Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

COFFEE IN THE BARN Marnie rode into the teeth of the wind. She'd traded for a mule. Most folks wouldn't be caught dead on a mule, but Marnie considered the wisdom of her honored ancestors, and she considered the experience of the Kentucky carpenters and moonshiners from up on the mountain, and she remembered listening to old timers back East, on their infrequent visits back to the Appalachian hill country, how hillfolk spoke highly of hunting from muleback and how mules were smarter than horses -- a horse would run back into the burning barn, a mule would not -- and so Marnie made trade and got herself a riding mule, and right glad she was that she did. Muley, as she called the spotted sorrel gelding, was steady, dependable, fast when the need arose, which was almost never -- if Marnie wanted speed, she could saddle one of her Daddy's horses, but she liked the steady, dependable, Muley. Especially times like now, when she and Muley lowered their heads and pushed straight into the storm. Marnie knew there were mares they'd missed, mares that she'd seen big and pregnant, and if those mares birthed in this weather, cold or coyotes would get the colts, and she wasn't going to have that: she knew her Daddy's ranch intimately, she headed for the only wind break that would provide shelter from this particular blow. Most storms came out of the west; this one was screaming down out of the north, and it was screaming at the top of its frostbitten lungs, and Marnie and Muley made for a stand of brush and low pines, and she didn't find the mares. She found her Daddy. "I thought you were bringing out round bales," she called -- she had to raise her voice, the wind whipped her words away, and it wasn't until they were stirrup to stirrup that he could hear her well enough to understand her words. "The boys are fetchin' out the hay," Linn grimaced, ice-pellets stinging what little of his face could be seen: "I got the mares in yesterday, they're in the lower barn." Marnie nodded. "You came to find 'em." "I did." "I should have told you. I'm sorry." Marnie looked at her pale eyed Daddy and laughed. "If you brought 'em in yesterday, what are you doing out here now?" "Lookin' for coffee," he grinned. "Wanted to make sure I didn't miss any." "Did you?" "Don't think so. You ready to head back?" Snow whipped around them, a spinning blanket that isolated them in their own cold universe. "Let's ride fence back," Marnie said, drawing the knit scarf up over her face. "Elsewise we might get turned around." "Lead," Linn nodded: he followed his daughter, grateful he'd traded Stetson for a fur cap with earlaps: Marnie had done the same, and as the two crossed the pasture, keeping the steady wind on their left, they found and followed the fence back, grateful for this guide: Linn reflected that Marnie was right -- had he not a compass to look at, he would surely have gotten turned around when the wind shifted. The bright-red, white-crossbucked barn door slid open as they came near: they rode into still air, their mounts' breath shooting out great clouds of steam: as the door rumbled shut behind them, shivering as another frosty gust shook against the barn in frustration, father and daughter dismounted, led their saddlemounts over to where a radiant heater was pushing back against the cold, reflecting off the far wall, warming man and beast well on one side and a little on the other. They unsaddled, rubbed down, murmured, brushed, stroked: quiet voices called them good puppies, and neither horse nor mule seemed to mind being called puppies: once they were thawed out a little more, Linn turned to Jacob and Joseph, loafing with an affected casualness against the absolutely, spotlessly, snow-scrubbed-clean tractor tire: they'd already swept off the rear-mounted round-bale spear and its mount, they'd swept up where hay and chaff fell from their labors, and they elaborately pretended that there was nothing to do, that they'd been doing nothing, and that they were, indeed, loafing. Linn, of course, knew better: the round bales were set out where they should be, two of them at angles to one another, corners touching, providing not only feed, but windbreak: the boys remembered their Pa telling them about a buddy of his Mama's, Bob Beymer, who had a bull calf that ate its own cave into the lee side of a round bale, and sheltered inside the round bale in one of the worst winters to befall the county: Linn told Jacob and Joseph that Brother Beymer hiked all over that Wills Township farm, looking for that bull calf, or its tracks, or its carcass, and concluded that it had either escaped or been stolen: it wasn't until he walked past the round bales and smelled second hand bull feed -- fresh, fragrant, second hand bull feed -- that he walked around the lee side of the bale and found the wayward bovine looking out at him. For this reason, Linn and his boys set bales out in pairs, corners just touching, so their stock could shelter in the angle if need be. Thus far, none of their saddlestock managed to munch their own sheltered stall out of the round bales, but like anything else, it's an idea, try it and see if it works. Linn's gloves were clamped under his upper arm and his hands were gratefully spread in front of the radiant heater when Marnie came up beside him with a steaming foam cup of coffee. Linn blinked, realized he'd been woolgathering, looked at his darlin' daughter, smiled: he turned and found his boys were already sampling theirs, savoring something hot on this cold day. Linn took a noisy, appreciative slurp. In such company, he'd long believed, it was proper to slurp and slurp loudly, to emphasize the sheer pleasure of the moment, and as four chilled ranchers toasted themselves before the glowing face of the radiant heater, they shared long moments of a silent communing, at least until their coffee supply ran out, until they shut off the heater, made a final sweep of the barn, and headed for the house. It wasn't the first time they'd had coffee in the barn, it would not be the last, but on a bitter day like today, coffee in their barn, in front of the glowing-red heater, was just pretty darn good.

Deep Freeze of '77, Guernsey County, Ohio. Slaughter Hill fire. 20 below and every last pumper was froze up by the time they got there. One, and only one, truck had a working pump, war story omitted, suffice it to say that we collectively looked much like the figure Charlie T Waite references above!

THE ASSASSIN'S PLAN "Here he comes." Rice's voice was little more than a whisper from the cheap box-store talkie, but it was enough. A solitary figure in camo flattened out a little more behind a tombstone, waiting. He'd picked his hide carefully -- his visual signature would be broken by terrain and tombstones and differences in the grasses there in the old section of the cemetery -- he had a clear shot, less than fifty yards, and he had a scoped .22 rifle. More than enough to kill that pale eyed lawman. He'd watched him, he'd studied him: he did not want to shoot the Sheriff at his own home -- it was bad enough he was going to kill a cop, he knew every lawman in the country would be after him, but every soul in Creation would be after him if he assassinate the Sheriff at home -- he'd planned, he had only the one cohort in this matter, another young man with an ax to grind against this effective lawman that put a crimp in their petty criminal enterprises: he'd committed nothing to paper, he'd not written an Internet manifesto nor left a journal that could be read: no, he was, in his mind, the most effective assassin, the hardest to stop, the impossible to predict: a lone wolf who struck from a distance, and disappeared. A lean waisted lawman rode the Sheriff's black gelding up Cemetery Hill, pale eyes busy: his fleece lined collar was turned up against the cold, he was looking with more than his eyes, listening with more than his ears: he drew up, dismounted, looked around. Nothing really stood out; nothing caught his eye. That's what he does, the assassin thought, flattened out on the dirt, faded brown gloves on his hands, one eye exposed around the broad, white-bronze marker: he'll ride up here and look around, then he'll go set down in front of his Mama's tombstone. He waited, excitement mounting, spinning like an insane top in his belly, the thrill of the forbidden filling his soul -- I'm gonna kill this pale eyed troublemaker! -- he waited, excitement quickening his breath, he gripped the smooth wrist of his rifle, slipped his off hand forward and raised the fore end, lowered his head to look through the scope -- Something very loud and very metallic snarled in his ear and whatever that loud and metallic thing was, was also very cold, and it was being shoved deeply and painfully into his right ear. Very painfully. At the sound of an old fashioned, single action revolver rolling into full cock, the figure at his Mama's tombstone took a fast skip-hop to the left, turned, charged the sound. A knee drove down between the would-be murderer's shoulder blades, a second knee a little lower, pinning him most painfully, and a hand slapped the rifle barrel down and out of alignment with where the lawman had been: the fight was very brief, and ended with the realization that two unhappy and pale eyed lawmen were on top of him, that he had neither escape nor the means to even resist anything they did to him, and moments later, in irons and hauled upright, he saw headlights scythe around the far turn where the Sheriff's cruiser was cresting the Cemetery Hill road, under the big ornate cast iron arch. "How'd you know?" he gasped as he was being frogmarched to the waiting cruiser. "Boy," the Sheriff grated, "I was sniffin' out conspiracies and plots before you were out of diapers!" "But I didn't tell no one, I didn't put nothin' on the Internet --" The Sheriff yanked him to a stop, spun him around, seized the front of his coat and hauled him off the ground, brought him up to eye level and held him. "Don't ever try me, boy," Sheriff Linn Keller growled, and his voice started about ten foot below his boot tops and ground boulders out of the way to get to his throat: "I'm psychotic." Pale eyes blazed into the prisoner's fear-widened eyes, then the Sheriff added, "I mean psychic." "He told you," came the prisoner's whispered reply. "Damn you, John Rice, you weaseled on me!" The prisoner wasn't sure which was louder: the door slamming shut, imprisoning him in the back of the cruiser, or the cell door slamming shut after His Honor swung the gavel not long after and barked, "Guilty!" His Honor the Judge, after sentencing, was heard to remark to the Sheriff of the truly remarkable resemblance between father and son: indeed, both dressed identically, stood identically, they were within a half inch of the same height: tending his little ranch kept the Sheriff's waist lean and his shoulders and arms muscled, like his son's, and both men wore identical black suits with identical black Stetsons, but at His Honor's quiet pronouncement, Sheriff Linn Keller gave the Judge a puzzled look, gave his son an assessing look, then regarded the Judge solemnly as he replied, "I don't see that a'tall, Your Honor. Why, Jacob here is younger, smarter and better lookin' than me, not necessarily in that order!" "Flattery," Jacob replied dryly, "will get you everywhere," which for some perverse reason tickled His Honor's funny bone, and the stone faced lawmen gave up their solemn visages and joined the Judge in a quiet, shared but most sincere laugh.

WARN'T GOOD FOR HIS HEALTH I tasted copper and I knowed we was come to a killin'. I knowed what this pair done to that Hall boy, how they'd tied him over a log and taken a horse whip to him until he was bloodied and then what they done to that boy don't bear speakin' of in polite company and I ain't about to. Like as not they seen me ridin' north and they'd not been able to stop me, good chance they were expectin' me to come rattin' up the road in a wagon instead of the horse steppin' quiet on soft ground. I had my own flint rifle and I had that fowlin' piece Pa fixed for Tom Gaitten and we went on up into the settlement, Tom he paid me cash money and I headed on back for home and them two stepped out and one had a decrepit old gun of some kind and t'other had a coil of rope and a horse whip and I knowed what they had in mind. There is a time for palaver and this warn't it. I fetched up my rifle, my fingers had eyes, my middle finger set the back trigger as my trigger finger hauled attair striker back, I fetched up attair tiger stripe flint rifle Pa made me and I drove a pea ball right under the right hand varmit's wish bone. I won't call him a man. Ain't no man does what they done to that Hall boy. Now I had one shot and I knowed it and I knowed when you punch a hole in a man's guts you'll freeze him for the space of two heartbeats at least and I put my heels to attair mare and she bunched up under me and she drove chest-on into them two and from how it sounded an' how it felt, why, she put footy prints in one or t'other of 'em and I didn't much care which of 'em got horse shoes in his hide, me an' Pa's horse we were gettin' out of there and we warn't shy t' do it. I drew up and listened and reloaded attair flint rifle, I wiped off the flint and I primed it light like I always do and I run me a pick through attair touch hole so she'd fire fast and sure: some fellas like t' pack it full of powder but that has to burn from grain t' grain t' grain and that's why some call it a Flinch Lock. Me, I set my powder up ag'in the flash hole so's it'll flash through and that gives me a real quick fire. I reloaded and I listened and warn't no one a-followin' so me an' the mare we cantered on back down to the cabin an' Pa heard us comin' up the hill on the Quick Step an' he stepped out with the shotgun an' I allowed what happened and he didn't like that much, he knowed that poor Hall boy an' didn't set a'tall with what they done to the boy an' he hitched the mule to the wagon an' allowed as we'd go up together and finish what them two started. Turns out I'd finished the job. They was both of 'em dead an' we th'owed the bodies in the wagon an' taken 'em up into Corning an' the constable he was havin' himself a sociable ale an' he come out an' taken a look at the pair an' he allowed as I saved him the trouble of a hangin' for there was warrants out for 'em both. Warn't no reward money, though. I opened my eyes and blinked a couple times but I didn't move. Connie she was laid up ag'in me an' she was buck nekkid under the double quilts an' that was handiest for when she'd wake up cryin' quiet-like so's she'd not wake me, why, I'd wake anyhow and I'd take attair salve the Doc give us and I'd work it into them God awful scars and bruises her Pa put on her when he found she'd been seein' someone. I kilt one of her brothers, I broke her Pa's jaw bone and his arm and t'other brother, why, I just plainly stomped his guts into the ground an' I was well away from home when I taken on three of them and kilt two and I was clear over't Shallagotha sellin' furs t' Scotty like I always did, he give me the best price, Connie warn't but barely able to move and I warshed off them bloodied welts where she'd been held over the woodpile and belted with her Pa's razor strop til she bled and I looked at them two dead on the ground and wished I could magic 'em alive ag'in so I could kill 'em all over. I don't never recall bein' so boilin' mad in my life. Connie she put on somethin' loose that wouldn't bear too hard on her shoulders an' her back and we drove into town an' I found the doc first off an' he laid Connie down and I seen fury in the man's face and he asked who did this and I told him and I allowed as I'd kilt two and one was bad hurt and he allowed as that was a good thing and he sent a boy lookin' for the Sheriff an' he come an' taken my statement and allowed as I save him hangin' two of 'em and I could stay for hangin' the third if I'd like. No, said I, Connie and me will be headin' for home and likely north from there and find us a good patch of ground and raise us somethin' besides rocks an' he said I'd have to head north for that for Southern Ohio is nothin' but rocks and swamp an' the man's right. I woke up and looked at the underside of the wagon and I remembered all this, I heard the horse cropping grass and my shoulder was wet where Connie was cryin' in her sleep and I held her real careful-like for I did not wish to put no pressure on them healin' up cuts an' bruises. Marnie Keller sat at the table with two of her brothers, Jacob and Joseph. Old Pale Eyes was a subject of frequent discussion and of some speculation, and Marnie read these earliest accounts of the man's temper, considering the words as she read, looking for the message often hidden just under the words theselves. She looked at Jacob. "He's young, in this account," she said. "Probably Joseph's age." Jacob nodded. "Could well be." "Even if he's your age, look at his mindset. He knows things and he plans ahead." Two heads nodded wisely at her observation. "He's determined to make things right and when they're not, he rassles with them until they are." "Kind of like Pa said to that fellow yesterday," Joseph grinned. "I missed that," Marnie admitted. "What happened?" "Oh, some fella was raisin' hell in the Mercantile and Pa went in and grabbed him by the shirt front. Hit him pretty hard, too, then he twisted up a good handful of material and h'isted him off the floor." Jacob's eyes were veiled, but Marnie could see the approval he was trying to keep out of his expression. "Pa said if you bring a man's feet off the floor," Jacob said speculatively, "you take a lot of the fight out of him." "That's so," Marnie agreed. "What did Pa do then?" "He allowed as this fella was going to speak in an inside voice and he was goin' to behave himself, peacefully or otherwise, and he didn't much care which." "He said it quietly?" "Oh, yes. Very definitely he said it quietly." "Why'd he say it quietly, Sis?" Marnie's smile was quick, genuine and just a little predatory. "If he says it quietly," Marnie explained, "it tells 'em he's controlling himself very rigidly, and if they don't behave, he's going to get considerably less rigid -- kind of like crimping down a spring and holding it." "Makes sense." "Every one of our ancestors," Marnie said, tapping the open reprint with nail-trimmed, unpolished fingernails -- "every last one has been a law dawg of some kind, and every last one has busted their backside to keep people safe." "Mama does that too," Joseph protested. "Yes she does," Marnie agreed. "Is Mama related to Old Pale Eyes?" "No," Marnie smiled. "Gammaw found out she's related somehow to Sean." "Sean? Fire Chief Sean, that Sean?" "That one." Marnie frowned. "Or maybe it was Daisy." She blinked, considered. "No, I think it was Sean." She laughed, just a little. "Rescuer Mentality, from both sides of the family tree!" Joseph looked at the book under Marnie's fingertips, and Marnie looked at Joseph, waiting for the question to migrate from his eyes to his voice. "Old Pale Eyes shot one and ran over the other." "He did." "How bad did the horse hurt him?" Marnie consulted the work, turned to her hand written notes, ran her finger down lines of painfully-neat printing, stopped. "He shot one right under the sternum," she said slowly. "If they were squared off to one another, that would take out the abdominal aorta and the spine. The other one ... it says a hoof caved in his breastbone." "Warn't good for his health," Jacob drawled.

