SHORT STORIES!

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

THE AMBASSADOR'S WIG

My dear Mr. Hendershott --

Please forgive my not communicating sooner.

I fear demands of trade and political negotiation have demanded far too much of my time.

Marnie stopped, leaned back, removed her rimless glasses: she massaged the bridge of her nose, her eyes closed, wishing most sincerely that the insane dwarf inside her skull would kindly stop trying to sledgehammer his way out.

She lay her knurled-barrel silver mechanical pencil down, took a sip of tea, and wished with an equal fervor that she had some window into the past to consult Daciana, her ancestress's boon companion, the trick rider who lived in the house under the same mountain overhang that protected the Firelands Big Round Barn from the elements.

The trick rider who was also a Gypsy herb woman, and had ground herbs that cured headaches.

Marnie sipped her tea, her eyes closed.

It was quiet in her quarters -- her son was in school, children started school young on Mars, and their education was greatly improved for it -- The Bear Killer was with Jacob as he conducted his official duties as Sheriff, and Marnie was grateful for the quiet.

Another sip of tea and she put her delicate, bone-china cup back on its matching saucer and picked up her silver barrel pencil.

She re-read her words, she remembered lying flat on her back, looking up, wondering what she was doing on her back in the street, wondering why so many people were bent over, looking at her, wondering why a man in a workman's coat and cloth cap was regarding her with a mixture of horror and guilt on his face, and then she realized --

She'd been hit --

Marnie blinked, she looked back at the sheet of note paper laid out on her desk, and she smiled, just a little.

When Marnie was twelve or fourteen, or maybe even younger, she'd ridden past her house just at sunset, at the request of a family friend, Bruce Jones, who ran the newspaper.

He had an idea for the portrait her parents requested.

He had his camera on a tripod, he had her made multiple passes as the sun was lowering, he set up whatever passed for a motor drive on his fancy new digital camera, and he set sequence-firing flashes.

When the sun balanced on one toe, on the rim of the world, the clouds caught fire in the distance: sometime between just touching the horizon, and just disappearing behind it, when the clouds were fiery red and streaked with slate blue, Marnie rode past: the camera's rapid fire caught her in silhouette, then the strobes fired, he tracked her run, there were images of her in perfect, flawless, black silhouette against the incendiary sunset, and there were those images with her perfectly limned against the fiery sky, but illuminated by carefully-timed flashes.

That last one was her favorite, and she'd incorporated the image as the background of her personal note paper -- a Western horsewoman, leaned forward as her Appaloosa ran full-tilt, mane and tail floating.

This was the faint, faded image she'd had incorporated into her personal note paper, and this was the note paper she chose for this communication.

 

I regret very much that ill Fortune caused your roofing hammer to slip from your grasp and cascade down the roof's slope, she continued.

Marnie took pride in her handwriting.

She and her Gammaw delighted in reading written records from an earlier era, where handwriting was Everyman's art, and good handwriting was a sign of good breeding, of a good education.

Marnie's personal script was beautiful to behold; there were no great, showy flourishes, but her hand was distinctly feminine, and genuinely lovely, and that is the hand in which she addressed herself to a man who experienced a sense of profound distress at her involvement.

Marnie closed her eyes, remembered lying very still as her husband stitched the cut, high up on her forehead, right at the hair line, running horizontally.

The scar, he assured her, would be invisible: Marnie had her own opinion on the subject.

 

Sheer and fantastic coincidence alone caused the unfortunate meeting between your roofing hammer, and my head, she wrote.

Your hammer left your hand of its own volition: of this I am certain, as your work is known to be exacting and precise, and an exacting man of precision does not carelessly let slip the tools of his profession.

Please know that are not blamed for this unhappy moment.

Yours in all sincerity,

MK

 

Marnie re-read her handwritten missive, then she folded it carefully, sealed it with scarlet wax and a rose-shaped stamp impressed into the thumbnail-sized crimson puddle.

She turned it over, carefully addressed it to the roofer whose descending hammer had given her this persistent headache, thrust it into the system that would see it hand-delivered.

 

One week later, Ambassador Marnie Keller visited the same world again: she arrived unannounced, save only for a discreet communication, requesting to meet the roofer at a particular restaurant: he was shown into a private dining room, where Marnie received him with a smile and a brown-paper-wrapped pound of fragrant, still-warm-from-the-roaster coffee beans: the package of coffee was in another sack, and inside the outermost sack was a smaller one, bearing Coin of the Realm, and another note.

It would not be fair to ask a man to take the time to see me, without paying him for his time.

You are a skilled roofer and you have my admiration for your skill, and my thanks for the concern you expressed when we first met.

M.

Marnie wore the same gown she'd worn the day she'd been clobbered by the falling hammer; she wore the same ornate hat, pinned in place.

The only thing she wore different was a wig, which concealed the healing wound in front, and hidden by the ornately arranged hair, a low-profile skullcap with foam lining -- not enough to qualify for a hardhat, but between foam padding, its rigid shell, and the overlying, curled, thick layer of hair, perhaps enough if a rascally hammer made another sliding dive off a roof.

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

AND THE ABBOTT SMILED

Ambassador Marnie Keller was more than accustomed to diplomatic contacts with persons of influence, with men of politics and business, with the movers and shakers of their respective societies.

Ambassador Marnie Keller relied on charm, intelligence, and persuasion to further the cause of the Confederacy, and at opportune moments, of her own business interests, though she was careful to keep the two strictly separate.

When Ambassador Marnie Keller made such diplomatic contacts, she was careful to cultivate the appearance of propriety, both in demeanor, in word, and especially in appearance: she was mostly meeting men, and men are visual creatures: the Ancestors, as the original Southrons abducted by aliens were called, passed along the ancestral memory of mothers and daughters, sisters and wives, who were Ladies: men far from home will remember their Ladies fondly, and with nostalgia, and this high opinion of the Distaff was passed on to the subsequent generations.

Marnie capitalized on this.

Corsets support the back, trim the waist and uplift a woman's (ahem!) appearance; properly tailored attire serves to enhance a woman's natural femininity, and a woman's behavior only reinforces this appearance.

Consequently, when Marnie made a State visit, she was in a properly tailored McKenna gown, she wore gloves, her hair was immaculately styled, she wore no cosmetics -- none -- and she took pains to listen closely to whoever was speaking with her.

Even, she admitted privately, if it was the most dull, boring, kill-me-now drivel that had ever been droned into her ears.

For this reason, Marnie wore a McKenna gown this day, with a fashionable little hat pinned carefully to her ornate, rich-auburn wig: the wig was less than convenient, but her scalp wound was still healing, and the wig concealed an additional layer of protection, and, well, if she could prevent another misunderstanding by wearing a wig that hid a padded skullcap, so much the better!

On this particular day, Marnie traveled with a parasol, and with her young son, John Junior, a healthy young lad with bright and curious eyes, a quick grin and a spontaneous nature, a happy little boy who knew what it was to (inadvertently!) short out the school's power supply, who (unintentionally) managed to detonate an unexpected, bright and smoke-rolling exothermic reaction in First Chemistry class, a lad who laughed happily when a leather-winged pteradon snatched him after an Iris delivered him and a half dozen other classmates to the wrong world, thanks to another Iris misdirection.

(Marnie played hell getting him back safely, mostly because the ham-handed tech that keyed in the discharge coordinates couldn't remember what location he'd entered; it took the direct intervention of one of the Valkyries, using her Starfighter's computer-mind interface, to drive her living mind into the Iris computer and retrieve the information)

You might've seen this one on the Inter-System: it involved Marnie screaming out of an Iris on a winged horse, it involved the first documented use of the net-cannon, it showed a little boy squealing with delight as the pteradon released its prey to try and tear at whatever this cobweb thing was that suddenly enveloped its head, it involved Marnie turning her winged mare in what can only be described as a "screaming, banking turn," diving like a wing-folded falcon, and catching her laughing little boy in his arms, after Marnie checked for blood, saw claws penetrated his coat but no flesh, after which Marnie admitted she didn't know whether to hug him or smack him!

This is, of course, beside the point.

Marnie sent a note ahead, and the Abbott replied, and so at the appointed hour, an attractive mother stepped from the shadowed corner in the Rabbitville Monastery's courtyard, the Iris hidden by the noontime shadow's slant: they held hands and walked across the hand-laid stone flags toward a tall, lean man with a tanned tonsure, an unbleached-linen robe, and a tired smile.

Abbott William was a man of dignity, a man of propriety, a man who was receiving an Ambassador, and his greeting reflected the solemnity of the occasion.

Marnie smiled as she glided up to him.

Marnie was a woman of dignity, a woman of propriety, a woman who was making a State visit, and her return greeting reflected the solemnity of the occasion.

The Abbott threw his arms wide and yelled "MARNIE!" and seized her in a delighted hug, and Marnie released her little boy's hands, threw herself into his arm, hugged him tight and laughed as she laid her cheek against his shoulder, as she smelled his soap-and-water, sunshine-and-fresh air scent: Littlejohn watched this with big and solemn eyes, then he charged the pair and hugged both of them.

Marnie felt the Abbott laugh again: his hands gripped her upper arms lightly, carefully, as he drew back, as he looked at her with pride and with affection.

"Go on, say it," Marnie laughed, and the Abbott threw his head back and laughed, he looked at her and he shook his head.

"Bless you, Marnie," he said softly, and Marnie heard the genuine affection in his voice, saw memories swim wetly in his eyes, "you are the very image of Willamina!"

The Abbott harrumphed, wiped his eyes on the sleeve of his robe, dropped into a squat, looked frankly at Littlejohn.

The Abbott raised a finger, lowered his head slightly and asked in a confidential tone, "John, what did your Mama tell you not to say when you got here?"

Littlejohn's chest puffed proudly and he happily declared, "Mama said not to call you Woom Coffee!"

William laughed and hugged the laughing little boy to him, and Littlejohn hugged him back.

"Speaking of which," Marnie smiled as the Abbott stood again, "you might want to try this."

Abbott William raised the package to his  nose, took a long sniff, his eyes widening.

"Roasted fresh this morning. I believe you have a coffee grinder."

"I have the one you gave us, yes."

Marnie patted his sleeved arm, winked.

"You'll like this. It's Offworld."

The Abbott nodded, looked down at Littlejohn.

"Now what's this I hear about you riding with dragons?"

 

Littlejohn frowned as his Mama drew the mare to a stop, set the brake, dallied the reins loosely around the upright.

Marnie climbed out of the carriage, Littlejohn following: she reached for him to swing him down and he happily jumped, the way little boys will: he straightened, grinned up at his Mama.

Marnie planted her knuckles on her belt and shook her head.

"You and my brother!" she scolded affectionately.

They turned to look at the row of tomb stones.

Littlejohn scampered forward, knelt, bare knees pressing into the chilly, snow-dusted grass: one hand on the top edge of the stone, he bent closer, frowning at the laser engraved image of a pale eyed woman.

He looked back at his Mama.

Littlejohn surged to his feet, ran for the far end of the row, stopped again, frowned at the laser engraved image of a pale eyed woman in a long gown, then he looked back at his Mama.

Littlejohn thrust to his feet and ran back to his Mama and looked up at her.

"Mama," he said, "when you told Abbott William we were coming here, he said it's only carved rocks and nobody else was here, just the memories we brought with us."

Marnie spread a cloth, knelt: she tilted her head and gave her son those big, lovely eyes, the way she would if listening to a Diplomatic delegate, or a politician, or a businessman.

Littlejohn frowned, turned and looked at Willamina's stone -- at the laser engraved portrait that looked enough like his Mama to be her -- he turned and shot a look long down the row at a stone with the laser engraved image of a pale eyed woman in a long gown, a woman who looked just like his Mama, the two gowns looking identical.

"Mama, is he right?"

Marnie caressed her son's cheek and smiled that gentle, reassuring Mommy-smile she knew so well.

She waited, and she did not have to wait more than the space of three heartbeats.

Littlejohn looked past his Mama's right ear, his eyes suddenly wide, delighted: she watched him turn his head and look past the other side of her head, at something else that delighted him just as much.

A little boy took in a quick breath, blinked, looked at his Mama.

Marnie smelled lilac and sunshine, soap and water: she leaned back, still on her knees: even white teeth bit her bottom lip, she closed her eyes, trying to hold in the memories, but they still managed to run, wet and cold, down her cheeks: she heard Littlejohn's happy laugh, heard him talking, excited, heard her Gammaw's voice.

She heard another voice, heard the rustle of long skirt and petticoats, felt someone, warm and real, beside her.

Gloved hands slipped into gloved hands: Marnie opened her eyes, and this strong woman of politics, this woman of diplomacy, this woman of business and commerce, felt her reserve crumble  and fall away as two women, two mothers, two wives, embraced.

Littlejohn was happily prattling about his "Sients Spearmints" and how he scorched the chem-lab's tabletop when an experiment went awry, and he breathlessly described sledding off Mount Firelands on a plastic sled, with his Mama in the sled behind him, holding him around the middle, and how she screamed like a little girl as they went down Dead Man's Drop, and how they slid out onto smooth Martian sand for an incredible distance after their long tobogganing descent.

Marnie looked at Sarah and whispered, "Thank you for coming!"

Sarah pressed a rose into Marnie's gloved grip and whispered, "I'm glad to see our bloodline is still raising hell," then she looked over at Littlejohn, all little-boy grin and long bare legs and she looked back at Marnie.

"Now what's this about your throwing a bronco hood over a flying lizard's head?"

 

Abbott William allowed himself few pleasures in this lifetime.

He did not subscribe to the strict order of St. Benedict, but he did believe pleasures were distractions, and he knew he had to set an example: his own cell was austere, his personal schedule was rigorous, he often set the example of hard work by laboring with his hands, and this man who administered the entire Monastery, was tanned of tonsure, lean of muscle and was unashamedly callused of hand.

Abbott William lowered his head into the rich, fragrant steam rising from his heavy ceramic mug.

He remembered the innocent laughter of a little boy, the quiet pride in his mother's eyes, the genuine pleasure she took in pressing the brown-paper-wrapped, string-tied bundle into his hands.

Abbott William was a man who allowed himself very few pleasures, but here, now, today, he made an exception.

The Abbot sipped a truly excellent coffee, savored its flavor, its scent, savored the warmth of the heavy, white-glazed mug in his hands, felt the warmth glowing inside him.

And the Abbott smiled.

 

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

THE LADIES HAVE SPOKEN

 

Joseph Keller curled up on the folded saddleblanket.

It smelled of straw and of horses and of saddle leather, it was folded over, and another just like it lay beneath, padding between a sleepy little boy and the prickly, fragrant bale of hay he'd laid down on.

Gloved hands shoved two more bales into position, spread another blanket: a pure white mountain Mastiff flowed easily up onto the sleeping platform, trod the blanket with black-nailed paws, circled three times and yawned -- a wide-jawed, fang-bared, tongue-curled expression of drowsy-eyed intent -- then she laid down with Jacob's little boy.

Outside, a chain saw snarled, then sang power and destruction as its freshly sharpened chain sliced through firewood, reducing a fallen, dragged-in, standing-dead snag, to stovewood lengths.

Inside the house, women in aprons and housedresses tended the business of fixing a good, homemade meal: the kitchen table was stripped of its tablecloth, flour sprinkled on its far end, a freshly-kneaded lump of dough was thumped carefully on the floured surface and then quickly, efficiently rolled out broad thin with a flour-dusted marble rolling pin.

Skilled hands sliced ribbons from the thin, rolled-out dough: strips were lifted by other, younger fingers, draped over a sleeved forearm, ultimately handed off, to be immersed in simmering broth, to make good home made noodles.

More dough, more swift, practiced strokes of the rolling pin: pie pans were draped with pie crusts, quart jars opened, canned fruit and women's magic were added, sprinkled, spiced, another crust: quick, skilled pinches, the crust was brushed with milk and sprinkled with sugar: three more were prepared, introduced into the preheated oven.

Jacob Keller smiled as he lifted the chain saw, set it aside to snarl and mutter as he seized the long, seasoned trunk, dragged it a little closer: he wallowed it up on one thigh, kicked a chunk further back under it, slid out from under its not inconsiderable weight, grateful he kept his Martian quarters at one-and-a-quarter Earth gravities.

He flexed strong hands inside leather gloves, picked up the chain saw, goosed the throttle.

The blade melted easily through seasoned wood, showering pants legs, boots and chilly earth with fragrant, yellow-grey sawdust.

Inside the barn, Joseph slept, cuddled up with a warm, fuzzy Mountain Mastiff.

When he was very young, as he half-lay on a black canine of these impressive proportions, he'd chewed wetly on his little pink fist and looked at his Mama with big and innocent eyes and said his first word.

"Bear!"

The Bear Killer, of course, snuffed the child's little pink ear and licked the laughing little boy's jaw by way of thanks: Joseph celebrated by leaning into The Bear Killer's solid flank, closed his eyes and went instantly to sleep, a gift given to the young the old often wish they still had.

Now Joseph slept with a pure-white Bear Killer of a Mountain Mastiff, curled up on a folded saddleblanket that smelled of straw and of horses and of saddle leather, with the singing of his Pa's chain saw outside a reassuring sound that meant his Pa was close by.

Shelly smiled a little as she heard Jacob stacking stovewood in the ancient, faded-orange Dodge power wagon.

Angela looked up at her Mama's quiet smile, looked at Victoria as her younger sister used a flat spatula to slide fresh-baked biscuits, hot from the oven, from a baking sheet onto a plate.

"Mama?" Angela asked gently. "I know that smile, what is it?"

Shelly looked up, bent her wrist, wiped at a stray, auburn curl tickling her cheek bone.

"When Jacob was still young," she smiled, "I was at the Mercantile, and Gary tried to sell me a toy chain saw.

"It was battery operated, and it used a beaded chain instead of a real saw chain.

"I laughed and thanked him and said, "Gary, he's using his father's chain saw," and the poor fellow's face fell about three feet."

Victoria looked at her Mama, tilted her head a little with curiosity, blinked big and innocent eyes as she listened.

Shelly saw her youngest daughter's look and explained, "It's hard for men to realize that children grow up. In their minds they are still small children, even when they're not."

Victoria blinked, frowned a little, then said "Oh," as if that explained everything.

Outside, Jacob stacked wood efficiently in the truckbed: he loaded the aging four-by down onto its helpers, took off his gloves, smacked them a few times against a nearby fencepost, out of habit more than anything else.

He picked up the saw, took it over to the barn, to the air hose he'd run out ahead of time for this very purpose.

Jacob blew sawdust from the saw, he took it inside and wiped it down, coiled the air hose, shut off the compressor and popped off the air nozzle: Snowdrift ignored him until the *pssht!* of the nozzle's removal, then she showed her overwhelming excitement by looking at Jacob through slitted eyes, yawning elaborately, and draping her warm jaw over the sleeping Joseph's left hip.

Jacob spent a half hour touching up the chain's teeth, he topped off the fuel tank, filled the oil reservoir: satisfied, he set the saw back in its place, came over to the hay bales.

Jacob pulled off his gloves, rubbed Snowdrift's shoulder: she laid her blunt muzzle over his shoulder and groaned happily.

Jacob reached down, rubbed his son's back carefully, gentle.

"Heyyyyy, Joseph," he almost whispered, his voice Daddy-soft: "ready to go, bud?"

Joseph opened his eyes, blinked, stretched, looked around -- confusion, then delight filled his young eyes as he came fully awake.

The far door opened and a little girl came skipping in: she stopped, frowned and said "Oh poo!"

Jacob laughed silently as he turned, looked at his little sis.

Victoria looked at Jacob, distressed:  "I wanted to bring out Mama's ding-a-ling bell so I could hold it up and say Mama said to tell you ding-a-ling," and Jacob looked at Joseph and back to Victoria.

"Joseph," Jacob said, "I reckon it's time to eat, whattaya say?"

Joseph sat up, looked at Snowflake and at his Pa with equal measures of a little boy's delight.

"Yis!"

Jacob laughed, Snowdrift jumped to the clean-swept, smooth-surfaced cement barn floor, tik-tik-tikk'd over to Victoria, snuffed at her ear, her apron, looked back at Jacob and Joseph and gave an imperative, canine, jaw-snapping, whuff!

Jacob laughed.

"You heard the lady," Jacob grinned as father, son, baby sis and pure-white Snowdrift-dog made for the house and a good New Year's Day meal. "We'll take that stovewood over to the Widow Smith after we eat!"

 

Edited January 1 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

HEARING AID

Marnie Keller leaned back in her seat, ran a delicate fingertip around the gold rim of her delicate, eggshell-porcelain teacup.

"You want me to go back to Leatherwing," she said quietly.

"Yes."

"You have a diplomatic assignment for which I am particularly suited."

"Yes."

Marnie lifted her hand, laid her fingertips delicately on her tablecloth.

"Mister Chief Ambassador," she said, her voice soft, "what guarantee have I that another flying lizard isn't going to try and snatch my child, or myself?"

"We ... can ... arrange a secure location for your visit."

Marnie had not looked at him since he'd broached the subject, revealed the location.

Her lashes were demurely lowered and she stared at her half-empty teacup, citrus-tinged oolong cooling steadily as she considered her reply.

"That's not what they call it," the Chief Ambassador suggested carefully.

Marnie raised her eyes, and her expression was not kind.

"Mister Chief Ambassador," she said quietly -- her voice was not raised in the least little bit, but there was a cold edge to it he recognized -- "I dislike being given incomplete information. I was not told there would be pteradons or pterodactyls or whatever those God-awful things are called --"

The Ambassador frowned, opened his mouth to reply.

Marnie cut him off with a raised finger.

"I've come to grief when information was withheld, or when information was incomplete. I remind you, sir, my shuttle was shot down, with considerable loss of life -- all but one of my crew were killed, I ended up killing several who sought my life, all because I was not informed of the political winds blowing through their government!"

"Yes, I remember," the Chief Ambassador said carefully.

"Nobody bothered to tell me of the chief predators on Leatherwing."

Marnie took a quick breath, her nostrils flared, a sign of her increasing unhappiness.

"My son was taken by one of them. I'm told it's unusual that the one that took him, did not snap his head off and swallow it whole while in flight."

"That's not what they call it," the Ambassador repeated.

"Very well," Marnie said, looking very directly at the distinguished, older man in the tailored, grey uniform. "Let's say I do go. What else have I not been told about this world?"

The Ambassador considered carefully, frowned, reached into his coat, brought out a long, narrow book, flipped it open.

"As far as ..."

He withdrew a folded sheet from the book, handed it to Marnie.

"That is insect life."

Marnie unfolded the page, raised an eyebrow.

"My," she murmured.

Another page: "These are native ... I think they're more like legless lizards."

"Poisonous?"

"It'll say which ones are."

"More than one, then," Marnie murmured, frowning: she looked up, her expression serious.

"No horned toads, no Gila monsters?"

The Ambassador frowned, spread his hands: "I'm ... not afraid I'm familiar."

"Nothing about horny toads," Marnie murmured as she ran a quick eye down the rest of the page. "Just as well, they're terribly noisy."

"Noisy?"

The Ambassador riffled through the pages, pulled out another tri-folded sheet. "This one is noisy."

"Oh, a furball," Marnie murmured.

"They're everywhere, they scream like they're being killed."

"How big are they?"

"The size of my fist. Four small gripping feet, no tail."

"Is this all the dangerous animal life?"

"Almost. The other varieties stay away from people. You'll be wearing your Shield. I doubt if you will have any problems from any of them."

"I seem to remember being declined for my son's shield," Marnie said, her voice dangerously quiet. "I was told to take him with me, your mental men said this would favorably influence their ruling parties toward my words. We were denied proper protection and he was snatched by a flying meat eater!"

"Which you out-flew rather neatly."

"Flattery," Marnie said menacingly, "will most certainly not get you everywhere."
The Ambassador harrumphed, frowned.

"And another thing. I damned well will have personal Iris storage, I will have an arsenal at hand, and should it be necessary, I will bring out firepower that world has never seen!"

"You've changed your mind about going."

"I dislike leaving a job undone," Marnie admitted. "Now let's talk about the political parties and the players we know."

 

Sheriff Linn Keller bit gratefully into the thick, cold-meatloaf sandwich.

His pale eyed daughter watched him with amusement.

Linn swallowed, took a noisy slurp of coffee, swallowed.

"Oh Gawd that's good," he mumbled through another mouthful: he ate like the hungry man he was, and Angela delighted in knowing he was quite obviously enjoying something she'd baked, she'd sliced, she'd assembled, she'd brought him.

She leaned forward, set a shining red apple on his desk blotter.

He looked at it, nodded, grunted, took another bite of the meatloaf-and-sourdough.

"Marnie went back to Leatherwing," Angela said quietly. "We talked last night."

Linn looked at her, raised an eyebrow, nodded once.

"So far she hasn't had to kill anybody. She did shoot one of the native wildlife."

Linn frowned, swallowed, reached for his coffee.

"Littlejohn with her?"

"No. no, this wasn't a flyer, it was --"

Angela frowned, set thumb and fingertips together to indicate something the size of a baseball.

"They have round furry wildlife that scream like stepping on a dwarf the size of a housecat."

Linn bit half the remaining sandwich into nonexistence, chewed.

"They're unbelievably loud. Marnie said their buildings are well enough made to keep them from getting in. This one had to be planted in her room.

"She shot it by reflex. No one on that world ever heard a full-house .357. Marnie said she shot that Screamer graaaaave-yard dead" -- Angela wagged her head like a self-important evangelist while wagging an admonishing finger in the air -- "and also the wall and the ceiling and the roof!"

"Mama did something like that with a shotgun," Linn mumbled, taking another sip of coffee.

"I remember her saying," Angela affirmed.

"So how is she coming with negotiations?"

"Weeeelllllll ...."

Angela made a face.

"Daddy, do you remember telling us about the Preacher and the Mule?"

Linn nodded again, his face serious: he reached for the apple, bit into the sweet, crisp fruit.

"It seems the delegation was assembling downstairs when she shot the Screamer. She came downstairs as she always did, in her McKenna gown, she knew she'd be watched so she floated down the stairs with her skirt flowing behind her.

"Not five minutes later, someone came downstairs and whispered urgent words to certain members of the delegation, concerning the use of a weapon beyond the power levels of anything they had.

"Marnie knew they had no camera technology, so she shared the camera drone's image of her heading for the door, the Screamer sounding like it was being murdered at the top of its lungs.

"The hover-cam caught Marnie's turn, her draw, her firing from barely clear of the holster: she straightened, casually opened the cylinder, removed the fired empty, reloaded, closed and holstered.

"Marnie knew the structures were built well enough, tight enough, to keep the Screamers out, knew that someone put it in her room for laughs, or to unnerve her.

"She was wearing a vest that looked like it was part of her dress, and she wore her .357 under the vest: she said they settled down to negotiating, and she was grateful she'd been a dealer in the Silver Jewel, for she used the same observation skills with these political delegates, as she used in a good game of poker.

"They went outside and a Leatherwing tried to pounce on some kind of an animal in the street.

"Marnie pulled a 97 Winchester from a personal Iris and dumped two deer slugs and two charges of double-ought through the front ridge of its breastbone."

"Hurt it?" Linn asked dryly.

Angela laughed, nodded.

"Marnie reloaded the 97 and slid it back into its personal Ellipse, closed its visible Iris and continued on as if nothing had just happened, as if the bloodied, twitching carcass lying in the street didn't even exist."

"I take it they listened to  her a little better."

Angela smiled knowingly, nodded.

"You could say that."

"Did this help her negotiations?"

Linn took the last bite from the dreadfully-skinny apple core, tossed it underhand toward the trash can: "Two points!"

Angela nodded, smiled a little.

"She told me it was kind of like the Preacher and the Mule. They tried to shake her with a Screamer in her room, they had no idea a Leatherwing would try and grab someone's pet."

 

 

 

 

Edited January 2 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

SOCIAL BILLY

Jacob accepted the snifter of brandy from his father.

The distilled California sunshine swirled fragrantly in the delicate glass balloon: Jacob waited until his father poured his own, then both men raised their glass in salute, drank.

They set their glasses back on the tray.

Jacob knew his father would have a celebratory sip -- this was one of those occasions! -- but his father would partake no further, and that pale eyed old lawman had no liking for anything stronger.

Linn looked approvingly at his son.

"Does your mother know?" he asked, his voice quiet.

"Sir, I reckon she does," Jacob admitted. "She is a woman and women know things."

"Annette did not come with you, then."

"No, sir."

"You should bring her. Esther should know."

"Yes, sir."

