 
Ben Soul

Richard W. George

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2013 Richard W. George

All rights reserved.

If you want to have a friend read this novel, urge them to buy their own electronic copy. I have set the price low, to make downloading a small strain on the ordinary budget.

The Great Temblor

Ben came to the City on a day when the afternoon fog wrapped the City in a gray blanket. The great towers of the City's financial district disappeared into the mists, seeming to be topless. Ben thought of them as "topless towers" like those in the Marlowe play. Excitement surged through his weary body. Twenty-five hours on a bus had exhausted his strength, but the approach to the City revived him. Here he hoped to find the freedom to be himself that his home state refused him.

The City bus station was like most bus stations in that era, rundown and covered with pigeon droppings. A surly attendant perched on a wobbly stool inside a kiosk with rust stained windows. Ben approached the attendant. He had a sunken chest, a Prince Valiant soup bowl haircut, and his pale scalp showed through the thinning hair.

"Sir," Ben said, "can you direct me to the Dancing Pixie Motel?"

"I'm not a sir," the attendant replied in a surprisingly girlish voice.

"I'm sorry," Ben said. "Ma'am, can you direct me to the Dancing Pixie Motel?"

"I can." She pinched her lips together, as though to trap any words that might escape the cage of her teeth.

"Will you, please? Direct me?"

"Go to the street. Turn left. Walk three blocks up the hill. Turn right on Hauser Street. Motel's in the middle of the block." She turned away from Ben, dismissing him. He silently repeated her directions to himself, and went to the street. The number of people walking in both directions astonished him. He'd never seen so many people on one block before except during the Christmas shopping rush. Men and women in suits mingled with longhaired people in patched jeans, all hurrying to wherever they had to go. Ben was almost afraid to step into the stream, lest he be trampled trying to get where he wanted.

One blonde young man, walking by, slowed as he saw Ben in the archway to the bus station, and raked him from head to foot with a penetrating glance. Ben blushed to the roots of his brown hair. He felt disheveled, and the blonde's stare had almost undressed him. The blonde smiled at him. Ben frowned. What should he do now? The blonde shrugged, quickened his pace, and went on by. Ben summoned up his courage with a deep breath and plunged into the human stream. He let it hurry him up the hill to Hauser Street, where he did find his motel.

When he had checked in, Ben went to his room on the fifth floor. He opened the drapes and looked out at the street. Cars clogged the street's three lanes. Crowds cluttered the sidewalks. Everyone hurried, many with their heads down, as if they feared some sudden weather change might drench them. The noise, though muted by the double-paned window, almost overpowered Ben's hearing. He closed the drapes against the sound, turned out the lights, and fell asleep, still clothed, on the bed.

In the City Zoo, an old llama lifted her head. She wore her llama appearance for disguise. She was a unicorn with a unique horn. A ripple in the Cosmic Continuum, a new element, had come to the City. Something in it promised future benefit. The unicorn set the information aside in her brain, and went back to grazing and contemplating the twisted and strained rock that underlay the City.

Ben woke up several hours later. He opened the drapes. Light poured into the room, red, blue, and yellow flickering light. The City's neon night danced before his dazed eyes. He turned on a bedside lamp to look at the folder the motel provided. It listed, among other things, several restaurants. Only one was open all night. Ben consulted the clock. It was ten o'clock, local time. He took a shower, dressed in clean clothes, and went out on the street to find the Languishing Langoustine Burger Palace and Fish Fry. It was not far to go, for which Ben was grateful. The nighttime street was ominous with shadowed doorways and lurid patches of light. It was the Languishing Langoustine sign that was pumping the neon into his room.

The place was not crowded. There were three or four customers, each sitting singly, staring into an unseen emptiness only they could penetrate. None of them paid attention to Ben's entry. The reek of fried fish grew stronger as he approached the counter. He had thought fish and chips might be a reasonable choice, but the smell quite put him off. He chose, instead, a cheeseburger and fries. He asked for hot tea. The young waitress, Fern Boston according to the nameplate on her register, stared dumbly at him.

"No tea," she said. "Coffee's older than I am. Try a cola."

Ben yielded, and ordered the cola. When he got round to drinking it, it was mostly carbonated water and sugar. One bottle of cola syrup and a barrel of carbonated water must have provided the Languishing Langoustine with many glasses of the concoction. The cheeseburger was poor. Fortunately, Ben's digestion in his twenties was cast iron. He downed the mess, ate all the greasy fries, swallowed all the carbonated water, and left. He'd have liked to explore the street, but he was uncertain of the neighborhood. He determined daylight would be a better time for checking it all out.

The night clerk looked up at him as he came in. "What can I do for you?"

"Nothing," Ben said. "I'm just on my way to my room."

"What number?" The clerk turned to a rack of cup hooks holding keys behind him.

"Five-oh-one," Ben said. "I've got the key."

"Let me see it."

Ben stared at the clerk. "Why?"

"So I know you belong here," the clerk said. "We get a lot of sneak ins, if we don't watch out. Then they sleep in the halls. Scares our customers."

Ben took out his key and showed it to the clerk. "Okay," the clerk said. "Next time you go out, leave the key at the desk. It's safer that way, and so are you."

"Okay," Ben said. "Good night."

"Good night," the clerk said.

Ben went upstairs to his room. He went in, undressed, and lay down. Sleep eluded him. The neon crawdad blinked on and off, on and off. The burger and fries he had eaten rambled through the caverns of his abdomen with abandon. Every time he closed his eyes, he got an instant replay of his boss in Denver firing him.

Banks breed assistant vice presidents the way dogs in the dump breed fleas. Joe King, Ben's boss at Neighborhood National Bank, was no more pompous or asinine than most of his kind. He called Ben into his office. The office lights shone from his balding head. His weak chin was smaller than the knot on his tie.

"One of your colleagues has reported most disturbing information about you, Mr. Soul," he said to Ben.

"What sort of information?"

"He reports that he saw you, on the recent holiday weekend, in Central City. He observed you entering or leaving the Glory Hole Saloon, not once, but three times." The Glory Hole Saloon was a gay bar.

"Who is this colleague?" Ben asked.

"I am not at liberty to say." Joe King's face was contorted with contempt.

"Did he observe me from inside the Glory Hole, or outside?" Ben asked.

Joe King squeezed his lips together as if he had to resist someone's spooning bad tasting medicine into his mouth. "I presume outside. This colleague has spoken with Mr. Fuller Grace, our esteemed President. Mr. Grace is most distressed."

"Why?" Ben asked. "I went to that bar on my own time, and made no comment or otherwise indicated I'm connected with Neighborhood National Bank."

"That is irrelevant." Joe King began tapping his desk with his pen. "You are aware, I should think, that the Glory Hole Saloon is a notorious gathering place for inverts and other perverts?"

"It is?" Ben said in mock wonder.

"The Neighborhood National Bank family must be above all reproach." Joe King's pompous righteousness was so overdone it was almost comic. "Mr. Grace has decided you are not a fit person to work in this bank."

"He has?"

"Your employment is forthwith terminated." Joe spat the words out. Ben wondered if Joe was secretly enjoying playing the tough boss. "You will gather your personal items and nothing else, not a pen, not even a paper clip, and leave this establishment," Joe continued.

Ben stood stunned. "You have one half hour to complete your exit before I must have you forcibly removed. The guard will provide you your severance check as you leave."

Ben got a month's severance pay because it was in his contract. He hoped it wounded Mr. Fuller Grace to the quick to have to give him that money. He closed his savings and checking accounts, packed a suitcase, and bought a ticket to the City.

Now, here he was, tossing on a lumpy bed in his briefs, in a motel called the Dancing Pixie, trying to hypnotize himself to sleep with the light from a neon crawdad. Mr. Fuller Grace had ripped open the little cocoon Ben had lived in. As he stared into the flickering night, Ben wondered if he had it in him to soar like a butterfly. Eventually, he slept, dreaming an incoherent dream about dancing kangaroos. The neon crawdad flickered the night away.

### The League of Lesbos

Minnie Vann looked up as the woman came in. Minnie had never seen her before, but guessed right away she was from out of town. Her dress was a demure gray, with a white lace collar. She was not old enough, in Minnie's opinion, to wear such an old lady's dress. Presumably, since she had come to the headquarters for the League of Lesbos, she knew what kind of place she was in. Minnie eyed the woman's statuesque body with appreciation for her Valkyrie looks.

"Excuse me, I'm new in town," the woman said. "I just came in yesterday."

"What can I do for you?" Minnie put on her most gracious smile, imagining what she could do to this hunk of womanhood.

"Can you recommend restaurants near here?" the woman asked. She went on, "I've got a place to stay. It has a nice coffee shop, but I'd like to try something different."

"There's a place, about three blocks from here that I like. It's called the Plaster Peacock. Real extravagant décor. It used to be a brothel, way back in the day. Food's good, and the prices are fair. Woman who runs it is a looker, if you like the lush ones.

