SHORT STORIES!

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

ANGEL OF VENGEANCE, ANGEL OF DEATH

 

Dana Keller catfooted through the empty building, her mouth dry, her breathing controlled.

She was at once the hunter, and the hunted, the predator, and the prey.

Angela told her once that living creatures are surrounded by something called a Kirlian field, that if you slice a lobe off a living maple leaf and look at it with Kirlian photography, the living field will flow out and re-form the missing part, and that's how predators sense their prey.

A wounded animal, she said, has a different magnetic field, a different Kirlian field, and predators can sense this -- whether the predator was animal, or whether it was a human animal.

Dana faded back into a corner, her pistol in a two-hand compressed grip: she waited, silent, listening, knowing she was still wounded, knowing she was not yet healed -- knowing she'd lied to her Daddy the Sheriff, knowing she should not be back to work and yet she went back anyway because it's what the women of her line did!

She heard a scuff, as if someone were trying to move silently, but didn't expect a warped floorboard to be a half inch higher than the rest of the floor: she waited, backed into a corner, realizing she'd found a good defensive position.

If you can sense me, she thought, you can find me, and I'm waiting for you.

 

A week before, someone in a high powered, jacked up truck tried to run her off the road.

They'd come up fast behind her, beside her, tried to crowd her into the ditch.

Dana nailed the brakes, reversed: her Dodge automatically squalled all four tires executing the Military Maneuver Known as Getting the Hell Out of There: she got her speed up, whipped a flawless bootlegger's turn, yanked it into go-forward gear and mashed the go pedal.

Whoever this Jack Doe was, had good reflexes and one hell of an engine: he was keeping up with her, albeit at a distance, until she turned down a township road she knew of.

Dana knew her vehicle and she knew the road and she knew the truck, with a higher center of gravity, would never be able to take the turns like she did.

She'd been surprised, she'd allowed herself to be shaken, she swore in a hoarse whisper as she realized she'd not gotten a plate.

Dana nailed the brakes again, backed into a side road, jumped out, popped the trunk: she pulled out her 870, rolled a round of 00 into the open ejection port and slammed the slide forward: she alternated buck and slugs in the magazine, waited behind her car, watching the road.

She heard the truck, running hard, slow quickly and stop.

Dana waited, realizing there might be an access into the field behind her and to her left.

She took another step back, ready for either approach -- from the road ahead, or the field to her left.

The engine noise sounded like the truck was headed away: it faded, and finally was gone.

 

Dana smiled grimly at the faint sound, something like fingernails just touching a wall.

She eased her high powered hand light from her belt.

You're mine, she thought: she crossed her wrists, pistol ahead of her, cranked her left wrist back.

She squatted, spun around the corner, slashed the light down the corridor --

Empty --

She killed the light, pulled back: I blew it, he knows where I am, and fear sprouted in her guts and ran cold fingers snaking up her backbone.

Her breath shivered a little: she seized her fear, ripped it free of her spine, threw it from her, and allowed herself to grow very cold inside.

She'd heard Jacob describe the pale eyed Rage they shared, as something burning hot, something that consumed hm like fire: Angela's anger was cold, a deep and abiding hatred for everyone that hurt her, dead or not.

"I knooooow where yoooouuuu aaarrrreeeee," a mocking voice sing-songed -- some Jack Doe trying to sound spooky, trying to scare her.

Dana looked to her right.

She knew there was a stairway going down, a multi-pane window above the landing: if she tried going down stairs, unless she slid on her belly, she'd silhouette herself.

There wasn't much light, but there was enough to show her a chunk of plaster on the floor beside her foot.

She squatted, slowly, gripped the saucer-sized chunk, scaled it over the old wood railing, toward the landing below.

 

Angela Keller knew her sister was inside the old dry-goods store.

She knew someone had tried to get to Dana -- tried to run her off the road, left a threatening message from a burner phone, dropped a short bladed lock back by her tire, apparently interrupted before the tire could be slashed (no prints) -- and now Dana was inside on what Angela knew to be a malicious false call, a claim to have a kidnapped woman who was actually alive and well and safe at home.

Two minutes after they determined the intended victim was, in fact, just fine, someone called in a report of two men and a struggling woman breaking into the old dry goods store.

Angela and Dana responded.

 

Angela eased open the same door Dana used.

Angela had a double handful of Ithaca pump gun and a grim expression, and Angela had an asset she wished Dana had taken with her, an asset with tan fur, a narrow muzzle and feral yellow eyes.

Angela leaned her hip against the wooden handrail, advanced with her gunmuzzle leading: she moved slowly, carefully, breathing through her mouth.

Beside her, a Malinois, moving as silently as she: she did not need light to tell the moist black nose was scenting the stale air.

 

Dana smiled as she heard the creak of a board, as if someone stepped on a squeaky board just below her.

She looked down the dark hall -- there was a window at the far end -- no silhouette --

"I sseeeee yyoooouuuu" -- that damned voice again! -- 

Night vision?

Dana took a long, silent breath, listening with more than her ears.

If you want any meat, she thought, you'll eat a hell of a lot of lead first!

I came up the back stairs.

I cleared every room on this level.

Every door is shut and wedged.

I'm out of wedges.

No sounds of a protesting victim.

I'm betting he's below me.

That means I go down the fatal funnel.

Unless I bait him up to me.

Dana smiled in the near darkness, then she puckered her lips, whistled, two liquid, come-hither notes:

"Yoo-hoo, big boy! Come and get meeee!"

 

Angela felt the Malinois stop: there was barely enough light to see his head come up, ears pricked.

She crouched a little, laid a hand on his shoulders.

No bristling.

No growl.

She heard a whistle -- two notes, then Dana's voice:  "Yoo-hoo, big boy! Come and get meee!"

Angela heard something above her, and so did the Malinois: she felt his fur ripple upward, felt the rumble in his chest.

Angela had just enough light to see the steps were intact, that they were clear.

She advanced.

 

"I'm going to hurt yoouuuu, little girl," the voice taunted.

No you're not, Dana thought: the voice was from below her.

 

Angela laid a hand on the Malinois, crouched, brought her lips close to his ear, whispered.

"Get 'im," she whispered.

The quivering canine did not need to be told a second time.

He launched around the landing, up the stairs: Angela charged after him, making no attempt at being quiet.

"SHERIFF'S OFFICE! SENDING THE DOG!"

 

Dana raised her pistol, thumbed the switch on the end of her light.

"SHOW ME YOUR HANDS!"

Her Glock spat twice, she charged, drew back, spun, her light slashing the darkness as she did: 

Close, too close!

Dana's light drove down like an icepick, she drew back a leg, kicked.

 

Angela spun, drove a charge of buck into a man's belly at point blank range: a chunk of spine big as two fists parted company from its former home, sprayed against the ancient wall, darkening the wood even more: she jacked the action, brought her gunmuzzle around as the Malinois bayed, then started yammering, digging at a closed door.

"DANA!" Angela screamed against the red ringing in her ears. "DANA, REPORT!"

Dana's light was searing a dirty, unshaven stranger's retinas, her Glock muzzle invisible behind the blinding light she held.

"DO NOT MOVE!" Angela heard. "SHOW ME YOUR HANDS!"

He didn't: he grabbed for her leg.

She jumped back, just out of reach: his hand went for something in his waistband and his head exploded.

Dana swung her light down, saw the handle of a pistol in his waistband: she looked at what used to be a human head, knew she'd just punched his ticket to the Hell Bound Train, turned, went to the head of the stairs, shot her light down to the landing.

"DANA!" she heard.

"TOP FLOOR EAST!"

"YOU OKAY?"

"TWO TANGOES DOWN, NOT SECURE!"

Angela ran down the hallway to the door where the Malinois was digging, whining, barking.

"Back," she said, then slammed her bootsole into the door, beside the knob: she squeezed the weapon light switch, saw the door was padlocked.

"The hell with it," she muttered, dropped to one knee, blew the hasp out of the door frame with an upward-directed twelve-gauge slug, which rained an incredible amount of dirt, plaster and wood splinters down on her.

Angela kicked the door.

"Firelands, this is Angel One. Shots fired, two tangoes down, request squad and backup, hostage found alive."

 

Dana went down to the landing, her light on the wounded man.

"Are you the one that tried to run me off the road?" she asked, her voice loud, demanding.

The wounded man coughed, bloodied hands pressed to his belly.

"It didn't work, did it?" Dana asked conversationally, squatting: he brought his hand out and she caught the gun easily, twisted it back, jerked: he screamed as the finger broke.

Dana holstered her pistol, worked the broken finger out of the trigger guard, dropped the mag and locked the Beretta's slide back before seizing the injured man, rolling him over on his belly with an utter lack of gentleness: she ignored his screams as she cuffed him, quickly, tightly, double locked the cuffs.

There was a muted red glow, there, then gone: she looked up at the filthy old windows, saw red and blue competing for attention against the time-encrusted filth.

Thank God for the cavalry, she thought: the door below her exploded open and Angela pulled her light, illuminated the wall, marking her position.

Running feet charged up the stairs.

 

There was debriefing, there were reports, there were statements: the State Police forensics team gathered their data, took measurements, set up holographic recorders, took still photos and videos: Linn slid Dana's pistol into an evidence bag and handed it off to a technician, who receipted it in while Linn removed the pistol from his own holster and placed it in Dana's holster.

The Irish Brigade and their medics brought the cot and the patient to the head of the stairs: an Irishman turned, gripped the back of the Captain's belt, backed down the stairs, steadying the medic as he held the ambulance cot at arm's length overhead, keeping the blanket wrapped patient as level as possible: Shelly was at the head end, a reassuring feminine presence: the stairs were too narrow, elsewise an Irishman would have been on the left and on the right, gripping the cot and descending in step: Linn stepped back to let the medics past, watched as his daughters stood side by side, one with a shotgun tilted back over her shoulder -- she handed it off to the evidence tech, as was policy -- a second team loaded the wounded man face down on a second cot, and a deputy was dispatched with the medics to transport the gut shot man to hospital.

Tank, the Malinois, sat between them, looking very pleased with himself, as if he himself had brought about all that transpired that night: one of the evidence techs took a photo of the moment, and Angela printed it out later, showed it to Dana.

"Look at that expression," she murmured.

"You'd think he was taking all the credit."

"Typical man."

Two feminine hands reached down and caressed a canine head, and Tank closed his eyes with pleasure, mouth open, tongue curled, looking absolutely pleased with himself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 19 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

LEAVE

Two pale eyed deputies came into the Sheriff's inner office: both were in uniform, both walked with a catlike grace.

Both were visibly watchful, tense ... dangerous.

Sheriff Linn Keller looked at his daughters, his face carefully impassive.

"Department policy," he said quietly, "requires a mandatory leave after a line of duty shooting."

"Yes, sir," two pale eyed depties said in chorus.

"This does not indicate either of you did anything wrong. This is simply policy. Neither of you are required to make a statement for 72 hours. Until that time, don't, not casually, not in everyday conversation. Answer no reporters' questions, not even if provoked, make neither comment nor reply to any questions from anyone -- not family, not friends, not the cashier at the local grocery store, nobody. Anything you say can and damned well will be twisted around to try and hang you."

"Yes, sir," came the chorused reply.

"You each wear a body cam. They're also available on the open market. Any casual reply can be captured and used against you. Cell phone video and especially audio pickup is phenomenally high quality now. Anyone, and I mean anyone, a cashier, a grocery shopper, someone in church or pumping gas or anywhere you might legitimately be, could make a comment or ask a question or otherwise try and get you to say something incriminating. We have enemies over and above the dead and dying -- by the way, Dana, the fellow you gut shot died on the operating table."

Linn saw his daughter's eyes change, saw her mouth open, then close firmly.

"You will both very likely be called killers, murderers or murderesses, comments will be made in earshot -- again, this is psywar, it'll increase the closer to the inquest. People with agendas are already agitating for their own political gain. Don't give them anything at all."

"Yes, sir."

"You have already both made your confidential reports on secure devices inaccessible by this department or anyone else. Keep those reports secure. On the one hand, you made them while everything was still fresh in your mind. On the other hand, the adrenaline and unholy stress of a shots-fired incident scrambles the thought process. That's why we have 72 hours before we make a statement."

"Yes, sir."

"I will require neither of you to hand in your badges or your sidearms. You remain active members of this department and subject to call, but things will have to be pretty bad to call you in from mandatory leave. Questions?"

Two pale eyed deputies' jaw muscles tightened a little, then:  "No, sir."

"The Sheriff has made his statement," Linn said:  he came around his desk, gathered his daughters into his arms the way he'd done the night before, after they were home.

Two pale eyed daughters ran their arms around their big strong Daddy.

"I'm glad you're safe," Linn whispered, his throat tight. 

"Daddy?" Angela whispered.

"Yes, sweetheart?"

"Daddy, does this mean I have to stay in my room?"

Linn's head bent down a little, until his head touched both his daughters', and they felt his silent laughter.

"No, darlin', you don't have to stay in your room. Paid leave is just that. It's spelled vacation and it's not deducted from your vacation time."

A pale eyed father held his pale eyed daughters, and a pale eyed father was profoundly grateful he was able to feel them under his hands, feel them breathe, feel them alive and real and solid and safe.

Linn lowered his arms, as did they; he drew back a step: the father retreated, while the Sheriff gripped the faceted-glass doorknob, turned it, opened the door.

"Dismissed."

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

SHADOWS, AND MIST

A figure stood in misty shadow, faded back into deeper shadow.

Evil walked these city alleys: evil that preyed on those weaker, those less able to keep themselves safe, those whose life's fortunes turned against them and caused them to walk paths they would never have considered.

One woman a week had been found dead, either strangled, or strangled and clubbed -- murdered, for no reason than they were not as strong, or as fast, as the monster that seized them, and broke them, and left them bloodied and dead.

Another would be found in the morning.

This time it wouldn't be a woman.

A figure, a woman, unremarkable, save for her eyes -- eyes of polished marble, eyes cold and eyes unforgiving -- a figure drew back where the shadows were deepest.

Slowly, carefully, she wiped a blade with what used to be the dead man's shirt:  she bent, sloshed the cloth in a convenient puddle, wiped the blade again.

She did not look at the unmoving figure, not until the moon timidly peeked around cloudy curtains, horrified at the sight of blood, of murder done yet again -- then perhaps emboldened that justice was done, the moon boldly thrust curtaining clouds aside, looked very directly at death done in silence, then released the curtains and allowed them to close again, veiling the silvery face of the lunar orb.

A solitary woman walked down the alley, turned, and was gone.

 

The Abbott crossed himself as he came into the sanctuary, kneeling as he faced the Host: he rose, saw one of the White Sisters kneeling a little to the side, away from the sisters in Adoration.

He smiled, just a little.

Only one of the White Sisters knelt off to the side like this.

The Veiled Sister held a Rosary: as the Abbott's bullhide sandals whispered on the stone flags, the Sister's head came up, she slipped the green-glass beads into a concealed pocket, raised her head.

"Abbott," she said.

"Sister Mercurius."

"We need to talk."

"I thought you might."

"Your place or mine?"

The Abbott chuckled quietly: the two rose, bowed to the Host, crossed themselves, turned.

"I wondered when I'd see you next"

"I've been busy."

"When aren't you?"

Sister Mercurius walked sedately, a proper introverted gait, her hands modestly thrust into her sleeves before her: she waited until she and the Abbott were in the calefactorum, until a silent novice brought a sweating pitcher of herb tea and two fired ceramic cups.

"Are you sure you wouldn't prefer a confessional?"

Sister Mercurius raised her veil: suddenly she was Sarah McKenna, smiling like a mischevious schoolgirl, instead of the modestly veiled Sister.

"No, Abbott. I have nothing to confess.  Confession is for wrongs you've done, and it was not wrong to kill."

"Sometimes it isn't," the Abbott admitted, "but perfection exists in the mind of God. To think yourself far from imperfection speaks of the sin of pride."

"I've sins enough, Abbott," Sarah admitted, "but this wasn't a sin. This was justice."

The Abbott nodded slowly.  "Sometimes," he said, "we are the hand of God."

"I'll not make that prideful claim."

"There may be hope for you."

The two sipped the cool, sweet tea.

"You didn't come here to have tea with me."

"No."

Silence again.

"Let's just say I need your advice."

"Ask."

"Abbot, women were being killed. One a week. Strangled, clubbed, broken, bloodied."

"So I heard."

"I killed the killer."

"Weigh the cost."

"He had a choice. He chose murder."

"You cut off every chance he'd have to repent."

Sarah's eyes were cold, unforgiving.

"He prevented ten women from ever repenting. I kept more than that safe. As far as my soul, Abbott, I've made this same decision before and when it's necessary I'll make it again."

The Abbott nodded, considered the tea shimmering in his hand-thrown mug.

"Why come here, then?"

"Sometimes," Sarah sighed, "even when I'm in the right on something like this ... I like the reassurance of being told that I'm doing the right thing."

"Were you?"

Sarah's smile was gentle as she sipped her tea.

"You sound just like my father, you know."

"Thank you. I'll take that as a compliment."

"Believe me, it is."

Sarah tilted her head a little, smiled.

"Was I in the right?" she said, her eyes looking at something well beyond the far wall, then she looked back.

"Yes, Abbott.  I was in the right."

Edited February 20 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

BLOODY SHIRT

Michael and Victoria were still quite young, and the young are flexible in their mindset.

The world was still filled with magic; it was not at all unusual, in their worldview, for a black cat's-eye to appear, to widen, for their big sister Marnie to step out and hug them and laugh and sometimes she brought people with her, and sometimes she took their hands and stepped through the black cat's-eye with them and they were suddenly in another place.

They accepted this as usual, as normal, but as magical as well:  magic can be fragile, and this magic, they knew, must never be spoken of, lest it disappear entirely.

Michael was as fidgety and as spontaneous and with just as fast-moving a mind as any normal little boy, and as usual, his twin sister Victoria -- within minutes of the same age -- was more disciplined, more likely to sit still, to listen.

In other words, they were perfectly normal.

Victoria knew she was a girl and she knew she was expected to be a girl, and Victoria delighted in being a girl: her Mama delighted in dressing her in pastels and frilly girl clothes, in fussing over her hair and sharing womanly tasks, and Michael ... well, Michael was just as rip-roarin' happy to be his Pa's boy, especially when he wore blue jeans like his Pa, and boots like his Pa, and a Stetson like his Pa, and he dearly loved it when he and his Pa got into stuff.

Michael may've had the short attention span of a preschooler, but he was absolutely fascinated with anything that his Pa did.

When Linn dismounted the front wheel assembly from that faded orange Dodge Power Wagon, when his Pa laid out the wheel bearing on spread out sheets of newspaper, when his Pa had a socket set ready to hand with shining chrome sockets in symmetrical rows, when his combination wrenches were neatly ranked in their holder, Michael paid attention:  Michael sat on a rolling shop stool, hunched forward, absolutely fascinated as his Pa's hands tore down the old wheel bearing assembly and sloshed it around in an old dishpan of gasoline, as he cleaned it off and inspected it closely and then came over under good light and said "Michael, take a look at this," and the two solemnly inspected the worn part, with his Pa pointing out this and pointing out that, and so each of the youngest Kellers learned their place in the world, and learned how to conduct themselves in the world, and learned about their duties in this world.

When Marnie showed up, though, all bets were off, and both Michael and Victoria wiped their mental slates clean and prepared to receive entirely new lessons.

Michael and Victoria sat cross-legged on a red-and-white tablecloth, their big sister Marnie sitting cross-legged in front of them:  Marnie wore a McKenna gown -- again, something perfectly normal in their young worldview: they were used to their Mama joining the Ladies of the Tea Society, and on occasion she'd dressed the two of them for the occasion (they had to sit very still and not fidget).

Sarah was reading to them, something in which they delighted: their pale eyed Pa read to them, with one twin on each thigh, with them sitting up and paying attention, and generally ending up slouched over against their Pa's chest, sound asleep, and being packed off to bed: their Mama read to them, sometimes she read to them as they sat on the back porch steps and she sat on an upturned five gallon bucket with a hair pillow for padding.

Wherever it was, the youngest of the Keller young, learned to love reading by being read to.

Today they sat cross-legged on a world far from Earth, listening to Marnie read an account written by a Navajo physician, an account called Bloody Shirt.

 

Jacob Keller sat on the schoolhouse bench, eyes on the lesson, ears listening to Mrs. Cooper, the schoolmarm.

Jacob was quiet and focused, solemn and unsmiling: unlike the other schoolboys his age, he had no time for the usual games and juvenile-masculine jousting that was part and parcel of growing up.

He'd survived horrors and genuine hell that burned away his childhood, scarring him internally almost as badly as his back, and his back was a hell-map of whip-scars from the beatings he'd been given by the murdering son of Perdition that beat his pregnant Mama to death and tried to horse whip him to death.

Jacob buried his Mama, in spite of his injuries, then he'd used the mule to drag the murderer's body out of the cabin -- he left a trail of gore as he was dragged out the door, as Jacob used the monster's own .44 revolver to blow a straight channel to Hell in one ear and out the other, as the monster lay drunk on the bed he'd shared with Jacob's Mama.

And so Jacob sat, still, unmoving, focused.

He honestly did not feel the pencil jab him in the back.

Scar tissue is often tougher than the original, and scar tissue is often not enervated like the original, and when Jacob did not respond to being jabbed in the back, his bullying tormentor tried using a knife -- just a light little poke.

Jacob still did not react.

His tormentor, frustrated, knowing if he were discovered he'd likely be punished, nevertheless persisted: he poked Jacob in the back several more times, hesitating when Jacob shifted.

Finally he poked a spot that wasn't scarred.

He honestly did not see Jacob move.

He did feel his wrist crackle.

Jacob spun, seized the wrist, twisted and pulled:  he dove, his eyes dead white and his face like a sheet of stretched parchment, bloodless and ghastly:  teeth bared, his other hand driving forward, he had his tormentor by the throat, the two of them went over backwards, the knife fell to the floor between the rows of benches.

Emma Cooper stopped, shocked, her hand drawing back slowly from the slate board in front: her hand faded downward until it touched the chalk trough, and she released the lump of genuine English chalk, her mouth open at the sight of her best and quietest student, Jacob Keller, bent over someone -- it was a someone, she saw legs kicking, waving in protest.

Emma Cooper snatched her skirts, ran down the aisle between the benches -- she heard her voice shouting "JACOB! JACOB KELLER, YOU STOP THAT!" -- horrified, she realized Jacob had another student by the throat, pinned to the floor, the student's face was a ghastly purple, his tongue out, Jacob's white-knuckled grip around both throat and an outflung wrist --

Emma Cooper saw the knife --

Emma Cooper bent, seized the back of Jacob's coat, and with the strength given to women in moments of need, she hauled the pale eyed son of the pale eyed Sheriff off the floor, at least until Jacob swung his arms and slipped out of the coat and landed on the student again -- this time seizing his tormentor's lapels and hauling him clear off the deck, shaking him like a terrier shakes a rat.

Emma Cooper stared, shocked.

The back of Jacob's shirt was streaked and shining with blood.

 

Later that day, the Sheriff rose as a father came into the Sheriff's office with his schoolboy son.

The Sheriff heard the man out, listened calmly while the man blustered, as he shouted, as he demanded, as his son stood there, pale, subdued.

"You done?"  Linn asked -- then without waiting for a reply, he surged forward, seized the man, spun him and slammed him into the wall:  a blade pressed against the man's neck.

"If you move," Linn said quietly, "I will get blood all over that nice white linen shirt. Would you like me to do that?"

Linn's pale eyes bored into the man's soul.

"I asked you a question, mister. Answer me."

"No," the father managed.

Linn drew the knife back, held it up.

"You see the blood on the tip?"

His hand released the man's shirt front seized his throat, slammed his head against the wall.

"I don't like to repeat myself."

"I see it."

"That's my son's blood and your son put it there."

Linn released his grip on the man's throat, backed up, laid the knife on his desk top.

He reached down, picked up a boy's shirt, held it up.

"This is my son's white linen shirt," he said, "and this is my son's blood."

Linn's voice was quiet.

He knew there was no need to speak loudly.

He very definitely had the other man's undivided.

"Your boy tried poking my boy in the back with a pencil and that wasn't enough, he had to use a knife."

The man was suddenly off his mental balance: this was not going at all like he'd planned, and he realized he was on the defensive -- not just that, he apparently had not a leg to stand on, thanks to his son.

He looked at his boy, looked at the knife.

"I gave you that knife," he said to his boy.

"Yes, sir."

"Sheriff, how bad is your boy hurt?"

Linn's eyes were hard, cold.

"He'll live."

 

Dr. George Flint wiped the wounds carefully with a clean rag dipped in boiled water: his face was without expression as he worked:  Nurse Susan watched, silent, ready to assist.

Dr. Greenlees would be working with a frown, almost a scowl, even if things were going really well; Dr. Flint ... well, Dr. Flint would probably play one hell of a hand of poker, she thought, for his expression did not change from the moment Jacob came in and handed his Pa his bloodied shirt.

"I'm sorry, sir," he'd said, "this wasn't my idea."

Dr. Flint inspected the several punctures: a few were deep enough he probed them, satisfying himself they did not get as far as the ribs: painful though this was, Jacob did not so much as flinch, not even when Dr. Flint gauged the depth on the one puncture that wasn't on an irregular ridge of scar tissue.

Jacob waited, expressionless, as the physician placed blunt, browned fingers on his ribs, under his armpits, bade him breathe in, deeply -- as the Doctor asked if there was any pain when he breathed -- he looked very directly into the Navajo's polished obsidian eyes as the Doctor spoke quietly, told him to let his Pa know immediately if there was a sudden pain when he breathed, and if he did, he should immediately lay down on the side where the pain was, and stay there until either the Doctor could get to him, or he could be brought to the Doctor.

Jacob indicated that he understood.

 

Marnie looked up, smiled.

"Dr. Flint wrote about it, and that's how Jacob got his Navajo name. Now who's for ice cream?"

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 20 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

"IS THAT WHAT I'M SUPPOSED TO DO?"

I went down on one knee.

My left arm was around Michael's waist.

My right arm was around Victoria's waist.

They were both looking with big and concerned eyes toward our barn.

I caught them before they could go running to the barn, before they could interfere with what I knew was necessary.

Victoria turned to me, hugged me, allowing herself to go from concerned-I-wanna-help-my-sister, to scared-Daddy-I-don't-know-what's-going on.

Michael was trembling, but only slightly: he looked at me with big scared eyes and said "Pa, how come they're fightin'?

"Your sisters ... Dana ..."
I bit my bottom lip, then I dropped my arms under their backsides, stood, carried them back toward the house.

"We need to talk."

 

Dana's face was darkening: she'd gone from pale to near-purple, and gone there fast:  Marnie was cool, dignified, outwardly calm.

Outwardly.

Dana was in a full-on, rip-it-apart RAGE.

"DAMN YOU, DON'T YOU DARE JUDGE ME! YOU WEREN'T THERE!"

"No," Marnie said quietly. "I wasn't."

"HOW DARE YOU TELL ME WHAT I SHOULD HAVE DONE!"

"I simply suggested I could've helped --"

Angela SLAMMED her hand down on the old workbench, rattling tools and cans of parts, screws, nails: she yanked her hand away, exposed a six point star.

"YOU SEE THAT?  DO YOU SEE IT?  THAT MEANS I AM RESPONSIBLE!

"ME! 

"I HAVE TO HANDLE IT!"

"Yes, I know that --"

"THEN WHERE DO YOU GET OFF, MISS HIGH AND MIGHTY " -- she spat the word -- "DIPLOMAT!" -- she paused for breath -- "WITH A CONFEDERATE WAR FLEET AT THE SNAP OF YOUR FINGERS, WHERE IN THE BLUE HAYIL!! DO YOU GET OFF TELLING ME WHAT I SHOULD HAVE DONE?"

Marnie blinked, touched her gloved fingertips delicately together in front of her:  she blinked, calmly, considered for several moments.

"Perhaps if we had some tea --"

"THERE WAS NO TIME TO GO RUNNING HOME LIKE A SCARED LITTLE GIRL, THERE WAS NO TIME TO CALL YOU AND SAY I'M SCARED, I DON'T WANT TO DO THIS, SEND ME SOME MAGICAL TECHNOLOGY SO I CAN USE A SCANNER TO FIND THE BAD GUYS AND THE VICTIMS! THERE WAS ME, THERE WAS ANGELA, THERE WAS TANK AND THAT WAS IT!"

Dana Keller's eyes lost the last trace of any color at all: her fingers were not fisted, they were clawed, her teeth bared, she crouched slightly, and Marnie heard a distinct, deep, animal snarl.

It was a beautiful snarl, really: Marnie was as musically inclined as all the women of her line, Marnie had perfect pitch, and Marnie, in a detached moment, recognized a harmony when she heard it.