Linn gestured toward a chair: not until he was invited to sit, would Jacob lower himself into the comfortable upholstery:  Linn settled into his own comfortable, blue-velvet cushion, leaned back against the armless back, then hunched forward suddenly, elbows on his knees.

"Jacob, it is a fine thing to have sons," he said, his voice low, confidential, "but I'll be honest, I dearly love my little girls!"

Jacob's grin was broad, instant, genuine: he'd seen this very thing, and he honestly looked forward to his wife's being delivered of their first child: she'd only just told him of her gravid state, he'd snatched her up under the arms and swung her about, his face suddenly bright with unadulterated, undisguised celebration -- he remembered how Annette threw her head back and laughed the way she did when they were first married, when they were young and just getting to know one another, when they were still in the whirlwind of their early days as a couple.

"I wanted to let you know, sir," Jacob said thoughtfully, staring at the rug, then he raised his eyes, suddenly concerned: "Sir, should the news come from me or from Annette?"

Linn grinned, rubbed his palms slowly together, still hunched over, elbows still on his knees: he smiled, that quiet, unguarded smile Jacob saw but rarely, and he looked up at his son.

"Jacob," he said softly, "bring your wife. Esther just loves it when Annette comes to call. Women talk and it'll come out."

Jacob heard the door to his father's study creak a little, and his attention diverted just enough to miss a few of his father's words: he blinked, made a fast mental return to his father, and recalled the man said something about "sociability."

Jacob blinked. "Yes, sir."

 

Angela Keller was a pretty little blue-eyed girl, a happy, laughing daughter of the mountains who loved everything with an undisguised passion -- whether it was plucking a wildflower and bring it a-scamper to her Mama as if it were the most beautiful bouquet in the world, or whether she draped an arm over The Bear Killer and strutted along beside the big bear-cub-sized beast, as proud as a Princess being escorted by the most handsome Prince of the Realm -- Angela Keller paused at the door of her Daddy's study and heard him talking with her big brother Jacob.

Angela was a Proper Young Lady (something she said once at the Mercantile, punctuating the capitals with an emphatic, curl-bouncing nod of her head for each capitalized syllable), and a Proper Young Lady does not interrupt men in their conversation, but she was curious, and so she scampered down the hallway and looked up at her Mama with bright and shining eyes.

Esther turned, smiled that gentle Mommy-smile: "Hello, Angela!"

Angela may have been a Proper Young Lady, but Angela was still a bouncy, happy little girl, and so Angela blurted the urgent question she'd formed after hearing her Daddy's voice.

"Mama," she said, "Daddy was telling Jacob something I don't understand."

"Oh?" Esther asked as she picked Angela up, set her in a kitchen chair, and then sat herself, facing her curious, nose-wrinkling little daughter.

"Daddy said something about Social Billy," Angela said in a puzzled voice, then she looked at her Mommy with the bright and sincere eyes of an uncertain little girl.

"Mama, who's Social Billy?"

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

NEVER

Sarah Lynne McKenna's heels were loud on the stage's smooth boards.

Sarah wore one of her mother's creations -- she'd finished modeling her Mama's fashions next door for the buyers, her Mama was busy taking orders, charming the men and sharing light gossip with the women, so Sarah slipped next door to the theater.

Her hands were closed -- not quite fisted, but not far from it -- she marched the length of the stage, her displeasure evident in the manner in which her sharp little heels punished the boards: she stopped, opened her gloved hands, closed them again, turned quickly, marched back.

Even in her cloud of pique (which surrounded her like large cottony puffs of invisible vapor), her carriage was erect, her head up, shoulders back: it may be that she placed one foot quickly, precisely, in front of the other as she walked, because she was following the lay of the boards, walking one straight line of carefully-laid floor board as if walking a tightrope.

Sarah doubted not there were eyes on her.

This was, after all, a stage, and stages are built so people can view a production.

Heavy curtains concealed the stage, but there were ghosts, if nothing else -- every theater is haunted! -- but it was not until she turned for the second time, not until she was halfway across the stage, that she saw a lean young man in a tailored black suit slip out from the wings, his hat held modestly before him like a black-felt codpiece.

Sarah lifted her chin and altered her course: her step neither sped nor slowed, and her pale eyed did not waver.

She stopped, her flat belly two fists from the young man's flat belly.

"Jacob."

"Sarah."

The two regarded one another a moment longer.

"You're angry," Jacob said, and Sarah blinked, recognizing that Jacob just opened his mouth to let his father's voice fall out.

Sarah swallowed, nodded, laid her gloved palm on Jacob's chest.

"How can I help?" Jacob whispered.

Sarah dropped her hand, then she seized his elbow, swung him around, her hand on his arm.

"I need tea," she said, "and you're buying!"

A well-dressed young man, with a fashionably-dressed young woman on his arm, slipped out the stage door, down the wooden steps, down the alley and then out onto the main street.

 

Sarah sipped her tea delicately, carefully: Jacob, the fine, fair hairs shining on his upper lip, took a careful taste of his coffee, nodded.

"Vanilla," he murmured, "and warrrrrm."

Sarah batted her eyes innocently.

"You could pour your coffee into your saucer to cool," she suggested.

"Some folks do."

"You never have."

"Tried it once," Jacob admitted, "and spilled it all over the table."

Sarah wrinkled her nose, her eyes smiling over the rim of her teacup.

Jacob set his coffee down, regarded his half-sister with quiet and pale eyes.

"Now what wound you up like an eight day clock?"

Sarah took a breath, looked to the side: Jacob saw a flash of anger, quickly hidden -- She'll play a hell of a game of poker, he thought -- she looked back.

"Did you ever get angry at your father?"

Jacob considered his answer carefully.

Sarah studied his shoulders, his hands, his face: she knew he was considering and rejecting multiple possible replies.

"I ... have been angry," he admitted, his words coming slowly.

Sarah waited.

Jacob sipped cautiously, swallowed, frowned.

"It's better now that it's scalded the hair off my tongue."

Sarah's eyes smiled and she debated whether to kick him, decided she might miss, and that might cause misunderstandings.

Jacob looked at Sarah and admitted, "I have been angry, Sarah, but not at Pa. Angry at myself."

"Oh?"

Jacob's lips pressed together and he frowned a little, laced his fingers together, planted his elbows on the table, leaned his nose down on his finger bridge.

"It ... doesn't make sense," he admitted, "but I get so agger-vated at myself when I mess up. Especially when I don't know something ..."

His voice trailed off, he looked past her, then back: "It's not sensible, but I kick myself for not knowin' something before I could possibly know it."

Sarah lifted her chin, bit her bottom lip, looked back down at Jacob, who was studying her face as intently as she'd studied his.

"You are your father's son," Sarah murmured. "Mama and Esther have both said those very words about him, how he ... he gets so angry with himself if he makes even an honest mistake."

Sarah looked very intently at Jacob.

"It's as if ..."

She blinked, shook her head.

"Don't be like that, Jacob. Please. Don't be that hard on yourself."

Sarah raised her teacup, carefully, with both hands, drank.

Jacob considered his steaming mug, raised his eyes to Sarah's.

"Jacob," Sarah asked, and he heard something new in her voice -- "Jacob, did you ever want to hit your father?"

Sarah counted herself fortunate that she was watching closely, for she saw something she honestly did not expect.

She saw surprise.

"No," Jacob replied quietly. "Pa said at one time or another, every tall boy figures he can whip the old man. He said his Pa's sleeve was plumb full of arm and he never figured he could take the man, and he honestly never had any wish to."

"And you?"

Jacob gave Sarah a long look.

"Have you seen the man with his shirt off?" Jacob asked quietly.

"No."

"Next he has his coat off, pay attention to his arms."

"They fill his shirt sleeves," she replied -- a statement, not a question.

Jacob nodded.

"Yep."

A well dressed young man, with a well dressed young woman on his arm, walked back to the theater, stopped outside: Bonnie was coming out the front door of the exhibition hall adjacent, smiled as she saw her daughter on Jacob's arm.

Jacob stood fast as Bonnie came hurrying over to them, he removed his hat at her approach.

"I was about to come looking for you," Bonnie said in a worried voice, looked at Jacob.

"I'm sorry. I should have known Sarah would be safe."

"Yes, ma'am," Jacob said. "Will you need a hand carryin' your goods out?"

Bonnie smiled with honest delight, bounced on her toes like an excited little girl; "We sold out, Jacob! Everything we brought, and for a good price!"

"Congratulations, Miz Bonnie," Jacob said in his usual gentle voice. "Were there orders as well?"

Bonnie looked at Sarah and laughed, looked back at Jacob.

"I could have sold the dress off Sarah's back," she admitted, "and yes, we have orders to fill!"

Jacob looked at Sarah, who lifted a warning finger.

"Don't say it," she muttered, and Jacob closed his mouth carefully.

"Jacob, you are welcome to ride back to Firelands with us."

"I would like that, ma'am. If I may get Apple?"

"Of course. We should depart --"
Jacob drew the watch from his pocket, pressed the stem to flip open the case, showed her the watch-face.

"Give us a half hour, Jacob."

"Here, or at the depot, ma'am?"

"It will take us a half hour to reach the depot. We've loaded the empty trunks."

"Jacob," Sarah said as she released his arm, as she reached up and squeezed his bicep -- "Jacob, never?"

Bonnie saw the smile behind his eyes -- just like his father! she thought -- as he replied in a quiet voice.

"Never."

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

I SPOIL YOU TOO

A horse and rider, alone in the cold and the snow.

A mile back, what was left of a carcass bore mute testimony to a lightning-patterned Fanghorn and his rider having eaten: scavengers were already worrying what was left, packing off meat-heavy bones, snarling at one another as their kind always do.

Michael and Lightning pushed on into the teeth of cold wind and snow.

Michael knew he could bend his wrist and summon a shuttle, he knew he could walk Lightning through a friendly Iris and they would be on another world where it was warm and smelled like summer, but Michael remembered his beloved mountains, and besides, he knew where he intended to go.

He'd found a place on Fanghorn where he thought a man might be able to erect a cabin -- he'd found a sheltered cave, one big enough to build about a story and a half, or so he estimated -- there was room enough for a stable, hell, a barn! -- and he wanted to take a look at it, now, in winter, with a storm moving in.

Lightning, her belly full, belched comfortably: she slitted her eyes, moving steadily, sure-footedly.

Michael was surprised how quickly his destination manifested itself: one moment, an anonymous wall of wind-driven snow -- then suddenly the snow darkened, the wind slacked, they pushed through a final, chest-high drift.

Michael rode Lightning closer: snow still spun in the lee, adding to the drifts they'd just bulldozed through:  Lightning stamped, crow-hopped a few times, shaking off snow and cold and grunting as she looked around, scenting the cold air.

Michael shucked his rifle, eyes busy: he raised his off hand, shot a beam of light into the shadows, into the depths.

Nothing, he thought.

Suits me fine, but why isn't this used by the local wildlife?

Michael looked up, his rifle's muzzle swinging up as the crescent buttplate found his coat's shoulder.

The rifle's report was muffled -- his Confederate field was calibrated to almost completely silence outgoing gunfire -- Michael fired four times, swung back: part of his mind told him his pupils were dilated, part of his mind registered the blood-scented belch Lightning gave just before he broke the shot, just before he put a copper jacketed round between the shoulders of something batlike, something that fell, hit the ground, followed by three more.

Michael didn't have time to dismount.

Lightning was still hungry.

He waited while she feasted -- while she crushed bone, grunted, gorged, tore flesh, hide, meat, chewed loudly, messily, swallowed.

I don't think I want fried bat for supper, Michael thought as he thrust shining reloads into his rifle's gate.

He looked around, waited while Lightning gorged herself, moved on to the next: it was cold enough the meat wouldn't spoil, but it would attract scavengers.

Michael waited until Lightning sat down, raised her head, belched again, spat out a couple chunks of worse-for-being-chewed-and-swallowed bone.

He leaned forward, caressed her neck.

"How would you like a good slug of mineral water?" he murmured, then he bent his wrist: he frowned, looked around again, shifted his grip on his Winchester, tapped and swiped and looked up as an Iris opened.

Lightning walked through the black ellipse, unshod hooves silent on sand and rotted stone.

 

Lightning's fur glowed in the sunset's long red rays.

Michael rode right up the main street like he owned the place.

Little boys ran after him, yelling: Michael rode easy, rifle propped up on his thigh, more for appearances than anything else -- he'd learned it was expected -- he and Lightning watered themselves at a mineral spring they'd drunk from before, a spring that stank of rotten eggs, a spring that was cold and sweet and honestly tasted better than any water Michael ever had, if you didn't count good cold wellwater from home when they were putting up late-summer hay.

Lightning was the only Fanghorn the locals knew of, that had ever been saddle broke; owing to their carnivorous nature, they were not trusted -- happy little boys notwithstanding -- and so Michael found himself obliged to bend his wrist again, and open another Iris, and reappear elsewhere.

Fortunately, Mars excavated auxiliary launch bays when they established the Valkyries, they mined out more than they needed: Michael appropriated one, and with little effort, carpeted it thickly with straw, provided green feed for Lightning, spun out a featherweight blanket for them from the nearest Replicator.

He and Lightning laid down in fresh, sweet smelling straw: Michael spun the blanket over the side-lying Fanghorn, he pulled off his boots and his hat, rolled his coat up for a pillow, laid down and cuddled against his warm, comforting, gut-rumbling Fanghorn with the blanket over the both of them, and went to sleep.

Sheriff Jacob Keller watched this on his monitor, smiled a little as he did.

Ruth came over, silent in cushion-soled, fur-lined slippers: she leaned over her husband's shoulder, watched as Michael cuddled up against Lightning, as Lightning's head curled around, as both gave a contented sigh, just before Lightning raised her head, gave a resounding belch, then laid her chin back down and closed her eyes.

"They share a blanket?" she murmured.

"Capture the body heat," Jacob said softly. "She's warm enough, he'll not chill even on a cold night!"

"He'll have her spoiled," Ruth scolded gently.

Jacob leaned back, pulled his wife down on his lap.  

"I spoil you, too, darlin'," he grinned.  "It kind of comes natural."

Husband and wife shared a look that promised they, too, would share their body heat later that night.

 

Michael sat cross legged, sketch book open on crossed legs: Lightning snored quietly behind him.

The feather-blanket was still laid over the Fanghorn (she did seem to enjoy that!) and Michael had it drawn over his shoulders and over his knees, with just enough gap to sit there and draw.

Lightning's stomach rumbled occasionally -- this was normal for her -- he summoned memory and funneled it out the sharpened point of his pencil, and the bat-things on the cliff face clung to sheer rock and looked down at him.

He'd been lucky.

They were slowed by the cold.

Normally they attacked and came in fast, they were poisonous, they would strike and fly off and wait for their prey to die: Michael had heard of them, but he didn't know where they were found.

Now he knew.

Now he knew where to avoid.

Now he knew where not to build a cabin, and an adjoining barn, or stable, as he'd originally intended.

Michael considered the practice he'd put into rifle work, and of a sudden he was most grateful he'd listened to his Pa on how to handle a rifle, he was most grateful his Pa showed him how to reload, and he was very definitely grateful his Pa encouraged his practice.

 

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

ONE AFTERNOON, IN FIRELANDS

A massive cascade of loose, blown snow roared into the air and down the mountain.

Hidden in its spray, the cause of the crystalline tempest: it was red, it was boxy, it sounded like what it was -- a steam engine at labor -- and although it was on the &W right-of-way, it was not Z&W rolling stock.

Father and son sat their stallions and watched from a distance as this new innovation labored steadily along the gold track: there had been snow, yes; there were avalanches, yes, there always were -- and somehow, neither the Sheriff nor his son quite knew how, somehow, a steam powered rotary machine made it onto the Z&W trackage.

Linn knew Esther hadn't bought a snowplow -- it hadn't been deemed necessary, though the gold mines were agitating for her to get one, to guarantee the lines remained open from mine to refinery.

Linn also knew this was a genuine, honest to God, steam powered machine that was slinging snow for an incredible distance, a rolling cloudmaker barking hard against its load.

He and Jacob watched for a time, then Linn eased his weight off his backside the way he did before making a decision.

"I reckon they can clear tracks without my help," he said softly, and two men turned their horses and resumed their journey.

 

Crazy Hermey's hand shook a little as he hooked the bullhead can opener under the tin's rim, pierced the metal lid, opened a can of what claimed to be salmon.

It could have been fried shoe leather for all he cared.

He dumped the liquid into his cat's bowl, raked some chunks of what actually looked like fish into the bowl, then slung the rest of it into his frying pan: it sizzled, it stank, he cracked in two eggs and stirred it up.

Crazy Hermey picked up a bottle of something and dumped a short gurgle into the frying pan, then tilted the bottle up and took a long pull.

He needed something to steady his hand.

He'd run a half dozen batches of nitroglycerine, he'd gotten them safely to the stream and washed out the acid -- his hands ached from the cold water, but he'd got the job done -- he pulled bottles from the snow and carefully, exactly, trickled freezing-temperature nitroglycerine into each one.

Decanting the explosive was the only time his hands did not shake.

The man worked steadily, methodically, he was careful to use a funnel and to get not the least trace of nitro in the bottle's neck: he stoppered the bottles and ranked them in a wooden dynamite crate, packed the crate with snow, tamped snow so they were well padded, so they remained cold and immobile.

As long as they were kept cold, they would not go boom.

Hermey fried up his supper and referred to the bottle he kept close to the stove.

His cat seemed to like the fish: later that evening, Hermey would share half his fried up whatever with the cat, and the cat would like that, too.

Like most in his profession, Hermey's nerves were shot from making one of the most dangerous compounds of the era.

He still made it, for two reasons.

He was the only one willing to do the work, and it was the only thing he was confident of doing, that would make him a living wage.

He would load his snow packed boxes on the mule tomorrow, and take them to the depot in town, and he'd get another bottle of nerve tonic while he was there.

Chemist and feline shared a vile smelling concoction, and both laid down afterward, the stove was banked for the night and all was quiet in the snow outside.

 

Linn and Jacob rode back into town, put their horses up with Shorty: the crotchety old horse handler snarled and swore, something about two more mouths to feed, and damned horses were sick, everything they ate turned into manure, and he didn't know why he fussed with the damned things, all while he was currying them down and brushing their manes with the hands of a man who genuinely loved what he did.

Linn and Jacob stopped at the back steps of the Silver Jewel: each took off his coat, shook the snow off, swatted the snow off his Stetson: Jacob opened the back door, reached in, brought out a broom and swept the wooden back steps clean before he and his father kicked the snow off their boots and went inside where it was warm.

Daisy swung out to meet them, green eyes bright, mock-stern: she had a spoon in one hand, the other hand cupped under:  "I knew 'twas the two o'ye, kickin' a' th' steps like that! Try this!" 

The Sheriff blinked in surprise, opened his mouth: Jacob watched as Daisy yanked the towel from her shoulder, caught the dribble she'd manage to run down the man's chin.

"Well?"

The Sheriff looked at Daisy, his expression gentle: he said quietly, "Darlin', if that was any better, I'd just lay down and die of happiness!"

Daisy stared at the Sheriff in apparent disbelief.

"Ye don' think i' needs salt?"

Linn shook his head.

"There's no' too much garlic?"

"Can't even taste it."

Daisy thrust her hands heavenward, ignoring the gravy sauce that ran down the handle of her wooden spoon and into her fingers: "Saints above, I've finally done it!" -- she lowered her hands, muttered something in Gaelic as she wiped gravy off her fingers, frowned her way back into her fragrant, warm, welcoming kitchen.

"What was that about, sir?" Jacob murmured.

Linn looked at his son with honest confusion.

"Jacob," he said softly, pitching his voice so only Jacob could hear, "I don't have the least idea!"

Daisy popped back out of her kitchen with a clean wooden spoon this time, shook it at the Sheriff, then at Jacob:  "Well don't just stand there! I've a perfectly guid kettle o' stew waitin' t' be et! Ge' i' there an' set yoursel's down!"

Two pale eyed men said the only thing proper in such a moment: as one, they chorused "Yes, ma'am," and headed down the hall toward the Silver Jewel proper.

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

 SHIVERS

A straight, tapered blade spun through the cold snowfall of winter Denver air.

Had there been anyone to see it, the hard-thrown, hand-forged blade seemed to draw a straight line, appearing as a shining silver wheel, at least until it drove hilt-deep into a fleeing footpad's back.

The blade went hilt-deep into a man's kidney, or near enough to it to detonate an absolute blasting sunball of unutterable agony, to freeze and shock and incinerate his nervous system to such a degree that he collapsed, any scream locked in his throat behind pain-sealed vocal cords.

Sarah Lynne McKenna plucked up her skirt, lifted her chin, marched up to the man -- she planted her foot on his back, reached down, gripped the wire-wound handle with both hands, pulled.

She wiped the knife on his coat tail, gathered a good handful of snow and slowly, carefully stripped shining steel of any residual blood-trace: she dried her dagger on the man's coat-tail, slipped it back into its hidden sheath, then placed her foot on his shoulder, rolled him over on his back.

Sarah Lynne McKenna, the pretty, pale-eyed daughter of Bonnie Lynne McKenna, stomped her mother's attacker once, viciously, in the throat, crushing his windpipe, shattering his larynx, and tearing open the innominate artery.

Blood and mucus sealed his airway, guaranteeing his death from suffocation, or from drowning, or both.

Sarah dipped her knees, picked up her mother's stolen purse, carried it back to Bonnie.

Bonnie bit her lip against the pain.

The footpad's sand-filled leather cosh missed her head, but it was hard-swung and hit the base of her neck at the shoulder, driving her to her knees: she worked her shoulder -- nothing seemed broken -- but between being clubbed, between her purse being snatched from her gloved grip, and her daughter killing the man who attacked her, Bonnie knelt in the thick snow, shocked into silence -- the response of a woman who'd been beaten in the past, who'd been brutalized at some point in her life, the response of a traumatized woman who'd been viciously, brutally beaten to break her spirit, to make her obey, to keep her quiet.

Sarah looked around -- nobody could be seen in the feathery dusk -- snowfall hushed any sound of attack.

Bonnie's pained gasp as she was struck, as her purse was snatched by the running thug, could have been heard no further than two arm-spans distant, and the sound of a dying man falling in the snow made about as much noise.

Bonnie's eyes were big, shocked: Sarah glared at her and hissed, "Nobody hurts my Mama!"

Bonnie looked at the dead man's body, at big fluffy flakes starting to cover it, at the daughter who just brought swift and unhesitating death and justice to the lawless.

She allowed Sarah to steer her back onto the sidewalk, allowed herself to be towed down the street.

Two fashionably-dressed women disappeared into the increasing snowfall's dark.

 

Sarah shook down the ashes, added more wood to their stove: lamps for light, a stove for warmth, hot tea, and a book: Sarah sat on the private car's combination sofa-bed, curled her legs up like a cat, the very image of a flexible, genteel young lady.

Bonnie tried to read.

Bonnie finally lowered her book, closed it, placed it on the desk beside her.

"Sarah," she said in a worried tone, "shouldn't we have told somebody?"

"No," Sarah said simply, turning the page: she frowned a little, laid a meditative forefinger across her upper lip and frowned, the way she did when she was concentrating on what she was doing.

"But Sarah," Bonnie protested, "you killed that man!"

"It wasn't a man, it was a criminal," Sarah said distantly as she translated another line, frowned, backed up, reviewed the preceding paragraph, re-translated it and found her mistake.

"What are you reading?"
"Vingt Mille Lieues Sous les Mers," Sarah replied quietly.

"Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea?" Bonnie asked. 

"Yes, Mama. Jules Verne."  Sarah pronounced the author's name after the French fashion, her voice gentle, almost caressing the words as she spoke them.

Bonnie passed her hand over her brow, leaned her forehead into her hand, then looked up.

"Sarah ... you killed a man!"

Sarah looked up.  

"So?"

"Sarah, you can't just kill someone!"

"Yes I can," Sarah said simply. "You offered no protest when I killed that man was going to take us to the fleshpots of Frisco and chain us each to a crib. You said nothing when I punched a Derringer into a bank robber's ribs when he was threatening the girl behind the grille with a revolver. A criminal is a criminal, Mama, and a man that will try to club a woman over the head is a man committing a murderous act! It's God's blessing that he missed your head and hit your shoulder!"

Bonnie made a little mewing sound and wrapped her arms around herself, turning her face away.

Sarah rose -- quickly -- she snatched a blanket from the cupboard, spun it around her Mama, pulled her upright.

Bonnie was shaking now.

Sarah steered her over to the sofa, sat her down:  Bonnie lowered her face into her hands.

She looked up when Sarah gripped her wrist, pulled gently: warm, fragrant vapors bathed her face and Sarah whispered, "Oolong, Mama. Tea is a very civilized drink."

Bonnie took the teacup in both hands -- she dare not try holding it with one hand only! -- she sipped the hot, fragrant brew, tasted brandy, drank anyway.

Sarah sat with her, arms around her Mama, held her: the two leaned against one another for the remainder of the journey back to Firelands.

The Sheriff met them at the depot.

He saw Sarah through the window, saw the gloved flutter of her urgently-beckoning hand.

He climbed the black-painted, cast-iron steps, came into the warm, welcoming private car, came over to the ladies, went to one knee, looked from Sarah to Bonnie and back, concerned.

A long tall Sheriff carried a blanket-wrapped woman from the private railcar, placed her very carefully in the rented carriage: he drove her and her daughter home.

Sarah preceded them, opening doors and kicking rugs aside.

Linn carried her through the front door, followed Sarah upstairs.

It hadn't been even a year since Sarah secreted an Army Colt in a gutted rag doll, not long after she dressed like a girl much younger than she actually was, not long since she went up to the grinning, rat-faced man who'd just told Bonnie that he was taking them both to the seaport bordellos to earn money enough to pay her late husband's gambling debts, and he would take great delight in personally shackling them both to their cribs ... it was less than a year after Sarah gave this sneering intruder the wide-eyed look of a frightened little girl, just before the rag doll's head detonated and the first of six .44-caliber round balls drove through him at point blank, scorch-his-coat, range.

Linn waited, Bonnie bundled and wrapped and still trembling in his arms as Sarah turned her Mama's bed down.

The Sheriff placed her, carefully, gently, as if he were placing a sleeping infant abed, trying hard not to wake it.

Sarah's gloved hand gripped his and she looked at him with a sincere expression.

"Thank you," she whispered.

Linn looked down at Bonnie -- she'd turned her face from him -- he remembered how she'd shivered as he carried her, he remembered how utterly lost she'd looked, he remembered everything she'd been through -- he looked seriously at Sarah and whispered, "Should I send Esther over?"

Sarah looked at her Mama, looked back at the Sheriff, nodded.

His jaw hardened a little as he gave a single, curt nod, then turned, paced quietly out the door.

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

HIGH BID

I remember how irritating that fella's voice was.

Esther called him a Shakespearean thespian.

I called him an annoying ... well, I'll not say what I called him, I just didn't say it out loud.

I felt Esther move beside me -- her hand was on my arm as we sat in the padded seats, in  the best private box in the house -- I know she looked at me, I know she gave me that look of hers, I know she was making a judgement of some kind, and I reckon I know what she was thinking when she did.

I can't play poker to save my sorry backside, but I have a pretty good poker face: I can read men like a newspaper, but damned if I can read women.

Esther, on the other hand, can see through me (and everyone else) like window glass.

I kept my face and my spirit calm, I blinked slowly, I tolerated being there, but I could cheerfully have run my fist right down attair actor fella's throat, grabbed him by the ankle and jerked him inside out.

It's rare that someone's voice irritates me to that degree, but by the Sachem! this fellas' high and whiny voice did just that!

"To beeeee ... or not to beeeee"  ... that issssss the quessssstion," drawing out his S's like a hissing snake.

Had I not been there with Esther I'd have got up and walked out.

I recalled this after we got home.

I recalled this after we et a light meal the maid had ready for us.

I recalled this after my young clustered around me and I set my bony backside down on the rug in my study and gathered them all into my arms, all but the baby in its crib, and they-all giggled and hugged me back and they smelled of soap and water and one of 'em smelled of fresh baked bread and I reckon that was one of the twins.

They-all scampered off to bed and I carried two of 'em by one ankle and Esther scolded me gently as I did, she said they'd be too excited to sleep, and I packed a giggling red-faced little girl and a laughing red-faced little boy upstairs, one in each hand, careful to hold them high enough I'd not bonk their noggin against a stair step or anything.