A BROTHERLY CONFERENCE "Jacob?" Jacob swam reluctantly to consciousness, opened his eyes. He'd been sleeping really well, so well he didn't want to wake up, but a voice called him ... "Jacob?" Jacob rolled over, saw his younger brother standing by his bed. Jacob threw his covers back, came out of the bunk, nostrils flared, adrenaline pump hammering, wide awake in one-tenth of a second or less: his eyes swung around, he turned, looked up, out toward the stairway -- No haze, no smoke -- No smoke alarm -- No raised voices -- His brother looked away, guilt written like a newspaper's headline across his face. Jacob turned toward his brother, laid a hand on his shoulder, sat: he looked into eyes two years younger than his own and said in a quiet, but very serious voice, "Is all well?" "I'm sorry. I shoulda waited til morning." Jacob rubbed his face, took a long breath, blew it out. "I'm awake now. Ask." "Jacob, how big was that Morgan horse you rode?" Jacob's expression hardened. "You weren't supposed to hear that conversation." Joseph shrugged. "I find things out." Jacob hooked a thumb toward his bunk. "Sit." Joseph sat. Both these young Keller men sat, their feet flat on the floor, arms straight down, gripping the edge of the bunk: they unconsciously assumed the posture that would launch them to a standing posture with the least effort, the least time, should the need arise. "How much did you hear?" "Enough." "Spoken like a true interrogator." "It comes honest, remember?" Jacob laughed, quietly, knowing his mother had ears like a radar dish, knowing that she slept on a hair trigger like the rest of them. "I heard you say you couldn't look over the stallion's back." Jacob nodded slowly. "Yep," he confirmed, grinning. "That's one tall horse!" "Good lines?" "Oh, ya," Jacob nodded. "Genuine Morgan?" "Looked to be." "I didn't think Morgans got that tall." "They've had better'n ... oh hell, since the 1860s to breed 'em up." Joseph frowned, considered. "You said nobody rode there." Jacob nodded, yawned, wide, deep. "If nobody rides there, where'd your saddle come from?" Jacob glared at something across the room, or probably something far beyond the opposite wall, then he looked at his younger brother and said simply, "Your sister." "Ah." Joseph nodded wisely, as if this answered everything. "She has a way of arranging these things." "Like that girl you're sweet on?" Jacob grew very still: he closed his eyes for several moments, then he nodded and said "Yes. Like the girl." "What's her name?" "I thought you were listening." "Just wanted to make sure I was hearing it right." "Dear God," Jacob hissed, "you're contaminated!" "Whattaya mean contaminated?" Jacob glared at his younger brother. "You're using every trick a lawman uses to get information." Joseph shrugged. "You're gettin' married, you're going off-planet, someone's got to fill in." "I'm not going --" Jacob protested, then stopped, stared at the floor. "Yes I am," he said softly, then he looked at Joseph and grinned. "Her name's Anna Mae," he said quietly. "You'd like her."

ARRANGED It was not often that anyone pulled the rug out from under Jacob Keller. Jacob was the pale eyed son of the pale eyed Linn Keller. Jacob was a Deputy Sheriff, a man of judgement and consideration, a man who took seriously the Biblical admonition to be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger: when the moment demanded, he could be swift enough -- and such moments had come to him, and been handled with an appropriate level of utter ruthlessness -- Jacob learned well from his father, and from his father's peers, how to judge men and how to not just look, but to see. It was a considerable shock to his sensibilities to find that he'd judged a situation very, very wrong, and having mentally prepared for something that didn't exist, he had to get his psychic footing and find a plan B, and fast. Sheriff Marnie Keller maintained a regular communication with home: she found it useful to consult with her father, the Sheriff, she found it useful to bounce ideas off him and off her younger brother; although she was making more and more friends, both personal and professional, on a variety of worlds, her thoughts always came home, back to Colorado, back to her childhood Firelands. Thanks to certain Confederate technologies, she could visit Earth undetected, and uncontaminated: there were very few microbia on Mars that would cause trouble on Earth, but the chance of carrying something unwanted from Earth to Mars was a distinct possibility, and so any travelers to or from, wore a protective fieldsuit that absolutely prevented contamination -- even when Marnie brought her children to visit, and her little boy joyfully stripped buck naked in the back yard and stood in the first rain he'd ever experienced in his young life. It was not a terrible surprise, then, when Jacob was called to the family's comm panel, the one that utilized this alien technology, when his big sis's face smiled at him from the screen, when she said that another of the worlds could use Jacob's help. "If you'll slip out to the barn," she said, "we've got a portal waiting on you." "What, you don't have a starship for me?" he asked, pouting out his lower lip and assuming a doleful expression. Marnie laughed. "You hot-rod!" she scolded. "You just want to ride that interstellar sports car again!" Jacob grinned. "Hey, you can't blame a guy for tryin'! I'll be there in five." He scribbled a note -- Gone to Aunie Em -- it was the prearranged, coded message that he was off-planet: only his parents knew its true meaning, only he and they had access to the comm panel: he ran upstairs, peeled out of his jeans and flannel shirt and back into uniform with the speed and ease of a quick-change artist (he thought for a brief moment he probably inherited that skill from another pale eyed predecessor) and came downstairs, gunbelt snug around his middle: he hesitated, then grabbed his shotgun, slung it muzzle down from his off shoulder: he'd unsnapped the talkie, left it on his bed, as chances were good he'd not be in range of their mountaintop repeater. Jacob strode for the barn: as he slipped in the man door, the lights came on automatically; he looked at the glowing silver oval, waiting silent, patient, beside the shining-red Farmall Cub's rear tire: he walked through it with the ease of a man walking through a doorway, smiled as he was suddenly half his former weight. A laugh, a pair of shining eyes, a delighted "Jacob!" -- he and his sister embraced, laughing: he squeezed Marnie hard under the arms, hoisted her off the floor, gave her a little shake, felt her gasp, felt her shiver: "Oh that hurts so good!" she whispered, and he eased her back to the floor: Marnie twisted a little, equal amounts of relief on her face and in her voice both: "That's better!" she whispered. Marnie gripped Jacob's arm. "How would you like to visit another planet?" "Whattaya need, Sis?" Jacob grinned. "First, I want you to meet somebody. She's got quite a crush on you." "God help me," Jacob muttered. "Is she over eighty or under eight?" "She's eight." Marnie tapped her hand-pad, gripped Jacob's arm. "Back through." They stepped through the silver oval and were on a well manicured lawn: gravity was suddenly heavier, it took Jacob about a second and a half to reacclimatize to what felt like Earth-normal: he smelled heavy perfume -- flowers of some kind -- scents that were almost familiar, but not quite: he looked around, the two-story house behind him was mostly windows, neatly painted and trimmed: he turned to face his pale eyed sister. "Jacob, I've been called to consult and to help with investigations on several of the Confederate worlds. This one is lightly populated and they'd like your help in setting up a Sheriff's office." "Why not recruit Pa? He's the Sheriff, I've never set one up before!" Marnie patted his chest with the flat of her hand "Because you're the right man for the job, and because somebody really wants to meet you." Jacob raised a skeptical eyebrow. "She's eight," Marnie continued innocently, and Jacob's suspicions only deepened: when his older sis got to looking really innocent, it generally meant she was trying to sell him on something. "Eight." Marnie nodded. "She's really cute, too." "A cute eight year old. Why do I get the feeling I should blow the canopy and yank the red handle?" He heard a door close behind him and swore, silently, fervently: he'd turned his back to a structure, he'd turned his back to a door, he could've been killed -- Jacob turned. Jacob's hand came up, seized the stiff brim of his uniform Stetson: he tucked it correctly under his off arm, grateful his epaulet's button kept the shotgun's nylon sling in place. He saw a big set of deep-violet eyes regarding him with wonder, he saw a smile as bright as sunrise itself, he saw a beautiful young woman stop, grip her skirts, drop a flawless curtsy. She rose, extended a hand: Jacob took her hand, raised it carefully to his lips, kissed her knuckles: "My Lady," he murmured, and her face colored, her eyes demurely downcast. "Jacob Keller," Marnie said, "this is Anna Mae Hill." "This isn't the eight-year-old you were talking about," Jacob said, glancing at his sister. "Today is my eighth birthday," Anna Mae said softly. "This planet takes twice as long to orbit their sun as yours," Marnie explained. Sixteen, Jacob thought. "I'll let you two get acquainted. We'll meet with the Sheriff's Committee this afternoon." Marnie touched her hand-pad, smiled, turned and stepped back through the silver oval, which disappeared. Sheriff Linn Keller looked up as his son entered the inner sanctum without knocking. Jacob sat heavily on a chair, tilted his head back, dropped his Stetson in his lap, took a deep breath, blew it out. Linn placed his pen very precisely along the left edge of his desk blotter. "How goes the project?" Linn asked carefully. "Sir," Jacob said, "I am beginning to appreciate every word you've ever said about bureaucracy, laymen, meddlers and people who wished they knew what they were talking about!" "I see." "It's coming along, sir, but God help me!" -- he sat up suddenly, planting his forearms on his knees, thrusting his head forward -- "Sir, this is like setting up shop back in Old Pale Eyes' time! The same mindset, in ... hell, most of the towns I've seen have the same construction as Firelands, back when, same materials and likely for the same reason." Jacob frowned, continued. "I'm fighting politics, business interests, dirty deals, we've got brothels, gambling houses, counterfeiting, I stopped one lynching, two bar fights and a bank robbery, and broke the stock off my shotgun when it was close-in and too crowded to go firing shots" -- he grinned at his father -- "I'm glad Gammaw taught me about bayonet and rifle butt work she learned from the French Foreign Legion!" "Comes in handy," Linn nodded. "There's more." "There always is." "Her name is Anna Mae." Linn's eyebrow raised. "She's sixteen of our years, eight of hers. Their planet takes twice as long to orbit the sun. I'd like you and Mama to meet her. Mama especially. Mama can tell things about people and before things get any more serious I want to get a second opinion." "What does Marnie think?" "She's the one who arranged our meeting." "Good family?" "The best. Well established, prosperous, good reputation. I'm judging Old Man Hill's politics to be as close to a true neutral as a body's going to find." "How advanced is their technology?" Jacob laughed. "Sir, it's a good thing you brought me up with horses. First thing they did was take me out and see if I knew my way around a headstall." "And ...?" "I picked the biggest stallion there and baited him with tobacker like I always did. I checked his teeth and his hooves, ran my hands down his legs and watched to see if he'd bite my bent over backside." "Did he?" "No, sir, but he did pull the bandanna out of my hip pocket and wave it like a flag." Linn laughed, nodded, for he'd had a horse that did that very thing. "I didn't bit him, sir. They were all watching to see if I'd lost my mind or if I never had one in the first place. They said later that I had to be addle brained to forget even to bit him." Linn nodded, once. "I swung up into the saddle and the fight was on," Jacob grinned, and his grin was broad and genuine and spread easily to his voice. "That stallion just plainly knocked me north, south, east, west, up to the Texas moon and down to oil!" "Did you stay on him?" "By God's grace alone, yes, sir, I did, but I was spurring him fore and aft and swatting him head and hinder with my Stetson, and that was a pretty good trick for I wore no spurs -- he like to rattled my liver loose, but I stayed on him and we taken off across the pasture and I'm leaned over his neck with my hands pressed flat on either side and I'm yellin' and he's got his ears laid back and over that fence we went, he come around in a big easy circle and I got him to turnin' with my knees and he was a quick study, we come back across that fence and Anna Mae was there and clappin' her hands like a schoolgirl, just a-bouncin' on her toes, and we come around and run a weave and a figure-eight and then he ho'd when I leaned back and told him ho, and we walked up to her Pappy and he allowed as that big Morgan horse seemed to have picked me, all right, and I don't think I could've tickled him any more if I'd handed him a hundred dollar bill." Linn nodded slowly, again, and Jacob could see the approval in his father's pale eyes. "They've railroads, sir, but few of 'em. They've not many people on the planet yet. Most travel is ... well, most there hadn't seen a man ride horseback." "That's surprising," Linn said slowly. "Sir, you recall we read in Old Pale Eyes' first Journal how that sliver tongue German swindled him into volunteerin'. We read that Old Pale Eyes was one of two men there who knew how to ride a horse, that nobody in the North or the East rode -- they drove. Drove carriages, drove buggies, drove wagons, nobody rode. 'Twas a novelty to see a man a-horseback, and they were layin' bets on how fast that horse was going to kill me when he started to buck." "Morgan horse, you say?" "They called him a Morgan, yes, sir, but 'twas bigger than any Morgan I ever saw. I couldn't look over his back." Linn whistled. "Tall horse, that." "Yes, sir. Good singlefoot gait, once he slowed down." "Split the wind, did he?" Jacob grinned. "Stuck his nose straight out and punched a hole in it!" "Now tell me about that cute little filly that caught your eye." "Sir ..." Jacob frowned, picked up his Stetson, began turning it round his his hands as he arranged his next words. "Sir, I believe the phrase 'arranged marriage' come to mind here." He looked very directly at his father. "I'd still like you and Mama to meet her." "I think," Linn grinned, "that can be arranged."

DOUBLE OH SIX AND SEVEN EIGHTHS A pale eyed woman in a McKenna gown stood shoulder to shoulder with her black-suited, dignified husband: beside them, their young, properly attired for church: little girls in mid-calf frocks, befitting their few years, little boys, alternately solemn and fidgety in black suits and stiff collars. Before them, the Parson, leading the service; around and behind them, friends, neighbors, kinfolk, in-laws, outlaws, those gifted, skilled and most essential souls so vital to the survival of a frontier settlement. The sanctuary was laid out with an eye to maximum strength: it was geometrical, made of flat planes, melted into native rock: the predominant shape was the hexagon, the strongest shape in nature, seen in honeycombs and in crystalline structures: the melted, compressed, shaped and cooled rock was three meters thick, and proof against the weight of the strata above. Voices were raised in song, united in adoration of their Creator. Just as a nation will unite to a remarkable degree when attacked by an enemy from without, so will a people unite their worship in a frontier, where every moment can hold their death, where a mistake can kill one, a dozen, a hundred of their fellows: so it was here: nearly the entire settlement attended services, staggered so vital areas could remain staffed. The Sheriff normally sang quietly enough, sang carefully enough, that her voice was not prominent: rather, it was a pleasant and harmonious undercurrent to the flowing stream of song: her husband, her children, close enough to hear her, knew of the purity of her voice, but none other suspected. She'd been invited to sing in their Choir; it was more a polite invitation, and she smiled and declined, excusing herself with the needs of her office: even here in church, she wore a discreet communicator, hidden under the material of her dress-sleeve, and even here in church, she was far less than unarmed: thanks to Confederate technology, she also wore a field-suit, which was programmed to activate in less than one-tenth of a second in the event of either personal attack, or catastrophic decompression, and could be manually triggered in anticipation of hostilities -- while losing none of the ladylike appearance of a pale eyed woman in an ornate wig, a fashionable little hat and a carefully tailored McKenna gown. Every society has its customs, and Firelands was still developing its own: the Mars colonists embraced the frontier philosophy that they were on their own, the entire world and points beyond intended their demise, and damned if I'll let that happen! -- they fell back on ancestral memories and legends: attire became distinctly Western, and thanks to a brisk trade in certain native minerals in great demand on one of the Confederate planets, they had a ready supply of ... well, more things than can be listed here: currency was established, shops opened, off-planet tailors and milliners delighted in setting up shop in Firelands on a part-time basis, finding the lesser gravity unique, even refreshing: Dr. Greenlees found himself overseeing an actual hospital, learning medical procedures developed in parallel to Earth's, sometimes borrowing heavily from Earth medicine: to his absolute delight, he even encountered two classmates who'd attended medical school with him, gifted young men, quiet, highly skilled, intense young men who never seemed to mix socially: in the happy conversation of acquaintance re-established, he discovered they were actually from one of the Confederate worlds, skilfully infiltrated into his class, learning all they possibly could, to be taught by them, after classes, back on their homeworld. These two Confederate surgeons, descendants of actual Confederate medical personnel who'd been abducted with their fellows by aliens seeking to establish a disposable mercenary force of skilled and effective primitives, happily joined Dr. Greenlees and his pale eyed wife for meals, for visits. In the course of conversation, comment was made about the variable gravity in Firelands, how the Sheriff's living quarters were at 1.25 Earth-normal gravities, with the hospital's gravities varying as to the needs of the patient: severe fractures, for instance, had a zero-G ward, to allow osteoblasts to knit shattered bone surfaces back together without the interference of gravity's pull: force fields were used instead of metallic pin fixation, then gravity was slowly reintroduced, as resistance is necessary for bone strength and good health: in like wise, those sections dedicated to physical therapy had varying gravities, according to the needs of the patient. "Artificial gravity was completely beyond our scientists' reach," Marnie smiled over beef and gravy -- Dr. Greenlees' eyes were busy, watching their young daughter daintily scoop up mashed potatoes and gravy, while her older brother industriously formed a broad, shallow lakebed with his potatoes and then carefully filled it with gravy, reflecting his love of the fragrant brown sauce -- "Confederate technology was given, in exchange for ... services." Marnie blinked, realizing she may've overstepped herself: she was sure this exchange was no secret among Confederate worlds, but she was still hesitant to say too much. "Services?" came the natural question, and Marnie realized she'd just painted herself into a corner. "They recruited me as an investigator." Her son regarded her with sudden interest: he'd become a big fan of the Noir genre, of Jimmy Cagney bad guys and Humphrey Bogart detectives, and had even given an experimentally nasal "youse guys, nyaa, nyaa," until his Mama's quiet look silenced any further efforts. Even on Mars, Mama's "The Look" held a potent strength. "What were you investigating?" "Nothing on your worlds," Marnie said frankly. "They had me working organized crime." "Oh, like the Mafia?" one asked brightly -- he, too, was a fan of Earth films, and had recently binged on something about a Godfather: Marnie smiled and looked down at the wheat roll she held as the guest's hand raised, thumb and fingers together: "Leave the gun. Take the cannoli." "Nothing that dramatic," Marnie murmured, her face coloring a little, then their guests saw her eyes light with impish humor: she tore two tufts off her biscuit, stuffed them in her cheeks to pouch them out a little, lowered her head and husked, "I made him an offer he couldn't refuse!" Her daughter looked aloofly at her tidy, now-empty plate; her son looked at his Mama with big and surprised eyes, Dr. Greenlees swallowed quickly to keep from choking because he knew his laughter was unavoidable, and their guests applauded and nodded: one lowered his head and looked over a set of nonexistent spectacles and said quietly, "Have I the honor of meeting Secret Agent Double-Oh-Seven?" Marnie laughed, picked up a delicate, bone-china teacup, smiled over the rim and murmured, "No. No, I'm not 007. I'm Double-Oh Six and Seven Eighths!" She looked around, smiling. "Okay, who's for dessert?"

