Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

HELLO The Sheriff had several gaits, most of which were signals of one kind or another. This was one few had seen. The Sheriff was moving with utter silence, his bottom jaw thrust out: he moved like a panther, he moved like his joints were oiled, he moved like he was ready to flow like a greased shadow in moonlight so he could sneak up on someone and politely rip the head from their miserable carcass. He didn't do that, of course. What he did was to stop a fight, fast and wordlessly, by virtue of seizing one of the warring parties by the scruff of his shirt collar and yanking him to the ground while he reached out and seized the other warring party by his shirt front and threw him down as well. He turned, faster than men naturally turned -- the two had no time to react, respond nor roll -- hard hands drove down onto their breastbones, twisted up material and chest hairs, hauled them both off the ground: the world swung around them for a bright, startling moment, until they both SLAMMED against the stone front of a main street building -- the net effect that of dropping from a rooftop flat onto their backs. Hurried hands shoved open the man door beside the squad bay: a blueshirt medic spun out, hauling the door as far open as the heavy, old-fashioned slow-closer would allow, standing well out of the way as the wordless, grim-faced Sheriff brought two troublemaking customers inside. The Captain came back inside, letting the door shut behind him, staring as the Sheriff slow curled both guests well off their feet. He turned, eyes pale, glared at the Captain, then he dropped his twin burdens, turned, walked out without a word. Another blueshirt medic, a woman, watched through the man door's big window as the broad shoulders under that military-creased uniform shirt stride down the concrete apron and turned uphill, back toward the Sheriff's office. Shelly smiled quietly, the way a wife will when her husband does something of which she genuinely approves. She turned, walked over to their guests as they struggled to sit up. She looked down at the pair on the floor, folded her arms, patting her foot, looking for all the world like a schoolteacher who'd run out of patience. "Are you two going to behave yourselves," she asked quietly, "or do I need to have my husband come back and have another talk with you?" That night, Shelly had further occasion to regard the masculinity expressed by her husband. She went out to the barn. He bent a little, raised both hands, drove each down into a bale of hay: he crushed his hands shut around the strings, hauled two bales off the ground. His jaw was set, his expression was that of a man who most sincerely wished to lay hard hands on an enemy. Shelly watched as Linn twisted, threw one bale of hay over the high board fence, then twisted the other way and slung the other bale over -- throwing each bale, one handed. She watched, she waited, not wanting to interrupt his pique. He only did this when he was mad as hell, when he was frustrated at not being able to personally rip some deserving soul's guts out, kick their backside up between their shoulder blades, and then proceed to get mean with them. He stopped, closed his eyes, took a long, deep breath, his mouth closed: he exhaled silently, then pulled off his gloves, turned to his wife as he stuffed them in a hip pocket. His pace was deliberate, his boot heels not loud, not really, but very distinct, as he paced over to his waiting wife. Linn took her hands, gently, raised one, then the other to his lips, kissed her knuckles: he hugged her carefully, as if she were delicate china, as if she were fragile, as if he was afraid he might break her. "Thank you," he whispered. Shelly laughed and hugged her husband, she looked up, she blinked innocently -- so that's where Victoria gets that look! he thought -- "What did I do this time, handsome?" He hugged her a little tighter, laid his cheek over on top of her head. She felt him take another long breath; she cuddled her ear into his breastbone, listened to the slow, powerful rhythm of that magnificent heart of his, running slow -- if I didn't know he was in such fantastic physical shape, I'd think he needed a pacemaker! she thought, smiling a little as she did. She looked up, he looked down: she saw his eyes change ... no longer ice, now a pale blue, that shade few saw, and only in intimate moments. "For bein' you," he whispered, and kissed her forehead. He released her, turned, snatched a saddle blanket off the side of the stall and draped it quickly over another bale of hay. Shelly knew the message. Sit, we need to talk. She sat. They sat in the barn, fragrant with the smell of horses and tractors, of saddle leather and straw. Linn leaned forward, forearms on his thighs. "Years ago," he said softly, "I read of a primitive tribe whose young men went out in the world to search out Death so they could kill it." Shelly waited, her thigh warm against his, her shoulder just touching his arm: she remembered his sculpted muscles, well defined, wet from the shower, and she felt her ears warming as her thoughts wandered to the not entirely pure. She felt him take another long breath. "I don't know if Death can be found as a corporeal being," he said slowly, "and I don't know if Misfortune walks beside him, and they toss a coin to see what they're going to do when they run into a mere mortal." His hands closed slowly, not completely into fists, but close. "Why Michael?" he asked softly. "Hasn't he hurt enough? Good God, that idiot soldier near to killed him, his spine was so damaged they had to grow him a new one -- that alone --" He took a deeper breath, blew it out, a harsh sound in the barn's stillness. Three heads raised at the sound -- one large, pure white and curious, two coal black, much smaller and no less inquisitive. Shelly laid a hand on his shoulder blade: she wasn't sure what to say, and so she said it with a wife's understanding hand on her husband's back. "Why Michael?" Linn whispered hoarsely, dropping his forehead into his hands. "Why not me?" Shelly patted his back. "You're not allowed survivor's guilt," she said softly. He turned his head, eyes veiled, looked at her sternly -- very little short of anger, she knew, but not anger at her. "They're my ghosts to carry," he said hoarsely, and Shelly blinked, bit her bottom lip. Linn looked away, looked across the cement floor, his expression almost lost. "He's my son," he said faintly. "I'm supposed to protect him." "He's growing up. You remember growing up. It's a wonder we survived childhood." Something round, black and curious came waddling over toward the pair, Snowdrift watching from her blanket lined nest behind another hay bale. Linn picked up the curly-furred Bear Killer pup, set it on his lap, grimaced happily as a pink tongue taste tested his cheeks, then his ears. He laughed, eyes and mouth closed, then the little furry Bear Killer pup turned around in his lap and dropped dramatically, gave a great sigh significantly larger than his short coupled carcass, and relaxed, safe between hard-muscled forearms and flannel shirtsleeves. Shelly looked speculatively at her husband as if to ask "Well?" He turned, looked at his wife. He didn't quite smile. He was close to it, though. His voice was quiet: his face might not be smiling, but his voice, was. "It's hard to be in a bad mood when a pup says hello."

Pat Riot, you are exactly RIGHT, in both your premise, and in your response! Well said!

I've been told air fryers are worthwhile. A correspondent was lamenting reheated pizza in the microwave is soggy, reheated on an oven rack heats the whole oven (and kitchen), not to mention dripping melted cheese on his disposable aluminum catch pan. He said reheating pizza in the air fryer brings the crust texture back to what it should be. I believe him when he tells me this, for he is notoriously hard to please!

VULCAN, I NEED YOUR HELP It used to be a hardware store sledge hammer, at least until Kid Mike bought it. He smiled a little as he picked it up -- it looked like a toy in his callused, knuckle-scarred hands -- he took it home, he gripped it not far from its head, frowned, slid his hand down a little more, nodded. A few strokes with the crosscut saw and what the local hardware sold as a two-hand sledge hammer was now Mike's new, one-hand, blacksmith's Single Jack. Most Single Jacks swung back when Fireland was young, were lighter than this, but still substantially heavier than most one hand hammers: they were used to drive a star drill, to drill holes to place shots of powder, or later, of that new-fangled waxy-stick dynamite stuff. The principle remained the same, though: this modern day blacksmith needed a hammer that hit with both control and with authority. Kid Mike he was known to certain women with pale eyes -- he'd been called that by a laughing Sheriff who taught him that yes, he can actually dance (though she had to wear her highest heels!), and since then, more pretty women with pale eyes danced with him in the big round barn under the granite cliff's overhang. Mike withdrew his work from the forge, gauged the color, set to work with a steady rhythm: he'd started with three ceremonial taps on the anvil, something his father did, and his grandfather before him: it was Willamina -- or maybe Marnie -- who taught him this was to chase out any evil spirits that may be lurking in the iron, three strikes for the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, three strikes for the three leaves of the Shamrock: she'd tilted her head and folded her arms and smiled up at him with those lovely, barely-light-blue eyes and said, "And if it's good enough for Granddad, it's good enough for me!" Mike raised his hammer and began his work. Michael adjusted the hover-screen where he could see it best, smiled a little as his Big Sis stepped out from behind her desk and addressed the class. "This is an in-service," she said, "you're all on shift so I won't take long. The best presentation I ever sat through was also the briefest. This might not be the best, but it'll be in the top ten." Michael saw appreciative looks from the class: he recognized two nurses who'd taken care of him earlier this same morning. Most, he knew, were new students, though his pale eyes picked out the six armed blue stars that marked the medics among them. "This is my friend Mike," Angela said, smiling, her voice pitched to be heard to the back row of the lecture hall. She ran her arm around the man's waist and hugged into him, and the visual was almost that of a little girl playing nurse hugging her big strong Daddy. If Angela wore her highest heels, she would have looked Kid Mike square in the collar bone. It's not that she was that tiny. It's that Mike was just plainly that big. Angela released her one-armed hug, drew back, looked up, smiled. "Mike, hold out your arm." Mike raised a muscled arm -- bigger in circumference that most of the ladies' thighs -- he extended it like an ancient, twisted, very solid oak branch, horizontal above the winged white cap she wore. "Mike is a blacksmith," Angela said, "and a damned good one. There are good blacksmiths, Mike is damned good!" She smiled up at the man and saw his ears were reddening. She looked back at the class. "Today's subject is Therapeutic Communication, and Mike here has helped me make a very important point in the past, so here it is." She stepped to the side and said "You can relax now, I'm almost done embarrassing you." Mike grinned like an unabashed schoolboy. Angela gave the roomful of assessing femininity a knowing look and said, "Sorry, ladies, he's married." A hand rose in the back and a voice called hopefully, "Yes, but is he happily married?" -- to the quiet laughter of the rest of the nurses, and the red-faced grin of the bashful-looking blacksmith. Angela raised a teaching finger. "Here's my point," she said, then pulled up a chair, stood on it, laid a hand on Kid Mike's sculpted shoulder. "If I look at Mike here, if I clap my hand on his shoulder, if I give him a grin and a wink and a laugh and I tell him 'Mike, that hat looks awful, I'd ought to knock it off your head and stomp it into the ground,' he knows from the wink and the grin and the hand on the shoulder, he knows from the laugh and the bantering tone of voice, what I'm really saying is, 'Mike, that's a good looking hat and I wish I had one just like it!" Angela paused, looking around, her face going from cheerful to serious. "If I send Mike an e-mail or an IM or a text or a note and he reads, 'I oughta knock that hat off your head and stomp it into the ground!' -- without the wink, or the grin, or the hand on his shoulder -- why, that's an invitation to a young war!" Angela ran her hands around his elbow, pulled his arm up level, slid his short shirt sleeve back to show the phenomenal, sculpted muscular hypertrophy that is part and parcel of a blacksmith's visual signature -- "Just look at this arm! In case of a tie, Mike here is NOT coming out in second place!" Angela pulled his arm down, patted his shoulder, murmured "Thanks, Mike," and stepped off the chair. "So here's the lesson and we're almost done. "Ninety percent of communication is nonverbal. "Ninety percent." She let the words hang. "The words you use are only ten percent of the message. We think of a phone call as efficient. It's not as good as face to face. A written note, a text, an E-mail, is stripped even further of the valuable clues and cues that signal what is actually being said." She looked up at Vulcan, folding his arms across his broad chest. "If you doubt that, just send Mike a note about his hat."