They-all wanted their Pa to tuck them in, and I did, and I set in the middle of their bedroom floor and I opened a book and read to them, and I must just be a terrible bore 'cause when I pitched my voice like I recalled my own Pa when he'd tuck me in when I was wee little, why, they-all relaxed and rolled up on their sides and their eyes closed, and once they were all asleep, why, I set the book back on the shelf and cat footed out in my sock feet.

Esther watched me from the doorway as I read.

She had a soft look about her, she looked open and vulnerable and she told me some time later that's what her own Daddy did when she was a wee little girl, and once we were alone and she was braiding her rich auburn hair into her go-to-bed braid, she stopped and looked at me and smiled that quiet smile I remember and she said her Daddy used to grip her ankle and pack her off to bed upside down just like I'd done our twins.

I looked in that heavy plate mirror and stared at my reflection and I recalled all that.

I looked at the man in the mirror and I remembered, and I recalled what it was to wrap my sleeping young in a blanket and pack them off to the bunk, and I remembered what it was to wrap Bonnie in a blanket and pack her out of the private rail car and upstairs to her bunk.

I dropped my head and my breath came a little faster as I recalled how she shivered as I carried her, she did not open her eyes but she laid her head against me like a frightened child, I recall how Sarah laid a hand on my arm and lifted her face to me and I leaned down and she whispered in my ear that her Mama told her once that your arms were the only ones that ever offered her safety.

I screwed my eyes tight shut at that memory.

The first time I laid eyes on Bonnie, I could have ripped the beating heart from my breast and laid it at her feet, her and that skinny little starved-out girl-child of hers.

I fell for Bonnie McKenna that day and I fell hard.

I never acted on it.

Esther kept me alive shortly after, and Esther ... 

Esther is my wife, and Esther is a dear and wonderful woman, and I love her with more than my heart, and I genuinely can not imagine a life without her.

Esther is the other half of me, the better half.

She's also younger, smarter and better lookin', not necessarily in that order, I thought, and the reflection in that heavy plate glass mirror smiled, just a little.

Another memory, and I dropped my head and felt shame.

Bonnie's first husband -- pardon me while I spit! I thought viciously -- was rotted on the inside and I never knew it.

He had me fooled seven ways from Sunday.

I liked the man, I respected the man, at least until Bonnie showed me the books and the banker showed me the dirty deals he'd pulled, how he'd squandered Bonnie's entire inheritance -- a young fortune! -- he'd hocked their ranch, sold their cattle, there at the last he was in so deep, a man came to take Bonnie and Sarah and use them to make money --

I glared at my reflection.

"Damn you, it's your fault," I whispered, and I felt my good right hand knot up into a fist, and I was almost ready to drive my fist through my reflection when I realized 'twould do no good, I'd likely bust a knuckle and likely I'd end up cut and bleedin' and I didn't need to scare Esther and I sure as hell didn't want to cause damage to my gun hand.

I took a long breath, eased it out.

I still loved Bonnie.

I dealt with the bank to buy their ranch back and then I had Bonnie meet me in the back room of the Silver Jewel and the banker was there and the attorney was there and Bonnie went dead white and set down hard, for she was sure she'd just lost everything, and when I told her the ranch was hers, free and clear, why, big tears rolled down her face and she chewed on her knuckle and she give a little squeak and Esther came in just as Bonnie rushed me and grabbed me and clung to me like she was drownin' and I was the only float in the ocean, and I looked at Esther and genuinely felt more helpless than I ever had.

I needn't have worried.

Esther can see through me like I was made of window glass.

She already knew what I planned to do, and she give me a quiet smile and a wink, she glided over to us and reached up and pulled my head down to hers and whispered, "I am proud of you!" -- I recall the warmth of her breath as she puffed her whisper into my ear -- Bonnie drew back from me and her face was all red and wrinkly and wet down the cheeks and she grabbed Esther and Esther held her and soothed her like a mother will a frightened child, and Sarah stood back, her eyes big, and she came over to me and gripped my hand and pulled me aside -- I reckon it looked like one of them steam tug boats pulling a battleship -- she got me an arm's length away from the women and beckoned me down where we could speak quietly.

I went down onto my Prayer Bones to get us almost eye to eye.

"I'm becoming a woman," Sarah said in a quiet and serious voice.

I frowned a little, for the words puzzled me, and I looked at her.

Sarah looked at them, looked at me and asked, "Is that what I'm supposed to do when I'm happy?"

I shoved my jaw bone out and frowned again, I pulled up a seat for her and one for me, and with Beatrice the banker beaming happily at Esther and Bonnie, with the attorney signing this and pressing wax seals on that, I looked at Sarah and said honestly, "Women are a mystery, Sarah. I've studied wimmen folks all my entire life, and I genuinely cannot figure 'em out!"

Sarah considered this, looked at the attorney, at the banker, at her Mama and Esther, still embraced, then looked at me.

"I think it's easier being a man," she said frankly, then she tilted her head and looked at me and said, "By the way, when I get married, will you give me away?"

I looked this lovely girl-child in the eyes and I taken her hands gentle-like in my palms and I looked her squarely in the eye and said, "When that day comes, darlin', you bet your bottom dollar I'll give you away!"

Sarah punched me in the chest -- hard! -- and snarled, "I'm worth more than that! You're not even gonna bargain for the highest bidder?"

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

OVERHAUL

Daisy wove among men in black-rubber fire coats with the grace of the dancer she was: basket on one arm, a baked sandwich in the other, she'd put good beef in biscuit dough and baked them, knowing there'd be hungry men to feed: baked in one piece, they would not fall apart like a sandwich made with two slices of bread, and could be eaten with one hand if the other was occupied.

Sean smacked a leather-gloved hand on a fireman's shoulder and rumbled, "Ye did well, lad," and the tired Irishman gave the big-shouldered fire chief a grateful look, just before Daisy held up something that he couldn't quite focus on, but smelled absolutely wonderful.

Gloved hand gripped gloved hand, wet and wrinkled fingers emerged from the saturated leather glove and gripped the meat biscuit: Daisy's hand dove into the basket, brought up another, stuffed into her husband's mouth as he opened his mouth to say something.

Sean's eyebrows raised and his ungloved hand came up and Daisy turned and sought out more hungry men to feed.

The fire was extinguished, but still steaming, still hot.

The Irish Brigade was on overhaul.

They'd attacked the fire like a personal enemy, they'd coupled another hose and had it ready for anyone brought from the fire: two screaming children were soaked down, fast; willing hands laid them on clean sheets spread over the canvas litters, loaded them into the ambulance wagon, drove them quickly to the fine stone hospital still under construction: nobody died, and that was a blessing, but it troubled the Irishmen that two children were burned on their watch.

Daisy circulated among those Irishmen who were outside the fire structure, she stepped aside as the house's seared and ruined contents were thrown out, shoveled out, soaked down, as hot spots were found and extinguished.

Nobody wished to respond to a rekindle.

Linn turned to let Daisy pass, walked up to Sean, approaching from his port quarter so he could be seen -- addressed if available, ignored if busy.

Sean looked at the Sheriff, grinning.

"I hear you saved the family," Linn said quietly.

"Aye, we did that," Sean said, just as quietly, "but two children are burned."

Linn nodded, looked at the smoking ruin.

"Not a whole lot left."

"Nah. Wood dries out, this high up. Burns like hell."

"I'll see they're put up in the hotel."

Sean nodded, took another bite of his meat-filled biscuit.

"Need anything?"

Sean turned, grinned again -- that cocky, red-headed Irish grin of his.

"Sheriff," he declared, "I could use a good cold beer!"

"How many men you got here? I need to bring enough for everyone."

Sean laughed.

"Bring a dozen, they'll no' go to waste!"

 

Daisy stomped back to the Silver Jewel, muttering darkly as she always did -- the uninformed would count this as ill temper, but those who knew her, knew she kept track of her plans by throwing them out on the air so she could see what they sounded like, and at the moment, she was reviewing her having ordered her kitchen staff to continue baking the meat biscuits, in addition to the usual kitchen fare they prepared -- which in wintertime, was often good thick stews, fragrant and flavorful.

She kicked the snow off her shoes, stomped up the swept-bare steps, hauled at the door and swung inside.

Tillie looked up at her, concerned: "How bad was it, Daisy?" she asked fearfully.

"Nobody killed, God and ten saints be praised," Daisy sighed leaning against the polished counter: "twa children burned, an' th' Doc carin' for 'em now, th' house is lost but everyone else isna' hurt."

Tillie nodded, closed her eyes, lowered her nose into her steepled fingers: Daisy remembered Tillie had been burned out as a girl, and had the scars to prove it -- both visible, and otherwise.

"I need t' see if we've food ready t' take," Daisy muttered tiredly, turned and shoved her way through her own fatigue, and headed for th fragrant, welcome warmth of her kitchen.

 

Chief Chuck Fitzgerald read the hand-written account of a long-ago fire.

He looked up from the ancient pages and smiled, just a little.

He remembered how the Sheriff's daughters would set up operation on the tailboard of the first-on-scene pumper, they'd dispense coffee from insulated boxes and arrange heavy paper cups on a tray with the edibles: they would pick these up and slip between laboring men with the grace of the dancers they were, they'd hand out sandwiches and those heavy paper cups of scalding coffee, and he chuckled at the memory of one of his men lowering a ceiling hook down from a second story window, remembered the Sheriff's daughter -- whichever one she was, he didn't recall exactly -- she wiped the filth off the hook with a paper towel, stacked two doughnuts on the hook and impaled one on the spike, and Irishmen on overhaul happily brought the ceiling hook up, and in, and for a moment, hungry men on overhaul had a moment's tasty respite.

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

A COOL LITTLE OLD LADY

Sheriff Willamina Keller sat heavily, her face carefully impassive, which generally meant she was either powerfully unhappy, profoundly delighted, or in pain.

Her obsidian-eyed segundo was satisfied her stiff posture and her clenched jaw was not due to any concealed delight.

"JW," she said quietly, "I need a favor."

JW Barrents felt his scalp tighten, felt his ears pull back a little.

Of all the people in the world to ask him a favor, this short tempered, pale eyed Sheriff was absolutely the last person in the world he'd think would make that request.

This was genuinely troubling.

Willamina closed her eyes for a long moment, then opened them and looked up at him.

"Could you get into the med cabinet and get me two painkillers and a coffee?"

It was Barrents' turn to assume a wooden faced impassivity.

He nodded, once, and went out the door, closed it behind him.

Willamina closed her eyes, took a calming breath, took another, and damned her left Achilles tendon.

When Barrents returned, she had not moved.

At all.

He set the individually wrapped NSAIDs on her green desk blotter -- they were prepackaged, two Plaster of Paris pills per foil-and-paper wrapper -- he'd fixed her coffee the way he knew she liked it.

JW watched with the feeling of seeing a marble statue pick up a cheeseburger and take a bite.

I don't think I've ever seen her take anything for pain, he thought.

She downed half the coffee, lowered the heavy ceramic mug, hung her head into the palm of her hand.

"Paul," she said softly, "can you run things for about two weeks?"

Barrents blinked, surprised:  "Can do, Boss."

Willamina looked up, smiled thinly, the way a woman will when she is in pain.

"I remember when you said that ... over there," she murmured.  "Thank you."

Barrents looked very directly at the Sheriff.

"Mind fillin' me in?"

"JW," Willamina said frankly, "you're probably familiar with the adage that the drunk is the last to know he's impaired."

Barrents nodded, once, a single ponderous inclination of his head.

"I'm not a drunk, but I'm a damned fool," Willamina said bitterly.

Barrents frowned.

"I'd not agree, but okay," he said carefully.

Willamina closed her eyes again.

"Paul," she said, "you've watched me start to limp."

"I wasn't going to say anything."

"I've got a bone spur in my left Achilles tendon."

She saw concern in his dark eyes.

"Doc wants to put me in a leg brace for a month."

Barrents listened carefully, shining-dark eyes unblinking.

"I told him I'd go two weeks and we'll see how that goes, and he said unless I rest the part it'll never get better."

"You don't want to be seen in a brace and on a cane."

Willamina tipped a finger at him.  "Bingo."

"You'll disappear for the time necessary."

"Unless I'm needed."

Barrents leaned forward suddenly, looked very directly at this woman he'd come to admire and respect.

"Boss, we've only got one of you. Take what you need to get yourself better. We'll get by."

Willamina leaned back in her chair, a moment's pain slipping past her guards, showing momentarily on her face, and Barrents realized she was looking drawn, as if long term pain was working on her more than she realized.

"I hate to do this," she muttered.  "Linn will be alone, he can handle the horses with no problem, he's not given to drink or parties --"

"I'll check on him, Boss."

Willamina gave him a grateful look.

"Thank you, JW," she said, her voice soft.

Sheriff Willamina Keller pushed up from her chair almost awkwardly.

"Boss?"

Willamina hesitated, leaned forward, palms on her desk.

"If you're seen on a cane, go armed. Someone seen as crippled up is way more likely to be attacked."

"I know," she replied softly. "I'll do that."
Willamina walked slowly, taking small steps, toward the door: she stopped, laid a hand on the big, hard-muscled Navajo's shoulder, whispered "Thank you," and nodded, and he was reminded of old women he'd seen who'd done that exact same thing.

 

Sheriff Willamina Keller drove the rented Jeep down a highway she'd not driven for some years.

She'd rented a motel room in Nelsonville, she'd asked staff for help getting her things into her room: two young men from Campus Police were just coming into the lobby, and offered their assistance: Willamina thanked them for their kindness, bade them place her suitcase in the bathtub and the small case on the bathroom countertop, beside the sink.

She leaned on her cane, tilted her head and regarded them frankly.

"If you'll forgive an old woman," she smiled, "you both present a proper uniform appearance."

She held out a card to each and said, "Take that from someone who knows."

Two young, green-as-spring-grass Campus Police officers' eyes widened when they saw the six point star embossed on the business cards, the words SHERIFF WILLAMINA KELLER, FIRELANDS COUNTY, COLORADO.

Willamina limped to the door as the two made their exit, and before she closed the room door and ran a washcloth through the security loop, she smiled a little to hear one of the young officers say something about a "Cool Little Old Lady," the way the boys did when she'd park herself in a folding chair in the Firelands High School hallway and knit or darn socks as she waited for her young to finish band practice or some after-school activity.

 

Sharon waved something colorful and rectangular at Barrents as he came through the door.

"Got one from Willa," she said cheerfully.

Barrents came over, accepted the postcard: on one side it had a cartooned, barefoot hillbilly in a rocking chair in front of a steam-puffing moonshine still: on the reverse, in the handwriting he knew so well, he read Apparently I'm a Cool Little Old Lady. Lecturing at local Academy tonight. Didn't have to shoot anyone. W.

Barrents and Sharon looked at one another.

"Didn't have to shoot anyone?" Sharon said slowly, speculatively.

Barrents' eyes hardened a little as he re-read the words.

"I'd better give her a call," he said quietly. "Do we have her number?"

"We have it," Sharon said, "but she'll fill us in when she's ready."

Barrents' hands closed, slowly, but did not clench: he nodded.

"You're right," he said.

Sharon looked at him, her expression serious.

"She's had our backs for so long, it's natural to want to cover hers," she said.

Barrents nodded.

"Her number's in on her desk if you need it."

Barrents frowned, shook his head.

"No. You're right. She'll let us know."

 

Willamina's left Achilles tendon felt better for not having to stretch with each step.

As much as she hated to admit it, having that walking brace strapped to her leg was helping, even if it meant her right hand gripped the cane.

She had a wooden cane and she gripped the curved handle with the hook forward, instead of to the rear.

Nobody -- especially not the individual who was taken to jail with a broken wrist -- realized this meant she was carrying the cane as a weapon as well as a walking assist.

This, of course, was completely lost on the other fellow, the one who grabbed her arm while she was at the gas pump: her unthinking reflex was to snap his hand back fast, hard enough to break three of four fingers: she snatched her cane, drove its rubber tip into his collar bone hard enough to knock him backwards: she backed up against the rented Jeep, pistol in hand, her voice loud, harsh:

"SHOW ME YOUR HANDS! MAKE NO MOVE UNLESS I TELL YOU OR YOU WILL BE SHOT!"

 

Sharon raised a colorful rectangle as Barrents came through the door.

JW came over, looked at the dispatcher's smug expression.

"What," he asked slowly, "did she get into this time?"

"She's running up a score."

JW raised blunt fingers to the stamped-tin ceiling, his silent supplication followed by a resigned expression.

"What now?"

Sharon handed him the morning mail's most interesting delivery.

Broke one arm and four fingers.

Not mine.

Testifying in the morning.

Interesting language in interrogation when they found they'd tried to jump a Colorado Sheriff.

W.

Barrents shook his head, smiled quietly, which in anyone else would be a hearty chuckle.

 

Willamina came through the door one month later.

She wore her skirted uniform and the ugly-but-superbly-comfortable Marine issue shoes.

She also walked slowly -- but without the leg brace, and without the cane.

Barrents drew two coffees, set them aside, drew a third, added a drizzle of cold milk to each: he brought two of them to Sharon's desk, handed one to the dispatcher, one to the Sheriff.

"Get your coffee," Willamina said softly. "I won't deprive a man of a morning's pleasure."

Barrents' eyes smiled a little at her words.

He brought over a chair for the Sheriff: she thanked him, set her coffee on the dispatcher's desk, sat, retrieved the heavy ceramic mug.

"I know you'll be asking," she said, "so here's what happened.

"I went and stood where my Daddy was killed, I went to the graveyard and talked to more than him."

Barrents frowned a little and turned his head slightly, as if to bring a good ear to bear.

"The two medics who picked him up are dead," Willamina said, and he heard a note of regret in her voice.

She looked at him him and swallowed and she looked almost vulnerable in that moment.

"I never did thank them for trying to save my Daddy," she whispered.

Sharon reached over and laid gentle fingers on Willamina's hand, Barrents' strong, weather-tanned hand closed around her other hand:  Willamina turned her hands, gripped both of theirs, looked from one to the other, then she bit her bottom lip, released, wrapped her hands around the mug's welcome warmth.

"I stopped to fuel up," she said, "and apparently a woman in a leg brace and on a cane looked like an easy mark."

Barrents waited.

"When I saw a weapon, I responded as I have trained.

"The cane was in my hand and I hit his wrist before he could grip."

"The cane ... wood?"

"Steamed white oak."

"You're awfully fond of seasoned white oak," Barrents said skeptically.

Willamina smiled a little.

"It was examined. I think they wanted to see if I'd drilled it and filled it with lead or something."

"Did you?"

She smiled a little. "It wouldn't pass TSA inspection if I did that. No, just a little old lady's walking stick."

"Your postcard said arm and fingers."

"That," Willamina smiled, "was the other guy."

"Other ... guy?"

"He grabbed my arm. I snapped his hand back fast, hard and nasty and broke his four fingers."

"I remember seeing that demonstrated."

"I built a training dummy. It's in my barn. It's muscle memory and reflex now."

Barrents nodded.  "Go on."

"You know I practice weak hand shooting."

Barrents grunted.

"You practice it enough I can't call it weak hand!"

Willamina laughed quietly, nodded.  "Flatterer."

"No brag, just fact."

"All right, Will," Sharon said knowingly. "I watched the series too!"

"After I broke one arm and four fingers, that left hand draw came through like a champ."

"What did the local cops think?"

Willamina sipped her coffee, swallowed, savored its warmth and its taste both.

"I was guest speaker at their local community college's police academy. Apparently both they and the local police think I'm a cool little old lady."

"Are you back up to speed, Boss?"

"Not yet," Willamina admitted. "This doesn't go any further than the three of us, but I'm planning on taking things easy for the next week as well. If I overdo it, I'll have to go back in that walking brace."

Barrents nodded his understanding.

"I'll run interference for you," he said quietly.

Willamina squeezed his hand again, gave him a grateful look.

"Thank you."

Barrents laughed quietly. "My son said that very thing about you!"

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

B'AR MEAT

Michael Keller was as much a child of the mountains as had been his masculine ancestors.

That these mountains were not on Earth, was completely irrelevant.

He'd built shelter, he had an overhanging rock to his back, he was elevated just a little from any water runoff or drip from the rocks overhead that might run under him, he'd laid a waterproof tarp and overlaid it with cut slash for both camouflage, and protection against puncture, he'd built a windbreak of cribbed up stone, and he'd cut firewood in plenty for his needs.

Michael chose his position carefully.

He had water, he had deadfalls enough to cut up and drag in, his shelter was tight and he could keep warm, or at least warm enough, and he'd shot and cut up eatin' meat and hung it high enough to keep it safe.

Michael knew these mountains well enough -- he'd observed Lightning closely enough, and the native wildlife as well -- he'd learned which roots to dig, he'd consulted with local folk, he was content to stay here, alone -- though his rifle was never, not ever, out of reach.

Lightning was not with him.

He wasn't sure where she was, and it wasn't important.

When she came into heat, he'd pulled her saddle and barebacked her to where the nearest Fanghorn herd was gathered.

He dismounted, pulled the saddle blanket: she was restless now, and when the wind shifted, she raised her muzzle, scented the wind: Michael sat, waited, knowing the urge to mate was deep, primal, probably undeniable.

Come back to me when you're ready, he thought, and as he thought it, Lightning stopped, and turned, looked back at him for several long moments, as if she heard his thoughts: then she lifted her blunt muzzle and tasted the breeze, and trotted toward the herd.

 

Ambassador Marnie Keller maintained a considerable written correspondence.

Some of the Confederate worlds were incredibly advanced; others were slower to develop industry: she'd fairly recently facilitated metals manufacture, but using more advanced technology to prevent the destructive techniques she'd seen on Earth.

Until she paid a State visit to one of the worlds, and was greeted by mounted Confederate cavalry, maneuvering with the correct commands she'd heard her pale eyed Daddy discuss in his presentations for the Ladies' Tea Society and elsewhere.

Buglers passed commands with brassy notes, ranks of lean young horsemen paraded, passed in review, maneuvered, with all the polish and the dash of dedicated young men doing what they genuinely loved to do, young men fueled by that most powerful intoxicant of knowing they were absolutely, inarguably, in the right!! 

Marnie laughed and clapped her gloved palms together in genuine delight, for the sight of well-disciplined cavalry is genuinely a treat for the eyes, and an inspiration to the soul:  she bounced on her toes, excited as a girl, and fluttered her kerchief overhead in salute as they passed, as her hosts glanced sidelong at her with the expressions of men who knew they'd just found favor with an influential individual.

 

Angela Keller was tired.

Her bones were tired.

She was worn out, she was beyond exhausted, she was discouraged.

Sometimes -- no matter how skilled the practitioners, how advanced the technologies -- people still die.

Angela worked shoulder to shoulder with the ER crew, trying to repair the fragile, torn bodies devastated by uncaring machinery: she'd marshaled their forces, she'd organized their efforts, she'd arranged the arrival of advanced machineries, but in spite of her efforts, in spite of everyone's efforts, Death walked out of the hospital with a harvest of souls, just before the sun came up.

Angela's shift was over; she'd stayed overlong, because she was needed: she seemed to be everywhere, she never stopped moving, not until the last of them was pronounced, not until they were sheeted, covered, moved to the morgue: numb, she and the other ER nurses cleaned up, changed clothes: she stripped out of bloodied scrubs, she scoured her stained white nursing clogs under running water with soap and scrub brushes, and hung them to dry on the stainless-steel hooks provided.

Angela scoured her flesh as mercilessly as she'd scoured her shoes, as if punishing herself with soap and a bristle brush could scrub away the incompetence she felt.

When finally she emerged from the locker room, she was not wearing her trademark white nurse's dress, nor was she in the ornately-stitched boots and jeans she wore when she was intending a soul-cleansing ride on a spirited horse.

One of the White Sisters, one of the Veiled Nuns, slipped silently down the hallway, hands in her sleeves, a silken veil covering her face.

A finger pressed the elevator button: the nun entered, the doors closed: when she emerged, she was on the top floor.

The nun went to the door marked PENTHOUSE NO ADMITTANCE and pushed through it.

Silent feet ascended the stairs, rounded the landing, climbed the last set of stairs; a key thrust into the lock, the door was pushed open against reluctant, seldom-used hinges.

The Veiled Sister stepped out onto the snowy roof, looked around.

Mountains surrounded the quartz-faced Firelands hospital; the sun was only just chinning itself over the rim of the world.

A pale eyed woman lifted her silken veil and tasted of the cold, clean air.

When the first of four hearses backed into the discreetly-offset loading area, their black-suited drivers stepped out, stopped, listened.

A voice.

A woman's voice, in rebellion against death, against the futility of even trying, a voice that refused to accept there were some things that happened, despite our best efforts, a woman's voice that slashed the shining blade of beauty against ugly reality's thrusts.

Two men in black suits stood and listened, for a woman was singing Beethoven's Ode to Joy, as the sun took its first peek at the hospital's walls, a woman's voice that sang in open rebellion -- sang  with all the beauty and all the power and all the strength of Heaven itself.

When the woman finished singing, she bowed her head.

She lowered her veil.

She looked over the edge of the hospital roof and waited, and watched as two blanket covered forms were wheeled out and loaded into the hearses.

A woman's voice, her whisper unheard:  "I'm sorry.  We tried."

A woman lowered her silk veil to hide her face, and went back inside, and disappeared.

 

Michael listened, rifle in hand.

He had every confidence that his rifle was enough medicine for whatever this planet held, as far as wildlife.

There's not much a man can't stop with half a thousand grains of lead backed by a good charge of soft coal.

He listened, breathing through his mouth.

It had been three days since Lightning went into heat -- since she joined the herd -- Michael was set to wait however long he had to, even though he knew she might never come back: until then, he intended to wait.

Something was out there.

He suspected it was whatever passed for a bear hereabouts.

He'd seen them before and they were big, fast, deadly, scary as hell.

He'd never shot one, but he had every confidence his rifle was up for the task, and so he waited, rock wall to his back, walnut and browned steel in hand.

A roar, sudden, harsh, hoarse: another, more familiar --

Lightning!

Conflict: the sound of a collision, then another roar: hooves, loud on the rocky ground --

Damn I wish I could see this! he thought, I should have rigged flood lights --

Sounds like she just kicked something --

I don't ever recall her kicking on attack --

Another ursine roar, pained now, interrupted with the sound of another meaty blow.

Michael gripped his pocket light, cocked his wrist back, laid the rifle's forearm across his bent-back wrist, thumbed the back button --

He saw something pale drive down, saw fighting canines for a bare moment before they bit into the back of the bear-thing's neck.

There was the sound of bone crushing, then stillnes, until Lightning threw her head back, jaws and fangs streaming blood as she screamed her victory -- if the voice of an insane steam whistle can be called a scream.

 

Juliette's breathing quickened, her eyes swinging wildly beneath sleep-closed lids.

She woke, paralyzed, terrified, blinking rapidly at the subdued, reassuring glow of the night lights.

She fought to wake -- she could move again -- she threw her covers back, almost fell out of bed.

She felt like she was suffocating.

She'd had a nightmare again -- the nightmare -- she was blind again --

Barefoot, stumbling, she made for the front door, as if the house was crushing her, she had to get out, she had to get out! --

Michael blinked, startled, his hand upraised as if to knock hesitantly on her nighttime portal.

She almost fell into him, seized him in panic, terror shedding from her like shattered ice: she hugged him with the strength of a frightened girl's desperation, then she turned, looked at the big Fanghorn, at two more, much smaller Fanghorn colts flanking her.

Michael caressed Lightning's jaw, smiled gently in the light of two moons.

"Lightning's gonna be a mama," he said, "and she's gathered up two orphans."

Juliette turned, looked at the nearest.

"The red one is Stormcloud," Michael said, "and that one" -- he kissed at the other, smaller Fanghorn colt -- "that one's Avalanche."

Juliette blinked, smiled, extended a hand.

Two young Fanghorn colts head-bobbed up to her, snuffed at her hands, her belly.

"They're gorgeous," she whispered.

Michael held out a swirly-striped peppermint for Lightning, unwrapped two more, and Juliette held her hands out, then accepted Michael's kerchief to wipe off the horse slobber.

"Do they eat grass?" she asked at little more than a whisper.

Michael regarded her solemnly, at least until he smiled.

"Truth be told," he said, "they like b'ar meat."

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 9 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

REALIZATION

Michael was unusually quiet.

I knew he'd been somewhere off-planet, I knew he'd been stretching himself, I knew he was getting an education he could not possibly get in any college hereabouts.

I also knew my son.

He'd been through something -- I just wasn't sure what -- I looked at my wife and she give me a concerned look and I knew Shelly saw something wasn't quite as it should be.

Victoria was the proper young lady: she looked all frilly and girly and ate as dainty as a pretty girl ought.

Michael looked almost ... lost.