"One of us?"

"I think so, but I don't think she knows it yet."

"I know how that goes. Thanks." The woman opened her purse. "May I leave a small donation?"

"We always like money here," Minnie said. She got out her receipt book and noted the five dollars in the amount blank. Then she looked up. "What name should I put on the receipt?"

"Put any name you want on it," the woman said. "I won't need a receipt." Minnie looked at her a long moment. "Call me Sappho, if you need a name."

"Okay," Minnie said. She saw a pair of white gloves in the purse when the woman put her wallet back.

"Goodbye," the woman said, "and thanks." She walked out the door with a Valkyrie's stride.

Minnie said, "See you around," to her back. "Damn it," she said to the stuffed parrot on its perch by the desk, "I didn't even get her name. That one's got promise. I should have asked her what hotel she's staying in." The stuffed parrot did not comment. Minnie turned back to the paperwork in front of her. She shuffled the sheets covered with numbers. They meant nothing to her. She sighed with relief when the telephone rang. She picked up the receiver.

"League of Lesbos, this is Minnie Vann."

"Minnie, this is Salvación Mandor, at the Homeless Mission," the voice on the other end said.

Minnie looked around. She was alone in the office. "I'm alone. We can talk freely," she said. Salvación Mandor was not a friend most of her Lesbian acquaintance could understand Minnie having. Missionaries sold poorly among the women at the League of Lesbos. Ms. Mandor, also, was a psychic, another phenomenon outside the League's particular Lesbian box.

"Excellent," Salvación said. "Have you been monitoring the Cosmic Balance today?"

Minnie replied, "I hadn't got around to my meditating yet. I usually do that at night." Minnie was, like Salvación, a Keeper of the Cosmic Balance.

"I sense a great disturbance. I'm getting strange pictures from my unicorn in the Zoo."

"What kind of pictures?"

"Strange patterns of stretching threads. They stretch and they warp and some of them snap."

Minnie wrinkled her brow in puzzlement. "Beats me, what to say they mean."

"But you've sensed nothing?"

"Not yet. Do you suppose it's a natural disaster, or one a bunch of politicians cooks up?"

"I have no guidance about that. I'm laying in a supply of blankets and dried foods."

"Need any cash to buy stuff?"

"Not today. My donors are being generous."

"Holler if you need any help."

"Please let me know if you get any information from the Cosmic Balance."

"Will do. Anything else?"

"No."

"Minnie over and out, then," Minnie said and hanged up the phone. She looked up at the silent parrot. "Strange woman, La Señora Mandor. She's sure got a tie into some unusual vibrations." She looked at the pages of numbers before her, and shoved them aside. She turned to the mail and began to open it.

Minnie had opened only a few letters when Len DeLys came by. His usually impeccably combed hair was slightly tousled by the wind blowing in off the sea. Minnie smiled at him. She thought him attractive, for a man, and appreciated his open acceptance of women.

"Hey, Minnie, how are you this fine day?"

"As well as can be expected."

"I see you got a day off from the mailroom."

"Lucked out this time. The dweeb agreed to stay on through the end of today. Monday, I'm all alone."

"That's going to make things hard for the Lesbian League."

"They've got other volunteers. They'll survive. What do you need?"

"Your list of Lesbian Leaguers that plan to march in the Carnival Parade tomorrow. Do you have it?"

Minnie shuffled through the papers on her desk. "It's here somewhere." She turned over several small piles of documents. "Ah. Here it is." She handed him the list. "Everything organized for tomorrow?"

"As organized as things ever get." Len shrugged as he folded the list and put it in his shirt pocket. Minnie knew from long experience with him that nearly every detail of the parade was nailed in place.

"And how's your love life?" she inquired.

Len sighed. "I'm still alone." He flashed a sad smile at her.

Minnie nodded. She knew the condition. "So am I," she said. "It's the curse of middle-age."

"Or something. Gotta go. Hang in there, Minnie. Your princess will come."

Minnie grinned. "She'd better be driving a diesel."

"She will be, Minnie, she will be."

"See ya, Len." Len waved goodbye as he left.

Minnie spoke to the stuffed parrot as the door closed behind Len. "Now there's a boy who needs a proper fairy prince. Too bad they don't grow on lamp posts."

### Beau Meets Doctor Field

Beau groaned. A rattling rapping at his chamber door betokened he'd sleep no more that day. The rapping rattling increased to pounding.

"Go away, y'all," Beau shouted at the door.

"Colonel LeSieupe! Colonel LeSieupe! Wake up!"

Beau opened his eyes. He did not recognize the voice.

"Just a moment," he mumbled sleepily. At that moment, an acute ear, perhaps one with dialectical linguistic training might have heard Beau's soft Southern burr waver. Sometimes it was as deep as the pools of Georgia's Okefenokee and other times it was as high and dry as the Texas Panhandle. The door rapper had no linguistic training in dialects or major languages, though he could and frequently did obfuscate in psychiatrese.

"I'm coming," Beau said more loudly. He didn't want the pounding to start up again. His hung-over head pounded enough by itself. He fumbled for his robe and wrapped the white terry cloth around himself. He couldn't find the tie, so he clutched the robe closed as he went to the door. Beau opened the door as far as the night latch chain permitted. He peered with one eye at the little red-haired man with Chester Alan Arthur sideburns and a round belly on a lean frame.

"Yes?" he said, "What can I do for y'all so early?"

"Early! My God, man, it's nearly two o'clock!"

"I work nights," Beau drawled, getting consciously more southern. "Ah y'all a Damnyankee?" he asked, making six syllables of that last three-syllable word. "Y'all sound like one."

"I'm Dr. Chester Field, psychiatrist, from Davenport, Iowa," the little man outside Beau's door said, drawing himself up to his full short.

"Well, how-de-do, a Damnyankee," (six syllables), "for sure!"

"You can say Yankee, and I don't mind," the little man said pompously, "but I am not damned! I've been saved!"

Beau half-expected him to pull out the Iowa National Flag with its picture of Jesus Christ in red, white and blue on a field of green corn.

"A damn-proud-Yankee, Ah see." Beau grinned. He enjoyed heckling Midwesterners.

"Sir," said Dr. Field, "let me couch myself in these terms: I was asked by a suffering young man to come here and ask you to come downstairs."

"Does the young man have a name?"

"He calls himself Noah Count, and he said you would know who he is."

Beau sighed. Noah was the neighborhood purveyor of proscribed herbs, to whom Beau owed several favors. He seldom liked filling Noah's requests for payment.

"What makes you think he's sick?" Beau asked.

"To be a psychiatrist I had to study medicine. I think he's been poisoned—perhaps something he ate. He's pale and perspiring heavily."

"Noah's like that a lot. He probably just dropped a bad combination of pills. Was he spacey?"

"What do you mean?"

Beau frowned and thought. "Loco?" he said, dredging the word from his forgotten past.

"No, altogether lucid. He made excellent sense."

Beau thought a minute. Noah lucid was an odd concept. He closed the door and slipped the night latch, and opened it.

"Come in, sir," he said.

Dr. Field's face turned red. It had a look of incredulity mingled with embarrassment. Beau followed the doctor's line of sight. He realized that his robe had peeped open, and that he was on display at half-staff.

"Come in, sir," he said gravely, "forgive my dishabille." He inclined his bead and waved the doctor in. The slight bow Beau made offered the doctor a more expansive crotch view until Beau straightened up and closed his robe.

"Who is with Noah now?" he asked the doctor.

"No one. He said he'd be all right if you'd come. He won't go to the hospital until he talks with you. Do hurry!" Some urgency in the doctor's voice penetrated Beau's night fog. He began to move more rapidly, at a near-normal pace for most of the world, for Beau a real rushing. He dropped his robe, and began to look for his clothing (which he had scattered around his one-room apartment in abandon the night before).

The first item he found was his white goatee. Dr. Field's eyes grew larger and rounder. They bulged like a frog's eyes. Beau found his white mustache, and his hat with the attached wig, and put these items on. Then he went to the drawer for a fresh shirt. He laid it on the rumpled bed. He took a linen suit from his closet.

Noah came through the door Beau had neglected to close behind Dr. Field.

"Beauregard LeSieupe," Noah shouted, "I arrest you for indecent exposure of a friend to near-death on the streets of The City!"

Beau threw his hands up in the air.

"Put 'em down, Beau," Noah said, and laughed.

"Noah!" Beau shouted, wrapping his arms around Noah and his portfolio of drawings, "How are y'all?"

"Doing, don't you know, just barely doing," Noah snickered, "but not as barely as you. Put on your pants, Beau."

"What kind of doctor are you?" Beau said, turning angrily on the Iowa psychiatrist, who was blushing and teetering on the edge of Beau's unkempt bed. "What do you mean, scaring me about Noah, here, being poisoned?"