She heard the harmony from beside her left leg, as something solid and furry leaned against her skirt, and Dana heard it from beside her, as something solid and furry leaned against her denim-covered leg.

Each of the pale eyed Keller ladies reached down, laid a gentling hand on the white-furred head of a yellow-eyed wolf.

 

Linn set Michael and Victoria down: he was already in a squat, he went the rest of the way onto his bony backside and crossed his legs like Big Chief Mug Wump.

His two six year old children did the same.

"Michael."

"Yes, sir?"

"Michael, what are actuarial tables?"

Michael blinked, frowned, looked up, puzzled.

"I don't know, sir."

Linn smiled, just a little, and two childrens' hearts relaxed, just a little:  here in the house, they could not hear what was (or was not) transpiring in the barn.

"Actuarial tables are something the insurance firms use to determine their rates, according to the risk of paying out money."

Michael frowned, clearly not understanding.

"Insurance companies keep track of every profession and every avocation and they adjust their insurance premium payments accordingly.  

"Oh."

"The actuarial tables show us that men die earlier than women, in most cases."

"How come?"  Michael went from distressed to curious like the turning of a card.

Linn steepled his fingers.

"Michael, if I bang my thumb with a hammer when I'm trying to drive a nail, what do I do?"

Michael grinned -- he frowned, glared at his thumb, shook it and then shoved his bottom jaw out with a scowl.

"What would your Mama do if she banged her thumb just as hard?"

Michael slung his hand vigorously, gripped it with the other hand, clutched it to his breast, rocked a little and howled in a juvenile exaggeration of what he'd seen his Mama do in the past.

Linn snapped his fingers -- which ended Michael's performance -- "Exactly," he said.

"Now. Let's take this further. Why do men die of heart attacks more often then women?"

"Women have silent heart attack," Victoria protested.

"Yes they do," Linn nodded, looking directly at her with a wink: "women often don't realize that's what's happening, but we're learning better, aren't we?"

Angela nodded solemnly.  "Mommy said so too!"

"Yes she did. Unfortunately what do men do when they're having a heart attack?"

Michael frowned, then looked at his Pa, concerned:  "They die?"

"Too often they do," Linn agreed. "Y'see, Michael, men are taught from birth" -- he straightened his spine, threw back his shoulders, struck a Heroic Pose of a Greek God, which brought giggles from his youngest -- "Men hide when they're hurt. Remember last time we ate at the Silver Jewel, your Mama came out of her seat and grabbed that fella?"

Michael and Victoria were big-eyed and solemn again, remembering the scene.

"The fellow was choking. He didn't want to make a scene at the table so he headed for the men's room. He got three steps and started to collapse and your Mama ran her knee under his backside, bear hugged him and Heimliched him three times, hard."

"Mama saved his life," Victoria said with an emphatic nod, and her pale eyed Daddy grinned.

"Yes she did," he agreed, "but if that fellow had fell down and nobody cleared his airway ...?"

"He'd have died," two young voices said softly.

"Exactly. Women have sense enough to go to the doctor when something is wrong. Men -- too often -- will say it's just gas, or something I ate, or it'll go away on its own, and men die."

"Oh."  Two children sat, cross-legged and blinking, taking all this in.

"Now -- about Dana and Marnie."

"Daddy, howcomewhyizzit --" Michael blurted, and Victoria blurted "Daddy, howcum they're fightin --"

Linn raised his hands, smiled gently.

"Dana had a really bad day at work," he explained.

"She shot seven guys that tried to kidnap her," Michael said with the positive knowledge of a little child. "They said so at school."

"Wasn't quite like that," Linn corrected in a gentle voice, "but we can't say a word about it, not to anybody."

Two children nodded solemnly.

"Yes she did have to kill someone. It's hard on a good man when it's a righteous shoot. She had to kill the bad guys to keep them from killing her. She did the right thing and her conscience is clear, but it's still hard on a good clean conscience to know they've sent someone to hell. Dana has kept it inside too long. She has to make a statement tomorrow and Marnie came home to help her."

"But how come they're fightin', Daddy?" Victoria asked, distressed.

"They're not," Linn smiled. "They're clearing the air, Dana is discharging all that held-back stress all at once, and Marnie is the lightning rod."

"Ouch," Michael whispered.

Linn nodded.  "It's not easy," he agreed.

 

"I overstepped myself," Marnie said quietly. "I'm sorry."

Dana glared at her, one hand on a White Wolf's shoulder, caressing its silky, snowy fur.

"You're right. You had to handle it, you were responsible for it and you did your job."

Marnie's gloved hand was busy in another White Wolf's silky fur.

"I only wish --"

"Don't," Dana warned.

Marnie stopped, closed her eyes: she nodded.

"You're right," she said quietly. "I came across as judgmental. I'm sorry."

"Maybe it's a good thing," Dana said, willing herself to calm: the White Wolf helped -- somehow she was not surprised at the she-wolf's presence, somehow she wasn't surprised that she knew this was a female, lending her quiet reassurance in a difficult moment.

"Oh?"

Dana smiled with half her face.

"I have to give my official statement tomorrow."

"You have a lawyer" -- it was a statement, not a question.

Dana nodded. "I have."

"A specialist?"

"The best."

"A lawyer who specializes in defending the innocent, not the guilty."

"Damn right," Dana muttered.  

"Good. A defense attorney who's used to defending the guilty will pleabargain you straight into a prison sentence."

"Don't I know it," Dana spat. "Saw that too many times."

Marnie tilted her head a little.  "There's more to you than meets the eye."

"How's that?"

Dana looked at the workbench, picked up her badgeholder and its six point star, slid them back into a pocket.

"When you realized you had to break the shot, I was just finishing some sensitive negotiations. I was standing at the head table. On my right, running away from me, negotiators from one hard-headed, hard-bargaining group. On my left, opposite the first, negotiators from another hard-headed, hard-bargaining group. They'd just come to accord, we'd just finalized the signatures, and my friend here" -- she looked down at the white wolf, who was leaning companionably against her leg, ears laid back with pleasure at the attention she was getting -- "appeared at the far end of the tables.

"She came trotting up between them, straight toward me, and I felt -- for the moment, I became you, and I felt your realization that you had to take the shot, and I felt the sear break as you pulled the trigger.

"I stepped back and said 'Gentlemen, forgive me, I must go prevent a war,' and I triggered the Iris.

"In that moment, the entire fleet of Starfighters, every last one of them, woke up and laid in a course for Earth.

"I stepped out of my Iris into the mothership just in time to hear General Quarters sound."

Marnie smiled, shook her head.

"Helen of Troy started a war," she sighed. "You had thirteen star systems of hell-raising Confederates ready to mobilize on your behalf."

 

"Sir?" Michael asked, frowning a little.

"Yes, Michael?"

"Sir ... Dana was yelling, real loud ..."

Linn nodded.

Michael was uncertain, processing everything he'd been told.

"Sir, is that what I'm supposed to do?"

 

 

Edited February 21 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

McKENNA INVESTIGATION AND APPREHENSION

 

An orange mist enveloped a stranger wearing a ghillie suit.

What was left of a can of bear spray spun off to the side, clattered to the ground: the camo-wrapped, long-lensed camera fell on its neckstrap, forgotten.

His hand stung, he squinted his eyes, then shut them, stumbling blindly uphill, away from the choking cloud: it was suddenly very hard to breathe, he was instantly nauseated, the skin around his eyes felt on fire.

A silent guardian with a rifle drew back, motioned: something bearlike, something very black, with feral-yellow eyes, obediently joined the rifleman.

The two descended the hillside, silent, as the morning’s updraft carried the yellowish cloud away from them, away from an unsuccessful attempt to get photographs of certain residents of the Sheriff’s ranch.

Later that day, two drones fell from the sky above the same ranch, their electronics confused, scrambled by a focused, high energy pulse: these were collected, sent to a certain Federal agency, and charges preferred against those who wished to get aerial photos of the home of two of the Sheriff’s deputies, both of whom were recently involved in line of duty shootings.

When two strangers in a rented sedan tried to turn up the Sheriff’s driveway, they were met by a grinning boy on a shining-red Farmall tractor sitting crosswise of the roadway, a post hole digger swinging from the three-point hitch and fresh dirt on its auger: when one blew the car’s horn impatiently, the boy raised a talkie, lowered it, smiled, and shut the tractor’s engine off.

Within one minute, a Sheriff’s cruiser arrived and the pair, after a brief discussion, decided it would be better to depart, rather than be arrested for harassment and trespass.

 

Deputy Sheriff Angela Keller testified.

She was as collected, as parsimonious in her replies, as her pale eyed father.

When challenged as to the need for use of deadly force, Angela asked for a particular exhibit: a photograph was projected on the courtroom’s big screen, showing a pistol in close proximity to a limp, finger-curled hand.

A second photograph, showing evidence markers, little yellow plastic tents with big black numbers, placed over fired shell casings, so the empty hulls could be seen by the camera.

“Deadly force was directed at me,” she said.

“Your testimony,” the prosecutor said, referring unnecessarily to handwritten notes on a yellow pad, “was – and I quote here – “It was completely dark.”  Is that still your testimony, Deputy?  I remind you, you are under oath. How could you possibly have seen anything?”

Angela turned her head, addressed the Judge.

“If the Bailiff will pass me my shotgun.”

“I’ll allow it.”

The bailiff picked up the shotgun, looked at the uniformed, pale eyed deputy on the witness stand.

“Confirm empty.”

“Confirmed empty.”

“Confirm the evidence strap is run through the action and loading gate and that this renders the weapon inoperable.”

“Inoperability confirmed.”

Angela stood, stepped down from the witness stand, raised her chin to someone in back.

There was the brittle *click* of a circuit breaker being thrown; the courtroom went dark, then a bright circle of pure-white light shone on the ceiling.

Angela could be seen in its reflected light, holding the shotgun, muzzle-up.

“I have a light on my shotgun,” she said. “Very useful in dark places.”

Angela pursed her lips, whistled a gentle, three-note whip-por-will, and the courtroom lights came back on.

Angela handed the shotgun back to the bailiff and resumed her seat.

The inquest continued; Angela was professional, Angela was polite, Angela was uniformed as a Sheriff’s deputy, and the only crack in her impenetrable personal shield was when she was asked about her other professions and how this line-of-duty shooting affected her.

“I am a nurse,” she said, “and as a result of the media declaring me an ‘Angel of Mercy, Angel of Death’” – the screen lit up again, a screenshot of an evening news broadcast, bearing that title in high-contrast letters – “I’ve been fired from my nursing position in the City.”

Her lip curled into a sneer as she added, “It seems their administration doesn’t want nurses who can keep people safe.”

“Wouldn’t you say that’s a fair statement, though?”

“Objection!”

“I’ll answer,” Angela snapped, her jaw hardening: her eyes were pale, her glare challenged the prosecutor.

“My job,” she said, her voice cold enough to frost the air as she spoke, “is to keep people alive. I do that however I must. As a nurse, I use medical procedures. As a Sheriff’s deputy, I have a variety of tools. As a human, I recognize I cannot keep anyone alive if I’m dead!”

She looked at the screenshot, still glowing on the screen, thrust her chin at it.

“I didn’t ask for that. All I wanted was to retrieve the hostage, alive and unharmed.”

She glared at the prosecutor, her final words an open challenge.

“We did that.”

When the jury returned, it was with a no-bill.

 

Dana’s inquest was that afternoon; she, too, was no-billed.

Two pale eyed sisters walked out of the courthouse, two uniformed deputies with pale eyes, side by side.

The ladies of the Tea Society filed out with them, flowing around them, flanking them, preceding them as they descended the marble courthouse stairs, a pastel cloud of feminine support and encouragement: that same day, the Tea Society discreetly communicated to the Sheriff that they would like to continue their use-of-force lessons, especially those geared to the feminine use of the defensive shotgun – at a time that would not attract unwanted, negative attention:  the Sheriff bundled the inquiring mother in his arms, hugged her carefully, tilted his head so as not to disturb the fashionable hat pinned to her elaborate coiffure, then whispered, “Thank you for your discretion,” and then released his hug, stopped at arm’s length, his fingertips gently on the upper arms of her McKenna gown.

“We’ll arrange that.”

 

Angela Keller, in her white uniform, held up sterile-gloved hands: she had six student nurses from three different worlds, in their blue-and-white-striped uniform dresses and pastel-blue, winged caps: outside, the sky glowed a soft green, as it did when one of the planet’s two suns was only just slid below the horizon.

Angela stood on one side of the post-operative patient's bed, a student on either side of her; the others stood on the other side of the bed, silent, attentive.

“I had an instructor,” she said in her gentle voice, “who could not teach her way out of a wet paper bag. I learned absolutely nothing from her words, but my Daddy taught me to watch the hands.

“Her hands knew the work.

Her hands taught me more than any word she ever uttered.”

Angela looked around, laughed a little.

“I hope I’m not that bad!”

Student nurses from three worlds laughed a little, relaxed: Angela was their favorite instructor.

“Now here’s how I want to see you change this surgical dressing One hand clean, one hand not, like this.”

 

A City detective laughed quietly as he read the report on his computer screen.

His partner slouched over, sleeves rolled up partway, necktie askew, a coffee in each hand: he set one tall paper cup down on his partner’s desk, dropped his hip indolently on the corner of the desk.

“So are you reading the report or a comedy routine?”

His partner laughed again, grinned at his partner.

“You recall that harassment case we got handed?”

“Yeah, sexual harassment instead of going after real criminals. Waste of time. Why?”

“It’s solved.”

“What?”  He came around, read over his partner’s shoulder: the two were silent, scrolling slowly through statements, photographs, more statements.

“Whoa. Back that up.”

Secretary said a candidate for a job opening went into subject’s office.

Secretary opened intercom as instructed by investigator and began recording as instructed by investigator.

Secretary heard subject discuss proper attire and actions required, recording attached.

Candidate stated she was not going to dress like a schoolgirl for him or for anyone else and she was not going to perform sexual favors for him or anyone else.

Sounds of scuffle ensued.

Candidate said in loud voice “Let go of me!”

Subject replied “I like it when they fight.”

Subject was observed exiting office without benefit of opening door first, photograph of broken door attached.

Candidate is reported to have landed on subject like proverbial ton of bricks, secretary’s words, recording attached.

Candidate is said to have handcuffed subject and informed subject that he would behave himself or he would be thrown through another door.

Subject behaved.

One detective laughed, the other patted his partner on the shoulder.

“Who in the hell did you get?” he asked. “Is that her picture?”

“That’s her, pretending to be the candidate. She looks like a high-school girl, doesn’t she?”

“SHE put a man through a closed door?”

“Yyyep.”

“Dayum!” – then, “Who is she?  Can we get her hired on?”

“No, she’s taken. She’s got a side gig – I’ve got her card.  Here.”

His partner took the card, read it aloud.

“McKenna Investigation and Apprehension,” he read, “Home of the Black Agent.”

He looked at the candidate’s image, still on his partner’s screen.

“She’s not black,” he protested.

“She said black is her favorite color,” her partner shrugged. “Especially for night ops.”

“Cute girl, though.”

“Cute?” his partner snorted. “Look at those eyes.”

He touched the screen, pinched his fingers open, enlarged the candidate’s image.  “Look at those eyes, Buddy Joe.”

His partner leaned closer, swore.

“Those are the eyes of a polished marble statue, amigo,” the detective said quietly. “I don’t know what hell that pretty little girl saw in her lifetime, but with those eyes?  She could kill you three times before you hit the floor and go home and sleep with a clean conscience.”

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 22 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE MALL

 

Angela Keller was Woman of the House.

She was the last of the retired Sheriff’s children still living at home.

She was engaged to a fine young man, and she was worried about leaving her Daddy, because she knew the old lawman with the iron grey mustache was nearly blind now, and she’d gone to great lengths to preserve the illusion that he was still as strong and as capable as he’d ever been.

She’d presented the fiction that perhaps arthritis made writing less than comfortable, and so she became his personal secretary: given this arrangement, it came as no surprise to her that her Daddy knocked the corner of his chair with the side of his boot, bent a little to plant his palm on the padded arm, then turned and seated himself.

“Angela,” he said quietly, “if I may, I would make an entry.”

“Of course,” she said: he heard the rolltop desk slide open, heard the drawer, and in his mind’s eye he saw his daughter, a woman now, brisk and efficient: his imagination populated the room with her image, opening the ink-bottle, dipping the quill and wiping it delicately on the inside of the faceted glass, her other hand’s fingertips slipping good rag foolscap under the ribbon that held it on the felt writing surface.

“I thought most strongly of Joseph this day,” he dictated.

“It was near to five-thirty, or so said the Parson when I asked him.

“I had the sudden feeling that my grandson Joseph was in peril.

“I felt as I had in battle, something I’ve not felt for some long time now.

“I felt keen to join in the fight, as if it were possible to shed the scales from my eyes and stride with Tarquin’s boots across the salt water ocean and side with my kindred in battle.”

Angela’s blue eyes looked quickly at the back of her Daddy’s head, just visible above the back of his comfortable old chair: she wrote steadily, catching up with his thoughts as he hesitated.

“I fear that my grandson has come to some ill fortune in that damned French war.

“His father forbade his going.

“I knew the folly of forbidding him this thing, for I myself was gulled into war by the slick and silvered tongue of a German recruiter, back in the Ohio territory.”

He hesitated again and added softly, “Back when I was a young man, back when I was but newly wed.”

Dana dipped her pen quickly, resumed writing: her hand was quick, feminine, graceful, very legible: Old Pale Eyes paused, as if staring through the window at a memory only he could see.

 

Marnie stepped through the Iris into her Daddy’s study, planted her knuckles on her belt.

“Well!” she declared happily. “You two knew I was coming!”

Two young heads nodded solemnly at her happy pronouncement.

“Are you here to fight again?” Victoria asked almost sadly.

Marnie folded her legs, knelt gracefully, opened her arms for a hug, gathered a double armful of apprehensive young humanity to her.

“No, sweets,” she murmured, kissing one, then the other: “I am so very sorry for that. I should have put a damping-field around the barn so you couldn’t have heard us.”

“We felt you,” Michael said accusingly, and Marnie sighed, nodded.

“That’s why I’m here,” Marnie admitted.

“You felt Dana too.”

“Yes, I did.”

“Will she take an Iris home?”

Marnie smiled, shook her head.

“No, sweets, I’m afraid she’ll come home the regular way.”

“Why? You take the Iris.”

“That’s because I’m a diplomat.”

“Oh.”  Michael frowned.

“What did Dana do?” Victoria asked, hugging her rag doll to her like something precious, pressing her nose into its yellow yarn spray of hair.

“I’m not really sure, sweets,” Marnie admitted.

“We know she had a battle, but I don’t think she went to war.”

 

Dana Keller held the dress up, looked at her Mama, held the dress against her front.

“Well?” she asked. “Too summery?”

“Mmm, you’re pushing the season a little,” Shelly replied.  “How about … this one?”

“Ugh, that looks like a couch cover!”

Shelly held it out, looked at it again, hung it back up.

“Yes it does. Uncle Will has a couch cover with that same print.”

“I could wear it and become invisible.”

Shelly dropped her head as if to glare over an invisible set of spectacles.

A hand grabbed Dana’s upper arm, pulled.

Shelly wasn’t sure quite what happened, only that someone was suddenly rolling over in mid-air, landed hard against a rack of dresses: Dana had this someone’s arm in a pain-compliance grip – arm twisted, wrist bent – someone out in the main part of the mall was yelling “SECURITY! SECURITY!” – Shelly stood, wide-eyed, shocked –

One moment they were a mother and daughter, shopping at the mall, and the next, her daughter had some Jack Doe by the arm and was bringing a pained yell from him –

Uniformed security came running in, reached for the yellow crossdraw Taser –

Angela thrust her hand straight up, her badge holder displayed plainly, her other hand maintaining an iron grip on her attacker’s bent, groaning wrist:  “SHERIFF’S OFFICE! ON THE JOB!”

 

Sheriff Linn Keller’s head came up, as if he heard something, distantly, something that demanded his attention.

Dana, he thought.

He felt the sudden blast of passion subside to a smoldering level, knew that his daughter’s feelings were under control, that she had a situation controlled, that she herself was controlled.

He knew that she was still mad as hell, but she was no longer ready to rip someone apart barehand.

Capable of it, but not about to do it.

His cell phone rang.

He pulled it out, looked at the screen.

Shelly, he thought: he swiped the screen, tapped it.

“Yes, dear.”

He listened to Shelly’s brief report, nodded: “I’ll send backup.”

Sheriff Linn Keller reached for his desk phone, punched in a number from memory.

“Sheriff Keller, Firelands County. Give me the Chief.”

 

“Mar-nie?”

“Yes, sweets?” 

Marnie by now was cross legged, her long skirt puddled out around her, the youngest of the Keller Brigade cross legged on her skirt material.

“How come we felt you an’ Dana?”

The Iris opened again and Angela stepped out, smiling as she usually did:  she knelt beside her sister, tilted her head a little as she looked at the six year old twins.

“Because they were impassioned,” Angela replied.

“That means really mad,” Michael said with a knowing nod.

“I know that,” Victoria protested.

Angela held up her palms. “We all felt it,” she said, “even Jacob and Ruth’s baby felt it. Woke him up crying.”

“Uh-oh,” Michael said, and he and his twin sister shared a look, and an understanding: strong emotion would be felt throughout this invisible network, and they didn’t want to wake the baby!

“I’ll bet they’d make good Interceptor pilots,” Angela speculated.

“You’re readin’ my mind?” Marnie said offhandedly. “If they grow up as a Brainship … they’ll have integrated more fully than anyone has to date.”

“What about the energy demands? You know how flighty children are, they’ll want to pop from this galaxy to that without regard for the distance.”

“Energy demand is nearly zero. It’s not like you’re using a reaction engine and burning tons of fuel to move pounds.”

“You better talk to Pa ‘bout that,” Michael said, a warning note in his young voice. “I’m not old ‘nuff to drive yet. I don’t think Pa wants me flyin’ no In-ter-cep-tor until I can drive.”

 

Dana Keller’s eyes were dead pale as she spoke with the prosecutor.

“First, he assaulted a law enforcement officer.

“Second, he had a lock back knife, a criminal record and he admitted he’d just made threats to cut his girlfriend’s face if she dared to see whoever he’d accused her of seeing.

“Third, he grabbed me.”

Dana folded her arms, gave the prosecutor the full benefit of her cold glare.

“He already confessed that he thought I was his girlfriend.”

She raised a hand, a finger with each point:  “Motive, means, opportunity, if I hadn't thrown him over my shoulder and taken his wrist out of joint, he would've taken a knife to me and I'd had to've shot him and that would mean serious inconvenience and a bloody ton of paperwork."

She separated her words and spoke quietly, which carried more weight than if she'd screamed the words in his face.

"I,  want,   him,   charged!”

Deputy Sheriff Dana Keller, wearing a tailored suit dress, heels and an absolutely icy expression, leaned across the prosecutor’s desk, her blanched-white knuckles pressed into his desktop.

Her voice was as hard and as cold as her eyes.

She spoke quietly.

There was no need to raise her voice.

“Nobody – and I mean nobody – grabs a Sheriff’s deputy and gets away with it!”

“You’ll have to sign the complaint.”

“Sign it hell, I am preferring charges as a law enforcement officer!”

 

Linn Keller sat at the head of the supper table, looked around at his family assembled.

Everyone except Jacob was there – they had two leaves in the table so everyone would fit – the girls all worked their magic while Linn and Michael retreated to Linn’s study; both were willing to help, but both realized they’d just be in the way.

Linn looked around the table, and the family looked back at him, and they saw his eyes tighten a little at the corners, the way they did before his smile spread to the rest of his face.

“Now this is proper,” he said softly, then he bowed his head and talked to his plate.

 

“Mar-nie?” Michael asked hesitantly as his big sis started toward the Iris.

Marnie stopped, turned, tilted her head a little. “Yes?”

“Marnie, did Old Pale Eyes feel stuff too? Like we did?”

Marnie considered, then smiled: she and Angela looked at a particular shelf in their Daddy’s study, a shelf that contained the reprinted Journals.

“Volume six?” Dana asked.

“I’m betting seven.”

Marnie reached up, pulled down volumes six and seven:  Linn rose, offered his chair, stood back as Marnie settled into his desk chair, turned on the green-glass-shaded lamp, paged quickly from the back of the journal, toward the front.

She was looking for a change in handwriting.

The last volume, she knew, was finished out in a masculine hand – Jacob’s hand, after Old Pale Eyes passed away – but before that, the handwriting was delicate, feminine, quite lovely, actually.

They felt her satisfaction when she found the entry she was looking for.

She looked up at Angela, smiled.

“You’re right. Volume Seven.”

She pulled a dainty little set of slender, rectangular, wire rimmed spectacles from somewhere in her bodice, slipped them on her face and ran them halfway down her nose, and managed to look very proper as she did.

“This entry,” she said, “mentions a previous entry, when the Old Sheriff felt his grandson’s charging into his final battle. He didn’t feel him killed, but he felt the warrior’s attack.”

She looked up, looked at Michael.

“That was in the very early days of the First World War, so yes. Yes, Michael, we’ve been able to feel… it … for a very long time, and probably further back than Old Pale Eyes.”

“Cool,” Michael breathed.

Victoria looked at Michael, distressed.

“Butbutbut … I can’t get away with nothin’,” she wailed.

Linn laughed quietly, bent down, hugged his darlin’ daughter from behind.

“Do you remember,” he whispered in her ear, “how your Mama knows stuff?”

Victoria nodded hesitantly.

“Your Mama knew when Jacob fell off a horse and broke his arm, and him half a county away. Your Mama knew when you fell and scraped your knee. Your Mama knew when I was bringin’ her flowers on the sly and tryin’ to surprise her.”

Victoria nodded, frowning the way a little girl will when faced with great and immutable truths.

“Mamas always know. We can’t get away with nothin’. Never been able to, never will!”

“Oh,” Victoria said, her bottom lip pooched out, disappointed.

Angela and Dana shared a look with each other, then with Marnie: the three nodded, a silent understanding passing between them:  That won’t stop her from trying.

And it didn’t.

 

 

Edited February 23 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

TRAIN LEAVES IN FIFTEEN MINUTES

Jacob didn't care for the man even before he opened his mouth.

He cared less when this dandified stranger with the fancy stick-pin in his puffy silk necktie said "You there! You're what's-his-name's boy!"

Jacob Keller, in many eyes, his own included, was a man grown: he was fifteen, he was doing a man's work, and he didn't see himself as anyone's "boy."

He turned so he was almost squared-off to this dandy when he said mildly, "Don't know anyone by either of those names, mister."

Jacob's moves and Jacob's words had been deceptively slow.

His knife wasn't.

The stranger's jaw came out, his nose came up and he uncorked a backhand at Jacob's face.

Jacob's knife was in his grip, the blade was laid back along his forearm and he raised the blade to block.

The stranger's hand was laid open and bleeding: shocked, he grabbed at it, then held it from him, gripped his wrist, looked around, wide-eyed.

"You might want to get outside before you bleed all over Mr. Baxter's clean floor," Jacob said:  Mr. Baxter tossed him a wet bar towel and Jacob wiped his blade, slowly, deliberately, dried it with the dry end of the towel, slid it back into its sheath and tossed the towel back.

The stranger gasped, squeezing his wrist, shocked at how badly he was bleeding, staggred at the sight of his hand laid open, almost split in two.

Jacob grabbed the dandy's coatsleeve, pulled.

Hard. 

"Let's get you to the Doc," he said unsympathetically.

They left a plainly marked, very red trail from the saloon to the still-under-construction, quartz-front hospital.

 

The next day, an Eastern dandy with a diamond stickpin in his puffy silk necktie presented himself officiously at the Sheriff's office: his hand was well and tightly bandaged, he'd gotten a clean suit from his traveling trunk while the blood was being saltwater soaked out of what he'd been wearing.

A pale eyed lawman with an iron grey mustache rose as the man came in.

He did not rise out of respect.

He rose because he wanted a good like at this spalpeen who thought it proper to backhand someone who didn't kiss his royal backside.

The stranger removed his immaculate low-topper.

"Sheriff Keller, I presume."

Linn nodded, once.

"J. Foster Franklinton," the man declared, as if that meant something.

The Sheriff waited.

"I wish to file charges."

Again the slow, silent nod.

"I was set upon by a local villain and my hand nearly cut off my arm!"

"Your hand was split because you tried to backhand my son," Linn said quietly.

"I -- you -- your son?" -- his voice went from bluster to stammer and back: only then did he realize the absolute lack of welcome, the utter absence of any sympathy in the man's stance, his face, the depth of icy frost in his polished-glacier eyes.

"I can see I'll find no justice here --"

Linn was across the room in two strides.