Finally he looked up at me and spoke.

I wouldn't have been surprised if he'd said "I'm not hungry," or "I don't feel good."

Instead he said, "Sir, may I counsel with you?"

I counted that a serious thing.

Boys his age don't usually use such formal language.

He looked half sick when he asked it.

I nodded, once; I pushed back, rose, nodded toward my study.

We withdrew into a more private area.

Michael went over to the rifle rack.

He pulled his saddle rifle, the one that rode his scabbard when he rode his Fanghorn.

Michael pulled a loaded round from the six-round carrier on his stock, set the rifle back, grabbed the extra chair and pulled it up to my desk.

I set down and turned my chair to face him.

Michael looked at the round and turned it slowly, stared at the shining, blunt, flat nosed cast lead bullet.

"Sir," he said finally, "this will stop about anything."

I considered for a few moments before nodding and agreeing quietly, "Yes, I reckon it will."

Michael's eyes were fixed on the bullet as he turned it, slowly, stared as if it were the most fascinating thing in the world.

"Sir," he said, "I ..."

His voice trailed off and he looked up at me and said "Sir, you ever been close to a ten foot bear?"

I raised an eyebrow and whistled.

"You're talkin' about ten foot squared out?"

"Yes, sir."

"Damn," I murmured. "THAT is one sizable beast!"

Michael swallowed.

"Yes, sir," he agreed.  "It was."

"Michael," I asked quietly, "are you hurt?"

"No, sir."

"Lightning?"

"No, sir. She's ... she tore into it."

I leaned over and set my forearms down across my far thighs and looked closely at my youngest son.

"Michael," I said quietly, "Lightning is pretty damned big, but she tore into a ten foot b'ar?"

Michael sat up straight, squared his shoulders, dropped his hands flat on his thighs, boots flat on the floor.

"Sir," he said, his voice tight with the memory, "it was full dark. I'd hung my meat well up in a tree so nothing could get to it. What came around isn't quite a bear but it's close enough."

"I've ... seen 'em," I said slowly. "Planet Fanghorn."

"Yes, sir."

"Ten foot?" I repeated, remembering the bears I'd seen, two I'd helped skin out ... when the hide was staked out, it was almost square, and was measured long ways and cross ways.

An eight foot squared out hide was pretty damned big and I saw the b'ar it came off of.

To imagine a TEN FOOT b'ar ...

... I felt hairs start to stand up on my arms as I pictured it.

"Lightning came in to where I was camped, sir. She'd come frash and I turned her loose to be bred. I set up camp with a rock face behind me and I cribbed up a wind break on the windward side. 

"I'd no food in camp to attract trouble, sir, what I had was h'isted fifteen feet or so up, three of 'em so if one got et I'd still have a meal or two."

I nodded slowly.  "Sensible," I murmured.

"Sir" -- he held up the rifle round -- "this is 500 grains of linotype. Good old Lyman Number Two alloy. This will take down a bull buffalo and I know how big a buffalo is, but sir" -- he swallowed, shivered a little -- "when Lightning come back, she kilt the b'ar that was tryin' to get my possibles, and I went down and taken a look at it.

"Before I went down, sir, that rifle felt like a mountain howitzer.

"When the sun come up and I went down and looked at what was left of that b'ar ..."
Michael took a long breath and shivered.

"Of a sudden, sir, this" -- he looked at the rifle round again -- "didn't feel nearly so big."

I laid a hand on my son's shoulder -- just laid it, didn't grip it.

"Michael," I said softly, "I hear wisdom in your words."

Michael nodded numbly.

"You're wiser than most. You've learned you can die. You've learned you can be hurt and you learned first hand what it takes to come back from bein' hurt.

"You've faced up to and faced down more than most grown men will in a lifetime.

"I'd say you are showin' great good sense!"

Michael swallowed again.

"Thank you, sir," he said quietly.

I looked over toward the kitchen.

"Your Mama has some good blueberry pie hasn't been et yet."

"Thank you, sir, but I don't believe I'm hungry."

 

I turned to my screen, consulted a program I'd had Marnie install.

"Marnie's likely in bed asleep," I said thoughtfully. "Why don't I leave her a message."

The screen behind the time converter lit up: Marnie was awake, she was sitting up, smiling over a steaming mug of something that was probably fragrant and sweetened with raw honey.

"I knew you were thinking about me," she smiled, and I saw her eyes shift.

She frowned, leaned forward.

"Michael," she said, her voice serious, "what happened?"

"His realization of mortality woke up again," I said. "I need schematics."

Marnie nodded, set her mug aside, slid a yellow pad in front of her and picked up a pencil.

"Do you have anatomic particulars for native wildlife on Planet Fanghorn?"

Marnie frowned, turned to another screen, another keyboard.

"I have an incomplete list, I'm afraid, but let me make inquiries. What exactly do you need?"

"They have something analogous to a bear."

I could hear her fingers pattering on the keyboard.

"Mmm ... yes, I have it."

"Could you send me ... I need where to shoot to stop one."

"You'll need a mountain howitzer," she said frankly.

"How about a .45-60, 500 grain conical, with as much 2F as the case will contain?"

Marnie smiled, then laughed quietly: "That's a howitzer!" she nodded. "I'll ... Let me get back to you, give me 24 hours, your time."

"Roger that."

I cleared the screen, turned back to Michael.

"You already know where to hit a grizzly," I said quietly. "I'm willin' to bet that'll stop their version, ten foot or otherwise!"

"Thank you, sir," Michael said quietly, and he seemed to relax just a little.

"You were telling me about Lightning."

"Yes, sir."

"She came back to you."

"Yes, sir."

"Was she serviced?"

Michael's grin was quick, not quite there-and-gone, but almost.

"I'm sorry, sir, I didn't get to put chin markers on the stallions, but I reckon she must've, else she'd have stayed."

"I would be inclined to agree," I said slowly, "but you can take everything I know about breeding Fanghorns and stuff it down into a sewin' thimble, tamp it down good and you'd have room to pour in a quart of whiskey on top!"

"Yes, sir."

"How you set for loaded rounds?"

"I'm good, sir."

"Good. We'll get the particulars from Marnie and figure on some drills."

"Thank you, sir."

"Do you reckon she can fix us up with 3D targets?"

Michael hesitated, then gave me a skeptical look.

"Sir," he said frankly, "I don't believe there's a whole lot Marnie can't get done, peacefully or otherwise!"

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

THE COLLECTION I NEVER WANTED

Reverend Gilead Keller shivered as he sank to his knees, a hand to his belly.

He didn’t need eyes to know his hand was bloody.

He was sick.

My strength pours out like water, he thought, and part of his mind almost scolded him that even now – now that he’d been knifed – he automatically quoted Scripture.

Gilead fell over, curled up, his teeth set, locking the sounds of agony behind his tongue, forbidding their release.

He didn’t realize the knife that drove into his guts was under his foot as he lay beside the unconscious body of his attacker.

 

Sheriff Linn Keller and his wife were only just returned from vacation.

He looked at Paul Barrents and said in a quiet voice, “Story at eleven,” and the solemn-faced Navajo nodded, just enough to be seen.

Shelly reported for duty, silently regretting the reality that the gowns she’d suddenly come to really, really enjoy, would not be in the least little bit practical on the emergency squad.

Neither of them knew until Angela’s call that evening that Gilead was recovering from emergency surgery.

 

Angela Keller’s eyes were hard as she glared at a side screen, as she turned to the second screen to prepare her illustrated report for her father.

She looked back at the Sheriff’s image on the left half of the screen, at another Sheriff’s serious face – her brother’s, looking shockingly like his father – she said, “I’m live streaming the reconstruction of what happened. Sending now.”

Linn and Jacob both blinked, sat up straighter and looked around with interest  as a three-dimensional image of Gilead’s church interior became reality around them.

They watched a man charge Gilead, try to seize him by the throat as the knife came up: Gilead’s hand came up, seized the incoming wrist, shoved it away from his throat, then the knife dropped and arced up into the vulnerable belly – it hit and hit hard – Gilead’s feet came off the floor – they saw the scarred face turn to honest fury, and Gilead moved faster than it would seem possible.

He got his arm around his attacker’s neck, reached down, seized the man by the crotch, hauled him off the floor: they saw rage in Gilead’s expression, they heard his roar as cords stuck out in his neck, they watched in shocked, admiring silence as this tall, lean, stone blind preacher hauled a heavy-muscled man off the floor and slammed him face-down, bouncing the man’s forehead off the arm of a pew in the process and either breaking the man’s neck or cold cocking him, they weren’t sure which.

Angela saw father and son both look up at her, and Angela heard two men’s voices in ghostly synchronization:

“Where are they now?”

“Gilead is recovering from surgery, his prognosis is excellent. The perpetrator is locked up while his defense attorney tries to argue him out of jail.”

Angela looked at the two pale eyed men, each occupying half her left hand monitor’s screen.

“I’ve already had Marnie declare this a Diplomatic incident, but she didn’t have to. General consensus is that any man who could best a known killer is a man not to trifle with, and any man scarred across the face, with two glass eyes and a left hand that only half works, is a man worth defending.”

She frowned and turned to the other screen, looked back. “Message coming in, stand by one.”

“Sir?”

“Yes, Jacob?”

“Sir, I can tie a fine noose of thirteen turns.”

“Thank you,” Angela said quietly to her other screen, turned back.

Father and son looked back to the pale eyed woman.

Her bottom jaw slid out and her lips thinned as she said, “Save yourself the trouble, Jacob. The man Gilead body slammed is dead.”

 

Shelly took the call in the Chief’s office.

Fitz watched as she blinked, as she frowned a little, as her eyes tracked left, right, as she blinked again, as she murmured “Thank you,” and hung up the phone.

Something told the fire chief the news had not been good.

Shelly folded one arm across her chest, her other hand cupping her mouth: she turned away from the Chief for a moment, shook her head.

“I go on vacation to relax,” she said, her voice tight with anger, “and this happens!”

Shelly turned abruptly to face the Chief.

“I, need,” she said slowly, separating her words the way she did when she was ready to commit insecticide, “the heavy, bag.”

 

Gilead lay with his eyes closed.

He waited patiently while his wound was cleansed, his bandage changed: he did not flinch when the gel-cold probe was pressed against his belly, run smoothly to the left, then to the right.

“The nanos are doing a fine job,” he heard someone say quietly.

Another voice: “What did they call this?  Ultrasound? I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“We wanted you to see it in operation first.”

Gilead smelled Angela before she spoke: he smiled, just a little, opened unseeing eyes.

He raised a hand, she pressed it between hers.

“You smell good,” he murmured. “I’ll bet you had your Saturday night bath early.”

Angela did not laugh, but he could hear the smile in her voice:  “Flatterer!”

“Hey, only with the prettiest girls!”

“And how do you know I’m pretty? I might look like a mud fence after a spring rain!”

“Trust me, darlin’,” he said quietly. “I wouldn’t care if you looked like Atilla the Hun’s elbow, you’d still be beautiful!”

She squeezed his hand a little.

“What about that guy that tried to stab my parishioner?”

“He’s dead.”

“Can’t say I’m surprised.”

“I’m surprised it took him that long.”

“Was he seen?”

“After what he did to you? Nobody was willing to do more than throw him in a cell and forget about him.”

“God forgave him,” Gilead grunted. “I suppose I’ll have to.”

“He got through your muscle wall, Gilead, but he didn’t puncture your guts.”

“Thank God for small favors!”

“From the size of his knife, I’d say that was a big favor!”

“Yeah.”  Gilead grimaced. “Since he didn’t get any guts, can I have a drink now?”

“Rum, rye, beer, vodka, Sterno?”

“Coffee, tea or me,” Gilead teased quietly. “Just water. Alcohol depresses me.”

He heard the gurgle of water, the rattle of ice in a plastic pitcher.

“How fast does it depress you?” Angela asked, and he heard the honest curiosity in her voice.

“Fast!”

He stopped talking as a straw touched his lips: he carefully lifted his hands, found the cup, held it with his free hand, straightened the arm with the IV in the bend of the elbow.

Angela watched his Adam’s apple move as he swallowed; he came up for air, handed her back the empty cup.

“More?”

“Not just yet,” he gasped. “Let me get used to having something on my stomach.”

“Do you feel up to receiving visitors?”

He hesitated, then asked, “Is my wife here?”

Angela laughed quietly, patted his hand:  “She chewed through two locked doors trying to get to you!”

“Doors are expensive, let her in.”

“What about other family, friends?”

“Not yet.”

His voice was serious, a little uncertain as he repeated,  “Not yet.”

“Okay. Let me know when.”

He felt the catches being released from the bed’s siderail, heard plated tubing whisper as the siderail was lowered: he felt his wife’s animal warmth before she bent, kissed him, hugged his shoulders, carefully.

“Pardon me if I don’t rise,” he whispered as she laid her forehead down on his collar bone and ran her arms under him, around him.

Gilead closed his eyes and remembered how she looked on their wedding day, and he laid his head over against her hair as best he could, and he held her, felt her breathe.

“Gilead,” she whispered.

“Yes?” he whispered back.

“Gilead, you’re not allowed to die before I do, you know that.”

He chuckled, immediately regretted it:  “Sorry about that, darlin’, I’ll try to do better!”

 

Sheriff Linn Keller came through the man door beside the squad bay just in time to see his wife drive a spinning kick into the heavy bag.

An Irishman saw him come in, backed away from where he’d been backing the bag, and the Sheriff started to step into his place, then stepped back, because when Shelly had her dandruff up, she tore into the heavy bag like a personal enemy, she tended to circle it and punish it from several directions, and she did not hold back one little bit when she did.

The Chief and most of the Irishmen looked curiously at the Sheriff.

“Cousin Gilead,” Linn said, “is not dead after all. We found him, he’s – long story – he was attacked in church and he took a knife in the gut. Still killed the man that tried to kill him.”

“Barehand?”

“Yep.”

“He didn’t shoot him?” a surprised voice asked.

Linn shrugged.  “He’s a preacher,” he said casually, “and he believes in the laying on of hands. Even if he is stone blind.”

 

Reverend Gilead Keller stood behind his pulpit as the hymn finished, faded.

“Please be seated,” he said, spreading his arms as he always did.

His ears told him as accurately as his eyes could have, that the congregation was indeed resuming their seats.

Gilead frowned.

“I get confused easily,” he admitted. “I’m not sure …”

He frowned, considered, then his hands moved as if speaking on their own.

“My father is William,” he said, “his twin sister was Willamina. She married Richard.”

His hands made three stops in mid-air, one for each name.

“Now I’m not sure if that makes Richard an uncle, maybe a great-uncle, since he was related by marriage maybe that makes him an in-law or an outlaw.”

He waved a hand as if swatting at a mosquito.

“Whichever it is, he told me once that a scar meant you came up against something that was meaner than you were.

“I prefer my father’s description.”

He smiled, just a little, and said, “My father said a scar means something tried to kill you, and failed.”

He raised fingertips to his scarred face, the other hand dropping to his still-tender belly.

“Well, folks, I think my father had the right of it.  Matter of fact I’ve got quite a collection of scars.”

He smiled wryly and said, “I assure you, this is a collection I never wanted!”

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

ACCEPTANCE

Sheriff Linn Keller stood with one boot up on the bottom rail, his coatsleeved arms laid over the swept-clear top plank.

Michael used to imitate his Pa's posture, just at a considerably lower altitude.

He imitated the posture again today, just not quite so close to the ground.

Victoria, dainty and feminine and fur-trimmed with a feathered hat perched at an angle on her elaborartely-upswept hair, assumed no such casual posture: she stood beside her long tall Daddy, gloved hands thrust into a fur lined muff, grateful for the long hemline that protected her stockinged legs from the cold winter wind.

Never thought I'd see the day, Linn thought, and he felt his eyes smiling at the corners.

He watched as his mares advanced, cautiously, as they snuffed Michael's Fanghorn, then gathered around her and the two orphaned Fanghorn colts, a protective cluster that spoke of welcome, and of the need to protect the young from winter winds and predators.

"Do you reckon it's because she is with colt?" Michael asked.

"Reckon so," Linn murmured, remembering how the mares fled from Lightning in the past, how they gathered in a nervous cluster at the far end of the pasture, the Herd Stallion trotting protectively back and forth between his mares and this alien interloper.

 

Marnie and Angela were visiting one of the remote planets, surveying their medical needs: things were considerably less developed than they'd been led to believe -- so much so that when a boy ran in and collapsed, breathing deep, desperately, when he blurted his Ma was laborin' and the doc was gone, two pale eyed women looked at one another and abandoned their State visit.

Two pale eyed sisters, united in purpose, each on an Appaloosa mare, galloped across wavegrass meadows and through thin brush, a little boy riding double with Marnie providing direction.

Women are women, no matter what world they are on; there were neighbors, there were kinswomen, but when this pair came pounding across the long field beside a small, tidy house, when they bore arrow-straight for the house, when they swung down and brought the boy down with them, women parted: these interlopers were regarded with hard and suspicious eyes, which dissuaded them not at all.

Marnie and Angela did what they did very well.

They took charge.

A mother was delivered of her child by a pale eyed nurse in a winged cap and a white dress, and women who'd grown up with the idea that outsiders were not to be trusted, warmed to the idea that perhaps these two could be.

No official record was made of this event that opened a closed, clannish, insular world to the widening influence of the Confederacy.

This simple act, two women responding to the need of one of their kind, was a pebble dropped in a sill pond, its widening ripples having good effect for a surprising distance.

Two Outside women were accepted that day, and that was the beginning of their acceptance of the Confederacy.

 

Steady hands dropped the charge of FF black into shining brass cases; pale eyes watched closely as bullet and charged brass were run with caution into the press, as finished rounds were carefully examined, set with their fellows.

Father and son activated a Confederate field that both gave a false image of all that was within, and damped all sound over a certain very low threshold: they examined the real-looking, simulated, Planet Fanghorn bear, up close and from a distance: they consulted anatomic drawings, they touched controls and rendered the simulation almost transparent, then rotated it to examine internal bone structure and organ placement.

When they were finished, when fired cartridge brass was soaking in the galvanized pail they carried back to the house, still concealed by the interference field, both father and son were satisfied that each of them could place a killing shot into the bear, and that it would be effective.

 

Michael slept in his own bed that night, under his own roof, as did Victoria: Shelly smiled and leaned her head over against her husband's shoulder as they looked in on the pair, apple-cheeked and relaxed, and they remembered their young when they were much younger, smaller ... when they were still children.

Father and mother held hands as they watched their sleeping young breathe, then they withdrew, closed the door soundlessly behind, and retired to their own bedchamber.

On the morrow, Shelly would take her daughter to the City and go shopping, they would try on outfits and eat at the food court and giggle and be silly, as mothers and daughters do, while the Sheriff and Michael would tend horses and fences and very likely go to the Silver Jewel for a meal, as fathers and sons do.

The ladies returned with purchases and laughter, the men joined them, and that evening, the supper table was well attended.

 

 

 

Edited January 11 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

SNOWFALL

"Firelands, Angel One."

Sharon frowned, reached for the transmit key, pressed with three curved fingers.

"Angel One, Dispatch, go."

"Request direct with Unit One."

"Stand by one."

Sharon pressed a key on her intercom panel; a moment later, the Sheriff strode across the polished marble floor, came to the dispatcher's desk, nodded.

"Angel One, Actual is on station."

"Recovery operation complete, official notification to follow."

Linn bent, one palm flat on the green desk blotter, the other pressing almost delicately on the dark-grey-plastic transmit bar.

"I roger your mission accomplished. Proceed Phase Two."

"I roger your Phase Two, should be home for supper!"

Linn leaned back, looked down, winked at Sharon.

"Like some fried shrimp?" he asked quietly, and Sharon knew that something just went right.

Something, she had no idea just what, had just gone overwhelmingly, absolutely, RIGHT! -- and it was ever his habit to indulge her love of shrimp when that happened!

 

Angela sat back in the comfortably upholstered co-pilot's seat.

The uniformed young man in the pilot's couch laid in his course; the ship rose to altitude -- straight up -- then shot west-northwest, invisible to the casual eye, insensible to radar, and not hampered by the need to shove through the air: the Diplomatic shuttle lived in its elliptical, disc-shaped bubble, reality parted before it and closed behind it, and in less than three seconds, they were over a cemetery, and descending.

Angela fed the images into the polished-silver, toaster-shaped drone: it rose, the hatchway whispered open, allowed the drone to hum almost inaudibly rearward, closed: Angela followed the tracking on her screen as the drone exited the shuttle, descended.

The drone turned, extended a nozzle.

Angela established a cylinder-shaped camouflaging field around drone and grave marker both as a sun-bright laser burned an image the stone, as another to its left seared another image into polished Vermont granite: the nozzles retracted, the silver toaster floated upward, returned to the shuttle.

Heavy snow obscured any distortion of the air that might have been accidentally noticed; the shuttle rose, another course was laid in.

Angela smiled, studied the image on her screen.

Gammaw, she thought, you'd like this.

 

Victoria buckled the shining-black instep strap of her dancing shoe, fastened the ankle strap, stood.

She was more than accustomed to dancing in heels.

She was careful never to wear heels unless she was dancing, in practice or in performance, but this was different.

She and her sisters dressed one another -- corsets and stockings and frillies and McKenna gowns, fine hats and gloves and shining shoes, earrings, cameo necklaces, veils, lace, embroidery ...

... all severe, unrelieved, black.

Angela's long tall Daddy wore a handmade suit, all in black; his white shirt had tiny vertical pleats, but the vest under his coat was black-and-silver brocade: his boots were burnished to a high shine, his Stetson was flawless, and Jacob and Michael each resembled their father in each of these details.

A family wore mourning -- not because they mourned, but because they celebrated a solemn recognition.

Marnie and Angela added a touch from their younger years.

They each wore a pair of their Gammaw's heels, and they each wore one of their Gammaw's mourning veils.

It was snowing -- big, fluffy flakes, the kind that pile up deep, and fast, the kind that casts a magical hush over the world:  a family gathered around a grave half a continent away and more.

An invisible field kept snow from falling on the family assembled.

Sheriff Linn Keller looked around at his young, at his wife, at The Bear Killer and Snowdrift.

"We gather at the grave of Mama's Daddy, my grandfather, my children's great-grandfather," Linn said, his voice carrying well in their invisible shelter.

"Angela finished the job Gammaw started, and that was to restore Granddad's medals."

Linn bent, gripped the black-velvet cloth draping a tombstone, pulled it free.

"I never knew, until Angela excavated Gammaw's work and went to see it completed," Linn said as he looked at the newly-appended stone, "that Granddad had these.

"Those men who knew him, those who served with him, told Gammaw he never spoke of his time in-country."

Linn saw the unspoken question in Michael's eyes, in Victoria's expression: they saw the corners of his eyes tighten as he continued, "When a man has actually been there -- when a military man has seen action -- he is not likely to speak of it."

The twins lifted their heads a bare fraction as comprehension arrived in their young minds.

"Gammaw said her damned drunk of a mother threw his medals away, and she was not able to recover them. It's taken this long to get them re-issued, but re-issued the are."

Linn looked at the stone again, then reached in his coat pocket and pulled out a single bullet.

He placed it on the stone, among the other bullets on the rough-faceted, slightly-domed top edge.

Each member of the pale eyed family placed a single bullet on the tombstone, in memory of the single round their ancestor got off as Death bore down on him at full throttle.

A family filed into an Iris, and the Iris closed, and snow began falling on the grave once more.

 

Sheriff Linn Keller hung his Granddad's revolver, in its new, slightly larger display frame, back on the wall.

In addition to his Granddad's old duty revolver and six rounds of WWII surplus .38 Smith & Wesson ammunition, the case contained the photograph of his granddad Ted as a pale-eyed man, the formal portrait taken of every soldier.

Beside this new addition to the display, there were two medals.

Sheriff Linn Keller looked long at the display, remembered using that very revolver to kill the man who tried to murder his Mama.

Somehow, with the addition of the portrait and the medals, the framed revolver seemed more complete.

 

A figure on horseback rode through the snowfall.

It was snowing more heavily now; it promised to get deep, but the horseman astride the Appaloosa mare was not dissuaded by snow on the Stetson, by snow on the sheepskin collar.

An attractive woman in a Western saddle drew up at the foot of a grave, back in the Ohio country: she rode around the grave and leaned down, placed something on the gravestone.

If anyone was there to hear it, they might have heard a whispered voice -- or maybe it was only the wind, one of those gusts that accidentally seems to frame a word or a phrase.

A fresh-cut rose lay on top of the stone, and in the stillness that followed its placement, with snowflakes falling straight down now, a whisper lingered for a moment.

"Rest easy, Daddy."

A pale eyed woman rode into the falling snow, and dissolved into the white silence, and the snow fell flat on the ground, for her mare left no hoofprints in the fragile surface.

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

FACING OUTWARDS

The congregation rose at the piano's opening bars.

Reverend Gilead was not behind the pulpit, but the attractive woman in what was called a McKenna gown had marched purposefully down the aisle and seated herself at the piano as if she owned it.

She consulted the note sticking out of the hymnal, then rose: she went to the board on the wall to the right of the pulpit, unfolded a small stepladder, ascended three steps and quickly inserted letters and numbers, listing the hymns: she consulted the stack of available letters in the basket hanging under the message-board, frowned, descended the little stepladder.

The congregation watched silently as a pale eyed woman picked up the ladder, snapped it shut -- deliberately, briskly, loudly, a sharp and woody note in the church's hush -- she set it back down, turned and lifted her chin, marched to the center of the aisle and stopped.

"Friends, kindred, in-laws and outlaws," she announced, lifting her hands, "I don't have the right letters to put the sermon's title up today, so we'll start with the hymn at the top of the list!"

She turned, marched to the piano: she seated herself, opened the hymnal, propped it open, then slipped two fingers into a hidden pocket and withdrew a slim, Japanned glasses-case.

Angela Keller adjusted her round, wire rimmed spectacles, slid them halfway down her nose, lifted her hands, looked in the broad mirror over the piano.

"Please rise," she called, lifting her arms, palms toward the ceiling, then spread practiced fingers, and the opening chords to the old and familiar hymn filled the Church.

Four stanzas there were, and halfway through the fourth and final stanza, a man in the rearmost pew placed his closed hymnal on the warm spot where his bony backside had been:  he stood erect, squared his shoulders, paced off on the left and strode purposefully down the aisle with what could only be described as a regular, military pace.

He timed his move so the final note faded as he took his place behind the pulpit.

"Be seated," a familiar figure said, his voice at once gentle, and pitched to carry.

They did.

"Reverend Gilead," he said, "is being examined by physicians who specialize in their craft. I'm here to deliver a sermon. It'll be shorter than his and I can't guarantee it'll knock all the rust off your corroded soul, but I'll not waste your time a-doin' it.

"You'll notice his wife Adina is not here either. She's not with him at the moment but she is at the center of today's sermon.

"I'm Sheriff Linn Keller of Firelands County, Colorado. I've been everywhere, I've done everything, I'm never wrong and if you believe all that, I'll sell you a wheatfield in the middle of the Great Misty Swamp!"

His grin was quick and contagious, and a relaxed chuckle ripped through the congregation.

"My son Michael has something that looks like an oversized, muscle bound monster of a wall busting horse, and that's exactly what she is. She's got a big bony ram in the middle of her forehead, I think her skull and her neck bone is made of solid rock, she can bust through a brick wall and make it look easy, and now she's with foal.

"I don't know how Fanghorn herds work, but once she came back from being serviced, she brought what we figured out were two orphaned colts with her. They're weaned, but only just, and they're welded to the mare like a burr on a long haired coon dog."

He hesitated, looked at the prim pianist:  "Angela, do they have coons here?"

"No, Daddy."

"How about coon dogs?"

"Not yet, Daddy."

"Well horse feathers."

"They do have burrs, Daddy, and they do stick."

"Then y'all know what I'm talkin' about," Linn said firmly. 

"Now I'm going to tell you all something and I don't want any of you to let on like you know."

Linn raised his palms toward the congregation as he spoke, the way a man will when he is issuing a cautioning word.

"Gilead doesn't know it yet but you can't fool some people. My Mama could see through folks like window glass. She could look at someone and take a good look at their back bone and see if there was a streak of yella, or a white stripe" -- he hesitated, frowned, looked at Angela again.

"Darlin', do they have skunks here?"

"No, Daddy, they don't."

"Ahh ... haah," Linn said slowly, frowned, pulled out a small tablet:  a few taps, swipes, frowns, an appealing look to his daughter: Angela sighed dramatically, pulled out her own tablet: a moment later, the holographic image of a Rocky Mountain spotted skunk appeared in mid-air, rotating slowly.