"Easy," Noah said, "easy, Beau, he thought I was dying; that's why he came to get you. I can put on a pretty good act when I want to."

"An act!" Now Dr. Field was furious. He jumped off the bed to his feet. He put his left foot on a wine bottle Beau had neglectfully left there by the bed, and his feet went under the bed, heels up. This pushed his nose into the pile of Beau's fluffy white throw rug. Dr. Field sneezed. Beau seldom shook the rug. Beau reached over and lifted him by his collar.

"Chester, honey," Beau drawled in his most syrupy manner, "Y'all seem a mite clumsy for so early in the day. Maybe some o' that Iowa corn fermenting in your gizzard?"

The expression on Dr. Field's face was a comic mixture of shock and rage.

"I don't drink hard liquor!" he spluttered. "Not before the dinner hour!"

Noah was laughing so hard he doubled over. When he did, the drawings in his portfolio slid out on the floor. There were some twenty of them, mostly of a category the Iowa courts would probably deem obscene, if they had been explained by an art expert or a precocious five year old child. Noah was fond of phallic subject matter. Dr. Chester Field was no art expert; he was, however, in his own way a competent psychiatrist, and so knew how to recognize a phallic symbol when he saw one.

"Mr. Count," he said, "your jest was questionable." He was craning and twisting his neck to see Noah's pictures.

"Did you hurt your neck?" Noah asked him, suddenly concerned. Noah had heard of lawsuits based on much less provocation.

"No." Dr. Field swooped suddenly and picked up several drawings from the pile. "Are all these pictures of similar subject matter?"

"Yes," Noah said. "When an artist gets a good model, it's a good idea to make several drawings. Good models are expensive."

"The price depends on how much extra-curricular activity goes with the modeling," Beau drawled.

"How much for these seven?" Dr. Field asked. Noah looked at the drawings the doctor had selected. He thought a moment.

"Well, they're part of a set of ten, don't you know," Noah said. "Take the set for four hundred dollars - I'm giving you a discount, for being so mean to you and playing the joke on you." Beau stifled a giggle. Noah seldom got more than ten dollars for the best of his pictures, and sometimes couldn't give them away.

"Will you take a check?" Dr. Field asked. "I have traveler's checks, but I'd like to keep them back for places that don't take a credit card."

"You got money in the bank to cover it?"

"Yes."

"Then I'll take it."

Dr. Field extracted an imitation leather checkbook from his inner coat pocket and began to scrawl figures across the picture of a tractor in a cornfield tastefully executed in sepia ink on a pale green background. Noah and Beau began sorting the pictures and putting them back in the portfolio, except for the set of ten that Dr. Field had ordered.

"I'll fill in the name," Noah said; "I'm uncomfortable about letting my real name out too many places, don't you know."

"How 'bout some coffee, across the street, Noah?" Beau asked.

"Only if you put your pants on," Noah said.

"I don't have much time," Dr. Field said as he handed Noah the check with a flourish. Noah gave him the ten drawings with a grin at the gleam in Dr. Field's eyes. "I'd like some answers to some questions."

"What are your questions?" Noah said in a tinny computer voice.

"What did you pretend to be sick for?"

"To see what would happen, don't you know."

"That's all?"

"It seemed like a good idea at the time."

"It's been profitable to y'all, Noah," Beau interjected. Noah and Dr. Field ignored him.

"I've got a question for you, Doc," Noah said.

"Ask."

"What's a nice shrink like you doing in a place like Iowa?"

Dr. Field was blank for a moment. Consternation wiped the ruddy good humor from his face. He frowned then, wrinkling the inner corners of his eyebrows ever so slightly toward each other. It was plain to see that the question puzzled him. Perhaps he had never heard anyone question the value of living in Iowa before.

"I've always lived there," he said.

"I guess everybody's got their own troubles," Noah said.

"I like it there," Dr. Field said defensively.

"Some of us have more troubles than others," Beau drawled softly.

"Is that what turned you to psychiatry," Noah asked with great sympathy, "Living in Iowa?"

"When I was a child," Dr. Field began pompously, "my grandfather was a missionary among the Amazon tribes." Beau yawned, and Noah put on his best "interested-but-I'm-really-not-here" look. Dr. Field took it for engrossed interest.

"My grandfather," he went on, sure now of his audience, "used to come home with tales of shrunken heads. Once he brought one home for our church to see. You understand this was when I was a child." Dr. Field looked at Noah and then at Beau, pleading for understanding in his eyes. They nodded; they understood that this was when Dr. Field was a child.

"I was fascinated with that shrunken head," Dr. Field said, closing his eyes. A look of religious ecstasy swept over his face.

"I wanted to shrink my grandfather's head. I hated him." Beau recoiled from the violent spasm of detestation contorting Dr. Field's face. He reached down and covered his groin.

Dr. Field continued. "I sublimated my desire to shrink my grandfather's head into an honorable and useful profession that of psychoanalytically 'shrinking' heads. I've been psychoanalyzing my grandfather ever since."

The gleeful satisfaction on Dr. Field's face looked like an orgasm to Noah; surreptitiously he checked the doctor's trouser fly for a telltale wet spot; there was none. Dr. Field opened his eyes suddenly.

"Also, it's a good living and easy to make." Noah nodded appreciatively.

"You're a regular chap, don't you know," he said, and clapped Dr. Field on the back. "I like you," Noah said, and held the little doctor in a tight embrace for a brief moment. Dr. Field blushed even redder. He discovered that he liked the warm feeling of being close. He filed a mental note to investigate the therapeutic values of human touch in a learned paper. When Noah released him, a little shadow of sadness crossed his face. Impulsively, Beau grabbed him. At first Dr. Field was a little disconcerted that Beau hadn't put on his pants yet, nor even an undergarment, but then he decided that with Beau that was nothing unusual.

"It was awfully sweet of you to come for me for Noah's sake," Beau said, as he patted Dr. Field on the back of the head. "He's quite a rascal, and often imposes his pranks on the general public this way."

"Beau," Noah said, "put your pants on. Yes, thanks, doctor, for the check, and for coming up. It was a trick, and you played along just fine; I knew you would."

"How did you know that?"

"Your name tag from the convention."

Dr. Field looked at it with a puzzled frown on his red eyebrows. The little broken veins in his nose wrinkled too, and the tiny scratch from Beau's shirt stud squeezed out another tiny drop of blood.

"What?"

"It says on it, 'The American Convention of the Helping Professionals'," Noah said with a grin, "and that says you like to help people, don't you know."

"Oh," Dr. Field said, staring down at his upturned nametag,

"I hadn't thought of that before. I've got to be going," Dr. Field said. "The plenary session should be about finished, and then the fun starts. I've enjoyed getting to know you two. Perhaps I'll be seeing you again." He walked toward the door, staring at the top drawing in his new collection. Beau gently took hold of his elbow and steered him around the doorframe.

### Feathers

In the morning Ben set out to explore the City. He soon found a parade. Swirling and swaying in time with the tangled melodies of guitars and trumpets, feather dancers came down the avenue. It was Carnival Weekend, and the grand parade had begun, as always, with the Male Feather Dancers. Great plumed headdresses, modeled on Aztec originals, topped the dancers. Feather cloaks splayed behind them, iridescent with all the colors the avian kingdom could supply. The dancers wore little else, except, for legalized modesty, abbreviated satin thongs that revealed as much as they hid. Spring had come, and the City celebrated.

It was all so wild and new to Ben, so newly come from the mountain hinterland, so newly come to be freely himself. He stood at the side of the street, almost quaking with lust, to watch the Feather Dancers pass. He yearned to belong to that golden brotherhood, yet doubted he'd ever have the courage to expose himself so utterly to the world.

The Lion Dancers followed the Feather Dancers. The rhythms changed from Latin to Oriental. The Lion Dancers fascinated Benjamin, as well, but in a vastly different way. He had not realized the world held so many slim, graceful men.

From across the street Len DeLys surveyed the crowd. He idly admired the dozen or so young men he saw. Several he vaguely recognized. One, he could tell from the heightened color of his cheeks, was probably seeing his first City parade. The flush of excitement and almost embarrassment was typical of newcomers to the City and its ways.

Len had helped organize the parade and the fair at its end. The fair counted most, to Len. He hoped the multitude of booths and food stalls would generate enough cash to help substantially the charities he and his friends had persuaded to sponsor the show. The Trash Can Brigade from the City's Sanitation Department stopped their march and performed a ballet of sorts with a lot of clanging of their trashcans and lids. Len thought he felt the street shiver under his feet.

He glanced across the street again. The young newcomer had begun moving, following the Lion Dancers and the Feather Dancers. So, he preferred the young and graceful to the mature and muscular, Len mused. He smiled wryly. It was a cliché of City life that, at thirty, one's love career was over. By thirty-five one should have moved to the suburbs, or at least the City's outer neighborhoods. Len hadn't. Once in while his tall, lean frame still drew glances on the Street. Suddenly bored by the Trash Can Brigade, Len began to parallel the young man's walk following the dancers. Len told himself it was time to check on the fair. Besides, the young man intrigued him.