I'M GLAD YOU'RE HERE Victoria and Michael were twins. Victoria was still slender and girlish, with the suggestions of contours that meant Daddy's Little Girl wasn't going to be so little much longer. Michael was growing in height. He was not yet sprouting chin whiskers, and likely would not for a few years, but damned few, if his pale-eyed Pa was any judge. Consciousness returned to Michael's system with all the subtlety of a slammed door: his eyes snapped open, his hand tightened a little -- even in the induced relaxation of a painkill field, the feel of a warm, strong hand in his was a comfort. Michael's eyes snapped open. He was flat on his back -- he was carefully positioned, with rolled material bracing under his knees, under his ankles. His hand tightened a little on his Pa's and he swallowed. No boy wants to look vulnerable in front of his Pa, but Michael could not help it: he'd known pain that absolutely destroyed his reserves, and this most recent recurrence shattered the reserves he'd built against that particular, very personal betrayal in front of the Grand Old Man. "Sir," he whispered, swallowing again, "I'm glad you're here." Linn's hand tightened a little on his son's, his other hand lowering, sandwiching Michael's hand between both of his. "I won't ask how you feel," Linn said quietly. "They showed me your pain index. I doubt if I could have taken that level of pain." "Warn't good," Michael gasped, making a very small, experimental move, shifting his hips ever so slightly. "What happened, Michael?" Michael's eyes ranged across the ceiling of his hospital room, he blinked twice, then looked at his Pa. "The cats," he whispered, and Linn felt his son's hand tighten again with the memory. "Sir, the cats -- they hunt in packs, they bite through the back of the skull --" Linn shifted a little, turning to look very directly into his son's face. He nodded, once. "Go on." "Sir, it's my fault. I let my mind wander." Linn considered this, frowned a little. "Looked to me like you did quite a bit right." "I was careless," Michael almost spat, his voice bitter. "You handled a hot potato someone dropped right in your lap. Tell me how it started." Michael hesitated. "I felt Lightning," he said, his voice distant. "I felt her and I knew something was not right. I bent and leaned back and shucked out my rifle." He looked up at his father. "That didn't hurt, sir." "What happened next, Michael?" "Something hit her in the hind quarters. I felt the claws dig into me -- into her --" Michael's eyes were confused. "I didn't get clawed, sir, I -- she --" "I know. What did you do next?" "It was Lightning," Michael whispered. "I felt her -- I felt the cat dig into her -- I twisted around and drove the muzzle --" His voice trailed off as his eyes grew distant, looking at the memory. "You stopped the threat," Linn said quietly. "Yes, sir, that's when I realized I'd hurt myself, a-twistin' like that." "What do you remember next?" "I doubled over, sir. It hurt too much to do aught else." "Marnie said you called for backup. That was sensible." "Yes, sir." "Do you remember making the call?" "No, sir," Michael admitted. "All I can recall is grippin' the saddle horn and Lightning was landin' hard and it hurt ..." Memory leaked, hot and wet from the corners of his eyes: he squeezed his eyes shut, tight, turned his head away, started to raise his arm. Something soft laid against the side of his face and he stopped his arm before he could lay it across his eyes. His Pa was pressing a kerchief against the corners of his eyes, one side, the other. His folded hankie was warm and smelled of clean laundry, of home. "I'm sorry," Michael hissed through clenched teeth. "Michael," Linn said, his voice quiet: Michael felt the bed creak as his Pa's weight came on the shining-steel siderail, as the older man leaned over, closer to his son. "You've nothing to be sorry about," Linn said, his voice deep, gentle, reassuring. "You got hit with more pain than a grown man can take. You nailed a mountain cat before it could swarm up and bite you through the back of your skull. You kept Lightning alive. Victoria already took care of the claw-digs on Lightning's hinder, but she said Lightning didn't much like it." "Victoria," Michael whispered, his eyes opening, almost panicked. "Sis, is Sissy okay?" Linn grinned, then laughed. "Victoria had her belly down so she could reach the cat digs. She cleaned 'em out, she poured in some peroxide and she wiped some ackumpuck into 'em so they'd not infect." "How'd Lightning take it?" "She stuck her neck out and screamed like someone goosed a steam whistle." Michael chuckled through his distress. "I've got her and her colts at home. They still don't like molasses twist." "I'm sorry, sir." Linn grinned, squeezed his son's hand again. "Don't be. It's given Victoria an excuse to spoil 'em." Linn straightened a little, looked over, hooked a rolling steel stool with the toe of a boot. He released the siderail latch, one-handed, eased it down, sat, never releasing his son's grip. "Sir?" "Yes, Michael?" Michael turned his head a little, looked at his father. "I'm glad you're here."