"Now these critters," Linn said, and Angela raised an eyebrow.

"Daddy," she said gently, "you said your sermon would be shorter than Gilead's!"

"Ah, right."

The six foot long skunk ceased to rotate in mid-air, disappeared.

"Let me try that one again. Mothers are wonderful and mysterious creatures, and women often ... know things."

He looked closely at one, then another nodding head in the congregation: he thrust a bladed hand at one, then another -- "Uh-huh, yeah, you fellas know exactly what I'm sayin', don't you?"

"Yeah," a boy's young voice called, "I can't get away with nothin!"

"Don't feel bad, fella," Linn laughed, "I couldn't either!"

He grinned again, raised a hand, just a little.

"Now back to what I don't want you all to let on.

"My son's Fanghorn mare sniffed at Gilead's wife as they were gettin' ready to leave to go to the doctor.

"I was not sure she was going to let Adina leave."

 

"Uncle Gilead," Michael said, his young voice serious, "you know they completely regrew my spinal tree."

Gilead felt Michael's hand grip his: he frowned a little, nodded, felt the air move ever so slightly and smelled lilac and soap and water, and he smiled.

"Juliette?" he said gently, and Juliette sidled up to him, laid her hand on his and whispered, "They regrew my eyes. They had to . Mine were too badly damaged for repair."

"Did you have any nerve atrophy?" Gilead asked quietly, and Michael's hand tightened as his stomach shriveled.

"I don't know," Juliette admitted.

Lightning chirped, sounding like an outsized canary, delighted at finding a fresh pile of birdseed, or whatever delights canaries: Michael looked up, saw Lightning was laid down behind Adina, almost curled around her.

Thunder and Avalanche were backing up toward her, facing outward, their heads moving left, then right, like synchronized, short, stubby, snakes.

Michael frowned.

He'd never seen this before.

Victoria walked around the big Fanghorn and approached the colts, planted her knuckles on her hips.

"What are you two doing!" she scolded.

Thunder lowered his head, snuffed loudly.

"Is that a warning?" Victoria scolded, shaking her Mommy-finger at the young Fanghorn: "I'm meaner than you are" -- she unwrapped a peppermint -- "and I have bribes!"

If Thunder held any incipient hostility, it disappeared at the cellophane crackle of the spiral striped treat being unwrapped:  Victoria bribed both Fanghorn colts, wiped the horse slobber off on a rag she'd draped over her shoulder for that purpose, she stepped closer and caressed them both, laughing as she stood with a Fanghorn colt's jaw draped over each shoulder, as her hands felt two Fanghorns purring happily.

Victoria laughed, slipped past them, came up beside Lightning, patted her flank.

"Here, kitty, kitty, kitty," she called gently, and Lightning laid her neck protectively around Adina, who looked at Victoria with an uncertain, almost a fearful, look.

Angela laid her hand under Lightning's big mule ear, leaned against the side of Lightning's neck, just behind her head, reached over and laid her other hand behind the other big, fuzzy ear.

"What do you see," she whispered.  "Show me, Kitty Kitty!"

Victoria closed her eyes as Lightning brought her head around to snuff loudly at Adina's front, as she raised her head, as she chirped happily, as she laid her head down in front of Gilead's wife and purred.

Victoria massaged Lightning a little, laid her head over against her silky mane and whispered, "Thank you."

Adina looked around, trying to decide whether to stand very still, to sink into the ground, or to run in screaming panic.

Victoria straightened, came over, took Adina's hand in hers, looked at her with big, pale, very serious eyes and said, "Adina, you're pregnant."

Adina's mouth dropped open with honest surprise.

"You didn't know?"

Adina blinked, closed her mouth, shook her head, ran a surprised hand over her flat belly.

"So Gilead doesn't know either."

Adina shook her head.

"Lightning knew, didn't you, girl?"

Lightning sighed dramatically; the colts came up, ponderous, attentive, arranged themselves so Adina was between Lightning and their backsides.

"The colts know," Angela said. "This is what they do in their herd. They protect the mothers and their young."

Angela tapped at her wrist-unit.

An Iris opened.

"Gilead?" she called.  "Time to go."

"My dear?" Gilead called, extending his elbow.

Adina looked at the two Fanghorn backsides, looked at Victoria. looked at her husband as he rose.

It took some effort to persuade two protective Fanghorn colts and a gravid Fanghorn mare to allow this new member of their herd to depart with others of the herd.

 

"It seems Fanghorns are quite protective of pregnant mares and their young," Linn grinned.

"I will ask a personal favor of you all."

He looked almost ruefully at Angela who lowered her head, looked warningly over her spectacles and shook her Mommy-finger at him.

"Please don't tell anyone that I said your preacher's wife is with foal!"

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 12 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

OUT FOR A SWIM

Joseph Keller's breath caught in his young throat.

He'd just turned thirteen, he'd been taken in by their Church as a full member, his Pa and the Parson both told him that at twelve or thirteen, Christ was taken into the synagogue as a man grown, and accepted in his society as the same.

Joseph took all that very seriously -- this in an age where girls were marriageable at thirteen, where girls could, and did, run a household at thirteen, where adulthood came early because it had to.

Joseph was not thinking of any of this, however.

Avalanches were not at all uncommon in the high country -- matter of fact, he'd helped built snowsheds over the Z&W in areas identified as likely to be buried by the sliding white stuff.

He drew his gelding to a stop and he'd surveyed the tracks and his young eyes saw two of the Kolascinski boys above the snowshed.

That didn't trouble him.

When the snow above started to move, now that troubled him, and him too far away to do a damned thing but watch!

One of the boys saw it in time -- he jumped off the edge of the snowshed, landed, splayed out, half-scrambled, half-swam far enough under the lip of the overhanging roof to let the avalanche roar and hiss over him: Joseph saw him disappear in a cloud of the glittering stuff, and he disregarded this one.

He'll likely be all right, he thought.

The other boy -- the younger one -- Joseph knew both Kolascinski boys -- hell, he knew their entire family! -- he saw the white death sluice silently down the mountain and sweep him into its cold embrace, he had an occasional glimpse of something dark as gravity and fluid mechanics brought a powdered solid down the mountainside.

Joseph waited, his eyes busy.

Part of him wanted to whistle and yell, to startle his mount into a flat-out gallop.

Part of him urged caution, as a fresh avalanche is unstable and could happen again, and he'd no wish to have his saddlehorse buried alive and suffocated.

To be real honest, he didn't much care to have that happen to him either.

Joseph was his father's son, and his first thought was for his horse, just as when the day was finished, he cared first for his horse first, and then himself.

Joseph saw something dark struggling as the cascade slowed, as the blowing cloud cleared.

Joseph Keller's pale eyes considered the best way there, remembered the terrain, now hidden by smooth, glittering snow.

"Yup, now," he said, his voice soft.

 

Karl Kolascinski didn't realize he'd been standing on the snowshed roof.

He was too close to the edge.

When the avalanche started, he fell, startled: he didn't expect the world to drop out from under him, but part of his mind knew if he slid down the mountain, he'd never stop until he hit bottom, and bottom was waaaaay farther than he wanted to go!

He splayed out arms and legs, felt gravel ballast under him, scrambled blindly uphill -- he felt gravel, then the squared end of a railroad tie through knit mittens -- he wallowed, he dug, his toes found purchase -- he couldn't see, it was hard to breathe, desperation propelled him --

His hand dropped over a rail.

Karl seized the rail, brought his other arm up and gripped steel rail as well, pulled hard, kicked, came up on his knees, fairly launched across the tracks: he turned quickly, slammed side-on into the ice-rimed rock wall, dropped into a crouch, breathing hoarsely.

Safe.

He beat snow off his mittens, wiped his eyes, looked around, coughed.

"Benjamin?"

His voice sounded funny, here, like the sound was being swallowed.

He looked at the snowy, sparkly cloud hovering in the air, stepped over the rail, looked downhill into the glittering cloud.

"BENJAMIIIIN!"

 

Joseph was not able to say later whether his horse jumped, scrambled or swam.

It didn't matter.

His horse felt his urgency and his horse fought through the snow -- lost footing twice, dropped into the snow, found rock or mountainside or something solid, continued to fight through --

"Ho, now," Joseph murmured, looking around.

Where did I see him last?

I saw something dark --

It had to be him --

Joseph willed himself to stillness, turned his head, slacked his jaw and half-yawned to crack his ears open from the inside.

His gelding flinched, swung his head like he was looking at something in the snow, almost in arm's reach.

Arm's reach is right, Joseph thought as the snow collapsed a little and a green-mittened hand broke the surface.

Joseph watched as an arm wallowed around in a circle, as if thrust straight overhead and stirred around some, then the other arm, and something white and snowy coughed and popped up like a cork.

The gelding took a cautious step, another, and Joseph reached down, seized the arm above the elbow, and the mittened hand seized him back.

The gelding backed, carefully, as something in the snow wallowed and thrashed and finally broke through, sputtering, coughing, snorting snow from nose and mouth and trying to blink snow from its eyes.

"Ho, now," Joseph murmured:  he leaned down, got the other arm, pulled.

Benjamin Kolascinski sneezed, opened snow-dusted eyelids, looked with honest surprise at Joseph's solemn face.

"Good morning," Joseph said quietly. "How'd you keep from goin' on down the mountain?"

"Pa told me if I'm in a snowslide," Benjamin coughed, "he said I should swim out of it, so I did."

 

Karl watched as something dark swam through the loose snow, as snow below it started to slide again, just a little, but not much: it was closer to level, just enough grade to let the air-suspended stuff move if you kicked it again.

Karl stared, realized it was a horse and rider.

Karl shivered, cold of a sudden, he beat snow off his pants legs and his arms and he swatted the front of his coat, slapping himself as free of snow as he could.

That's Joseph! he thought.

What's he doing here?

Karl watched as Joseph's horse startled, as it seemed to look at something very close --

Karl's eyes widened as he saw an arm, another arm, as he saw the Sheriff's son lean down and grab something and pull --

Benjamin!

 

Joseph Keller considered, pale eyes looking down the tracks.

I could build a fire here and strip 'em down, thaw 'em out, he thought.

I'd use just as much time gettin' 'em home.

Let's get 'em under roof, their Ma can get some hot soup down 'em and get 'em in a nice warm dry bunk!

 

Inge Kolascinski was a mother, and mothers have instincts, and a mother's restlessness often tells her something is not right with her young.

Inge threw a cloak around her shoulders, lifted the heavy latch, pushed the door open, stepped outside.

She saw someone walking -- a man, leading a horse -- two figures were on the horse --

Inge's breath caught in her throat.

Joseph lifted a hand in greeting -- Inge realized those were her missing sons on his horse --

Something happened --

Inge ducked back inside, turned to another of her sons:  "Fetch wood," she said, her voice low, urgent, the tones a mother uses when she will brook neither argument nor question.

Inge Kolascinski, wife of a gold miner and mother to beautiful daughters and adventurous sons, stirred up the fire, added more wood, checked the hot water reservoir in back of the stove, then she stirred the thick, meat-heavy stew that was adding its herb-spiced fragrance to their spacious cabin.

Something told her both hot water and hot stew would be needed.

 

When Kohl got home that night, after he'd stood to allow his wife to broom the snow off his legs, he beat snow off his coat and hat and came inside where it was warm and it smelled the way a hungry, hard-working man likes.

He did think it odd that two of his boys were abed, piled up under more covers than they usually used.

Inge spoke quietly, looking over at the two: Kohl's face grew serious, he gripped his wife's hand, patted it gently, nodded, then came over to the boys, drew up a stool, sat.

Karl was in the upper bunk, Benjamin in the lower.

"Pa?" Benjamin asked from his piled-up nest of hand-quilted insulation.

Kohl nodded gravely.

"Pa, I did like you told me and it worked."

Kohl looked up at Karl, back down at Benjamin.

"What happened?" he asked quietly, his voice concerned, his eyes serious.

Benjamin swallowed.

"Pa, we got hit by an avalanche."

Kohl looked up at Karl, the older of the two.

"Are either of you hurt?" 

Two boys shook their heads.

"What did I tell you?" Kohl asked as he rested a firm, fatherly hand on the highest lump under the covers -- a shoulder, he judged.

"You told us if we were in an avalanche we should swim out," Benjamin said. "When it hit us I heard your voice and that's what I did and it worked."

Kohl was silent for a long moment:  he closed his eyes, he bowed his head, he nodded.

"I'm glad it worked," he whispered, his throat tight.

Inge ladled thick, rich-smelling stew into bowls.

"Come and eat," she called.

Neither father nor sons needed to be told twice.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 13 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

A LITTLE THEATER

Something short, pastel, fast moving and LOUD!! streaked across the street.

A police officer moved to intercept, shouted a warning.

Too slow.

The crescent buttplate of a '73 rifle drove into a man's kidneys, followed by the collision of six stone of incensed female: Michael stiffened as the collision of cop and his twin sister rolled over him: his steady chant went to a full-voiced shout: "ARCHANGEL CALLING MAYDAY, MAYDAY, GET ME SOME BACKUP, NOW!"

 

Ambassador Marnie Keller picked up the gleaming sugar-tongs with delicate, lace-gloved fingers, transferred a tan, maple-flavored sugar cube into her steaming cup of tea, blinked innocently.

"You realize, of course, that since the Diplomatic branch is involved, this has elevated to an Official Incident."

"I realize that," a man in formal attire said slowly, frowning: "I also realize that it was hardly necessary to blow the sky apart above them and land in force!"

 

Michael Keller rode Lightning up the street at a spanking trot -- which, to everyone else, looked ponderous and slow, until they realized just how much ground a trotting Fanghorn actually covers.

He looked around, saw buildings with false fronts, single pane windows -- at least they're genuine glass! he thought -- a team and wagon was halted up ahead, a ladder was steadied against a pole, and men were working on overhead wires.

Michael leaned back and Lighting halted, lifted her head, sniffed:  she muttered, shook her head, and Michael reached down, caressed her silky-furred neck.

"I know, darlin'," he murmured.  "Electricity scares me too."

The ground lit up with a bluish glare and Michael looked up, startled.

A man fell backwards, his leg through the rungs of the ladder: the ladder started over backwards as men flinched, arms thrown up, then tried to stop the ladder's fall.

It came down over the wagon, the far end hit the ground: Michael was out of the saddle, he hit the ground, launched into a sprint.

Victoria was one street over.

She saw the flare, heard men shout: she turned Peppermint, her face grim, and the Appaloosa mare launched into a gallop, shot like an arrow between two buildings, came out on the street as Michael seized the man, pulled him free of the ladder, rolled him over.

Victoria bent her wrist, hesitated as Michael brought his wrist to his lips.

"ARCHANGEL CALLING MAYDAY MAYDAY MAYDAY CODE BLUE CPR IN PROGRESS NO DRILL," he snapped -- slowly enough his words were crisp, distinct, hurried enough to leave no doubt as to the veracity of his call.

Victoria lowered her wrist.

Michael's fingers were deep in the purpling man's carotid groove: Victoria saw his lips move as he counted silently, saw him position, landmark, then begin driving his weight down into the man's breastbone, responding as he'd been trained.

 

"Your people," Marnie explained patiently, as if to a slow child, "interfered with a lifesaving medical procedure. They interfered with Diplomatic personnel, and they committed armed assault on Diplomatic personnel."

Marnie stirred her tea, her moves delicate, feminine: she placed the spoon on its holder, tilted her head, looked at the well-dressed official.

"In order to save a man's life, it was necessary to establish that we were there, in force, under arms, and that we would bring as much to bear as we had to, in order to stop your people from further wrongdoing."

" 'Our people,' " he said, an edge to his voice, "had no idea a child carries diplomatic --"

Marnie's eyes raised -- they were all that moved -- but when they did, they were dead pale, and the color was rapidly retreating from her fair features.

"Your people all admitted, during interrogation, that they recognized Michael, they recognized Michael's fanghorn, and they recognized the business end of a Winchester rifle," Marnie said coldly.

"Michael Keller is known on this world, thanks to the Inter-System. He is the only living soul to routinely ride a Fanghorn. Even on Planet Fanghorn, they are not domesticated, they are not broken to saddle, and they are --"

An upraised palm interrupted the Ambassador's patient voice.

 

A flash, as if lighting, followed by the slap of thunder's blast: overhead, four flat bottomed, shining-silver ships appeared, then two Starfighters, establishing their overwatch orbit as the Shuttles deployed landing gear, as they sat down, fast, engines screaming, hot winds blasting against the street: they landed, exhaust thundering against hand-laid brick and raising a cloud of free-blasted bedding sand, then the shuttles SLAMMED open and uniformed soldiers ran out in columns, bayonets fixed: the street filled with sharpened steel, men moved in step, a wall of death advancing toward the wagon, the ladder, the back-shrinking policemen: the utility men were on top of their wagon, Victoria lowered her Winchester's muzzle, she backed up close to Michael, stopped.

"MEDIC, UP!" came the shout -- men parted -- four men with a grav-litter ran up, knelt beside the laboring Michael.

Michael rocked back on his haunches, stood, backed up a step.

The unmoving man was seized, hoist ungently to the grav-litter, his shirt and vest split open: wires, pads, an IV pole was raised, locked into place: one medic bled the IV tubing while another called, "OFF!"

Men stepped back, palms raised, while automatic machinery made its analysis.

"AUTOPACE!" the lead medic called:  a shock, a minor convulsion, fingers pressed into the carotid groove -- a look, a nod, and the IV needle found a vein --

"I'm in, plug me up!"

More connections, the automatic dispenser went on-line with the intravenous setup: four men gripped the grav-litter, turned, ran the floating transport device to a waiting shuttle.

Michael turned to Victoria.

"Thank you," he said quietly.

"YOU!" the uninjured policeman snapped, pointing at Victoria.  "SURRENDER YOUR WEAPON --"

Four bayonets were in sudden close proximity to his face.

The senior ranking officer spoke quietly.

There was no need to raise his voice.

"Disarm them," he said, "and place them under arrest."

"SEE HERE, YOU CAN'T --"

The press of cold steel under his jaw stopped his speech.

 

"Was it really necessary to blow the sky apart and come blasting down out of the heavens like that? People heard that and thought the Millennium was arrived!"

Ambassador Marnie Keller smiled quietly, sipped her maple sweetened tea.

"We needed to establish our immediate authority," she smiled, tilting her head a little as she did. 

"Besides, who doesn't love a little theater?"

 

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

THUS SPAKE RUTH

Sheriff Jacob Keller glanced irritably at the screen.

It was the Inter-Colony news, and it showed him with an unhappy individual in each hand: the camera's angle made him look like a giant, the effect not at all diminished by the fact he'd wound up a good handful of shirt front and had each man hoist off the deck by at least a foot.

Jacob was Sheriff, and Jacob had to handle situations, and Jacob followed his pale eyed father's example: reason and patience were often enough to handle a situation, but if vigorous action was indicated, he jumped in headfirst with both feet and made sure everyone involved understood Jacob was The Law, and Jacob's Word would be obeyed, peacefully.

Or otherwise.

And he was more than willing to show exactly what "otherwise" meant.

Jacob sighed, shook his head: he hung his uniform Stetson on its peg, took off his coat and hung it up: he subscribed to the archaic notion that he should wear a vest, at minimum, over his shirt.

Ruth, for her part, gave her husband an approving look: she set a platter of something she'd tried for the first time -- she'd made an Earth delicacy she'd tried, when Jacob took her home for his most recent visit -- something Ruth never had before -- something called "Meat Loaf."

Jacob looked at it, and Jacob closed his eyes and took a long, deep, very obviously savoring breath: he smiled a little, that boyish smile she'd fallen in love with -- he looked at her and murmured, "Darlin', that smells goood!" -- Ruth knew by the way he drawled out the word that he genuinely approved, and she blushed a little and dropped her eyes, the way she'd done when he first met her, when he'd first realized he had feelings for her.

They looked at the screen, frozen at the moment Jacob flexed both arms and hauled the pugilistic opponents off the floor, the narrator's voice quiet and professional in the background.

Jacob looked at Ruth and blinked uncertainly, then he looked at the screen and said "Screen off."

Ruth gave him that patient look of hers and she said gently, "But, dear, I was just appreciating the view!"

Jacob laughed, and Ruth laughed with him: they dipped up whipped potatoes and drizzled gravy over them, Jacob ate with a good appetite, and little Jacob watched them with big and innocent eyes that missed absolutely nothing.

Jacob was about halfway to his full mark when he spoke.

"Darlin'," he said, his voice gentle, the way it was when he addressed his wife, "I have no idea what you ever saw in me."

Ruth looked at him, amused: "I'm trying to think of something ... profound," she murmured.

Jacob thrust his chin at the darkened, silent screen.

"You can see for yourself.  Your husband is a bully who uses overpowering strength to get his point across!"

Ruth gave him almost a pitying look.

"I see a man who can take a jawbone to the Philistines," she said quietly.

"Yeah," Jacob grunted. "Kind of like the Preacher and the Mule."

Puzzlement: Ruth's brows twitched together, she blinked a few times, and Jacob grinned, lifted a hand.

"Never mind, story at eleven," he chuckled, and Ruth was even more confused: she picked up a roll, split it open, added a good dose of butter, part of a recent shipment from her father.

That evening, after Jacob took pains to pay very close attention to his son, after he had his young son explain his lessons -- Jacob had long been of the conviction that to know a subject well, one had to teach the subject, and he had his son teach him what the son had learned -- after they'd tucked young Joseph in bed and retired themselves, Jacob lay on his back, holding his wife's hand, stared at the ceiling ...

... and smiled.

Ruth rolled up on her side, cuddled into him.

"What are you thinking?" she whispered.

Jacob smiled a little more: she laid her hand over his flat belly, he laid his hand on top of hers.

"When we were married," he almost whispered.

"Hm?" Ruth hummed drowsily.

"I remember what you told me."

Ruth closed her eyes, smelled soap and her husband's cologne and his unmistakable man-smell, and she nodded, her cheek against his shoulder.

"Where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God,” Ruth recited.

Jacob rolled up on his side to face her, ran his arm around her, kissed her forehead.

"Darlin'," he whispered, "what did I ever do to deserve you?"

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

A PROMISE KEPT

The surplus GI entrenching tool scraped futilely at the frozen ground.

Young hands, gloved hands, raised the tool and drove it hard into wintertime graveyard sod.

The wind was picking up, snow stung what skin wasn't covered.

He knelt, he raised his arms, he tried to make a dent in the drifting white cover, but all he succeeded in penetrating was snow, and the icy crust beneath.

Again and yet again he raised the tool: when finally cold and fatigue slowed him to a frustrated, chin-tucked stop, breathing into his collar to keep from frosting his lungs, he threw the olive drab folding shovel down, bent over, head in his hands, and groaned.

He felt a presence -- he'd heard nothing -- then a hand on his shoulder: firm, fatherly, and a voice.

"Howdy."

He pushed up from the snow, looked miserably at a sympathetic face, at pale eyes between a snow-covered Stetson brim and a curled, iron-grey mustache: the eyes were old, tired, almost out of place in such a young face.

"You look about done in."

The discouraged young man nodded, thrust a chin at a cardboard box, almost snow covered, a little drift forming in its lee.

"I promised Granddad I'd bury him out here," he said.

"I reckon Granddad would recommend you get thawed out first," came the quiet reply. "It's not far to the Silver Jewel. What say we have us a good hot meal and cozy up close to the stove?"

Two men stood; a gust of wind whipped snow between them, a glittering white curtain of knife-sharp crystals, there and gone.

"Name's Keller."

A gloved hand thrust out.

"Wilburn."

Gloved hands clasped.

"Your car start?"

"Should."

"You'll need to turn around. Snow's blown off the gravel so you shouldn't have trouble. Back on the road and turn right, town's just over the rise. Silver Jewel is on the right. Meet me there."

A young man picked up a cardboard box and an entrenching tool older than he was.

The folding GI shovel went in the trunk, and the ashes of a man he remembered, a man he'd loved, went in the passenger front seat.

 

"That wind's fit to cut right through a man."

Wilburn watched the man pull off his coat, give it a shake and a swat to dislodge the snow: he pulled the back strap free, brought his Stetson briskly down against his leg, knocking off a surprising amount of snow.

"C'mon in, it's cold out here."

"You're ... Sheriff?"

A grin -- quick, almost boyish, and the man with pale eyes and the iron grey mustache suddenly looked twenty years younger: he hauled open the heavy door with ornately swirl-frosts etched into the glass.

They went into the welcome warmth of the Silver Jewel Saloon.

"Back here."

They paced back through the lightly populated saloon, settled into a table in the back corner.

Wilburn was not at all surprised the Sheriff hung coat and Stetson on a peg behind the round, black, cast iron stove.

He was very surprised when the Sheriff set an old fashioned, lever action rifle in the corner beside him when he took his seat with his back to a wall.

Wilburn hadn't seen the man bring in a rifle, but then he was cold and he was concentrating on getting inside where it was warm.

"Now what brings you clear the hell and gone out here?" the Sheriff asked gently, and it was more a fatherly, or maybe a grandfatherly question, not that of a suspicious badge packer.

Wilburn swallowed and felt grief again, like an ocean wave swelling quickly from the depths.

"My Granddad liked it out here," he said. "He dearly loved to fish and he ... I think it was somewhere around here he fished, and he said when he died he'd like to be buried out here."

"You brought his ashes."

Wilburn nodded.

"Kinda figured. 'Twould be difficult to get a grown man in a box that small."

Wilburn blinked, surprised, then chuckled a little.

His Granddad said that same thing, that he'd planned on being cremated so he'd not spoil during the trip, and he could be transported more easily in half a shoebox than in a full size coffin.

"You realize you were tryin' to dig a hole in Potter's Field."

They leaned back as the cute little has slinger in the red-and-white check dress sashayed up to their table, set coffee in front of each man, an insulated pot between them, and a small pitcher of milk beside it.

"Two specials, if you would, please," the Sheriff said gently, and the waitress hip-shot him and laid a familiar hand on his shoulder:  "I'll bet you say that to all the girls!" -- she looked at Wilburn and smiled, "Isn't he just the sweetest thing?"

Wilburn laughed uncertainly as the Sheriff's eyes smiled knowingly.

"I generally come in here and torment those girls somethin' fierce," he admitted, "and they give as good as they get. One time for my birthday they allowed as they were goin' to give me a strip tease. Three of 'em came skippin' back here, they were ready to start a remodel so one reached up and peeled a long strip of wallpaper loose -- that was the strip part -- then they all three stuck their thumbs in their ears, wiggled their fingers and said "Neener neener nee-nerrr!" and run a-gigglin' back to the kitchen.  That was the tease part."

The Sheriff sighed, shook his head.

"I think my wife put 'em up to it."

He looked at Wilburn again as the stove threw off welcome waves of heat.

"Startin' to thaw out a little?"

Wilburn tried his coffee, found it very much to his liking: his brows puzzled together as he looked up at the Sheriff.

"Vanilla?"

"Yep," the lawman grinned, even white teeth bright beneath his elegantly curled lip broom. "They make that just for me, bless 'em!"

Conversation suspended as the meal arrived.

Wilburn was honestly surprised: he hadn't realized how hungry he was, and he never realized meatloaf and mashed potatoes could taste so very good!

When he commented on it, the Sheriff nodded knowingly: "When I was newly wed, my wife put me to cuttin' up taters for beef stew. I didn't know any better so I diced 'em up real fine. She looked at 'em kind of funny but put 'em into the stew -- I noticed she used a good cut of meat, she has arthritis so she had me cut up that cold meat so's not to hurt her hands -- I diced it up fine too, and don't you know that was genuinely the best beef stew I'd ever had."

He chuckled a little, buttered a sweet roll.

"Mama used to chunk her taters up kind of big, and she used a cheap cut of stew meat ... now I'm not as dumb as I look" -- he looked at Wilburn the way a man will when he's confiding in a friend -- "an old and dear friend told me that's proof the Lord is merciful -- but I never, ever, told my Mama that my wife made better beef stew than she did!"

Wilburn smiled a little, nodded.

"Your Granddad like to fish, didn't he?"

Wilburn looked up, surprised.

"He favored a fly rod."

"You knew him."

"I did," the Sheriff nodded.  "Liked the man. Didn't hear he'd passed until well after the funeral, I'm sorry."

Wilburn nodded, and the Sheriff saw how absolutely lost he looked.

"Tell you what. I think we can inter your Granddad in the regular cemetery with the decent folks. Potters Field is where they buried executed criminals and such-like, back when."

Wilburn frowned a little.

