolver Michael remembered hanging there, when he’d visit his Pa in that selfsame office. He looked at the portrait beside, that of another genuinely beautiful woman. This one wore a floor length gown, her hair was elaborately atop her head instead of Marine-short like his Gammaw. Michael knew this was the legendary Sarah Lynne McKenna, the justly famous Black Agent. Like most children that grow up looking at something every day and every day, he took the two portraits for granted: he looked at them, but didn’t really see them, and as sometimes happens, he stood and studied one, then the other, and genuinely saw them, probably for the first time. He’d honestly never appreciated just how identical the two of them were. He compared them to his mental image of Marnie. He felt the edge of his Pa’s desk. Michael carefully orbited, backwards, around the rim of his Pa’s solid old desk, found the high, padded back of his Pa’s chair, drew it out, sat. His pale eyes never left the two portraits. Michael frowned, considered, applied all the young knowledge he had on the subject, and came up dry. A quiet voice behind his right shoulder said “If you think too hard, your hair will catch fire.” “Hi, Marnie.” Michael smelled sunshine and lilac water and felt a familiar hand grip his young shoulder. “Your father is working on a puzzle.” “He’ll figure it out,” Michael said proudly. “I know he will. He always does.” “You’re puzzling over something too.” “Marnie, are you a ghost?” Feminine laughter, light, delicate, hands gripped his shoulders, massaged him through his heavy denim vest: “Does this feel like a ghost?” “Marnie, how come you and Gammaw and Sarah all look alike enough to be clones?” The hands stopped massaging, gripped him gently instead. “I don’t know, Michael. God’s honest truth, I don’t know.” “The Parson said reincarnation’s not real.” “He might be right.” “Then how come there’s so many examples of it?” “That,” came the soft-voice reply, close up behind his ear, “is for wiser heads than my own.” “Pa and Jacob and Old Pale Eyes, and there’s a couple more –” “I know. Remarkable, isn’t it?” “Pa said someone with a big black horse got that trucker out of there just before the thing blew up on ‘em. He doesn’t know who it was and that’s eatin’ at him.” “Your father doesn’t like puzzles.” “No.” Michael frowned. “Sometimes a puzzle can’t be solved.” “Don’t tell Pa. He’ll hammer at it until he does.” He heard the familiar, feminine sigh behind him. “Your father sounds so very much like Papa.” Michael frowned, surprised, turned. He was alone. “Marnie!” he exclaimed, annoyed, then movement at the corner of his vision: he turned, looked out the window, saw a pale eyed woman in a McKenna gown astride a truly huge horse, smiling at him as she walked her horse past the pane. Michael was out of his father’s high back office chair like a shot: he scrambled for the front door, yanked it open – Nothing – He drew back, shut the door, went to the window, looked again, then returned to his father’s padded, high back office chair, sat. He looked at the portraits again, looked out the window, looked back. “Pa,” he said aloud, “isn’t the only one that doesn’t like puzzles!”

I've also developed a fondness for Anna Lapwood -- she's a British artist, in the finest sense of the word, and she makes the biggest pipe organ in the WORLD sit up and talk! I thought I was genuinely Hot Stuff, playing first chair French horn, UNTIL I SAW ANNA LAPWOOD RUNNING AN ORGAN ... ... suddenly my skill level seemed more like drunken honking on a harmonica, compared with hers!

Standing up on my knees for all three of you!

Back when dirt was young, and so was I, I could swing a sledgehammer like that. This level of effort would kill me today. My respect and my admiration to these craftsmen and the work that they do!