SAME OLD STUFF It felt like a deep, penetrating punch, it felt like his entire body was screaming this is wrong, this is wrong, this is WRONG, and he felt more sick than he'd felt in his entire life. He saw the master-at-arms touch a control on his pad, and the auto-carver began lasering Custerson's name in the waiting tombstone. The pale eyed woman stood over him, revolver still in hand. "Mr. Custerson," she said pleasantly, "I am ashamed to say that we are related. It is a distant blood connection, but we are still blood. "You demanded a duel of honor, sirrah, and now you are hoist upon your own petard, bested by your own terms and conditions." Sheriff Marnie Keller opened her blued-steel revolver's cylinder, lifted the extractor star enough to hook a trimmed nail under the fired round's rim: she pocketed the empty, dropped in a loaded round, closed the cylinder. She turned; the revolver disappeared back into her McKenna gown. Custerson gasped, then started wallowing violently: he was gut shot, his spine was shattered, his abdominal aorta damaged: there was a roaring in his ears, he was dizzy, dizzy, he fell back, hands clutching at the thin grass -- They'd come to this distant place, away from everyone. He alone, the Sheriff alone, the referee, and of course the video drone. They met alone on a treeless plain, a place where the grass was fine and thin and soft underfoot, a place where the wind rippled Marnie's long skirt, where the scent of grasses and flowers and distant livestock perfumed the air. The Sheriff seriously interfered with the much-less-than-legal business he was establishing, one to which good and decent people objected: he was setting himself up as head of an intended empire, one which preyed on his fellows. He stood to gain both wealth and power, and neither in any small measure. Could he but stop this interfering Sheriff, his plans could come to fruition, and so he chose a method which both appalled and intrigued all who heard it: He challenged her to a duel of honor. They met in this lonely place, they three: a table, a tablecloth, blades of varying sizes, weights, designs: falchions, hand-and-a-half swords, broadswords, rapiers, a surprisingly eclectic selection, all neatly paired. Custerson stood on one side of the table, Marnie on the other: she paced slowly the length of the table, considering each: he paced with her, and as they came to the end of the table, Marnie tilted her head and looked at Custerson. "Violation of the Code Duello," she said pleasantly, "is an immediate forfeit?" "It is." "And you intend that only one of us should leave here alive." "That's right." She smiled, a bright, womanly smile, then she clapped her hands like a delighted schoolgirl and bounced on her toes: "How utterly delightful!" she exclaimed. "If you can best the Sheriff, you establish your strength and you show the universe itself you cannot be stopped!" He considered for a long moment, then smiled. "Yes. Yes, that's correct." Marnie's hand snapped up, there was a clap as if thunder smote his ears, and he collapsed, his legs gone: Sheriff Marnie Keller, revolver in hand, her eyes suddenly pale, hard, the bloodless skin of her face drawn tight over her cheekbones. "You, sirrah, are in violation of the Code Duello," she challenged in a clear and ringing voice, for the benefit of the referee, who stood shocked at this sudden and unexpected development. "Under the Code, you must challenge by either throwing down a gauntlet, or backhanding me in public. You, sirra, did neither. As the challenged party, I and I alone have the choice of time, of place and of weapons, and I chose none of those things." Marnie opened the cylinder of her gold-inlaid Smith & Wesson, extracted the fired round, slid it into a hidden pocket and withdrew a fresh round. "You, sirrah, are hoist on your own petard: under your own terms and conditions, you have violated the Code Duello and you yourself are declared forfeit." Marnie turned to the referee. "Have you any dispute?" The referee considered, then shook his head slowly. "No. There is no dispute. The duel is forfeit, just as you say." Marnie looked at a fellow named Custerson, a man distantly related to her, a man who intended to establish his criminal empire, a man whose soul was sitting up and looking around in surprise, just before it left what had been its physical body. Sheriff Marnie Keller looked very directly at the video drone, hovering not far away. On a distant planet, orbiting around a distant star, pale eyes watched the figure on their monitor, a pale eyed woman wearing a McKenna gown, a woman who slid a revolver into a hidden holster: just before it disappeared into the gown's tailored folds, the watching eyes saw the gold inlaid Thunder Bird, shining boldly against blued steel. Sheriff Linn Keller nodded approvingly: behind him, a tall son gripped his father's shoulder and Linn heard Joseph's quiet "That's my sis!" Dr. John Greenlees Jr looked up as his wife came through the airlock, all smile and long gown and open arms: he hugged her, picked her up, murmured into the shoulder of her gown, "How's my favorite wife?" Marnie laughed, tilted her head a little, caressed her husband's clean-shaven cheek: "Tired," she admitted, "and hungry. I want supper and you're buying!" "I know a nice little restaurant in Karachi," he deadpanned, and she swatted at his shoulder: "Liar!" she smiled, and they both laughed. Marnie took her husband's arm and they turned toward the exit. "How was your trip?" "Oh, you know, same old, same old," she sighed. "Investigation, prosecution, challenged to a duel, the usual." "Dull and boring," Dr. Greenlees groaned. "You need some excitement in your life." Feminine laughter floated behind them, cut off by the airlock door as they left the receiving bay.

... I need one of those emojis where the jaw bone hangs down about the belt buckle ...

A FRIENDLY EAR Reverend John Burnett was of retirement age, but not retired. He'd joked his life's mission was to spoil his wife, and indeed she'd bought a license plate frame that said across the top, BLESSED BY GOD, and across the bottom, SPOILED BY MY HUSBAND! He'd just finished loading the dishwasher, dropped in the square detergent pillow, closed the door and turned the knob until it started to hum. Reverend Burnett frowned, straightened. Something wasn't right. Reverend Burnett washed his hands -- quickly, efficiently, getting the sticky from dirty dishes off his paws -- he dried them on a rough green dishtowel, tossed the towel over the back of a kitchen chair, headed for the short hallway that separated the Parson's living quarters from the little whitewashed church. He paused, listening before opening the door: he heard a tentative note on their piano, a chord, another: he waited, his hand on the knob, then smiled as skilled hands coaxed the "Arkansas Traveler" from the ivory 88. He opened the door, smiled as the pianist's fluorishes and skilled sinister-hand work brought the ancient tune to living, sonorous life, filling the inside of their silent little church with an audible smile, with the laughter hidden in the piano player's heart. The Parson opened the door, stepped into the church: there was a piano stool beside the piano bench, there was a pale eyed Sheriff on the piano bench, and the Parson pulled out the stool and parked himself beside her as she played. Willamina segued easily into a brisk, precisely-chorded "Oh Susannah," and the Parson saw something he didn't often see. He saw the quiet, contented smile of a woman who genuinely loved what she did. He waited; he listened; the Sheriff played "Dixie" as gently and reverently as any hymn, skilfully going up a third, then a third again: she gave the Parson a sidelong look, her smile that of someone in mischief, sliding smoothly into "The Wearin' of the Green" -- but she played the tune lively, bouncy, and Parson Belden threw his head back and laughed with absolute delight as she climbed a third again, the left-hand counterpoint sounding distinctly Scottish, as if it should be played on the pipes instead of the piano. Willamina's fingers caressed the keys as the final notes faded, a lover's touch, as if reluctant to let the final vibrations disappear: she closed her eyes, closed her hands, turned: she sat very straight, very properly as she lifted her chin and addressed the Parson. "Don't tell anyone," she said quietly, "and no I don't intend to play piano in church." The Parson smiled a little, raised an eyebrow. Willamina sighed, folded her hands in her lap: she bowed her head, bit her bottom lip. "I like to slip in at odd moments," she said quietly. "Things happen, and I talk to God about 'em." The Parson nodded. "I got a call from a brother officer back East, or at least he used to be." Parson Burnett's eyebrow twitched up, he turned his head a little, and Willamina laughed. "Daddy used to do that," she said, and the Parson looked honestly puzzled. "He turned his head -- just like you did -- like he was bringing a good ear to bear." She smiled -- a little sadly, he thought -- she blinked, returned to her original thought. "He needed a friendly ear." Bruce Williams tasted copper. He'd come into the little coffeeshop there on the town circle with full intent to indulge himself. Bruce was a thrifty man, Bruce was a retired man, but Bruce was a lonely man: he'd buried a wife and a daughter, most of his contemporaries were dead, or moved off, he'd moved north with his new bride and now she was dead, their dogs were dead: he was a man alone, and every two weeks, on what used to be payday, he'd come up and laugh and joke with the owner and her best friend and he'd get a flavored coffee. He'd placed his order, paid for it, stepped off to the side to shamelessly ogle the pastries in their little countertop display case, when the door opened: Bruce's internal alarm went off and his hand went flat on his belly -- a move he'd cultivated, his coat was open, he looked like an old man holding his belly because of some internal discomfort -- but from here, his hand could blade under the jacket and access the sidearm he was never without. An individual came in at the top of his lungs, shoving people aside -- Bruce saw him raise a square black pistol, heard him screaming about giving him the money, about he was gonna kill everyone and gimme the money NOW, and Bruce's hand came out from under his jacket with a double handful of double-stack justice -- he saw the red dot come up, placed it on the screaming man's earlobe -- sniper shot, he thought, take out the medulla, reactionless kill, he won't fire -- Training and training and training again kicked in -- "DROP THE WEAAAPON!" The perp turned, his gun muzzle turning with him -- Who in the hell just fired my gun? he wondered, brought the red dot back down to follow the falling figure's face -- Movement to his right -- He turned, the window spiderwebbed around a hole, then two more, he fired once, wondering how his red dot found this second shooter so fast -- "Parson," the Sheriff said quietly, "I partnered with the man for a lot of years. He'd married and been widowed and we'd just drifted apart, but when he needed a friendly ear, he knew who to call." The Parson nodded, slowly: he'd gotten such calls himself, from time to time. "It looks like he'll be no-billed. The coffee shop has cameras and the owner was working that day, she's prior Army medic and she backed his story to the hilt." "Who was the second shooter?" "The getaway driver." "Will ... Bruce? ... be all right?" "I think so," she nodded. "How about you?" "I came to talk to God about it." "Did you?" She nodded, smiled. "I suppose God will forgive my indulging in your piano." Reverend John Burnett laughed again. "Make a joyful noise unto the Lord," he chuckled. "I can't help but think He'd be pleased with your good work." The Parson's brow wrinkled just a little, and Willamina knew there was a question forthcoming, so she waited patiently for his thought to take shape. "You came to talk to God about it," he said slowly. "I've heard you say that before." "My Uncle Pete used to say that," Willamina smiled. "We were working on his truck one day and my wrench slipped, I barked my knuckles and bloodied 'em a little. He watched as I used brake cleaner to get the grease off and he knew that felt really good on those open wounds, so he gave me that wise look and asked quietly, "Did you talk to God about it?" -- she laughed, and her laugh was contagious -- "so ever since ..." Willamina looked at the Parson with her very best Innocent Expression. "Besides, aren't we told to pray without ceasing?" The Parson's slow nod of appreciation affirmed Willamina's premise. "Thank you for coming in." "One of the few places I can come and not be interrupted," Willamina smiled. "I interrupted you." Willamina laughed, laid gentle fingers on the Parson's knuckles. "Parson," she said, "I needed a friendly ear, and you and God were kind enough to help me out. That's not an interruption." Willamina stood, gave the man a warm look. "Your wife told me that you go out of your way to spoil her." She blinked, bit her bottom lip. "Take it from a decrepit old widow-woman. You're doing the right thing." Willamina turned, walked quickly to the center aisle; the Parson watched her leave, listened to the precise cadence of her hard heels, blinked as bright sunlight seared through the open door, then blinked again as mountain sunlight was sliced off by the closing portal.

THAT'S WHY THEY'VE GOT A SHERIFF Two pale eyed Keller boys sat on the front porch. The ranch house was old: old, but very well maintained: it had been well and strongly made to start with, its additions and modifications had been done with what an ancestor called an Oil Field Grade philosophy: big and mean and hell for stout. A surprising percentage of the new construction was Eastern white oak, seasoned and tough as ... well, tough as seasoned white oak: the stuff was so obdurate, it took a carbide blade to cut it, and even then the blade threw sparks like it was cutting through spike nails. It was not possible to spike white oak with even heavy nails: holes had to be drilled first, and the nails soaped, which slowed construction but guaranteed these timbers would stand when the rest of the house was gone, rotted, turned to dust and less than a memory. Jacob Keller and his younger brother Joseph sat on the front porch, looking into the distance, communing with the silence: The Bear Killer shoved himself in between them, sprawled, big, warm and furry, and the three of them gazed at the sunlit tops of the mountains distant. A few pioneering stars pushed through the high haze: automatically their eyes went to a part of the sky where Mars was, or ought to be (in this they were almost right), then they looked at one another and said with one voice, "Marnie." Jacob watched as his younger brother looked away, frowning. "What's on your mind?" he asked in a gentle voice -- his words were as direct as his father's, but his voice was as gently pitched as his mother's. Joseph frowned again, ran his hand into The Bear Killer's fur. "Jacob, does Marnie have a jail on Mars?" Jacob considered the question for some time. The popular media, the official reports, painted an optimistic picture of hardy pioneers in harmony and unity, laboring shoulder to shoulder to wrest a living from a cold, dead planet, barely surviving on what Earth could rocket them, but making it work: public information releases all addressed the positive, and like most edited information, used many words to actually say very little. "Joseph," Jacob said, "what do you think?" "I think Pa sent you there to help her out," Joseph said frankly, and Jacob looked at him with honest surprise. "You weren't supposed to know." Joseph shrugged. "I listen," he said frankly, "and I put things together." "What've you put together?" "You went there and we're not supposed to talk about it. Marnie had Pa get her a case of .357s and .30-30s and buckshot and that Valkyrie pilot parked her starship in the barn so nobody would see it an' she took Marnie a bunch of stuff she needed." Jacob raised an eyebrow, nodded: the Mars vessel was actually a Valkyrie-class, not a starship, but he saw no screaming need to correct Joseph on the matter. Joseph's pale eyes studied his older brother's face as he nodded: he was taken by how much Jacob looked like their pale eyed Pa. "I was there," Jacob said softly, then looked sharply at his younger brother. "You know this is family business." "Omerta," Joseph said firmly, accenting the last syllable, and grinned as he surprised his older brother yet again. "How do you know about Omerta?" Jacob asked slowly. "Marnie," Joseph said simply. "Marnie always liked the Old Mafia." "Really?" Joseph nodded. "She said the Old Mafia had respect. She said they did kill but they only killed one another. Business, nothing personal" -- Joseph grinned as he said the words, accenting them as he'd heard them in movies on the subject -- "but they didn't kill outside their profession. Not like the modern gangstas." He looked at Jacob. "She told me I'd learn things that were covered by omerta and what's in the Family stays in the Family." "That sounds just like her," Jacob muttered. "Besides, who'd believe me? Starships in the barn, Martians in the backyard, your going to Mars as her deputy and coming back after you kick butt and take names?" He sneered into the gathering darkness. "Nah. That's family. We don't talk about those things." Jacob nodded, considered. "You asked if Marnie has a jail on Mars." Joseph looked at his big brother. "She's got one now. She said people are people wherever you go. They've got drunks, wife beaters, bullies, they've got thieves and she said it's a good thing she's Sheriff. If she had to run under Earth rules it would get out of hand. She said if she cracks heads and raises hell they understand what she's sayin' and they quit that foolishness." Jacob grinned and it was not a pleasant expression, especially when he added, "Sometimes they quit that foolishness. When they don't, she has to get impressive with 'em." Joseph nodded slowly. "They got any gold up there?" Joseph felt the change in his older brother. "They've got prospecting miners," he said slowly, "and when they went into the deepest canyons they looked for gold." "Did they find it?" "They found topsoil, Joseph. They found topsoil and they're making it into cropland underground." "That's why they've got those God-awful big solar collectors." "Yyyep," Jacob affirmed. "Once they got to diggin' for dirt, they dug deep and they found traces of meteor gold, but nothing more." "Oh." Joseph sounded almost disappointed: he frowned and said softly, "Well darn it anyhow." "How's that?" "I'd hoped Mars was better than here," he admitted. "Things are bad enough in the city, Marnie never went without --" he stopped, looked guiltily at his big brother. "I know," Jacob said softly. "I don't either." "Good." Jacob didn't have to shift his weight to feel the reassuring presence of blued steel inside his waistband: his Uncle Will told him of carrying a Colt 1911 off duty, carrying it Mexican, without a holster: "when you're skinny like me," he'd told Jacob, "it rides real nice behind the iliac crest inside my waistband. Carried it like that for years." "No, Joseph," Jacob said softly, "Mars is no different than here. Jail, drunks, fights, people are people wherever you go. That's why they've got a Sheriff."