He seized the stranger by the front of his coat, hoist him off the floor, brought his nose within a half inch of the other's pencil-thin mustache.

"Major Jackass Franklinton," Linn grated. 

"Oh dear God," Franklinton whispered, the words slipping out before he could stop them.  "You!"

"You're damned right, me," Linn said. "You threatened to have me hanged. When you got stepped on by three separate officers and you were told to pull in your horns and shut your mouth, you allowed as you'd ruin me."

Linn set the man down, his face pale, the skin stretched taut over his high cheekbones.

Linn fell back a half step and backhanded the dandy: the impact snapped the man's head around and blood sprayed from pulped lips.

Linn peeled out of his coat, tossed it behind him, onto the desk.

"You arrogant jackass," Linn grated. "You tried walking with hard heels over everyone you could during that damned War. You got laughed at to your face and nobody followed your orders. You were transferred because higher-up knew if they didn't, the enlisted would pull your drawers down and bend you over a log, they'd take a belt to your backside and run you out of camp nekked and they didn't want an officer humiliated to that degree, so they just transferred you."

Franklinton dabbed at the corner of his mouth with a kerchief.

"You try that out here, it'll get you killed. Your hand will never be the same. Doc said it will heal -- eventually."

"You can't do this," he gasped in a husky voice, looking at the bloodied kerchief, touching bruised and swelling lips, his eyes wide, shocked.  "You can't do this!"

Linn's jaw slid out.

"I just backhanded you, you damned coward," he spat. "That is an honorable man's challenge to a duel of honor. You will choose the time, the place and the weapons, or by God Almighty, I will!"

"The Code Duello," the other protested. "A second -- and at dawn --"

Linn drew his left hand Colt, with his left hand, he drew his knife with his right, spun the blade easily between his fingers.

"Knives or guns," he said. "Unless you'd prefer a broad ax?"

Franklinton shuddered.

He'd been watching as Linn fought, roaring defiance as their position was overrun, as he launched his last round from his musket and lay about with the butt and the bayonet, and there at the end, when the bayonet stuck in a man's ribs and the broken rifle twisted from his hands, he'd snatched up an ax from a nearby wood-pile and lay about, a madman in a blue uniform and bloodied face, slaying absolutely at the top of his lungs.

Franklinton remembered seeing this, shook his head: he raised his good hand, palm toward the silently-snarling Sheriff, cowered away from the man:  he took a step back, another, then turned and ran, snatched for the door, yanked it open in a blind panic and ran, ran without looking, ran from Death itself that remembered his crimes and wished a reckoning.

Something caught him hard in the gut, something that doubled him over and knocked every bit of wind out of him: a leg hooked behind his ankle, he went down on his backside, a foot stomped on his chest, flattened him to the boardwalk.

A set of pale eyes looked down on him from a face without a mustache, a face that bore a remarkable resemblance to the man within.

Jacob Keller bent, shoved something into Franklinton's vest pocket.

"That," he said, "is a train ticket. It's good today. After that" -- he smiled, and the smile was not pleasant -- "I might think you want to cause some more trouble."

Fifteen year old Jacob Keller's smile was utterly without humor.

"Your trunk is already in yonder carriage. Train leaves in fifteen minutes. Don't miss it."

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

LORD SAVE US FROM THE CURSE

 "Sir?"

"Yes, Jacob?"

Jacob drove his post hole diggers into the hole he'd made, brought out the last of the dirt, set the diggers to the side and looked at his father.

"Sir, I do believe this is the first I've ever known someone to've bought dirt!"

Linn smiled quietly, nodded.

They'd gone to the depot and loaded the crate into the wagon, they'd brought the wagon around behind the house and dropped the tail gate, they'd opened the crate and shoveled dirt into a wheelbarrow half full of year old horse manure.

Jacob had no question as to the ancient manure: he well knew it takes a year to burn the fire out, so when it's used as fertilizer, it won't burn up your plants: he knew his father spent good money to buy fruit tree saplings, and he was paying close attention as to how the man installed them.

He and Linn laid out where the trees would go.

Linn had them well spaced, not exactly in straight lines, but rather in lines that followed the gentle slope's contour:  Jacob imagined fruit trees, grown and matured, and he realized a man could ride a horse between them -- riding to the left of one, the right of the next, at a wide open gallop: Jacob's pale eyes smiled a little at the thought of a controlled gallop, weaving in between the trees just as hard as a good horse can run.

Jacob and his father patiently packed water and dumped into the holes before adding the half-and-half of Northern Ohio dirt and well aged horse manure: the sprouted saplings were rooted in the exact center of each hole, water added.

"Sir, you do nothing without reason."

Linn considered this as he added a sapling to a hole, scraped dirt in around it.

"Sir ... there's dirt to be had closer than Ohio."

Linn nodded, slowly:  he went down on his other knee, carefully added dirt to the hole.

"Jacob," he said, "this dirt comes from the farm I had, back East."

"Sir?"

They moved on to the next hole.

"I was married, Jacob."

"Yes, sir?"

"I got slick talked into that damned War, and may God Almighty forgive my corroded soul for that."

"For the War, sir?"

"No.  No, Jacob, I left my wife and my farm to go off to that damned War."

Jacob didn't quite understand, so he held his counsel and waited.

"My wife and our little girl died of the small pox while I was gone."

Jacob stopped, looked very directly at his father, his face grave.

"I wish I'd died instead," Linn said softly. "Connie was ... she was my anchor, Jacob, she was my lighthouse. She was the only bright spot of sanity in a world gone insane."

"Yes, sir."

"She ... I got home a week to the day that she died, and our little girl died in my arms that night."

"I see, sir."

Linn struggled to his feet, as if he were suddenly old: he leaned against the wagon's tailgate, stared off at the far horizon.

"This dirt," he said softly, "is from that farm."

Linn looked down the curving row of freshly planted apple trees.
"I'll forever have something ... I loved her, Jacob. I loved that woman."

Linn's voice was quiet, his guard was down: Jacob knew his father was vulnerable, and he was thinking hard, trying to come up with something -- something that wouldn't bruise a man whose heart was hanging out on his sleeve.

Linn closed his eyes, took a long breath, looked at the row of freshly planted saplings.

"A man plants trees as an investment in the future," he said softly, then looked at his son and smiled, just a little.

"Drive the wagon up behind the house, Jacob. I'm going to spade up Esther's table garden and this dirt will do it good."  Linn gripped the time-smoothed handles of the wheelbarrow.

Jacob swarmed into the wagon, picked up the reins, clucked to the dapple: horse and wagon and a crate and a half of good black northern Ohio dirt, rumbled the short distance up the hill toward the house.

Father and son laid out the table garden, based on Esther's preference: they dug steadily, spaded up space enough and more, dumped in dirt and burnt out horse manure and worked this in: by the time they were done, they could smell supper, and their stomachs reminded them they were about starved plumb to death.

Father and son turned the mare into the back field, stacked their garden tools and washed up: they were just pumping fresh water for their ablutions when Parson Belden came around the house, grinning.

"If I'd known you two were at labor, I'd have helped you out!" he declared. "Water enough for me to wash my dirty cotton pickers?"

Linn laughed, nodded. "Pull up some dishpan, Parson, been looking forward to your comin' around!"

That evening, as they sat down to supper, Linn asked the Parson to speak the blessing.

Jacob honestly never remembered how the Parson's blessing started, nor did he recall the most of what he said.

His memory was too amused by the Parson's final words:

"... and Lord, spare us the curse of the long winded preacher, AAA-men!"

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

A WEEK

Jacob Keller looked at his wife.

Jacob was lean, like his father; he had pale eyes, like his father; his voice was quiet, reassuring, at least when he spoke to his wife, or to his children, or to his horses.

Just like his father.

Jacob did not, however, have a wife like his father.

Esther Keller, daughter of culture and gentility, was of a more genteel upbringing than Jacob's wife Annette: in fairness, though, Annette did not see her father murdered by Yankee raiders, nor did she listen to her mother's and her sisters' screams as they were dragged away and despoiled by those same damned Yankees.

Esther did as her Papa told her -- she hid -- she hid with her Papa's prize racer, cowering in thick brush behind the rearmost tobacco-shed.

Esther was shivering with rage: her Papa was defiant, even when gut shot: he swung a hard-knuckled fist at the murderers who clubbed him down, snapped a noose taut about his neck and hoist him in his own front yard, to strangle and kick his last.

Esther had her Papa's dueling-pistols, one in each hand, and when a pair of raiders spotted her, she raised them both and fired them both simultaneously, and she sent two damned bluecoat Yankees to the hell they most richly deserved, then she dropped the empty pistols, snatched up her skirts and ran, ran as if the Devil himself was after her, ran with the full knowledge that Old Cloven Hoof was very real and lived in the hearts of every last one of these damned Yankee bluecoat ravening monsters.

Esther waited for the right moment, then she swung up on her Papa's racer, settled into the saddle her Papa surreptitiously had made for her, walked him down the creek, moving slowly, steadily, into deeper brush, deeper shadow.

Annette had been disowned by her father: he'd mistakenly thought her romantically involved with a common sailor, when in truth it was a girl from the waterfront who bore a resemblance to Annette who was enamored with the man of the sea: not fifteen minutes after her father turned her out of her own house, her home where she'd grown up, she was snatched by opportunistic slavers -- gut punched, gagged, wrist-bound behind her back and stuffed in an enclosed hack with three other kidnap victims.

Jacob himself knew his own version of the Infernal that walked the earth; his back was a war map of whip scars, mute testament to the thieving drunk who took his Mama whether she wanted it or not, who beat his Mama and beat Jacob, who went into an absolute rage when he found Jacob's Mama was with child, and took a whip to her, and to Jacob when he tried to intervene.

Jacob was barely able to crawl back into the house when the monster passed out with a nearly empty bottle on the bed beside him.

He never heard the .44 revolver come to full cock.

He barely felt it as Jacob thrust it hard into his one ear and blew his eternal soul out the other side of his head.

Jacob blinked, considered how incredibly fast the human mind ran, for all this seared through his forebrain between the blinks of his pale eyes, as he looked at his beautiful bride, as he considered he'd seen that look on her face before.

"Jacob," she said quietly, crossing her arms as she spoke, "I don't want you hurt again."

Jacob walked slowly across the front porch, cupped his hands, warm and reassuring, under her elbows.

"Don't much care for the idea myself," he said in that gentle, reassuring voice.

Annette uncoiled her arms, gripped his muscled arm with one hand, laid her hand, cool and caressing, against the side of his face.

"No, Jacob," she whispered, "I'm scared."

Jacob frowned and looked very deeply into his wife's troubled eyes.

"Darlin', what have you seen?"

Annette looked away, turned away.

"I'm not a witch-woman," she said quickly -- too quickly -- Jacob came up behind her, gripped her shoulders, molded himself against her warm, womanly backside.

"My mother is," Jacob whispered, bending his head down, laying his cheek against her hair behind her ear:  "my mother knows things, Annette, it's a gift that only women have."

Annette twisted out of his grip, spun around, seized his hands, her eyes wide ... 

... scared ...

"Jacob, you've been shot and men have tried to kill you."

"He almost missed, darlin', and the blood all soaked out of the shirt."

"That's not what I mean," Annette scolded, still whispering: "Jacob, I can mend a shirt and I can soak a shirt but I can't ... you're not a shirt, Jacob. I can't just make another one of you like I can a shirt!"

"I like the shirts you make me," Jacob smiled: he started to lower his face to kiss his wife when he realized her eyes were filling up.

He pulled back, startled.

"Darlin', what have I done to you?"

"Jacob," Annette squeaked, "I don't want anything to happen to you" -- her face squinched up the way she did when she got all weepy, and she laid a hand on her belly.

Jacob's eyes widened.

His face split into a grin broad as two Texas townships, he snatched his wife up off her feet and stepped out away from the porch, he whirled her around:  startled, Annette gave a surprised little squeak and a hiccup and crossed her arms tight over her bodice and leaned her head into her husband's chest.

Jacob slowed his mad whirling spin, set Annette down on her feet, he took her face between his hands and kissed her, delicately, carefully, then looked down at her still-flat belly.

"Broom straw," he said. "We need a broom straw."

"I'm not far enough along, Jacob. I don't have any belly to balance the broomstraw on."

Annette swallowed, patted her husband's chest the way she'd seen her Mama pat her Papa's chest in such moments.

"I promise we'll run the broom straw, Jacob, but ... not yet."

Jacob dipped his knees, ran his arms around his wife, hugged her tight, tight, and she could feel him laughing silently as he did.

"Jacob," she whispered, her head tilted back, her chin propped on his shoulder as he crushed her to him, "promise me you'll be careful!"

Jacob released his embrace, seized her under the arms, kissed her quickly, carefully, held her at arm's length, his face shining with absolute and utter delight.

"Darlin'," he grinned, "you bet your bottom dollar I'll be careful!"  

Jacob threw his head back and laughed, then looked down at his wife, his eyes shining.

"Why, just think!  I get to teach him how to whistle and whittle, how to cuss and spit and sharpen a knife, I got to teach him all kind of man stuff --"

Annette gave him a patient look.

"And if it's a little girl?" she asked.

"Then I'll have to spoil her seven ways from Sunday and make sure she grows up every inch the Lady that her Mama is!"

Jacob hoisted Annette off her feet again, and a young husband and his pretty young wife laughed in front of their great stone house, up on the mountainside, halfway between the settlement below and God Almighty in the heavens.

 

"My dear," Esther murmured, "I have news."

Linn wiped the nib on his pen, laid it very precisely beside the note-paper he was writing on: if his wife thought a matter important enough to interrupt his crafting a letter, it was important enough for him to devote her his full attention.

"I am very much at your disposal," he said gravely.

Esther glided over to her pale eyed husband, smiling, her hands folded very properly in her apron.

"My dear ... you are to be a grandfather."

Linn's grin was quick, broad, boyish: he surged from his chair, caught his wife under her arms, hoist her easily from the floor and spun round about, a dancer's step, and Esther laid her hands on his forearms, threw her head back and laughed, one leg bent up behind her.

Linn brought his green-eyed, red-headed bride down, kissed her carefully, delicately, then hoist her back up to arm's length, and brought her down again, setting her gently, easily, down on her feet.

Esther tilted her head, looked at her husband with wise and amused eyes.

"My dear, a boon, if I may."

"Name it."

"Please, my dear ... I know you are Sheriff, and I know it is yours to keep the peace, but I would see you grow old and die in your own bed."

Linn raised an eyebrow.

"Sounds like a good idea to me," he agreed.

"Liiinnnnn," Esther said, a warning note in her voice.  "My dear, I am serious when I say this."

Linn raised Esther's knuckles to his lips, held her cool, feminine hand warm and secure between his own warm and callused palms.

"I must be circumspect indeed," he murmured, his voice and his eyes suddenly thoughtful: "it would not be seemly for you to teach my grandson those things which are the right and proper purview of the grandfather!"

Esther gave her husband a knowing look.

"And just how soon, Mr. Keller, are you taking your grandson to houses of ill repute, to pool halls and saloons, and to all sorts of salacious entertainment?"

"Fear not, my dear," Linn said reassuringly, "I shall teach him those things of which a well-born young man must be both conversant, and experienced!"

"You scoundrelly old poop," Esther murmured.

Linn hugged his wife again, nibbled her neck with his lips, which caused this well-born daughter of Suth'n gentility to wiggle with delight.

"Mr. Keller," she whispered, "I'll give you all week to stop that!"

 

 

Edited February 26 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

DIDN'T HAPPEN

Marnie wore a flour sack apron over her cheerleader's uniform as she industriously scraped thawed hamburger meat off a still-frozen core.

It wasn't a genuine flour sack apron -- there were genuine examples in the Firelands museum, but this wasn't one -- she and the ladies of the Tea Society fabricated simulacra, lookalikes, with washable lettering stenciled on the apron: they offered the choice of washable, or permanent, and one of their number took a perverse delight in wearing one of the reproduction flour sack aprons with the words "Self Rising" proudly stenciled across her very pregnant belly.

Marnie was two months shy of her twelfth birthday; she was a cheerleader, and a good one; she was Daddy's girl, an accomplished equestrienne, and tonight she was the family's cook, a fact to which absolutely no one objected.

She drafted from what her pale eyed Daddy called the "Unorganized Militia" to shred lettuce, dice fresh tomatoes (or as fresh as store bought in late February could be) and set out plates and napkins: ever the practical and pragmatic sort, Marnie asked Jacob to set two rolls of paper towels on the table as well.

She'd baked hard taco shells, she'd stacked the fragile edibles with great care: some few still broke and were set aside: Marnie, like her Mama, laid a soft tortilla on a plate, then set the hard shell on this, and everyone added whatever they wished to it: the last of the frozen hamburger meat yielded to persistence and the sharp edge of her metal spatula, and she seasoned and fried the panful of fragrant meat, with her personal Secret Ingredients:  diced crispy bacon and plenty of onion, with enough garlic to bring out the flavors without being noticeable itself.

The smells of culinary industry were sufficient to assemble the family without the need of further announcement: even The Bear Killer looked on with happy anticipation, knowing there would be drips, drops, spills and catastrophic failures, not necessarily in that order, which is one reason their kitchen had a linoleum floor.

Easy cleanup.

 

Off-going day shift filed into the firehouse, grinning at the good smells trapped in fragrant layers in the still atmosphere.

The on-going shift already had their turn: the Irish Brigade hosted a meal a couple times a month, feeding two shifts worth of the Sheriff's office and the police department, with care packages sent to midnight shift, and tonight the main course was chili and cornbread -- which smelled really, really good!

The conversation of the combined emergency services was wide-ranging and cheerful, and involved absolutely nothing connected with firefighting, law enforcement or emergency medicine: there was laughter, discussion of a new baby, the cost of college, how the fellow who'd dug out and repaired the most recent water line break made it look easy -- even though he had to have been wet and freezing -- Linn dipped a slice of cornbread thick as his finger in chili soup and quietly slipped it to the waiting Malinois sitting hopefully beside him, looking steadily at him with dark and shining eyes.

One of the Brigade looked over at him and looked at the Sheriff and said quietly, "One of these days I hope to find a girl that'll look at me like that."

Linn nodded, reached for another chunk of cornbread.

 

The troops fed, dishes washed and set to drain, what few leftovers were left over packaged and put away: Marnie made enough soft tacos to make peanut-butter-honey-and-cinnamon roll-ups for next day's lunches, not as a main course, but as part of the sack lunches the Keller young took to school:  Marnie rode herd on her siblings, made sure homework was tended, showers were taken, dirty clothes thrown downstairs -- something they only did when their Mama wasn't home -- Marnie collected the cheerfully tossed dirty duds and hustled them back to the Maytag and set it thrashing.

Marnie climbed the stairs quickly, silently on sock feet, made sure everyone was abed, brought up clean, dried and folded clothes while she was at it: this batch was dried the night before, and it was efficient to bring clean clothes up when she made her are-you-in-bed check.

Marnie ran the mop (almost unnecessarily) in the kitchen floor, looked around, nodded once, emphatically, with satisfaction: she picked up her saddle shoes from the foot of the stairs, opened the front door and let The Bear Killer back in from his most recent trip out: together they ascended the ancient, solid stairs, slipped into Marnie's bedroom.

Marnie looked at her reflection and smiled.

She'd honestly forgotten she was still wearing an apron, and she'd forgotten she'd been so busy she hadn't changed out of her cheerleader's uniform.

The Bear Killer yawned, wide, curling his tongue as he stretched: when Marnie came back in from her shower, she looked over at her sister's bed and smiled at the sight of a great black bearlike mass cuddled up with a sleeping child, a little pink arm draped over the curly black furred shoulder.

 

Linn carried his bowl to the sink, slipped it into the waiting pool of soapy water, stood aside as his wife did as well:  Linn reached up, gripped Shelly's shoulders gently, squeezed, just a little, their private way of saying "I love you" while in the public eye.

Shelly turned, leaned back against the sink, sighed tiredly.

"You've had a busy day."

"I know."

"You even sound tired."

"Tonight's taco night at home."

Linn nodded.

"I can only imagine what kind of a mess I'll have in the morning."

Linn looked down at Tank, smiled.

"I reckon The Bear Killer helped with cleanup."

"He helped with cleaning babies' faces when we were feeding them."

Linn chuckled.  "Worked, didn't it?"

Shelly thrust her hands in the soapy water, found the submerged dishrag, began washing dishes.

"Is there very much left over?" Fitz asked, to which the rest of the Irish Brigade laughed.

When there was chili at the firehouse, leftovers were something that very definitely did not happen.

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

YOU AIN'T NO PREACHER?

"Your name's Keller."

Sheriff Linn Keller's eyes tightened at the corners.

Linn's coat was unfastened: his hand was against his belly, ready to sweep the coat open.

He stood, looked very directly at the individual that saw him, moved in on him, from the moment he came through the fancy frosted-glass-pane doors of the Silver Jewel Saloon.

Linn's move was slow, planned, powerful, while looking perfectly innocent.

"Who's askin'?"

Linn's off hand caught the slap, his heel hooked the other's ankle: Linn's boot drove into the stranger's ribs, hard, and two Colt revolvers came to full cock, each unblinking black bore looking very directly at a proximate threat.

One was on the floor, realizing he'd just been shamed at his own game.

The other was backing him, had his hand almost wrapped around the handle of his own revolver.

"Take it out, slow," Linn said quietly, and there was no trace of humor in his eyes.

The backup's eyes uttered a thousand threats his lips dared not utter:  he brought the Remington out, laid it on a table.

"Turn around and put your hands flat against that wall and don't move or I'll bust a hole through your guts."  Linn saw movement from below, his finger tightened slightly on the trigger: "Don't," he said warningly, then his Colt spoke and the man who'd braced him felt his soul yanked out of his miserable carcass.

His dead hand fell open, a hideout gun falling from limp fingers.

Tom Landers stepped out where he could be seen, short rifle in hand: he preferred the precision of a carbine over the to-whom-it-may-concern approach of a shotgun: Linn thought to demonstrate to him that a shotgun's spread would be minimal at across-the-saloon distances, but decided against it.

If the ex-Sheriff and now chief peacekeeper of the Silver Jewel Saloon cared to work for him, Linn was not about to tell him his business.

Another, at the bar, started to slide around the corner, as if he hoped to skulk away unseen.

Mr. Baxter's invitation was too good to refuse.

it involved a freshly drawn mug of beer.

It also involved Mr. Baxter's two pipe shoot gun.

Reasoning that living, and having a beer, beat being killed and never tasting beer again, was the better choice ... well, he made a sensible choice and returned to where he'd been standing at the bar.

"You."

Linn holstered his right hand Colt, kicked the empty from his left, reloaded: his holster-and-reload was quick, efficient, as he brought his right-hand revolver to capacity and holstered it as well.

The man at the bar reluctantly set down his beer mug, came toward the pale eyed Sheriff with the reluctant step of a schoolboy about to be chastised.

"Stop."

He stopped.

"You three come in together. Why?"

"Ev?"

"Don't you 'Ev' him, I'm doin' the askin' and you'll answer or I'll skin you slow."

Linn's smile was just as slow and as precise as his words, and just as devoid of humor.

"Only I'll skin you with the dull side of a spoon. Now what are you three up to?"

"I, he, I'm not --"

"Shut up," Ev snapped.

Linn drove a hard fist into the man's soft ribs, spun, getting his weight behind the heel of his hand: he drove Ev in the back of the head and gave him a good close-up look at the wall.

The entire wall boomed with the impact.

"I am not a patient man," Linn said, his voice still quiet, just enough to be heard through the gunshot's echo still screaming in his ears. "This man's dead. I ain't above killin' you two."

"He'll do it, too," Landers offered cheerfully. "Killed three so far this week, that makes him behind by two."

Linn's eyes tightened at the corners, the way a man will when he's filled with pleasure, when the delight he's feeling hasn't spread to the rest of his face.

"You're Linn Keller."

"Yep."

"You're that Stone Creek preacher."

Linn's eyebrow raised a little and the slightest ghost of a smile pulled at one corner of his mouth.

He reached up and turned over his lapel to reveal a six point star, a star that said SHERIFF in hand-chased engraving across its equator.

"He's my cousin," Linn said.  "I'm Sheriff Linn Keller and you two are under arrest."

 

Reverend Linn Keller walked slowly through the Orphanage dormitory, looking left, looking right, nodding his satisfaction, his approval.

It was not a big dormitory -- a half dozen beds, three on one side, three on the other -- the boys slept here, under the supervision of himself and a trusted adjutant, a man who'd recently lost his own wife and sons in a fire, a man Preacher Keller knew, a man in whom the Preacher had full faith and confidence.

There was a sharp double-knock:  "Parson?"

Reverend Linn Keller stopped, smiled.

Only one voice sounded like that, only one voice called him "Parson."

"Hello, Jacob."

"Sir, my father bade me ride the wind itself to bring you this."

Reverend Linn Keller turned and looked at his cousin's son Jacob, and he realized this was no social call.

Young Jacob Keller wore a revolver like he knew how to use it, and he had a rifle across his arm in the bend of his elbow.

Reverend Keller accepted the folded note: he opened it, read it, read it again, raised an eyebrow, considered.

"Jacob, I'll need your help."

"You have it, sir."

Reverend Keller thrust his chin at the open door: the two walked outside.

The pale-eyed Reverend put two fingers to his lips, whistled, a single, wavering, high, compelling note: young feet began running, eager young faces charged him from several directions at once, boys and girls alike, and behind them, his wife, wringing her hands in his apron, which told him she was making bread when his summons interrupted.

"Master Hall," Linn said.

"Yes, sir?"

"You will draw a traveler's pouch and you will pack smallclothes and stockings for an overnight."

"Yes, sir."

"I just took a look at the dormitory."  He turned slowly, taking a fast head count -- all here -- and said, "Every bed is made and well made, the floor is clean, I find it satisfactory in all ways.  Well done."

Little boys grinned, shifted their weight from one leg to another.

"Master Hall and I are required in Firelands for three days. In my absence, you will follow my wife's instructions."

"Yes, sir," five young voices chorused; the girls were clustered around his wife, for all the world like a cloud of chicks surrounding a mother hen.

Reverend Keller waited while his wife gathered what little he would need -- the same light loadout as he'd prescribed for young Master Hall, with the addition of a comb and a few other trifles.

Not twenty minutes later they were mounted, the big-eyed little boy riding behind the pale eyed lad who felt like a fencepost in a tailored black suit.

 

Esther Keller opened her arms, knelt.

"Charles," she said, smiling: a happy little boy ran into her motherly embrace.

Sheriff and Preacher shook hands, each one regarding the other with a carefully grave expression.

"Jacob."

"Sir."

"Remain, if you please."

"Yes, sir."

Linn turned to the brandy-shelf, decanted three volumes, handed one to his cousin, one to his son.

"God ride with us," he said, hoisting his libation: three glasses rose, three voices murmured "Amen," and three pale eyed Kellers drank.

Linn eased the tapered glass stopper into the bottle's frosted neck, gathered the glasses and set them with the bottle.

"A man came here to kill you," he said.

Reverend Keller frowned.  "Kill me?"
"It seems the young fellow you brought with you is ... valuable."

The Reverend's eyebrow raised quickly, descended slowly.

Pa does that, Jacob thought: as usual, he was busy turning invisible and listening to every word.

"We've two in the calaboose that confessed to being hired."

"Confessed."  The Reverend's voice was skeptical.

"They had to be encouraged."

"I see."

"Your young charge was orphaned."

"He was."

"You never met his parents."

"We buried his parents."

"His parents were heirs to a young fortune. He is the last surviving heir. Whoever adopts him will gain that fortune."

"I see."

"There are men who want that fortune."

The Reverend took a long breath, sighed it out.

"That's why we had to get both of you here."

"But what of my wife and the other children? Might they be targets? An unscrupulous man could capture them and threaten to burn down the barn around them."

The Sheriff smiled, and his smile was not entirely pleasant.

"I'll need the names of his dead parents. I know how to fix this."

 

Michael sat cross-legged beside Victoria, both children listening to their pale-eyed Daddy, engrossed in the tale he was spinning from one of the many books on his shelf.

"Sir," Michael asked, "do you have a cousin?"

Linn slid an eight of diamonds into the book as a bookmark, leaned back, rubbed his closed eyes: it had been a long day, but part of his unwinding routine was to read to his children: it was something he'd done since his first child, and he saw no need to change now.

"Oh, I've got several cousins, Michael. None of 'em look like me, though."

"You don't have any named like you?" Michael asked, disappointed.

"No, sorry."

"Daddy, don't you have any sky pilots in your family?" Victoria asked in a disappointed-little-girl voice.

Linn laughed, shook his head.  "No, Princess," he said in a soft voice, "afraid not."

"Oh."

"Can you read some more?" Michael asked hopefully.