"It won't take much of a hole for that box," he admitted, "but I didn't make a mark in that frozen ground when I tried."  He blinked, considered, and his shoulders sagged.

It just occurred to him that he was in the presence of the County Sheriff, and you can't just dig a hole and bury someone, there has to be grave space purchased and recorded and he'd need his Granddad's death certificate --

"Let's go up and take a look," the Sheriff said. "You'll play hell gettin' a car up Cemetery Hill in this weather. Do you ride?"

"You mean horses? -- um, no, not really."

"We'll fix you up."

The Sheriff rose as the hash slinger came over with the check: he pressed something green and folded in her hand and said seriously, "Darlin', I've been tryin' to think of somethin' to tell you that's not rude, crude or socially unacceptable, but I work with men and I only hear the ones you can't tell at Mama's supper table!"

The waitress came up on her toes, kissed the Sheriff's clean-shaven cheek -- quickly, a delicate, little-girl peck -- then she looked at Wilburn and giggled, red-faced, and skipped off toward the kitchen.

 

Wilburn handed the box down to the Sheriff, then climbed awkwardly down from the mule.

He didn't know he'd ridden a mule and not a horse -- in his world, horsepower was under the hood, not under a saddle -- all he knew was, he rode with his Granddad's ashes in one arm and his other hand welded to the saddle horn, as his mount plodded patiently, sure-footedly behind the Sheriff's spotted horse.

"It's right over here."

Two men turned, the wind pushing them; Appaloosa stallion and brindle mule stood close to one another, backsides to the wind, waited patiently as the pair walked down a row of stones, went down hill to another row, stopped.

Wilburn stared, his mouth opened in surprise.

A stone -- his Granddad's name -- date of birth, death, husband, father, beloved grandfather --

The stone was round topped and old fashioned looking, but his Granddad's image was laser engraved beneath the lettering, fishing net in one hand, a bending fly rod in the other.

The Sheriff scuffed snow aside, reached down and removed a board, revealed a small, square hole.

Wilburn knelt, placed the box carefully in the hole, paused.

"Rest easy, Granddad," he whispered, his words whipped away by the cold wind.

The box slipped from between cold-numbing fingers, dropped: the Sheriff went to one knee, removed his Stetson.

Two men quietly committed the remains of someone they knew, to the earth from whence it came.

 

Wilburn thrust out his hand and the Sheriff took it.

"Thank you," he said. "I hadn't expected ..."

He swallowed.

"Weather's supposed to clear up tonight," the Sheriff said. "You might be wise to stay the night and take out after a good breakfast."

Wilburn nodded.

"Granddad said I wasn't like the other boys," Wilburn said. "He said I would listen to sound advice, and that's what this sounds like."

The Sheriff grinned.

"I knew your Granddad and I knew he wanted to sleep out here. Figured I'd get things ready."

"I, um, the estate can pay for --"

The Sheriff shook his head, smiled sadly.

"It's taken care of."

Wilburn's eyes stung as he nodded.

The Sheriff handed him a small, black leather bound book.

"You left this at the table when we ate."

Wilburn's eyes widened with distress.

"Granddad's fishing journal," he gasped. "Thank you. I'd ... I didn't know ..."

A fatherly hand rested on his shoulder, pale eyes between a Stetson brim and an iron grey mustache twinkled, winked, like a father, or a grandfather.

 

That night, as Wilburn got ready for bed, he sat on the edge of the mattress and paged slowly through his Granddad's fishing journal, re-reading the familiar words.

He remembered there were two blank pages left, in back, and he tried to think of some fitting words for the final entry.

He turned to the back, turned one blank page, stopped.

The other page was not blank anymore.

There was a pencil drawing, of two men kneeling in the snow: beside them, an oval topped tombstone with old fashioned lettering: between them, a small box being lowered into a hole in snowy ground.

Small drifts of snow, wind-blown crystals -- the Sheriff was drawn facing Wilburn and the interment, but Wilburn was drawn with an incredible accuracy.

Beneath, in an ornate, old-fashioned, copperplate script:

A Promise Kept.

 

Edited January 16 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

DISCRETION

"No."

A woman's hands, skilled, firm, stopped.

"No?"

Gilead swallowed.

"Is my wife here?"

He felt her pause as much as he heard it.

"I ... no, I'm sorry --"

"Then don't remove the bandages, not yet."

"But ... we have to assess --"

Gilead drew his head back a fraction, his voice hardening.

"No," he said firmly. "The last thing I saw before I lost my eyes was the face of an angry man attacking me. The very last thing before the lights went out."

He stopped, calmed himself: it took an effort to steady his breathing, to unclench the fists he was pressing hard into his lap.

"I want," he said slowly, "the very first thing I see, with these new eyes --"

He stopped, swallowed, then continued at a strained whisper.

"I want the very first thing I see, to be my wife's face!"

A woman's hands, gentle against both sides of his face: he felt her nod.

"I'll get her."

 

Linn looked up at his Uncle Will.

Marnie's voice on the speaker, Marnie's face on the screen.

"Angela said the bandages come off today, but there's been a complication."

Two men regarded the screen with carefully neutral expressions.

"What... kind... of complication?" two men asked with one voice.

Normally Marnie would have smiled, or even laughed.

She did neither.

Ambassador Marnie Keller leaned back, steepled gloved fingers, frowned a little as she considered her answer.

"They're bringing his wife in now."

Two men leaned forward, suddenly: "Marnie," Linn said sternly, "do you need us?"

Marnie placed her palms flat on the desktop, lowered her head and looked very directly at the camera.

"I will advise in six minutes or less."

Uncle and Nephew looked at one another, and when Will spoke, his voice was quiet as he spoke for them both:

"God Almighty, I hate waitin'!"

 

Adina heard the ladies' room door open.

She was too miserable to care.

Adina knew the stall door was open behind her, she knew her backside was looking at whoever just came in.

She did not care.

Strong hands took her shoulders, pulled.

"Stand up," Angela said quietly, firmly.

Adina stood, jaws locked against the misery she felt.

She heard the crackle of a water bottle's seal breaking.

"Here. Swish and spit, then take a small drink."

Adina did.

Adina closed her eyes as Angela wiped her face, carefully, gently, the way Adina's mother used to when she was sick.

"Adina?" Angela whispered, and Adina laid a hand on her belly.

"It has to be a boy," she whispered, then coughed: she turned, spat into the sink, ran water and splashed her face.

Angela waited until Adina pushed up from the sink, then handed her the towel.

"Gilead is asking for you."

Adina nodded, swallowed.

 

Gilead's head turned a little as the door opened.

"She's here, Gilead," Angela said briskly. 

Gilead sat up a little straighter.

He was in an exam chair; he heard something rolled closer, smelled his wife's cologne, felt her hand close around his: he frowned, turned his blind face toward her.

"Adina? What's wrong?"

"Nothing," she said quickly. "Do we know yet ...?"

"No," he said. "I ... wanted to wait until you were here."

He felt her nod, raised his head: "Proceed."

"Dim the lights, please," a man's voice said, then:  "Gilead, let's see if this works."

Gilead's scarred face was not quite neutral -- Angela saw his jaw muscles shift, saw him swallow.

He turned his head, just a little, toward the hand that held his -- toward his wife's hand -- as the bandages were carefully unwound from around his head, from over his eyes, he turned his face to where his wife sat, holding his hand.

"I can feel you shivering," he whispered. "It's all right, darlin'."

She squeezed his hand in return: Angela lifted her chin, looked to a plastic pan: she accepted it from the aide, held it discreetly behind her, watched Adina closely, in case her morning sickness returned.

 

"Five minutes fifteen," Linn murmured.

The screen lit up, Marnie tilted her head and smiled at her Daddy.

"I heard that."

"You have hearing like your mother," Linn deadpanned. "Report."

"I'm sending an Iris."

"Good, bad or otherwise?"

"The news is good."

Sheriff and retired Chief of Police looked at one another, looked back at Marnie.

"Bring it."

 

Reverend Gilead Keller looked around.

He stood behind the pulpit, gripping its edges almost as if to keep from falling over.

He lowered his head, swallowed, looked back.

"I had a fine sermon all polished up and ready," he said, his voice husky, "but ... if you'll forgive me, let me instead say thank you."

He swallowed again.

"My wife tells me of your many kindnesses."

He stopped and swallowed again.

Concerned, one of his congregation stood and said "What's it like to be able to see again?"

Gilead's smile was slow, but it broadened: he looked at his wife, seated with family in the front pew.

Gilead blinked, laughed; his wife gave him a look, mouthed the words, Don't you dare!

Gilead nodded, looked at the man whose voice he knew better than his face.

"The very first thing I saw," Gilead said slowly, "was the most beautiful thing I could ever see."

He looked at Adina.

"I saw my wife's face."

 

Gilead held the brandy snifter carefully, swirled the shining liquid slowly, marveling at its appearance.

Linn, Uncle Will, Jacob, Angela, Marnie, Shelly -- all raised their glasses to him: his wife raised hers as well, and Will felt the corners of his eyes tighten as he remembered Angela pouring Adina's snifter with something tan and bubbly:  "Ginger ale for you, sister!" she'd murmured.

"Gilead, you said this morning that your wife's face was the first thing you saw," Linn said, and gave his son a knowing look.

"Yes," Gilead admitted. "I said that."

"I notice you didn't go into detail."

"Gileaaaaad," Adina said, her voice rising slightly -- clearly a warning -- and Gilead felt his face and his ears warming rapidly.

Gilead cleared his throat, looked down at his brandy, looked back up at his wife.

"You could say that," he admitted.

Will came to his rescue, raised his glass:  "To Discretion!"

"Discretion!" the entirely family chorused, and drank.

Gilead took a taste, decided that apricot brandy was to his liking, drank: he lowered his glass, looked at his Uncle Will and said quietly, "Thank you."

Adina shot him a look -- gratitude, he reckoned.

Her face was indeed the very first thing he saw when he opened new eyes and saw again for the first time in a year and a half.

He just didn't say in public that his wife's face was shoved down in a plastic pan as she heaved up  her guts from morning sickness.

 

 

 

Edited January 17 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

SHE DIDN'T

"Good mornin'," a quiet voice said.

A man moved, or tried to.

He was stove up and sore and it hurt to move.

He managed to throw an arm over, come up on his side, then awkwardly, painfully, up on all fours.

He stayed there for a long moment, gathered his strength, felt blindly to his left, found a shelf of some kind.

He managed to make his feet, steadied himself with one hand against a heavy timber wall.

It hurt to move, it hurt to stand, it hurt to lift his head.

He opened his eyes -- they were swollen, he raised his free hand to a bruised, tender cheek bone --

Good God that man can hit! he thought, and remembered the sight of a fist coming at him, just before his lights went out --

"Got coffee, if you're of a mind," the voice said mildly.

"Thanks," he replied, forcing his eyes open a little further.

Jail.

I'm in jail.

What the hell did I do this time?

He managed to sway and stagger over to the bars.

A tall fellow with pale eyes stood on the other side of the bars; he held a steaming tin cup, handle  toward the prisoner.

"How'd I get here?"

"Wasn't peacefully."

"Thank'ee."

A pale eyed lawman waited while the prisoner took a sip, took another, drank.

"Reckon you'll need the chamber pot. Bucket's in the far corner yonder."

"Yeah, thanks."

"Back shortly."

 

Daisy Finnegan raised her fisted hand, belted the Sheriff's office door -- three hard, summoning slams of the heel of an Irishwoman's hand, demanding entry.

A pale eyed lawman lifted the heavy latch.

He didn't have to open the door.

Daisy shouldered it -- hard -- pushed it and the lawman out of her way.

She stopped, coffee pot in one hand, a cloth-tucked withie basket on her forearm: she glared up at the silent lawman, thrust an accusing finger at his chin -- "Not a word, you!" -- she stomped back toward the cells, snatched the keys off their peg, disappeared down the short hallway.

Linn shook his head and sighed -- silently, as he knew any sound would bring more Irish ire down upon him -- he closed the door, set the latch, turned.

Daisy was a woman driven by purpose and a red-headed Irish temper.

She snarled as she thrust the key into the cell door's lock, grunted as she yanked it open, glared at the prisoner as he turned quickly away from her, set the bucket down:  "Have done, woman, I'm not buttoned up!"

Daisy's glare scorched his spine and her sharp tongue seared the air: "SAINTS ABOVE, HA'E YE NO DECENCY! THERE'S A LADY PRESENT! NOW GET YERSEL' READY AN' HERE'S BREAKFAST AN' YE'D BETTER EAT WI' A GUID APPETITE!"

Linn stopped short of the hallway, unable to suppress the widening smile laying claim to his lean, tanned face: he folded his arms, leaned his shoulder against the timber wall, waited.

He heard the faint clink of tin cup on blue-granite coffeepot spout.

"This is fit t' drink," Daisy scolded, her voice harsh: "th' man can't make coffee fit t' drink if he had to!"

Daisy thrust the cup at the man, handle first, then she set the withie basket on his pallet, snatched the covering cloth free: she turned, snapped the cloth open, then tucked a corner into the man's collar, Irish-green eyes snapping.

She frowned at his discolored face, at one eye swollen nearly shut: she laid a gentle hand on his cheek and murmured, "Ye found me attractive enough last night!" -- she seized his shirt front in both hands, pulled him down or herself up, kissed him quickly, gave him a smoldering look and whispered, "A woman wants t' know she's still desirable!" -- then she shoved him away from her, whirled, stomped out of the cell: she SLAMMED the door shut, gave the big, heavy key a vicious twist, stomped down the hallway, slapped the keys into the Sheriff's chest -- "I'll need me dishes back!" she shouted.

The prisoner heard the heavy door open, slam shut: he looked up at the Sheriff as the amused lawman sauntered to his cell.

"What," he asked, "was all that?"

"That," Linn said quietly, "is why you woke up here."

"What did I do?"

"You patted her fanny."

"Dear God," the man groaned, "she beat me? -- feels like I got run over by a freight wagon!"

Linn shook his head.

"She didn't beat you," he said quietly. "Her husband did."

He leaned a forearm across the bars, his thumping head on his forearm.

"I got locked up for grabbin' her backside?"

"No," Linn grinned, "so that big Irish fire chief couldn't get to you to finish the job!"

Linn looked at the basket.

"From the smell of that, you'd best eat while it's still hot. I'll look and make sure Sean's nowhere in sight and we'll get you turned loose from here, but was I you, I'd figure it's way healthier a couple counties away from here!"

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

TO WRITE A SERMON

Gilead pushed through the heavy glass doors, stopped just inside, grateful for the warmth, for the lack of wind.

He looked around at the familiar-yet-so-foreign interior of the Sheriff's Office.

Sharon tilted her head, looked at the man curiously.

"Hi," she said.

"Umm ... hello," Gilead said uncertainly.

"Help you find somebody?"

Gilead looked to the rear of the lobby, toward a door with frosted glass and a six point star.

"I'm here to see my father."

 

Sheriff Jacob Keller looked up, surprised, took two long strides toward his brother.

The Bear Killer flowed along beside him, greeted the newcomer with a canine version of the Hoover treatment.

Jacob's grin was as wide as it was genuine: "You're just in time for dinner!"

"Actually," Gilead said uncomfortably as The Bear Killer taste tested his hand, "I need your advice."

"Easily got!" Jacob winked. "Come on in and say hello to Ruth, she'll be tickled to see you!"

 

Jacob, Ruth, Gilead and young Joseph sat around the table, The Bear Killer happily beside Joseph, alert for fallout -- as Joseph was getting some size and responsibility about him, fallout was rare these days, but The Bear Killer kept station anyway.

"I know I can have a meal fabricated," Ruth said quietly, "but it just doesn't seem right!"

"Darlin'," Jacob said gently, and Gilead could hear their father's voice in his brother's throat, "if you went to the trouble to make it, you bet your bottom dollar I'll eat it and be glad for it!"

Joseph looked from one adult to another: he hadn't spoken six words since Gilead came through the door with Joseph's father.

Gilead winked at Joseph, looked at Jacob, who happily mopped his plate with a torn open sweet roll.

"I know it's not mannerly," he said, "but it's so good I don't want to waste any!"

"I'll agree there," Gilead echoed, looked at Ruth:  "Thank you. I'm sorry, I should have sent word ahead."

"Oh, pshaw," Ruth smiled, coloring. "I've fresh apple pie ... anyone?"

Jacob rose, thrust his hand toward Joseph:  "Twist my arm!"

Joseph happily seized his Pa's wrist and Jacob flinched: "Ow, ow, ow, all right, I'll have pie!"

Father and son laughed: Ruth looked at Gilead, concerned at the sadness she saw in his eyes.

 

Ruth withdrew discreetly, allowed the men their privacy.

Gilead sat, clasped his hands: he was leaned forward, elbows on his thighs, frowning: Jacob waited, recognizing the signs of a troubled man who was trying to think of the right way to say something.

Jacob saw Gilead blink twice, rapidly, and knew he'd come to a conclusion.

"Jacob," Gilead said, "do you think Pa can forgive me?"

It was Jacob's turn to lean forward, only instead of sadness or concern, his face was genuinely surprised.

"Come again?"

Gilead looked miserably at Jacob.

"You remember ... when Mama's oldest daughter ... they had such a screamin' fight and she left and ..."

Jacob nodded.

"Pa and I didn't come to words, I just left."

Jacob waited, grateful he'd practiced the Poker Face.

"I ... I realize now Pa would've supported anything I did."

Jacob waited, listening closely, assessing his older brother's body language very carefully.

"You recall Pa told us at some time or another, every boy figures he can whip the old man?"

Jacob nodded, slowly, once.

"I never figured I could whip him," Gilead admitted, "but I sure thought I knew more than he did!"

"Did you?"

"Academically, maybe, but good sense, no. No, Pa is far wiser than I."

"You're farther ahead than most men your age."

Gilead looked at Jacob curiously.

"Most men don't really realize how smart the Grand Old Man is until they're well older than you!"

Gilead grimaced, looked away.

"At least he didn't slaughter the fatted calf," he muttered.

"He was fixin' to, then you went in for surgery, Marnie got in a scrape, Angela threw some fella through a window when he tried to lay hands on one of her nursing students, then there was a tree fell across the fence, cattle got out, I don't recall what-all went on but he had his hands full."

Jacob looked very directly at Gilead.

"He wanted to throw a big feed for you and bring in dancin' girls, kags of beer and he was even goin' to import an couple fallin' down drunks for the occasion so none of our people would have to get plastered."

"Is this where I fetch out that block of salt?" Gilead deadpanned, and they both laughed.

"Now I am not followin'," Jacob said with an exaggerated casualness: "what terrible thing did you do to fear Pa won't forgive you?"

"Jacob, in Scripture ... there's so much that's symbolic. Any time someone goes East it's symbolic for rebellion, and I went East. I reckon Pa would have put me through divinity school and likely I could've found a church to pastor out here, but I got a bad case of stupid pride and wanted to do it myself."

Jacob lifted his chin, considered, lowered his head, thought for several long moments as memories sorted themselves out and recollection arranged memory-pieces in a clearer order.

"I met Adina and got married. Do you remember I brought a girl home and Pa didn't approve of her."

"Vaguely."

"She's dead now. Pa ... didn't like her and that went all through me, so I dropped her and hated myself ever since, but she's dead so there's no goin' back to fix that one."

Jacob waited.

"I put myself through school and got my ticket, I got a church to pastor and I was doin' just fine until that pair come in and they took my eyes."

"That's when Marnie stepped in."

"She did, bless her. Got me a church offworld, she did, and I was doing good work there."

"I recall watching the vids where you took a knife in the guts keepin' your people alive, and you stone blind."

Gilead's face paled a little -- his new eyes were not pale, but they showed a hardness, a deep and abiding anger, there and gone just as quick -- Gilead nodded.

"And now we're here," he said.

"And you wonder if Pa can forgive you?"

"I was proud, Jacob. I left. I wanted to hurt him because my pride was bruised and that is no reason to cut off from family like I did."

"Gilead."

Jacob shifted in his seat, sat very straight.

"I'm not Pa, and I won't presume to speak for him, but I reckon he is the forgivin' kind. He's long allowed as God plays fair if He plays a'tall, and he's done his best to run his life that same way."

Gilead considered this carefully and finally nodded, then snorted and smiled with half his mouth.

"You know, Jacob," he said quietly, "when things were at their worst for me -- after I'd lost my eyes and I didn't reckon I'd ever see my wife, ever again -- Pa's words ... those same words ..."

His voice trailed off.

Jacob turned, pressed a key, tapped a few more.

"Pa will be at work. Your best chance will be to catch him at the Sheriff's office. I can open you up an Iris in the foyer between the outer doors and the inner."

"Thank you. I'll take you up on that."

 

Sharon watched the stranger disappear into the conference room, then she keyed the intercom.

"Sheriff? A man to see you. He's in Conference waiting."

 

That night Gilead sat in his comfortable old chair, leaned his head back the way he did when he was composing a sermon -- before he had eyes again, he'd have to memorize his sermons.

Adina smiled as she brought him coffee, sat it on his desk the way she always did, in exactly the spot she always did, knowing consistency of placement is vital in the world of the blind.

Gilead blinked, looked at his wife, smiled.

"Darlin'," he murmured, "you are gorgeous!"

"You told me that six times so far today!" she smiled.

Gilead nodded.  "Good."

"You looked like you were composing your sermon."

Gilead nodded, slowly, smiling just a little.

"My best sermons have come from actual experience," he said softly.

"How was your visit with your father?"

"Do you mean, did he forgive me?"

Adina nodded.

Gilead rose, took his wife's hands in his own, his grip gentle, the way he always did.

"Darlin', my father forgave me freely and completely, and turns out he never held my leavin' against me."

"Did you tell him why you left?"

"I told him I had a bad case of bruised pride and stupidity."

Adina tilted her head, caressed his cheek. "But that's when you met me."

Gilead gathered his wife into his arms, held her, felt her breathe, felt her warm and living and very real in his arms.

He whispered in his wife's ear, and she suspected she was hearing the core of his Sunday sermon:

"God plays fair if He plays a'tall."

 

 

 

 

                                   

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

PLANNING

"He's an old man."

"He is."

"I could take him."

Two men lifted their beers, took a drink.

"Then what?"

"Whattaya mean, then what?"

"You take an old man. So what, he's an old man!"

Beer bottles were lowered to the crumb-littered tabletop.

"He's Sheriff."

"And he's an old man."

"So?"

"So you step on a Sheriff's toe, every cop in the State will howl. You can't get away, they'll catch you and then what? You know what they'll say in gen-pop? 'He beat an old man. Big whoop.' "

"They'll say I beat a Sheriff!"

A derisive snort, a sip from a longneck.

"Your funeral."

 

An older man with twinkling, merry eyes and an iron-grey mustache looked up, grinned.

"Howdy!" he called, amused at the surprised -- almost disappointed -- expression on the stranger's face.

The stranger mumbled something in reply.

"Pick up that saddle and fetch it over, would you?"

Still surprised, the stranger turned, gripped the brand-new, just-unwrapped roping saddle: it was heavy, it was awkward, he had to reset his grip twice before dragging it off the sawhorse and waddling over with it.

"Thank'ee kindly," the Sheriff said pleasantly: he gripped the saddle, hoisted it easily, laid it over the edge of the stall, whistled quietly: something big, furry, silent and solid! slid in between the stranger and the Sheriff.

"Stand," Linn said quietly: the stranger slipped ahead, frowning as the Sheriff spun a saddleblanket over the stallion's back, smoothed it with a twitch and a swipe of callused palms: he laid a black doghouse stirrup across the saddlehorn -- "Not that it'll stay there," he complained good-naturedly to the staring stranger -- he picked up the saddle with a genuinely surprising ease, swung it back, then over the horse's back.

The stallion took a restless step, tail slashing.

"Oh, mutter your granny's hairbrush," the Sheriff chuckled: he bent, busied himself under the splotchy, brown-red-and-white horse's belly, straightened.

"Do me a favor," the Sheriff said as he laid a hand against his stallion's throat, pressed gently, backed him up half a length:  "grab those two bales of hay and set 'em over here for me? I'm gettin' puny in my old age!"

The stranger was absolutely nonplussed: here was a man he'd intended to jump from behind, he'd figured to beat him into a bloody pulp, take him by surprise and murder him, and here he was being ordered around like hired help instead!

Still -- the element of surprise was lost -- he squatted, spread his arms, tried to grip the bristly payload.

The Sheriff came up beside him, working his hands into a pair of leather work gloves.

"Easier way," he said, "like this" -- he dipped his knees just a little, ran curled fingers under the hay strings, stood: he picked up two bales, walked them over, twisted, swung one, then the other up, tossed then casually right where he wanted them.

He turned, grinned at the stranger.

"Ever put up hay?"

His voice was gentle, friendly, almost ... fatherly.

The stranger shook his head.  "N-n ... no."

"I just got done throwin' half a thousand bales. My elevator broke and had to get 'em into the hay loft by hand."  He did a slow deep knee bend, frowned a little, looked up, his eyes still bright, as if ready to spread over the rest of his face with good natured laughter.  "I'm still kind of sore after that!"

The stranger opened his mouth as if to say something; he nodded, mumbled something, turned.

Pale, knowing and somewhat amused eyes watched the stranger walk quickly away.

 

Ambassador Marnie Keller excused herself: she discreetly withdrew around a corner, raised a cell phone to her ear, delight in her face and anticipation in her voice: "Susie?"

She listened, blinked.

"Susie, you did the right thing, now get out of there! I'll send a car!"

 

Michael Keller raised a leather-gloved hand, knocked politely on the Farmall Cub's shining-red hood.

Linn looked up, grinned.

"Sir, did Marnie speak to you today?"

"She did, Michael. Had supper?"

"Victoria is inside just talkin' up a storm with Mama."

Linn frowned. "I reckon we'd best get inside and take 'em to the Silver Jewel for supper, elsewise they'll figure to go to the City and you know what that means!"

"Yes, sir," Michael grinned. "They'll both get new shoes, Victoria will want to wear those pretty new shoes and that means we'll hit every dance, every cotillion and every formal dedication this side of who-knows-where!"

"I reckon she'll dance with a hundred men."

"And get proposed to by twice that many."

Father and son and a great white Snowdrift-dog sauntered toward the house.

"Your sister talked with an old schoolmate, Susie Smith. You remember Susie?"

"The one that got into drugs and trouble, sir?"

"She's the one. Marnie got her clean, God knows how. I know she was off-planet for a while. She called Marnie and Marnie called me."

Michael stopped suddenly, regarded his father with hard and pale eyes.

"Sir?"

Linn stopped, turned, regarded his son's suddenly-solemn face.

"Yes, Michael?"

"Sir, are you safe?"

Linn laughed quietly: behind him, the front door opened, mother and daughter stepped out, pulled the door firmly shut behind them and set the alarm.

"We're going out for dinner," Victoria called, sounding like a little sister threatening to tell on someone: "are you two coming?"

Linn's eyes were tight at the corners, they were bright as they looked at his son, as he laid a gentle, fatherly hand on Michael's black-suited shoulder.

"I am safe now, Michael," he murmured. "Marnie's warning and I took care of it, story at eleven."

 

Two unwashed, disreputable sorts sat at a crumb-littered table, opened a fresh longneck apiece.

"Where's Susie?"

"Hell if I know. She left."

"Take anything?"

"Nah. Just left barehand. Can't have got far. Say, you jumped that old man yet?"

A brow-furrowed glare was the only answer.

 

 

 

 

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

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

A WOMAN'S ADVICE

Dr. John Greenlees toweled another plate dry, set it carefully in the cupboard, turned and picked another just-rinsed, still-warm plate.

Shelly could tell he had something on his mind.

Normally everyone who shared the supper table, would lend a hand with dishes, but somehow her husband and children knew Marnie's husband wanted the detail, and so they discreetly ... evaporated.

Shelly waited: mothers are wonderfully perceptive creatures, and she knew the younger man had something on his mind.

When the last plate, the last cup, the last dish was scrubbed clean, dried, set away, Dr. John hung the dish towel where it normally draped: Shelly tilted her head a little to the side -- so that's where Marnie gets the habit! -- and said, "What's on your mind?"

Dr. John Greenlees, physician and surgeon, frowned a little as he considered: he'd had his words all ready, and suddenly they seemed awkward and uncertain.

"It's Marnie," he finally said.

"Oh?"

"I need your advice."

"Oh."  Shelly's eyebrows went up, she nodded thoughtfully, then she looked at the cupboard behind Dr. John's left shoulder.

He turned, withdrew two coffee cups.

The pair sat at the corner of the kitchen table, each with a steaming mug of coffee.