JUST ANOTHER DAY The Bear Killer rolled over on his back. Under other conditions, his rippling black lips, the exposing of ivory canines, the deep rumbling growl, would give pause for consideration and perhaps a re-evaluation of certain life choices. At least in the sane, rational, adult mind. This ... didn't happen. As a matter of fact, when The Bear Killer's voice raised a little, from that deep, chest-echoing, primal snarl that originated somewhere millennia ago when lupine ancestors were among Earth's apex predators, the behaviors that started this unmistakable vocalization only increased. The Bear Killer lay on his back, happily thwapping his thick, plumed tail on the floor, while eager, giggling schoolchildren massaged his chest and his belly, looking at one another with expressions of absolute, utter delight. Michael sat cross legged, grinning, a book open on his lap. He hadn't intended to read for this schoolhouse full of children. He'd intended to deliver a stack of books, he'd intended to touch his hat brim in deferential respect to the schoolmarm, he'd intended to saddle up. That's all he'd intended to do. The Bear Killer came along with him, for no particular reason; Lightning and Cyclone, of course, flanked him as he rode, and although the schoolhouse full of children knew what the Fanghorn was, although they'd seen Michael riding in, although they saw the smaller Fanghorns flanking, none of them knew what The Bear Killer was. This world never evolved lupines, nor any of their kin. Children and dogs have a natural affinity for one another, and when The Bear Killer trotted happily up to them, tail swinging and mouth open in a doggy smile, children -- especially the youngest children -- did what children always do. They reached out, and they giggled, and soon Michael was sitting cross legged with a big idiot grin on his face. Cyclone and Thunder begged for attention as well, finding it with the older students. Dignity was cast to the winds. A truly huge mountain Mastiff was on his back, reveling in all this attention, two juvenile Fanghorn rolled over on their backs, heavy hooves pawing happily at distant clouds overhead: a schoolmarm leaned against the frame of their one room schoolhouse, hiding her smile behind a hand, even white teeth biting her knuckle lightly to keep from giggling. She ended up bringing Michael one of the books he'd brought. Michael turned so his shadow cast on the page -- he'd no wish to barbecue his eyeballs, reading from white paper in direct sunlight -- the schoolmarm asked Michael in a gentle voice if he'd read to the students. Cyclone rolled over, shook herself, stuck her neck out and belched, then came over beside Michael and folded her legs. Thunder got up, shook, trotted around his dam and over behind Michael, slipped easily between wide-eyed, marveling schoolchildren, and settled down opposite his sibling. Michael looked up, grinned. "This book," he said, "was written by a fellow named Mark Twain. That means riverboats and steam engines and that's for another time." He held the book up, showed the cover, turning as he did. "This one is Tom Sawyer, and I particularly like it!" Michael Keller worked his bony backside a little, getting comfortable, sitting cross legged on the ground: he opened the book, he began to read. Children listened with wide and marveling eyes, young hands resting in curly black fur, or the fine, silky fur of two quietly-snoring Fanghorn colts. Next day, another world: Michael was riding through a pass not unlike many of the passes back home, when Lightning whipped end-for-end, snarling. The Bear Killer was not with him. Cyclone and Thunder were already facing their back trail, then they turned, one facing left, the other right. Michael felt Lightning's warning rumble -- it was an impressive thing, forking a horse that made his Gammaw's Frisian look small, and feeling that deep, feral snarl he'd heard before, that snarl that meant blood was about to be shed. Michael reached back and down and gripped his rifle's checkered wrist, brought it free. Something landed on Lightning's hind quarters: Michael twisted, his back screaming at him for his foolishness. Michael drove the gunmuzzle into a tawny skull, jerked the trigger: he turned to face forward, teeth set against his spine's agonies: he jacked the lever as Lightning twisted, reared. Michael was almost blind with pain. He laid down over Lightning's neck, willing himself to silence, jaw locked against his internal agonies. Lightning's head snapped to the left -- fast -- she reared, she came down hard -- Michael gripped his saddle horn left handed, his rifle across the saddlebow, he blinked stinging eyes, then hissed as Lightning came off the ground, came down, hooves bunched: Michael shoved his pain aside, looked over to where Lightning was driving a forehoof into something tan and furry. Michael could not straighten up, and every time Lightning came down on something, it drove an explosion of utter agony up his backbone. He didn't raise his wrist to his lips. He was bent over already. All he had to do was gasp a few words. Victoria came out of an Iris on her Daddy's Appaloosa, Angela came out, threw her cruiser broad side of the road, skidding up dirt, lights spitting alarm. Marnie appeared behind with four lean young men with shotguns and irritated expressions. Angela came around the front of the cruiser, sizing up the situation: her eyes went for the trees on the uphill side of the road, her shotgun's muzzle following her eyes. Marnie's shotgun spoke, then Angela's: Victoria faced the opposite direction, eyes busy, scanning the trees. Cyclone and Thunder were busy driving bloodied muzzles into something that was apparently edible. One large and very hard hoof held what was left of a crushed skull down while they took turns gorging on the remains of a tawny cat of some kind. Lightning was growling -- Angela blinked, then laughed -- she'd heard saddlehorses make noises of many kinds, but she'd never heard one growl -- that chest-deep, menacing, I'm-going-to-eat-you-and-your-entire-family sound a predator makes when they are a mile and a half past unhappy. There honestly wasn't enough left under Lightning's broad, rocklike hooves, to eat: she'd very efficiently turned something that might have been a big cat of some kind, into furry paste. She walked fearlessly, patted the muttering Fanghorn's neck, looked up at Michael. "You okay?" she asked, then she saw Michael's face and knew that no, he was not okay. Feminine hands coaxed the Fanghorn ahead, away from the bloody, greasy patch in the hard packed roadway. Angela patted Lightning's thick foreleg: "Down, girl," she murmured, and Lightning, sounding like a distant thunderstorm had taken residence in her chest cavity, folded her thick legs and bellied down. Thunder and Cyclone looked around, disinterested: a nearby stream claimed their attention, and they went to wash their faces and their palates in clean running water. "I turned too fast," Michael hissed between clenched teeth. He felt the too-familiar pressure of a scanner easing down the curve of his back bone. Angela looked across Lightning's back at her sister, her expression serious, then raised her wrist-unit to her lips. "This is Angel One," she said quietly. "Diplomatic priority, requesting injured Diplomatic staff transport direct to Central Medical." Michael was still doubled over, not daring to move. "All I wanted was to deliver some books," he gasped. Angela reached back, pressed on the saddlebags -- empty -- "Did you deliver already?" Michael tried nodding, grimaced as he realized that was a supremely bad idea. An Iris opened in the roadway. Angela caressed Lightning's neck, then her jaw. "Up, girl," she whispered, and Lightning turned her bone-bossed head, one eye regarding Angela -- she wasn't sure what Lightning's expression was -- the big Fanghorn rose, easily, smoothly, as if realizing movement was a bad thing for her rider. Victoria held out a hand, made a kissing sound. "Here, kitty, kitty," she called, riding her Daddy's saddlehorse forward and into the Iris. Horse, rider, Fanghorn and colts all disappeared into the black void of the Iris: Angela skipped around it, jumped into her cruiser, pulled through it -- she didn't understand what little she knew about Iris technology, but she knew she could drive through it from its back side like a bead curtain, and did. Marnie and four Confederate guards climbed in. Angela eased the shifter into reverse, left her red-and-blues on, and backed through the Iris. "Do you suppose the Sheriff will object to your being out of the county?" Marnie asked quietly. Angela swatted her on the arm and laughed.

SHORT, FAT, AND SLOW Victoria Keller had the marvelous ability to look like ... well, whatever she chose to look like. She'd grown up reading about the legendary Sarah Lynne McKenna, who learned the art of the Quick Change from modeling her Mama's fashions for the San Frisco buyers, and from haunting the theaters, next door and elsewhere: she'd learned tricks of presentation, not only foundations and face paint and wigs and costumes, but how to stand, how to move, how to project not just the voice, but the personality as well. Victoria Keller read of the legendary Sarah Lynne McKenna's physical attributes -- not her stature, not her build, but rather her ability to become instantly, brutally, unexpectedly, violent. Victoria had not the childhood traumas that burned Sarah Lynne McKenna's soul into a hard, charred knot, that made her hard and vicious and brutal and merciless and utterly, completely, absolutely, without a conscience -- when it suited her. Victoria decided there were facets of this personality she should adopt. To that end, she selected one of the fuzzy pups Snowdrift watched and herded and taught and nursed, and Victoria hauled buckets of steaming-hot water to a small galvanized tub out in the barn, knowing it would cool off, and cool quickly, being poured in a cold tin tub set on a cold concrete floor. By the time she added soap and changed into a rain jacket, her hand thrust in the water told her it was just right, and so she picked up her selection from the fuzzy black litter and dunked it in the tub. Victoria's hands were careful, Victoria's hands were firm: she worked soapy water into the pup's curly black fir, carefully gave this smaller, shining-black version of her Mama a bath. Sarah Lynne McKenna used to do this with The Bear Killer, back in her day. Victoria concentrated on her work, even going so far as to pile soap suds atop this little Bear Killer's head like a bubbly crown. This lasted about three and a half seconds, until a vigorous shaking prompted Victoria's squint and turn-away, grateful that she'd worn the rain jacket. Satisfied, she brought the pup out, dunked it in a galvanized bucket of clean, warm water, used a paper cup to carefully rinse soap suds down off the head and ears and down the back bone. This, of course, prompted its own cascade of vigorously slung water. Once Victoria got the pup rinsed off and toweled down, this little ball of soaky-wet, gleaming-back wiggle and grunt, closed its eyes and sneezed vigorously -- once, twice -- Victoria transferred it to a big fluffy bath towel, and sat down on a hay bale and brought the pup up onto her lap and dried it the rest of the way with careful, almost delicate attention. Pups, little boys and pale eyed Daddies all share a common characteristic, one that Victoria, for her few years, knew well. This little black furred fellow blinked as he was dried off; he'd filled his belly; warmed from bathwater and from being wrapped in a fresh, dry towel, held on Victoria's lap, he stood on wobbly legs, then fell over with a dramatic sigh, and was instantly asleep. You're just like an old bear, she thought, remembering her Daddy's words on the subject. You get your belly full, you get warm, you fall asleep! Victoria slipped a collar around the pup's neck, drew it carefully snug. It had the usual vaccination tags, owner's name and phone number, and the pup's name. "Hello, my name is 45. If I'm lost, I belong to the Sheriff," and a phone number. Victoria remembered talking about naming this pup with her Daddy. "He'll become Bear Killer when he's big," she said, her voice serious, "but right now he's 45." Linn looked at her curiously, smiled a little. "He's ... 45?" Victoria blinked, giving her big strong Daddy her Very Best Surprised Little Girl look: she wasn't a little girl anymore, she was starting to look womanly, but Victoria practiced being who she wanted to appear to be, and at the moment, she knew, she was better served by appearing to be, Daddy's Little Girl. She gave her Daddy those big lovely eyes and said in a little girl's voice, "Daddy, you said the .45 Automatic is short, fat and slow, and it gets the job done." Victoria held up the pup she was cuddling, still nested in the towel, still muzzle-thrust out over her forearm, and still sound asleep. "I think this one fits that description!"

Sometimes that heartfelt primal scream is necessary to keep from putting your fist through a wall (or some idiot's face) Especially after a day like yours!

😆😆😆 Oh dear God, I am HOWLING!!! 😁😁 I kid thee not, my face is the color of a rotten strawberry and mirth and merriment are both leaking in saltwater streaks down into my somewhat lopsided mustache!

Nor I. They're usually left outdoors; in SE Ohio's hill country, you have high humidity, tree pollen, coal smoke, dust, dirt ... they get filthy, fast, they have to be washed down before use, not to mention the underside of the seat providing fine nesting territory for paper wasps, hornets and the like. Then there's birds that like to land on it and dump ballast before launch. Like anything else, "You pays-a you money and takes-a you choice," but as for me ... ... no thank you ...