"Pweeeeez?" Victoria asked.

"Bedtime," Linn said. "We'll pick this up later."

"Did the Sheriff go after the bad guys?" Michael asked.

Victoria's eyes were big, anticipating, as much a question as her twin brother's words.

"Tomorrow," Linn said. "Now up, you two. On your feet, let's go."

Sheriff Linn Keller knelt, took his young behind their thighs, hugged, stood, looked from one happy set of pale eyes to the other happy set of pale eyes.

"Pa?"

"Hm?"

"Pa, did Old Pale Eyes pack his kids off to bed too?"

"Yes, Michael," Linn said softly as he set off for the broad, solid built staicase.  "Yes, as a matter of fact, he did."

 

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

THE PREACHER, PART TWO

 

Ambassador Marnie Keller crossed her legs, standing, then went down, gracefully, Indian-legged beneath her long skirt: Michael cuddled up on one side of her, Victoria on the other.

Dr. John Greenlees Jr. sat more conventionally, in a chair, their blanket wrapped infant in his arms: the medicine man was grinning like a big-eared kid as he looked down at the arm-waving, blinking, well-fed little boy: young John Jr. gave a truly huge yawn, closed his eyes and was asleep, just that fast.

Sheriff Linn Keller picked up the Journal, opened it, set the Eight of Diamonds bookmark on his desk.

"Where were we," he said thoughtfully as Angela Keller came in, gripped her sister's shoulders, bent and whispered "Thank you for coming, it means so much to Daddy!" -- and Dana slipped in with her, coming around the other side of Linn's desk and parking herself on the floor after the fashion of both her big sisters.

Linn looked around -- from his left, around, to well to his right, nodded.

"Jacob is settling a dispute," Marnie offered, "otherwise he'd be here!"

Linn nodded.  "I understand," he said, a note of sadness in his voice: he too had missed events and occasions, because of the demands of his job.

He looked back to the Journal, traced nail-trimmed fingers across the page, found his place, read.

 

Jacob Keller knew his Pa had a soft spot for stray dogs and lost kids.

Jacob stopped and grinned when he came into his Pa's study.

Two pale eyed men in black suits, two men with iron grey mustaches, sat with a child on his lap, grinning -- their walls were down, their defenses, asleep: they were two men, each with a happy little child, and the sight took Jacob very much by surprise.

He'd known his Pa in such moments.

He and his Pa had shared quiet moments, sitting side by side on a log or a fence rail, talking quietly in voices gentle.

Here, Jacob saw two men who looked enough alike to be twins, quietly delighted in the company of a wee child, laughing on their lap.

Jacob stopped, drew the door to behind him: he stood, ribbon-tied papers in hand, his hands crossed before him.

He had business from Mr. Moulton, his father's attorney, but it could wait.

Jacob was not about to interrupt the moment's happiness, for he well knew the times in his father's life when happiness had been far from him indeed.

Two pale eyed men looked at him, looked at one another:  they rose, an apple-cheeked child in their careful grip: each man brought the child's face close to his own, twiddled his mustache against the giggling little face, then set them down:  the maid discreetly opened the door, received the happy, laughing little boy and the equally delighted little girl, closed the door behind, leaving the men to their business.

One of the men stood; the other raised a summoning hand.

Jacob could tell which was his father, but he also realized the resemblance was so striking that a stranger would have difficulty indeed telling this Stone Creek parson from the Sheriff.

Jacob crossed the room, his back straight, his step confident, his chin up: he presented his father with the papers without comment.

"Join us," Linn said quietly: a small round table had been moved into the room, and the three brought chairs around it for their council of war.

Linn carefully untied the red ribbon, tossed it over the back of another chair, where it slithered out of sight, probably coiled and piled on the velvet seat: the Sheriff's attention was on the paper work, fresh from the legal office of Moulton & Son.

He smiled a little as he did, a smile that didn't extend beyond the corners of his eyes:  Mr. Moulton and Tillie had become an item, and word has it Tillie was with child, and Moulton told the Sheriff in confidence that his first child would be a son, he would countenance nothing else! -- Linn looked over at Tillie, who looked at her husband with a wife's patient and understanding eyes, and Linn grinned, openly this time:  he'd said the same with his own wife, knowing full well he'd be just as delighted in a little girl he could spoil outrageously as a son he could raise in his own image.

Preacher Keller waited silently: the man could have been a carved statue.

Linn looked over one paper, another: he nodded, ran pale eyes down a third page: he handed the three pages to his cousin.

Jacob watched the two men carefully.

His father, as usual, was as wooden faced as a cigar store Indian.

The Parson was almost as expressionless, at least until he got to the third page:  a slow smile spread across the man's face, he looked at Jacob, handed him the three pages, accepted two more from the Sheriff.

"Jacob," he said, satisfaction richening his quiet-voiced words, "we've got 'em!"

Jacob's jaw slid out and he nodded, once.

 

A red-faced man's angry fist slammed into his desktop.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY SOLD OUT!"

"Just that, Mr. Shaw. They sold all interest in both businesses before their death."

"I DON'T BELIEVE IT! WHERE'S THAT KID OF THEIRS!"

"We sent three men to get him, sir, but they haven't returned."

"FIND 'EM AND FIND THAT KID! I WANT THAT MINE AND I WANT THAT BRICK WORKS!"

A knock on the door: the hired girl held up a folded note with a red-wax seal, held it before her like a shield against the angry blast that was sure to follow.

"A message, sir," she said with a dip of her knees: she closed her eyes against the angry wave of harsh words, she crossed the room, started to place the note on his desktop:  he snatched it from her, she dipped her knees again, turned, snatched at her skirts and almost ran out of the room.

"Damned bog-Irish," the red-faced man muttered.

He opened the note, read it, anger plowing deep furrows into his puffy forehead: he read it again, one finger across his upper lip like a tobacco-stained mustache.

He lowered his hand, his eyes hard.

"What is it?" his son asked.

"The stupid --"

The man bit off his angry words, thrust from his chair, knocking the wooden seat over behind him: he stomped over to the wavy-glass window, thumping the heel of his fist against the window frame in a steady, angry, glass-rattling rhythm.

"I don't understand," his son protested. "So his boy is in an orphanage. We adopt him out --"

"What do you think I was doing?" came the snarled riposte. "Adopt him and get his inheritance! Damn that meddlin' preacher --"

"It says here he's gone to Firelands with the boy."

"Get your hat. Train leaves right shortly."

"Should I get someone to come with us?"

"Bring Hoghead. He'll be enough."

 

"You sent the man a note?"

"I had Mr. Moulton send one."

"What said the good lawyer?"

"I explained the situation to the man. He agreed with me that Charles has lost too much already, and when I told Moulton I was sawed off and damned if I'd see him in a sham adoption so some shyster could get what his parents honestly earned, Moulton said he knew how to head him off. He's already filed the papers at the State level. It's official. His parents died ... intestate, I think the word is ... by our reckoning, when they died they were so poor they couldn't afford to pay attention."

"What about the payment you gave them to buy their business interests?"

"I hadn't taken the cash money to them yet. It's here, and Charles is here to accept it."

"A little boy will have little use for that kind of cash, Sheriff."

"We'll figure something out," Linn said: Jacob heard a note of satisfaction in his voice.

"Sssooo ..."  Preacher Keller said slowly, "you had an attorney draw up false papers to falsely show the deceased sold their businesses to you, when that didn't actually happen."

"That's right."

"The Devil is the father of lies," the Parson said carefully, "and this smells like a lie."

Linn looked very directly at his cousin.

"You weren't in the War."

"No."

"Count yourself lucky," the lawman grunted, then his face hardened: "When necessary, you use the enemy's own weapons against them. You use their tactics against them, you turn their violence back on them. Same goes for some slickering scoundrel that would adopt a little boy, take his inheritance and cast him aside. I know this Shaw. He's crooked enough he planted a grove of corkscrews for shade and they'll have to screw him into the ground when he dies. If he wants to pull a fast one for ill gotten gain, I'll pull a fast one so he doesn't' get it!"

Preacher Keller nodded, slowly.

"There is justice in that," he said thoughtfully.

"Moulton sent him word that we were here and if he wanted to talk things over we'd meet him at the depot."  

Linn looked at the clock.

"That gives us three hours."

He stepped over to the bell-pull, gave a gentle tug: the door popped open as if by magic and the hired girl glided in as smoothly as if she were a carven character on a cuckoo clock.

"Yes, Mr. Keller?" she asked, her blue eyes big and innocent and sparkling with mischief, as they often did.

"Mary, when will dinner be ready?"

"It is ready now, sir. I was just coming to get you."

Linn put a dramatic hand to his breast, leaned back and thrust a theatrical hand toward the hired girl, palm up:  "When you're good, you're good," he declared:  his sudden departure from solemnity was surprising enough, and entertaining enough, that preacher, Sheriff, firstborn son and maid all laughed.

"You heard the lady," Linn said. "Parson, last time you were here, you gave us a good Baptist blessing. Reckon you can give us a good Presbyterian blessing this time?"

The Reverend Linn Keller regarded his badge packing cousin with a straight face and said, "I'll have you know, sir, I speak fluent Presbyterian."

The Keller men chuckled their way to the noontime table.

 

The train sighed her way into station, her stack's exhaust pure white, her stop was gentle: Bill was the engineer and he took pride in his work: when the cars stopped, they were in exactly the right position for a comfortable disembark, for the freight to be offloaded.

A solitary figure in a black suit waited on the depot.

Shaw and his son came down the cast-iron steps of the passenger car, stomped up the white oak steps at the end of the depot platform, glaring left, glaring right.

"Mr. Shaw, I presume," a youthful voice challenged.

Jacob Keller's voice was not near changed yet, he had not the least trace of a mustache, but he had the unmistakable stamp of his sire upon him: Shaw glared at the boy.

"My father the Sheriff was unavoidably detained."

"Unavoidably detained," Hoghead sneered.  "Ain't that fancy."

Shaw stomped toward Jacob. "MY BUSINESS IS NOT WITH A CHILD! I WANT MY SON AND I WANT HIIM NOW!!"

"You'll keep a civil tongue in your head," Jacob said coldly: Shaw, a man with an inflated opinion of his own importance, chose to notice nothing more than Jacob's lack of stature:  he intentionally noticed nothing more about him, elsewise he might've seen Jacob's eyes grow ice-white, shining like the polished heart of a winter glacier.

Jacob's hand moved to his belly; his coat was unbuttoned, his boots were shoulder width apart.

Duffy, watching from behind his boss, frowned, surprised.

The boy was ready -- too ready! -- but he was a boy, he was just a boy --

Shaw snatched at a saddle laying against the Depot's clapboard wall, seized up a horsewhip.

"DAMN YOU!" he roared, shaking the coils free, "I'LL TEACH YOU MANNERS!"

Jacob's weight shifted slightly, just enough to swing his hips to one side while his coat remained still.

Jacob's Mama sewed a few buckshot into the coat's seam for this very reason.

When Jacob's hips shifted, his bladed hand knifed under the coat.

Shaw took a step forward, brought his arm back, fully intending to bloody this arrogant whelp --

 

Sheriff Linn Keller's head came up at the sound of a pistol-shot.

"No," he groaned: two pale-eyed men leaned forward, their mounts surging into a gallop.

Jacob Keller stood with a cocked pistol in hand.

Duffy started to move but stopped when he realized that pale eyed boy didn't look like a boy anymore, he looked like a cannon muzzle pointed at him, and he realized that -- although he'd been looking at his boss's arm, swinging braided leather back with full intent of horsewhipping a mouthy kid, and the kid beyond him in plain sight -- Duffy realized he had honestly not seen the boy's draw.

Duffy saw movement beyond the boy, a man with a rifle -- Duffy raised his hands, spread his fingers as the rifle's bore looked very directly at him -- whoever was behind the boy, was using the corner of the Depot for cover, a tactic he'd seen before among men who knew what it was to fire shots, and to be shot at.

Duffy heard horses gallop up, felt as much as heard boots pounding up the three steps to the depot platform.

Two men in black suits -- one seized him, spun him around, drove him against the side of the depot --

The other went to Duffy's boss, ripped coat and vest open, looked at blood spreading below his breastbone, watched as the light went out of the man's eyes.

Reverend Linn Keller looked over at the horsewhip in the man's relaxing grip.

He looked up at the Sheriff.

The Sheriff's eyes hardened and he turned his frosted glare to the shoulder-striker pinned against dusty clapboards.

"Your boss is dead," he said flatly. "You're needed in court."

At the other end of the depot, a man with a rifle drew back, went back inside the telegraph office, parked his musket where it normally lived.

Lightning had been in the War, and Lightning was not about to let the Sheriff's son stand alone, and now that the Sheriff was here, why, the man could return to his normal duties.

 

Michael frowned, then shivered.

He'd seen his Pa swing a horsewhip, he'd seen his Pa cut branches thick as a man's finger off a tree with a horsewhip.

He'd seen his Pa take a horsewhip to a hanging hog carcass, he'd seen his Pa cut slices into and ribbons out of the dangling pork.

"Jacob was nearly horsewhipped to death, wasn't he?" Dana asked quietly.

Linn nodded: his jaw was set and hard, and Angela saw the slightest tremor in the man's fingers.

Angela knew her pale eyed Daddy, and Angela knew her Daddy still blamed himself for the hell and the hurt Dana survived when she was loaned as an undercover to a city police department.

Angela knew her Daddy was remembering all this when he read about young Jacob, back when, and that's why she saw the slight shivers in his fingers.

"He wasn't about to let anyone hurt him again," Dana persisted.

"No," Linn whispered.

"Good."

Dana and Angela shared an understanding glance.

"It's called disparity of force," Marnie explained as she hugged her two youngest siblings to her. "A grown man with a horsewhip can cause death or grievous bodily harm to a child, and Jacob was ... how old?  Eleven?"

"Eleven," Linn said quietly.  "It was a year after he came to Firelands. He might've been fourteen, we don't know for sure, but I'm bettin' on eleven, from everything I've read."

"Pa?" Michael asked. "What happened after that?"

Marnie smiled.  "I did some research on that," she offered, pulling a glowing reader from somewhere -- she was good about having unexpected things about her person -- "young Charles was raised by good parents, Charles started a business and was outrageously successful, and he died a rich old man in San Francisco with a fleet of sailing-ships, several sawmills and a fortune to his credit."

"Yaaaaayyyy," Victoria cheered quietly, patting her little hands together, and Linn closed the book, slid the Ace of Spades under the corner of his desk blotter.

He knew he'd need it again.

Sheriff Linn Keller looked around again, looked at his several young gathered around as they'd all done when he read aloud.

Linn couldn't help it: his grin was open, honest, unaffected.

"Y'know," he said, "this is nice."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 4 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

LEAVES

Chief of Police Will Keller knew the woman.

Chief of Police knew her little boy.

The woman's husband taught at the high school.

Will knew him too.

The man had a gift for reaching troubled boys: he could connect with any of them, and that, Will knew, was a gift, and a rare gift at that!

The woman was on her knees and she was swallowing hard and reaching into her purse, the way a woman will when she's about to start crying and she wants to hide behind a handkerchief.

The boy was standing on the sidewalk, looking up at the leafed-out tree in front of the drugstore.

His hands were to his face, he wore a brand-new pair of glasses, and he was just standing there.

Chief of Police Will Keller walked up to the woman, went down on one knee: she was pressing a lace-edged kerchief to one closed eye, then the other, before lowering her own glasses back into place.

"Eleanor," he whispered, "are you okay?"

Eleanor looked at her five year old son, and Will followed her gaze.

Will nodded with understanding a moment later, when the little boy spoke, but at the moment his attention was on Eleanor.

"We knew Bobby ... had problems," she said, "balance and always running into things, and ... we thought... we didn't know he was almost blind."

Will nodded, his eyes on her knuckles as she crushed the damp kerchief in her grip.

"We're just ... he ... his first pair of glasses."

Will looked over to young Bobby.

He was standing dead still, looking up at the tree, hands gripping the glasses he wore, a look of absolute wonder on his young face.

"The optometrist said his eyes were so bad ... it was like he was underwater all the time."

She looked at Will and started crying again.

"I never knew it was that bad, Will.  I never realized it!"

Chief of Police Will Keller gathered Eleanor into him, held her while she sorrowed her guilt into his shoulder.

He looked up at little Bobby.

He saw Bobby's wondering expression split into a grin, and Will heard this child's voice, full of marvel, full of discovery.

Bobby looked up into the tree, his hands still gripping these magical glasses that let him see clearly for the very first time in all his entire young life, and Will had to swallow hard as he heard a six year old boy's words.

"So that's what leaves look like!"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

FOOT PATROL

It was a rare day, it was a pleasant day, it was a sunny day with little wind:  Chief of Police Will Keller took a deep, appreciative breath, paced off on the left, spit-shined boondockers silent on rubber soles and heels.

Will chuckled as he remembered himself as a green-as-spring-grass rookie, trying to spin his baton on its lanyard, trying to bump its end hard enough on the sidewalk to bounce it up into his hand: he'd seen that on TV once, and hard as he'd try, he never could get it to work right, so he gave it up for a bad job.

The few times he did try, his enthusiasm was greater than his precision, and he'd succeeded in driving the end of his turned-hickory baton into the side of his foot.

Nowadays Will didn't try for anything showy: winter had washed much of the color from his close-cropped hair, leaving the stains of many snows behind -- either that, or his body was recycling again.

His twin sister Willamina once told him about how well the body recycles resources, and Will wryly suggested maybe the grey hairs he was starting to sprout, were brain cells that got kicked out because they didn't work anymore so his body was recycling them as grey hairs, and he and his pale eyed twin sis laughed quietly.

Will did not walk with the disciplined, precise stride of the military man; his carriage was erect, he carried his years very well, and he lacked the "Equatorial Bulge" he'd once confided to Willamina that he dreaded -- he worked hard enough to keep it off! -- his uniform trousers and uniform blouse were sharply creased, and he looked almost like someone's kindly old grandfather out for a morning stroll.

Grandfatherly, that is, if you disregarded such things as the badge, the whistle-hook and whistle, the blued-steel, engraved Smith & Wesson on his belt, and the snugly cinched duty belt it rode on.

Two little boys were crouched on the corner, looking curiously at an anomaly in the sidewalk.

It had been there for years; the town industriously put a redwood planter in the middle of where the glass-and-aluminum phone booth used to stand.

One boy turned his head, squinted one eye shut:  "Hi, Chief," he piped, "what's this for?"

Will stopped, hunkered, regarded the concrete phenomenon dirty young fingers were exploring.

"That's a rain guard," he said.

"Huh?"  Two little boys looked at him, noses wrinkled with confusion, the way little boys will.

"Do you ... no, you probably don't remember when we had a phone booth here."

Two little boys looked at one another, confused at the unfamiliar term.

"There's one in the museum," Will offered.

"Oh, yeah!" one said. "You can get inside an' ... an' ... but the phone don't work."

"It doesn't?" Will asked, his voice gentle, encouraging as he laid a warm hand on the lad's hunched-over back.

"Nah. I tried it. I pushed all the numbers around that rounder thing an' all I got was a dial tone!"

Will chuckled, patted the lad in a fatherly manner:  "I'll show you how that rounder thing works one of these days," he said, rising; his knees crackled their cartilaginous protest as he did.

Will saw the drugstore's proprietor watching.

The drugstore's front door was recessed in from the sidewalk, with glass walls on either side of the foyer it formed: Will stepped inside.

"Morning, Bob."

"Morning, Will."  

Bob Parsons thrust a chiseled chin at the two still-hunkered boys, a moment before the rose and ran, laughing and yelling, up the sidewalk.

"I wish I had their energy," he chuckled, shaking his head.

"Willa once said if you'd put parabolic collectors around the schoolhouse playground, you could catch enough childish energy to power the town's electrical needs for a year!"

"Don't doubt it one bit," Bob sighed. "What were they lookin' at?"

"Do you remember when Old Blue used to live in the phone booth?"

Bob smiled -- he had a broad, natural, contagious smile, he was a good-natured man, probably because he'd seen enough hell during the War in Europe.

"Blue pretty much lived in here during the winter," Bob said softly, his eyes going to a place by the baseboard: the window seat was a display now, but back when, high school kids would sit in it and soak up as much of the thin winter sun as they could, eat ice cream, and watch snow falling outside.

"I remember Old Blue used to sleep there."

Bob nodded, smiled, just a little, the way a man will when he remembers.

"In good weather he'd sleep in that phone booth. The door never closed more than halfway unless you helped it."

"I remember."

"I laid up that cement dam to keep runoff water from runnin' into the ... from ..."

Bob swallowed, looked away.

"Didn't want old Blue gettin' wet, y'understand."

"I understand."  Will's voice was gentle.  "The boys were lookin' at your hand laid dam."

Bob nodded.  "I'm glad they set a planter in the middle of it.  Lookin' at that dam kind of reminds me of Blue, y'know?"

Will nodded, thinking of the several dogs he'd known and loved in his own lifetime.

"Yeah, Bob," he agreed.  "I know."

Will resumed what appeared to be a casual meander up the street.

Will preferred foot patrol whenever possible.

It wasn't possible out in the county, of course, but the county was someone else's jurisdiction: he had the town, he had his white Crown Vic cruiser if need be, but on a lovely morning like this, he preferred Shank's Mares for his transportation.

His morning pass included the Mercantile, his quiet observation of two retirees frowning over a game of checkers on the nail keg, with another nail keg on either side for seats: Will's quick eye noted the tassel on one, and he knew both men were seated on the thick cushions he'd had Crystal sew up for him, back when ... back when his beautiful bride was just that, before the brain tumor that took her from him:  he blinked to dispel the memory, turned, walked silently into the Mercantile.

The proprietor turned as the door's spring-mounted bell tinkled cheerfully:  "Will, you'll want to look at this," he called happily, turning.  "I just got in my new shipment of fly rods!"

"Myyyyy goodness," Will said admiringly, running his eyes from the shining-new reel, the length of the flexible, responsive rod.  "You'd have to know what you're doin' to run such a fine machine, Gary, and that leaves me out!"

Gary gave the rod an experimental flip, his expression that of a man who knows what it is to stand in waders, in a cold mountain stream, trying to land a Royal Coachman in just the right spot to drift past a hungry trout.

"Everything goin' all right?" Will asked, looking around.

"Right as rain," Gary replied, carefully setting the rod on the display rack. "You?"
Will rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

"Gary," he admitted, "I laid awake all night tryin' to think of a big lie to tell you and just absolutely nothing came to mind."

Gary laughed, shook his head:  "You're not supposed to imitate my bad examples!"

Will chuckled his way out of the Mercantile: he saw a familiar truck coming down the street, he stepped out, waved it to a stop.

"Jim," he said as the window cranked down, "Gary just got a new shipment of fly rods in. You might want to take a look at 'em."  Will winked, stepped away, knowing Gary was going to make a sale, and within the next few minutes, if he was any judge.

Will's arrival in the town library was greeted with a God's honest juvenile mobbing:  he went down on one knee, opened his arms and had more grade-school kids hugging into him than he could encompass with both arms wide:  his arrival was not at all by accident, for he knew Ezra Shaver, the third grade teacher, walked her class down to the local library every week to pick out books, and sometimes to hold lessons in the back room: she believed active young minds benefitted from a change of surroundings while still being taught, and Will believed it delighted his fatherly old widower's heart to receive the happy greeting of clean-scrubbed, shining young faces.

The Mayor discussed this with him, once, and Will said such things as "community relations" and "open lines of communication" and "building a trust and a rapport," and the Mayor nodded: this appealed to his politician's sense of re-election, and he reasoned that if the Chief were well liked, he would, by extension, be well-thought-of for keeping such a man on payroll.

Will's first loop ended here: he directed his steps back toward the Municipal Building, but not before stopping in the Silver Jewel Saloon.

Like other pale eyed lawmen through the ages, he came in silently, took a step to the side:  the wall was to his back, stairs to his left, the hotel desk and then the bar ahead of him:  Tilly (her name was actually Tina, but whoever worked behind the hotel desk was automatically "Tilly," just as whoever was tending bar, male or female, was "Mr. Baxter) -- Tilly smiled up at him, her body language was relaxed, without any sign of tension.

Will winked at her -- he'd dated her mother, back when -- he went on into the saloon proper, laid a dollar bill on the counter, looked around.

Mr. Baxter (who was one of the new barkeeps, a cute girl who hadn't gotten her McKenna gown sewn up yet) smiled and poured Will a steaming mug of coffee.

She leaned against the bar, looked at him with big, inviting eyes:  "Go on, say it," she murmured.

"A priest, a rabbi and a preacher walk into a bar," Will grinned.

"And they all yelled OUCH!"

Will spread his hands in mock dismay.  "You've heard it!"

"Chief," the lovely young woman with long, curled eyelashes asked as Will sipped his coffee, "you are the only man in this place who has never made a pass at me!"

Will looked at her, surprised, then smiled gently, leaned against the bar, spoke in a quiet, confidential voice.

"Darlin'," he said, "I did give it some thought."

"Really?" she asked, lowering her lashes seductively and settling her chin on her wrist-bent knuckles.

"Oh, yes," Will murmured, "but I had to consider ... at my age, a hot woman and a cold glass of water and I'd die of a heart attack!"

They both smiled -- they did not quite laugh -- she gave him a speculative look and said, "Don't sell yourself short."

 

Will continued on down the street, warmed by hot coffee and chuckling at how he'd actually felt his pulse pick up when she told him not to sell himself short.

"You'll not go there," he said to himself.

A Shepherd dog looked at him from deeper in the alley -- ears up, head up, tail swinging hopefully.

Will extended a hand and the black-and-brown canine came bouncing happily down the alley, stopped, dancing a little on his forepaws, the expression of canine delight.

"Why hello there," Will said softly, squatting and rubbing this new acquaintance's ears and neck.

No collar, he thought, no sign one's been worn.

That's odd.

"You hungry, fella?"

The Shepherd licked his chops hopefully.

"Let's get you something, hey?"

The Shepherd's hind quarters swung with his thick tail as he expressed his approval.

 

Bob Parsons looked out the window.

One of the little boys that had been examining his rain dam, was running across the street.

Across the street, at the mouth of the alley, the Chief of Police was standing, suddenly, his arm out-thrust, mouth open, obviously in a shout, a command.

Bob felt his stomach shrink.

Something brown streaked across the street, something fast moving with lots of teeth: Bob stood, shocked, as a big German Shepherd seized a little boy's backside at full charge, twisted, spun: child and canine both rolled, just as a car came to a tire-screaming stop, most of a car-length through where the boy had been a moment before.

Chief of Police Will Keller came over, picked up the lad, dusted him off, then turned and rubbed the grinning, tongue-hanging, tail-swinging Shepherd dog.

"Good boy," he murmured.  "Goooood booooy!"

Young fingers explored the seat of his blue jeans.

"Any holes?" Will asked.

"Nah," the boy said, grinning.  "That was fun!"

Will laughed, shook his head:  a memory, faint with time, of saying something similar after an event that left adults paled and shaking.

Bob Parsons came out:  "Will, is he okay?"

Will's arm was draped over the Shepherd-dog's shoulders, a warm tongue happily laundered the lawman's jaw, knocked his eight point milkman's hat askew:  Will removed his uniform cap, grinned at the storekeeper.

"Everything's fine!" 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

TO BEAT THE MONSTER

A shiny purple Jeep eased into the police range, parked close to the benches.

There was just enough misty miserable rain to soak your shoulders if you were out in it for any length of time.

A set of pale eyes stared bleakly through the windshield.

Nobody else was there: Dana unlocked the gate and drove in, locked the gate behind her: she did not want company, and the only people who might show up, would have the key to the lock, and would therefore be authorized.

Dana sat alone, listened to the wind gust against her Jeep, heard it singing as it caressed the antennas: the mist was fine enough it was inaudible as it hit the passenger window, eventually gathered enough to run down in hesitant, irregular streaks.

Dana Keller climbed out of her Jeep, locked it, walked up to the little white painted shed with the corrugated tin roof:  she unlocked the door, grabbed the nearest target, the one she wanted.

It was a rather worse for wear, flesh colored human torso, armless, on a wheeled dolly.

Dana wheeled it out , towed it behind her as she trudged through wet, packed gravel, set it at about ten feet.

Just like he was that night.

Dana Keller went back to her Jeep, unlocked the back door, swung the door open and the hatch up and pulled out her shotgun.

She'd drawn the oldest shotgun in the Sheriff's armory, the one used for training, the one that saw the most rounds, the greatest wear, the one that had been used on raids, on the road, the one that was worn enough and loose enough the Sheriff didn't want it in a cruiser, and so the stock was painted yellow and the word TRAINING stenciled on either side.

Dana knew the Sheriff planned to replace all the shotguns at once, and soon: she also knew that this old residenter, this experienced, pretty well worn out old scatter gun, was likely the one least valuable gun they had.