"You need my advice," Shelly prompted. "About Marnie?"

He nodded, his face serious -- he looks so much like his father! -- John was hunched over his mug, shoulders rounded, forearms on the tablecloth: he leaned back suddenly, threw his shoulders back and looked at his mother in law.

"Marnie is having nightmares," he said, "and I don't know what to do!"

 

Marnie Keller was waiting for her husband when his Iris appeared.

He stepped out of the black ellipse into their parlor and stopped, surprised.

Marnie did not stop: she powered forward, stepped up to her husband, ran an arm around behind him and her other hand behind his head, pulled his face down to hers and kissed him rather soundly.

Dr. John returned both the intimacy, and the embrace: when they came up for air, he whispered, "I love your welcome home speech!"

Marnie looked up at him, affection in her eyes and welcome in the pressure of her womanly form against him.

"John," she whispered, "thank you, we need to talk!"

Her expression may have shown affection, but his confessed confusion: he sat beside her and she gripped both his hands in both of hers.

"John," she said decisively, "I have not been ... as attentive ... as I should have been, and I must beg your pardon for my distraction."

Dr. Greenlees frowned, looked curiously at his wife's solemn expression.

"Dearest ... you are an Ambassador."

"Yes, but I'm also your wife."

"You have never failed to be my wife."

Marnie's hands tightened, just a little, and she looked past him, then looked back.

"John," she sighed, "I can't say I prevented a war, but I delayed one."

"I might count that a good thing," John said slowly.

"It is," she agreed. "The more we can delay hostilities, that many fewer men will die."

"If I recall correctly, you single handedly prevented at least three wars."

"I had help, but yes, and more than three."

Her voice was soft, but her eyes filled with memories and she looked away.

"John, I've been having nightmares."

John almost -- almost! -- said "I know," but some instinct bade him to silence: instead, he pulled his wife into him as he leaned back a little, and she sighed and laid her ear on his chest, the way she did when they were courting.

"What are your nightmares?" John asked softly. "Let us look the Devil in the face!"

"I stood on a reviewing stand," Marnie said, her voice as haunted as her wide, staring eyes.

"Mine were the inspiring words that sent fine young men to die.

"They were cavalry, John, and they were beautiful ... shining horses and shining lances, pennants and guidons and uniforms, straight lines and disciplined ranks and mine was the voice they heard, telling them to go forth to ... to war."

He felt her breath catch, felt her breathing quicken, heard her voice drop to a whisper.

"Mine was the last voice they heard before they died."

 

Shelly Keller blinked rapidly, frowned a little, sipped her coffee as she arranged her thoughts: John saw her eyes swing left, as if looking into her husband's study, and she knew at least one of her thoughts was of him.

She lowered her coffee.

"Linn has nightmares."

John studied her face as he listened.

"His are either things that happened that he couldn't prevent -- those are the worst -- or things he fears might happen, and those are almost as bad."

Shelly swallowed, set her coffee down.

"He came across a wreck. He was off duty -- I don't think he was ... he may not have been a Sheriff's deputy yet. His father was still alive. He ... the car ... he knew the car.

"It was a rollover and the gas tank was split, and he bellied down to look and saw the driver was hanging upside down from the seat belt.

"Then it caught fire.

"He had a small extinguisher but it was useless, he tried but he couldn't ... he couldn't help ... that's been thirty years ago and he still wakes up hearing screaming."

John nodded somberly: he knew the wreck, the victim was his father's classmate, a good friend ... but he never knew Linn was first on scene, nor that he'd been powerless to help.

"There were others.

"He tried to talk a man out of committing suicide.

"The man blew his brains out while Linn watched.

"He came across a wreck and it caught fire as he arrived, and all he had was a two-and-a-half pound dry-chem. He still wakes up hearing the driver scream to death."

"Has he seen anyone about this?"

"No," Shelly sighed. "He'll tell me 'They're my ghosts to carry,' or 'I got me into it, I get me out of it.' "

 

Dr. John Greenlees listened to his wife's quiet, stressed syllables.

He bent his head a little, kissed the top of her head.

"Dearest?"

"Hm?"

"You play poker."

It was a statement, not a question.

"Mm-hmm."

Dr. John reached up, pulled the knit afghan off the back of the couch, drew it over them both.

"What are the odds that yours actually will be the voice to send them to war?"

Marnie hesitated.

"Dearest, you are the Ambassador. You talk people out of fights. Yours is the voice of reason and of good counsel. You help find compromise and you give them a way out."

"I don't want to fail, John," she whispered.

"Know what I think?" he asked quietly.

Marnie looked up at him like a little girl looks hopefully at her Daddy.

"I think you actually give a genuine good damn about what you do as Ambassador.

"I think you have a conscience tall as a shot tower and big around as a church.

"I think those nightmares are remote possibilities that you can foresee.

"I think you are the smartest, wisest woman I know, and I think you will fight like ten red-handed hells to keep anything of the kind from happening!"

Dr. John Greenlees tightened his arms around his wife, his voice quiet, strong, filled with conviction.

"Marnie, you've seen death and you've dealt death and you've screamed at death. You went to war when those Raiders murdered our children and tried to murder everyone in the Colony."

His voice sank to nearly a whisper.

"You know what war is, and that's why you're Ambassador. You don't want anyone else to have to see what you've seen!"

Marnie was quiet for several long moments -- long enough John wondered if she might have slipped into exhausted sleep -- then she murmured, "You're right."

 

"When Linn has nightmares," Shelly confided quietly, "I'll feel him quiver -- he rarely moves, but he'll shiver just a little. I'll lay my hand on his breastbone and his hand will slice out from under the covers and press mine to him, and I'll feel him shaking. He'll take one deep shivering breath, then he'll relax and that's it for the night."

 

Dr. John Greenlees lay beside his wife, her hand in his.

He lay awake until drowsiness claimed him, until his soul submerged in the silent lake of slumber, and the dark lake remained undisturbed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

THE BOLSHOI MEN'S CHORUS

 

Shelly dropped her head a little, glared at the German Irishman, planted her knuckles on her belt and tapped her foot like a schoolteacher addressing a naughty student.

"You'll let me take a look," she said quietly, "or Chief will order you to ER and they'll strip you down to the altogether and take pictures!"

Shelly turned, raised her Mommy-finger, and the rest of the Irish Brigade withdrew from the bunkroom.

"I'm getting better," Shelly murmured. "I didn't even have to shake my finger at them!"

The engineer unbuttoned his red-wool, bib-front shirt, pulled it off, tossed it on the bed.

Shelly took his left hand, pulled gently: he straightened his arm.

She frowned, turned him to get better light from the window on his swelling wrist.

"I don't think --" he started, and Shelly's glare was enough to stop his hopeful words.

She laid her palm under his, then tapped his fingertips, watching his expression as she did.

"Pain?"
He shook his head.

Shelly slid her palm down to mid forearm.

She raised her own arm, flexed her wrist down.

He bent his to match.

She slowly hyperextended her wrist, drawing it back as far as it would go.

She saw no sign of discomfort on his face as he imitated her movement.

Once she was satisfied he hadn't chipped the left distal ulnar prominence when he slipped on a concrete step and fell, she had him drop his drawers, examined the side of his knee the same way her husband examined a horse's leg: not only with observation, but with the laying on of hands.

To be perfectly honest, Shelly's examination was as professionally efficient as her husband's equine assessments: after having him grab the foot of a bunk and do a deep knee bend while her fingertips listened on either side of his knee, she had him pull his drawers back up.

She laid a hand on his shoulder as he cinched his belt, looked him in the eye and said with a straight face, "You'll live."

"Gee, thanks for the sympathy," he muttered, looking red-faced at Chief Fitzgerald, who had his arms crossed, with one hand covering his mouth and hiding the lower part of his steadily reddening face.

"Do I at least get a lollipop for being a good boy?" the engineer complained in the whiniest voice he could manage, and Shelly dipped two fingers into her uniform blouse pocket, pulled out a cellphone wrapped, cherry flavored sucker, handed to him.

She looked at Fitz and said, "Nothing broken, I don't think there's anything chipped.  Cleared for duty."

"Good enough!" Fitz nodded.

"I feel like an ass, fallin' like that," the engineer muttered.

"If you like, I can arrange the Bolshoi Men's Chorus to sing in a harmonious minor note," Shelly said, straight faced: she clasped her hands in front of her breastbone and swayed dramatically as she sang, "Duuummmbbbbb, Duuummmbbb!"

She came up on her toes, kissed the red-faced German Irishman on the cheek, spun like a giggling little girl, skipped over to the firepole -- a jump, a drop, a happy "Wheee!" and she was gone.

A voice echoed up from below:  "Hey, we're jealous! We didn't get a lollipop!" 

 

 

 

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

TO KEEP A CONFIDENCE

Michael Keller breezed into the conference room with all the stealth of a dust-devil on a windy August afternoon.

A dust-devil in a black suit and a broad, bright-eyed grin.

He didn't run -- the Abbott considered that his twin sister might've skipped happily -- Michael's gait was rapid, but contained: he strode purposefully the length of the heavy timber table, placed a squarish, cloth-wrapped, string-tied bundle in front of the Abbott.

The scent of coffee rose invitingly from the bundle, and William raised curious fingertips to the cloth, finding it pleasantly warm.

He raised the warm bundle, closed his eyes, inhaled deeply, smiled.

"Fresh from the roaster," Michael grinned. "This isn't Confession but I need it covered with the Seal of the Confessional!"

The Abbott placed the fragrant gift back on the tabletop, gave the tall, slender lad an amused look, nodded.

Michael pulled a chair out, dropped into it, leaned forward -- for all the world like his pale-eyed father did, only with the nervous energy of youth -- elbows on his knees, hands clasped and two fingers steepled, he frowned at something inside William's ribcage and then looked up.

"Abbott," he said, "I am convinced of the existence of God."

It was not easy to surprise the Abbott: after a lifetime in the Priesthood, he'd heard confessions enough, he'd seen things enough, very little could surprise him.

This, however, did.

"Abbott," Michael pressed on, "I'm going to tell  you some things this world isn't ready for yet, so bear with me."

The Abbott nodded gravely.

Michael pulled his sleeve back, bent his wrist: the Abbott saw something that looked like ... well, he wasn't sure what it was like: he'd seen Michael horseback, wearing leather roping cuffs, and this ...

... wasn't ...

Michael passed two fingers over it, and it changed from flat black (leather?) to a complex-looking, glowing screen.

Michael looked up toward the tabletop, the fingers of his off hand busy.

The Abbott blinked, surprised: he'd seen such things portrayed on the silver screen, but never in person.

"Hologram?" he hazarded.

"Yes, sir. And for scale --"

What the Abbott saw, rotating slowly end-for-end, was long, slender, silver: flat-footed legs extended, the image appeared to land delicately on the tabletop and what looked for all the world like the hinged bottom jaw of a sleek, dangerous bird of prey, lowered, to reveal a black sarcophagus.

The sarcophagus rose, stepped off the lowered jaw, stood: black arms and black hands gripped the spherical black head, twisted, lifted.

"Howdy!" Gracie's voice called, then her image gave the Abbott an assessing head-tilt: "You've lost weight, but your color's good!"

The Abbott blinked as the image drew back, grew: suddenly Gracie was life-sized, standing through the table, with the great silver bird overhanging her shoulder, it jaw swung down behind her, absolutely filling the tall, quiet room.

"Gracie?"

Gracie laughed, that contagious laugh he remembered so well: she was ever a welcome guest in their Monastery, and as often as the Ladies' Tea Society joined the White Sisters in choral praise, so did Gracie with her curlyback fiddle -- she'd ride in on a mule in a mid-calf skirt and work boots, in a flannel shirt and a broke-brim hat, looking like a lost mountaineer, but when she pulled out her signature fiddle, she could spin magic from its strings fit to bring a strong man to tears for the hearing of it.

"Abbott, I'm well on the other side of two star systems away," Gracie grinned. "I'm a Valkyrie -- we're a squadron of fighter-interceptors and we just got put in our place."

"I ... have never ... heard Confession from a ... hologram?" the Abbott said hesitantly.

Gracie laughed -- that contagious laugh of hers, easy, natural ... clean, he thought, then corrected himself.

Innocent.

No ... clean suits her better!

"Abbott, I'm not stationed on Mars anymore. We're part of a thirteen star system Confederacy. Michael consulted with you on where to get Douay Bibles printed up for distribution. Faith is alive and well in all the Confederate worlds. Presbyterianism is chief among the represented beliefs" -- the holographic image turned, looked at Michael, looked back.

"Abbott, we intercepted a rogue world sailing through space. God alone knows how it got knocked out of orbit. It was pretty much a planet sized frozen rock but it was headed where it shouldn't.

"Each of our Interceptors command firepower enough to incinerate a planet, my ship here" -- she hooked a black-gloved thumb over her shoulder -- "can cut a world apart and play pool with the fragments, but there were complications."

Gracie's transmitted image frowned and she turned to look at her ship, as if asking a question, or listening for an answer.

"There were two interlocked pulsars that ... they each put out a spinning beam that could slice Gunfighter here in two, or burn her out and me with her, and flying through that would be like trying to swim a goldfish through two interlocking Cuisinarts.

"We couldn't stop that rogue planet.

"Abbott," Marnie said, her voice and her face suddenly serious, "my ship and I have eyes that can see light-years into the distance. We can slip between dimensions and cross universes in the space between heartbeats. I can see what color a DNA strand is, when I look through my ship's eyes, and my ship and I can calculate trajectories and solve problems that would take ten legions of mathematicians with quantum computers a lifetime to figure out."

Gracie's life sized image in its black skinsuit, standing through the table in front of the cleric, looked very directly, very seriously at him.

"Abbott," she said softly, "the entire squadron came together and we talked to God about it.

"This was something we couldn't get through to stop, and by the time that planet bulldozed through the beams it would be too late to prevent its dropping into a gravity well and being slingshot toward occupied planets -- three of them all told -- we projected the damage it would do and we knew there's no way we could evacuate ahead of it and we wouldn't be able to stop it."
Gracie closed her eyes, took a long breath.

"We had two choices, Abbott.

"We could sit there and watch a slow motion train wreck blast three occupied worlds into shrapnel, or we could call on the biggest, meanest, most powerful weapon system any of us knew about."

The Abbott's interest was evident: he leaned forward, nodded once, unblinking eyes listening as intently as clean-scrubbed ears.

"A temporal rift opened up. We found where it led, a year later -- God opened the rift, the rogue planet sailed through it, the rift closed and a cosmic billiard ball was plucked from the table before it could shatter three worlds."

"Where did it go?" the Abbott asked quietly.

"In a decaying orbit around a neutron star. It'll be torn apart and pretty much its dust will be sucked down onto the star and that'll be it."

Gracie tilted her head, hefted her spherical helmet.

"Gotta go, Abbott," she smiled. "Got a train to catch."

"A ... train," the Abbott echoed skeptically, and Gracie laughed, and the Abbott smiled to hear it again.

"We do what good we can, Abbott. We're constantly on patrol. We're not the only life out there and we've had to draw lines in the sand, and I'm due to patrol a known border sector." 

Gracie lifted her helmet, started to ease it down over her Marine-short haircut, then she hesitated, lowered the helmet.

"I'll be talking to God about it."

The Abbott watched as the life-sized image of a black-skinsuited woman, standing through the solid timber table, slipped the helmet over her head, twisted it slightly: he heard a distinct, metallic *click!* -- the figure turned, walked back to the huge silver bird's open jaw, turned, lay down, and became a shining-black, human-shaped sarcophagus once more.

The silver jaw closed -- silently -- then the entire Interceptor simply, silently ...

... disappeared. 

Michael's voice was quiet in the sudden, hushed absence.

"When the cockpit closes," he said, "there oughta be something. It ought to whine shut, like hydraulics maybe."

The Abbott nodded thoughtfully, looked down at the beads, forgotten in his hand.

"I should have given her this to take with her," he whispered.

"She was a hologram, Abbott. This is real" -- Michael patted the fragrant cloth package of fresh-roasted, still-warm coffee -- "Gracie was a projected image."

He tapped at his wrist-unit, considered, smiled.

"Abbott, all this is under the seal of the Confessional. This world isn't ready to know about us yet. As far as anyone knows, Mars is lightly populated but cut off and they've not been able to raise a signal. Nobody knows for sure whether the colony is alive or not. They are.

"Marnie isn't Sheriff anymore, Jacob is, only this world doesn't know that. 

"Marnie is Ambassador for the entire thirteen star system Confederacy, this world doesn't know that.

"We have technologies that make Earth's most advanced achievements look like scratching stick figures in the dirt.

"Do you remember after a Christmas service, you gave each of the Ladies of the Tea Society a little leather wallet with a Rosary in it?"

The Abbott blinked, smiled, nodded.

"Gracie has hers with her. It's in a pocket of her suit. She has a Bible with her and she doesn't just read it daily, she studies it."

The Abbott considered this, nodded.

"Abbott, thirteen star systems has more inhabited, Earthlike planets than I can think of offhand. I've been to several, but not all. Their level of technology ranges from early steam industrial level to well more advanced than Earth. The seminal history of this Confederacy is ... a subject for another time."

"Which means ... you're trying to make a point."

Michael looked at the Abbott, and the cleric saw something that surprised him.

He saw memory in Michael's eyes, and he saw a fear of that memory.

"I was shot," Michael almost whispered, "my Fanghorn and I. It was an energy-rifle that could cut a battleship in two with one slice. It overpowered our field and burned out my spine and did more damage to my back bone than anyone realized."

He swallowed, closed his eyes for several long moments: the Abbott leaned forward, laid cautious, gentle fingertips on the back of Michael's hand.

Michael opened his eyes, gripped the Abbott's hand, looked at him with the expression of a scared, hurt little boy.

"They had to pattern me a new spine," he whispered, "they scanned Victoria's spine and regrew mine -- the bony structure -- but they couldn't regrow a neural net from hers. They patterned hers but they had to honestly regrow mine from the word go."

Michael shivered.

"Abbott, doctors are good and technology is fine, but they ... can't ..."

Michael closed his eyes again, took a long, steadying breath, grimaced.

"PTSD, I guess, sorry about that," he whispered. "That'll happen when you feel your body burning from the inside."

Michael's grip remained tight around the Abbott's tanned, callused palm.

"You remember the joke about the scientist challenging God to a creation contest. The scientist reached down and scooped up a handful of dirt and God said "No, get your own dirt!"

The Abbott smiled, just a little, nodded encouragement:  Go on.

"Doctors and technology don't make their own dirt," Michael said, his voice serious, his breathing betraying the stress of memories he really didn't want to look at again. 

The Abbott laid his other hand, warm and reassuring, over Michael's, pressed gently.

"I understand," he said quietly.

Michael rose, still holding the Abbott's hand.

"Thank you," he said, his voice tight. "I had to talk to someone and I figured I could trust you to hold this confidence."

Michael released the Abbott's hand, bent his wrist, tapped at the screen, or whatever it was the Abbott saw: something tall, black, elliptical opened behind Michael, at the far end of the long, heavy table, and something huge, ugly, blond-furred and lightning-patterned walked slowly out of the ellipse, hung its blocky, muscled neck over Michael's shoulder, chirped like a contented canary as Michael caressed its blunt, broad nose.

"This is Lightning," Michael said. "She and I were hit with the same energy rifle and she had to heal same as I did, only she's tougher. She had to heal on her own, until Victoria rubbed some Starfighter nanos into her so she'd heal faster."

The Abbott had absolutely no idea what starfighter nanos were, but there were some things a man of the cloth simply accepted.

Life sized holograms were a new experience, but the Abbott accepted this.

A black ellipse and a genuinely huge and rather ugly horse-thing was another.

Michael unwrapped two peppermints, said "Hold out your hand."

The Abbott watched as this fanged horse-thing sniffed, clearly interested, then delicately lipped the swirly, red-and-white hard candies off his palm.

Michael handed him a cloth -- "for the horse slobber," he explained -- the Abbott laughed quietly, handed the used rag back.

"Lightning and I have been tried in the same fires," Michael said, "literally."

 

The Abbott sat alone in the conference room, considering.

He'd blocked off an hour's time, to meet with Michael, and he'd used nearly the full hour.

He leaned back in his chair and looked at the high ceiling, remembered a spaceship and its pilot, a monstrous horse-thing with fangs and a quiet voiced, pale eyed, tall boy of his acquaintance, and he smiled, just a little.

"Saint Mercurius," he murmured, "sometimes you go to the Confessional, and sometimes it comes to you."

He looked out the window, looked up at the cloudless winter sky, smiled quietly.

He asked me to keep this meeting in confidence, the Abbott thought as he felt amusement tickle his belly from the inside.

I don't think that will be difficult.

Who would believe that I had a spaceship, a fighter pilot and a Monster Horse with fangs, visit me all on the same day?

He picked up the squarish, cloth wrapped bundle, lifted it to his nose, closed his eyes, took a long, savoring sniff.

He looked at the stenciled brand inked into the cloth:

Ambassador's Blend

McKenna Coffee Works

The Abbott laughed quietly.

This, he thought.

This they will believe.

 

 

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

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

MOUNTED INFANT-RY

Ruth moved in like a tugboat with a maternal instinct: something small, bundled and noisy was handed off from one maternal set of hands to another -- a later review of surveillance was met with the approvingly murmured words, "Quarterback Sneak!" -- Jacob received the football, stepped through the airlock door, lifted the flap of soft fuzzy blanket and frowned at the red, wrinkled, open-mouthed and very loud little boy-child.

Jacob Keller pulled out a small, powerful light, held it almost into the little, scarlet, wide-open mouth, pressed the button, frowned: he switched off the light, returned it to an inner pocket.

Beside him, the airlock whispered open, a little girl brought out two baby bottles: she lifted the flap of Jacob's coat pocket, slid them in, looked up at the Martian Sheriff, smiled shyly as he winked at her.

Not long after, a Martian Sheriff and another man's child emerged from an Iris into a sunlit field.

Jacob curled his lip and whistled, laid the blanket wrapped bundle down on wind-bent grass.

Apple-horse, curious, bent his neck and sniffed at the unfamiliar creature that waved chubby little arms and looked around, wondering whether to cut loose and imitate a juvenile storm cloud or not.

Jacob unbuckled the left hand saddlebag, pulled out a pint flask, wiggled the genuine cork out of the bottle's neck.

The contents were a thin purple in color -- Uncle Will's Finest, half and half moon likker and home made wine -- guaranteed to go down like Mama's milk and blow the socks off a man's feet, carried by a pale eyed lawman for medicinal purposes only.

He had medicinal need for this potent potion.

Jacob dipped the pad of his little finger into the bottle, looked down at the grunting, restless baby boy.

Right about then, the child decided it was time for another good long extended caterwaul.

Jacob pulled its little red fist out of its mouth and quickly, with the ease of having done this before, lightly anointed angry red gums covering ready-to-emerge teeth with the soothing fires of distilled Numbitfast.

He laughed silently at the child's shocked expression -- the protesting thrusts of a young tongue, until the realization that pain relief was better than its taste -- Jacob took advantage of this moment of juvenile confusion, plugged the bottle's milk-dripping nipple in, murmured "Storm Plug."

 

Back in the Firelands Colony, Ruth towed two young children, one in each hand, into another section, smiling at the happy, energetic young: behind her, a young mother, frazzled, changed clothes: her husband stepped into the room, smiled, extended his hand.

"It's been a while since we had a night out," he said, and winked.

 

An Appaloosa stallion and a pale eyed Sheriff scented the wind, looked into the distance: yonder, just shy of the mountains and misty in the distance, a storm was building: the wind was carrying toward them, and Jacob smelled rain, he smelled ozone from the thunder storm: it was still miles away, the sun was still warm on his back, and he leaned forward slightly to cast his Stetson's shadow on the baby wrapped up in the blanket.

Between the horse's motion and the comfort of a filling belly, and probably because chewing on the rubber nipple helped its sore gums -- and likely having worn himself out squalling as long as he had -- a little baby in a blanket and in a Sheriff's arms, relaxed, and fell asleep.

 

Ruth discreetly withdrew as husband and wife were shown to their table.

She'd given the wife a recall button to press, when they were ready to return; their other two children were napping under the watchful eye of another of the Firelands ladies: Ruth knew children, and she knew how important it was that they burn off nervous energy, and she'd taken them somewhere very near her home, a place where they could run and jump and leap into piles of fragrant straw, where they could chase billy goats with three horns, and the billy goats could chase them, back and forth in a sunlit field, with little baby billies bouncing after them, laughing: finally, tiring out, the goats came up and crowded up against them, the children each gripped a curled horn, and the billies trotted happily back, towing cheek-glowing, out-of-breath children, half a dozen curly-white Little Billies following.

 

Jacob ducked to clear the crude lintel.

He rode Apple into the open-sided shed: they just made it before the rains hit.

Jacob swung down, carried the wiggling baby over to a work bench, laid him down and stripped him down.

"I ain't as good at this as m'wife," Jacob muttered, "but I've changed my share of little backsides. Holt still now" -- and a father's experienced hands managed a swift and expert diaper change, complete with powder and frown.

Jacob made sure the diaper was smooth, snug, secured: he rewrapped the sleepy little boy in the blanket, dropped the soiled diaper in a plastic sack and threw a knot in it -- "That'll hold the smell," he explained to the yawning little face that looked up at him -- "how's them teeth, hey? You need another gum rubbin'?"

A little baby boy managed a truly huge, stretching yawn: Jacob picked him up, leaned him over his shoulder, over the spit rag he laid just in case.

"You'n me," he rumbled, "we're like a couple old b'ars. We git our belly full, we git warm, we go to sleep!"

Jacob raised his leg, got a boot into the doghouse stirrup, bounced twice, swung back into saddle leather.

He had to hunch over just a little to keep his Stetson out of the crude rafters: he bent his wrist, tapped a command, and he and Apple-horse eased through an Iris, and the sound of rain on a tin roof was gone.

 

The Bear Killer's head came up and his tail began slashing back and forth across the smooth stone floor.

Apple-horse walked easily, daintily, steel shoes loud on the slick-polished deck: Jacob walked up to a particular doorway.

"Ho," he called softly, and Apple-horse ho'd.

Ruth smiled as she stepped out, caressed Apple's nose, then looked up at her husband, smiled: she raised her arms and received a sleeping little boy-baby.

Jacob touched his hat-brim and Ruth stepped back across her threshold: an Iris opened, and Jacob walked Apple through it.

Not five minutes later Jacob came through the door, smiled as Ruth glided over to him: Jacob's grin was broad and boyish as he held his wife.

"Did they make it?" he asked quietly.

"They're still there," Ruth said. "I imagine they'll spend the night."

Jacob grinned, nodded, laughed quietly.

"I wonder how many other Sheriffs do things like this?"

Ruth caressed his smooth-shaven cheek, blushed a little as she did, but there was no missing the pride in her face, and in her voice, as she said, "Only the ones who take care of their people."

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

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

ON THE BACK STAIRS

Children they were, and like children, they slipped away from adults' watchful eyes every chance they got.

It's what children do.

They sat side by side in companionable silence, each knowing the other a kindred soul, each realizing without outward proofs or adult assurance they were bonded somehow, conjoined on a deeper level than didactic instruction.

Sarah Lynne McKenna sat beside Jacob Keller, each leaning against the other, neither speaking: beneath them, behind them, above them, voices, a piano, the sounds of saloon and of commerce, coming through hand-fitted walls and stairs, but between them ... silence, and this was a comfort to them both.

Each bore scars, terrible scars, from adults who'd done terrible things to them both.

Not all the scars could be seen with the naked eye.

Both knew their responsibilities; both knew the duties expected of them; both lived now in stable homes, both loved and trusted their parents, those adults to whom they had to answer, those adults who -- thus far -- had given no sign of violence toward them, no sign of temper toward them.

Neither trusted completely.

Both had been hurt far too deeply, too terribly, to ever trust anyone with the innocent completeness of a child.

No one but each other.

Jacob blinked a few times, the way he did when a notion occurred to him, and Sarah saw this and smiled just a little, laid her hand on his, squeezed gently.

"How come these steps are so clean?" he almost whispered.

Sarah smiled, thrust out a foot, pointed her toe like a dancer: "I had these made," she replied in a soft voice. "Felt soles. I wear them here."

"Felt?"

Sarah nodded.

"I wear these indoors when I wish to be silent."

Jacob's brows puzzled together a little.

Sarah smiled. "I dust these steps myself."

"You said nobody else knows about them."

"They don't. I locked the panels above and below so nobody can get in. The panels are cleverly enough made you can't tell it's not just part of the wall."