Ben bumped into a longhaired man, dressed in ragged jeans, torn sneakers, and a gray Tee a couple of sizes too large for him. "Wow! Some parade!" Ben said. "Sorry I bumped you."

"Not a prob'," the man answered. "New in town, guy?"

"Yes. I came in yesterday, on the bus.

"I thought so. Watch your feet, as well as the parade, man. Don't want to bump some broad that'll make pulp out of you." The man crossed the street during a break in the parade. Len watched him cross, and stopped him on the other side.

"Who is that stud?" he asked

The longhaired man glanced over his shoulder. "New boy in town, he says."

"I haven't seen him before. I'll have to watch for him."

The man scanned Len toe to head and back to toe. "A bit young for you, Pops."

"Maybe, maybe not," Len said, his eyes following Ben. "Maybe I'll have to find out." Len moved on, crossing the street to follow Ben.

Ben said to no one in particular, "I'd love to be part of that."

"You can be, if you want to," Len told him. "Sometimes you have to make the first move, ask for what you want, y' know?"

Ben blushed. "Oh. Now I'm embarrassed. I shouldn't talk out loud to myself." Benjamin looked at the older man in front of him. His thought that the man was in good shape for somebody that age.

"Don't sweat it. You're new here, right?" Len responded.

"Yes, just got here last night."

"From a long dry time in a place with no men you'd want to be with."

Ben stared at Len in surprise. "That sums it up pretty well. How'd you know?"

"Like knows like." He smiled at Ben. "Mingle with the crowds, say 'Hello' with your eyes. Won't be long before some guy or another responds."

Ben smiled back. "Thanks. I'll try that. Things are real different here from things back home."

"Different how?"

"Back home, I just got fired from my job because somebody saw me come out of the wrong bar."

"Well, welcome to the City. Most folks here don't mind what bar you come out of, or who went in with you."

Ben moved along to follow the parade. "I can be happy with that," Ben said over his shoulder. "See you later, maybe."

Len muttered to himself, "You're losing it, DeLys; you should have invited him for a drink, or coffee. You even forgot to ask his name."

Len walked away, wondering what about this guy had caught his attention. He certainly wasn't the only recent arrival to the City. Something wistful about him? They were all wistful. He was nice looking, but not an Adonis. One of the booth operators came up to Len with a problem, and he put the other man out of his mind.

Ben walked away from the parade route toward the fair grounds. He was so busy looking around him that he didn't notice the trio standing on the sidewalk. One man was dressed in full southern fried chicken colonel regalia. The chicken colonel lifted his hat. His wig was attached to the hat. Without the hat and its gray fringe, the man was suddenly young and vulnerable looking. The second man was dressed in full hippy regalia. The third member of the trio was a red-haired short man in a formal business suit. The three shook hands and the colonel and the hippy walked away. The red-haired man looked around him, as if to get his bearings. That's when Ben bumped into him.

The man dropped a portfolio of drawings he was holding. Ben, embarrassed, said, "Oh, excuse me. Let me get them for you."

"No problem," the man said as he hastily stooped to gather them up. "Just some drawings I bought." Ben got a glimpse of one drawing. He was sure it showed a nude man with an erection. The short man hurried away. Ben started toward the fair again. A rotund man in a saffron robe girt with an emerald green tasseled cord and sandals handed him a leaflet. Ben deposited it in the next trashcan he saw.

The Fair Committee had set the booths along three alleys. At the Bay end the alleys were open, to allow the breeze to cool the fairgoers. A large tent stood to the left as one faced the Bay. It made the dressing rooms for the parade participants. Benjamin found the tent just as the last of the Feather Dancers disappeared inside. He was too shy to try entering, even though the entrance was unguarded. Not even sure why he had followed the dancers, he watched the Lion Dancers enter the mysterious tent. He waited. Perhaps someone would come out.

Len came into the fair area just as one of the Feather Dancers, now in skin-tight jeans, T-shirt, and sandals came out. The look of longing on the young man's face raised a choke in Len's throat. Twenty years before he had been that young, that naïve. The stud in the jeans brushed right by the new kid, bent on the Thai Beef-on-a-Stick Booth. Several more dancers came out, chattering in a group. The young man looked longingly after them.

Benjamin began to wander through the alleys of the fair, stopping a while at a booth offering turquoise rings and bolos. Benjamin liked bolos. He selected a small silver piece set with green turquoises. When he heard the price, he shook his head, and left it at the booth. He'd learned quickly that things in the City cost more than they did in the mountain hinterland. He determined to be frugal. The fair was to close tomorrow. Perhaps he'd do better on prices if he came back just before the booths closed. It was only a short walk from his motel room. Ben turned up the street toward his motel.

### Gilead's Balm

Vanna Shayne fixed an expression of quiet pride on her face and gazed at Dickon as he came into the pulpit. He announced the scripture for the sermon was from Jeremiah and Corinthians. Vanna quit listening as soon as Dickon opened the great pulpit Bible and commenced reading. She did not lose her expression; she intended it to reassure the congregation how loving and supportive a pastor's wife she was.

She masked her feelings well. She loathed Dickon. He had many faults. He was male. He was in charge. He was not ambitious. He paid more attention to God and the Church than he did to Vanna. He would not succumb to Vanna's control.

Vanna did not wonder why she had married him, though she much regretted it. She knew precisely why. He was clergy, and, in the constricted world of Vanna's upbringing, clergy were power brokers. Only after she married had she seen enough of the rest of the world to know that it honored most other professions with greater power and wealth. Dickon was worse than most clergy in the scramble for eminence. He had made it plain to Vanna that he had little interest in climbing the ladders of church prestige, and that he wasn't interested in leaving the Church for other work.

Vanna let her fury build. This door had closed. She disabused herself of any hope for Dickon's change of heart. How to get away from him was another matter. She felt the old helplessness steal over her, the weakness that had come with being younger and frailer than her brother and her father. Unaware of her facial change, Vanna frowned. Painful, angry, memories of being an impotent girl child flared along her synapses.

Dickon droned on. Some nonsense about the balm of Gilead. He'd started off quoting Jeremiah, a book Vanna particularly detested because Dickon loved it. Then he'd begun by describing _Commiphora Opobalsamum,_ the little tree that provided the balm. The congregation seemed interested, but Vanna drifted into a haze. She spent most of the sermon detached from the church, reveling in her anger's building.

She heard his voice change through the haze of her anger. Dickon was winding up whatever raft of nonsense he'd been laying on the congregation. She returned to the room, and to the hard pew that cut off the circulation to her legs.

"There is a balm in Gilead," Dickon proclaimed to the congregation. "Whenever the darkness threatens to overwhelm us, there is a way out. Whenever our wounds seem too grievous to bear, there is a balm of Gilead to make the wounded whole."

For a change, Dickon had said something in a sermon that resonated in Vanna's perception. There was a way out. She didn't know what it was, yet, but she would not be yoked to this yokel preacher forever.

Vanna went to the coffee hour, said all the proper things, smiled at the proper people, pretended to care what they answered about their health, or mental state, or the price of eggs on the wholesale market. Her inner mind was working furiously. There was a way out of the prison of her wedded distress. She needed to get a job.

### Clara Dee (From the _Book of Bygone Days_ )

On the night Vanna was born, her grandmother, Clara Dee tottered through the frost-dried stalks of corn. Smut had blighted the crop before the frost came. The black spores rubbed off on her long gray skirts staining them as they swirled around her unsteady feet. The old moon's sliver cast a shadow of light across the sky just bright enough to pale the stars.

Clara didn't look up at the sky. She had little use for celestial machinations--especially not now, when her laboring lungs struggled to suck in enough air to keep her moving.

Her ankles were thick with dropsy, and her body swelled with edema under the gray skirt and black bodice stained with scraps of several meals. She knew her time was upon her, and welcomed it, if she could only hold it off long enough to complete her revenge.

Oh, revenge, yes, on Yuna Dee, her daughter-in-law. The bitch had just whelped again, tying herself ever more tightly to Clara's beloved son Perry. She should be especially vulnerable, now, while her soul was closing the gaping hole bringing a new life into the world tore in a mother.

Clara grimaced, as her left foot caught in a twisted pumpkin vine hardened in the cold. It almost tripped her. She cursed it, mechanically, as she swayed, barely catching her balance in time to prevent a fall. Her foot throbbed with pain. She spread her arms out at her sides, and then closed her eyes to squeeze the red pain from her foot. She extricated her swollen ankle from the dead vine with great care and lifted her foot over it. She opened her eyes and peered into the dim moonlit night.