Except for one they didn't have anymore, a High Standard with mechanical issues.

That gun wouldn't work unless it was held upside down, which saved a rookie officer's life on dark night when he was distracted and the gun stripped from his hands: the first round went into the starry sky as his trigger finger reflexively tightened when the other guy grabbed the gun and jerked, and as he backed up and his assailant tried without success to jack the action, the greenhorn drew his sidearm and put six rounds of issue Parabellum into the attacker's wishbone, just like that pale eyed old Sheriff taught him.

Dana set the box of 00 buck on the bench beside her, worked the cardboard flap loose, swung it up.

She looked at the plastic simulacrum facing her, mindlessly thumbing round after round into the extended magazine.

That's about the distance they were, she thought, and she remembered that night of horror, that night of violation, that night of violence -- her cheekbone was still sore where she'd been slugged, but nowhere near as tender as those areas inside -- those bruises on her eternal soul -- those injuries of the spirit, hidden, unseen.

For a moment, for one bare moment, she felt again that horrible realization that she'd hesitated.

She hesitated, and that's when they grabbed her, when they beat her, when they did more, much more, much worse.

Dana felt her chest tighten, she felt short of breath --

And then she just plainly came unglued.

Deputy Sheriff Dana Keller, the pretty young daughter of that pale eyed Linn Keller, saw her attacker, the first one, the one that surprised her and frightened her, and Dana drove four fast charges of military issue Double-Ought into the punished plastic: she did not retreat, she did not look for cover, she advanced, firing as she went, round after round driving into her memory, until the gun was empty: Dana drove the gun's muzzle into what was left of the mannikin's face, swung the butt up for a butt stroke, drove the butt of the gun down onto the collar bone: she was a raging, raving machine, dead silent, the screaming she heard in her ears was locked deep in her throat, but the absolutely deadly nature of her assault could not be denied.

Sheriff Willamina Keller, her grandmother, arranged to train with the French Foreign Legion while she was in Afghanistan: Dana didn't quite know how the Legion Etrangere figured into that campaign, but she accepted that her Gammaw sought out the best instructors when she wanted to know something.

Her Gammaw learned the Legion's method of close-in fighting, using the rifle as a weapon: she was compact, she was wiry, she was fast, and when she came home, she taught this system to her pale eyed son (her husband disdained to learn anything of the kind ... he was, after all, FBI, and the Bureau taught him everything he could possibly need!) -- Linn, in turn, taught each of his children, with turned-hickory riot batons at first, then with surplus military rifles, built for abuse.

Now Dana turned her badger loose.

She saw her attackers, she saw the monsters who did things to her that should never be done to any girl, any woman: she emptied the shotgun into their memory, into the dummy, as she advanced, she laid into it with muzzle and butt, until her vision was hazy and she was straddling the knocked-over mannikin, holding what was left of the barreled action across its throat, snarling as she choked the life out of it, until a feminine hand gripped her shoulder and a gentle voice murmured, "I think he's dead now."

Dana was a woman of Keller blood.

Dana was a pale eyed warrior who'd bled, and who'd drawn blood.

Dana was wounded, deeply wounded, but a wound too soon enclosed is a wound that festers, and has to be lanced, has to be drained.

Dana staggered to her feet, fell to her knees:  she bent, blindly reaching for the broken, yellow painted buttstock: she gasped and choked her way back to her Jeep, she threw what used to be a worn out old riot gun into the back of her Jeep, closed hatch and back door and got as far as the driver's door before she collapsed on the wet ground.

It took her a half hour of crying like a lost child, of screaming into her steering wheel, before she felt steady enough to drive.

Angela was waiting for her when she pulled up into the space at the Sheriff's office.

She went out into the misting wind, waited while Dana staggered to the back of her Jeep, looking like she'd been dragged backwards through Hell and a McCormick Reaper: Dana pulled out the broken shotgun, stared at splintered wood with wide, shocked eyes, looked at her sister.

"Did you face the monster?" Angela asked.

Dana looked at her, nodded, shivering.

"Come on inside where it's warm. We'll donate these in the parts bin."

Angela ran a hand under her little sister's near arm, her other arm across Dana's shoulders, steadying her.

"I wondered how long it would take you to beat it."

They were inside, sipping coffee: Angela had a blanket around her little sis's wet shoulders, waited patiently as Dana sat there with her head hanging over the steaming mug.

"Thank you for being there," Dana gasped. "Your ... hand on my shoulder ... I needed that."

Angela frowned, tilted her head.

"Come again?"

"At the range. When you told me you thought he was dead enough."

Angela's eyebrow twitched up and she looked curiously at her stil-shivering sister.

"Dana, I've been here all day.  I haven't set foot outside until you pulled up."

Dana's head came up, her eyes wide, and then they both saw something that hadn't been on the conference room table a moment earlier.

A single, fresh-cut rose, a bright-scarlet rose with drops of misty-wet on its soft, fragrant petals.

Two pale eyed sisters looked at one another, and suddenly they realized who it was that brought a troubled girl, a moment's comfort.

Edited March 2 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

CAN'T MAKE IT, SORRY

Sheriff Linn Keller looked up, nodded.

"That's why I make the calendar out ahead of time," he said mildly, "conflicts either exist or arise, and we can change accordingly."

"Believe me, Sheriff," Angela said, "I would much rather present for the Tea Society than I would tend this detail!"

Sheriff Keller nodded, took a long breath.

"I tend to share your sentiments," he agreed.

 

Angela Keller pulled slowly into the hospital's parking garage.

She was, by her own admission, "suspicious as a curly wolf" -- though how a curly wolf was more suspicious than the regular lupine, was something she really didn't understand.

She saw nothing out of the ordinary as she idled up the ramp to the second level, the level with the walkway over to the hospital building.

She saw a convenient spot.

Rather than just pull into it, she checked her mirrors, pulled past, backed her pretty purple Charger with the supercharger hood, into the available space.

As soon as she shut off the engine, she felt eyes on her.

Angela was not in her uniform dress -- she was not there to work, she'd been fired because she'd used a pistol to keep someone safe, she'd been awarded by the Mayor and fired by Personnel -- she'd come to pick up her final paycheck, which they'd neglected to direct deposit into her account.

Angela looked around again, twisted a little in her seat as she opened her door, a quiet move to ensure she could feel her sidearm was still in its place on her belt.

She stepped out, settled her unbuttoned suit jacket a little.

Her pulse was up a little and she felt the adrenaline starting to trickle into her blood, getting her ready for unpleasantness.

Movement left.

Angela was still between the cars; she'd pressed the lock button when she got out, so the car was locked when it shut, and she'd had the dealership disable the auto-unlock feature on the passenger front door.

A good thing.

Two street thugs came at her -- one for the passenger door, she felt the car rock as unwashed fingers hooked under it, pulled -- the other, anonymous in a hoodie and a surgical mask, pulled up his shirt to show a pistol in his waistband.

Angela didn't wait for him to reach for it.

She honestly did not remember drawing.

She was amazed to hear a woman's voice -- loud, commanding, echoing between cement ceiling and floor, demanding the street rat SHOW ME YOUR HANDS, DO IT NOW DO IT NOW DO IT NOW! -- and realized with a degree of honest surprise that it was her voice.

The accomplice jumped back against the next car, turned, ran.

"HANDS IN THE AIR OR I'LL DROP YOU!"

Eyes, wide, white above the mask, two arms shot straight up.

Angela turned over her lapel to reveal a six point star, her other hand keeping her Glock steady on the holdup's wishbone: she reached under her coat, spun out a set of cuffs.

Six minutes later, with Security running toward her, she shoved her way past a protesting secretary, dragging a protesting prisoner, shouldered into the board meeting:  she shoved her prisoner's belly into the edge of the shining, heavy table, doubled him over, turned her lapel over.

"DEPUTY SHERIFF," she announced in a loud voice. "I'M HERE TO INVESTIGATE WAGE THEFT AND FRAUD, BECAUSE A NURSE WAS FIRED AND NOT PAID HER LAST PAYCHECK! WHILE WE'RE AT IT, A NURSE WAS FIRED BECAUSE YOUR PARKING LOT IS NOT SAFE! THIS PRISONER IS UNDER ARREST FOR ATTEMPTED GRAND THEFT AUTO, CONSPIRACY, AGGRAVATED ASSAULT WITH WEAPON SPECIFICATION AND POSESSION OF A FIREARM IN A POSTED NO-WEAPONS ZONE! NOW WILL SOMEBODY TELL ME WHY I WAS FIRED WHEN IT'S EVIDENT YOU CAN'T KEEP THIS PLACE SECURE?"

 

Deputy Sheriff Angela Keller looked at her pale eyed Daddy.

"I have to testify in court as to my out-of-jurisdiction arrest," she said, "and I'll be appearing before the Board of Directors with my legal counsel."

"You're trying to get your job back?" Linn asked.

"No. No, you couldn't pay me enough to work for those damned sheepherders. I'm going to make them agree that they should never have fired me, that they were at fault for not keeping their premises safe, and I'm going to make them offer me my old job back, with full back pay and full seniority."

"I thought you weren't going back."

"I'm not," she said, and her smile was not pleasant. "I'm going to make them offer it so I can throw it back in their faces."

"Before or after they award back pay?"

"After, of course," Angela said, striking a cheesecake pose. "A girl's got to eat, you know!"

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

JUDGEMENT

"Close the door."

Paul Barrett, one of Linn's oldest friends and now his Chief Deputy, eased the door shut, looked at his boss with unreadable black eyes.

"Grab a set," Linn said as he hunched forward, laced his fingers together on the green desk blotter. 

"Paul, I need your advice."

Paul considered the ungrammatical invitation, the slouched posture, the personal request.

Not an official summons, then.

Linn looked at his segundo and smiled with half his mouth -- also an encouraging sign -- "Paul, I try hard not to offend."  He frowned a little at his hands as they unlaced, as he straightened.

"I remember my mother" -- Paul's train of thought took a side track, remembering the moment in a flash of insight: Linn's mother, Sheriff Willamina, had occasion to speak with a rabbi, in her official capacity: when the Rabbi was shown into the conference room, Willamina was looking out the window, and spoke without turning.

"I need your advice," she'd said without turning: "I have a memory fragment that it is not proper for a woman to shake hands with a Rabbi."

Paul remembered being silent and watchful, he wasn't intending to be in the conference room but he'd gone in to retrieve his notebook, and faded back against the wall and froze as his father and the Rabbi came in.

The Rabbi, he remembered, was a kindly old man who walked with a cane and a quiet smile:  he walked slowly -- not as if he were in pain, more as if he planned each step -- and when he was closer, he said, "A wiser Rabbi than I said that the woman's hand should be shaken, so as not to embarrass her."

Willamina turned, looked at him, smiled just a little -- with her arms folded.

Paul had no idea the nature of the meeting; he slipped out behind his father, who was discreet enough not to take any official notice -- though Paul looked at his father, and was warmed by his father's approving wink.

Paul had seen his old friend follow his Mama's example in such matters many times in the past: he was direct, when directness was the best course; he was fast and brutal, when that was the most effective course; the man was not perfect, and on those occasions when he'd been wrong, he'd said so in so many words, he'd looked people in the eye to apologize to them and say in so many words that he was bass ackwards wrong and the fault was his entirely.

Paul was satisfied that -- on the extremely rare occasion when a mistaken arrest was made -- that Linn's fast and frank admission, kept them from lengthy (and expensive) litigation.

When Linn asked him to "grab a set" and then said he needed Paul's advice on how not to offend, Paul leaned forward, forearms on his knees, regarded the Sheriff with unblinking eyes, nodded, once.

"Paul, the older I get, the more I outlive personal enemies."

Paul waited, silent, unmoving.

"You may've heard me cuss that dirty John Allen when I couldn't find something."

Paul remained still, carven, as if he were a watchful predator beside a game path, invisible in his stillness, waiting.

Linn took a long breath.

"John Allen was a real character. I knew the man, and he offended me."

Barrents' carved mask raised an eyebrow.

It took quite a bit to offend Linn, and the man that succeeded, had to have worked at it.

"The man was in a position of public trust. His actions put the public health at risk, and when he was informed of this, rather than fix the problem, he shot the messenger."

"You?" Paul grunted.

"Me. Got me fired."

"Back East?"

"Yep."

Paul waited.

"The man was never brought to task for his transgression. In time, certain State agencies were made aware of his actions, but by then ... he'd sold the business that was causing the problem, and apparently they couldn't get enough money out of him to make a prosecution worthwhile."

Paul's stillness was remarkable:  had a mouse run under his chair, it would have been fossilized into a furry grey statuette by the still silence fairly cascading from the Chief Deputy.

"It's rare that I'll celebrate someone's death, Paul."

"You're celebrating this one."

"Damned right."

"How can I help?"

"There's where I need your advice. You are a strict teetotaler."

Paul nodded.

"Normally I would throw out some Kentucky Drain Opener and knock back a happy salute."

Paul smiled, just a little, raised a finger.

"Be right back."

Linn waited, staring at his desk calendar, at the handwritten notation in red ink.

Paul was returned in a few minutes with a steel thermos and two paper cups: he closed the door quietly behind him, set the paper cups down.

Linn watched as Paul dispensed something water clear, two fingers' worth.

Each man gripped a paper cup, hoist it in salute: whatever it was, it was chilled:  they drank.

Paul's black eyes smiled, just a little, at the surprise in his boss's pale eyes, as Linn thought to himself that was some of the best water he'd ever tasted.

"This," Paul said, "is from a ceremonial spring. I had a feeling today was special."

He poured another volume in each cup.

They raised the second libation.

"To judgement," he said.

They drank.

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

ARE WE AGREED

Ambassador Marnie Keller knelt, gracefully, as she always did, her rich velvet skirt puddling around her: a happy little boy ran barefoot to her, wobbling a little as he did: Ambassador Marnie Keller laughed with her delighted son, and for a moment, for a long and happy moment, all the other cares and strains she'd been under, were gone.

The Ambassador sat down with her son and gave him her full attention: when her husband came in, she was sitting on the floor with him, reading aloud, her voice gentle, pleasantly modulated, soothing: a little boy in a diaper and a yellow pullover laid back against his Mama's thigh, looking up at her as he chewed on his fist.

This was not the first time Dr. Greenlees wished for some kind of a magical camera implant, so he could push a button behind his ear and *click!* -- he'd have a permanent snapshot of what he was seeing.

It did not take long for John Jr. to fall asleep: Marnie picked him up, carefully, hoping to give him the sense of floating; she wrapped him in warmed flannel, laid him in the crib, turned to her husband, sighed with pleasure to feel strong and masculine arms around her.

"Rough day?" he whispered.

Marnie nodded.

"I prevented a war today," she whispered.

"Tell me about it over supper?" he whispered back. "I've got it waiting."

"Bless you, John. I'm starved!"

 

"NO WE DO NOT NEED TO VAPORIZE THE ENTIRE PLANET!" Marnie shouted angrily.

The room had been abuzz with voices -- with plans for weaponry, troop and ship deployment, sustained demands of high-output energy cannon -- but when the Ambassador, who'd never spoken above a pleasant, may-I-have-your-attention greeting when convening meetings, when the Ambassador known for her feminine and genteel appearance and her unfailing manners, SLAMMED her gloved palm down on the table, SHOUTED in obvious anger --

When her milk-fair skin was a ruddy red, when the cords stuck out in her neck, when anger fired her soul and blazed from her eyes --

"Now look," Marnie said sternly, straightening and planting gloved knuckles on her waist, "we took a strike team and made multiple surgical extractions. We cleaned out the perps. I gave the Chief to understand he would arrange to have the corruption cleared out, peacefully or otherwise."

Marnie glared with hard eyes at men gathered for a council of war, men who represented an unholy amount of interstellar firepower, men who were more than willing to use it to right a wrong.

"It was MY family that was offended, MY family that was harmed, and MY family will decide --"

"NO!"

"Admiral?" she lifted her chin and answered in an icy voice.

An Admiral rose, looked around him, looked at her.

"Ambassador," he said, his voice hard, "you are one of us. You have more than proven your value to the Confederacy as a whole. If we allow this outrage to go unpunished --"

Marnie snapped her fingers.

A holovid seared into life between the long tables, the conjured image taken from across the street of a partially-demolished building.

"There I am," Marnie said, "and here is my brother. You can see these are the condemned, and each of them has a noose about his neck."

Another snap of her fingers and the holographic image came to life.

One, then another, and finally all of the figures standing at the edge of a building that was missing its front, fell, jerked to a stop, twisted, kicked, until they hung motionless, lifeless, swaying.

Marnie snapped her fingers again.

Another image:  one man this time, and beside him, a young woman in a uniform not familiar to most of them.

"This," Marnie said, "is my little sister. She is the one who was ... assaulted. Those who went over the edge, those you just saw hanged, were the men who beat her and did much worse than that.

"They're dead.

"This man" -- another snap of her fingers, and a pale eyed Sheriff's deputy stepped behind the condemned, set her bootsole on his backside and sent him to hell with a hard thrust of her leg -- "this man arranged to have it done.

"Those responsible are dead, and dead at the hands of my family."

"WE ARE YOUR FAMILY!" the Admiral shouted angrily: men nodded, voices raised in agreement, until they formed a shouted chant: "WE ARE YOUR FAMILY! WE ARE YOUR FAMILY! WE ARE YOUR FAMILY! WE ARE YOUR FAMILY!"

Marnie let the chant run, she let those men assembled blow off some steam: she'd suspected there would have to be some relief, for she'd seen faces redden, she'd seen hands close into fists, she'd seen heads come together in nodding agreement over some low-voiced comment.

Marnie waited several long moments, then raised her gloved hands, lowered them slowly, palms-down.

The volume lowered; silence replaced shouts.

Marnie planted her fisted knuckles on the table before her, leaned on them: she looked to her left, she looked into every set of eyes: she swung her gaze around, down the long table on her left, up the long table on her right.

She looked at every man there, and every man felt the touch of her pale-eyed gaze.

Marnie nodded.

"We have no need to vaporize an entire planet," she said finally, "and we have no need to draw a ring around a city and turn it into a mile deep pit of molten slag."

Her eyes were pale, hard, the eyes of someone who knew what it was to take her revenge on the evil that was done to one of her own.

"Gentlemen, you honor me more than you know when you tell me that I am family."

Marnie took a moment to collect herself.

Every eye in the room was on her face.

Every man there watched a skilled negotiator, a disciplined arbiter, thrust her bottom jaw out and chew on her bottom lip.

"Gentlemen," she said, then cleared her throat, swallowed, tried again.

She looked up, looked around.

"Last night ..."

Marnie took another breath, tapped at a flush-mounted screen built into the tabletop before her.

Another holovid appeared between the tables.

The horizon blazed scarlet with sunset's glory.

Granite teeth, broken and jagged, tore at the clouds behind the silhouetted rider, then a blaze of light illuminated the rider.

"That's me," Marnie said, "and that is my Daddy's stallion."

They saw a beautiful young woman, leaned forward over the stallion's neck, her hands flat against furred muscle just under the mane: the look on her face was one of utter delight, and the stallion's nose was punched forward, his ears laid back: the shutter tripped at just the right moment, all four hooves were off the ground and it looked as if horse and rider were one magical creature, riding the wind itself.

Her gloved finger caressed the glass plate; another image -- it was Marnie again, sinking gracefully to the floor and opening motherly arms to a happy little boy, half-staggering, half-running on chubby little legs:  the image zoomed in close as mother and son came face to face, with laughter shared, with shining eyes.

The image disappeared and Marnie straightened.

"That," Marnie said, "is our son, John Junior. If anyone tried to hurt him, God Almighty is the only force that could keep me from retaliation."

She looked around, nodded.

"It is to your credit that you are willing to bring Hell itself upon the heads of anyone who caused my family harm, but we've already done that. If I'd known you felt so strongly about it, I'd have included you in our necktie party."  

Marnie smiled, just a little.

"My sister is healing. Those wounds of the spirit are harder to heal than those of the body, and those have been difficult enough. My thanks to the many offers of your hospitality. My sister is considering some time offworld, and your generosity will no doubt contribute to her healing."

Marnie looked around again.  "Are we agreed that we won't burn a smoking hole in the Sol system today?"

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

"Wick, this is Linn."

"Be damned. Didn't think I'd be hearin' from you!"

"You're not. Got some fellas here need your help."

"Didn't think I'd hear that out of you either!"

"You didn't. Here's what we got. If I take official notice of these poor fellas I'll have to inquire if they've been drinkin' and that could lead to paperwork, y'see."

"Ahh-huhhh."

"Now if you were to bring that big four wheel drive pickup of yours and some chain, you might want to bring two twenty-footers, you can ease these poor fellows out of the mud."

"Wha'd they do, get all drunked up and drive into the swamp?"

"No, this time it wasn't their fault."

"What do you mean, this time?"

There was a patient sigh, then, "Let's just say luck was runnin' ag'in 'em this time."

"What's in it for me?"

"I reckon you could talk 'em out of a six pack, they got an extra ain't been drunk yet."

"Well, hell, if that's the case ... whereinell they at?"

"Come on out the Kelly Stretch, a-past the old barn with all the tin signs nailed on it and take a left at the dead dog in the middle of the road. You'll see 'em from there."

"Oh hayil, I'll be there 'bout ten minutes!"

Linn punched the red hangup button, handed the cell phone back to the anxious young man who was shifting his weight from one foot to the other, listening to the Sheriff's conversation.

"Sheriff," he said nervously, "thank you, I owe --"

Linn raised a teaching finger, cutting off the nervous stammer.

"You've not been drinkin'. When you hit that mud fan where it washed off the hillside right across that curve, there was no salvation. Was it anyone else they'd take a look at your buddies and the beer and just have a field day. Once Ellswick gets you back on firm footin', just take them home and you go on home too."

"I can do that, Sheriff."

Linn winked at the young man, nodded to the others, swung up into the saddle.

"Once Wick gets here, I'd give him one of those twelve packs. I mentioned a six pack but if he gets a twelve, he'll be inclined to help you out in future."

Linn grinned.

"Helps to cultivate favors.  Yup, now."

A pale eyed Sheriff on a shining black gelding turned and clattered noisily down the center line of the two lane road, then ducked off onto a mountain path he knew of.

Linn waited until he'd gotten home -- time enough for Wick to get those young fellows pulled out -- then he called the highway department and told them about that minor mud slide that ran a fan of slick, sloppy runoff right across a ninety degree curve, right in the wrong place to sling an unsuspecting vehicle into the roadside ditch.

Linn was just hanging up his saddle when Victoria came into the barn, ran noisily across the cement floor with a delighted "Daddeeeee!"

A short-coupled, curly-black, miniature Bear Killer was bouncing happily along with her.

Linn stooped and caught his little girl, hoist her up and around and back down as the little Bear Killer danced happily at his feet.

"Whereyabin DaddyImissedya!" Victoria exclaimed in the excited, run-together chatter of a little girl, and Linn rubbed The Bear Killer companionably and grinned.

"I've been building alliances," he said, knowing he could as well have answered he'd been making mud pies and it would mean just as much to her: all she knew was, her Daddy was paying attention to her, his hands were strong and reassuring as they held her, and his voice was Daddy-gentle as he spoke with her! 

Edited March 5 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

SALVATION

Ambassador Marnie Keller unfolded the letter, read.

The Confederate Ambassador watched as she broke the red-wax seal, as she unfolded the page: he saw her chin lift slightly as she read, saw her eyebrow raise, and not lower, not until she'd finished, not until she'd re-read the handwritten communication, not until she folded it, slowly, carefully, not until Ambassador Marnie Keller tapped the folded sheet against her chin as her pale eyes wandered to the far wall, looking at something -- a memory, perhaps? -- well beyond the painted, plastered portal.

"Bad news?" he asked softly.

Marnie blinked, looked at him, looked at the note.

"No," she said. "Just ... surprising."

Marnie rose, frowned.

"How long before we leave for Nawlins?"

The Ambassador's eyes tightened a little at the corners, they way they did when he approved of something: Marnie worked hard at correct pronunciations, she was scrupulous to use the correct form of address when speaking with someone, or of someone, and she'd taken great pains to frame locations very correctly when she spoke their names: there were subtle differences between the worlds, time-altered differences in dialect, cadencing, pronunciation: the Ambassador knew Marnie discreetly sought out a native of the world they were scheduled to visit, and at a State visit, she wished to pronounce the name of their capital city correctly -- more than that -- she wished to pronounce it like a native.

"Two days."

"I have time, then."

The Ambassador rose, paced slowly over to her.

He stopped short of taking her gloved hands in his.

"Madam Ambassador," he said softly, "come back to us. You are more of an asset than you realize."

Ambassador Marnie Keller nodded, slid her ID chip into the slot, keyed in a sequence, disappeared.

 

Deputy Sheriff Dana Keller closed her suitcase, opened it back up.

She looked at carefully folded clothes, plastic-bagged shoes, she looked at efficiency, at order.

She picked up the suitcase and dumped the whole thing out on her bed, turned, sat heavily, the way someone will when they're discouraged.

Marnie appeared just as Dana jumped up, reached behind her, swatted a pair of shoes from behind her backside where she'd just sat (rather painfully) on the hard edge of a leather shoesole.

Dana looked at her sister, shoved goods and garb aside so Marnie would have room to sit as well.

"Don't you get tired of wearing that?" Dana complained.

Marnie shrugged. "It's my trademark. Everyone knows me as the Ambassador when I'm dressed like this."

"Does anyone else dress like that?"

"No. No, styles in the Thirteen Systems evolved. So did their science, their culture, their language, their music. Nothing stays the same."

"Nothing but you."

Marnie smiled, just a little.  "Hardly."

"Mama said all she wanted was for you to be a girl."

"And I was too busy being a tomboy."

"She never said that."

"She said I was trying to be a Not-Mommy."

"Were you?"

Marnie sighed, rubbed her younger sister's back.

"I've had a long time to think that one over," she said gently. "My Mama -- my birth-Mama -- was such a failure ... I didn't want to be anything like her. I never knew my seed donor so Daddy is the only Daddy I ever knew. He ..."

Marnie hugged her sister closer, laid her head over against Dana's.

"Daddy made me feel safe," she whispered.  "I wanted that. I wanted to feel safe."

"So you wore boots and rode horses and Gammaw taught you how to fight."

Marnie nodded.

"Gammaw was ... special."  She whispered the word, and Marnie heard the smile in the whisper. "Gammaw wore skirts and dresses and I wanted to be Gammaw."

"And now you're you."

Marnie nodded.

"I interfered with an investigation," Dana offered.

"Sounds interesting," Marnie murmured.

"I helped a man avoid prosecution."

"You have my undivided."

"I helped him escape across state lines."

Marnie reached over with her other hand, her glove closing, warm and gentle, over her younger sister's knuckles.

Dana looked at Marnie and saw pale eyes looking at her over a set of spectacles run down to the end of her nose.

"This is a look of approval," Marnie murmured, and Dana laughed, then sighed, looked at the floor.

"He was innocent, Marnie," she said softly. "He was innocent."

"You proved this."

"I convinced the right people of it."

"And?"

"And I don't know all the ins and outs of it, but when they found he wasn't the one they wanted -- when they found who actually murdered a Federal officer -- they quietly dropped charges."

"What about him?"

"He had to threaten exposure of one of their dirty little operations to get them to scrub the usual sources of all reference to his having been implicated. It was less work to do a deep dive into the records than explain their own dirty deeds."

"Welcome to politics," Marnie murmured.

"Do you remember Daddy reading to us about Sarah McKenna?"

Marnie looked at her sister, surprised.

Sarah McKenna's exploits were some of their favorite sections of the Journals, and as little girls, they often asked to have them read and re-read and re-read again.

"Sarah went somewhere -- I forget where" -- Dana shook her head in frustration, frowned -- "anyway ... she wore a veil. Women wore veiled hats, they went in and out of fashion but there's always someone wearing out-of-fashion. Anyway ... she lifted her veil enough to show that awful scar she'd painted from one eye down across her face and another across her throat and she whispered" -- Dana's hand went to her throat, squeezed, and she said in a husky, strangled whisper, "I used to sing opera!"

Marnie smiled, her gloved hand tightening over Dana's knuckles:  "That's exactly how I imagined she'd sound!" 

"I did that same thing."

"What?"

Dana nodded.

"I had to go undercover again."

Marnie's expression was no longer approving.

"Who talked you into that idiot decision?" Marnie hissed.

"No."

Dana shook her head, stood suddenly, bringing a minor cascade of cloth goods over the edge of the bed to the floor.

"I had to do that, Marnie.  I had to do it for me."

Marnie surged to her feet, glided in front of her sister, took her face between gloved hands, looked very directly into her pale eyes.

"Dana, are you hurt?" she whispered.