YOU DAMNED TIN PLATED KNIGHT IN SHINING ARMOR I came through my own front door like I always did. I hung my Stetson on its peg the way I always did, hooked my boots off and left them in the boot tray and came sock foot into the kitchen, like I always did. Shelly turned, looked at me, waited: I came silently over to her, gathered her gently, almost carefully into my arms – she joked in moments of confidence that “My husband holds me like I’m a delicate porcelain teacup!” – Shelly brought her arms up, shoved my embracing arms away. Her fingers ran down my shirt front, freeing the buttons: her expression was serious, she gripped the tabs on my vest, ripped them away, looked up at me as I murmured, “Now, dear? What will the children think?” “I need to check something,” she snapped. “Strip to the waist!” I did. I pulled my shirt tail loose, hung my uniform shirt over the back of a chair, then the body armor; I brought off my T-shirt and Shelly gripped my shoulders, turned me a little to get the most light on my chest. She took my elbow, lifted my arm, turned me, studying my ribs: she was clearly looking for something, though I had absolutely no idea what: she turned me a little, then did the same for my left side: she finally turned me clear around, examined my back, turned me again, snatched up my T-shirt, shoved it into my hands. “Get dressed,” she snapped. “You’re buying tonight!” I long ago came to the conclusion, or perhaps the realization, that women are contradictory, confounding and confusing creatures, and no man – especially not I! – would ever figure them out, and so, when faced with the unexpected (like tonight), I took what I’d found to be the wisest course, and did as I was told. Shelly folded her arms, turned away from me: she went to the sink, viciously scrubbed at a platter, rinsed it and carefully placed the heavy, older-than-she-was oval ceramic in the drain rack, pulled the stopper, emptied the sink and rinsed it, her moves deliberate, controlled, almost … angry. I dressed, wordlessly; I came up behind my wife, gripped her shoulders, lightly, gently, looked at her barely-visible reflection in the window over the sink. “Darlin’,” I said in as gentle a voice I could, “is there –” Shelly whirled, thrust herself against me, her jaw thrust aggressively forward, her arms suddenly stiff against her side: she honestly glared at me, then twisted away and stomped off toward the front door. I raised an eyebrow. I had absolutely no idea a’tall what I could possibly have done to upset the woman. Reckon I’ll find out eventually. Not a word passed between us as we drove to the Silver Jewel, as we went inside; not a syllable escaped Shelly’s clenched teeth until she told the evening waitress that she’d reserved the back room. I brought my hand up, unobtrusively turned on my body cam. Whatever was about to happen, was apparently serious, and if something unexpected was about to happen, I’d want to be able to document everything that was said. Shelly ordered the special, and coffee, for us both, waited until we were alone in the back room. She gave me a long and penetrating look, her expression almost unreadable. “Darlin’,” I said gently, knowing my choice of a first word would be like tossing a pebble in a still pond, “what’s going on?” Shelly’s jaw was set: she looked away, she looked back, she opened her mouth to say something when the door opened and the hash slinger in the pink-and-white checker-print dress came in with coffee and salads. I watched the door shut behind the waitress, looked at my wife again. “Shelly?” Shelly leaned forward, the inside of her wrists against the edge of the cloth-covered tabletop. “I talked with Angela,” she said. “And?” Shelly’s eyes ranged upward, then to the side, and she blinked rapidly as she did: she looked back, bit her bottom lip. “Linn, you nearly died.” I raised an eyebrow. “They re-grew and replaced your left lung entirely.” She swallowed, looked to the side, looked back. “The right lung… they replaced half. “You had surgery to both your retinas and while they were in there, they took out the cataracts that run in your family.” “I see,” I murmured. Shelly ignored my remark. “They worked on your brain to take care of concussion damage.” My wife honestly glared at me. “I don’t see how anything could damage that thick skull of yours.” She stopped, took a breath, closed her eyes and pressed her lips together, then continued. “They rebuilt your entire right inner ear, including new enervation, replacement cilia, they had to completely regrow and replace the semicircular canals that let you keep your balance. You have two new