SHADOW WALKER A Scotsman once said, "A sentry protects as much ground as his bootsoles cover." A sentry paced slowly in the nighttime stillness. Fires were banked, the evening Tap-To had been beat on deep-voiced drums that lacked the rattling snare across their bottoms; soldiers were in their tents, and moving from one shadow to another cast by twin moons in a cloudless sky, another shadow. The sentry stopped, turned, bored, disinterested: his pace was casual in the cool night air. He neither heard, nor felt, a shadow that flowed from beside a bush, that fell in behind him, matching his pace step for step, until he passed into another shadow: when he emerged into moonlight again, his silent companion was gone. Michael Keller squatted, eyes busy, listening with more than his ears. Michael remembered his sister's account of running through what had been a battlefield, running desperately toward casualties, stopping to check for signs of life: there were dead, too many dead! -- here she cinched a torniquet around a leg to stanch what life was left and keep it from running out into the incarnadine puddle already gathered: there, she slapped a foil dressing on a chest wound, taped it quickly on three sides, slapped the other half of the foil packaging, sterile-side-to, taping it on all four sides: she told the frightened, gasping soldier "Breathe in," then she clamped her hand over his nose and mouth and hissed, "Breathe out!" -- blood and trapped air bubbled out her one-way valve, hastily fabricated and effectively employed: her pale eyes glared into his with an imperative, a command: his jugulars were bulging, he was struggling to breathe, but this woman, this angel, by suffocating him with her hand, was making his breathing easier. Angela left a flashing tracker on each of the wounded: she ran from one to another, doing what she could with what little she had. The battle made itself known with no warning, at least not to her. She had no time to prepare: she hadn't found out through regular channels. She had time to grab a shoulder bag she kept packed for the unforeseen, and she'd run, and she'd come out just in time to be too late, too late! -- Then she was shot. She felt her field set up when the slug arrived, suspended, held with invisible energies that surrounded her, kept her safe: another, a minute later: someone was deliberately targeting her. Angela raised her wrist to her lips, spoke urgently: her words triggered a programmed response, her words galvanized and mobilized twenty handpicked nurse-paramedics she'd trained, she'd worked with, she'd tried and tested and found each of the twenty to be absolutely reliable, extremely competent, well motivated, and available. Another slug, captured as she knelt by another handsome young body: he lay still, his eyes half open, teeth showing, white, even, a fine young man in the stillness of death. She did not need to press her fingers into his throat to know there would be nothing there. It was later when Angela went to the command tent, later when Angela set up her field hospital tent, later when she accosted the enemy field commander after she threw a lower ranking officer out. It was later when word spread, and spread fast, that someone was deliberately targeting her -- after the battle was over -- after both sides withdrew from the field -- when the only thing moving was a solitary Angela, white against the grasses. Now a shadow waited, watched, listened. Technology not known to this world drew lines from Angela's positions, to the point from when came the assassin's shots. Technology unseen located the individual responsible, the one sniper who intentionally attempted to murder a noncombatant. A shadow flowed from the bush and into a tent, a shadow that clung to the ground, a shadow with a knife held between its teeth, a shadow that flowed into the tent. No sound came from beneath nighttime canvas. No movement disturbed the taut, wax-and-turpentine-coated cloth, shining with nighttime dew. The shadow did not emerge. Michael was showered, in clean clothes and shined boots, silent as a technician compared the exemplar from the captured rifle to the heavy slugs captured by Angela's personal field. Four sets of pale eyes regarded the comparison, then looked at one another as the words were pronounced: "We have a match." Michael had no need to move like a shadow again; he'd been inside the tent, he'd sent a location pulse: now, when the Iris opened, it lowered over the sleeping man. The tent was found empty the next day. A prisoner was brought into the classroom by large, hard-muscled, hard-eyed guards. The classroom was empty, save for a woman in white, a woman wearing a winged cap, quietly grading papers at her desk. The guards released the man's arms: wordless, they withdrew, closed the door. The woman never looked up. "You tried to murder me," she said, making a mark on a paper, setting it aside, bringing another sheet in front of her. "I'm a soldier," came the stiff-voiced reply. "Yes," Angela agreed, setting the paper aside, bringing another onto her green desk blotter. "You kill soldiers. You don't kill noncombatants." "I kill anyone on the other side. Those are my orders." "I reviewed your orders," she said coldly. "You are not supposed to shoot noncombatants." "You were helping the enemy. That makes you the enemy, I don't care what kind of fancy clothes you're wearing." Angela finally looked up, then she laid her pen across the paper she hadn't examined yet. "What you did," she said quietly, "was to commit a war crime. Where I'm from, that's called attempted murder." "YOU MADE YOURSELF AN ENEMY WHEN YOU HELPED THEM!" he shouted. Angela stood, walked slowly down the aisle between classroom tables, stopped just out of arm's reach, tilted her head a little as if she were examining a biological specimen. "Our legal section is reviewing exactly what orders were given," she said, her voice even. "You will be held until your orders are reviewed. It may be such a thing that you were acting under orders. If that is the case, whoever gave those orders will be prosecuted as the murderer. In the meantime, both sides have been given --" "YOU CAN'T DO THIS! I'M A SOLDIER!" he shouted angrily, hands tightening into fists, his face reddening with the strength off his defiantly-shouted challenge. "Fear response," Angela said mildly. "Inappropriate aggression to prevent unwanted information --" Her reaction was faster than his attack -- not surprising, as she expected his punch. The floor came up to meet him, his arm screamed with pain, his wrist felt like it was going to twist off his forearm, and then something detonated an absolute sunball of agony into his tenderloins as a pair of white-stockinged knees speared into his kidneys, crushing him into the floor and knocking two weeks' worth of wind out of him and paralyzing him with unutterable, absolutely blinding, PAIN! A man's voice, gentle: "Pardon me, my dear." Hard hands SLAMMED down on his shoulder blades, crushed up two good handfuls of material, hauled the prisoner off the floor, turned him. A fist drove into his gut hard enough to bring his feet off the floor. The punch was delivered upward, up through the belly and into the diaphragm, intending to shock the lungs into standstill, intending to cause the greatest distress, intended to punish as well as immobilize. He remembered behind dragged -- how far, he didn't know, where to, he didn't know. All he knew was, when he was finally able to take a breath and roll over, he hurt worse than he'd hurt in his entire life. That he had to wipe away tears to see was of no matter. That he saw steel bars when his vision cleared, was of no consequence. He could not prevent the memory of a set of pale eyes, inches from his, a quiet voice. The words. The words that ran a trickle of cold water down his back bone. "You," a man said quietly, lips barely moving beneath an iron-grey mustache. "Tried to hurt. "My. "Little. "Girl." He'd seen soldiers disciplined. He'd heard soldiers scream with pain when they were buck-and-winged. He'd heard of soldiers being horse whipped, he'd heard descriptions of men screaming as plaited, oiled leather sliced through skin and muscle and laid ribs bare. Nothing -- nothing! -- frightened him more than those quiet words, as those pale eyes, an inch from his. Not after being downed by a mere woman. Not after being hoisted off the floor like he was a rag doll. Nothing put cold, clattering fear into him like those quiet-voiced words. "You. "Tried to hurt. "My. "Little. "Girl."