"Not this time," Dana whispered back.

"Fill me in."

 

The Ambassador rose as Marnie appeared.

"Madam Ambassador," he said formally. "Is all well?"

"Mister Ambassador," Marnie said with an equal formality, "I understand you are a father."

The Ambassador regarded this slim, attractive woman with a curious eye.

"I have that honor, yes."

"Mister Ambassador, do you remember the moment when your young did something truly ... mature, something that surprised you into realizing they were capable of conducting themselves in a truly adult manner -- not merely mature, but adult?"

The Ambassador considered for a long moment.

"Yes," he said finally. "I ... have."

"I'd mentioned that my sister was badly hurt in an operation."

"I remember your mention, yes."

Marnie's eyes were veiled, but behind her long-lashed mask, the Ambassador could see a soul of polished granite.

"My sister found her healing."

The Ambassador nodded gravely, his expression serious.

"She found it by preserving an innocent man's reputation."

Again the slow, solemn nod, the expectant silence.

Marnie's eyes drifted off to the side and she added softly, "I had no idea she was so ... capable."

The Ambassador raised an eyebrow.

"In my... limited... experience with women of your line," he said carefully, "I have come to appreciate the remarkable capabilities I've seen."

He considered for a moment, then added, "We've another day, Madam Ambassador. Time is an investment. Take it from a man who will never hear his son laugh again. Go home. Be with your husband and your son. I'll forward coordinates for the Nawlins negotiations."

Ambassador Marnie Keller neither discussed nor argued: she turned, slipped her ID chip into the slot, keyed in a sequence, disappeared.

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

"I GOT SKILLS!"

Michael looked up at his Pa.

The two were sitting back in the Lawman's Corner, just the two of them, a pale eyed father and his pale eyed, eight year old son.

It was unusually warm -- the air was chill and uncharacteristically damp, but warmer than average this high up -- father and son were working steadily on their meal, listening to the talk around them.

Michael learned early and well from his Pa, the way children do -- imitation, and observation, far more than didactic instruction -- Michael saw his Pa's eyes lift, he saw the look of disapproval at the voices from the nearest booth -- two elderly women, one of whom could not find any favor in what she'd been brought.

Michael recalled his Pa ordered blue cheese dressing with his salad.

His Pa never said a word when the waitress set his salad down and said "Thousand Island dressing."

Michael looked at his Pa, and his Pa closed one eye: at this silent, fatherly instruction, Michael held his question.

The two worked steadily through their platesful of chopped sirloin, taters and gravy, salad: Linn tore his roll apart, grinned at his son.

"It's not polite to mop up your gravy," he said quietly as he mopped up his gravy, "but this is good enough I'm making an exception!"

Michael had already eaten his, elsewise he'd have done the same:  Linn leaned back as the waitress came over, and Michael paid close attention when his Pa addressed the harried-looking hash slinger.

"You're havin' one of those days," he said -- a statement, not a question -- the waitress gave him a grateful look and nodded.

"Kind of figured you were," Linn said quietly.

"Dessert?" the waitress asked, or rather gasped, as she picked up the stacked plates and utensils.

"If you'd have any pecan pie?" Linn asked hopefully, and the waitress look crushed.

"No, I'm sorry," she honestly moaned. "We're out of peanut butter, out of peach, demand for pie comes and goes and we're nearly out" -- she looked at Michael -- "but we have chocolate!"

Linn looked at his son.

"Sound good to you?"

Michael's head turned toward the wall, his young hand pressed against the cool wood lining their corner, felt it shiver a little.

"Be damned," Linn murmured.  "Thunder. Didn't think that was comin' til this afternoon."

Michael looked back.

"Yes, sir. Chocolate sounds good."

"Two of 'em, please?" Linn asked with a gentle voice and a gentle smile:  the waitress nodded, picked up the stack, headed for the kitchen.

Linn leaned over the table toward his son, and Michael leaned over toward his Pa.

"Michael," Linn said gently, "did you hear those women behind you?"

"Yes, sir."

"You recall how they just complained to high heaven?"

"Yes, sir."

"Michael, those kind of people are not happy with anything. They'll complain if they were hanged with a new rope, to quote the Duchess."

Michael had no idea who the Duchess was, but he added this new phrase to his young and growing vocabulary.

The waitress came back, a distressed look on her face:  she set down a fresh glass of sweet tea for Michael, refilled the Sheriff's coffee:  "I am so sorry," she said, "but we're clear out of chocolate. All we have left is cherry!"

Michael was only eight years old, but Michael was observant, and although Michael did not realize the full implications of what he saw, he realized that his Pa put this poor distressed soul at ease when he said, "Just so happens cherry is my favorite."

"Warmed up, with ice cream?"

"Yes ma'am, two of 'em if we could please."

Michael remembered this meal, in the Silver Jewel, when it was just he and his Pa: it was a good memory he carried into his adult years, and when he sat with his own son in just such a place, he too had occasion to teach his young protege by virtue of the living example of his own life.

Michael was reminded multiple times through his life, however, by his pale eyed Pa speaking a favorite memory: after they'd finished their pie and ice cream, after Linn paid the bill and the two stepped out under the roof overhanging the boardwalk, they held station as heavy clouds gave up trying to hold their payload, and the fat, thick, heavy, COLD cascade fell in sheets from the heavens, punishing the pavement and soaking the unwary.

"Michael," Linn said, "I can bring up the Jeep so you don't get too wet."

"Nah, I can swim," Michael said offhandedly, then grinned up at his Pa.  

"I got skills!"

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

RADIOLOGY

Sheriff Linn Keller was flat on his back on a padded table, a long foam wedge under his knees taking the discomfort from his lower back:  the radioographer rubbed the inside of his forearm with something wet and almost cold, tilted her head like a vulture considering a particularly appetizing carcass.

"You look stressed," Linn said gently.  "One of those days?"

"Honey, it was one of those days before twelve o'clock," she sighed: somewhere between "one of those days" and her sigh, the IV went into Linn's vein, easily, smoothly:  he felt the cold as she flushed with saline, he smiled a little as she carefully secured the IV site.

"Now remember," she cautioned, "when the contrast hits you, you'll feel flushed."

"Like I wet myself," Linn grinned, and the tech laid gentle fingertips on his shoulder, bent closer, said confidentially "I wasn't going to say that," and giggled all the way back to her control booth.

The scan was quick and uneventful: when the Sheriff left the hospital, he had a green cling wrap holding the folded gauze on the IV site -- he thought to himself the tech used green because she thought he was Irish, then he thought she thought he was Irish because he was full of blarney, then he remembered what he'd been very recently told he was full of, and considered that maybe that was the case after all.

He went over the results with his daughter, the nurse: she looked at the results of the most recent scan, she took another look at his bloodwork, she pulled out a dainty little set of wire rimmed spectacles, placed them well down on her nose and glared at him overtop the wire rims, wiggling her nose like a bunny rabbit.

"I suppose you're going to give me hell now," he said, and Dana could hear the smile in her Daddy's voice.

"The scan shows everything is stable and has been for the past five years. That means you stay healthy and don't get yourself killed or I'll never speak to you again!"

"Is that kind of like your Mama telling me I'm not to die before her?"

"Dad-deee," Angela said, a warning note in her voice, "you have to give me away in marriage, remember?"

Linn nodded.  "I remember."

"Now. Your blood work.  You, my dear Sheriff, are a remarkably healthy man who needs to eat more blueberries and walnuts."

"I just happen to like both."

"Good. That makes it easier. And you have to eat more broccoli."

"Don't push it."

"Okay, we'll find something else. Alfalfa maybe."

"Alfalfa's a legume. I'll eat peanuts. Peanut butter and jelly sammitches. Peanut butter chocolate sauce over ice cream with crushed walnuts."

Angela raised spread fingers to the ceilling, shook her head.  

"O Lord," she begged, "is this man always so obstinate?"

"Only when I'm refusing to take myself seriously!" Linn grinned.  

"Daddy, your heart has a slight enlargement and there's a slight enlargement to your ascending aorta. These have remained stable for the past five years. You have a cyst on your liver that remains unchanged. So far, nothing to run screaming from the room waving your arms over your head."

"Yeah, that's what I said after the scan. The tech didn't run screaming from the control room so I knew there was nothing spectacularly bad on her screen."

"Did you ask if she saw anything?"

"I asked if she saw a spare set of keys."

Angela looked at her Daddy over her spectacles -- again -- and gave a dramatic, exaggerated sigh.

"I did not ask what she saw. I know they scan but they can't diagnose."

Angela nodded. "People think the X-ray tech can tell them something right away."

"No. I've listened to too many techs complain about that very thing. I'm not about to task them with anything of the kind."  Linn looked at his daughter.  "More blueberries and walnuts?"

Angela nodded.

"And peanuts."

"Peanuts won't hurt."

"Peanut butter and blueberry jelly sandwiches."

"Daddy," Angela warned, shaking her Mommy-finger at him, "you are incorrigible!'

"I also have an appetite for a banana split and I'm buyin'!"

Angela rose as her father did:  "Okay," she said, pretending to reluctance, "but only in the interest of dietary anti-oxidants, isoflavones and necessary nutrients found in fresh fruits, chocolate and tree nuts!"

"Nothing but the best," Linn said solemnly, offering his daughter his elbow.

 

 

Edited March 6 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

AND THE ANGEL CRIED

The foreman wiped his cheek, saw blood, wet and bright on the back of his work glove.

His head was ringing -- his ears were not ringing, no, his entire head rang like a cathedral bell -- he closed his eyes, opened them.

If this is hell, I earned it, he thought, and then he began to fight his way through the rubble.

It was always hot in the foundry.

Now it was hot and the dust hung heavy in the air: he had no idea what blew -- one moment all was as it should be, then he got knocked off his feet -- chunks and fragments of something sailed over him as he landed on the floor -- it took him a long moment to gather wind and strength enough to roll over, to work his way to all fours, then to his feet.

The gas, he thought.

Got to shut off the gas.

His eyes weren't working like they should -- they felt gritty, almost numb.

He saw his water jug, still under the table where he'd set it.

He unscrewed the spout, tilted his face up, dumped it over his face, into his eyes: he blinked he snorted, he sloshed some around in his mouth, spit, drank, screwed the cap back on the spout.

Where was I?

What the hell happened?

Explosion ... gas ... gotta shut off the gas ...

The foreman ignored the steady trickle of blood that ran down his face, down the chest of his singed overalls.

 

Angela Keller, pristine in her nursing whites, was covering complications of pregnancy -- even those ordinary, expected results of a mother who just shed her placenta and was now shivering so hard the siderails of her bed had to be padded, padded as thickly as if she had a seizure disorder:  "The placenta is one of the body's most powerful endocrine glands. The sudden loss of its --"

The classroom door opened and the hospital's director shoved in.

"Whatever you're doing, stop. Everyone get ready to move. Disaster protocol, foundry explosion."

Angela's eyes turned pale: she turned to the shocked faces looking at the door, looking at her.

"Nurses," she said briskly, "leave your books and your purses, they will be secure here. Bring your field kits, you should have them packed and ready as we discussed at the beginning of the term."

One of her students raised a tentative hand: Angela saw how pale she'd become, and Angela knew she had to be their rock, their anchor, their example.

"Miss Betsy."

"Miss Angela ..." 

Betsy was the shortest, the slightest built student in the class: she was also the best at patient care, and Angela noticed early in their acquaintance that Betsy had the firsthand knowledge in moving, turning and handling a comatose patient -- not an easy thing at all.

"Miss Angela, we're not nurses yet."

Angela looked very directly at Betsy, then at the others.

Angela lifted her chin and spoke, and she later imagined it was her Gammaw's voice that came out of her throat.

"NOW HEAR THIS," she declared, "EFFECTIVE NOW YOU ARE NURSES. YOU WILL BE DOING THE WORK, YOU WILL HAVE THE RESPONSIBILITY. YOU HAVE THE TRAINING AND YOU'VE BEEN DOING PRETTY DAMNED WELL. SADDLE UP!"

Angela watched with approval as her dozen students went to the cubbies along one wall, withdrew canvas shoulder bags, slung them over one shoulder and across their bodies.

"Nurses," Angela said as she slung her own warbag across her, "with me!"

 

The foreman found a length of heavy tubing -- he had no idea what it used to be, only that it was flattened on one end, torn as if ripped apart by an insane giant -- it was long enough to jam into the wheel valve: with the additional leverage, he got the valve to turn, a little, then more:  he withdrew the cheater bar, reinserted it, pulled again: another two tries and the valve was turned far enough he could discard the cheater and grab the wheel with gloved hands and muscle it shut.

He hadn't realized how much noise the fire was making until he'd shut the valve, until the fire shrank, shivered, died.

He turned, looked deeper into the rubble, flinched as part of a wall fell over.

Someone grabbed his shoulder:  he turned, saw a familiar face, a man he worked with every day, a man that used to have a beard, a man with singed stubble and what looked like a bad sunburn.

The man's mouth moved.

The foreman looked at him oddly and the man's mouth moved again.

It looked like he was shouting, and finally he made out what his co-worker was trying to say:

"Who else is alive?"

The foreman looked around, looked back, shook his head.

The two waded deeper into the rubble, started digging, started throwing bricks and chunks of hot steel aside.

 

Multiple Irises opened like elliptical mouths outside the foundry, within the fenced, gated property.

Men and machines poured out: yellow loaders with black lettering, yellow cranes with black booms, bright-red fire trucks: a flyer was released from its flatbed trailer, launched straight up, began sending high-res images back to the command truck:  a yellow bulldozer with CATERPICKLE stenciled along the hood bellowed out of an Iris, exhaust snarling aggressively into the dusty air: it turned, guided by the images from the flyer, stopped.

Rigid suction lines were coupled, attached: the tractor started up again, lowered its blade, cut through the chain link fence and made a straight shot for the nearest water: men jogged alongside it, a portable pump was towed into position: the tractor got the line as close to the water as it could, released, turned, backed: chain was run around the line, its end was capped with a strainer basket, two men waded out into the water, grateful for rocky fill underfoot as the crawler advanced the line into the slow moving water.

The big empty yard was organized chaos: men, machines, a combination of canvas walls and plastic panel roofs forming up, plastic decking laid down.

The field hospital was being assembled, additional transport stood ready to take patients through the appropriate Iris to waiting facilities offworld.

A bus pulled up outside the gates, flagged through by the constabulary, a bus that braked to a stop and allowed a baker's dozen nurses to flow out, and through the open gates, toward the field hospital.

 

He found a boot.

He dug some more, threw aside chunks of brick, slabs of bricks still mortared together: a leg, then the other leg, a body.

The foreman knelt, bent closer, squinted.

"Charlie!"

His voice was faint, far away, though he felt himself shouting.

"Charlie!"

He looked up.

Men were running toward him -- men in unfamiliar suits, but men with the grim look he'd seen before.

He raised a summoning arm.

 

Angela was everywhere at once: she was a steadying hand on a young shoulder, she was a moment's encouragement as young hands wrapped a blood pressure cuff around a filthied or bloodied arm, as another listened to a chest, nodded.

Betsy was busy with shears, stripping a man quickly, efficiently: stainless steel chattered through dust-filthied work pants, she put both hands on the shears and muscled through the worn belt, then up the side seam of the shirt.

Angela moved on to the next table just as a stretcher was set on it: her fingers told her what her eyes already knew: practiced fingers found the Adam's apple, dropped into the carotid groove, pressed, held:  she closed her eyes, counted to ten: she whipped the stethoscope from around her neck, listened to the unmoving chest, then shook her head: a black tag was tied on, the stretcher carried to another tent.

Angela turned, looked back at Betsy.

She saw her most tentative, her least certain student, already had oxygen on her patient: Betsy stripped open a foil pack of vaseline gauze, saw her set the gauze, still on half the opened package, aside: she pressed the vaseline side of the foil packaging against the bubbling hole in the man's chest, watched as she taped it on three sides -- both sides, and the top, leaving the bottom unsecured -- then seized the patient at belt and shoulder and rolled him up on his injured side.

Angela came around the other side of the table, pressed the bell of her stethoscope against the man's chest -- high, then low -- looked at Betsy, smiled just a little, nodded.

A teacher's greatest delight is to see that light that comes in a student's face when they grasp a lesson that had been just beyond their grasp.

When Betsy saw Angela's look of approval, Angela saw that same realization in her student's face.

Angela made a mental note to have Betsy present before her class, on the use of a one way flutter valve, when the patient has sustained a penetrating chest wound.

 

The disaster response team moved with the practiced efficiency of men who knew their work, and did it well.

Technology unknown on this world was used to locate survivors; offworld devices hoisted or vaporized rubble in order to remove the injured, and after the survivors, the bodies.

Through it all, a dozen plus one in winged caps, their hands busy, their faces serious: they were young, they were determined, they were handmaidens of life, handmaidens of death: not all that were retrieved, could be saved.

Physicians there were, yes; surgeons, both male and female, technicians and technologists, but of all these, it was the nurses the injured men remembered.

One man, half his face burned, one eye destroyed, a man beyond pain, looked at the smallest of these women in white winged caps: with the last of his strength, he asked, "Are you an angel?" and his hand closed around her wrist, gently, and then relaxed, and she felt the soul leave his body as his last breath sighed out, and was gone.

Betsy was not the only one there who shed tears that day, but hers was the picture that made the newspapers on ten worlds: as she bent over a man, as her face crumpled and her tears dropped on his burned face, the shutter tripped, the picture appeared above the caption:

"And The Angel Cried."

 

 

 

Edited March 7 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

THE EIGHT DAY CLOCK

 

Sarah Lynne McKenna snapped her fan shut, slapping her gloved palm loudly and glaring at an unshaven man in a rumpled suit, a broad-shouldered sort out of place in the dining room of a fine hotel.

Sarah rose, stood, her closed fan in both hands before her: she held it loosely, almost casually, she lifted her chin.

"State your business, sirrah," she said icily.

The shoulder-striker glared at her turned a little as if to line up a backhand slap: the sound of a revolving-pistol rolling into full cock froze him.

"I'll see you later," he snarled and started to turn.

The woman's hands came apart, the fan fell to the floor: his eyes, attracted naturally to movement, followed the fan as it fell: he looked up and saw the woman had a long, slender, almost needle-like blade in hand.

"You will see me now, sirrah," she said, her voice low, cold: he forgot, for just a moment, the cocked pistol he heard to his right.

He was an enforcer for a crime boss; his world was simple, uncomplicated, basic: when faced with violence, one responded with greater violence, or one withdrew, to do violence another day.

He'd been sent to find a woman, and that woman wasn't here -- the woman he wanted had a scar down her face, another across her throat, the woman he wanted wore a face-veil to hide those terrible scars.

This woman, though, this woman defied him in public, and he would not stand for that defiance.

He was a hand taller than she, well broader across the shoulders, hard-muscled.

She would stand no chance, once his hands were on her.

He surged forward, expecting her to freeze, as women always did.

She did not freeze.

He bent eagerly, going for a grab: something hit his hip and then he felt something, a momentarily prick that grew into an utterly blinding, agonizing, paralyzing PAIN --

The floor came up to meet his face --

Someone detonated a sunball of paralyzing, screaming, incinerating AGONY in his tenderloins --

A chair crashed down on the back of his head, his face made intimate contact with the burnished floor: the chair was well-built, and did not break.

One could not say as much for his nose, his jaw and one cheekbone, for when a pale-eyed woman in a fine gown seized the dining room chair in her gloved hands, swung it hard and brought it down on the back of her attacker's head, she did not do so in either a gentle manner, nor in a half-hearted manner:  no, she swung the chair like she meant it and she hit him with full intent to drive his face through to the cellars below.

Sarah Lynne McKenna pulled the slender, needle-like blade from the man's kidneys, lifted his coat tail and wiped the blade on the inside of the material: she splashed a little wine on the coattail, wiped the blade again, slid it into the handle of the dropped fan.

A well-dressed woman snapped her fan open, fluttered it delicately, took a well-dressed man's elbow, walked with a queenly gait toward the front door.

No one dared impede their progress.

 

Sarah sighed, leaned her head back against the padded headrest: the private car shivered as they started moving, as slack banged out of the couplers, as a pale eyed man in a tailored black suit regarded her with admiration.

"Little Sis," Jacob said softly, "I have never seen better!"

"You should see me on a good day," Sarah murmured without opening her eyes. "Thank you for kicking him like you did."

"It was that or shoot him," Jacob grinned, "and you know how I hate loud noises!"

"I ought to have Mama spank you."

"What was he all fired up about, anyhow?"

"He was looking for that feathered doxy that stole some papers from a crooked councilman."

"Will we be receiving a warrant, or maybe they'll send detectives looking for you?"

"No," Sarah sighed.  "I pay the staff well to see nothing. Besides, the other diners will attest that a woman was set upon by an unwashed brute, she defended herself against a known footpad and street thug."  

She opened her eyes, gave Jacob a sleepy look.

"I saved them the trouble of catching him. He's wanted in two states and a Territory."

"You could have claimed any reward on him."

Sarah smiled. "That's partly why he was after me. I did collect the reward money, when I stole those papers showing just how crooked the councilman was."

"Was?"

"The newspapers each received a third of the bundle I stole, along with a whispered suggestion that they can get the content from the other papers to fill out the complete story. By now the headlines will have him run out of office, if only to preserve the Mayor's image."

"You don't play fair, do you?"

"I never have, Jacob."  Sarah opened her eyes, gave her brother a gentle look. "Not after everything that was done to me, no, I don't play fair. I am just a small and weak woman, helpless in the face of outrageous fortune, a defenseless player on the brutal chessboard of a cold and uncaring life."

"So you stole from this crooked councilman as well."

"He was the one who hired a wanted man. All I did was collect the bounty on the dacoit's head."

Jacob Keller's expression was thoughtful: he eventually got up, came over, slipped his arm under his sister's ankles, raised her legs onto the long, padded sofa, worked a pillow under her head.

Jacob Keller, pale eyed and unsmiling, moved carefully, silently, as he eased a cupboard open, as he teased a folded blanket from the cupboard, as he draped it carefully over his sister's still form.

Jacob's eyes tightened a little at the corners as Sarah cuddled into the velvet upholstery, just a little, as one dainty, gloved hand gripped the edge of the blanket, pulled it in under her chin.

 

It was not uncommon for the Sheriff to have visitors.

Most of the time, he knew they were arriving -- most of the time, but not always.

Linn removed his Stetson as he came through the door, hung it on its peg, swept the immaculate kitchen with pale and appreciative eyes, looked to his right, hesitated.

He did not know the young woman lying on the couch in his study.

He did know the young woman sitting in his office chair, reading.

Angela looked up, smiled, put a finger to her lips:  Linn pulled off his boots, set them in the tray, went over to a cupboard.

Angela watched as her father removed a thick quilt, unfolded it:  he moved, silent on sock feet, over to the sofa, carefully draped the quilt over the diminutive sleeper's form: he saw her wiggle a little, saw one hand grip the edge of the quilt, draw it under her chin as she cuddled deeper into the couch without waking.

Linn turned, catfooted over to his daughter at her beckoning gesture, bent, hands on his knees, his ear close to Angela's lips.

"Her name is Betsy," he heard as his daughter's breath tickled the fine hairs on his ears. "She has been through two days of absolute hell and she's wound up like an eight day clock."

Linn turned his face toward her, closed one eye, nodded gravely, moved his own lips to his daughter's ear.

"There is cold meatloaf and salad," he whispered back, "and I'll heat up the oven for some fries. Less messy than deep frying."

He drew back, read the silent Thank you from his daughter's lips, looked at the two nursing caps on the edge of his desk, looked over at the young woman, asleep on his couch.

The young Bear Killer lay contentedly beside Angela, looked adoringly up at her, gave a truly huge, tongue-curling yawn, then laid his head down on curly-furred, sinner's-heart-black paws, and went back to sleep.

 

Sarah McKenna woke as the air brakes thumped and hissed beneath them.

Jacob was still sitting in the same chair, in the same place: something told her he'd been awake, alert, watchful, for the entire journey home -- though very likely he'd prowled like a pregnant cat while he did, and only seated himself so he'd be where she could see him when she first opened her eyes.

Jacob rose:  Sarah sat up, gave herself a few moments before rising.

Jacob folded the puffy, warm quilt, replaced it in the private car's cupboard, turned.

"If you're hungry," he said quietly, "Annette fixes enough to feed a young regiment, you're welcome to supper at my place."

Sarah walked slowly over to her brother, hugged him, laid the side of her face against his collar bone: he hugged her to him, felt her warmth, felt her long, deep, sigh.

"I'd like that, Jacob," she murmured. "After the last few days I'm wound up like an eight day clock."

Jacob rubbed his sister's back but made no other reply.

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

NOTHIN' SPECIAL

I like old horses, Jacob thought.

They've got more sense.

This one sure as hell has more sense than the man a-ridin' her.

Jacob's stallion plodded patiently alongside the aging nag a young man rode into town, a nag that knew her way home, and was headed that-a-way about as fast as she cared to travel ... which really wasn't very fast at all.

This suited Jacob.

The fellow in the saddle, the younger man riding beside him, very likely had no idea where he was -- chances were fair he didn't even realize he was in his own saddle.

Jacob knew well that the young and the inexperienced generally have to get one good drunk on, one genuine High Lonesome of a skull popping, pass-out-in-the-street drunk, in order to understand why it's not wise to drink to excess.

Once, and only once in his young life, had Jacob indulged in the distilled spirits: he was smarter than most, and indulged alone, in a line shack, and ended up buck naked, howling at the moon: by his own admission, he hadn't had a morning after, he'd had an entire day after, and that was the last time Jacob drank well indeed but not at all wisely.

This young fellow, now ... Jacob genuinely felt sorry for him.

He'd been plied with drink after shot after tumbler after bumper after snort after two fingers' worth, for whatever reason the population of the Silver Jewel thought it great sport to supply this agreeable young fellow with the Demon Rum and its related distillates, and by the time Jacob came along, he was busy trying to pour himself over the railing so he could mount his horse -- which was on the other side of the watering trough and well out of reach.

All he'd succeeded in doing was getting his Saturday night bath a few days early.

Jacob got him out before he drowned, he'd got him dried off at least a little, he'd managed to muscle him up into his own saddle; Jacob rode with him, and now the pair were almost to where a still drunken rider lived with his young wife.

Firelands was a town that didn't do a whole lot once the sun started to crowd the Western horizon: people worked hard, they played hard, they slept well at night: one wag was of the opinion that a man could fire a cannon down the main street and roll up the boardwalks as soon as the sun went down, and no one would be in the least bit inconvenienced by it: this was very nearly so.

By this gauge, it was rather late by the time the patient old mare plodded into her own pasture.

Jacob swung down, ground-reined his Apple-horse: he managed to get his younger counterpart out of the saddle without his hitting the ground (although it was a near thing!) -- Jacob propped the still-damp young fellow against a well-built rail fence, hung his arm over the rail and told him to prop up that fence post with his shoulder so it didn't fall over: given a task, his inebriated brain seized upon this Bounden Duty, and though his mind swam in alcoholic fumes and splashed in an ocean of distilled grain, he managed to shove his shoulder into adz-smoothed timber and prop that rascally fence post up as he'd been told.

Jacob unsaddled the mare, rubbed her down, baited her with a scoop of grain: he saw a light, a woman came out an opening door, shaded her eyes to peer more deeply into the dark:  "Dirk?" she called hopefully.

Now why couldn't I think of his name? Jacob wondered. I knew it and couldn't think of it!

Jacob unwound Dirk's arm from over the rail, got it around his shoulders: he spoke quietly to the stumbling sufferer and got a little less than halfway to the plank house when he spun, got behind his young charge, bent him over: Jacob's arm was around Dirk's lean belly and he bent him over.

Dirk's stomach had been insulted enough for one day.

By Jacob's estimate, the poor fellow heaved up enough contents to account for two weeks of intake: they were fairly near the pump, and so managed to make the pump, Jacob got some water down him: Dirk bent over and heaved this up as well, and Jacob primed him with more from the tin cup, pumped the washpan full.

Dirk washed his hands, clumsily, awkwardly, then gripped the pan and shoved his face into the cold water:  he came up, blowing, snorting: Jacob thrust a flour sack towel into his hands, and Dirk rubbed his face.

Jacob stood behind him, still holding him around the waist, and a good thing, for the deck underfoot was exhibiting a distinct list to starboard, and was also going down by the bow.

Another tin cup of water, this one stayed down:  Jacob's voice was quiet, reassuring, not quite nonstop, but enough to wake the sobering mind from its staggering stupor.

Jacob got the arm around his shoulders again, reached around back of him, gripped the waistband over the opposite hip:  awkwardly, haltingly, the two made for the cabin, made for the worried young woman with a lamp in hand, the young woman who stood awkwardly, her pregnant belly thrusting proudly under her apron.