eardrums. Angela said they enlarged the arterioles in both inner ears so you would not suffer that lifelong tinnitus anymore.” Shelly closed her eyes, clenched her jaw in frustration as she heard the door open again: that cute little hash slinger (is it my imagination, or do waitresses, doctors and State Troopers get younger every year?) brought our supper. I automatically salted my mashed potatoes – taters always need salt! – and threw some pepper on taters and gravy just for general principles. I picked up my fork, looked at Shelly. She was staring at me, staring with an intensity I hadn’t seen for some long time. I set my fork down. One tear came a-rollin’ down her cheek. “Mr. Keller,” she hissed, “you glorious, heroic, self-sacrificing, tin-plated idiot, do you realize you nearly died?” I looked my wife right square in the eye and said flatly, “Mrs. Keller, I was not going to let you die. I figured to bust the corner of the windshield and rip it free and get you out of there, peacefully or otherwise.” “Or die trying?” she squeaked, her bottom lip quivering like a little girl. I come out of my chair and reached for her: I took her under the arms and honestly picked her up out of her seat just as the water works started, and I held her, and held her tight, the way I used to hold our children if they were hurt, or scared, or terribly upset, and needed to feel safe while they rained out their sorrows on my shirt front. Once her rainstorm passed, I laid my cheek against hers and whispered, “Why did you strip me in the kitchen?” “There are no scars,” she whispered. “They did all that surgery and there are no scars!” I kissed her forehead: the door opened, the waitress stopped, took a look, pulled back, closed the door, and I made a mental note to thank her for that discreet withdrawal. “Darlin’,” I murmured, “do you recall I told you Michael saw there was no give-up in you?” She sniffed, nodded. “You jumped in that dumped-over crackerbox for the same reason I come after you. You weren’t going to let someone die on your watch.” She nodded again. I tightened my arms around her and whispered fiercely, “Mrs. Keller, you are the reason I draw breath in the morning and the reason I come home at night. You are why I don’t cash my paycheck at the beer joint. You are the reason I don’t open a house of ill repute and make a million dollars” – She pulled her face back, looked up at me, and I looked down at her. “Darlin’,” I said, “I knew what I was ridin’ into when I come after you, and I knew I would likely get killed, but if I’d done nothing and you had been killed, I couldn’t live with that.” “Michael and Victoria don’t need a folded flag and a picture. They need their father.” “I could say the same about their needing a mother.” “You damned tin-plated knight in shining armor!” “Flattery,” I said solemnly, “will get you everywhere.” Shelly started to cry again, and then she hauled off and kicked me in the shins. Hard.

FROM BREAKFAST TO DEBRIEF I saw that little girl’s eyebrows raise a little. When Shelly jumped into my arms, why, I hugged her like I always do, and I hoisted her a little like I always do, and I give a little shake like I always do, and her spine gave kind of a rippling pop like it does when I haven’t stretched out her back for a while. Shelly slacked her grip and leaned back enough to look at me. “You idiot,” she smiled, “you damned fool, you stupid hard headed contrary –” I picked her up again and put my mouth on hers. I had no idea who-all might be watching. I genuinely did not care. Breakfast was good. We ate with a good appetite, and as I finished my coffee, Angela gestured for a podium to be set on the table at the front of the room. “The debrief will begin,” she said: “Sheriff, could you come up and give us your recollection of events, please.” I winked at Shelly: she looked at me and said “Please, Linn, don’t be so long winded!” “Does yas knows me or what?” I asked in a nasal drawl. I placed my Stetson beside the wooden tabletop podium. “Sheriff Linn Keller, Firelands County,” I said, lifting my chin: “My wife, Paramedic Shelly Keller, Firelands Fire Department.” Heads turned; Shelly colored delicately and she shot me a complex look that I think meant she loved being introduced but she was ready to clobber me for making all those people look at her like she was something special. “Nurse Angela instructed that I should tell you what I remember.” I looked at my daughter. Angela folded her arms and lowered her head a little, looking at me through her lashes, just like her Mama was prone to do in such moments. “I remember, just now, eating a loaf of bread