PROMISE ME YOU'LL BE CAREFUL Angela Keller, the pretty, pale eyed daughter of a pale eyed Sheriff, turned slowly to face the uniformed military officer. Her eyes were cold, her eyes were pale, color stood out almost like dots over her cheekbones, and the rest of her face was dead white. A sane man, a rational man, would have recognized these as warning signs of impending doom, death, destruction and utter ruin. Unfortunately, the military officer had himself confused with someone important. Angela pressed a button on her wrist-unit, closed her eyes, took a long breath, and counted silently to five. Then she opened her eyes, and she smiled. A sane and rational man would have backed away -- not that it would've saved him -- but the officious uniform with a self-important bully inside, leaned in a little closer, probably intending to intimidate this slender female in a nurse's white uniform. His mistake registered in a detonation of pain, of shock, of the sensation of inheriting the front bumper of a Mack truck somewhere below his breastbone. Deputy Sheriff Angela Keller, RN, exploded with the cold control of someone with multiple colorful belts in a variety of Oriental methods of un-gently pacifying thy neighbor. Angela Keller responded with the brutally efficient Israeli hand-to-hand system intended to keep hardened warriors-to-seasoned-citizens safe in a close encounter of the unpleasant kind. In short, Angela Keller used knees, elbows, heelstrikes and a side-snap-kick to fold up this blustering, bullying, interfering officer like a cheap suit, and drive him backwards into two soldiers standing behind him. When the four soldiers accompanying the officer looked up, startled, they were looking down the business end of four Ithaca twelve-gauge shotguns, held by a like number of lean young men in Confederate-grey, diplomatic uniforms. Angela stalked closer to the gasping, lower-ranked officer, waited until his soldiers got him to his feet. "Captain," she said, her voice frosty enough that vapor should have been visible with her words, "I outrank you, I outrank your superior officer, I outrank your field commander, and I outrank your Chief Exec." Her words were quiet, her words carried authority, and her words brooked no argument. "You will leave my facility, and you will take your damned interference with you. If you return, you will be shot on sight. There will be no military presence here other than Diplomatic personnel. We treat wounded no matter who they are." "This isn't over," the Captain managed to gasp. Angela backhanded him, the sound loud in the shocked-silent medical tent. "Get out," she hissed, "and remember this the next time you try throwing your weight around!" Angela waited until his soldiers followed him out, then she raised her wrist-unit to her lips, spoke quietly. Thirty seconds later, the medical tent was surrounded with Vietnam-era armored personnel carriers and just over a hundred armed Diplomatic troops: overhead, an Iris opened, and a half-dozen Huey gunships emerged at ten-second intervals, forming a noisy, clattering ring overhead, slowly orbiting the hospital tent. They would be replaced by boxy, silent Diplomatic Swifts, but not until the noise and motion of another world's warbirds established the authority of the Diplomatic Corps at a battlefield hospital. Sheriff Linn Keller's face was grave as he listened to his daughter's quiet-voiced words. He heard matters in her voice that she'd not put into words, and that concerned him. "Darlin'," he said, "are you wearing your Shielding?" "Yes, Daddy," she said -- normally her voice would have been lighter, normally she'd have dropped her eyes like a little girl, and maybe even she'd have flushed ever so slightly. Today she did not, and that notched up the Sheriff's concern for his little girl's safety. "Darlin'," he said, "please tell me you are carrying." Angela smiled, just a little. "I want to show you something, Daddy." Angela rose, turned, motioned to someone off-camera. "Daddy, do you remember Betsy?" Linn smiled. He'd been introduced to one of the most competent nurses he'd ever seen at work -- Betsy, short, pretty, fast, competent: Angela told him she thought of her as "Bitsy" because she was just an itsy bitsy little thing, until she saw her working. Betsy came into camera view. Angela leaned forward, expanded the camera's field of view. Betsy looked like a little girl playing at being a superhero of some kind. She wore what looked like faceted, white-plastic armor with red forearms, red shoulders -- red shin guards -- she carried a white helmet with a red crest. Angela had Betsy turn around, obviously modeling the suit. On the chest, a big, six armed blue star, the same insigna worn by Angela's Mama, a paramedic with the Firelands Fire Department: the same big, unmistakable insignia on the back. She wore fingerless black gloves, and whether she wore white-plastic boots, or whether they were simply covering sabatons, the effect was that of a pretty girl in plastic armor. Angela turned her, traced a forefinger in a big rectangle, from across the shoulders to across the low hips. "This is the Confederate field generator," she said. "It's two fingers thick and it can power two households under full draw. The suit" -- she turned Betsy again -- "thermal controlled, soaks up sweat, recycles drinking water, and it can take a hit from a 20mm recoilless rifle firing depleted uranium." "Dear God," Linn breathed. "Plastic can take that?" Angela and Betsy both laughed. "No, Daddy. The ... we use a regenerative field. When something hits, its energy is used to strengthen the field. The harder the hit, the stronger the field. Energy is absorbed, stored, reused." Betsy lifted a white-plastic-looking helmet, slid it over her nurse-short hair: it left her face open, at least until she pressed a control and a visor dropped quickly to chin level, overlapping the high neck. "Now that," Linn said quietly, "is impressive." "It's practical," Angela sighed. "These idiots!" -- she spat the word -- "Daddy, I'd hoped the Confederacy would've learned from Earth's mistakes." Linn frowned, leaned a little closer to the screen. "They're the same as we are, Daddy. Just the same. Old men throwing their spleen at one another until they put young men out to die for them, they kill off the best and the brightest and when there's blood enough that one side or the other decides the cost is too high, they sit down and talk." Angela's voice was bitter, harsh: she thanked Betsy quietly, looked back at her Daddy. "Thank you, Betsy," Linn called, and the shy, blushing nurse in what looked like toy plastic armor, smiled a little and waved, then disappeared to the side. "Marnie is running herself ragged, trying to put out fires, trying to stop the wars." "Wars?" Linn's ears pulled back a little as he frowned again. Angela nodded sadly. "I had to backhand a Captain this morning and throw him out of my hospital tent." "You were saying." "We have Diplomatic troops surrounding us with orders to let no one in but field medics and patients." "What about field artillery?" "We've generators enough to keep a force dome over the compound. It'll catch a 500 pound blockbuster and it won't even sound like a firecracker." Angela smiled, and the smile was not kind. "Don't worry, Daddy. The warring parties have been given strongly worded instructions from the Diplomatic Corps that -- until they have their own field medics -- the Angel Brigade is not under their command or control, and is not answerable to either side, and if they don't like it, they've been given the understanding that we can field more men in uniform and under arms, than they have total population in their respective countries. When they realized that interfering with the Angel Brigade would risk their entire military being flattened, they pulled in their horns." "Angela," Linn said seriously, his voice quiet, "you are at risk for assassination. Small men with a small amount of authority are dangerous when that authority is challenged. You're at risk for a sleeper disguised as one of the wounded." "I know, Daddy. I'm wearing Uncle Will's .357." Linn's smile was not at all kind. He knew how well Angela could run that particular Smith & Wesson. "Promise me you'll be careful," he said quietly. "I promise, Daddy."

Knew a fellow who was so crooked he was screwed into the ground, would that count? He's the fellow who planted a grove of corkscrews for shade.

Yep. Blue dye in the bowl and evidence tape over the sink faucets. Testing for a nursing position. Passed.

OUTCOME A curious son of the Shining Mountains regarded his horse with an assessing eye. He'd asked his Pa a question, when the man was busy, and his Pa hadn't answered: Joseph didn't press the matter, realizing he'd asked in an unhandy moment. He went ahead and finished his chores -- there were always chores! -- but he worked steadily at them and got his assigned tasks finished. His Pa turned, saw his son was missing, then he heard the ax, the clatter of seasoned wood, and he smiled inwardly, the corners of his eyes tightening a little. Joseph often disappeared once his chores were done -- but he never disappeared without purpose -- he'd tend schoolwork that either needed finished, or that he wanted to be better prepared for; he'd read, and if it was at all possible, Jacob did not his son's reading. Jacob's pale eyed Pa told him at the same age that "All the wisdom in the world is found in books," and his Pa was a man who enjoyed reading, and because his long tall Pa read, and enjoyed reading, Jacob read, enjoyed reading as well: because Jacob, as a father, read, and his son saw him reading, his son, and Jacob's other children, read as well. Joseph was not reading, though. He might've headed for the house, but Jacob knew if Joseph saw a water bucket needing filled, he'd fill it, if he saw the woodbox needed filled, he'd fill it. Then he'd go read. Jacob smiled again as he worked on the harness, carefully tapping the clean-punched leather layers over the rivet's shaft, dropping the copper collar over and then peening the rivet flat: a half dozen more to go and he'd be finished. The sound of an ax cleaving seasoned wood echoed off the side of the house and down into the barn where Jacob was working. Jacob smiled. His son disappeared, yes, but he saw something that needed done, and he was doing it. Joseph packed an armload of kindling into the house, carefully arranged it in the kindling bucket, overflow stacked vertically in the corner of the kitchen woodbox. Schoolboys talk about anything and everything, and Joseph's school chums described stacking a minimal amount of wood to make the woodbox look full. Joseph considered this household heresy: he took pride in his work, and when he was done, kindling was jigsawed vertically in the kindling bucket, so tightly it would take a wiggle-and-pull to coax the first piece out. It was after this that he looked around, frowning. He was alone, his curiosity was up, there was bacon on the platter, fried up and in plenty, so he grabbed four strips -- one disappeared between strong white teeth -- the other three left the house by the back door, and they took Joseph with them. Jacob looked up after he'd hung the repaired harness, after he'd inspected his saddle, after he'd carefully considered the other saddles hung there in the barn, after he'd carefully gone over bridles with pale eyes and strong, callus-edged fingers: he looked up as Joseph came into the barn. Boys at loose ends will saunter, Jacob knew, and Joseph did not saunter: his step was purposeful, betraying his inherited restlessness, his spinning energies that invigorated his pale eyed soul. Jacob looked at his son, marveling at how fast his firstborn was growing. "Learn anything in school?" he asked. Joseph looked seriously at his father. "Sir, was wondering about something." Jacob nodded once, hung a bitless bridle back on its peg. "I didn't know the answer so I found it." Jacob frowned a little, turned to face his son. This much conversational preface meant that his son thought this important enough to address. Joseph considered for a moment, then pushed forward, through his thoughts. "Sir," he said, "I wondered if horses like bacon." Jacob's eyebrow rose. "And?" "They don't, sir." Jacob's face was solemn. "Do we have a reasoned conclusion from this?" Jacob asked formally. Joseph smiled, sudden, that bright, broad grin that spoke of his inner orneriment. "Yes, sir," he declared happily. "More for me!" Michael Keller smiled as he read the account of a grandson's happy declaration. The words were written in a careful, disciplined hand, by a man long dead, but living in legend, and in a pale eyed boy's imagination. Reprints of Old Pale Eyes' Journals enjoyed a surprisingly broad circulation, and were popular reading on the Confederate worlds, for the same reason they were enjoyed in Firelands County. Old Pale Eyes made a grand use of the simple declarative sentence. It is always interesting to look at the world through someone else's eyes, and the subject matter, told firsthand by a man who lived in interesting times, provides marvelous grist for the popular imagination's mental mill. Michael Keller read Old Pale Eyes' account of his son Jacob, laughing at his son Joseph's solemn pronouncement that he'd wondered if horses liked backon, and Michael could not help but wonder himself. Michael absolutely loved bacon. Michael could not imagine anyone who didn't. He knew there were probably poor deprived folk who lacked a taste for this culinary delight. He was quite happy he was not one of them. In due time, another Journal would be added to, on a glowing screen rather than on good rag paper, with a steel nib dipped in good India ink: another pale eyed Sheriff would smile as he committed his account of a father's conversation to a more durable storage than his memory. Michael read about a conversation, he wrote, something to do with a boy's question: "Do horses like bacon?" My youngest son Michael read that question, and so he conducted what he called a "Scienterrific Spearmint." I think he stole the phrase from a comic strip somewhere. He fried up a pound of bacon and offered it to several of my horses. They preferred molasses cured chawin' tobacker. He came to me, solemn-eyed and a little distressed. I think he thought he was going to end up eating most of the pound himself. A pale eyed father leaned back and smiled as he looked at the memory again, that of a distressed-looking boy solemnly regarding his long tall Pa. He said -- with a degree of disappointment -- that the horses did not care for bacon, but a Fanghorn mare and her two colts ate the whole pound, and none left for him!