Beloved Perry had been a young man of so much promise, before Yuna Darien had bewitched him with her mincing ways and pious demeanor. Clara had tried to drive her off, and then to scare her off, and had even bluntly told her to leave poor Perry alone. Poor addled boy, he had been no match for the wily wench. She inveigled him into her church, and into a marriage, and altogether out of his mother's control. The fierce loss still infuriated Clara, even ten years later.

Not far now to get out of the garden patch. Just the bean rows ahead. That meant more stepping over things. Her knees trembled with the effort. Then she stood on the gravel drive. The pebbles poked at the soles of her feet and seemed to be struggling to get between her toes in her slippers. She wished she had her shoes, but they no longer fit her swollen feet. She bit her tongue, and persevered over the rutted drive to the opposite side. Here the grass, though brown and brittle, was almost soft and comforting after the garden and the drive.

She went forward up the hill. From time to time, she stopped to breathe. Once an owl flapped by her. She took it for a good omen, and smiled grimly. She patted several times at the pocket of her skirt. The necessary things were there, spiderwort and St. John's wort, with dogbane, stinging nettle, and miner's lettuce. All she needed to work her hedge witchery.

She came to the gate into the pasture, and struggled to open it. It was a heavy wooden gate on rusty hinges, and Clara opened it no more than she must to pass through. When she felt strong enough, she shoved it closed. She leaned on it to gather her breath.

It was only a little way, now, to the top of the pasture hill. Why one had to perform this particular spell on a hilltop Clara did not know. The oral grimoire her mentor in the dark arts had forced her to memorize had been very clear on this requirement. The sheep had bedded down at the top of the hill, instinctively guarding against canine kind. Clara had expected them to be here, and struggled between them, using their backs occasionally as leaning posts. The sheep bleated a little, but they knew Clara and were not greatly disturbed.

At last, Clara reached the hill's high point. The lead ewe slept there. She nudged her aside and sat down with a great snapping and popping of her joints. She'd worry about getting up when she had finished.

She took the plastic bags of dried worts from her skirt pocket and carefully packed them in a pipe she took from another pocket. She packed dried plants in layers, first the miner's lettuce, and then the St. John's wort, and then the stinging nettle, and then the spiderwort, and topped it all off with a layer of dogbane. She lit a match and applied it to the pipe, sucking the smoke in through the stem. She coughed and wheezed. Slowly she drew on the pipe again, and began muttering the spell to twist her daughter-in-law's spine.

Halfway through the stinging nettle layer, Clara lost consciousness and entered into a dimension she had never entered before. A great force she did not recognize, but knew was not Yuna, engulfed her little spirit. The force greedily sucked all the malice from her and dropped her down through the ether into an abyss.

Perry Dee heard a mournful cry on the hill. He grabbed his jacket and dashed out to check his sheep. The cry had sounded very like a coyote, the bane of sheep kind. He found his mother among the sheep, stone dead. In the big house, the newborn whelp, Vanna, smiled an eerie smile at the flaking ceiling over her as she embraced her grandmother's malice.

### Vanna's Dreamtime

Vanna had excused herself from the Sunday evening women's meeting, pleading a headache. In truth, she couldn't stomach any more talk of babies and diapers and ways to please cantankerous husbands. Dickon was working on his next sermon in the study. To avoid him, Vanna went to bed early. She slipped into a dreaming sleep. We are, the bard has told us, the stuff whereof the mind constructs dreams.

The mouse, gravid with young, nibbled at the muffin crumbs on the plate by Vanna's bedside. Poor mouse; she had only lately taken to visiting this old house, since the more familiar one next door had gone vacant of cheese and supplying tenants. Across the plate from her, a cockroach, black, shiny, and ugly, worked at a smear of butter. Tonight his brethren were pillaging elsewhere.

Nervously the mouse looked about her. Strange currents charged the atmosphere. A lingering stale odor of cat, though very old, still tinged the air with danger. She glanced at the sleeping Vanna, and suddenly scurried down the lamp cord to safety behind the baseboard molding. A chartreuse phosphorescence suffused Vanna's aura, making an eerie witch light in the room. The cockroach clambered down the nightstand to a haven under the bed, its tiny claws clicking in the oppressive silence of the night.

Vanna was dreaming. She dreamed she was a kitten, with gray and white stripes. She was playing with a large red maple leaf, batting it back and forth through the dust motes swimming in a ray of sunlight. Suddenly the leaf escaped her paws as she felt herself hoisted through the air by a string around her neck. She was swinging from the string, hung over a nail, her thrashing tail swirling the dancing dust motes into frenzy.

And then she transcended her kitten form, metamorphosing into a bat. With a rabid shriek, she flew her claws into the face of the neighbor boy who was tormenting her kitten. She gouged his eyes with the taloned hands at her wing joints. Blood ran down his face, red in the sun, black in the shadows. Flies gathered--hordes of flies--to feast on the stringy things that dangled from the sockets where the boy's eyes had been. The bat Vanna chittered in glee, and flew into the shadows of the hayloft to lurk in its murk until the moon should rise bloody over the eastern hills.

Then Vanna sat suddenly in human form on a dais. Her dress was a black velvet sheath. Around her neck she wore three strands of black pearls. One by one the men she had known came before her to plead their innocence. Tears stood in many of these helpless creatures' eyes. Several fell to their knees, begging her mercy. Every one of them was nude, with a flaccid penis and shriveled scrotum.

Vanna pronounced the same sentence on each: "Off with his head!" she shouted, like the Queen of Hearts in _Alice in Wonderland._ From nowhere Amazon guards appeared to drag the hapless men to the chopping block.

Last of all, Dickon came before Vanna for judgment. He refused to bow or beg. He simply stood, armored in his own self-confidence. Vanna woke, struggling for breath, because she could not devise a sentence that would break him. Fury radiated from her in a black aura.

The aura washed over the little mouse hiding in the wall. She trembled in her nest of dryer lint and sofa cushion stuffing, and went into labor. Desperately she prayed to all the rodent gods she knew for a safe birth. Sadly, she delivered a stillborn litter of mottled and scarred mouselings. Grief overcame her, and she wet the cushion stuffing with her tears. Vanna glanced at her clock, rolled over, and fell into a dreamless sleep, a bitter smile twisting her lips.

### Kitten on a String (from the _Book of Bygone Days_ )

Vanna's dream woke her remembrances. When she was a small girl she had a kitten, one Mama Cat's last litter. It was, like its mother, a gray cat with white stripes and mottling. It had a particularly loud mew for so tiny a being. She ignored the kitten's littermates. None of them fascinated her the way this kitten did.

Vanna knew the kitten could not leave its mother for another few days. She stroked it again, and put it back to Mama Cat's belly to nurse. She sat, hunkered on her haunches, and watched the kitten suck greedily. Its eyes were not yet open. Only when Vanna's mother's voice, stern with a note of command, called her in to eat, did Vanna leave the cat.

A pout marred the infantile prettiness of her face as she got to her feet, brushing straw from her pinafore. She scraped her shoes against the iron blade at the door of the barn, turning them to inspect the edges of the soles for lingering mud or manure. One could not track such substances into the house; the rules strictly forbade it. A frown creased her childish brow under the tangled mass of black sausage curls on her head. In the sun blond highlights played along the strands. The young girl walked quickly toward the house. Just as her mother was making ready to call again, the young girl came into view.

Yuna Dee, the girl's mother, was prematurely gray. Her hair had once been spun gold, but since her daughter's birth, her second child, she had gone gray and lines etched weariness into her delicate features. Not yet had she come to the years where her nose would touch her chin, and her chin rest on her sagging chest, but age before her time wore on her already. Her shoulders sloped forward, and her neck was growing bent. Even now, it hurt her to look up at the sky.

Vanna came into the kitchen. Since it was lunchtime, the family would eat its large meal now, here, around the kitchen table. A roast beef, already sliced, filled one plate. Mashed potatoes filled a familiar blue bowl. Gravy puddled in the gravy boat. Fine black cracks ran through its white glaze. Too long warming in the oven one holiday dinner had sent it from the holiday china cabinet to this kitchen meal banishment. A huge salad of mixed green plants and such vegetable accompaniments as cucumber, celery, and radishes rounded out the meal.

On instruction, Vanna washed her hands. She was primly disgusted at the mess of soapy dirt her brother, Dan, had left in the washbasin. She tried to rinse it down the drain, spilling water on the floor as she tried to spread it around the basin to rinse the dirt away.

A sharp "Vanna!" from her mother hurried her to the table. She hastily dried her hands on the damp towel, also marred with the traces of Dan's dirty fingers. She slipped into her chair just as Father folded his hands and closed his eyes. He intoned a grace, and then opened his eyes, took meat, potatoes, gravy, and salad in turn onto his plate, and passed each dish to his wife, Yuna. She in turn served herself, Dan, and then Vanna, some of each food. Vanna had no great liking for salad, but in the Dee family, no one disputed Mother's allotment of food. Mother thought salads good for girls, so Vanna got a large portion. She bravely ate it all first, so as not to have the taste lingering on her tongue.