IT IS A BLESSING ON ME A pale eyed horseman rode up to a man swinging an ax. He'd split through a whole pile of saw-wood, all but this final chunk: the Sheriff watched as this lean, muscled fellow swung his ax in a tight, swift arc, cleaving the saw-chunk into halves. Another dozen strokes and it was reduced to stovewood and kindling. "Pardon me, friend," the Sheriff called, and the young man -- lean and browned with weather and with work, the kind of a man who will wear himself out tending his homestead -- looked up at an older man with an iron-grey mustache. "Howdy," he greeted back. "This is yours," the Sheriff said, leaning down and handing the man a small poke. "What's this?" "It's a blessing." The Sheriff's expression never changed, but the younger man's did: he gave the lawman a distinctly suspicious look. "A blessing. On who?" he challenged. Linn leaned down in the saddle, looked very directly at the man. "This is a blessing on me," he said quietly. "Take this from a man who knows what it is to bury a wife." The younger man felt his stomach shrivel at the man's quiet words: the lawman had only just turned his shining red stallion than the younger man dropped his ax and ran, ran for his house, ran with all the screaming fear of a man who'd just heard a pronouncement of death. His wife looked up, surprised, as the latch slammed open, as the door swung wide, as her husband stumbled at the threshold, went face-first onto the floor, the cloth poke flying from his trauma-shocked grip. It skidded across the swept-clean floor, came to rest a foot from the wife's shoe: the excitement loosened the string holding it shut, and a single gold ring barely wobbled out the puckered cloth neck, fell over, gleaming and gold on the smooth plank floor. The wife picked up the ring, the poke, placed both on the table: her husband came to his knees, his feet, came across the room, seized his wife in a crushing embrace, burying his face in her hair. "Charles," she laughed, "what is this?" -- and he thrust her away, held her at arm's length: only then did she realize the fear in her husband's expression. "Charles?" "That man -- a stranger," he stammered. His wife tilted her head, blinking: "You mean that man on a red stallion?" "Him, yes, him, he said, he gave me that, he said --" "Charles." His wife laid a gentle hand on his stubbled cheek. "Charles, sit down, please." Her husband, shaking as adrenaline screamed with unused frustration through his body, sat, placed an elbow on the clean tablecloth, leaned his head over on his knuckles, staring at his wife. They were young, and they were but newly wed; neither one had two shekels to rub together, but they had all the strength of youth, all the good intentions of someone just starting their life together. Charles looked at the cloth poke, at the gold ring beside it. "I could never afford a ring," he said quietly. "That man ... did he give you this, Charles?" Her husband nodded. "He asked for a drink of water. I drew from the well and he thanked me for my kindness. I drew another and watered his horse. I invited him in for a meal and he laughed and said if he didn't get home to his wife's supper, she would address him with a frying pan, and then he looked at my hand." "Your hand?" He said his wife wore the same kind of ring, back East." Charles looked away, shame reddening his ears. "Charles, do you remember giving me the thimble?" He looked back, nodded. "I think that was the very nicest thimble I've ever had. I cut off the end and I wear the base as my ring." "I always wanted to get you a proper wedding ring." She looked at the poke, undid the string completely, dumped it out. A small handful of silver coin, a half dozen gold, a note, folded. They stared, open mouthed, at this sudden wealth, more money than either had seen for ... well, more money than either had ever seen piled up at one time. They stared, they closed their mouths, they looked at one another. Charles reached slowly for the note. My wife cut off the thimble I gave her, Charles read, and declared that as her wedding ring. To my shame I never got her a proper wedding ring. It is a blessing on me if you would give your wife a proper ring. He looked up at his wife, looked down at the note again. "What does it say, Charles?" He read it aloud, read it slowly, thoughtfully. "He asked me to take this," Charles said. "I didn't hear him when you drew his water. I was splitting wood ... all I knew was he was there and he gave me this poke and said for me to take it, it was a blessing from him ... he said take this from a man who knows what it was to bury a wife." Sheriff Willamina Keller read the hand written note. She regarded the silver ring on the desk blotter before her. It was thin, it was worn, it was scratched, as a ring will be when it's worn for a woman's lifetime: it was a little irregular along one edge, and she recognized it for what it had been, for she'd read of such before. The librarian tilted her head, studied the artifact. Willamina smiled a little, nodded. "Another donation for the Museum," she smiled. "This is the ring handed down through a family, and they wanted to donate it before it wore through and broke and was lost or thrown away." "Oh, how nice! Have you the provenance?" Willamina laughed. "I have," she said, "and I'll get more. I know the donor, she's a friend of mine. We'll sit down and have coffee and I'll get the begats clear back to who wore this first." Willamina picked it up, looked at it thoughtfully. "Back when ... a woman was given a thimble by her betrothed. A paper of pins or a thimble was no cheap investment in those days. A woman would cut the base off the thimble and wear it as her wedding ring. That's what this is." Willamina read the note that accompanied the donated ring, smiled. "The donor asks us to display this in our museum," she said softly, then read from the letter itself: " 'It is a blessing on me.' "

YOU GOT A PERMIT FOR THOSE? It was not a mark of disrespect to the firehouse cook when a sweet roll was launched on a nearly level trajectory, fired at an admirable velocity, as it bounced off the forehead of one of the Irish Brigade: laughter filled the firehouse, the Captain's face was a remarkable shade of red, and the Captain picked up another sweet roll, tore it open and scowled as he laid a good troweling of butter on its torn open lower half. Linn was there when it happened. He'd heard about the seminal event and, being a curious man, wished to find out the particulars for himself. Firelands is not a large place, small town gossip runs as swift here as anywhere, and the Captain found himself being visually assessed by a surprising percentage of the female population -- which kept his ears so red it's a wonder they didn't set fire to his close-trimmed, grey-shot hair. Linn caught up with the Captain as they emerged from the ambulance entrance behind their hospital: Crane and his daughter wheeled the freshly-wiped-down, newly-linen-changed cot out the automatic double doors, lowered it, hoisted it easily into the back of the waiting squad. Linn walked his Apple-horse around the front of the squad, waited by the driver's door: Crane walked up to the man, shaded his eyes as he looked up at the silent horseman in a uniform-tan Stetson and an iron-grey mustache. "All right, Pale Eyes, say it!" he challenged. "Everyone else has!" Linn's jaw eased out, he nodded, then he leaned his head back, considered the structure of the clouds over the near peaks, looked back. "You got any coffee ain't been drunk yet?" he drawled. Captain Crane frowned, one hand on the open door's window channel: "Coffee!" he exclaimed. "You're headed for station," Linn said. "Meet you there." The Captain climbed into the ambulance cab, shaking his head and muttering something about damned old lawmen and why doesn't he just say it and I know he's going to, and then he looked at his daughter, who was giving him the same wise and patient look his wife used to give him in such moments. Shelly reached over, rubbed her Daddy's shoulder and said in a soothing voice, "Now, Daddy," and the Captain laughed and reached for the mic. "Firelands Squad One enroute fuel-up, available." The Captain's ears burned a hotter red as he stomped out of the All-Night. He usually grabbed a coffee while he was in there. This time he didn't. Behind him, the clerk was looking at him the way a woman will when she's assessing a man anew, when she's sizing up a potential partner, when she knows she's looked at this fellow half a thousand times at least but only now is she really looking at him. The clerk wasn't the only one regarding the man in such a way, but she was the most recent. The Captain's expression as he pumped Diesel into the squad's rear tank was honestly suspicious: he looked at every girl and at every woman with the same trepidation, the same expectancy: he hung up the nozzle, capped the tank, stepped out behind the squad and got the clerk's go-ahead wave, then he returned to the squad's cab, wrote down mileage and gallons, and marked back on the air and enroute station. Silence not uncommonly filled the squad's cab; if nothing needed said, often nothing was said; there were no pressing matters to be discussed, though the Captain did catch his daughter looking at him with amusement, which only increased his red-eared scowl -- to the point that, as they swung the rig around to back into the bay, Shelly observed quietly that she's surprised his glare didn't burn a hole through the windshield. The Sheriff was just drawing a big mug of coffee when Crane stomped into the spacious, spotless, firehouse kitchen. Linn handed the man the mug, drew one for Shelly, then for himself: they sat at the end of the long table, the ever present bowl of sweet rolls between them -- Linn at the end, Crane to his left, his wife to his right. Milk was passed from hand to hand, a pale sacrament to bless the scalding coffee. The German Irishman grinned, slid his cell phone from a shirt pocket, tapped and swiped at his screen, approached the lawman at the end of the table. The Sheriff slurped his coffee noisily, carefully, for he'd filled it a little too full and he didn't want to spill: he raised his head, set down the mug, dashed tan droplets from the curve of his handlebar, reached for a sweet roll. "You might want to look at this," the German Irishman said quietly, holding his phone in front off the Sheriff. "Oh thanks a hell of a lot," Crane groaned, running frustrated fingers through his hair. The Sheriff watched: it was a cell phone video, surprisingly steady, shot from the rear corner of the squad at the ER entrance: a little girl, maybe second grade, was standing beside the squad, regarding the shining, polished, Omaha-orange-and-white rig with the awe-struck expression of an admiring little child. He watched as the Captain came up beside and behind the little girl, as she turned to him with even wider eyes and asked shyly, "Are you a pa-wa-med-dic?" The Captain squatted, nodded and said gently, "Yes, darlin' I am." "Ooo," she breathed, then she gripped his upper arm wonderingly, looked at him with delight and innocence as she felt hard muscle beneath the uniform shirtsleeve and declared in a happy, second-grader's, little-girl's voice, "Wow! Nice guns!" Captain Crane's ears reached a truly astonishing shade of scarlet as he reached for a sweet roll. He and the Sheriff looked up as a voice shouted "Hey Cap! You got a permit for those guns?" It was not a mark of disrespect to the firehouse cook that the Captain, instead of eating the sweet roll, stood and fired it on a near-level trajectory and bounced it very precisely off the Welsh Irishman's forehead.

COFFEE Marnie Keller knew her mountains intimately. She grew up riding the family saddlestock bitless; her mule was a steady, reliable, unimaginative creature, given to a plodding gait that seemed to indicate the beast was about to fall asleep in mid-step. So far it never had, but there's a first time for everything: when Marnie leaned back in the saddle, the mule stopped, head hanging, looking like it was ready to collapse. It didn't do that, either. Marnie dismounted, patted the long eared creature's neck, pulled her Winchester from its carved scabbard: a quick peek and cartridge brass peeked back at her from the partly-opened action. Marnie had a day off and she wished to be alone. Marnie was young and Marnie was pretty and Marnie was at war with herself: she knew the chemical changes were to blame, womanly hormones that disturbed her normally disciplined, rational, reasonable train of thought: her most recent anomaly involved stopping at a truck stop. She never stopped at truck stops. After dark. She never stopped anywhere after dark. Alone. She never stopped at such places, alone. Never. She'd gone inside. A pretty young woman in a tailored suit dress and heels. Alone. When a man with engineer boots on his feet, calluses on his palm and grease stains on his work trousers challenged her to dance, she'd done something else she'd never done before. Against her training, against sound advice, against her own good sense, she took him around the middle and declared "Cut a rug!" and she ended up not only dancing with most of the men there, but singing, on stage, with a band she'd never seen before, and she'd sung very well. Very well indeed. Marnie made a clean breast of the evening's activities to her father, who'd waited up for her; he did not mention it the next day, and neither did she, and Marnie took the time to saddle up Muley and head for the mountain. She wanted to think. She wanted to sort out her life. Things were happening with a shocking speed: she was an Academy graduate, she had her own car, she was commissioned a deputy sheriff, she was discussing marriage with John Greenlees, who was a prodigy in his own right -- and because of their mutual academic achievements and probably some bureaucratic screw-up, they were both being sized up for the Mars launch. Marnie shook her head, found a likely rock to set on: the mule was grazing in a desultory fashion, looking for all the world like it might fall asleep in mid-bite. It didn't. Marnie closed her eyes, tilted her head back, felt sun on her face, willed her young body to relax. She wished to be alone, to think. Some good distance away, a trucker waited beside his rig: the driver's front tire blew a sidewall and he'd had the Devil's own time keeping his tractor-trailer under control until he could fight to the shoulder, stop without catastrophe: somehow he managed -- how, he had no idea, other than his Guardian Angel probably recruited the same legion that picked up and packed around those great foundation stones that ended up as Solomon's Temple. He'd managed to get a signal, he'd called for the service truck, he waited, and while he waited, he remembered, and when he remembered, why, he recalled a pretty young woman he'd danced with at the truck stop not long ago, a good looking gal with really nice legs who climbed up on a chair, then a table, then the stage, she'd grabbed the microphone like she owned the place and she'd sung better than he'd heard a woman sing in a very long time. He'd no idea who she was -- later that night, he heard the band discussing her and nobody knew who she was, just that when the regular singer got there, she disappeared -- he smiled, for she'd looked at him from the stage as if he was the only one there, as if she were singing for him alone. A horseshoe, another, with the weight of a horse above them: he blinked, realizing he must've drowsed, warmed by his truck's radiator, lulled by the quiet rumble of the idling Diesel engine: he'd slouched back against the radiator, his backside on the front bumper. He blinked, grinned: "Well, fancy meetin' you here!" A pair of smiling, pale eyes regarded him saucily from the back of a truly huge, absolutely black horse with feathered hooves. "Have we been properly introduced?" she asked with a smile -- a smile that made him want to rip the beating heart from his chest and lay it at her feet. "I heard you sing," he said, "and we danced -- back at the truck stop the other night." The pale eyed woman laughed, her head back a little: silhouetted against snowy mountains behind her, she was absolutely an image he wished he had on film, so he could frame it and have it forever. "I do sing," she admitted, "and I'm told I'm pretty good." She saw disappointment on his face as something loud, raucous, commanding seized his attention: he leaned forward, walked to the driver's front corner, looked. "Well, here comes my repair," he said, turned -- Gone. Later that day, at the All-Night, a trucker pulled in to get rid of some secondhand coffee and load up with some hot and fresh. Air brakes hissed, dust rolled ahead of the truck as it came to a stop in the long dirt strip dedicated to trucks stopping there: he rolled his crackerbox up nose-to-tail with the square tail of a local delivery truck, set the air, climbed out: not long after, considerably relieved, he returned, climbed back in. Instead of slugging down some liquid ambition, he set the coffee in its holder and rolled up the window, locked the door, crossed his wrists over the steering wheel and laid his forehead against the back of his arms for a catnap. This worked really well until a passing truck, for some unknown but definitely perverse reason, laid on the air horns as he went past. His head snapped up, his windshield was filled with the back end of a delivery truck, he reacted by sheer reflex: He mashed his hind hoof hard on the air valve, stiff-armed the steering wheel and froze, teeth bared, eyes wide, afraid to move, absolutely certain he was about to ram another rig and not one damned thing he could do about it. White-knuckled, jaw-clenched, he waited an eternity, and absolutely ... nothing ... happened. He saw movement to his left, looked down. A pretty young woman in jeans and a denim coat, a young woman riding a tired-looking mule, tilted her Stetson back, looked up at him. He rolled his window down, absently noting that his hand was shaking. "You okay in there?" she called. "I heard you set the air." He looked forward, woke up a little more, rubbed his face, nodded: he shook his head, looked back down at her, and as more brain cells woke up and began firing in some kind of reasonable order, he realized -- "Didn't I just see you --" he began, pointing back the way he'd come. She looked at him with big and innocent eyes, and his stomach contracted a little as he realized she had those same pale eyes he remembered. "You -- she -- was on a big black horse --" He saw the young woman's face change: she ran two fingers into a coat pocket, came up with a cell phone: a few taps, two swipes, she walked her mule up to the truck's door, sidled it up close -- "Was this her?" she asked, holding up the phone. He looked, nodded: there was no mistaking the old-fashioned, rich-royal-blue riding dress and matching hat, the lace-cuffed gloves, but it was her expression that caught his eye, the look of a woman who could have any man she pleased, a woman who had her eye on him. "That's her," he nodded. "That's the woman I was talking to. She sang at the truck stop and we danced --" Marnie looked at him, raised an eyebrow, slid the phone back into its pocket. "The mountains," she said, "are haunted." She looked at him, raised an eyebrow. "That is the formal portrait of my several times great grandmother." "I, but, she --" He blinked, shook his head. "I really need this coffee!"