toasted up and buttered, a dozen eggs fried up, a pound of bacon fried crispy, a big plate of fried taters and two pots of coffee for breakfast.” I looked at Angela with my very best Innocent Expression and added, “It isn’t wise to eat too much on an empty stomach.” Angela began patting her foot like a schoolmarm and I looked at the rest of the assemblage: the men were grinning, or hiding their smiles behind casually-raised hands. I looked back. My voice and my face were now serious. “We responded to a reported tractor trailer wreck. Upon arrival we observed it was on fire, unknown cargo. The fire department responded, with the paramedic squad. “I observed a particular color and texture of smoke that told me a nitrate based fertilizer was not only burning, it was close to detonating. “The Fire Chief realized we were in too dangerous a situation, we were too close, he ordered all hands to drop their hoses and pull back, fast.” I swallowed as I looked at the memory of my wife atop that laid-over truck’s cab. “My wife was making entry to evacuate the driver. My concern was to get her away from there. To that end I jumped on my horse and we rode for the front of the cab. “My wife was coming through the windshield with the driver. “Another rider was there and grabbed the driver, I grabbed my wife and we proceeded to get some distance, at least until a giant kicked us all in the backside and I ended up flat on my back with every bit of wind knocked out of me, every locust in three states singing in my ears, and I wondered why in two hells I was just a-layin’ there on the damp ground. “Rescue arrived and took charge of my wife. I got in the saddle and headed for the ridgeline a quarter mile distant, where I’d seen the driver and the other rider’s horse. By the time I got there, the other horse was gone. The driver and I walked back.” I chuckled, just a little. “I will admit the driver was walking considerably better than I was. If I didn’t have an arm over my Outlaw-horse’s neck, I’d have been eating dirt, for all the way back the deck assumed a distinct series of maneuvers – roll, pitch and yaw, all three.” A dignified older man raised a hand: “Sheriff,” asked he, “how would you rate your hearing?” I considered for a moment. “Sir” – I looked very directly at him – “Doctor?” “Doctor will do.” “Thank you, Doctor. I seem to have no more locusts singing in my ears. I would say my hearing acuity is better than I remember.” Another hand. “Yes, sir.” “Sheriff, how would you rate your sense of balance?” I could not help but laugh, just a little. “Doctor, is it?” – a nod – “thank you, sir.” I squared my shoulders, laughed. “I am most pleased to report the deck underfoot neither rolls, pitches, nor yaws, and that is quite honestly a great comfort!” “Sheriff, have you questions for us?” “I have.” I looked at my darlin’ daughter, sitting back beside my wife, doing her best to look professional, competent and innocent, not necessarily in that order. “First, please forgive my bluntness, but where exactly am I; how did I get here; what has been done to me; but first and most importantly, is my wife entirely well?” Shelly lowered her head, her face positively aflame. I raised an eyebrow to my daughter, looked at men and women alike, assembled and paying very close attention to me. “Sheriff, perhaps you’d like to sit down, this may take a while.” I picked up my Stetson, walked back to Shelly: Angela rose and followed discreetly, sat beside Shelly. I looked over as Angela leaned forward a little. “You might know this as an M&M,” she almost whispered. “Mortality and Morbidity. It’s where cases are discussed, frankly and without accusation.” I raised an eyebrow, nodded, then turned my attention to the dignified older man behind the podium. More coffee appeared: Shelly passed, as did Angela, but like Fitz told me once, “The Navy runs on coffee, and so do I!” I sipped hot, fragrant coffee, smiled a little – Angela must’ve told them I like vanilla and honey in mine, I thought, and made a mental note to thank both the cook and my daughter for that kindness. “Sheriff, you are in the Millersburg Hospital. I feel safe in saying we are the premier treatment facility for this quadrant of the galaxy. You were transported here courtesy your daughter” – the Doctor nodded to Angela, who inclined her head a little in acknowledgement – “I understand she arranged for your and your wife’s transfer from your local Firelands facility, back on Earth.” I nodded, my eyes never leaving his: I wanted it evident I was listening carefully to the man’s words. The doctor then described matters which were quite honestly