Conversation at the Dee dinner table could not commence until all had eaten everything except dessert (canned peaches today, another item Vanna disliked). Conversation became mandatory over dessert. Father Perry Dee asked questions, and the family answered them. First Dan had to tell how he had progressed with whitewashing the goat pen. Then Mother Yuna had to report on how she had progressed with blanching and freezing the surplus beans.

Vanna, as a five-year-old, had only to describe picking up her toys and tidying her room. Ordinarily Father's inquisition stopped with such matters. Today another question troubled his mind.

"I saw," he said, "signs of mice in the granary. That's Mama Cat's patrol. I suppose the old fool has popped kittens again, somewhere." Vanna held her breath. "It's time, I think," Father went on, "to allow a litter to live." Vanna let out her breath. "We need more cats around to keep the mice down." Dan and Mother nodded.

"She's in the barn," Vanna suddenly volunteered. Father turned a hard black eye on her. He looked at her for a long moment.

"You could have told me earlier."

"I forgot, sir." Vanna felt tears at the back of her eyes. She knew it was folly to release them in front of Father. Tears only doubled whatever punishment Father measured out.

"Show me," he said, pushing back his chair and standing up. Vanna looked at the last spoonful of canned peach in her bowl. She raised her eyes to her father. "Forget the peach," he said. "Mother will compost it so it doesn't go to waste." Vanna looked at her mother. She nodded her permission. Vanna got up also. She put her tiny hand in her father's big, calloused hand. Anger and resentment flared in her as she let her father take control. Her Aunt Mella Dee had told her several times about the evil control men held over women, and suggested women should always subvert that control wherever possible. Vanna had absorbed the lesson's sense of oppression without quite understanding what it meant.

She showed her father the kittens, and their mother. Mama Cat swiped at him when he poked a finger into the litter to count the kittens. Mama Cat had lost too many litters to Perry Dee's burlap bag.

"Not this time, Mama Cat," Perry said. "Let's leave them be, Vanna. Let them grow strong and hungry, to kill the mice." Vanna looked longingly at the gray and white kitten. Miracle of miracles, it opened its eyes. The right was green and the left was blue. The kitten sparked a connection with the little girl. This cat was no mere mouser to be. Vanna knew with five-year-old certainty that this kitten was more important than any of the others.

With her father's indulgent agreement, Vanna got in the habit of reserving small tidbits for Mama Cat and her kittens. Vanna had argued, and Perry agreed, that the felines would prosper with a better diet, and thus be stronger to catch more mice.

Every time she took a paper napkin full of scraps for the cats, she singled out the gray and white kitten for special attention. So it came to pass that this kitten, which Vanna called Dora, became far tamer than the average barn cat.

That was Dora's undoing. Barn cats learn early to distrust farm boys. Farm boys grow up to be farmers who drown unwanted kittens. Vanna's brother, Dan, had a guest over to play, one Maxie Mumm. Maxie's sister, Minnie, was scheduled to play that same Sunday afternoon with Vanna, but she had contracted a childhood illnesses, and was kept home. Maxie had auburn hair, and eyes that appeared either green or blue, depending on the ambient light. Maxie and Minnie were the unwanted offspring of a nameless vagabond cherry picker and an itinerant sex therapist, Chrysantha Mumm.

Maxie was no crueler than the average boy of his age and time, which is to say, he had all the makings of a monster, or a good soldier, but was not vicious enough to become a loan officer without special training. He was a year and a half older than Dan Dee, and commonly led in their games. Maxie detested cats, ever since one had severely scratched him when he was an infant.

It was near the time Vanna brought scraps to the cats, and Dora, ever greedy, was near the barn door, pacing and mewling. Dan and Maxie found the half-grown kitten. Dan's description of the cat as one that was "always hanging around" inspired Maxie to sink to his worst. He scooped Dora up and held the feline tight.

"Get a string," Maxie said. Dan, as always, overawed by Maxie's air of command, found a length of baling twine and handed it to the older boy. Maxie proceeded to make a noose, and circle the cat's neck with it. Then he took the other end, still clutching the protesting cat, and flung it over a protruding piece of machinery. He drew the loose end toward him, and let go of the cat. It swung in space, choking, spitting and mewling. Vanna found her cat just in time to rescue the choking creature from death. She ran at Maxie, forcing him to drop the string. Dora tumbled to the ground, coughing and spiting.

Vanna picked the kitten up and soothed the poor creature, stroking it until it became calm, and could breathe regularly. Then she put it down on the straw-strewn floor and fed it some of the scraps she had brought. She was on all fours talking to Dora when Maxie sneaked up behind her.

Maxie liked girls only a little more than he liked cats. Minnie had come into his life and stolen the attention he had thitherto had completely as his own. Maxie was twice Vanna's height, and had the strength of his anger, as well. He hoisted Vanna with one hand on her childish chest and the other under her groin. Inadvertently his thumb pushed her panties roughly into her most private place. He picked her up in this way and set her aside, dropping her roughly on her hands and knees.

Vanna's helplessness infuriated her. She screamed her fury. Dan came running. He found Maxie chasing Dora, who was too quick and clever for him.

"Vanna," Dan said, "hush up! Father will hear you! What's wrong?"

Vanna choked back her sobs. "Maxie touched me in a personal place," she blubbered.

"Where?"

She pointed. Dan nodded. He put himself in front of Maxie. "You'd better go home," Dan said. "You scared Vanna. It's best to wait until she cools down." Maxie opened his mouth to argue, looked carefully at Dan's expression, and turned and ran across the fields to the tumbledown trailer where he and his family were staying.

"Now, Vanna," Dan said. "Listen to me. Don't say a word of this to anybody, understand? Father would only get upset, and maybe start a fight with the neighbors. We can't have that, can we? It'd make Mama cry."

Vanna nodded, and brought her tears under control. She banked her fury; she in no way extinguished it. Silently she vowed to find the secret of power, and grasp it for herself. She vowed to revenge herself on Maxie.

"Wash your face under the faucet outside," Dan said. "The come to the house. We'll pretend this never happened." Vanna nodded again, and stood. She brushed her clothes as clean of straw as she could, and followed Dan to the house.

Aunt Mella Dee gave Vanna a means of revenge, although she hadn't intended to. She laughingly told Vanna's mother, Yuna, about a childhood incident where she had spilled the laundry into a poison oak thicket. Some of the garments collected sap from the plants, and the whole household had endured rashes and blisters for a couple of days until they deciphered the cause and re-washed the clothes.

Vanna knew poison oak. A large clump of it grew on the edge of the grove. She waited for the Mumm's laundry day. Vanna, wearing rubber gloves, harvested a goodly number of leaves and stems. She crept up on the Mumm trailer and rubbed liberal amounts of urushiol into the crotch of each pair of boy's briefs drying on the clothesline. She took the crushed leaves away, and threw the rubber gloves in the trash.

Maxie Mumm was soon in torment. He scratched at his privates all morning, until his teacher sent him home to bathe. Maxie bathed, and the hot water excited the urushiol to blisters. On the third day of his exposure, Chrysantha figured out what had been done to her precious son. Maxie wound up in the hospital.

Chrysantha immediately suspected Minnie had done the deed to revenge herself on her brother for some childish prank. Minnie finally convinced her mother that the probable culprit was Vanna, because Maxie had teased her kitten. Chrysantha rang up the Dee household. Dan answered. He told Chrysantha how Maxie had assaulted Vanna, and threatened to make the story public if she persisted in punishing Vanna. Chrysantha Mumm got the picture.

A few days later, the Mumms disappeared into the rural west. Dora, the kitten, avoided all humans, including Vanna, thereafter. In Vanna the seed of rage began to grow slowly; long years after it would blossom and bear dark fruit.

### The Manila Envelope

Emma examined the stained manila envelope Mother's attorney had sent. It had come by express delivery just as she had finished her morning coffee. Mother's lawyer had sent it. It was old and smelled musty. "Emma" was on the front in her mother's handwriting. It was only two weeks since Mother had died, and Emma was still adjusting to her absence.

She unwound the red string from the two cardboard buttons on the back. Mildew odors rose from the flap as she opened it. She carefully withdrew two folded sheets of paper. A yellowed snapshot fell out of the folded sheets. Emma opened the brittle sheets, careful not to tear them. Six more little yellow snapshots lay inside.

They looked like the pictures from a booth in a penny arcade. Seven different young men, all dressed in sailor's uniforms, smiled at her. Emma put the snapshots on the table beside her and turned to the papers. Mother had written a note in pencil. Emma turned on a lamp to see the dim writing better through the tears blurring her eyes.