PULLING A SNEAKY PETE Jacob Keller pressed his back to the rough-cut siding boards. His breathing was quicker now, his eyes pale, he had that devil-may-care grin on his face Sarah had seen on her pale eyed Papa's face, and she knew -- in spite of possibly getting caught -- that Jacob was enjoying the hell out of himself. Sarah's expression was just as delighted, and for the same reason. Their orders were to make the delivery unseen, to get away undetected: this would not be easy, but they came prepared. Sarah slipped to the corner of the building, weighed a bread-covered meatball in her hand, gauged the distance: she brought her arm back, threw -- she didn't throw awkwardly, like a girl, she threw with the assured boylike snap that spoke of long practice heaving rocks at a mark. Jacob, too, weighed a meatball: he stepped out beside her, pale eyes on the second dog: as the first sniffed at the offering and the second came over, Jacob's arm whipped down and a second edible bribe whistled in on a fast, low arc. Two dogs sniffed, snapped, gobbled the offering, licked their chops, looking hopefully toward the unkonwn origin. Jacob and Sarah listened, readied another baked meatball bribe, picked up a basket with their other hand. Quickly, silently, each one ran on the balls of their feet, pausing only to flip another hush-puppy to the ranch dogs: they came up against the house, pressed their backs to the dusty clapboards, paused for a breath: Jacob peeked around the corner, gestured. The pair took a half-dozen quick steps, set their baskets down in front of the front door, silently, carefully: Sarah handed Jacob the rickrack, he set its notched edge against the door, wrapped the tag end of the string around his finger, pulled hard. They ran. A rickrack is a wooden sewing thread spool, notched along one rim; a nail is run through its middle and serves as a handle, stout cord is wrapped around it, the rickrack is placed against a closed door, the string is pulled and the sharp, startling RRRRACK! is guaranteed to surprise anyone inside. They made it to their first concealment before the door opened. Twenty yards away, another set of young eyes, peering through concealing brush, saw the door open, saw a woman's hands go to her mouth, saw her turn and look behind her, then look out into the gathering dark, trying to see who might've left these ribbon-tied baskets of baked goods, canned goods -- probably the same soul that left a sack of flour the day before. Three pale eyed Keller young slipped silently away, keeping hidden, moving silent, with all the stealth that pale eyed Papa and that feather-footed Charlie Macneil imparted them: when they were most of a mile away, they converged, mounted, turned toward home. Three children rode wordlessly through the gathering dark, moving easily with their horses, completely at home in the saddle: Sarah's divided skirt allowed her to ride astride -- her preference, she'd tried sidesaddle once and disliked it intensely -- they presented themselves at the Sheriff's office, two pale eyed boys in undistinguished dun-colored clothes and vests and hats, and a pale eyed girl in a dress of a similar hue. Sheriff Linn Keller rose as they came into the little log fortress, as they waited his good pleasure with the impatient patience of well mannered young. Linn looked from the youngest, who was trying to look solemn and unemotional, to Jacob, who was trying hard to look innocent and casual, then to Sarah, who had the same I-ate-a-canary-with-butter-and-honey expression on her face he'd seen on Bonnie's face when he caught her looking at him in an unguarded moment. Linn stood at an easy parade-rest, nodded to the youngest of his operatives-in-training. "Report." "I was the lookout," he said confidently, "and I watched over the entire area. When it was good" -- he raised a bladed hand, turned it, lowered it -- "I gave the go-ahead." Linn nodded, shifted his gaze to Sarah. "We moved into position," she said quietly, "as we'd planned. You were right about scouting ahead of time and it did help to draw the diagram. Jacob was right when he suggested baked meatballs to keep the dogs quiet." Jacob grinned, his ears reddening a little as his pale eyed Pa looked at him, nodded. "Once we hushed the puppies," he said, trying to stifle his grin and almost succeeding, "we moved in as planned. We set the baskets on the porch, Sarah pulled back and when she was halfway to cover point, I rickracked the door." "And?" Jacob's grin could not have been repressed if he'd covered his face with plaster bandages. "I run like a scared thief, sir, and I run fast!" "Were you seen?" "No, sir." "Sarah?" "We were not seen," she said confidently. Linn looked back to the youngest. "And?" "And we split up and met up as we'd planned." Linn nodded. "I'm hearing scouting and I'm hearing planning. Did your scout and your planning do you any good?" "Yes, sir," the three chorused: the two boys looked at Sarah, who lifted her chin and elaborated. "Scouting gave us to understand the dogs were vigilant, but could be bribed. Scouting ahead of time gave us layout, terrain, places to avoid, it let us know what kind of ground we'd have to cross and how noisy it would be to cross to the house." Linn nodded. "Sir?" Linn nodded again. "Sir, we've helped the widow out before, but we've just rode up and give her supplies." "We have." "Why did we do this sneaky?" Linn's eyes tightened a little at the corners. "Tell me about the baskets." "They had baked goods and canned goods, sir," came the thoughtful reply, "and sewing notions and a few trinkets." "What about the baskets themselves?" "They were lined with --" Jacob blinked, surprise widening his eyes. "Cloth, sir. Print cloth and too much to just line the basket." He blinked, delight widening his grin. "She received cloth, sir." "Ribbons on the handles," the youngest added. "Ribbons, and lots of 'em." Linn relaxed a little, sat on the corner of his desk: Sarah's eyes were concerned, as she knew her pale eyed Papa's back gave him hell if he stood still too long. "So ... pretty print cloth, lots of ribbons, trinkets and foo-far-raws ...?" He saw the light of recognition in the eyes of the assembled Keller young. "We watch out for the widow as a regular thing. We'll not change that. This was extra. Why was it sneaky?" "Let not thy right hand know what thy left hand doeth," came the chorused reply. Linn nodded. "And the season." "Sir?" "She doesn't have two cents to rub together. This way she'll have some extra to give as gifts." Sarah frowned, tilted her head a little, regarded her pale eyed Papa with interest. "Sarah?" "There is ... something else," she said slowly, looking at Jacob, then back to her Papa. "Why the stealth?" "Did you like it?" Three children grinned with the open honesty of the young. "Yes, sir. It was fun to be sneaky and not get caught!" "Yes it is." Linn looked from one set of eyes to the next, to the next. "Unless I miss my guess, you will each have need of that skill. The best way to teach it is to do it, and the best way to do it is to make it fun!" He straightened, stood, reached for his Stetson. "You have done good work, square work, which I have orders to receive." He looked approvingly at the three. "I believe Daisy has some good frash pie that ain't been et yet." Esther met them in the Silver Jewel -- somehow none of the Keller young were surprised that their Papa engineered this whole thing -- and on this night, a father who wished to teach useful skills to his young, taught them more than they'd realized: not only the value of planning and of stealth, but that of charity, and as they seated themselves in the back room of the Silver Jewel, they watched their pale eyed Papa draw out the chair for Esther, and watched him treat her like a queen. This did cause some difficulties later in their lives -- children learn more by observation and imitation than by didactic instruction, and Linn taught with the living example of his very life -- the young men he sired, grew up looking for a woman who was completely a Lady like their Mama, a woman of culture and intelligence, with a spine of laminated whalebone and seasoned white oak, and the daughters of their line grew up looking for a husband who would demonstrate every gentlemanly, and every manly, virtue they saw in their lean waisted, pale eyed Papa. But these are troubles that did not come their way until they were well more mature, and that is a story for a later time: let us leave this family to their meal, and to their delight at having pulled off a very successful, a very effective, Sneaky Pete.

YOU'VE EARNED IT "You look like hell." Marnie looked up at the waitress, smiled a little as she accepted the coffee. "Yeah, God loves you too." They were the same age, they'd gone to school together; one wore a deputy's uniform, the other, a waitress uniform: both of them sighed quietly, planted an elbow on the table, leaned forehead on palm and groaned. Marnie raised her head -- she could never relax her vigilance more than three-quarters of a second without getting reeeally uncomfortable -- pale eyes swept the inside of the little glass-and-chrome drugstore and malt shop. "How's your Mama?" "Dying," came the mumbled reply. Marnie frowned, tilted her head a little as she regarded her old school chum. "Kelly, did you get any sleep at all last night?" "No." "Your caregiver --?" "Sick. Her kids brought the Wichita Awful-Awfuls home from school with them, and now the whole family is sick." "Uh-oh," Willamina grunted sympathetically. "Uh-oh yeah. I'm okay, just tired." "No sleep and you came on in to work. Who's watching your family?" "Cousin Nellie came in, bless her. She and her daughter, that way they won't carry the crud to Mama. Fragile as she is, a head cold would kill her." Marnie nodded, not really knowing what to say. "HEY!" -- Marnie's pale eyes swung like gun turrets to the source of the harsh, petulant voice -- "WHAT'S A GUY GOTTA DO TO GET SOME COFFEE AROUND HERE!" Kelly saw Marnie's eyes go suddenly pale. Marnie stood, picked up her coffee, walked over to the man's table: he and two others sat, and Marnie's expression anchored the other two in their seats. They both knew this pale eyed daughter of the pale eyed Sheriff, they both knew her pale eyed grandmother. They both saw the twinlike resemblance of this female deputy to the pale eyed Sheriff they knew and saw in action before. They'd both seen Willamina just plainly clean house in a barfight, and they both knew they didn't want anything to do with the wrong side of the Sheriff's displeasure, and their gut told them they really, really didn't want to discover this particular deputy's temper. Their companion, unfortunately, was not quite as intelligent. Marnie put her coffee down in front of the scowling fellow, laid a hand on his shoulder. "Here. Have mine. Haven't tasted it yet. Can I get you anything else?" He jerked his hand from under her hand, snarled "Bacon and eggs," and something like a fist hit him just below that little notch where his collar bones almost met, right at the top of his wishbone. Marnie's hand closed a good handful of work shirt into a white-knuckled fist and twisted. She'd hit him left-handed and she'd hit him hard enough to rock him back just a little, and her face was white and tight-stretched over her cheekbones as she twisted her fist and straightened, bending her left arm and hauling him easily out of his seat. It was all the more remarkable that he was a big man and Marnie ... wasn't. "Let me know when you get tired," she hissed: her eyes were wide, dead white, expressionless as the polished marble orbs of a Grecian statue. "That waitress," she said quietly, "is running on zero sleep. None. Her Mama is dying of cancer, her whole family is sick, she's been up all night keeping everyone else cleaned up and alive and she still came in here to work, probably she needed the break. You finish your coffee and you keep a civil tongue in your head or I will throw you out that front door and you won't hit the street until you cross the center line!" Marnie turned her head, glared at the slack-jawed soda jerk staring from behind the counter. "Three orders of bacon and eggs," she said quietly, and in the shocked silence, her quiet words were clearly heard: she turned her gun turret expression back to the fellow whose feet were about an inch off the floor. "I'm going to set you down now. You might drink your coffee before it gets cold." Sheriff's Deputy Marnie Keller, daughter of the famous and short-tempered Willamina Keller, lowered the man slowly back into his 1950s-era tin soda shack seat: she went back to her table, gave the room one final, cold-eyed sweep, sat. Kelly was gone; Marnie's attention had been on the fellow she'd just hoist off the floor, and she was considering that she'd likely be sore for her effort, but she regretted it not. Her Daddy taught by example, and from him she'd learned good manners, and her Gammaw taught her in the same wise ... only Marnie learned a different lesson from her Gammaw. She'd never seen her Daddy haul a man off his feet like that. She'd seen her Gammaw do just that. Kelly came out less than a minute later with three orders of bacon and eggs, and coffee for the other two. They ate quickly, uncomfortably, shooting glances at the pale eyed deputy who sat, silent, unmoving, watchful: when the waitress brought their checks, they looked at the slips, looked at the deputy, looked at one another. Kelly bussed their table, wiped it down, came back out, collapsed across the little table from Marnie. "It was almost worth it," she mumbled tiredly. "What's that?" "When they read PAID IN FULL on their bills." Marnie smiled, just a little. "Wanted to show them I'm not entirely a hardcase." Kelly looked up as another girl in a waitress uniform came through the door. "Looks like your relief just arrived," Marnie smiled. "Go home, get some rest, you've earned it!"

GUILTY PLEASURE Marnie Keller was usually up before the sun was. By now, she usually had her morning ablutions tended, she was fully dressed and in the kitchen, getting ready to fix breakfast; she was usually in what her brother Jacob called her "White Tornado Mode," but this morning ... She wasn't. Marnie Keller, the pale eyed daughter of the pale eyed Sheriff and his paramedic wife, lay relaxed, warm, safe in her own bed, the reassuring warmth and weight of a certain black, curly-furred dog cuddled up against her backside: Marnie slept on her side, her legs bent a little, and she smiled in her sleep as The Bear Killer dreamed, as his paws pushed on the soles of Marnie's feet. THUMP-thumpthump-THUMP THUMP-thump- Marnie swam through the layers of her dream, giggling like a little girl at the prospect of The Bear Killer dreaming in Morse code: she imagined describing the canine cadence to brother Jacob and asking his translation, and as she surfaced from the dream and opened her eyes, she smiled as she thought Jacob would likely tell her it translated to "Eat at Joe's." Jacob was like that with his big sis. Marnie smelled bacon frying, she smelled fresh brewed coffee, she fancied she smelled waffles, her Daddy's specialty, and she sighed, opening her eyes and stretching: her Daddy meant well, Marnie knew, but he wasn't as efficient in the kitchen as she was, and his cleanup would take significantly longer, but it would get done. Breakfast smelled so very good, and Marnie was hungry, but the bunk felt so good, and Marnie indulged herself so seldom in such matters: she smiled and cuddled deeper into her covers, with the warmth and weight of a certain canine against her entire backside adding to her overall comfort. Marnie and The Bear Killer each gave a long, relaxed, most sincere sigh of contentment. They can be forgiven this one guilty pleasure.