well above my understanding. On the one hand, Mama was a nurse, my daughter is a nurse, my wife is a paramedic, and I am not entirely unintelligent. On the other hand, when a clinical discussion of repair of inner ear cilia goes into far greater and technical depths than I’d ever known existed, all I could do was sit and listen and hope that eventually he’d say something that would make sense to my admittedly limited education in the Materia Medica. That wasn’t bad enough. I’d heard Shelly and Angela professionally discuss something called “shock lung” in context of IEDs or other overpressure events. Apparently mine were and it damn near killed the both of us, they admitted they honestly had no idea why or how I was able to mount up, ride a quarter of a mile, walk a quarter of a mile back with the driver and not just up and die, let alone live long enough to get to our local hospital and then get transferred out. The Doctor yielded the floor to another specialist, who discussed retinal damage due to concussion and acceleration-deceleration injuries, and how these injuries were treated: damn near every word of that work, done to both Shelly and myself, went sailin’ over my head, and I am not the least bit ashamed to admit to it. Once another couple of fellows spoke, and by then I was feeling completely outclassed and absolutely at sea, Angela rose and adjusted a little near-transparent boom mic I hadn’t noticed, apparently some kind of an earpiece apparatus. “The Sheriff and his wife are alive,” she said bluntly, “because he was wearing a belt plate. Unfortunately it did malfunction, it did result in their being hit by the pressure wave and injured, but it worked well enough to keep them alive until we could treat them. The original belt unit is being examined to see why it was not working as it should have; if there is a flaw, we wish to disseminate this information, system-wide.” She looked over at me, her expression solemn. “You should each be wearing one, not just the Sheriff,” she said quietly. “To that end, you are each wearing a new, tested unit, and should you be in another explosion, it will muffle both sound, and will cushion the overpressure and acceleration waves. If you are touching another person, if you are touching another living creature, the protective field will safeguard them as well, and that brings us to Outlaw.” Angela lifted her chin; the front of the room, where I’d stood and where other speakers had just vacated, became a grassy pasture. Red barns with white trim appeared in the background, white-painted fences ... it looked like a scene I'd seen in Kentucky, many years ago. Outlaw was surrounded by at least a dozen children, all about Michael and Victoria’s age, and Outlaw was quite obviously enjoying a currying. He always was an attention hound, he always did love being fooled with, and between being fed little dainties off flat palms – the only thing I recognized was an apple, halved and offered up – and multiple carefully-applied curry-combs, why, I reckon he must have felt like equine royalty. “The veterinary corps is not here to deliver their report,” Angela continued, “but bottom line, Outlaw was seriously injured but is now healthy, and he should have no memory of the event – which I’m sure you’ll forgive the lengthy veterinary presentation that memory block alone would generate.” I nodded but said nothing. “Sheriff, if you’d like to bring your coffee, you and your wife will be given a final examination, and a written back-to-work authorization.” I frowned at my coffee mug, looked up at Angela. “How long have I been here?” I asked. “One week,” she said crisply. “You were between your wife and the blast. You took the worst of it.” Shelly’s hand found mine, under the table. “Are there any further questions or comments?” Shelly and I come down from Outlaw-horse’s back and I tossed his reins over the hitch rail. The firehouse door near to exploded out and the entire Irish Brigade came charging out at the top of their lungs: we were seized, glad-handed, back-pounded, bear hugged, and somewhere in all that confusion, I managed to ask Fitz if anyone else had been hurt when she went boom, and he said no and it’s about time I got back to work, and I was a good-for-nothing layabout and seven kinds of a scoundrel for scaring them like that and he’d even gone to the expense of having his good suit cleaned for he was sure he’d be pallbearer at my funeral, and I allowed as it does a man good to smell like Moth Balls in church, and I am not the least bit ashamed to admit that we seized one another and crushed one another in a long, tight bear hug.