NEVER UNDERESTIMATE A LITTLE CHILD Ambassador Marnie Keller, feminine and dignified in a McKenna gown and matching gloves, a quiet smile on her face and a fashionable little hat pinned a little off-center to compliment her elaborate hairdo, slung her Ithaca muzzle down from her left shoulder and looked at her father. Sheriff Linn Keller rose, his face serious. "Marnie?" he asked quietly. "What's wrong?" Marnie swallowed hard. The Sheriff's eyes were hard, pale, assessing: he gauged her stance, her balance, her color; he took note of her expression, her breathing, of feminine fingers lightly gripping her shotgun's fore-end, the determined look on her face. He turned his head ever so slightly, as if to bring his best ear to bear: he spoke again, his voice quiet, a little deeper, the way a man will speak when one of his own has been threatened. "Darlin'," he said, "who do I need to go after?" Marnie looked at her father, he voice hollow, almost faint. "I promised Littlejohn I'd be all right," she said. Linn's eyes widened slightly and Marnie read alarm in his stance: he moved, fast, came out from around his desk, ran his hands under her arms. Marnie did not collapse, but she did lean into her Daddy, hugging him, taking one long, shuddering, indrawn breath, sighed it out. "I'm not hurt," she whispered. Linn lowered his head, looked fiercely into his daughter's eyes. He did not speak. He did not have to. Marnie knew this man, this quiet man, was ready to go to war. She laid her head against his collar bone and whispered, "It's all right, Daddy. It's all right now." Littlejohn regarded his mother solemnly as she prepared to step through the Iris and assume her diplomatic duties. "Mama," he said, and Marnie stopped, turned, then she stopped altogether and stared. Her son, her little boy, all nine years' worth of growth, of laughter, of play and of learning, stared at her with an earnestness, a solemnity, she'd never seen before. "Come back when you're done, Mama," he said, and she'd never heard him use that voice before: "Promise me you'll be back." Marnie flowed over to a serious-faced little boy with wide and unblinking eyes, a little boy in knee pants and a pullover shirt with the image of a locomotive with a horse's head and hooves and the words IRON HORSE beneath: she hugged him quickly, then held his shoulders as she knelt and looked very directly into his eyes and whispered, "I'll be back," and kissed him on the cheek. "Yes, ma'am," he said, and Marnie's heart cooled several degrees. He'd never called her "Yes ma'am." It was always, "Yes, Mama." Marnie turned her face away, frowned, debated. She was expected, her skills were needed to arbitrate a territorial dispute, she was requested because both sides either knew her, or knew of her, and trusted her: she turned at Threshold, her skirt twisting as she did, and she looked back at Littlejohn, who stood, watching ... He's almost glaring, she thought. It's like he knows ... something. "I'll be back," she said soundlessly, her lips framing the words -- seen, unheard, but real -- then she rose gracefully, turned, and stepped through the Iris. "I told Littlejohn I'd be back," Marnie said quietly as she settled into a chair, drawn up beside the Sheriff's desk. "He had ... I don't know. A premonition, maybe ... usually it's only women who ..." Linn waited, then offered, "Our bloodlines are converging with every generation. He may be able to manifest what only women have been able to do." "Negotiations fell apart," Marnie said quietly. "If I hadn't been wearing my Confederate field, I'd have been killed in the first volley. It's considered bad form for an Ambassador to wear a Field, but I can hide a multitude of sins under a long dress." Marnie saw her Daddy's eyes pale by several degrees. "When it started, I got between ... I ..." Marnie had grounded the muzzle of her shotgun between her feet: she patted its figured walnut rearstock. "I found it necessary to address the sinners in a language they'd understand. "We made for the Shuttle. I fought a rearguard action" -- she looked at her Daddy, tilted her head a little -- "you remember you showed me how to skipshot against a wall, and how skipshot off the ground, how the pattern fanned out at knee height?" The Sheriff nodded, his face carefully expressionless. "I ... kept their heads down and got us back to the shuttle, and we got out of Dodge before any of us were belted in. "There will be official repercussions, there will be sanctions and charges and court actions, there always are, and if war breaks out we'll land on 'em with an occupying force in strength enough to kick every last one of their backsides so far up between their shoulder blades --" Marnie closed her eyes, leaned her forehead down on her shotgun's recoil pad. "All I could think of was Littlejohn, Daddy." Marnie raised her head, looked at her father with eyes he'd never seen before. "He knew, Daddy. "He knew. "Somehow. "All I could ... I heard him telling me to ..." She groaned, lowered her head again. "Marnie," Linn said softly, "do you remember saying that to me?" Marnie looked up, over the brown rubber recoil pad, blinked. "I was leaving for work and you came down the steps and you stopped and looked at me all serious and said 'Daddy, be careful,' and I recall that surprised me." "I remember," Marnie whispered, lifted surprised eyes to his. "I ran to you and I grabbed you and I told you I'd lost everybody but you and Mama and I didn't want to lose you too. "You picked me up and I remember how strong you felt and you twiddled my nose with your muts-tash and you whispered that you'd be coming home 'specially for me." Linn waited as Marnie's eyes filled with the memory, as she looked suddenly at him. "I remember when you came home, you had a knife slice across your belly." "Barely broke the skin," Linn grunted. "Didn't even need stitches." "I knew when it happened, Daddy. I felt it." Her hand went to her own belly, feeling the memory again, a memory she'd kept hidden, pushed back into her mind's dark places where she kept things she didn't want to look at. "I came back to you," Linn said quietly, "and you came back to Littlejohn. Do you know why?" Marnie shook her head slowly. "I came back to you because when I faced off to that fella, I could hear your words, like you were saying them a foot away from my good ear." Linn's words were as quiet as his expression. "When I heard your voice, I stepped back, fast." Marnie lost a significant percentage of color from her face. Sheriff Linn Keller grinned at his daughter, gave her a wink. "Never underestimate the power of a little child!"

I WAS AFRAID A pale eyed Sheriff considered the quiet voiced question. The Sheriff wore a black suit with a carefully knotted necktie. His son wore a black suit as well, his tie was as carefully tied: both sat their horses in the welcome warmth of the afternoon sun, considering the incredible spread of mountains and meadows before them. "You have a question," Linn had said, and this surprised Jacob: he'd not given any indication that he was turning over a query in his mind, he'd carefully not let on his consideration that he might want to pick the right time to ask, yet here his Pa knew ... somehow. "Sir," Jacob asked bluntly, "were you scared?" Linn crossed his palms over his saddle horn, leaned forward, took the weight off his backside, gave his spine a little twist: Jacob heard two muffled pops, then a third: this much he saw in his peripheral, for both men were looking over their horses' ears. Besides, Jacob did not need to look, to know that a momentary expression of pain, followed by relief, would chase across his Pa's face, and be gone. "You know I was in that damned War," Linn said quietly. "Yes, sir." "Time or three I was right concerned." "Yes, sir?" "Most times ... Jacob, war is hell in ten flavors. It's either boredom and routine and march your men back and forth to keep 'em busy and out of mischief, then when a fight comes, you're so damned busy of a sudden you don't have time to be scared." "Yes, sir." "You know I come West after bein' Town Marshal back East." "Yes, sir." Jacob paused, and when his Pa did not continue, he hazarded, "Chauncey, sir?" Linn nodded. "Yep. Little coal minin' town. They even had a zinc mine. Someone told me what looked like a big pile of dirt was one million dollars in zinc ore. Found out later the man was exactly right. Someone had a photographer come and take a picture of it and he put it on postcards and sold 'em. He had to write on the picture in white ink -- "One million dollars in zinc ore, Chauncey, Ohio", elsewise folks would ask why he was tryin' to sell postcard pictures of a pile of dirt and rocks." Jacob felt the corners of his eyes tighten a little: he'd known snake oil salesmen in his time. "Yes, sir," he said carefully. "I reckon I told you about Butcher Knife Joe gettin' all drunked up, he knifed one fella and come allowin' to cyarve his name in my liver." "Sir?" " 'Twas Village Council meeting night. I was there so they could belly ache about my wage and anything else you can think of and when a boy come in and allowed as Butcher Knife Joe was comin' up the street allowin' to cut me up, why, them councilmen started layin' bets on how long I'd last. "Do you know what I felt, Jacob?" Jacob blinked, puzzled, looked over at his father, who was still staring into the distance. He wasn't staring at miles and at mountains, he was staring at a memory. "I didn't feel anything, Jacob. That damned war burnt all the feelin's out of me. "I paced off on the left and 'twas like I was leadin' men into battle again. "I could hear drums and I saw knees rising and falling to my left and to my right like waves, like wind on wheat ..." His voice drifted off a little; he blinked, took a long breath, continued. "A man was comin' at me with a blade in his hand and I felt ... nothing." He looked over at Jacob. "Nothing." "Yes, sir?" "Joe pulled out an Army Colt and he taken a shot at me, and he taken another, and he fired off all six. He clipped my coat and he clipped my hat and I walked up on him, I grabbed his wrist when he come up with that knife and I drove the muzzle of my Navy Colt up into his guts and I pulled the trigger and blew his soul out through his back bone. "He hit the ground and I stood there and watched the light go out of his eyes. "I holstered my revolver and I taken his and I turned and walked back up the street and back to the little brick blockhouse that was the Village Hall, and I walked in and tossed the village back their badge and told them to go to hell, I was going West, and I packed all I had left in the world in one grip and saddled up my good old plow horse Sam and we taken the steam train that night and I never looked back." Jacob nodded. "I didn't feel anything, Jacob," he said softly. "That damned war just bled me dry for ... I didn't feel joy nor grief, 'twas all bleached out of me like sun bleachin' old bones out white in the desert. "I come West and I was town Marshal a couple places, but I didn't feel a thing there neither, least not until the Mayor allowed as they weren't goin' to pay me, so I busted a chair across his back and threw the Council President against a wall and taken my wages out of the Mayor's wallet and made the barkeep come over and watch me count out what was due me before I tossed the wallet back on the man's chest." Linn was quiet for several long moments. Jacob waited. "I come on West, Jacob. I found gold in that dry Kansas riverbed. I kilt a man that tried to sneak up and steal Sam-horse. I didn't care. I saw sunsets and sunrises that looked like God Almighty was paintin' with living fire, and I felt nothing. "I watched a herd of buffalo overtake and knock over a covered wagon in the distance, and when I got there, the two ox they had pullin' it were dead, trompled and busted open and ugly, and the biggest piece of anyone I found was two shoes and a sun bonnet. Everything else was paste beat into the ground. "I didn't feel a thing there neither. "It took me a good long while before I started feelin' anything a'tall, Jacob." He turned in the saddle and looked very directly at his son. "I have you to thank for that." "Me, sir?" Jacob practiced the Poker Face, but his practice failed him utterly; his expression was one of the genuine Flabber Gast. "I knew I'd obliged myself to raise you up considerable better than you'd known. 'Course marryin' your Mama helped too." "Yes, sir." "You asked about fear, Jacob." "Yes, sir." "There's twice I genuinely felt fear." "Yes, sir?" "Once was when I threw the wall of that wrecked passenger car off Angela and picked her up and she just hung there limp like a rag doll and I just knowed she was dead." The man's voice was heavy with the memory as he spoke, his words slow, as if he had to pull them through the earth itself to drag them into the sunlight where they could be seen. "Maybe that was more grief than fear. "When you got shot when the Reavers come rippin' through town and you and the Parson each had a rifle in the bell tower and you took a rifle ball through the shoulder." Linn took a long, open mouth breath, sighed it out, his eyes distant again, scanning the horizon without seeing it. "I laid my knife crossways of the wound for you was bleedin' out and I laid Duzy's hand on the knife and my hand on hers and I spoke the Word and stopped your bleedin'." Jacob blinked, then he nodded, just a little. He remembered that night, he remembered being lowered -- fast! -- through the hatch and into the church below and laid out on the floor, he remembered his Pa's face pale and tight and serious as hell lookin' down at him, he remembered Duzy, and those big violet eyes, and he remembered his Pa pressed something on his shoulder and of a sudden heat drove through him and right before he passed out he realized he was going to be all right, he just had to rest some. "There was one time," Linn added thoughtfully, "one time when I honest to God Almighty felt Gen-You-Wine, Mon-You-Mental, fear!" Jacob waited, breathing carefully, eyes wide and unblinking as he considered there hadn't been much he could think off to make this man fear anything! "I reckon you should know this, Jacob." "Yes, sir?" Linn's jaw slid out, he took a long breath, frowned at his saddle horn and chewed on his bottom lip, then looked back at Jacob. "Women folks put stock in their trifles," he said seriously. "Your Mama has a fine set of sewin' shears and I one time used 'em to cut big sheets of paper I needed halved for map making." Jacob's eyes changed: Linn saw the understanding, and the concern, in them. "When Esther found out I'd used her good sewin' scissors for cuttin' paper, why, I could see the green fires lit up behint those lovely eyes of hers, and I will tell you honest now..." He grinned crookedly -- "I seen them green eyes a-spittin' fire and I was genuinely afeared!"