Jacob got him inside.

Together they got the poor fellow stripped down: Jacob picked him up, laid him on the rope bed's tick mattress, rolled him up on his side and worked a towel under his head, a towel that draped over the edge of the bed into an empty, rinsed-out slop bucket.

Dirk honestly passed out after all this, Jacob on one knee beside the bed, his hand warm, strong on Dirk's uphill shoulder.

Jacob rose, stepped back, looked at Dirk's wife, who was busy looking embarrassed and uncertain.

"He's never done anything like this before," she almost whispered.

Jacob nodded, pulled a chair over behind her, eased it up until it just touched the backs of her legs:  she sat, hands clasped, worried, between her knees.

"He'll feel bad in the mornin'," Jacob murmured: he reached into his coat pocket, handed her a folded paper envelope. "Doc give me this. Mix it in his mornin' water. He'll be dry as a powder horn and he'll slug this down. Point him in a safe direction in case it comes back up in a hurry, but get as much water into him as he'll drink. It helps the big head. The powders will help the bad belly."

"Do I mix this" -- she looked at the hand-folded envelope -- "with cold water or hot water?"

"Doc said water that's just warm but no more, and follow it with good cold water."

Jacob looked at her very pregnant belly.

"How close is the baby?"

She lay a hand on her belly, looked at her snoring husband.

"Any time now," she whispered.

"I'll have the Ladies come out," Jacob said quietly. "You shouldn't be alone."

She shot him a grateful look, wrung her hands together in distress.

"Thank you for not locking him up," she whispered. "He's never done this before."

"I know," Jacob nodded.  "He's always been sober as the old Judge. Ever'body and their uncle were busy gettin' him drunk and thinkin' it was just such great sport."

Jacob rose.

She followed him with big, vulnerable eyes.

"You're a good man," she whispered.

Jacob smiled, almost sadly, shook his head.

"No," he said.  "I'm nothin' special."

 

Two days later, Jacob's son Michael planted the sawed chunk on the splittin' stump, stepped back.

Jacob swung the broad ax, clove the chunk in two: he pulled the ax free, stepped back, waited for Michael to grab one of the halves and set it back on the stump.

Both Kellers stopped and looked as Annette came up their driveway at an easy trot -- or rather, as she drove their fine and shining buggy up the drive, for it was their mare that trotted, not Jacob's wife.

Jacob leaned the ax against the stump, straightened: Michael stood, grinning, as his Ma drew the chestnut to a stop.

"Jacob Keller," Annette said, her eyes dancing with delight, "I'll have you know you've been elevated to sainthood!"

Jacob gave her his very best Innocent Expression, which of course fooled her not one little bit -- she as his wife, after all, and wives tend to see right through their husbands' facades.

Annette tilted her head a little and regarded father and son, laughed: even at his tender age, Michael even stood like his father.

"What in Heaven's name did I do to gain the approval of the Pope?" Jacob asked.

"Dirk and his wife send greetings, and they have a fine healthy baby boy named Henry, after Dirk's father."

Jacob grinned -- broad, quick, genuine: he remembered how big that poor young woman's belly was, and he'd been honestly afraid she might go a-laborin' while he was still there.

"Dirk still has no memory of the night, but his wife took me aside and said to thank you for your kindness."

Annette tilted her head again and gave her husband a speculative look.

"She's right, by the way."
"How's that?"

"You are a good man."

Jacob walked up, took the mare's cheek strap, rubbed her neck as Annette dismounted.

He and young Michael walked the buggy back to the barn and got it backed into its stall, unhitched the mare, rubbed her down and grained her a little, and Michael looked at his father curiously as Jacob muttered, "Honest to God, I'm nothin' special!"

 

Edited March 8 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

MICHAEL THE ARCHANGEL

Michael frowned as he listened to the Irish Brigade's discussion.

He and his Pa used to sit down with maps and identify places they'd been -- Linn had a love for paper maps ("they never run out of batteries!") and a compass (there's one on my cell phone and I don't use it!) -- he and Michael would hunch over the contoured green-white-and-brown sheets, follow trails, roads, identify hills, hollows, run, watercourses, railroad tracks; their maps were waterproofed, and more often than not, carefully hand-inked with corrections or updates.

When the map was projected onto the wall-mounted, pull-down screen in the firehouse, Michael stood beside his twin sister and regarded the projected image with solemn eyes.

A hiker was lost and presumed injured; there was a known cell-phone-dead-zone where the hiker was last seen, and part of a text managed to get through, enough to indicate trouble and help needed.

Victoria looked at the map, looked at her twin brother, raised an eyebrow.

Michael's nod was shallow, but it was enough.

The Sheriff's pale eyed twins turned, slipped between the search parties assembled: the Sheriff's youngest two children ran home, ran with the ease of the mountain bred, a little boy in polished Wellington boots and a little girl in a denim skirt and saddle shoes: they arrived at home, scarcely out of breath in spite of the altitude, ran upstairs.

Angela got into her closet, shrugged into her insulated Carhartt jacket, as it was a little chillier than she'd anticipated, and a fluffy white sweater with pink ribbons was not quite enough to keep her warm: Michael pulled on his own.

He waited for his sister to put on a pair of tights, and while he waited, he grabbed a pair of talkies dedicated to special use.

He set them both on channel 3, which would communicate with each other, but thanks to Jacob's electronic skills, Michael knew they could go channel 6 and receive the Irish Brigade's common channel, and if absolutely necessary, they could declare an emergency and talk on that frequency as well.

Brother and sister had exchanged not one word thus far.

They descended the stairs, ran to the barn, into the back pasture.

Two pale eyed children of the high mountains, mounted on mountain-bred Appaloosas, clattered down the gravel driveway, across the blacktop road, onto the mountain trail they knew very well indeed, and head up the mountain, toward where the hiker was last supposed to be.

 

A drone hummed into the air, flown by an admitted computer geek: much to the dismay of his parents, instead of putting money into kegs of beer, fast cars and chasing girls, he'd bought a well used ambulance, stripped out the trim and disinfected the interior thoroughly: it had been the project vehicle for the local community college, the engine and transmission were both rebuilt, the electrical system gone over, both alternators rebuilt, new batteries installed: the front suspension, the drivetrain, were all removed, inspected, replaced, all under the watchful eye of both the instructors, and also one of the vehicle's original builders, who'd heard of this project and who'd taken an interest in it.

Heater hoses, radiator hoses, vacuum lines, steel brake lines, all replaced: power steering lines, brakes, topmast to keel and stem to stern, what used to be an engine of mercy became a rolling ham radio shack, a computer geek's dream, and when it was backed onto the apron at the firehouse, a shoreline attached, the systems inside came alive and a pencil necked geek looked from one computer screen to another and said, "Showtime!"

A yellow tarp was laid out on the concrete apron ahead of the overhauled ambulance with yellow lenses where reds used to live: traffic cones weighted the four corners, caution tape ran from the tops of the traffic cones, in the center of the tarp was a red circle with the letter H hand painted, and on this designated landing zone, a six-motor drone woke up, hummed happily to itself, lifted easily into the thin air.

Eddie Smith was less a geeky high school kid and more a part of his setup as he flew straight up, laid in a course for the last known location, watched his drone's flight path on one screen.

He hadn't turned on the drone's cameras yet, in order to save precious battery power.

 

A pale eyed deputy twisted the shoreline, pulled the plug free, hung it on its designated hook: the barn doors were rolled aside, cool air rolled in.

Dana looked at yellow lettering on the edge of the olive-drab hood -- WILLAMINA, it said -- she set her boot on the step, climbed aboard.

"Come on, Jimmy, don't fail me now," she muttered.

A moment later, the turbocharged Cummins clattered to life, the turbo whistling happily as Angela eased the big machine out of their barn and accelerated down the drive, down the paved road toward the first rendezvous point.

 

It wasn't the first time he cursed himself for his stupidity.

He'd set out by himself on a clear path, he'd stopped to admire the vistas several times, he'd taken some absolutely breathtaking photographs.

He had no idea where his camera was now.

He'd been swinging the camera to get the very best image before he pressed the shutter release when the path collapsed from under him.

He'd traveled most of the way on his backside, but he'd lost the camera: his cell phone had a very little signal, then none at all: his best bet, he reasoned, was to send a text.

It took him some time to do this.

He was seriously distracted by the agony in his knee, where he'd stopped himself with one foot against the young boulder in his path.

He sent the text, sent it again, dropped his head back against damp scree: one hand fumbled at the chain around his neck, the chain he pulled, brought out an oval, silver medal, rubbed it between thumb and fingers.

"Saint Michael," he whispered, "get me out of this one!"

 

Michael and Angela rode single file up the narrow path.

It was not a path either one wanted to hurry on.

Michael was leaned over, studying the path: he saw fresh disturbance, his quick young mind read where waffle stomper soles stopped, turned, likely considering the vista: Michael grew up with it and didn't see anything particularly interesting, and neither did Angela.

It wasn't until Michael saw where the ground was soft, where it was fallen away, that his interest was piqued.

The Sheriff's pale eyed children drew up, stopped.

The path was narrow -- very narrow -- Michael looked ahead, then turned in his saddle to address his twin sis.

"There's a flat up ahead," he said, "I think it comes around and back of Robert's Knob --"

He felt Apple try to jump, try to twist out of the way, and the path collapsed under him.

Michael's teeth clicked together as he realized he and Apple-horse were headed downhill, and God Almighty was about the only thing that could stop them.

Angela watched, horrified, as her twin brother and his spotty horse cascaded downhill -- Apple was not quite stiff-legging it, his hind quarters were working, they came out below, on a flat --

Angela blinked.

Michael and his Apple-horse were both upright.

Michael looked up at his twin sis, waved:  "That was fun!" he called, his boyish voice high-pitched, echoing:  Angela waved back, then she held up her talkie.

"Oh, yeah," Michael breathed as he pulled his talkie free, turned the channel selector.

Michael grinned at the fellow lying up against a boulder, a man in shorts and hikers, a man whose knee was swollen and discolored, and his leg at an awkward angle.

He squinted up at this rescuing figure that just descended from the heavens on a shining white horse, shading his eyes a little with one hand as he did.

"You're Saint Michael?" he asked, surprised.

 

Dana turned up the volume on her radio, frowned, went F6.

"Quarter unit, this is Four, say again your traffic."

Michael's young voice came over the common fire frequency.

"I found him," Michael called. "His knee is hurt but he's alive. Angela is waiting to pop smoke."

Eddie Smith looked up at the Sheriff, pointed at one screen.

"I've got her," he said. "Let me widen the view."

The Sheriff watched as the drone's camera backed away a little, looked downhill.

"There. There's a man and a horse ... let me zoom in here."

The image enlarged, fast.

"Ouch, that knee looks painful."

Fitz looked at the impressive array of commo before him.

"How do I talk to my guys?"

"Red mic, red for fire. F6 your channel. Blue mic for S.O."

Fitz picked up the red mike, began directing his troops.

 

Angela pulled the pin on the smoke grenade, stood up in her stirrups, threw it toward the flat Michael indicated right before his equine version of a Nantucket Sleigh Ride.

The glorified tin can spun through the air, bounced once, rolled onto the grassy flat and began evolving an impressive red cloud.

Angela shaded her eyes, looked up, saw the drone, waved.

 

Dana wheeled the six-by into the flat, stopped: she could see Angela, still mounted, waving from the other side of where the path gave up and slid downhill.

Angela dismounted and walked over to the edge, stepping cautiously: the ground was solid here, the footing under her turbocharged prime mover, equally so: men and equipment piled out of the back, a rappel was established: nylon tow straps, pulleys, blocks and line, and Angela used the bumper mounted winch to good effect.

A hiker in a rescue basket was hauled up the steep grade.

Below him, Michael and Apple-horse picked their way along a game trail, made it back to the narrow path he and his twin sister came off of originally.

 

Victoria and her Apple-horse turned around in their own length, on the narrow path, her sure footed mountain horse dainty as she did: she rejoined Michael and they rode home, unsaddled their horses, turned off their radios and set them back, and were busy with a cut throat game of checkers played on a plank gridded off with a yardstick, a number two lead pencil and a fair degree of precision: washers served for black checkers, hex nuts for red, and when the six-by with WILLAMINA stenciled in yellow along its hood, backed into the barn and shut off, Victoria happily grabbed a hex nut, jumped three of Michael's washers and declared "King me!"

 

A hiker looked at his wrapped leg, listened to the physician's explanation of the x-ray up on the light box: the hospital chaplain, one of the Brethren from the Rabbitville Monastery, stood patiently beside the bed, waited for the medical discussion to end, for the physician to depart.

"Padre," the hiker said, gripping the visiting friar's hand, "you won't believe this, but I saw Saint Michael descend from the heavens on a spotted white horse!"

 

Back in the Sheriff's barn, Saint Michael regarded the checkerboard with dismay, looked with juvenile distress at his twin sis and yelled, "No fair! You cheated!"

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

HE'LL HAVE TO

Linn and the veterinarian ran practiced hands down the Appaloosa's leg -- one, then the other -- the two men stood back and watched the gelding pace, left, then right, according to Linn's call of "Gee!" -- then "Haw!" -- then he reached into his vest pocket and pulled out a plastic wrapped peppermint, and the gelding needed no further encouragement to approach.

Matter of fact, Linn thought, you couldn't have kept him away from that red-and-white, spiral striped, horse crack.

"He doesn't appear be hurt any."

"No."

"Did you take a look at that slope he went down?"

The vet looked at the Sheriff speculatively.

"Steep?"

"Yep."

"Scree?"

"Yep."

The vet shivered.

"Didn't fall?"

"Nope."

The vet caressed the gelding's neck, looked back at the Sheriff.

"You buy a lottery ticket lately?"

Linn grinned.

"Would Michael buy it, or do we take the horse into the All-Night and have him make the purchase?"

The vet grinned back, then sobered.

"Last time I saw a horse go down a slope like that ..."

"I remember."

"Where's Michael now?"

"School."

The vet nodded.

"I'd say this fellow is just fine. Doesn't seem to have pulled anything, I'm not feeling anything tender or hot, he's not favoring anything, no limp, no hesitation, no flinch."

"I took a close look at his hooves. I was looking for any cuts just above ... "

Linn's voice tapered off and the vet saw him shiver.

Smith was concerned enough to look closely at the Sheriff and ask quietly, "Are you okay, Linn?"

Linn grunted, looked at the Appaloosa, who came over and rubbed his nose against Linn's front, plainly bumming for another peppermint.

He got the peppermint, and he got rubbed under his jaw, which got him to close his eyes with pleasure and mutter something deep in his equine chest.

"You talk to your boy about going down that slope?"

Linn nodded.

"I looked it over, Doc. Path collapsed under the hiker and it collapsed under Michael as well."

"He didn't ride down that slope by choice."

"No."

"Linn," the vet said quietly, "not every father knows that his boys listen.

"Michael did.

"I've seen you riding with him and I saw how Michael watches you, and listens to you, and tries hard to be like you."

Linn nodded, his expression uncertain.

"What you taught him, kept him alive. If he'd lost the saddle and gone down hip pockets over teakettle, he'd still be rollin' unless he hit one of those big boulders."

"Don't I know it."

"How'd you get that fellow out of there, anyway?"

"Dana took Mama's six-by up the cutoff and back down. They set up a pulley system and winched the basket out."

"Damn. I've been through there. How'd she fit something wide as that six-by through the Cutoff?"

Linn chuckled.  "Not peacefully," he admitted, "but that old truck is pretty tough."

"Did Michael ride up by himself?"

"No," Linn sighed. "Victoria went with him."

"The hell you say! That sweet little girl?"

Linn chuckled.  "That sweet little girl can stick in a saddle like a burr in a coon dog's fur."

Pete Smith shook his head, laughed quietly.

"Linn," he said, "you've raised some remarkable children."

Linn nodded.  "Don't I know it!"

"How's Marnie doin' clear up on Mars?"

"Last I heard, just fine."

"How's Jacob these days?  I heard he was on detached duty."

Linn hesitated, then nodded.

"Yep."

"Sheriff, you haven't told me how to be a vet and I don't want to tell you how to run your department --"

Linn looked at his old friend -- Pete thought the man looked honestly tired -- and replied, "Go ahead and say it, Pete."

"Linn, I don't know much about law enforcement, but if Jacob's doin' undercover work ... tell him to be careful, will you?"

Linn nodded, grinned.

"He'll have to," Linn replied. "He's replacing me one of these fine days."

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

ASCENT TO THE SUMMIT

Jacob came along not long after Marnie was adopted into Linn's family.

Willamina came over more often than she used to: she and Shelly got along like two old friends, which is not surprising; Willamina was good friends with Shelly's mother, and Shelly asked Willamina to be her Matron of Honor when she and Linn were married.

Marnie grew, as little girls do, and she watched solemnly as Jacob -- tiny, red-faced, too young to even turn over on his own -- was powdered and diapered as little babies are.

Marnie insisted on holding Jacob after he was clean and changed and fed and sleepy, and she soon graduated to the other motherly duties incumbent on the care and feeding of the infant human.

Willamina watched as Marnie learned these skills and applied these skills, and Willamina saw that Marnie never smiled -- not once -- as she tended these details: her expression was serious, very little short of frowning.

It was evident she was good at what she did, it was clear she considered what she did, to be important: Shelly accepted this assistance almost as if it was expected, but Willamina's instincts prompted her to look deeper.

Marnie was the child of Willamina's daughter, the child with whom she'd fought constantly, the child that ran off with a man, ran off to New York and got herself in trouble, the child that got into drugs and ended up coming home with a little girl and a terminally cancerous pancreas, a child that died in more pain that she'd caused in her lifetime.

Now Willamina regarded this unsmiling child, this little girl who rarely laughed, and considered the precision, the attention, the perfection, of every move she made with her smiling, gurling, laughing, knuckle-chewing little brother.

Marnie was holding her little brother when Willamina picked her up, set her on her grandmotherly lap, little brother and all, and held them both.

They sat thus, together, for several minutes.

Willamina laid her cheek over on Marnie's soft, fine hair.

"Marnie?" she murmured gently, and felt the child stiffen -- the way a child will, when she's used to nothing but criticism.

Marnie turned her head, turned her eyes, looked at her Gammaw, her arms tightening around her sleeping, blanket-wrapped little brother.

"You take the very best care of Jacob, Sweets. Thank you."

Marnie blinked, not entirely certain how to accept a compliment.

She'd been treated kindly, as Linn's daughter; she'd been treated as one of Linn's own, he was unfailingly patient with her, he was careful when he held her or picked her up, for he'd noticed every time she was touched, she flinched, she froze, she turned ghost white, as if she expected something bad to happen: even when her name was called, Linn noticed a look of absolute dread on her young face, replaced almost instantly by an impassive mask.

Linn and his Mama discussed these observations in quiet voice, when away from the house, well away from Marnie's quick and youthful ears.

Both agreed that this pretty little girl with pale eyes and a terrified heart, must have survived terrors unknown: add to this the medical reports, which Linn paled to read, after Marnie was carefully examined in a clinical setting, and Linn admitted he had no idea how to raise a little girl-child, but he'd do his best.

Now Marnie sat on her Gammaw's lap, and Willamina drew a blanket over her and Jacob both -- but Willamina kept her arms outside the blanket as she held her stiff, rigid granddaughter.

"Marnie," Willamina almost whispered, "how does Jacob feel when you hold him?"

Marnie swallowed, uncomfortable: Willamina felt the little girl's breathing quicken.

"Marnie, how did you feel when you were held?"

Marnie twisted a little, looked at her Gammaw with wide and frightened eyes, but made no reply.

"You're safe here, Sweets," Willamina whispered, rocking a little as she did. "You are safe here."

Marnie's breathing did not slow down: Willamina felt her shivering, just a little, and finally she laid her head over against her Gammaw's collarbone.

"Nobody ever held me like this," she whispered.

Willamina rocked her, slowly, gently.

"Nobody grabbed me unless they wanted to hurt me."

Willamina closed her pale eyes: it was her turn to wear a mask, to be utterly expressionless.

 

A year later, when little Jacob Harold began crawling, exploring his world, Willamina came over for another visit, as she often did: Marnie was not as fearful, not as timid, not as passively rigid when held: Jacob crawled from the oval hook rug onto the bare floor, stopped, patted the bare floor and laughed.

Marnie had been crawling with him: she bellied down, looked at her little brother.

Marnie smiled.

Willamina looked up, looked at Shelly, watching from the kitchen: Shelly's hand went to her mouth as Willamina smiled and looked back at the pair.

Linn was home from work.

It wasn't unusual for Linn to take a nap when he got home, especially if it was a stressful day: Marnie and Jacob were half-in, half-out of his study as Linn went down on one knee, both knees, all fours, then lay down: little brother and big sister turned, looked, and Linn pointed to them and said sternly, "I'm gonna take a nap and I don't want to be bothered!" -- he looked at his Mama, looked at his wife just beyond, and winked.

Linn laid down on the floor and waited.

His wait was brief indeed:  Jacob turned with a happy gurgle, trundled industriously on all fours, Marnie following:  Linn's arms were crossed, his face laid down on his arms, and the watching Ladies could see his grin as a happy little boy and a happy little girl climbed up on dear old Dad, young Jacob Harold attaining the summit of Mount Backside, squealing and happily spanking the Old Man's hip pockets, Marnie giggling as she lay beside.

Willamina expressed her disappointment, afterward, in a private moment with her daughter-in-law: she was so unhappy to have seen that, she said, without having a camera ready!

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

SIREN SONG

Fire Chief Chuck Fitzgerald looked across the bay, raised a finger, thrust his arm out like he was casting a line.

The German Irishman hit a cast aluminum button that hadn't been used for a decade anyway.

He had no doubt the siren would work -- the Irish Brigade took pride in their equipment, in their station, in each other; they kept everything -- everything! -- ready for use at a moment's notice.

The pale eyed Sheriff was clutching  a K9 harness vest, with its built-in remote-trigger strobe, with its radio tracker, with its six point star and the words SHERIFF K9 embroidered in gold on the black Kevlar surface.

Marnie gripped her father's shoulder.

"Daddy," she said quietly, penetrating the black cloud of the Sheriff's self-absorbed anger, "you know what kind of a nose Tank has."

Linn glared at his daughter, his jaw muscles bulged against the language he wanted to use.

Marnie brought her other hand up, gripped his other shoulder as well.

"Tank wants to please, you know that."

An impatient finger hit the cast aluminum button again, pushed hard, held it.

"He'll be scenting and he'll be looking. You know him. He's a scent-and-sight hound, even if he does like to steal your socks."

Linn closed his eyes, took a long breath, his hands crushing into shivering fists, the harness material of Tank's unused vest wadding up in his palms as he did.

"He got the scent and he took out. He's like that. He's fast."

"He's fast and we don't know where he is."

Linn looked at Fitz.

The German Irishman turned from the switch, strode across the firehouse: he shoved the latch with his thumb, swung the grey breaker box panel open, ran his eyes down the row of breakers.

"You know how he hates the siren," Marnie continued. "Now let's get outside and listen."  

Marnie did not wait for her father's reply: she turned, raised her talkie, pressed the textured, flush-mountted transmit button on the side.

"This is Mary Seven. All hands, now hear this. We're about to blow the fire whistle. When we do, listen and listen good. Tank will howl when he hears the siren. Get a bearing and report when we run the inventory, Mary Seven clear."

Marnie thrust a boot into the black doghouse stirrup, swung onto her Daddy's black gelding, kneed him about, gigged him into a fast trot.

When the fire whistle blew, she wanted to have some distance.

As much as Tank hated that fire whistle, the gelding hated it more, and if she didn't have some distance, she'd have to play rodeo right in the middle of the street, and she didn't want to do that.

Not with God and everybody watching.

There was a brittle click as the breaker was turned back on, the sound of hurried steps crossing the bay floor.

The German Irishman raised a hand, looked across the firehouse, cheerfully called "Fire In the Hole!"

 

A little boy can cover a surprising distance, but a little boy at high altitude will wear out kind of quick.

A little boy sat on a handy rock and threw his head back, breathing hungrily, laid back, leaned over, curled his legs up: the sun was warm, he was out of the wind and he felt half sick.

 

A brown-black-and-tan Malinois cast back and forth on the depot platform, tail swinging: he pattered down the stairs, stopped, turned, nose in the air, tasting the wind.

The Malinois turned his head, swung around, mouth open, tongue curled, the happy expression of a dog doing what he loved.

He took off running, running toward a path he'd run before, a path that went up the side of the mountain.

Tank had a snootful of scent, thanks to the coat held down for his inspection:  he'd cocked his head a little and shoved his nose deep into the quilting, his tail whipping.

The Sheriff rose, turned: they were outside the firehouse, the wind was carrying down the mountain, toward them, when Tank drove his muzzle deep into the coat, when he drew his head back, when he raised his muzzle, sniffing the air: Linn turned to pick up the canine vest, turned back.

He saw the retreating backside of his K9 partner, full sprint, disappearing around the back of the firehouse.

 

Marnie gripped the gelding's barrel, snatched off her uniform Stetson.

If we're going to dance, damn you, I'll beat you to death with my hat!

Midnight hated that tower mounted siren with a deep purple passion, and Marnie knew it: she felt like a condemned man must feel, strapped to a keg of powder, when the sizzling fuse just disappears into the keg, in that bright tenth of a second before detonation.

The ancient, surplus, tower mounted air raid siren began to rotate, began to howl, began to scream: the timer was handmade and ancient, strips of curved copper driven by a washing machine motor, a V-belt and two pulleys: as long as the curved contact strips were touching the metallic brushes, the siren ran; the curved strips broke contact, the siren began coasting down, its alarming howl dropping in pitch, if not volume.

Midnight shivered, danced a little, shook his head, muttering.

"Don't you dare, damn you," Marnie snarled.

Her head came up, as did her hand: she mashed her Stetson down on her heat, snatched the talkie free.

"THIS IS MARY SEVEN. KILL THE SIREN, KILL THE SIREN, KILL THE SIREN!"

She sat very straight, listened, turned her head a little, turned it back, smiled.

"Gotcha."

 

A little boy rubbed his eyes, confused.

He had no idea where he was and he didn't have any idea why he was hearing a wolf howl, then he opened his eyes and there he was.

Big and brown and black and tan, a wolf, big as he was, sitting there looking at him, right before he raised his muzzle and sang again.

It was not the first time the wild song of a yellow eyed canid sang for the joy of singing, and it would not be the last, but it was the first time a little boy sat up, delighted, threw his head back and sang with him.

Deputy Sheriff Marnie Keller urged Midnight up the path, toward the Wildsong, toward a happy and somewhat discordant harmony.

She raised the blocky talkie and pressed the textured, flush mounted transmit button.

"Dispatch, this is Mary Seven. I believe we've found him."

 

A little boy's mother would include the picture cut from The Firelands Gazette in a scrapbook.

The picture was of a delighted looking little boy riding in front of a mounted Sheriff's deputy, with the deputy's jacket around him: the picture was taken quartering-on, from a little distance: it showed the shining-black horse, the laughing deputy, the delighted little boy with his arms thrown wide, and a black-brown-and-tan Malinois trotting along beside them, looking up at the mounted pair, mouth open in a doggy grin, curled tongue declaring his absolute happiness.

Edited March 10 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

A SURE THING

 

Jacob Keller sat across from Attorney Moulton's desk, marveling at the collection of volumes ranked behind the man.

All the knowledge in the world, his pale eyed Pa told him once, is contained in books.

Jacob considered that their big, blacksmith-shouldered Irish fire chieftain was also right when he observed, "Lad, th' intelligent man isn't th' one who can spout answers like a fountain.  'Tis th' man who knows where t' find those answers!"

Sean's words, given with a wink, a fatherly hand on Jacob's shoulder, came back on the heels of the Sheriff's observation.

Mr. Moulton was riffling through his files: he withdrew a sheaf of papers with a satisfied grunt.

"Jacob," he said thoughtfully, "you chose well with your investments."

"Thank you, sir."

"These are copies of the original papers. You asked me to keep them for you."

"Yes, sir. I feared one copy might be lost, but a second copy kept somewhere else would be wise."

Attorney Moulton nodded slowly. "I wish some grown men would think that way," he said, almost sadly: "you remember Old Man Penrod very nearly lost his ranch when his house burned, and his papers with it, and a false claim on his property was filed at the State Capitol."

"I remember, sir."

"That's why I've taken pains to keep my files in a fireproof room. Cost me enough, too!"

"I would imagine so, sir."

"God be praised I've never had to test it," Moulton said absently, his pencil busy on the pad beneath his good right hand.

Jacob waited patiently, his hat across his lap.

"Your father ... suggested these investments?"

"Two of them, sir. My mother suggested three. The others were mine."

Mr. Moulton's eyebrows raised and he whistled admiringly, looked at the lean young man across the desk from him.