FROM HERE TO BREAKFAST “Fitz?” My heart dropped to about my boot tops. I knew what I was seeing, my mouth was dry, my hand clamped down on the Fire Chief’s shoulder. He turned suddenly, the way he did when he was aggravated at being interrupted, then he saw what I was seeing. The truck was over on its side, it was afire, the smoke coming off it was a dirty yellow and getting thicker, and my wife was on top of the laid-over cab, just muscling the door open. “PULL BACK!” Fitz yelled – it was little short of a full-voiced scream, then he grabbed his talkie, raised it, squeezed hard. “DROP HOSES AND PULL BACK, GET SOME DISTANCE, SHE’S GONNA BLOW, GET A QUARTER MILE BACK, NOW!” I turned, thrust a boot in Outlaw’s stirrup. I didn’t bounce and boost into the saddle like I usually did. I drove into the hurricane deck and Outlaw spun under me and the spirit of the century-dead Cannonball must have gone rip-roarin’ out of the grave and into his living soul because we launched toward that burning wreck like a ball out of a Napoleon field gun. I’m screaming like a madman, I’m screaming “SHELLLEEEEE!” and she’s already in the cab and I’m thinking Easiest way in is the windshield, bust the corner and rip it free and there was a hiss and that old ugly yaller smoke started out almost like a jet and I’m a-comin’ up beside the laid-over road tractor and I see the windshield peel away and someone is kickin’ it free from the inside and Midnight he comes around and we’re off the pavement and throwin’ clods as he was diggin’ in and we launched toward Shelly and she’d got a man around under the arms and I recht down and grabbed her and someone else was there and got the driver and I hauled my wife up across the saddlehorn and I’m yelling “GO GO GO GO GO!” and Midnight he lays his ears back and punched his nose out and we’re bustin’ a hole in the wind and I reckon my Guardian Angel was streaming along behind me like a gauzy kite-tail and a madman between my ears is screaming SHE’S GONNA BLOW GET SOME DISTANCE DISTANCE DISTANCE and something kicked Midnight and me in the backside and the both of us flew forward and he’s trying to keep his legs under him and we went over a fence and ‘twas to no effort of my horse that we went, we just kind of got booted over the bobwarr and he landed and we landed and I rolled over and I had a death grip around my wife and I heard her grunt and I heard me grunt and we come to a stop and I let go and just laid there and the wind was plumb knocked clear out of me – I couldn’t hear – I blinked, confused, looked up at the sky, the clouds – Shelly – I fought to get some wind in me. Damned if I was going to die a-layin’ there so I rolled over and Midnight, he was layin’ over on his side and not movin’ and Shelly was dead still. Dear God I’ve killed ‘em both! Midnight’s hind hoof twitched and then he grunted and r’ared up his head and I got a little more wind in me and retcht out and I grabbed Shelly’s hand. She brought up her other hand, rubbed her forehead and she had this funny puzzled look about her and then she looked at me and I’m still tryin’ to breathe and she looks all concerned and I rolled over and fought up to knees and elbows and I taken as much of a breath as I could and that warn’t much and then I stood up on my knees and so did Shelly and Outlaw, he’s workin’ his pins under him too and I got my feet down ag’in the ground and stood up and Shelly she come up with me and we looked around and I staggered over to Outlaw and ten thousand field crickets were singing in the hot August sun and every last one of ‘em takin’ up residence inside my skull and Outlaw he got to his hooves and I leaned ag’in him and got an arm over his neck and I sagged some and then we walked over to Shelly and I got my arm around her and we walked back towards what was left of that truck. I squinted. It felt like my eyes were full of dirt. I pulled out a bedsheet handkerchief and wiped my eyes. I was dizzy as hell. I had one arm over Outlaw’s neck and one around my wife, for she didn’t feel none too steady neither. I handed my white hankie it to Shelly. Movement, left -- Who in the hell is that? When I turned my head to the left, the earth took a hard list to starboard underfoot and then went down hard by the bow. Had I not an arm over Outlaw’s neck, I’d have hit the ground for sure. I reckon that’s the truck’s driver yonder up by the ridge line but how in the hell did he get that far away that fast? The boxy red rescue truck was coming around the crater, around the wreckage, stopped. I saw fire coats and the men that wore them, pouring quickly out of every door on that machine. One raised an arm toward us, pointed. Men ran toward us. I pushed Shelly