FIRST TIME FOR THE RICHTER SCALE Linn was waiting at the kitchen table when Marnie came through the door. Marnie came in, hung her coat on the hall tree and walked directly over to her father. It was late -- very late -- they both looked at the kitchen clock, looked at one another. "Are you okay?" Linn asked in a gentle voice. Marnie nodded, her expression unreadable, and not for the first time, Linn damned his inability to crystal-ball the opposite sex: he could read most men like the weekly newspaper, but women, by his own admission, could pull the hood wink over his eyes faster and more easily than any man. "Is there anything I should worry about?" he pressed. Marnie pulled out a chair, sat: she wore a tailored blue suit dress, intentionally duplicating her Gammaw's favored business attire; she wore heels, just like her Gammaw, and was Linn not her blood father, he'd have sworn this was a young Willamina Keller, so remarkable was the resemblance between the two. "Daddy," Marnie said, "there is a first for everything, and tonight was a night of firsts." Linn's left eyebrow raised and Marnie laughed a little. "Not that, Daddy. My virtue remains intact, I didn't kill anyone and nobody did anything rude, crude or socially unacceptable to me." She tilted her head a little, regarded her father confidently. "As a matter of fact, I may have found an alternative career choice." "Oh?" Linn regarded his little girl with the critical eye of a man who's been lied to by the best, and who was not about to let one of his own try to lie out of a situation. "Daddy, I danced with at least fifty truckers, I sang in a honky tonk band and called a square dance in a truck stop lounge." Sheriff Linn Keller was grateful, in that moment, that he was seated, that all four legs of his chair were on the ground, and that his jaw bone was bolted in place at the hinge, elsewise he might've gone through the floor with his chin down to about belt buckle level. An attractive young woman finished fueling her Jeep, screwed the cap back on, inserted the key and turned it: she gave the cap a tentative twist, felt it freewheel: no one would siphon her tank without working for it. She looked across the lot at the gaudy, neon-signed truck stop: the heavy glass double doors opened, music came out, and Marnie smiled a little. She'd never been inside this truck stop, and she was curious. Her business in the city was concluded, she was on her way home ... she'd filled the Jeep's belly and it was time to put some coffee in hers, and so she drove the Jeep to a well lighted parking spot, got out and locked it, looked around, then walked confidently inside. There was a live band, and they were playing; Marnie ordered a coffee, smiled as two men gave her an appreciative looking-over, paid for her coffee and, drawn by some pretty good guitar work, went into the lounge. She sipped her coffee, eyes busy; a broad shouldered fellow with a day's stubble looked at her and grinned: "Darlin', how about a dance?" he declared, and Marnie set her coffee down, ran her arm around his middle and took his other hand: "Hello, handsome, let's cut a rug!" It's been said in the American West that the most common looking individual might be college educated, or noble-born, and so it was here in the great homogeny of a truck stop lounge: a man in a work uniform shirt and mismatched trousers, danced with the ease and expertise of an exhibition dancer: the pair worked their way to the middle of the floor, where Marnie was handed off to another fellow who blushed bashfully but danced passably, and then to another one yet: Marnie laughed with delight, rejoicing in her anonymity, moving with each partner as if she'd danced with him for years, anticipating her partner's next move: she spun, she twirled, she spun out to arm's length like a top, whirled back: she lost count of the number of men who sought her partnership, until one of them mentioned what a shame it was that the lead singer wasn't with the band tonight. Marnie whirled free of the speaker's arms, skipped across the floor, up onto a chair and then a table and onto the stage: men's eyes followed her as she leaned close to the lead guitarist's ear: they saw the musician look at this good looking young woman with the really good legs, look at her with some surprise, then nod, and Marnie spun again, her skirt flaring, and she grabbed the microphone stand like she was laying hands on a dance partner, turned to look at the guitarist, nodded. The band finished their instrumental set, moved closer to the lead guitarist: a quick conference, the drummer tapped a one-two-three-four on the edge of his snare, the sharp wood-on-wood carrying well, setting the cadence. A pale eyed young woman in a tailored suit dress and heels took a deep diaphragmatic breath and did something she'd wanted to do for a very long time, a hidden, secret desire she'd kept from everyone, a deliciously wicked wish that very likely would absolutely scandalize everyone she knew. Marnie Keller, threw her head back, stage lights shining from her eyes, and an absolutely flawless, note-perfect "It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels" came from her throat, and filled the lounge. Marnie laughed with delight at the applause, took a step back and to the side, indicated the band with a grand wave of her arm: "Let's Hear It for the Band!" she shouted, clapping, and the applause, the whistles, rose accordingly. Another quick conference, another four-count from the drummer: more soulful country music, written by women who'd grown up in the Appalachian mountains, filled the lounge and filled men's hearts: the band moved smoothly into another, a bouncy "Rockiy Top" that had Marnie dancing as she sang, microphone drawn free from the stand, its black cord snapping like a horsewhip from her other hand, and about the fourth song, Marnie held up her hand, her face shining, motioned for quiet. "Now fellas," she said, "I have a secret and you've earned the right to know." She smiled, and it felt to every man there as if she smiled for him alone: her pale eyes swung from one side of the room to the other, penetrating to the furthest wall and everyone there. "I've never sung in public before." There was laughter, there were cries of "Nooo," and Marnie nodded, eyes wide and innocent. "It's true," she said. "I've always been afraid of singing in public. I've sung in church and I always sang low enough and kind of under everyone else's voices so they'd not know what I really sounded like, but I've always wanted to try it." She smiled again and her face just plainly lit up when she did. A voice from the audience called, "Can you call a square dance?" and Marnie turned to the lead guitarist: the band converged for a quick conference, then dispersed again and Marnie shaded her eyes, looked out into the crowd. "If you have enough girls to make a square, I'll call you one," she said, and immediately tables were seized, shoved back: men and women paired off, some were square dancers and some weren't but all were willing -- if this girl never sang in public before, and she was note-perfect on stage, by God! they could try square dancing to her! "Little Old Log Cabin in the Lane," Marnie announced, and skilled fingers on wound-steel strings drew the intro from guitars well older than they were: Marnie called the dance flawlessly, and at its end, she lowered the microphone, laughing: another dance, another song, and Marnie leaned her head quickly toward the guitarist, nodded. "Fellas," she said, raising a hand, "the regular singer just showed up, and the band is going to take a break, so while they're gone, I wanted to tell you something." She lowered the microphone, raised a hand to her lips, then lifted her head, shook her hair back. "My Mama," she said, "is spoiled." She smiled a little and continued, "My Daddy spoils her and makes no secret of it, he takes pride in spoilin' my Mama, only one night he doubled over on the livin' room couch and allowed as Mama ought to take him into the ER because his appendix was attackin' him. "She got him there and the doc looked him up and looked him down and said he was ugly and he needed to lose weight." She and the audience both laughed: she swung the microphone down at arm's length, brought it back up, pacing the length of the front of the stage. "Turns out my Daddy had a bowel blockage and they said they were shipping him out to a bigger hospital for emergency surgery. "My Mama stopped here, at this very truck stop, she was low on gas and she had to get home." Marnie's face was suddenly serious. "Mama came inside and tried to swipe her credit card to prepay her gas and the gal behind the counter -- you know the kind," Marnie smiled a little here -- "women that work an all night gas station are kind of hard around the eyes and they've got sergeant's stripes tattooed on their shoulder. You know the kind?" Laughter again, men's heads nodded, "Oh yeah!" from multiple throats. "She said 'Honey, that's a chip card, you'll have to plug it into the reader,' and my Mama started to cry. "They probably thought she was drunk of something, but she was just all in tears and she said she'd just watched her husband hauled off in an ambulance for emergency surgery, and she didn't know if he was going to live or not and she'd never used a chip card in her life and she didn't know what her pump number was and she had to get home and get some sleep because she had to work paramedic the next day, and that woman behind the counter -- real gentle-like -- took her card and plugged it in, and two men there watching her went outside with her and helped her because she was so upset she couldn't get her locking gas cap unlocked." Marnie paused, head bowed, chewing on her bottom lip: she raised her head and they could see wet running down both cheek bones. "Those two men were truck drivers. "Those two men who helped my Mama, and every man I danced with here tonight, were gentlemen in the finest sense of the word." Marnie raised her head, took a long breath: she wiped at one cheek, at the other, then she took a deep breath: with the band gone on break, she lifted her face into the lights, she opened her mouth, and she sang, alone, unaccompanied, a pretty young woman spotlighted on a stage. "Daddy," Marnie said, "I sang something I invented on that moment." She looked at her Daddy and she felt her heart spilling over her bottom lids again. "I sang it to 'Honky Tonk Angels,' only I said 'It was God who made truck drivin' angels,' and I invented the entire thing as I sang. "When I was done, there was just dead silence. "I finished with the last note and I stuck the microphone back in its holder, and I walked off the stage, and I went outside and got into my Jeep and came home." Marnie rose, and her Daddy rose with her. Linn took his little girl in his arms, held her gently, felt her shivering with the memory of the night. "Did they at least applaud your solo?" he asked, and he felt Marnie laugh, felt her draw back so she could look up at him, her face wet and shining with feelings she did her best to keep hidden most days. "Daddy," she laughed, "their applause registered a two point five on the Richter!"

ONE LAST BATTLE Chief of Police Will Keller waited uncomfortably, leaned back against the depot wall, trying to turn invisible. He knew she was coming, that she would be there: the train would be on time and she would be as well, wishing she could be early -- the wish of someone facing something very unpleasant, and anxious to just get it over with. She'd show up alone, she'd sit alone, waiting: Will didn't find this out about it until very recently, until he found out this would be the last time she'd be making this run. He heard the taxi come up behind the depot, heard it stop: a pause, a door slammed, the taxi pulled away, and he heard her coming up the steps at the end of the depot platform, the steps, his nephew and his grand-niece rebuilt of Eastern white oak. He straightened, turned. Mary Ann looked at him, smiled a little, the way a woman will when she looks so prematurely fragile. Will didn't say a word to her. He didn't have to. She came up to him and they ran their arms around each other and just stood there, grateful that neither one would be alone today. Will was a widower,; Mary Ann, a widow. He knew she'd received her cancer diagnosis the day of her husband's passing: she'd been taking the steam train to Denver for treatment. Today would be her last run in to Denver for treatment. She felt Will's long intake of breath, she looked up, she blinked as he chewed on his bottom lip as he looked at her with a surprisingly vulnerable expression. "I'm pretty damned proud of you, Mary Ann," he whispered -- she heard a catch in his sibiliants, as if he didn't trust even his careful whisper. "Why's that?" she whispered back. Will hugged her again, carefully, as if he was afraid he might crush her ribs with even the slightest embrace. "I know what chemo is like," he said softly, his cheek laid over on top of her head. "I know it feels like your joints are being pulled apart and you've got fire burning through your veins, and you've been doin' that ..." He felt her nod, felt her arms tighten a little around his ribs. "You've walked through hell itself, beating this." "Thank you for being here." The heard The Lady Esther whistle her greeting as she came around the far curve. Will didn't have to look to know she'd have shot a plume of pure-white steam into the clear, cold air, that her stack would be clean, that she'd have a pure-white exhaust, the mark of an efficient engineer: they stood and held one another until the train was stopped. "I wish we had some music," Will sighed. "Why's that?" "Mary Ann, I would admire to dance with you." "I'd like that." She took his arm and they walked to the end of the platform, down to ground level: they stopped at the bottom of the cast iron steps. She turned, hesitated. "Say it," Will said quietly. "I don't want to face this last treatment alone," she whispered. "I'm scared, Will." "I'll not leave you alone." "Thank you." She looked up at him, fear replaced with concern: "Can you just leave like that?" "It's my day off." She nodded, turned: she set one foot up on the ornate ironwork step, Will took her under the arms, gave her a hoist. A pale eyed lawman followed this fellow warrior into the private car he'd arranged. She would not face this one last fight alone.

PASS ME A BISCUIT The supper table was unusually quiet. Jacob, Joseph, Angela and Dana were watchful, silent: children have marvelous perceptions, and the pale eyed Keller young knew on some instinctive level that Something Happened. They didn't know quite what, only that it involved their big sister, that it was important, that their big strong Daddy and their quietly concerned Mama gave one another what a more mature mind might call "significant looks" -- but to these younger members of the family, it meant simply: Be silent, listen closely, and learn. Marnie sat, as she usually did, with a presence, a grace, as if life itself surrrounded her, gave her a perceptible field of some energy, some magic, some power; she ate in silence, and silence filled the kitchen as conversation was limited to passing the potatoes and thank you. Finally Linn looked diagonally across the ancient, solid kitchen table, his expression ... His expression was interested. "I understand your encounter went well." Marnie raised and eyebrow and lowered her fork. "The court expected neither maturity, nor a sketch artist," she replied, and she shifted her pale eyes to her younger brother. "Jacob, they were most pleased with your surveillance system." Jacob grinned, suddenly, that bright flash of boyish delight that first attracted Shelly's attention to her husband, those many years ago when they were schoolchildren: it was right after Linn seized a schoolyard bully and introduced him face first into the dirt, for which he was threatened with expulsion, at least until a newly installed surveillance camera showed the knife Linn kicked from the bully's hand, right before his much less than gentle takedown. "They liked your sketches," Linn prompted, lifting his coffee mug to try and hide the smile that threatened to broaden his face. "They did," Marnie affirmed. "They tried to claim the sketches were based on my looking at the defendant in the courtroom, until I pulled your little trick and accessed the courtroom's big screen. When it split screened a view from back window, side mirror, windshield and side view, the defense had nothing to stand on." "I thought you used your sketches," Jacob protested. Marnie smiled, just a little. "I did," she said. "I was able to show what it looked like from my perspective, I was able to draw as I narrated, I had a running show-and-tell. They'd never seen that before." "What did Defense say about your video?" "They objected, of course." Marnie frowned, considered her plate, looked up. "They tried to claim Prosecution withheld exculpatory video. Objection was overruled as prosecution offered the video, it held nothing exculpatory, and it served only to prove the defendant guilty." "What did happen, Marnie?" Jacob asked. "Nobody's ever told me." Marnie was quiet for several moments, then looked at her younger brother. "Jacob," she said, "do you remember how we practice getting out of a car and being attacked from behind?" Jacob nodded. "Do you remember how we practice being grabbed high or low and then reacting to that grab?" Jacob nodded again. "I parked my Jeep and looked around, looked into the mirrors and didn't see anything. "I opened the Jeep door and locked it, then I stepped out, looked around, turned to close the door." Jacob's face was serious as he focused on his big sister's face. "I don't know why they picked me. It wasn't a particularly bad part of town, all I wanted to do was meet a friend and have coffee, and this Jack Doe tried to grab me. He admitted later he was going to carjack both my Jeep and I, and he had worse plans for me than for the Jeep." Jacob's young face was serious: Linn saw his son's eyes going pale, saw his young jaw slide out, harden. "What did you do, Sis?" Jacob asked in a quiet voice, and Shelly's ear pulled back a little to hear it, for she'd heard that same warning tone in her husband's voice, just before he'd become very ... impressive ... with someone who richly deserved it. "He reached for the back of my neck," Marnie said frankly. "I turned and grabbed him just like we practiced. He was running and all I did was redirect his momentum." Linn nodded in silent approval; Shelly's hand tightened over his, her stomach fell several feet. All she'd known was that Marnie had to give testimony in a matter, following her driving into The City, to meet with a detective on a case that may have common elements with one in Firelands County. "The Jeep door was already closed and locked, I'd been attacked by one street rat and I didn't know how many more were there, so I drew my .357 and aimed it at the next guy's gut." Shelly's fingers curled and her nails dug into the back of Linn's hand: he laid his free hand on hers and she released suddenly, pulled her hand back. "What did he do?" "He twisted away from me and ran after the first guy." "What did the first guy do?" "He got to his feet, he turned and saw I had Uncle Will's gunmuzzle on him, so he turned and ran." She looked at her pale eyed Daddy. "I know you offered to come for the hearing," she said, "but you have a county to run, and I knew which lawyer to call." "That's my girl," Linn said, quiet approval in his voice. "Did they offer you the job?" "The court, or the police department?" Marnie smiled. "They both did, and so did a newspaper. It seems that when I started sketching, and warmed up by turning out pretty good lifelikes of the Judge and both legal counsels, the newspaper thought I might be a pretty good asset for covering major cases." "And ...?" Marnie smiled. "I still hate the city," she said frankly. "I'm staying here." "What about the hearing?" "With video and sketches and Gammaw's card?" Marnie smiled a little, looked at her plate, looked at Jacob. "With all that, Defense tried to swing a deal with Prosecution. I was excused and the detective I met up with said they pled guilty on all charges." Marnie looked at her Papa, clapped her hands gently together, held them out like Willie Mays ready to catch a pop fly: "Please pass me a biscuit!" Linn did exactly that. Linn picked up a biscuit, tossed it on a gentle arc across the table, and later that night, Marnie sidled up to him and turned a page in her sketch book: it showed the family around their supper table, Marnie's hands extended, Linn passing the biscuit like a quarterback throwing a football.