"Frankly, Jacob, from these latest results, you are a wealthy young man."

"Thank you, sir."

"What do you plan to do now?"

"I've given that some thought, sir," Jacob said slowly. "I'm not much of a gambler, but it strikes me that mines will play out in time, but there will always be need for meat on the plate, a roof overhead ... I've been looking at investing in building materials."

Mr. Moulton unfolded the paper, read it, nodded.

"Ames is a good and reputable firm," he said. "If they're selling shares, I would say a man would stand a good chance of making a steady income."

"I like the sound of that, sir."

"And your other investments?"

"Sir, I am inclined to sell the first two silver mines. Men have been asking whether they'd be up for sale and I believe I can turn a profit with a sale."

"You'll turn a handsome profit, but don't you want to keep making money from it?"

Jacob frowned, shook his head.  

"Sir, my crystal ball rolled off the table and broke. I've no way of knowin' how much longer that silver streak will run. If I sell now, I'll have a sure thing. If another man makes a pile of money from that mine, good for him, but if the vein plays out tomorrow and I'm sittin' on it like a dog in a manger, no."

"You're serious about liking a sure thing."

"Life itself is uncertain, sir."

"I can make the arrangements, same as last time."

"If you could, please. Your usual fee?"

"My usual fee."

Jacob rose, thrust out his hand.

"Mr. Moulton, thank you. I prefer not to make these deals in person. I am seen as still a boy and men don't like to do business with boys."

" 'Mere boy' is not a term I would apply to you, Jacob."

"Thank you, sir."

Jacob hesitated, frowned: Mr. Moulton knew there was something more on his mind.

"Sir ..."

"Yes, Jacob?"

"Sir, I would ... invest just a little bit more."

Mr. Moulton waited, inclining his head slightly to indicate his assent.

"Mr. Moulton, if you could arrange the purchase of a ruby red stickpin for a man's necktie, say, something the size of my little fingernail, and a matching lady's brooch with some fancy goldwork around it ... I would be very much obliged to you."

"For the Sheriff, and for your mother."

"Yes, sir."

"I will see to it."

"Thank you, sir."

 

 

 

Edited March 10 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

LIGHTNING ROD

 

Shelly Keller knew the touch of genuine fear twice in her life.

Both times, it was shortly after she'd done something she shouldn't have.

Once was when she backhanded her daughter, Marnie.

Marnie's head snapped around with the force of the blow.

Her head returned slowly to face Shelly as the air turned frosty-cold and Shelly saw her daughter's face drain of color and her eyes went absolutely white as her adrenaline levels spiked.

Shelly tasted copper and Shelly expected Marnie to rip her head off her shoulders and throw it through the nearest window without benefit of opening same.

Marnie's voice was quietly spoken, coldly spoken, as she told her mother that if she ever, ever hit her again, she, Marnie, would rip her throat out.

The second time Shelly felt that level of paralytic freezing realization was when her husband moved faster than Shelly's eye could follow.

She heard the angry voice, she saw a man make a move -- a good sized man -- and she saw her husband turn, seize the man's wrist, wind it up behind him fast and, from the pained yell that followed, far less than comfortably: the Sheriff introduced the fellow's face to the rounded, stainless-steel corner of the ice cream freezer, just before he released this one, punched a second in the gut while ducking an incoming, hard-swung winebottle: Linn seized the second one by the throat and by the crotch, hauled him off the ground and SLAMMED him down to the tile floor, ending the fight and leaving absolutely no doubt as to the folly of picking on what looked like just some hick rancher stopping for gas.

Shelly sat with the dispatcher while Linn made out the requisite reports back at the Sheriff's office.

Not one word was said on the drive home.

Shelly looked over at her husband.

Linn was his usual relaxed, cheerful self:  he reached over without looking, took Shelly's hand ever so gently in his own, gave her a reassuring squeeze.

He was driving, his attention was on the serious business of guiding a half ton of steel and glass, a guided missile containing two human lives and capable of destroying many more if his attention were slacked right at the wrong moment.

Shelly remembered how fast her husband moved -- how strong his grip had to be, to twist the first attacker's wrist out of joint -- or to pick a grown man off the floor and make it look easy.

He'd have been justified if he'd done as much to her.

Shelly went through the door first -- Linn, ever the gentleman, unlocked the door, let her through first, tapped the keypad to disarm the heads-up beeper -- Shelly stopped, turned, her eyes big and vulnerable.

Linn turned from the pad, looked at his wife: his face went from cheerful to concerned:  "Dearest, what's wrong?" he asked quietly.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, her bottom lip quivering a little.

Linn stepped into her, his left arm going around the small of her back:  she froze, expecting to be picked up and thrown across the kitchen table, or worse.

Linn took her other hand, brought it to his lips, kissed her knuckles carefully, gently, then he held her hand at extension, spun her around in a waltzing step, singing quietly: Shelly Keller, filled with guilt for having behaved as she had, waltzed with her husband, at least until they got to the head of the table.

Linn spun her, slowly, as he always did, and Shelly stopped and looked at her husband with big tears rolling down her face and her expression crumbled and she squeaked "I'm sorry," and fell into his front.

Sheriff Linn Keller, warrior and peacekeeper, father, grandfather and teller of tall tales, held his wife as she sobbed her submission into his shirt front.

Nobody was home to see it, and likely a good thing, for Linn's expression was one of honest confusion: his own words, given quietly to Jacob in one of the rare moments when a father's advice is actually of use, "If your girl wants to cry, let her. Hold her and let her rain herself out, even if you have absolutely no idea what in the hell is going on."

Linn had no idea, so he followed his own advice, and finally, when Shelly's tear storm rained itself out into his shirt front, he hooked a curled finger under her chin, lifted her face, kissed the tip of her nose.

"Darlin'," he said, "if I've done somethin' to hurt your feelin's --"

Shelly shook her head, dropped her forehead into his chest, shook her head again.

She looked up.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.  "I should never have slapped that cookie out of your hand and snapped at you like I did!"

Linn blinked, frowned, raised an eyebrow, looked at his wife, pulled his head back a little.

"That's all?" he asked.

Shelly's mouth opened: she'd just apologized, she'd laid her soul bare, what more could he want --

Linn took Shelly's hands, brought one, then the other to his lips, kissed her knuckles, lowered her hands.

"Darlin'," he said gently, "do you remember how genuinely bad a day you had?"

Shelly closed her eyes, took a long breath, nodded.

"Do you remember that new doc in ER gave you hell and turned out he was wrong, and the arrogant clod didn't have the grace to apologize?"

Shelly chewed on her bottom lip, her eyes swung to the side, she nodded.

"Do you remember that stray beef came RIGHT OUT IN FRONT OF YOU and if you didn't have a damned good set of reflexes you'd have had hamburger all over the Jeep?"

Shelly nodded again.

"Dearest" -- Linn's fingers were gentle as he touched her jaw, turned her face toward him -- "if a man can't forgive his wife when she's had genuinely a day from hell, he's not much of a man, now is he?"

Shelly swallowed:  Linn pulled out a handkerchief, laid it over her nose, pinched very gently, said in a fatherly voice, "Blow."

Shelly reached up, giggled, hiccupped, blew:  she wiped her beak, took a breath, gave a most unladylike blow that honestly sounded like a young foghorn.

She wiped her nose again, sadly regarded how badly she'd fouled his clean white hankie.

"I've got another right here," Linn said softly. "I always carry two."  He took the soiled snot rag from her, stepped to the far doorway, gave it a backhand flip toward the laundry tub, came back.

Shelly stepped over to the sink, leaned over it, stiff-armed, her head hanging.

"I saw how fast you hit that guy," she said, then turned her head to look at him.

"I would've deserved that."

"You what?"

"You'd just picked up a cookie off the cooling rack. I slapped your hand and yelled at you."

Linn paced slowly over to his wife.

He turned, leaned back against the sink, ran his arm around her shoulder.

"Shelly, look at me. You would not deserve that," he said quietly. 

"I saw the look you gave me," Shelly said, her voice husky.

"What did I look like?"

"You looked so... disappointed."

"I was," Linn admitted, his expressing sliding from concern to innocence.  "You make really good cookies."

Shelly leaned her head against her husband's chest.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

"For being human?" Linn asked. "Darlin', you're one of the most patient souls I know. When you load up to where you've got to lightning rod to get rid of it ..."

He bent his head, lifted her hair, kissed the back of her neck.

"Besides, The Bear Killer helped me clean up the cookie crumbs."

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

BELLIED DOWN

 

Victoria Keller was a very proper little girl.

She wore frilly dresses and shiny slippers and her Mama fussed over her hair and delighted that she had a pretty little girl she could raise as a girl.

Victoria was obedient and Victoria was gentle, and Victoria had pale eyes and Victoria watched and listened.

Sometimes Victoria decided she'd had enough of being a girly little girl.

Michael, of course, was as close to his sister as any twin, but Michael was most definitely all boy: Michael was his Pa's shadow, Michael loved getting into "Stuff" with dear old Dad, and Michael delighted in getting away with anything he could ... never anything terribly bad, but like generations of his predecessors, he had an adventurous spirit and a curious nature.

Michael and Victoria learned to read, each one determined to out-do the other, yet each equally determined to bring the other up to their level: what one learned, the other learned, and quickly, and so it was that two pale eyed children of that long tall Sheriff disappeared as they sometimes did, leaving behind nothing more than the fading sound of hoofbeats.

The solid built barn beside the Firelands Museum still stood, still sound, still protected by a granite wall on one side, in a natural lee: winter's snows never piled terribly deep, it was easily accessed to clean out second hand horse feed, or to haul in hay, and two spotted Appaloosas walked between the barn and the museum -- a stone museum that used to be a house, the home of one Sarah Lynne Llewellyn, until she took her maiden name back after becoming a widow.

The pair rode up the narrow passage, through a hidden opening, into the high meadow above, dismounted: they climbed with the fearlessness of children, they delighted in looking out over an incredible distance, visible from this high up, and they took turns looking down the sheer drop, giggling as they dizzied themselves, then leaning back against the sun-warmed granite, looking up at the incredibly blue sky overhead and dizzying again.

They navigated the narrow, ancient path with the ease of the fearless young, came out on the shelf known to their ancestors as a place of refuge, a place of contemplation.

"Did you bring it?" Victoria asked quietly.

Michael nodded.  "Bring yours?"
Youthful hands thrust into pockets, brought out small, high-intensity flashlights.

"It might be a den," Victoria cautioned. "It has been, you know."

"I know. I'll take a look first."

Two children moved to the low opening, knelt, then bellied down: they squirted beams of incredible brightness into the dark.

"I don't see much."

"I don't see any eyes."

Michael slithered in, fitting easily -- he thought he would, an ancestral Jacob made it in, and back out, when he interred his ancestral Bear Killer here.

"Michael?"

"Huh?"

"To your right. What's that?"

Michael swung his light, blinked.

There was not enough room to come up on hands and knees; he slithered forward without difficulty.

"Ummm," he said, wiping at something on what looked like a square tin box.

"Victoria ... you ever been here?"

"No."

"This has your name on it."

"What is it?"

Michael gripped the square tin, or tried to: he frowned, tried gripping his light in his teeth.

"Shoot your light over here. I gotta use both hands."

Michael shut off his light, thrust it into a pocket: he gripped the tin with both hands, worked it back and forth, dragged it toward him.

Another, behind it:  he stopped, shifted so Victoria's light could sear past him, illuminate the plate on the second square box.

He rubbed the plate across the front.

"Victoria?"

"Yeah?"

"This one has my name on it."

"Are there any others?"

Michael pulled his light out, clicked it on, swung it around.

"No."

He turned his light off, thrust it away: he worked backwards, dragging one box, then the other.

They backed out, emerging into daylight: Victoria got up, squatted impatiently as Michael wiggled backwards out from under the gap in the mountain, dragging one heavy tin box, then the other.

“Ow.”

“Ow?”

Victoria bellied down again, squinting into the darkness, then wiggled to the side as Michael’s boot soles advanced toward her.

It was more spacious inside than at the opening: Michael’s quiet-voiced “Ow” was because he’d banged his gourd on the narrowing opening as he slithered out backwards.             

Victoria stood, swatted at her front, frowning at how filthy she'd gotten: Michael stood, did the same.

Two pale eyed children studied the tin boxes, gripped the handles on top: they were easier to pick up, now that they were standing – the boxes were heavy, awkward; they managed to duck walk down the narrow path, leaned back a little, hugging the boxes to their bellies, their shoulders rubbing the granite as they did, the edge of their tin box hooked on their belt buckle.

It helped, a little.

They got down to their horses, stopped and washed their hands in the near-freezing stream: Michael slung his hands off, frowned at his front -- typical boy, he almost wiped his hands down his belly and thighs -- he stopped, reached back, dried his hands on the seat of his blue jeans.

Victoria tilted her head, considered this, then did the same thing.

Two riders walked their Appaloosas down the hidden path, came out between the still-solid old barn and its drowsing ghosts, and the museum, watching them with glassy, unblinking eyes: they made it home, they donated what they'd been wearing to the friendly local Maytag and got it thrashing, then scampered upstairs in underwear and socks.

They were showered and into clean clothes, their wet duds anonymous on the populated clothesline behind the house, before their Mama got home.

 

That evening, Michael and Victoria presented themselves at their Papa's desk: they stood, shoulder to shoulder, each carrying a wiped-clean tin box that Linn thought appeared heavy, judging by the way they held them.

Michael said "Sir, your advice?"

Linn hadn't gotten to whatever it was he'd been thinking about.

It was rare for his children, his youngest, to face him with such solemn expressions, even moreso for them to present with an obviously-heavy burden in hand.

Michael flipped a folded towel onto his Pa's desk.

"I don't want to scrape up your desk," he said, "this is kind of heavy."

Linn reached over, put a hand under the box, raised a surprised eyebrow.

"Yes it is," he murmured.

Victoria was barely able to pack hers, using both hands: Linn gripped her box as she offered it.

Linn saw her name was hand-chased on a plate, riveted to the front of the age-darkened metal.

"They're locked," Michael said.

Brother and sister watched a light dawn in their father's eyes.

He looked at one box, then the other: he looked at his children, at the boxes: he rose, took two long strides to a shelf, ran his finger along the row of reprinted Journals.

He pulled one down, flipped quickly through it: closed it with a snap, thrust it back, hooked the next with one finger, tilted it back, gripped it, brought it down.

Michael's hand opened as Victoria's hand opened and turned: they held hands, silently sharing an uncertain anticipation as they watched their father's suddenly-serious eyes scan quickly, as he ran fingertips down the page, as an unguarded expression of discovery tightened the corners of his eyes, broadened into an actual smile.

He snapped this Journal shut, carefully threaded it back into its place on the shelf: he turned, looked at his desk, looked beyond it to his Mama's ancient roll top desk.

Linn nodded, looked at his two youngest.

Michael felt Victoria's hand tighten in his.

Linn went to his desk, pulled open one drawer, another: he pulled out a keyring, fingered through the jingling sawtoothed collection, separated one key out – instead of flat and toothed, it was old-fashioned-looking, dark and round-shafted, a hollow in its end, with a single, spade-shaped projection at its end.

Linn went to a shelf, removed two books, two more, set them aside.

He reached in -- Michael and Victoria saw his elbow move a little, but they could not see what was out of sight on that eye level shelf --

Linn did something, turned something, it looked to the twins as if he turned his arm a little and pushed something, then turned his hand again: he replaced the volumes, strode quickly to his Mama's antique, ancient, heirloom rolltop desk.

Linn unlocked the ancient desk, carefully raised the curved, flexible wooden roll top, then brought it back down, silently counting the wood crossmembers as they passed a dimple, placed with a centerpunch by its appearance: he held the rolltop with one hand, inserted the key, turned it, opened a little hinged door: he removed the key, inserted it deep into the cubby the little hinged door revealed.

Carefully, slowly, he withdrew his hand, and with it, a small drawer, with a lid.

He withdrew the key from its front, inserted it straight down into the drawer's lid, turned the key.

Michael and Victoria saw him remove the key, place the well populated keyring on the desk's writing surface.

He lifted the lid on the drawer he'd just brought to light and withdrew a single key.

Linn turned, walked over to the two metal boxes.

His thumbnail explored a little tarnished-silver plate -- he found something -- a click, the plate slid aside, revealing a keyhole.

Linn slid the just-retrieved key into the darkened metal box's keyhole, turned it, lifted the lid: he did the same for the second box.

Michael was containing himself with an effort; Victoria was bouncing on her toes, grateful she was in sock feet, elsewise the hard little heels her Mama liked her to wear, would have beat a nervous tattoo on the hardwood floor.

Linn sat down, looked at these, the youngest of his get.

"Thank you for bringing these," he said.

"You're welcome, sir," two young voices said in a soft-spoken chorus.

"You got these from the High Lonesome."

Two young voices again: "Yes, sir."

“Good.”  

Linn looked at his two youngest.

"I think ... it's time."

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

SUDDEN GAIN 

"I have something for each of you."

Linn rose, walked over to the gun case.

He opened the door, brought out a pair of lever action rifles, brought them back.

"You two have proven yourselves responsible and trustworthy."

"Thank you, sir," two soft little voices replied.

He handed one to Michael and one to Victoria.

"Chamber check."

Two young children jacked the levers open, looked into the action, looked back.

"Clear," they said in one voice.

"Close and half-cock."

Actions closed, carefully, young thumbs laid over hammer spurs, pulled triggers; the hammers went to half cock.

"You each hold a model of 1892 Winchester rifle. They are chambered in .357 Magnum. They were originally .25-20, but they were converted, and I'd like to kick the fellow who converted them."

"Sir?" Michael asked: Victoria's question was spoken with her eyes and not her voice, as was usual with them both.

"I know in practical terms the .357 is a better choice, but my father had a 92 in .25-20 and I loved that little rifle. He traded it off for a Remington Matchmaster and never liked it. I've been hunting for a .25-20 ever since. When I found these a few years ago, I had them engraved and gold inlaid, and I set them back for the right time."

"A few years ago, sir?" Michael asked.

Linn grinned, nodded.  "The day you were both born."

Two young heads nodded solemnly.

"Ground the butts."

Two rifle butts came down on the holder's right foot.

"Look at the muzzle engraving."

Young eyes regarded gold-inlaid vining encircling the muzzle, slithering with a barbaric splendor rearward for three fingers' width.

"Now take a look at the breech."

Michael took a step back, looked behind, then swung the rifle level, having satisfied nothing of importance, that no one, was behind him: he considered the matching, gold-inlaid vining around the breech end of the barrel, then the side of the receiver.

In an ornate circle, an armored angel bearing a flaming sword: above, in a banner's arc, Michael: in the banner beneath, Angelus custos.

"Victoria."

Michael stepped forward, Angela stepped back: she frowned as she studied the barrel breech's vining, the receiver's gold inlaid, hand chased circle.

Within, a mounted warrior in feminine armor, astride a rearing horse: in an armor-gloved fist, held triumphantly overhead, gripping a silver-headed lance: in the over-arching banner, Victoria; in the banner beneath, Soror Valkyria.

"Now."

Two solemn-eyed children grounded their rifles' butts on the arch of their right foot.

Linn reached into one tin box, then the other.

The cloth within was in surprisingly good shape: it appeared to be a light weight canvas, and appeared to be ... waxed, maybe? -- Linn held the edge of the nearest box with one hand, muscled the poke out with the other, set it on his desk.

Solemn young eyes followed his efforts.

He did the same for the second box.

Each poke was tied with stout red cord.

Linn worked the knot on each, a little, freed each sack's neck, drew them open, one, then the other.

He looked in each sack and nodded.

He reached in each one and brought out a tiny, individual cloth sleeve, handed one to Michael, the other to Victoria.

"Take a look."

Each child slid thumb-and-forefinger into their individual, flat little sleeve, withdrew a silver coin.

"We'll have that inletted in your rifle stock," Linn said. "I know just the man for the job."

Linn reached into the nearest poke, Michael's poke, and withdrew a gold double eagle, handed it to Michael: he picked one out of Victoria's poke, handed to her.

"Take a good look," he said. "It's no wonder these were so heavy!"

Michael and Victoria looked at their double eagles, looked at one another, looked at their Pa, handed them back.

"This," Linn said, "represents a fortune. The way things are going, we will be wise to keep these as they are, in gold instead of Yankee greenbacks."

"Sir, where did these come from?"

"Do you remember Old Pale Eyes, way back when?"

"Yes, sir."

"He had the notion that he should provide for his children."

"Yes, sir."

"He had gold in a New York bank that wasn't found until after your Gammaw took office."

"Yes, sir."

"His son Jacob had the same idea."

"Yes, sir?"

"Jacob consulted a Gypsy trick rider named Daciana. She had a crystal ball and some said she was a witch-woman. I don't think she was a witch, really, but I do think she was a wise woman.

“She told Jacob how he should provide for those to come."

"Is that why mine says Michael and hers says Victoria?" Michael asked.

"Yes it is."

Michael frowned.

"How do we keep all this safe, sir?"

"What is the military principle of defense?"

"Layered principle of defense," two young voices chorused.

"What is the first layer of defense?"

"Knowledge!"

"Who do we tell about this?"

The twins looked at one another, looked at their Daddy.

“Nobody?”

Linn winked, nodded approvingly.

“Exactly that,” he affirmed.  “Nobody. Why do we tell nobody?”

“ ‘Cause the Baron von Ripemoff will break in an’ take it if we do!” Michael blurted.

“I was gonna say that!” Victoria protested.

“What else might they take if they broke in?”

“Everything,” Michael said sadly.

“Yep,” Linn nodded. “Everything not nailed down, wiring out of the walls, copper pipes, Christ off the cross and they’d come back for the nails!”

Linn closed each box, turned the key in the lock.

“I’ll arrange tomorrow,” he said, “to have those silvers inletted into your rifle stocks. I’ll give Marnie a call and see if she can help us out.”

Delighted eyes looked at each other, looked at their Pa.

“Marnie!” two young voices breathed in a quiet-voiced chorus.

 

An attractive young mother sat down in front of her screen, her pink-cheeked, shining-eyed little boy on her lap, looking around, very obviously interested in the world around him.

“Hi, Daddy,” Marnie smiled, then turned to the toothless, grinning little boy on her thigh:  “John, say hello to your grandfather.”

“Wa’l hello, John William,” Linn grinned. “You smokin’ cig-gars yet?”

“He doesn’t have a grandfather nearby to teach him bad habits,” Marnie laughed.

“I’ll have to remedy that!” Linn declared happily. “Say, you recall those two rifles I had you arrange to have engraved?”

“I do,” Marnie replied happily.

“Do you reckon you can arrange to have a silver dollar inletted into each rifle stock?”

Marnie lowered her head, kissed her warm, wiggling little baby boy on top of his head.

“Five minutes ago, or do you need it sooner?”

Linn pushed back from his desk, looked to his right: Michael and Victoria moved in front of the screen, each holding their rifle like they considered their personal carbine as the most precious thing they’d ever handled.

Marnie laughed quietly.

“Daddy, how would you three like to make a road trip?”

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

WHAT THE HORSE SAID

 

Deputy Sheriff Jacob Keller rode his stallion slowly up the wagon road to his fine stone house.

He was tired, but it was a good tired.

It was late; he wanted little more than to eat supper, and set down in his easy chair, and read from the Book.

“Lord,” Jacob said aloud, “forgive me if I don’t read as much as I’d like.”

Part of him smiled, a smile that did not quite make it to his face; he remembered reading from the Book, and being so tired he fell asleep as he did: his wife managed to get him to his feet, and to bed, and she’d observed quietly that the Almighty walked among us as a man, and He knew what it was to be tired, and He would understand Jacob’s having fallen asleep with the Word open on his lap.

Jacob’s stallion was not tired at all: it had been Jacob who’d done the work that day, Apple-horse mostly drowsed, hip-shot, patient, except when he was grazing, or politely ignoring one of the local dogs who yammered and snarled as if Apple-horse was a ravening monster.

Deputy Sheriff Jacob Keller hung his coat over a handy fence post and turned a hand to help a man who was trying to set up a hoist.

He and his sons were digging a well – they’d witched it and found where the vein of water ran, they’d found the convergence of two veins and decided to dig, but once they were beyond a man’s height in the hole, they needed a hoist, a winch mechanism.

Jacob was a fair hand with an ax: he sounded the ground around their hole with the shovel’s bit, he discussed what the man had in mind, and he allowed as they could fashion a winch and it wouldn’t be hard at all, and so Deputy Sheriff Jacob Keller proceeded to sink two post holes and set two posts, he selected healthy forks from the cut trees available, and cut them to length: he’d stopped to stone the ax head at frequent intervals, which interested both the man and his curious young son, and Jacob grinned and explained a sharp ax cuts and makes the work go faster, but a dull ax will bounce and cause injuries – he winked at the boy and added, “It also causes bad language, and I don’t want my Mama to stuff a bar of soap in my mouth!”

Jacob helped another man load goods onto his wagon at the Mercantile – Jacob knew he’d hurt his arm not long before – vanity prompted the man to not wear a sling, and Jacob was obliged to lay a wager with the man that he, Jacob, could load that wagon in less than so many minutes, and so Jacob loaded his several purchases while the man watched:  Jacob lost the bet, of course – he’d planned it that way, knowing the fellow could go home with honor intact, knowing there were sons at home to offload the goods and spare the man’s wounded wing.

Jacob stopped in the Silver Jewel for a sandwich and a beer – he’d hoped to rest and refresh himself, and as ill fortune would have it, he’d ended up distracting an argument long enough for Mr. Baxter to hand Tom Landers a bung starter, and while Jacob was entertaining half the pugilistic party, the other hit the floor with a knot on his head: Jackson Cooper showed up, and two disputants were hauled off to the calabozo, one with a headache and one without, and Jacob tried to return to his interrupted lunch.

There was a commotion down the hallway.

Jacob turned, looked, the strode quickly toward Daisy’s kitchen.

He ran into a cloud of Gaelic and a wall of indignation: Daisy was berating two fellows who were trying to muscle the biggest part of a new cast iron stove into the doorway, which wasn’t going well – one fellow was a bit more puny than he was willing to admit, and he honestly did not have the strength to carry that heavy, awkward stove up three steps and work it through the doorway.

Jacob slid in beside him, crowded him aside:  “Move your hand, I’ve got it” – he tucked his backside and gritted his teeth, for a cast iron stove is not a light thing at all: he backed up the three steps, he had the fellow at the other end swing to his right, they got the legs through, now swing left and come in: it took some more maneuvering, but they got it into Daisy’s kitchen, they got it generally where the old one had been, and Jacob let the fellow he’d relieved, take over assembly and final installation.

He turned and nearly ran into Daisy, who seized his face in both hands, pulled his face down and kissed him, once, quickly: she released his face and seized his lapels, pulled him close.

“I’ve wanted t’ do that t’ yer father f’r years,” she said quietly, “don’t tell him, but ye’ve made an Irishwoman happy” – she whirled and commenced to supervise the stove’s final positioning, and Jacob, having absolutely no idea what reply to make to this most unexpected admission of feminine admiration, wisely executed that military exercise known as Getting the Hell out of There!

Later in the day, a pair of draft horses decided they didn’t want much to do with a loaded freight wagon, and started to fight in the harness:  Jacob kneed his Apple-horse into a pursuing gallop as one of the two bolted down the street, trailing reins and trying to throw his collar:  Jacob caught up with the big gelding, managed to grab one of the reins, and by virtue of persistence and profanity, got him slowed enough to get the other rein: they returned to the scene of the crime, where Jacob brought the big footed fellow around, backed him back into position, and let the teamsters set about repairing the damage the now-peaceful pair had done.

Deputy Sheriff Jacob Keller walked his Apple-horse past his fine stone house, to the big, solid-built barn, swung down out of his saddle and just stood there for a long moment.

He knew young eyes were watching him as he unsaddled his stallion, as he brushed him down, grained him, as he trudged toward the house, hung his coat by the washbasin and pumped fresh, cold water, washed his hands and his face and snorted the water from his nose.

Jacob rubbed his face with a clean flour sack towel, reached up and plucked his Stetson from where he’d set it on its peg, dunked the skypiece on his grinning son: he pulled his coat from the other peg, draped it over his boy’s arm, ran his arm around his son’s shoulders.

They walked toward the house.

“Your Mama got anythin’ worth eatin’ in there?” Jacob asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“She got anythin’ ain’t been et yet?”

“Yes, sir!”

“Sounds good to me.”  Jacob’s hand tightened on his son’s off shoulder.

“When I was ridin’ up here I told Apple that I was hungry enough to eat a horse.”

“Yes, sir?”

“Know what Apple said?”

“Moooo,” Joseph grinned.

Father and son laughed and went into the house.

Edited March 14 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103