AND THE PREACHER GOT SOAKED Sheriff Jacob Keller frowned at his reflection. The man that looked back at him was dressed in his Sunday-go-to-meetin's. He'd knotted his green silk necktie and puffed it out properly, and like Michael, he had a rectangular ruby stickpin about the size of his little finger nail: faceted, gleaming, contrasting richly against the emerald silk, it was -- other than his wedding ring -- the only jewelry the man affected. He'd been invited to speak at church, Offworld, and as it was his father in law who extended the invitation, he accepted. He'd been welcomed by the community, especially after helping find two lost kids, after splinting a man's broken leg and fashioning a travois to transport the injured man -- and after apprehending a particularly violent criminal who'd tried to strangle a young mother as she was bathing her infant (Jacob quietly arranged for a table, two chairs, two windows and a door to be replaced afterward). Now, for whatever reason, their Parson wished him to deliver a guest sermon, subject of his choice. The church was about twice the size of the small whitewashed structure in Firelands. It was filled -- word spread fast, and folk came from a distance to see this famous soul, to hear what he had to say. Ruth, Marnie and Angela sat together: Joseph sat beside his Mama, a solemn-eyed little boy in knee pants, The Bear Killer sitting just ahead of him, alternating between laying his warm, furry jaw on Joseph's thigh, and on Victoria's knee, and the ladies were whispering bets to one another on how long it would take The Bear Killer to start to snore. Jacob visited their Parson ahead of time to get an idea on possible subjects of discussion, on what to avoid, were there any particular community sensitivities he might wish to trim from any presentation; they finally decided the ecclesiastical community on Mars, as a whole, would make a proper topic for the Sunday sermon. Their Parson asked Jacob about his church back home, on Earth, and Jacob's expression changed: where he'd been careful, controlled, circumspect in his replies, he became more open and animated, talking about Firelands, Colorado rather than Firelands, Mars. He mentioned frontier churches and circuit ridin' preachers, he spoke of an ancestral Bear Killer who found a wandering beetle more interesting than the Sunday sermon, and a very young Sarah Lynne McKenna loudly admonishing The Bear Killer of that era to behave himself 'cause they're in church, complete with a scolding expression and an upraised Mommy-finger, which united both Parson and Sheriff in laughter as Jacob told the tale. The Parson suggested Jacob ride up to their Church, horseback, in pious imitation of the Circuit Riders he'd described, and Jacob had absolutely no objection, for he spent too little time in the saddle and welcomed an opportunity to get horsepower under him for a change. The congregation planned to be outside, to see Jacob ride up on that fine, spirited spotty stallion. They planned to stand outside in pleasant spring breeze and warm spring sunshine. That's what they'd planned. The ladies were all frills and flutter and feminine ribbons and parasols, smiling and laughing quietly as Ruth's father drove their carriage toward the church. Ruth's parents both regarded the sky with an increasing disquiet. Springtime, they knew, could have weather, and weather could be brisk, and so their carriage was driven a little more briskly than the sedate trot they'd planned. Jacob intended to wait, to delay his departure, so as to arrive after the family, and he too considered the lowering sky and the increased wind. "Apple," he said to the restless, muttering stallion, "what say we step it up a bit." Apple stepped out in his long-legged, ground-eating trot, a deceptive pace that covered ground faster than a man would realize, and this suited Jacob fine, until they got to the bridge. When the rain started, it came down fast, hard: the congregation was already entering the church, filing in under roof: the broad front porch was crowded, at least until the wind started. Rains this early were cold rains and it took but little windblown precipitation to persuade the faithful that perhaps unity within was better than sightseeing without. For his part, Jacob did not pay attention whatsoever to the rain. He'd looked ahead at the bridge, at the little boy fishing from the bridge, at the little boy that squinted up at the first cold, fat drops, at the little boy that struggled up and slipped on the slick beam that formed the side of the bridge, as the boy fell in. Jacob gigged Apple-horse into a gallop, swung right. Apple stiff-legged to a stop and Jacob swore, quietly, sincerely, through clenched teeth. Apparently it was already raining higher up. The stream was moving fast and dirty, the boy fell in this side and was already swept under the bridge. Apple reared, whirled: Jacob saw something downstream -- a hand, there and gone -- he and Apple-horse found a path paralleling the waterway -- There, he thought. Looks like a shallows. Hooves drove into water, Jacob's pale eyes scoured the surface -- Sandbar in the middle. The stream is split, this side, that side. He's not here -- Apple-horse felt Jacob's knees, his heels, Apple jumped forward -- Jacob vaulted from the saddle, landed hard on soft sand and flat rocks, boot heels driving into the drift -- He waded out into the water, knee deep, belt deep -- Something rolled up against his legs -- Jacob took a deep breath, doubled over, drove both arms shoulder deep into that TAKE YOUR BREATH AWAY COLD WATER!! -- Cloth, flesh, movement -- Hands that saddled horses, that set fence posts, that seized criminal wrongdoers, hands that changed a baby's diaper and wiped tiny little noses and caressed a wife's jawline, hands that seized bales of hay and threw them easily, clamped down on cloth and an arm and locked shut as surely as a Number Two Newhouse trap. Jacob slogged out of the water, hauled a little boy up and over his forearm, breaking him over his arm like a shotgun. A little boy coughed a little, threw up dirty streamwater, coughed again. Jacob swung into the saddle, gigged Apple-horse up onto the bank as the rain came down harder, soaking all three of them. "Here he comes," someone said, pointing: heads turned, necks craned. A figure on a galloping horse came into view, but something was wrong. Instead of a dignified man riding a horse at a purposeful, steady gait, this rider was hunched over a little and didn't look right, and he was moving as if Hell itself was snapping at his coat tails. Pale eyed ladies slipped through the packed crowd, murmuring politely and shoving less than politely. Jacob drew up in front of the church, Apple-horse blowing, his breath steaming. Jacob swung down, a blanket wrapped little boy shivering in his arms. "Make a hole, people," Angela shouted, her voice carrying the unmistakable authority of someone who knew what it was to command troops: they took the cold, wet, shivering child into an anteroom. Angela listened as Jacob explained, briefly and simply, the boy fell into fast moving water and he'd gotten him out, wrapped him in the blanket roll he kept behind his saddle: Marnie gripped his shoulder, turned him, looked very seriously into his eyes and asked in a quiet voice, "Jacob, are you all right?" "I'm soaked and both boots are full of water and I would commit insecticide for some coffee," he replied with that quick, boyish grin of his, "but the Parson asked me to give the sermon, so here I am!" A long tall Sheriff squelched his way to the front, dripping water every step of the way: he shook hands with the Parson, stepped behind the pulpit, looked out over the packed church. "The best sermon I ever heard was the briefest," he said, "this might not be the very best, but it'll be in the top five." His grin was contagious, his coat was dripping, his Stetson was in his hand, steadily dripping water from its brim. "I had a fine sermon all polished up and ready to go, but that boy I fetched in fell off the bridge when the rain started." His voice was serious now, all trace of that good natured expression, gone. "When help was needed, I jumped right in and helped. I reckon that's as fine a sermon as a man can give." He laughed a little and said, "That concludes my sermon, I'm soaking wet and just cold as a wedge and if I don't get some coffee inside me I'll catch my death of the live-forevers!" He looked at the regular preacher and gave him that that contagious, boyish grin, winked and said "Parson, she's all yours!"