toward them, I got a boot into the near stirrup, I swung up. Outlaw turned under me and we headed for the driver. I squinted some and could have sworn there was another mounted rider, someone else on a black horse. A big black horse. I looked again and all I saw was the truck’s driver. It took a while for the red ringing in my ears to subside. Me and the driver both was talkin’ at one another in a loud voice, I found out later he was hard of hearin’ to start with so he was used to it. He allowed as he got his bell rung when his truck blew a tire and bit the ditch and come to grief, and he was wonderin’ why he was standin’ up inside the cab of his truck and why was it over on its side when this blond haired keg of dynamite ripped his door open overhead and jumped in with him, she took him in a bear hug and brought up both her feet and kicked the windshield at its edge – she kicked it twice, both feet at the same time – she taken a two hand grip on him and spun him around and slammed him into the glass and busted it out and then he said he got grabbed by someone on a big black horse, and next thing he knew something went BOOM and the world shivered underfoot and he was near to a quarter of a mile away, up on the ridge overlookin’ the explosion, and no idea how he'd got there. We walked back, and it took a while. He walked on my left, and my right arm was hung over Outlaw’s neck. That-there hard of hearin’ truck driver walked considerably better than I did. Outlaw wasn’t doin’ terribly good neither. I recall bein’ grabbed and laid down on something padded and I looked up at a black handlebar mustache with a man attached to it, and I said “Shelly?” and I recall a man’s hand laid over on mine and I read his lips, he said “She’s fine,” and I had to close my eyes and reach down to grab the side rails on that aluminum ambulance cot to keep it from spinnin’ around underneath of me. That’s the last I recalled until I woke up and reckoned I was in a hospital bed. I recall there was a young flock of lovely ladies around me, all of ‘em in pin striped dresses and winged nurses’ caps. I felt a gentle, cool hand on my forehead, a thumb pullin’ my eyelid up and there was a bright light shinin’ in my one eye. I twitched my head away, blinked, frowned, looked up. “Angela,” I whispered. She laid the backs of her fingers against my cheek, across my forehead, like Mama used to when I wasn’t well. “How do you feel?” she asked in a professional voice. “Shelly,” I whispered dryly. Angela leaned over, tilted her head to look very directly at me. “Look at me, Sheriff,” she said quietly. I looked at her. “Shelly,” I repeated as fear tried to claim my stomach. “She’s fine,” Angela said in that quiet voice of hers. I frowned, blinked. “I can hear.” Angela looked up, smiled, patted my hand. “Story at eleven,” she said. “Get some rest.” Something cold and hard pressed against the side of my neck, there was a hiss, and I didn’t wake up until the next morning. I woke up, looked around. A tent-folded card was on the hospital bed’s sidetable. Get a shower and get dressed, I read in a familiar hand. Your wife requests your presence at breakfast. Debrief afterward. I raised an eyebrow, set the card back on the sidetable. I laid there for a minute, gathering my memories, looking at what I recalled happening, then I sat up, stood. A shower, a shave, and I felt a new man: my clothes were clean, folded on the bedside chair and hanging up, even to my pocket watch, my Stetson and my gunbelt and boots. I came out of the hospital room fully dressed, my hat in my hand, looked around. One of the pretty young girls I remembered from – last night? Yesterday? – hell, it might’ve been a week ago or more – looked up and smiled. “I beg your pardon,” I said gently, for wherever I was, it was no hospital I’d ever seen, and that made me a guest, and a guest’s duty is to be polite – “I am expected for breakfast?” “Yes, Sheriff,” she said, and damned if she didn’t come up and claim hold of my arm like she owned me. “This way please.” I can’t say I was displeased. The attentions of a lovely young lady are guaranteed to warm the heart of an older man. We walked down a shining, spotless hall, turned: a set of stainless steel doors opened. We went either up or down, I’m not sure which, but curiosity was working on me. “Would you know,” I asked carefully, “about my horse?” She inclined her head slightly, smiled quietly, then turned and looked up at me. “I understand,” she said carefully, “he is not only well, he is being outrageously spoiled!” I smiled, nodded. “Thank you,” I said quietly, and the doors opened, and of a sudden I had a double armful of wife, and I can’t say I was at all displeased.