A PASSING STRANGER Jacob Keller looked at the stranger with an appraising eye. He had the watchfulness of a man who knew what it was to be in hostile territory. He also had the appearance of an injured man who was trying hard not to show it. The stranger drew up in front of the Sheriff's office and hesitated, and Jacob wondered for a moment whether he was going to dismount, or just topple over and fall to the ground. He dismounted. Jacob walked his Apple-horse across the dirt street and up beside the stranger's Morgan horse: the two men dismounted together, Jacob turning, watching the stranger's white-knuckled grip on his saddlehorn, before he released, bent over, hands on his knees, clearly not well. Jacob ducked around the hitch post, set one boot up on the board walk. The stranger was fast. He was also not a killer. Instead of drawing, he brought his hand back out from under his coat and nodded, coughed, spat. Bright red blood hit the ground when he did. "I'd hoped 'twas you," he half-said, half-wheezed. "You're all done in," Jacob said quietly. "How can I help?" The stranger took a couple breaths, as if to gather his strength, gripped the post and set his boot up on the board walk: it took an effort, but he got his other boot up as well, and with a stagger and a lurch, he made the Deacon's bench, collapsed. Jacob set down beside him. "I thought you was your Pa," the man almost whispered. "I been told that," Jacob nodded. Silence grew between the two of them. "I'm dyin'." "Kind of gathered that." "Your Pa." He coughed again, managed to haul out a stained kerchief, folded it to hide the bright red ejecta. "Your Pa was always square with me." "Yes, sir." "He always conducted himself," the stranger said, then had to stop for a breath or two -- "always polite." "Yes, sir." "I'm headed for," he said, stopped again for a couple breaths, "one of them sanitariums." "Yes, sir." "Might not make it." "Would you like me to ride along, sir?" "No." The stranger leaned back, threw his shoulders back, as if to allow his diseased lungs their greatest possible expansion. "Good of you to ask," he gasped. Jacob waited. "Wanted to tell your Pa," the stranger finally added, "thank you." "He'd ought be here noon or thereabouts," Jacob offered. "Might ye stay that long?" The stranger shook his head. "Got to go," he gasped. "Was I to wait" -- he had to stop and take another couple of breaths -- "might not ..." He stood, with an effort, teetered forward, caught the porch post to keep from falling over. Jacob rose when the stranger did, he watched as the stranger seemed to spend the last of his life's energies getting the few steps to his horse, watched as he gripped cantle and saddle horn, as he bounced twice and then rose to the hurricane deck more out of habit than anything else. It did not surprise him, a few hours later, when he received word that a man was found dead not far from Firelands, a man clutching a bloody kerchief, laying awkwardly beside the roadway, a good looking Morgan horse grazing nearby. It did not surprise Jacob that his father, listening to his son's quiet voiced report of this stranger and his conversation outside, rose and reached for his Stetson. Father and son stood shoulder to shoulder, regarding the still figure in the dead wagon as Digger went inside to unlock the back doors to his emporium, and somehow Jacob was not surprised when his father had a quiet voiced conversation with Digger -- instructions to lay this fellow out in a good quality box, in clean clothes, with his hands and his face clean and presentable. Jacob was not surprised, but he was curious, and he was also patient. As usual, his patience was rewarded. The two lawmen stepped out Digger's side door, set their Stetsons on their heads: one looked left as the other looked right, then the son looked at the father, and the father tilted his head a little. Two lawmen in black suits walked across the street and up onto the boardwalk: another few paces, and they were in the Silver Jewel. "Mr. Baxter," the Sheriff said, his eyes busy in the big mirror behind the bar, "two shots, if you please. The best in the house." Mr. Baxter turned, selected a top shelf bottle; pale eyes watched as two shots of Distilled Setting Maul splashed noisily into the short, squat glasses. "To one of the most dangerous men I ever knew," Linn said, hoisting his glass. "To a man who thought enough of you to come and say thank you," Jacob replied. Two men drank to a stranger's memory. "Who was he, sir?" Jacob asked. Linn smiled, turned, leaned back against the bar, one boot up on the polished brass foot rail. "Jacob, how would you like to make five hundred dollars?" Jacob turned, slouched back against the bar, the mirror of his father's posture. "Once we're back over in the office, I'll write out the affidavit." "Sir?" "He was worth half a thousand dollars in bounty money." "Do tell." "I knew where he was staying." "How long did you know, sir?" "Three years." "And you never cashed him in?" Linn's silence was reply enough. "You respected him, sir." "I did." "He respected you." "Yep." "He could have taken me, Jacob. Few men are faster ..." Linn's voice trailed off, then he looked at his son. "You and Doc Wilcox are the only two men I know ... you two, and Charlie Macneil." "Yes, sir." "He was always polite," Linn said softly. "Every time and without fail." "He did strike me so, sir." "The most dangerous men I've ever known were the most polite, Jacob. The gunfighters with the deadliest reputation were the most immaculate gentlemen." Jacob considered this for a long moment, then nodded, slowly. "Sir?" "Yes, Jacob?" "I reckon it would be ..." Jacob frowned, considered, thrust his jaw out as he did, then he looked at his pale eyed father. "Sir, it would not do him due respect if I were to cash in on his carcass." Linn nodded slowly. "I thought you might say that." And so it was that a wanted man, a dangerous man with a price on his head, was buried under a name nobody recognized, a name he wore back East, before he became someone else, before he became a dangerous and deadly man whose new name was known, and feared, a name that was buried with him.

LOOK, DADDY, A HORSIE! Linn was newly wed, a deputy, and mistrustful. Things happened at the All-Night, not because they catered to an undesirable clientele, but because ... well, it was there, it was open all night, and because it was about the only place open all night for at least a one county radius. Fuel for motor vehicles, fuel for parties, a minor stock of groceries -- milk, bread, things a family might have sudden urgent need for, as well as the usual snackies, and in season, there was a display of umbrellas that could be brought out for a rainy day and set out for impulse purchase: coffee, in Linn's opinion, was their biggest draw, and he personally made good use of their product, guaranteeing almost singlehandedly their supply never went stale. (He had quite a bit of help with this, of course, but Linn tended to be good natured with customers and staff alike, and when he entered, more often than not, it was with several smiles and some laughter in his wake) There were times, of course, when his visits to the All-Night were neither humorous, nor pleasant; he learned at a very tender age that evil strikes anytime, anywhere, and like any veteran lawman, like any veteran combat soldier, he'd adopted early on the mindset that he should be polite to everyone he met, but he should have a plan to kill whoever needed it. The lean waisted deputy could be forgiven if he was a little distracted in his thoughts -- just a little -- he'd recently married the good looking daughter of their paramedic captain, a girl named Shelly he'd had a crush on for a very long time, a girl who found it necessary one night after a football game to take his face in both hands and plant a kiss on him, to break through his gentlemanly reserve: she was delighted, and very surprised, when he returned her kiss with enthusiasm, nearly crushing the wind out of her when he did: she was a little breathless as their lips drew apart, and she never forgot the moment, there, alone for the moment in the parking lot, his hands firm and warm on her upper arms, his pale eyes gone to a light shade of blue, his coffee-scented whisper: "I've wanted to do that for a very long time!" She admitted to him later she nearly hauled off and slugged him for never letting her know, for she'd been burning a candle for him as well, frustrated that neither of them saw fit to discuss the matter... at least, not until that night when Shelly decided she had to do something, even if it was wrong. Linn was very much in love with his dark-eyed wife -- after they married, she'd worked briefly in the high school cafeteria while she was securing her paramedic certification, and Linn sent her flowers at the school. He did not send them to her home. He knew if he sent flowers to her at home, it would be good, but if he sent flowers to her at work, where her co-workers could see it, it would be better, and he was right: she came home and her mouth claimed his, after which she happily described how her co-workers hissed and sizzled like a bunch of angry cats: "Eeew! I hate you! My husband never sends ME flowers! Eeew!" -- a course of action which Linn filed away in the Husband's Book of Useful Knowledge, and so counseled young men who were sweet on a girl: send flowers where she can make 'em jealous. This night, though, Linn's mind compartmentalized his feelings, closing them off in a secret part of his mind while his pale eyes regarded the All-Night. He was running mounted patrol, and there was shoplifting reported from within, two nights ago: he and his Apple-horse orbited the station, silent, barely visible in the darkness: he would let himself be seen, likely he would ride up to the front door and go in for coffee, then return to his patrol: the All-Night was not his only area of coverage that night, but he knew he needed to establish a presence. Linn watched as a widow of his acquaintance brought in a bushel basket of apples: his silent nod of approval was unseen in the darkness as one of the football players approached her, then took the basket and packed it inside for her. Linn had an arrangement with the All-Night. If the window brought in apples, they would buy them, and any that did not sell before they got bruised up or started to go bad, Linn would buy: he watched a car ease up to a gas pump, as a young man went in, talked to the clerk: Linn saw him look around, then he took off his cap, laid it on the floor, took up three apples and started to juggle. Linn knew the signs; he looked at the young wife, anxious in the front seat, and the child, properly secured in the back seat, and concluded this young fellow was on the last of his reserves and was hoping to raise a few bucks gas money. Linn slipped the cell phone from his pocket, dialed a number: he saw the clerk turn, pick up the phone. "Sunshine, this is Linn," he said, "is that young fellow jugglin' apples down on his luck?" He saw her look at the young man, turn, look toward the front windows. "Yes," she said quietly. "Everything else all right?" "Yes." "Turn on pump 4, I'll fetch in my credit card right here directly." He saw her nod to show she'd heard, then she hung up, watched out the front window. Linn came into the light, silent as a ghost in fog, at least until Apple's hooves hit the cement pavement: he dismounted, cat footed up to the gas pump, eased the car's gas door open, unscrewed the cap. The young mother turned, startled, at the sound of a gas nozzle going into the tank: Linn stepped to the open driver's window, put his finger to his lips, winked: the young woman blinked uncertainly, then nodded. Linn filled the tank, hung up the hose, looked at the young woman in the passenger front seat again, and once again put a finger to his lips: he turned, made a kissing sound, and Apple-horse came head-bobbing up to him. He grinned at the young woman, swung up into saddle leather, rode around the car and walked Apple right up to the front door. The juggler was intent on his efforts: he vaguely registered that a new arrival bent, arm down, as if to put a bill in his cap: likely a one-spot, he thought to himself: Linn drew a coffee, added a drizzle of milk, a sippy cap, slid payment across the counter: he and the clerk shared a conspiratorial look and Linn looked at the juggler, smiled, slid another two dollars across the counter and snagged two apples from the bushel basket. He bit into one on his way out the door. Apple-horse swung his head at the sound, the scent of a fresh-bitten apple: nostrils, flared, tail slashing, he took a hopeful step forward, accepted the offering daintily from the extended hand: horse and rider each crunched noisily, delighting in their shared bounty, then the lean waisted deputy with well polished boots and a villainously-curled handlebar mustache, swung back into the saddle, rode into shadow, disappeared. The young husband came back to the car, grinning: he handed his wife the night's take -- a twenty, two fives and three ones -- and announced, "Someone paid for my gas already," and she said, "I know, he's already pumped it!" "I'll be damned," he said softly. "Who was it, do you know?" From the back seat, a little girl's hand in a pink mitten thrust forward, toward the windshield, and a child's voice exclaimed happily, "Look, Daddy! A horsie!"

IF YOU FIND OUT, LET ME KNOW Lawmen, medics, firefighters, all are cut of the same cloth: there is a fierce loyalty found among such folk, the same fierce loyalty seen in combat troops. It's been said that you're closer to your partner than to your own lawful wedded spouse, that you'd tell your partner things you'd never, ever tell your spouse, and this is very true. Let's face it: it's your partner at your back when both of you are gripping a double handful of blued-steel justice, as the two of you are being surrounded by a hostile carload of carnies at a 2 am traffic stop. Your partner. Not your spouse. You'll speculate with your partner, you'll entrust your partner with your deepest and most hidden secrets, because your partner entrusts you with the same, and trusts you to the same degree, and the two of you will pose questions of significance, of importance, matters that trouble your soul. Especially when the subject is women. Paul Barrents waited patiently. Linn remembered seeing the moon rocket on the pad, fueled, ready for launch, how cold plumes of liquid oxygen flowed downward, and that's how he imagined silence and patience cascaded off his partner. It was quiet, something neither spoke of: each had, in his day, uttered "The Dreaded "Q word" in their hospital's ER, and each had in turn been harshly addressed by the unsympathetic nurse who heard them speak this terrible jinx upon them. During a quiet shift, a man will speak of those matters he usually keeps hidden. Their cruisers all had a dual-battery system, allowing them to run radios with the engine off, and not worry about a dead starting battery: the only light in the cruiser's cab was from the radio's small display, and it was this faint light that allowed Paul sto see Linn nod, twice, shallow little nods. Paul knew his partner, and he was right. "Paul," Linn said, "I have yet to figure women." It was Linn's turn to know when the reply would arrive: Paul's chin lifted, just a fraction, before he spoke. "If you find out," came the quiet voiced reply, "let me know." Linn frowned, turned his head slightly toward his partner. "I fixed breakfast yesterday morning." Paul blinked, obsidian eyes impassive, searching the darkness outside their windshield. "I cleaned up afterward." Again the single blink, the only sign he was listening: Linn knew Barrents' ears were attentive, that he was listening with more than just his ears. "It took me longer to clean up than it did to fix breakfast," he said, "and I'd taken pains to not make a mess." Barrents waited while Linn marshaled his thoughts. "Now when Shelly fixed breakfast this morning, she took half the time I did to fix everything, she made two passes with a paper towel and the stove was spotless." Linn turned, shifting in his seat, facing his partner, hands palm-up in supplication: "Paul, how do women do that? Women's magic? Half the prep time, breakfast was as much as I'd made, one pass with a paper towel and other than doing dishes afterward, cleanup was done!" Paul took a long, thoughtful breath. It was his turn to turn in his seat, to face his partner: he reached out, laid a sympathetic hand on the pale eyed lawman's shoulder. "If you ever find out," he said quietly, "please tell me, because my wife does the same thing!"