Thank you, Sedalia Dave! LOVE those pictures!!

PROPER Sheriff Linn Keller poured a big mug of coffee. He'd come through the doors, unsmiling, which was not a usual thing. He'd stopped and looked at Sharon and asked, "Anything critical?" His dispatcher regarded him with an appraising eye. His uniform was immaculate, his boots well polished, his uniform Stetson was at his usual angle, the uniform itself pressed and presentable, but his face ... She shook her head. Sheriff Linn Keller actually sagged a little as she watched; he straightened, raised his arms straight out in front of him, half-lidded his eyes and staggered forward: "COOOFFFFEEEEEEE!" he moaned, then dropped his arms, looked at Sharon with his usual cheerful expression, and laughed. She threw a wadded up sheet of paper at him. Barrents came up to partake of boiled neurotoxin with him, looked at him: "Boss," he said quietly -- he called him "Linn" in private or informally, he called him "Boss" when he was worried -- "you look worn out!" "Snowdrift had puppies last night," Linn murmured, slopping milk into his mug: he set the carton down, picked up a napkin, wiped up the stray drop that leaped out of the mix. "Be damned," Barrents murmured. "I know I'd not seen her for a while. How many?" "Seven," Linn said. "Six made it." Barrents grunted, nodded. "Angela there?" "Hell, she was in a surgical gown and gloves!" Linn laughed. "Anybody else?" "Everybody but Jacob. He sent Joseph in his place." Linn laughed quietly. "First time the boy's seen birthin'. I've got to get him out here for calving, or when the mares foal." "He's got to learn." "Jacob has him to his father in law's ranch aplenty. He's helped dress birds for Sunday dinner." Barrents sampled his coffee, frowned. "Scald the hair off your tongue?" The Navajo grunted, amusement in his obsidian eyes: it was an old joke between them. "I reckon the kids laid claim to as many as they could." "Would you believe I had to set up a boxin' ring and put on my referee's shirt?" Barrents gave his old friend a knowing look, and this time his smile extended well beyond his eyes. The Bear Killer -- the original Bear Killer, the one that went to Mars -- snored. Joseph Keller lay on a hook rug, a gift from a friend of Ruth's mother. He lay on his side in the catastrophic relaxation of a little boy, one arm over The Bear Killer's ribs, his pink-scrubbed hand bright against the mountain Mastiff's gleaming black coat. His maternal grandmother rocked and knitted, smiling a little as she did, for a grandmother will rejoice in silence at the sight of a healthy child, and moreso when the child is asleep in front of her fireplace, in her home, and for the moment, the room was full of tranquility. Michael went to one knee and removed his hat. A little girl looked at him, all big, wide-set eyes and shining face and frilly dress: she laughed and ran forward and hugged Michael, spontaneously, innocently, and Michael hugged her back and laughed quietly, for the joy of an innocent child is a contagious thing. Her mother hesitated, uncertain: Michael was a Famous Person, and she'd intended to attempt an introduction, perhaps to ask if her daughter might give him a hug, but events often cascade faster than a mother's intentions can react. The child's face wasn't quite right, and Michael recognized that, and he honestly did not care. They slacked their happy embrace and the little girl looked over Michael's shoulder, blinking, and Michael saw absolute wonder in her expression. He released her, leaned back a little, and she launched past him. Michael looked up at the mother, who was somewhere between surprise, awe, delight and distress. Lightning was behind him, standing watchfully, protectively: Thunder and Cyclone were grazing not far away, but came over, curious, as this pink and giggling little creature seized Lightning's foreleg and laughed with delight, hugging what had to be the equivalent of a warm, fur covered, white oak. Lightning lowered her broad, hard-boned head, sniffed, her breath blowing the child's ruffles: the world held its breath as a happy little girl's giggles filled the air, as she stroked Lightning's blunt nose with wondering fingers. Michael squatted beside her, one arm around her waist: he reached around her, there was the crackle of cellophane, and two swirly red-and-white peppermints dropped into a little girl's hand. "Hold it out flat," Michael whispered, and she did, and Michael momentarily wondered if a mother behind him was going to pass out or have a case of the vapors as Lightning -- her fighting canines visible, shining ivory and gleaming in the sunlight -- very delicately lipped the Horsie Crack from a big-eyed little girl's delighted palm. Cyclone ducked under Lightning's belly, nosed Michael between the shoulder blades, then seized his hat from behind, backed up, bobbing her head and waving his black Stetson like a flag, extorting the pale eyed Fanghorn-rider for her share of the peppermint treats, and that's when three more children came forward, all wonder and stroking hands and marveling eyes, and Michael was glad he'd dumped just short of a whole bag of peppermints in his coat pocket that morning. He'd not handed out this many treatskis at one time before, and he was glad he'd come prepared. Sheriff Linn Keller had been seen on the Inter-System in candid moments, saddling his favorite stallion and bucking him out, competing with brother lawmen in steel plate shoots, or tossing clay and chalk balls in the air and detonating them into clouds of colorful dust -- toss, draw-and-fire, one time he tossed a can of corn in the air and ended up wearing a good percentage of the contents -- he looked ruefully at the supposedly cloaked hover-cam and said "That's not quite how I'd planned it" -- he'd been see on the Inter-System, laid over his stallion's neck in pursuit of a running criminal, he'd been seen making an apprehension, he'd been seen seizing a holdup's gun hand, twisting it behind his back for a fast disarm, then slamming the criminal face-down across the counter and cuffing him fast and less than gently, and once -- to Linn's red-faced chagrin as he watched the replay, afterwards -- he'd taken a mouthy young tough by the front of his shirt, hauled him off the ground, packed him over to the horse trough and gave him his Saturday night bath, a few days early. This long tall lawman, this keeper of the peace, this figure of legend seen on screens over thirteen star systems, was also seen laughing like a damned fool. It seems he'd laid down on the hook rug in his study, and a cardboard box full of fuzzy Mountain Mastiff pups dumped the box over (their Mama went off to explore the feed bowl, and her progeny didn't want their feed faucets leaving) -- but when this pack of grunt-and-wobble discovered something with an iron grey mustache lying on the hook rug, why, they proceeded to snuff his ears, nibble his fingers, tug at his collar and then collapse with a dramatic sigh on whatever part of his anatomy was convenient: this long tall keeper of the peace laid on his side, laughing, while fuzzy pups piled on him and gave great dramatic sighs and collapsed in contented sleep. Only one picture was taken of this, and that by his wife, with her phone: hover-cams did not intrude into his home, and this one photograph was only seen by family, and it ended up in a montage. A nurse in a winged cap, gloves and a surgical gown, a tall boy in a black suit down on one knee, which children and Fanghorns around him, a little boy asleep on a hook rug, warm in front of a fireplace and with a curly-black mountain Mastiff cuddled up with him, a Sheriff and his stallion, the lawman with Stetson in hand at arm's length and the stallion, humped up and all four feet off the ground, head down in mid-buck, mane and tail flying. Shelly saved them, printed them out, arranged them in a framed montage. She folded her arms and looked at the montage for a long time. She nodded, and she smiled: alone in the house, her voice was a whisper. "Now that's proper."

Amen Brother, my hand is a-wavin' in the air! Salesmen would come by our treatment plant and bring a box of doughnuts (bribery, an ancient and honored sport!) I'd tell the fellas I needed to get some duct tape, just tape the pastries to my belly, that's where they'll end up anyhow!

I believe this was all brass pounding. Morse code. No idea if they used a bug or not, or if it was all straight key work. To stay up that many hours, steady, pounding out names one after another ... that man has my respect!

Sailors' superstition: Dolphins are the reincarnated souls of sailors drowned at sea. This explains accounts of dolphins boosting drowning men to the surface, or even to shore. When my wife and I saw the dolphins circling the capsule, we looked at one another and speculated that they were celebrating with us. Saltwater sailors' souls, from the age of canvas, circling in celebration, circling in salute ...

A Northern Ohio University ... I think it was Brother Thomas ... a native French speaker who taught Spanish, and spoke it well ... but he stopped the class and asked in honest puzzlement, "Why are you all speaking Spanish with a French accent?" He was genuinely surprised when the class replied "But Brother Thomas ... that's how you speak it!" I understand Arnold Schwarzenegger was asked about his Austrian accent. He could not resist hamming up his answer ... "Ahkhsent? Vhat akhsent?"

Gorgeous photos! Proud of you, dear heart! Retirement is ... different ... but I'm sure you'll get used to it!