(admiring whistle) NIIICE!!!

Interesting!

INVESTIGATION Emma Cooper's smile was quick, bright, genuine as she greeted the Sheriff, as she took his hands, as she declared her delight in the achievements of his son Jacob, who'd only just started going to their little one-room school: she happily recounted the precision of his work, his unwavering attention, how he'd quietly, unobtrusively, helped two other students puzzle out the arcane mystery of sums and subtractions, how he was helping two others memorize multiplication tables and the names of the Presidents. "He is a quiet student, Sheriff," she said in a motherly voice, patting his hand as she did: he recognized her gesture as an unconscious reflection of her naturally maternal nature, otherwise he would never have allowed another man's wife to behave in such a way -- especially in public. As Emma Cooper was expressing her delight, Jacob was busy driving his fists in a quick one-two-three into another student's guts: he spun, kicked a second attacker's knee from behind, faded away from a punch and let it sail past his left ear before he grabbed a double handful of galluses and vest and threw the third tormentor over his extended leg. He stomped a belly, grabbed the collar of one who decided he'd had enough, seized th seat of said soul's paints, hauled him off the ground and drove him down atop his fellows. "Just lay there," Jacob said quietly. They didn't. As each got up, Jacob put them down, hard: there would be cracked ribs and bruised muscles in the morning: when they stopped trying to get up, Jacob addressed them in a quiet voice. "You three," he said evenly, "started pickin' on me from the minute I walked into that schoolhouse. I want to know why." A rustle of skirts behind him, he never turned around. "Hello, Sarah." Sarah Lynne McKenna was two fingers shy of Jacob's height, and the same age, or near to it: she leaned casually against Jacob, as if leaning against a tree or a fencepost, with her arms crossed and one foot crossed daintily over the other. "What'cha doin', little brother?" Jacob looked at her. "I'm investigating, little sister!" Sarah drew back, lifted a fist, waved it threateningly. "Who are you calling little, little brother?" Jacob looked at the three, rolled up on their sides, curled up some, trying hard not to groan: he hooked a thumb toward Sarah and said, "See what I have to put up with? My Pa's the Sheriff and she beats up on me every whipstitch, I can't get by with nothin'! Now how about it? How come you three pick on me every chance you get?" Sullen expressions; they looked away, came painfully upright, looked at one another. "Tell you what," Jacob said. "My Pa will give any man one chance. You've had yours. Give me any more grief and I'll drive you through the floor of that schoolhouse like a fencepost." "I prefer a frying pan," Sarah offered, "but Jacob just uses his fists." She gave them a wide-eyed, innocent expression as she added, "He's done it before!" Jacob looked at the three, turned, walked away: Sarah took his arm, minced along beside him until they were well out of earshot. "You were investigating?" she asked. Jacob looked sourly at her, nodded. "Did you find the answer to your question?" "No." "I know why." Jacob stopped. Sarah turned and looked very directly at her pale eyed half brother. "It's because you're quiet," she said. "They don't know what to make of you." "So they broke my slate, stole my chalk, tripped me and slapped me across the back when Miz Emma wasn't looking." "They don't know how else to make you react." Jacob turned, looked back, looked back at Sarah. "They know now."