REMEMBER Three sets of pale eyes studied the USGS topographical map. Marnie and Jacob were used to reading maps, picking out peaks, military crests, saddles, rights-of-way and other features of a nearby, or a distant, landscape: this area was far from where they stood, gathered around the table, a table with books and folders, legal pads, a cracked coffee cup no longer suitable for the breakfast table but Jim Dandy for holding a bristling handful of pencils, pens and markers. "This entire valley," Linn said quietly, "was built up. Coal was King and company houses stood all through here." "Company houses?" Jacob asked, looking at his big sis. "The coal companies built housing for their workers and charged them rent. Miners' families shopped at the company store, they were paid in mine scrip and generally not enough to meet expenses, so the company extended credit against the miner's continued employment." "Oh." "Not many of the old company houses left. Mama -- your Gammaw -- said there were a few in Chauncey. One less that they had to burn down." "Sir?" Jacob asked, surprised: "they burnt down someone's house?" Linn nodded. "Your Gammaw was a deputy marshal there when the fire chief caught up with her and said there was something she needed to see. He didn't know what it was but when your Gammaw shot a flashlight down into the wall they were tearin' out, why, she evacuated the building and pulled everyone back for a few blocks." "What was it, sir?" "Dynamite," Linn said solemnly. "Old, high-test dynamite, stronger than they make now. Nitroglycerin sweated out and crystallized and ... well, when the Wright-Patt boom squad got there, they soaked it with a fine mist of Diesel fuel, they laid a trail across the floor, scratched a road flare and tossed it in. Burnt nicely." "Didn't it blow up, sir, the dynamite?" Linn grinned. "No, Jacob, but it burnt. Fast, hot, real white, or so your Gammaw told me." Marnie offered no comment, save only to raise her eyes from the green-printed map and stare at the picture-heavy refrigerator door, imagining what it must've looked like to see a gunny sack sparkling like it was soaked and dried in rock salt. "Here" -- Linn traced the tip of a capped marker down the map -- "that's route thirteen. State route, runs north almost to Lake Erie and south near to the Ohio River." "Where did Great-Grampa ..." Jacob began, then stopped, uncertain whether he should say "where did Great-Grampa get killed." Linn bent closer, the black-plastic cap of the marker sliding down and to the side, just a little. "There's the power substation," he said softly. "Just north of that ... here." "There's a cemetery ... there, across the railroad tracks." "The old Catholic cemetery," Linn nodded. "Is that where he's buried?" "No, but a lot of coal miners planted there. Hisylvania Coal imported European hard rock miners, and most of them were Catholic." "Where is he buried, sir?" Linn unfolded an Athens County road map, laid it over the topo map, smoothed it out. "Let's get our bearings ... here's Burr Oak State Park, here's Athens, here's ... okay, Glouster, Trimble, Jacksonville. Trimble here, route thirteen, let's go south. Here" -- his marker stopped -- "here's Interstate 78 taking off toward Caldwell." "Interstate?" Marnie asked, and Linn laughed. "Mama called it that. It's anything but. Two lanes, blacktop, State route and crooked as a politician's conscience. Go out here ... right there." "I see it." "That's where your Great-Granddad is buried." Jacob and Marnie regarded the area enclosed with the dotted line, with solemn expressions. "When do we go, sir?" "We leave in the morning." "Yes, sir." Both children looked at their long tall Pa and asked with one voice, "Will we leave a bullet on his tombstone?" "Which bullet do we leave?" Linn asked, his voice quiet, gentle. ".38 Smith and Wesson," the chorused, "200 grain British service load!" Linn nodded. "We will leave a bullet," Linn affirmed. "Marnie, if you'll tend the maps, please, we'll take those with us." "Yes, sir." "You two head for the bunk. Get some rest now." "Yes, sir," they chorused: Marnie gave the county map two tugs and a turn and had it folded along its original creases, and made it look easy: Jacob glared at her and muttered, "Show-off!" Marnie slid the two topo quadrangles to him and he rolled them into cylinders, slid them in the long cardboard tube they lived in. Linn and Shelly watched them head for the stairs. "Jacob's hit a growth spurt," Linn observed quietly. "Don't I know it!" Shelly groaned. "Have you seen how much he eats? -- it's all going to height, I don't ..." Linn ran his arm around his wife's waist, drew her close. "You said yesterday his jeans are mostly high-waters now." "If he wasn't wearing boots all the time they'd be capris," Shelly groaned. "Sew on curtain fringe or bandana material." "I've done that." "I know. Gammaw did with mine. Started a fad, too." Shelly sighed, leaned into her husband's embrace. "It'll be awfully quiet without you three underfoot." "You've got the other two," Linn mumbled into her hair as he nuzzled into her ear. "Mr. Keller," Shelly said, a warning note in her voice, "I do believe you're trying to seduce me!" Husband and wife faced one another, Shelly's arms around his neck, his arms around her waist: conversation was suspended for several moments, at least until Shelly's delighted squeak as Linn swept her up in his arms and packed her toward the stairway. "Doors locked?" he asked. "Doors locked," Shelly affirmed. "Shut off the kitchen light, stud!" Marnie sat in front, the county map open: she alternated studying the printed sheet, and studying the terrain around them. They were driving a rental vehicle from the Ohio University airport outside of Athens, and Marnie was frowning her way along the route on the sheet before her. "I used to do that," Linn chuckled. "What's that?" Marnie asked absently, looking down the length of the Hocking River. "How come that's so straight?" "They channelized it," Linn explained. "Ohio University was never supposed to be here. We'll go past The Plains, where it was supposed to be. The surveyors stayed at a tavern and got all drunked up and when they laid out their map of the area, they got Athens and The Plains bass ackwards, they put the University in the flood plain and it flooded out. The government ditched out the river so it wouldn't, now it's just a straight channel." "Oh." They turned off the four-lane, onto a two lane state route: Marnie thought the state route signs looked funny -- a black 13 on an Ohio-shaped background -- well, this is Ohio, dummy, she thought. "We're coming into Chauncey -- look there, that sandstone structure? That was a lock on the Erie Canal." Marnie filed that remark away for future reference; she had only the vaguest idea what the Erie Canal might be, and for the life of her she had not the least idea why the Erie Canal would be clear down here in the south end of the state when Lake Erie was on its northern border. A curve, another, a green-and-white corporation limit sign: Linn pointed, a bladed hand thrust out at an angle: "Those houses there? Those are Company houses. They were intended to stand for twenty years. Those two are better than 125 years old. The one your Gammaw was in on was ... there." He thrust a knife hand toward a gap between two of the houses. "I don't see the town marshal," Jacob complained. "The Mayor disbanded the Marshal's office. Said it was too expensive, too much liability. It really wasn't, she wanted to show she could walk with hard heels over everyone and everything." "Dirty politics," Marnie suggested. "Exactly that," Linn nodded. "If you look up Dirth Suth'n Politics in Webster's, you'll find the black silhouette of Athens County right at the head of the column." They continued on across the railroad tracks, turned left, northward: another fifteen minutes and they were through Jacksonville, then Trimble. "The only difference between Jacksonville and Trimble," Linn explained as they slowed, "is a line on a map." They pulled off the roadway at the power substation. Linn shut off the ignition, released his seat belt: both children were looking around, following their Pa's example, making sure it was safe before opening the door and stepping out. Two pale eyed Keller men in suits and ties and brushed black Stetsons stepped out; an attractive young woman in a tailored suit dress and heels stepped out as well. Sheriff Linn Keller, his son Jacob, his daughter Marnie, walked in single file up the shoulder: Linn gauged the location of the substation, the angle of the guardrail, stopped. "Here," he said. They looked around. "There on the pavement" -- Linn thrust a bladed hand toward the blacktop -- "when your Great-Granddad pulled crossways of both lanes, he had time enough to get out and fire one shot." Linn unbuttoned his coat, ran his hand along his belt, gripped the handle of the Smith & Wesson Victory Model. Marnie regarded the scene silently, imagining the moment of collision, with Great-Gammaw Beverly watching in horror at the car, coming fast and not even slowing down, how everything in the car would have floated on the moment of collision, how Great-Gammaw was thrown up and sideways and came down across the front seat, how she scrambled to grab the police band talkie: Marnie remembered hearing that her voice was calm, concise, professional as she called for backup, how her voice was calm until she dropped the talkie and screamed "TEEEEDDDDD!" and launched out the open driver's door, how the world was filled with the angry sound of an engine under heavy throttle, the scream of burning tires as the fleeing felon tried to shove their car out of the way, how Ted's teeth were locked, his legs crushed between the two vehicles -- Linn opened the rental car's trunk, pulled out a small wreath, a long zip tie: he walked over to the guard rail, placed the ring of flowers, secured them. Marnie and Jacob were silent on the drive to the cemetery. Marnie remembered looking along the curve of the eroded creek bank, marveling at the ugly yellow creekbed -- is that mine sulfur? she wondered, then filed this, too, for future inquiry. At the graveyard, father and son removed their Stetsons, stood at the foot of the grave, silently reading the names sandblasted on the double stone, the dates of birth and of death: Marnie stood between them, trying to look mature, trying to look grown-up, but feeling very lost, now that she was facing the legend, walking in the legend, now that she'd been where her Great-Grampa was murdered in the line of duty, and now she stood at the foot of his grave, very grateful that her Daddy and her brother were on either side. Linn led the way: they walked up the side of the grave, each placing a single lead bullet on the stone: there were four others there already. "Lawmen will come here and leave one bullet," he explained, "in memory of the one shot he got off that day." "Where'd he hit, Pa?" Jacob asked. "He hit right in front of the driver, Jacob," Linn replied. "If he'd had a .357, it would have penetrated instead of glancing off. He'd have kilt the b'ar that kilt him." Linn squatted, gripped the corner of the stone. "Grampa," he said quietly, "I wish I'd have known you." Jacob and Marnie each laid a hand on their father's, wordlessly adding their wishes to his spoken words. "I was Jacob's age when your Gammaw brought me here for the first time," Linn said as he straightened, as he and Jacob settled their Stetsons on neatly-barbered heads. "We've been out here a number of times." He took a long breath, pale eyes hard. "It does well," he said thoughtfully, "for a man to remember." Two days later, Marnie and Jacob rode up Cemetery Hill, drew up in front of their family's row. They looked at their Gammaw's portrait, laser engraved in mirror-smooth quartz. They both dismounted, walked over to their Gammaw's grave, walked up beside the grave and gripped the edge of her stone. "We left a bullet for Great-Gampaw," Jacob said. "Gammaw didn't die like he did, so what do we leave?" "We don't," Marnie said: she stood, picked up a rose from the top of the stone, a fresh-cut rose, still speckled with morning dew, fragrant and vibrant: "hold still, Jacob." Marnie threaded the rose's stem through his buttonhole, smiled. "Gammaw would like that," she said quietly, and Jacob looked at the stone, then at his sister, and he realized that his pale eyed sister's words were exactly right: there'd been no rose on the stone when they arrived, and that meant his Gammaw liked their visit well enough to make it happen. In the fullness of time, Jacob brought his young to his Gammaw's grave, and told them of her, and they each left a fresh-cut rose on top of the stone, and when young Jacob Keller became a husband and his wife was great with child, just before the pains of childbirth prompted her removal to Labor and Delivery, a rose appeared on her bedside table, but that is a tale for another time: let us conclude with that quick peek into the future, where a grinning Jacob Keller, his mustache grown thick and luxurious and curled into a villainous handlebar, stood at his Gammaw's grave with a bundled little baby boy in his arms: "This is your Great-Gammaw," he would say with a grin, "and I remember her well." Father and infant son would then mount a placid, unexciting, elderly Paso mare, and were one nearby, one would hear the father telling the swaddled, yawning infant son, "Your Gammaw was a character." As they rode down Cemetery Hill, the father's voice would grow fainter as he continued, "Why, I remember --"

LEFT HAND, RIGHT HAND The Deacon's Bench in front of the Sheriff's office was the frequent home of a variety of folk: loafers, liars, tellers of tall tales, whittlers, spitters, the Sheriff, the Parson, ranchers, miners, railroad engineers -- a broad cross section of Firelands' backsides polished the Deacon's Bench at one time or another, and when it was populated, it often got kind of ... well, it generally got rather deep, and rather quickly. Subjects under discussion ranged from weather to women, fast draw to fires, weaponry to women, knives to kindnesses, wax candles to women ... did I mention that women were a favorite subject of discussion? -- didn't want to leave that one out. A particular schoolboy dropped his hind quarters firmly beside the Sheriff, who was frowning at the box elder twig he was working on: the schoolboy watched, fascinated, as the Sheriff fashioned a whistle, gave it a test tweet, frowned, made a miniscule adjustment to the slanted hole, tried again, nodded his satisfaction. He handed it to the boy and said quietly, "Don't blow this in school or Miz Sarah will cloud up and rain all over you." The big-eared lad grinned happily, short legs swinging as he regarded his freshly-whittled prize. Linn hunched over, elbows on his knees, turning his head slowly, swinging his pale eyed gaze up the street: the boy could not see the man's eyes were busy, picking out places where a man might lay ambuscade, might wait with a rifle, might skulk or try to look like he wasn't hiding when he really was: satisfied that no such skulkers lay to the up hill, he looked to the down hill. Linn looked at the lad. "You splittin' much wood these days?" he asked gently. "Yes, sir," the lad grinned: he had a tooth missing, the new one just coming through the gum line recently vacated by its predecessor. "Ma had me fill the wood box this mornin'." Linn nodded. "I did the same," he said in a gentle voice. The lad's eyes widened. "Your Ma makes you fill the wood box?" he asked in a surprised, little-boy's voice, and Linn laughed, ran his arm around the lad's shoulders, hugged him a little, released. "Worse than that," he affirmed, looking across the street at the Silver Jewel, then runnning his gaze up to the window where the Z&W's corporate office lived: "if I don't keep that wood box filled, why, the hired girl and my wife would gang up on me and drive me through the floor like a fence post!" "Really?" came the breathy, awe-struck reply, and Linn laughed again, something few saw in public, something that was safe to share with a little boy: "Why of course," he replied. "They'd each take 'em a fryin' pan and commence to takin' turns hittin' me over the head just like two gandy dancers spikin' down a rail!" "Ow," the schoolboy said sympathetically. "That would hurt!" "Once they were done with that," Linn added,"they'd make me fix the hole in the floor where they drove me plumb through it!" Miz Sarah popped out of the double doors of their little whitewashed schoolhouse across the street, for all the world like a cuckoo bird out of a German clock: she stepped out, schoolbell in hand, looked around: she saw her pale-eyed Papa sitting on the Deacon's bench with one of her young charges, she looked around at children approaching the schoolhouse, at others busy at marbles or tag or mumblety-peg beside the tidy, whitewashed building: Miz Sarah raised the handbell, swung it briskly: at its clear, shining cl-clang, cl-clang, the boy fairly levitated off the Deacon's bench, running before his feet hit the ground: he ran with a child's careless abandon across the lightly-rutted dirt street, joining the tide of youthful scholars responding to Miz Sarah's morning summons. Linn's eyes tightened at the corners, all the smile he allowed to show as they clustered around Miz Sarah like a bunch of chicks around a hen: she turned, her young flock flowing in around her, and before she drew the double doors shut, she turned, raised a hand in greeting, and Linn's heart swelled at her smile, shining and pink-cheeked in the long caressing rays of morning's sun. A child of his loins she might be, but she was still a beautiful young woman, a young woman Linn loved fiercely and protectively. The schoolboy was not the only morning visitor to the Deacon's bench. Morning's sun warmed the bench and the Sheriff's shins; other men, older and younger, joined him, spoke, departed: lies and information were traded, tales spun, there were coarse jests, laughter, the usual manly raillery, but in this wise the Sheriff came across a surprising amount of information, and part of that information was thanks to preparation he'd made, asking discreet questions here there and yonder. Thanks to information he'd gathered a week before, he handed one of the lean young men an envelope and gave him a quiet voiced instruction: the younger man listened, solemn-faced, to the Sheriff's instructions, nodded: coin slid from the Sheriff's callused hand to the young man's leather-gloved palm, disappeared: later that day, a freight wagon drew up in front of a young widow's home, and two strong young men began unloading firewood, stacking it neatly where the widow's husband used to rick it up close to the house, close at hand against winter's oncoming cold. The widow's hand went to her mouth as she was handed an envelope, as she opened the envelope, as she read the "Paid in Full" written on the delivery slip: she did not see another of the young men, working quickly, quietly, while she was distracted, stacking canned goods and sacks of flour and coffee at her front door: it wasn't until the freight wagon was pulling away, not until after the young widow was gone back inside as the dray-horse swung the wagon around, that there was a sudden, urgent knock at the front door: before she got to the door to answer the alarm, a grinning young man sprinted after the freight-wagon, seized the tailgate, soared over the smooth, painted boards and landed, laughing and awkward, in the now-empty wagon bed, flattening himself out so he'd not be seen by the staring, surprised widow-woman. The next day, instead of running for home after school, the same schoolboy came over and looked at the Sheriff, puzzlement in his expression and a question in his voice. Linn had just emerged from his office and saw the lad approach: something told him a conference was requested, and so he stood to receive his young guest. "Sheriff," he said, "Miz Sarah said something about a Dutchman named Sinterklaas and she said you knew him." Linn laughed, squatted so he would be closer to the lad's eye level. "I know the man," he said. "Well ... Miz Sarah said Sinterklaas was the one who brought Mama a wagon load of wood an' a bunch of dry goods." Linn nodded. "He's been known to do that." "Sheriff" -- the boy frowned, shuffled his feet uncertainly, the way an impatient little boy will -- "that Sinterklaas feller has been kind of busy this year." "How's that?" The boy looked at him, trying to puzzle some things together, throwing them out on the air so they could both see how they sounded. "Our fence busted down an' we didn't get it fixed but it got fixed an' our cows back in where they'd got out an' there's a new milk cow with 'em an' Mama said she got a bill of sale for it that said paid in full an' she never bought it an' she made me a new shirt an' she said they was a bolt of cloth showed up on her porch an' --" He wrinkled his nose, frowned, looked at the Sheriff with his head tilted over and one eye screwed shut. Linn raised a teaching finger, winked. "That-there Sinterklaas feller," he said, "was a Dutchman a lot of years ago that ..." Linn dropped his head, considered, then looked back up at the boy. "He was a rich man who knew who the poor folk were. Come Christmas time, why, he loaded up goodies for the folks that didn't have much and he delivered 'em, he'd drop a sack full of goods at their door, he'd beat on their door and run. Might be folks heard about his example and allowed as they'd Sinterklaas someone that needed some help." "Sheriff" -- the boy looked at the lean, pale eyed lawman with a troubled expression -- "do you reckon that Sinterklaas fella can bring me my Pa back? I miss him somethin' fierce." Linn rolled forward, dropped his knees to the dusty boardwalk, took the lad in a fatherly embrace. A lean old lawman who knew what it was to lose people he loved, held a shivering little boy who knew what it was to lose a father. "I don't know, son," he whispered, "but I do know good things happen. Reckon we'll have to wait and see." Linn held the boy as long as the boy wanted held, then he slacked his grip, pulled a bedsheet hankie out of his sleeve: he wiped the wet from the schoolboy's cheeks, pinched material over his nose and said gently, "Blow," and then he wiped the lad's blown-clean beak, tucked the kerchief in the lad's coat's breast pocket. "Go on home now," the Sheriff almost whispered. "I reckon your Mama has supper waitin'." Jacob watched silently as his father rolled back onto the balls of his feet, stood, brushed the dust off his knees. Linn turned. "Is he there now?" he asked, and Jacob nodded. Linn grinned. "That little boy will think that Sinterklaas fella must be magic." Jacob nodded. "Reckon so, sir." "How long has he been sweet on the Widow Hinkle?" "Since before she was married, sir." "I reckon she'll fix him supper." "Reckon so, sir." "He lost his wife and little boy back East." "Yes, sir." "Looks like they'll pair up pretty well." Jacob looked long at his father. "You arranged it, sir." He said it was a statement, not a question. Linn looked his firstborn in the eye and nodded. "Yes, Jacob. I arranged a widow who misses her husband, and a widower who misses his wife and child." "And you've kept her in wood and groceries when she didn't have two pesos to rub together." "Yep." "You had me round up her stray herd and fix the fence once they were back inside." Jacob's eyes tightened a little at the corners, all the smile he was allowing himself. "You never did let her know where all that come from." Linn laughed, clapped a hand on his son's shoulder: "Let not thy right hand know what thy left hand doeth, Jacob. When it comes to charity, why, I like to be sneaky." He winked confidentially and added, "It's more fun that way!"