_"Dearest child, I've decided to call you Emma. I'm writing this to you one year after you were born. When you are old enough, I will give this to you to read. You deserve to know your history and your mother's error. I am your birth mother. Your father is one of the seven men in the pictures with this note. Whichever man he is, he is dead. They were all on a military transport plane that crashed during a training flight. I wrote to them and told them I was expecting. When they died, the Navy notified me they all had made you beneficiary of their insurance. They were all gentlemen. Be proud one of them is your father. _

_If you turn out to be the proper sort of girl, I intend you to be, you will wonder how I ever came to be pregnant with you. Almost two years ago I went to the Zoo. I was watching two monkeys wrestle when seven sailors stopped near me. These seven sailors were nearby enjoying the monkeys. I made some comment, and one of them explained to me what the monkeys were doing. I was obviously embarrassed. They apologized, and insisted I come with them for a glass of wine._

_I had more than one glass, and when they suggested we imitate the monkeys, I agreed. We spent the night in a hotel room. In the morning, we took these pictures in a photo booth. I confess I may have been with any or all of them. You are the issue of that event._

_When I told my mother you were on the way, she disowned me. I bowed to her rejection, and never saw her again. Very soon after, she died. Let her lie where she is. She will never know the joy you are. That joy replaces any lost fmily love. With the money your fathers have left me I will study library science, hoping to make a better life for my little girl than I have had._

_Neva Freed._

Emma folded the sheets and laid them beside the manila envelope. Then she laid out the snapshots in an arc. One by one she turned them over. Yes, there was a date, April 2, 1941, penciled on each one, and a name. The pictures of Ed, John, Harry, Dick, Will, Dan, and Ted lay before her. She wondered which pictured her father. She could not find a match for her own face among them. Her mother's features had too strongly shaped her own.

Emma realized that she was half again as old as these men were when they had their photographs made. Emma sat for a long time staring at the seven photographs. When she was a small child, she had asked her mother several times about her father. Her only reply was that he had died honorably in the war. When she asked about grandparents, her mother had answered with vague generalities. Emma soon guessed that Mother would rather not hear any more questions on those topics, so she stopped asking.

"So, Mother," she said to the empty room, "I've been rather naïve, haven't I?" She gathered the note and the pictures and slipped them carefully into the envelope. A knot loosened somewhere inside Emma. Fury rose in her. She began slapping the upholstered arm of her chair.

"You lied to me, Mother! Is everything you told me a lie? All those years you told me to keep myself pure!" The words choked Emma's throat. She slapped the chair harder. "All those dates you talked me out of, because the men weren't as good as my father! No wonder you never took me to the Zoo!" Emma had begun crying. She hadn't noticed when. Her tears were more angry than sad.

"All the years I took care of you, Mother, and you couldn't tell me the truth about my own father, because you didn't know who he was!" She stood and paced around the room. She snatched up Mother's picture and laid it face down on the sideboard. "All the chances I lost! I hate you, Mother, I hate you!" Emma screamed a primal scream, and collapsed into the chair, breathing heavily. The room did not answer her.

In the Zoo, the unicorn with the unique horn raised its head and listened to the howling of the distant winds.

### Vanna's Proposal

Vanna approached Dickon after some days with a proposal. They had completed their supper of beans, ham, and slaw, and Vanna had done the dishes. Dickon had gone in to the living room to read the evening paper.

"Dickon," she said, "I think I should get a job." She tousled his hair with her fingers. She thought he found it charming. He actually hated it, but had never told her so.

"Doing what?" he asked, setting aside his newspaper.

"Typing. It's a skill I have. Or answering phones. I could do that." She noticed Dickon's hair was a little thinner at the crown than it had been several years earlier, when she married him.

"Why do you need a job?" She stared at his upturned face. It took a moment for her to realize he couldn't know what she had been thinking.

"To keep my mind from collapsing with boredom." She spoke as reasonably as she could.

"Surely parish work should provide you with a lot to do and with mental stimulation as well."

"The church is your job. I don't fit into church work." She took a deep breath. "Besides, I hate playing little mouse to your big cat." She saw the hurt surprise pass over Dickon's face before he quickly suppressed it. Damn him, she thought, he won't quit playing the ever-reasonable, ever-understanding, preacher long enough to argue with me! He always has to be so damn perfect!

"Where would you look for work? There aren't many jobs here. We already have a bigger income than most of the families in the church. We shouldn't take work they need to survive." Vanna's anger threatened to boil over. She thrust it back; anger would only defeat her purpose. Dickon froze up when she got angry. Before she could reply, Dickon went on.

"The Presbytery has an opening; it's part-time, in the Presbytery office in Los Albaricoques. If you're interested, I could mention it to Bobbo Link." Vanna swallowed an internal retort. The church again, always, with Dickon, the church.

"If you would, dear," she said, fully intending not to take it if it were offered to her.

"I'll call Bobbo in the morning," Dickon promised. Vanna thanked him, and went to her embroidery. She detested any kind of needlework, but, as Dickon's wife, she was expected to join the Ladies' Aid Society in preparing fancy things to sell to each other at the church bazaar. As she repeatedly pricked her fingers with the needle, she vowed within herself to make Dickon pay for his sins, and the sins of all the other males she had ever encountered. Later that night, when they had gone to bed, she had a small revenge. She pled weariness to forestall sex. Dickon didn't seem to mind; it was almost as if he'd offered because he ought to. Vanna lay awake while Dickon slept, her mind probing her memories like a tongue probes a sore tooth.

### Hope Chest (from the _Book of Bygone Days_ )

Vanna hated May on the ranch. It came with hot days and nights sucking the rain-soft earth dry, making it almost as hard as ceramic ware. In May ranchers marked lambs. Confused bleating and sheep stink wove a blanket with the heat that smothered the ranch. Vanna met Dickon one May.

Everyone, all the Dees and all the dogs, went to the field to round up the sheep and bring them in. Then they separated the ewes and lambs. This stirred the flock to great bleating. Separating the lambs and ewes in the chutes always raised an acrid dust. Its bitterness arose from powdering the dried sheep dung that littered the chutes. It caught in Vanna's nostrils and ravaged her lungs despite the kerchief she tied over her mouth and nose to keep out the dust. It hung and swirled in the hot air while they marked the male lambs and docked the tails of all the lambs.

Her father, Perry Dee, firmly believed women had a place in the universe. That place, in his mind, included chores like cooking, washing, cleaning, helping herd sheep, docking lambs, and sewing. He did not allow a woman to put the elastic on a lamb's scrotum. That was man's work. Women got to dock the tails by putting similar elastic on the tail. Perry insisted, for the health of his sheep, that the elastic be placed as high on the tail as possible. Since lambs didn't wipe, this often meant contact with dung-laden wool. Vanna wanted to mark the lambs, and, while she was at it, provide her father and brother with an elastic adornment as well.

Vanna detested her father at most times, but most especially lamb marking and docking time. He drove himself and her brother, Dan, hard. He drove Vanna and her mother just as hard. He and Dan went in at noonday to sit in the kitchen drinking lemonade while she and her mother put the noon dinner on the table, the dinner they had prepared before dawn while the men gathered the tools for working the sheep.

Lambing happened in December and January, months when the cold rains cut through any garment to chill one's bones and sinews. It came with blood and bad smells. Vanna remembered Christmases as an odor compounded of roast turkey, pine needles, sheep excrement, and sour milk. She hated the holiday season.

Vanna feared she'd go to her grave reeking of lanolin and sheep dung. She saw only one exit, and that was to find a husband who did not work with livestock, who would take her away from this living nightmare. Still under the influence of her father's religious tutelage, Vanna prayed for such a man. He came one Sunday, during lamb marking and docking time. The Dees, as was their regular habit, had washed off as much of the dust and lanolin as strong soap and hot water could move, dressed in their finest, and gone to church. Dickon Shayne occupied the pulpit.

Dickon Shayne surveyed the congregation in the Sheepshin Valley Presbyterian Church. His green eyes moved restlessly over the pews that held the ordinary run of gnarled farmers and worn women one came to expect in a ranching community. They, and the usual cadre of grey-haired widows, some plump as partridges on a spit and others lean as withered cornstalks, looked up at the redheaded divinity student with resigned expectation. A few young faces were sprinkled among the visages wind and weather had carved with history. Dickon smiled, introduced himself as a seminary student, filling in today for their pastor, who was at a Presbytery-mandated conference, and began intoning the invocation. He bid them rise and sing the first hymn. A young man came in and slipped into a pew with his family.

Dickon watched the lean grace of his movements. His hair was dark, and just a little longer than Sheepshin Valley fashion preferred. His shoulders were broad, and strained the dress shirt he wore. His eyes were dark, either blue or black, and the lashes surrounding them were lush and thick. His thin lips moved enticingly as he sang the words to the third verse of the hymn.

The young man stood next to a girl, probably his younger sister. While Dickon sang the fourth verse of the hymn with the congregation, he studied her. She wore her black hair long, and let it hang loose down her shoulders. Her black eyes glinted fiercely, as if to affirm life must be grappled with and conquered. Dark lashes, very like her brother's, surrounded her eyes. Her body was well proportioned, and promised an elegant woman would break through the girlish softness.