Jacob scratched his head, frowned.

"We're the only two who use these steps," she whispered. "I dust them so we can sit here and not get our backsides dusty."

Jacob turned his head, his shoulders, considered the length of this hidden staircase, looked back at the pale eyed girl seated beside him.

"That's an awful lot of work, just for us."

Sarah dropped her head, leaned into him a little more.

"It's the only place --" she whispered, then she swallowed, and Jacob turned, ran his arms around her, held her.

"You're safe here," he whispered, and he felt her shiver.

"You're the only one I feel safe with," she whispered back, and he heard her voice tighten in her throat, at least until she lifted her face and added, "you and Twain Dawg."

Jacob's grin was quick, boylike, bright, that there-and-gone look of delight that lifted her heart, that expression so very few people had ever seen.

It would be another year before the Sheriff would find written corroboration of several peoples' suspicions, that he was sire to both children, that they, Jacob and Sarah, were blood relation: until then, they knew only they had a deep affinity, the knowledge that each could trust the other with more than their immortal soul.

 

"Jacob."

The man's voice carried the warmth a father feels for a son, and Jacob could hear the smile hidden in the man's single word.

"Sir."

Sheriff Linn Keller stopped, looked around again -- the man's eyes were never still, he was perpetually watchful, a trait Jacob took as normal, for the men he looked up to all exhibited this same tendency.

"I had a big lie to tell you," Linn said quietly, "and damned if I can remember just what it was!"

Jacob almost never smiled in public, but here, with just the two of them and the Sheriff's stallion as the only witnesses, Jacob allowed his smile to flow from the corners of his eyes down through the rest of his face.

"Would it be swampland for sale in the Great Mexican Desert, sir?"

Linn frowned, shook his head.

"No, that was last week. Might have been Professor Nonesuch's genuine snake oil."

"The kind that makes a man younger, smarter and better lookin', sir?"

The Sheriff snapped his fingers, winked: "The very thing!" he declared.

He looked around again, eyes busy, searching.

He'll pull out his watch now, Jacob thought, and sure enough, the Sheriff curled his fingers, pushed up on a vest pocket, brought out a watch.

Jacob had designs on that very watch, and a surprise in mind: he'd have to be slick, he'd have to be quick, but when he was done, he believed both his Pa and the woman he refused to call Mama would be pleased.

 

Jacob smiled as Sarah flowed down the steps in her felt-soled slippers.

She'd had them made to look like her other pretty patent-leather slippers -- "I don't want Mama to know about these," she explained, "she'll ask why I had them felt soled" --

Jacob nodded, once, his expression suddenly stern, and Sarah bit off the rest of her explanation, swallowed the words, suddenly uncomfortable.

Sarah was above Jacob: he stood, held out his hands, and Sarah took them, took another step down, until they were eye to eye.

"Sarah," Jacob whispered, "I hide things too."

Two children with old eyes hugged one another, suddenly, desperately, each knowing in the most secret part of their wounded souls that here, here was the one living creature in all the world that would understand, that was the most worthy of the other's trust.

They slacked their long embrace, but still held hands, pale eyes looking into pale eyes.

"I have something to show you," Jacob whispered.

He curled his fingers, pushed up under a vest pocket, turned his hand and opened it.

Sarah tilted her head, interested: they sat, Sarah's skirts rustling quietly as she arranged them under her.

"Pa's watch," Jacob whispered.

Sarah gave him a puzzled look.

"I had this one made," Jacob explained. "I played hell gettin' his watch and gettin' it to a man that did engravin'. He chased this one" -- Jacob showed Sarah the closed watch cover -- "just absolutely exactly like his, only here in the middle -- see this? -- I had him add this and I told him to make it just as real as he could."

Sarah marveled at the closed cover of the watch.

In an arc, almost a compete circle, beautifully engraved into the hunter's case, the words

Sheriff Linn Keller

Sarah knew the Sheriff's watch bore his name, she'd seen something was engraved on it, and she'd been able to look at it -- she'd learned to read men, she knew when the Sheriff shifted his weight and dropped a shoulder slightly, when he looked around with his hand open a little in front of his belly that he was going to push his watch up and palm it before he read it -- she'd been close enough to see his name, engraved after this exact wise.

Jacob saw her lips draw up at the corners, saw her expression soften as she studied the center of the watch cover.

"A rose," she breathed, and Jacob grinned -- she looked up into Jacob's eyes -- Sarah hugged him again, quickly, impulsively, released, looked down at the rose engraved in the center of what used to be bare, polished metal.

Jacob's thumb pressed down on the stem and the engraved watch-cover flipped open.

Sarah's eyes widened and she cupped her hand over her mouth, and Jacob heard her quick, delighted breath as she blinked, as she leaned a little closer, as she stared at the inside of the watch cover.

"Jacob," she whispered, "it's Aunt Esther!"

Jacob's cheeks reddened and his eyes narrowed -- she felt his silent laughter -- they stared at the flawless, lifelike, hand-painted portrait of a truly beautiful woman, a woman with red hair and green eyes, a woman regarding the viewer with a quiet and knowing expression.

Esther Keller looked up at them from the inside of the watch-case.

Jacob closed the case -- reluctantly, Sarah thought -- he slipped it back into his vest pocket.

"I've already shown Mother," he said quietly, and his expression was troubled: he blinked quickly, lifted troubled eyes to Sarah and asked, his voice serious:

"Sarah, when she looked at this, her eyes watered up and she had to dab at her eyes."

"It's all right, Jacob," Sarah whispered, her hands warm and reassuring as they closed about his hand and the watch that it held.

"That means that she's happy enough to cry!"

Jacob blinked, confused, worried his bottom lip between even white teeth, looked at Sarah again and raised one eyebrow, just the way she'd seen the Sheriff do when discussing a confusing matter.

"It made her happy?"

Sarah nodded.

"Mama cried because she was happy and Mama cried for sorrow."

He looked at Sarah, slipped the watch back into his vest pocket.

"I don't reckon I have women figured out," he admitted, his hand protectively flat on the vest pocket, then she saw his eyes change as his train of thought was switched onto another set of tracks.

"I'll need to trade out his watch," Jacob said. "I'll play hell doin' it while he's asleep."

"Why not just give it to him?" Sarah suggested. "Walk up to him and tell him his watch is due for a cleaning and hand him this one, tell him a man ought to have an extra."

Jacob chewed on a knuckle as a smile flowed down from the corners of Jacob's eyes and over the rest of his face, and Sarah, silent on felt-soled slippers that looked just like the pretty shoes she usually wore, flowed like a ghost across those boards underfoot that would not groan and betray her passage, and she looked through a peep-hole she'd discovered years before and watched as Jacob walked up to his father, spoke: the man turned toward Jacob, Jacob held out his hand.

She could not see the Sheriff's face -- the brim of his hat was in the way -- but she could tell by the square-up of his shoulders, the slight straighten of his habitually-straight spine, that the man was pleased, even before he opened the watch-face.

She saw Jacob's hand raise a little, curled fingers indicating the watch, she saw his thumb twitch -- probably following his words, she thought, he might be telling the Sheriff to take a look and see if the time is right --

Sarah bit delicately on her knuckle as she saw the Sheriff's thumb tighten down, as the lid snapped open --

The Sheriff's head came up a little, and Sarah could just see his curled, iron-grey mustache widen and lift a little, the way it did when the man smiled, and Sarah wiggled a little with absolute delight as she saw the man nod, as he gripped Jacob's shoulder, as he turned to show the portrait to someone standing beside him.

Sarah drew back, rose gracefully, turned: she pressed a release, slid another, eased the panel aside on its silent, waxed track, slipped into the hidden back stairs, closed the panel and made sure it was locked: she hugged herself with happiness, remembering the moment when a father laid an approving hand on his son's shoulder.

 

 

Edited January 24 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

FRAME AND BINDER

Retired Police Chief Will Keller regarded the matted, framed drawing: his eyes were bright, wrinkled at the corners, the way they were when something pleased the man, and right now he was pleased indeed.

"I drew this part," Victoria said, her pink, clean-scrubbed finger indicating the lifelike, detailed pencil drawing of a Fanghorn in full charge, cleverly enough rendered to seem to be coming off the eggshell paper, about to ram into and tromple over top of the viewer.

"Michael drew that part."

Her finger shifted, withdrew: Will knew the horse, a rearing Appaloosa mare, and he knew the shouting girl astride the hoof-slashing mare, the little girl with the delighted, shouting expression, slinging her Stetson by its brim in salute as her brother came rip-roaring alongside on the war-charging Fanghorn.

Uncle Will looked at the picture, looked at Michael, at Victoria.

"You do know we're trying to keep the Confederacy a secret," he said quietly.

"This is safe," Victoria said knowingly. "It's not a photograph."

Will nodded, frowned at the drawing, shook his head.

"I do well to draw a stick figure," he sighed. "You two ... ever since I can recall, you both had this gift!"

"That's what Lightning looks like," Victoria said. "I had her run toward me so I'd know how to draw them!"

"Lightning thought it was fun," Michael said softly. "I dismounted and stood where Victoria was, and I had Lightning run at me the same way as we did Victoria, so I could see what she -- Victoria -- looked like when Peppermint reared when Lightning came past."

He grinned at the memory, then shivered.

"Peppermint got tired of just staying in one place," Victoria explained. "She wanted to turn and run with Lightning." 

She looked at her twin brother, bit her bottom lip, considered for a moment, then admitted, "We almost ran into Michael."

"It was close," Michael admitted, "but I had to know what they looked like when Lightning came through like that!"

"That," Will said softly, "would be pretty damned intimidating, having her come at a man like that!"

The twins nodded together, and their voices as well:  "It was!"

"I do appreciate this," Will said softly, looking from one to the other.  "Thank you."

 

Sheriff Jacob Keller eared the hammer back on his blued-steel .44.

"Don't," he said -- one word, quietly spoken.

It was enough.

More than just the Firelands colonists were familiar with the triple-click of a single action revolver coming to full stand, and the proliferation of Westerns through the Known Worlds popularized the notion that the plow handle revolver on a lawman's belt was a tool of mystical power, able to slap down the biggest, meanest sort with incredible ease -- an image Jacob took pains to reinforce when he took pistol practice out on the Martian sands.

Little boys and grown men watched the Inter-System broadcasts, watched as the pale eyed Martian Sheriff casually walked around a pile of sand, as he drew, fired, as a yellow-painted steel silhouette twisted and swung as if actually feeling the impact of a hard-cast .44.

Jacob shot into jugs of liquid, sometimes drawing both revolvers at once, a smooth, coordinated fast draw, hitting two plastic gallon jugs at once, blasting them both into impressive sprays of water -- hot water that vaporized, crystallized into clouds that sublimated away before they hit the ground.

When it became necessary to address the violent, or the deadly, the image Jacob cultivated worked in his favor -- not always, those who chose to indulge in recreational compounds, those enraged or impassioned, often disregarded the reasonable, the sensible

When Jacob eared back the hammer on his engraved, blued-steel .44, when Jacob spoke one word, quietly, it had the desired effect.

A knife fell to the deck and an individual felt himself sobering with a most unpleasant velocity.

 

Uncle Will opened a three ring binder he'd unwrapped: it arrived by common carrier, and instead of a return address, it had a pencil-drawn rose inside a horseshoe, and he knew who sent it.

He opened the notebook, read the note stuck to the inside of the front cover:

Uncle Jacob said he and Marnie helped you cast bullets.

He said what he's loaded with, he cast himself, with your furnace and your mold.

Will turned the page, grinned at the remarkable drawing: he wasn't sure if it was Michael or Victoria who rendered this, but when he looked at Jacob's delighted face, when he saw the look of delight on a baby boy's face as dear old Dad took him under the arms and swung him waaaaay up toward the ceiling, Will couldn't help but smile a little, for he'd done that very thing with Jacob, when Jacob was but a babe in diapers.

Another page, another drawing: Jacob sitting with his little boy beside him, Jacob's hand gripping his son's -- a light grip -- the next page, Jacob's hand, spread wide across Joseph's shoulder blades, his face turned toward his son and his mouth open a little, and Will could almost hear Jacob's praising encouragement as his son painstakingly plied his pencil and formed letters on paper.

Another page: Ruth, buxom and motherly, laughing as she knelt, all skirts and smiles as Jacob lay on his back, pressing the laughing, squealing little boy like he'd press a weight.

I don't think I could do better with a camera, Will thought, nodding.

Another page, and Jacob stood, his arm extended, thumb just coming off the full-cocked hammer, his eyes hard, unforgiving.

The drawing was flawless.

The drape of his watch-chain across his vest, the curl and texture of his handlebar mustache, his bladed stance, the slight tilt to his Stetson ... Will nodded again, turned the page and laughed.

He saw himself, holding something in a picture frame, with Victoria pointing to it and her mouth open in explanation.

Will raised his head and looked around.

If I frame these, he thought, I'll need more walls to have room to hang 'em!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 25 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

JUST ONCE!

The Confederate Ambassador marveled at Marnie's success.

Many's the time they two went to the negotiating table and came away with success and accord, with all parties quietly pleased, or all parties equally displeased -- Marnie explained once to such a group that "Diplomacy is the art of making everyone equally unhappy," which was just the soothing humor needed to take the sting out of nobody getting quite what they wanted.

The Ambassador marveled at Marnie's ability to draw a delegate aside and talk with an open, unaffected candor, a disarming openness that go results: Marnie was patient, Marnie was firm where firmness was required, and above all else, Marnie was a Lady, in the finest sense of the word.

The Ambassador genuinely regretted two things.

He honestly regretted being well older than the lovely young Madam Ambassador, and he even more sincerely regretted that she was a married woman.

 

Marnie flowed across the dance floor, an opposing delegate on each arm: with the staunchest representatives of their respective parties, each utterly at odds with the other, both walking with this beautiful, charming, younger woman -- with Marnie's face shining, her eyes bright, her laughter sparkling in the ballroom's lights -- none there could miss Marnie's charm, her skill, her ability to bring together people at opposition, and crack the hard shell of their stubbornness, and make it look easy.

Dance was an art preserved and cherished through the generations of Southrons, and skill at dance was yet the mark of a well-born gentleman: the opposing delegates heard the music start and suspected they'd been set up by this pale-eyed seductress in a floor-length gown, and they found themselves spun, each in a beautiful woman's hands: the familiar tune, the feel of femininity turning with them, moving with them, and two men who'd been ready to rip one another's throats out at the negotiating table, laughed with delight as a brisk "Turkey in the Straw" sang from a quartet of wide-spaced, curlyback fiddles.

There is something almost intoxicating, when a genuinely lovely woman pairs off with an accomplished dancer, moreso when her skill and his are well matched: a pale eyed Ambassador in a McKenna gown, a pale-eyed nurse in her white dress and winged cap, threw their heads back and laughed --  spun -- whirled out to arm's length, spun back, traded partners -- they danced in a perfect coordination, wheeling around the floor as everyone drew back to give them room.

Four hands came to center, a living star if viewed from above, smooth and graceful, Marnie's heels loud against burnished, narrow, close-set hardwood floorboards, in perfect time with the music, a brisk counterpoint to the fiddlers' skill: none there missed that the lead fiddler was a Valkyrie, and four more of her squadron-mates snatched up partners from the delegates, to populate the floor with femininity and masculinity in happy accord.

Negotiations had not been going well through the day.

Marnie consulted with the Chief Ambassador; they reviewed the day's proceedings, then Marnie went and freshened up (though the Ambassador couldn't imagine what needed freshening, Marnie invariably looked like she'd freshly bathed!) -- but when she came out, it was with a particularly well-fitted gown, and the Ambassador knew from the way she walked -- or, rather, glided -- that she had her heels on, and he smiled a little as he remembered she'd made specific requirements for the post-negotiation period.

The Valkyries were considered more than elite; they were almost untouchable, in the common mind, yet here they were, dancing like angels, one of their number spinning magic from a mountain fiddle they knew was older than she was, the other fiddler looking utterly nondescript and out-of-place in scuffed work boots, a calf length skirt, a man's flannel shirt and a broke brim hat.

Appearances notwithstanding -- the utterly unremarkable, and the black-skinsuited fighter pilot of legend -- the delegates each found themselves seized, spun onto the floor, dancing with an incomparably lovely, absolutely gifted, dancing partner, and it wasn't until every last delegate had been spun to dizziness on the floor, not until laughing femininity lifted each man's spirits, not until dancers male and female alike collapsed laughing on the sidelines, that the fiddlers smiled and withdrew, and Marnie glided out into the spotlight, raised her gloved hands and smiled, bade them all a very good night, and declared the proceedings at a close for the evening.

When the Ambassadorial shuttle lifted off -- they made conventional arrival and departure for reasons of formality and of protocol -- Marnie dropped her head back against her headrest, sighed dramatically, then opened her eyes and looked over at the Ambassador.

"Well?" she asked quietly. "What do you think?"

"I think we made a good accord," he replied in a quiet, satisfied voice.

"I do too," Marnie murmured.

"You look tired."

"Appearances are not deceiving."

"Is there anything you'd like to have done differently?"

Marnie smiled, just a little, opened her eyes again and said gently, "I know we have to present a dignified image ... I know that image involves arriving in a horse drawn carriage, and being formally received, and I know we have to bear up under all the posturing and all the accusing voices they reserve for these third party events."

"But ...?"

"Just once," Marnie said, lifting a gloved fist and bobbing it a little before her, "just once I'd like to go ridin' in on Daddy's stallion, I'd like to bring him up into a big showy rear, jump off and run up and deck that one annoying delegate!"

The Ambassador's face reddened a little at Marnie's words, and he could not help but smile quietly, for her words were uttered quietly, honestly, with a simple sincerity that told him she meant exactly what she said.

He opened his mouth to agree with her about planting a fist full of knuckles in a particularly obnoxious face, then he realized Marnie's fisted hand was relaxed, her head was turned a little, her eyes closed, and she was sound asleep, just that fast.

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

EXAMPLE

Esther Keller hesitated as she saw her husband's labors.

She stood at the corner of the house and looked at his backside.

Wives are perceptive and observant creatures, and Esther was both.

She knew when her husband divested himself of his coat, he intended some work, but when he hung up his vest as well, he was either unhappy, or boilin' mad -- generally the two meant the same thing -- and the fact that he was splitting wood with a broad ax instead of the double bit, argued for his mood more the latter than merely the former.

Linn's shirt was sweat-damp -- sweat dried fast this high up -- which told Esther he'd been working himself mercilessly, viciously, and that meant he was mad clear through, and he chose to take all that temper out somewhere he'd not cause any more harm that -- at worst -- a broken ax handle.

He set another saw-cut chunk up on the splittin' stump, ran a palm down the side of his hip, then the other palm -- Esther did not have to see his face to know he was absolutely glaring at the chunk he'd just set up -- he moved, smooth, fast, brought the ax around in a flawless, tight, incredibly swift circle --

Esther Keller was all woman, and mad or not, her husband struck a fine and manly figure when he was at labor.

Esther glided forward, swinging out to her right, more to come into her husband's peripheral than to stay shy of the swing of the hand-forged, broad blade: her eyes were as gentle as her voice as he stopped, parked the ax against the wood pile, as she said quietly, "I thought you might be thirsty."

Linn nodded, wiped his face and the back of his neck with a worse-for-wear cloth: he hung the sweat rag over the end of the ax handle, turned to Esther, approached her slowly, almost carefully.

He picked up the tall glass from the tray, looked over its thick rim at his wife's knowing eyes.

"Thank you, darlin'," he said, his voice quiet, the way it was when he spoke to her: he put the glass to his lips, took a sip, took another, closed his eyes and sighed quietly, then took a good long drink.

When he came up for air, Esther had a handful of pitcher handle and refilled the glass.

"Darlin'," he said quietly, "that is genuinely good!"

"You've been working for a while."

Esther turned a little, the way a woman will, to swing her skirts and remind a man of her femininity.

Linn nodded.

He took another drink, frowned a little: "Strawberries in this?"

Esther smiled.

"I cut up strawberries from some preserves and stirred in."

"Darlin', you've got somethin' good here!"

"I'm glad you like it."

Esther looked around: Linn kicked half the chunk off the splittin' stump and Esther set her tray down, came over, took her husband's hands.

"What is it, darling?" she asked quietly, and Linn gathered her into his arms, held her, laid his cheek over on top of her hair.

She felt his strength, felt him take a long breath, felt as much as heard him sigh it out.

"And don't tell me it's nothing, Mister Keller," she murmured, lifting her head and looking up at him with those lovely green eyes of hers.

Linn's eyes snapped open and he jumped like he'd been stung.

He was laying in his own bed.

His hand slid to the side, fingers open, searching --

A pale eyed old man screwed his eyes tight shut, his questing hand clenching futilely into a closed, shaking fist.

Just a dream.

It felt so real.

Esther --

He threw back the covers, squinted toward the window: not long after, Dana Keller looked up and smiled as her Daddy came sock-foot down the stairs, dressed and carrying his boots.

She turned up the lamp so he could see her: it was not yet daylight, and she knew his eyes were failing him, and she did not wish to startle him, like she'd done before, and he nearly came to tears apologizing to her for startling him.

She never told anyone about the event, but she'd never forgotten his voice -- younger, stronger, hopeful, as he turned toward her, as he said, "Esther?" -- then reality walked up and belted the man across the face with a cold dead fish, and he'd turned away, ashamed.

"You're up early," Linn said quietly. "Is all well?"

"Yes, Daddy. I knew you'd be up."

Linn set his burnished Cavalry boots down, careful to set them down quietly, then he took his daughter's hands and smiled, raised them to his lips.

"Darlin'," he confessed, "I'm near to stone blind, and you're still as gorgeous as I remember!"

Dana laughed and hugged her Daddy, throwing her arms around his neck and giggling like the little girl she used to be, and Linn hugged her back, straightened, brought her off the floor, then set her down, startled and half ashamed: she wasn't his little girl anymore, she was womanly now, and part of him didn't want this change to come quite so fast.

Dana patted her Daddy's chest, then ran her fingers under his necktie, gave it an entirely unnecessary tug:  "You're causing me trouble, you know," she said quietly, and he could hear the smile in her words.

"Oh, now, trust me to do just that!" he bantered back. "What did your old man do now?"

Dana planted her knuckles on her apron strings and declared, "Daddy, a girl looks to her Daddy to see what kind of a man she could marry! Now where in the world will I find someone who measures up to the example you've set?"

The hired girl came hurrying up, muttering apologies, mumbling that she had to get the fire up and get breakfast started and she'd not be but a minute or two, and Linn caught her by the shoulders and turned her toward him and lowered his head a little.

"Mary," he said gently (her name was Mildred, but he called her Mary out of habit) -- "don't be apologizin' to me now," and Angela heard the smile in his voice as he said the words: "we're not usually up this early, it's my fault and not yours!"

"There you go again," Dana complained good-naturedly, and the two women shared a look of mutual understanding. "Where am I going to find a husband who is as naturally kind as you are?"

Dana winked at Mildred, steered her Daddy out of the kitchen.

"Come on out on the porch and help me watch the sun come up. We're underfoot here and I hate to interfere with Mildred's good work!"

Father and daughter emerged onto the front porch, their breath steaming: the barking chant of the freight engine pulling the ore train was not loud, but it was clear, rhythmic in the dawn-shadowed distance.

Linn leaned against the porch rail, looking around, remembering.

Dana took his hand, looked up at the mountains, at the first fiery touches of dawn on the highest peaks.

"I understand a young man is interested in you," Linn said quietly, and Dana looked at him, suddenly, startled: her face colored and she felt her ears turn scarlet under her cornsilk hair.

"Yes, Daddy," she said shyly.

I'll bet she dropped her eyes like a bashful maiden!

"I understand he wishes to come and ask permission to pay you court."

He imagined her look of surprise -- she'll blink twice, then take a breath and blink twice again and then she'll answer --

Dana swallowed and said in a meek little voice, "Yes, Daddy."

"I've looked into his bona fides already."

Dana looked up at her Daddy's face, carved, weather tanned, masculine, lean and sculpted in morning's light.

"Yes, Daddy?" she said faintly.

"I will be pleased to receive him."

He felt his eyes tighten a little at the corners as he heard her sudden breath, as she hugged him, quickly, excited as a little girl.

"When the time comes," Linn said quietly, "your mother has a ruby pin. I would be pleased if you would wear it the day you are wed."

He turned his head, smiled down at her as he added, "Which I don't think is quite yet!"

They heard the door open, smelled coffee, smelled bacon, or at least its fragrant cloud, following the serving girl as she brought them each a big, steaming mug of freshly brewed.

Father and daughter stood on their front porch in morning's chill and looked together into the future.

 

Edited January 27 by Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

[Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103]

THE YOUNG

Marnie said this looks like the Ohio country where Gammaw grew up.

Michael eased his weight into his stirrups, stood up, worked his backside a little now that he was off his setter.

He straddled a creature taller than an African elephant, a beast with fangs and lightning-streaked fur, one of only three Fanghorns ever to tolerate a saddle, though that was changing: Lightning adopted two orphaned Fanghorns, outcast from the herd, and Michael and Victoria were working with them the way their Pa worked with colts back home, getting them used to wearing a light saddle, getting used to having a saddle blanket draped over their spine, of having weighted saddlebags behind the empty saddle.

The young Fanghorns were as quick and as intelligent as Lightning, equally demanding of attention: Marnie watched the twins working with the colts and murmured to Angela, "Sherlock Holmes must've seen this pair in action."

"Oh?"
" 'Jealous as a pair of professional beauties,' " she quoted, and Angela nodded thoughtfully.

"They are that!"

"How soon will they try riding them?"

"Michael said he didn't want to ride a two year old Appaloosa. I think these two are just short of two years."

"Three, then?"

Marnie nodded, smiled as the colts came trotting ponderously over to the fence.

Marnie hauled up her hemline, scaled the whitewashed board fence, dropped easily to the other side: Angela was a little slower, but when Marnie looked up from fooling with Cyclone, she saw Angela's look of absolute delight as Thunder laid his head against her front, closed his eyes and gusted out a noisy sigh of obvious contentment.

"I wonder ..."

Marnie looked up, smiled.

"Joseph needs to learn to ride, and so does Littlejohn."

Angela's eyes smiled at the corners: her hands were busy with the demands of a young Fanghorn with all the patience of a two-year-old at an amusement park.

"We don't want them ridden too early, but they need some weight, more than saddlebags."

"We can apply a medical monitor with their Confederate shielding. I know who to ask about spine related stresses."

"How do you think Jacob will react to our drafting from his Unorganized Militia?"

"If it comes to horses?" Angela laughed. "He'll be all for it!"

"I thought he might."

Angela reached under Thunder's jaw, rubbed it gently: the young Fanghorn muttered happily, and Cyclone came over, lifted her head, begging Marnie's attention.

"You're spoiled, you know that."

Thunder chirped quietly.

Lightning stood, watching, for all the world like a proud Mama.

"Michael said Lightning does that to show she's the Herd Mare."

"Do Fanghorns have a Herd Stallion?"

"Michael?" Angela called, lifting her chin.

Lightning came plodding along behind him as Michael approached.

"Does a Fanghorn herd have a stallion in residence?"

"Not generally. Not from what I've seen, anyway. They come around when the mares come fresh, but when the mares freshen they'll peel away from the herd and look for the studs."

"How soon will Thunder's automatic pilot take over?"

"Probably a couple of years, I think."

"Any idea when Cyclone will start to freshen?"

Michael looked at the contented Fanghorn colt, almost ready to melt for happiness as his sister's hands caressed the way she used to put Appaloosa colts to sleep when they leaned against her in that selfsame manner.

"I'm ... no, I ... don't really know," he admitted.

"I reckon we'll find out, then."

Michael nodded, frowned as an idea occurred to him.

"Sis ..."

Three pale eyed Keller ladies looked at him, blinked, and all three said with one voice, "Which one?"

Michael opened his mouth, his ears reddened -- good God he looks like Daddy! -- Michael looked away as his sisters all giggled -- his eyes swung toward Lightning and she lowered her head, chirped quietly as he caressed her jaw and muttered, "At least you still love me!"

"So what's your idea?" Marnie smiled.

Michael frowned at Cyclone, considered her loaded saddlebags.

"I don't want to put a man's weight in their saddles yet," he said, "but might we try Littlejohn or Joseph ridin'? They need to learn anyway."

Michael had the distinct feeling his idea had somehow been outmaneuvered as his sisters looked at one another, then at Lightning, then at the colts, and finally back to him.

"I think that could be arranged," Angela said finally. "I'll talk to Jacob. I know Ruth delights in going off-planet."