She'd look good standing beside me on Sunday mornings, Dickon thought. He was starting his senior year at the Seminary, and had already met the prejudice the average congregation held toward the unwed minister. He had watched the faces of several pulpit committees glaze over when they discovered his unmarried status promised no immediate end, since he had no fiancé. The married and almost-married students got the calls.

After church was over, while the student was shaking hands with the parishioners, Vanna drew Yuna back. "Can we ask him to dinner, Mother?" she inquired. Yuna stared at her daughter. Vanna had not demonstrated any great interest in men before this.

"Why, yes, I suppose we could," Yuna said. She looked for Perry Dee. The back of his balding head was well ahead of her. Uncharacteristically she made a decision without his approval. "We have the lamb roast in the oven, and quite enough vegetables and potatoes. We can always have canned peaches for dessert. Yes, I think we can invite him."

When she reached the Seminary student, Yuna introduced herself and her daughter, Vanna. She asked him if he had received an invitation to dinner. He said he had not. "Please," she said, "come dine with us. We're the third ranch on the left off Gray Fleece Lane. Do you know where that is?"

"Yes," he said. "I studied the map before I came up from Seminary this morning."

"We'll expect you within the hour, then," Yuna said. She told Perry as he drove them home that she had invited the Seminary student to dinner. Perry said nothing; dinner guests were in Yuna's bailiwick. Perry applied his mind to thinking up conversational gambits to get himself through his afternoon hosting chores.

Yuna bore just fame for her roast lamb dinners. To begin with, Perry had a genius for slaughtering a lamb at the peak of its flavor. Yuna enhanced the meat with slivers of garlic embedded in the roast, and a fine dusting of ground rosemary, salt, and black pepper (she ground the rosemary and pepper with a mortar and pestle). Commonly, she accompanied the meat with roast potatoes and carrots, and a cruciferous vegetable. On this day she had selected Brussels sprouts dressed with blackened butter. For dessert she served her favorite, canned peaches.

Dickon Shayne ate heartily; the home-cooked meal filled a gnawing emptiness in his psyche as well as his stomach. The after-dinner conversation, prompted by Perry Dee's carefully rehearsed gambits, ranged over a multitude of topics, political, religious, and economic. Vanna made every effort to attract Dickon's notice. He seemed pleasant enough, and he had no desire to ranch for a living. After he left, she consulted her mother.

"Mother," she said, "do you think I made a decent impression on Mr. Shayne?"

Yuna smiled at her. "Yes, dear, I think you did."

"Do you think he'll come back to Sheepshin Valley?" Vanna studiously dried the plates Yuna had washed and rinsed.

"Perhaps," Yuna said. "You can only wait and see."

On Tuesday Yuna and Perry received a short note of thanks from Dickon. In it he mentioned how charming Vanna's conversation had been. Yuna pointed out to Vanna that she had made an excellent impression. Two weeks later, when Dickon came just to attend Sunday services at the Sheepshin Valley Presbyterian Church, it was only natural for Yuna to invite him to dinner again (meatloaf, this time, another of Yuna's specialties). It was the first of many invitations.

Vanna consulted her Aunt Mella Dee, who had inherited some of Clara Dee's lesser spells. One of these was a love potion. She schooled Vanna in its preparation and taught her how to slip it into Dickon's tea or coffee. Vanna used the substance at the maximum dose. Over the course of his senior year, Dickon fell into the habit of spending Sundays in Sheepshin Valley, usually at dinner with the Dees.

When Perry Dee grumbled to Yuna about Dickon's freeloading ways, she hushed him with the prospect of a possible husband for their Vanna. At the beginning of May, Dickon proposed to Vanna. Vanna accepted. They planned an August wedding.

Dickon wrote to a friend from the seminary.

_Dickon Shayne_

_1016 Seminary Towers_

_Dinkum, California_

_May 18, 1972_

_Rev. Maurice Toryum_

_971 Blackwater Circle_

_Tumbling Rocks, Washington_

_Dear Morrie,_

_I have accepted a call to the Hollow Log Presbyterian Church in Bypass Village in Oregon. I am to begin there on the second Sunday in June. That Presbytery will ordain me. I look forward to this congregation. Most of the parish is older people whose children have grown and moved away. Not much chance to increase the Sunday School, but a lot of adult education opportunities. I will not have to report to a senior pastor, since I am the only pastor for the congregation, which numbers forty-seven. The salary meets the minimum, and a manse is provided._

_Further news: I am to be married in August. Her name is Vanna Dee, from Sheepshin Valley. Her family is staunchly Presbyterian, and faithful in their attendance at their local Presbyterian church. Her father has served, I believe, as an elder for two or three terms. Vanna has long dark hair, deep black eyes, and a great intelligence. She is an easy conversationalist, though a little shy. She is also frugal, a better cook than I am, skilled with a sewing machine, and will be, I think, an ornament to this pastor's calling._

_Pray a thanksgiving prayer for me. When I have specific dates and times for my ordination, I'll write to you._

_Yours in Christ,_

_Dickon Shayne_

Vanna wrote to a favorite aunt with great expectations.

_Vanna Dee_

_3729 Gray Fleece Lane_

_Sheepshin Valley, California_

_May 19, 1972_

_Ms. Mella Dee_

_1407 Wounded Partridge Lane_

_Bird-in-the-Hand, Utah_

_Dear Aunt Mella,_

_It's true. I'm getting married in August. Thanks for the family potion. I think it helped. Dickon is almost six feet, with red hair, green eyes, and a good body. He has a beautiful tenor voice that sells well in the pulpit. He even has a job, a "call" as they say it, to a place in Oregon. It's another hick town, like Sheepshin, but it's a starting place. With a little encouragement, Dickon should go on soon to bigger and better things. At least he doesn't plan to raise sheep or hay. He's allergic to both._

_I know you think I should have held out for a doctor or a lawyer, but there aren't any available specimens in Sheepshin Valley. We're lucky to get preachers and teachers._

_I don't think I'll have much trouble managing him. Mother says I should just let him think he's in charge of everything, and do my things my way anyway. She says it has worked well for her with Father. Dickon seems to be very much in love with me, at least he keeps saying so. I murmur similar responses, but I keep your advice in mind, Aunt Mella. The advice you gave me years ago about loving no man so much as I love myself. I'll write more later; right now Mother is ready to take me to town to find a wedding gown material within Father's budget._

_Your loving niece,_

_Vanna Dee_

Yuna Dee sat down, after the wedding clutter had been cleared away, and wrote a brief note to an old friend.

_Yuna Dee_

_3729 Gray Fleece Lane_

_Sheepshin Valley, California_

_September 5, 1972_

_Effie Denz_

_6879 Rutabaga Road_

_Truck Garden Town, Texas_

_Dear Effie,_

_Well, it's over and done. My little Vanna has flown the nest. She's now Mrs. Dickon Shayne wife to the Reverend Dickon Shayne, of Bypass Village, Oregon. The wedding was quite lovely, and, I can say with pride, I produced the whole affair within Perry's spending limits. One would think a father would be readier to indulge an only daughter than Perry was. We held the wedding at the church, of course, and the reception here, at the house. Vanna and I made her dress ourselves. It was a simple gown, Empire-waisted, with faux seed pearls sewn to the sleeves. She wore my veil, the one Mother bought me when I married Perry. The groom is handsome, a green-eyed redhead, with an erect posture and a shy smile that lights up one's heart. I hope they will be happy together. I fear Dickon is not as ambitious as Vanna might want him to be. They'll have to work that out between them._

_The house seems very empty without Vanna. Dan has grown into a silent man, hard, as his father is hard. Perhaps he'll find a woman, one day, and bring her home to be his wife, and dare I hope it? my companion._

_Do write and tell me the news of Texas, and the Denz family._

_Sincerely,_

_Yuna Dee_

### Thrift Shop Theology

Swami Rirenda Fendabenda felt his worship lacked focus. His altar, with a simple bronze Buddha incense burner and two candles was too simple. It did not impress the occasional visitor to his shrine sufficiently with his devotion. He needed more statuary, in short. As usual, funds in his capacious pockets were minuscule. He abandoned thoughts of buying brilliant ceramic saints from the Wong Brothers' Import Export Emporium or any other of the shops in Chinatown. Perhaps the St. Edmund's Thrift Shop had something to offer.

The Swami donned his saffron robe and tied the emerald cord around his ample abdomen. He put on his best walking sandals; the sun was high for the City, and the walks would be quite warm, at least on the sunny side of the streets. The Swami's feet were tender.

The day was warm, and he walked slowly, lest he break into a sweat that would leach the dye from his robes into his armpit hair. He had done so once, and the itch lasted for days.

St. Edmund's had few customers at the noon hour. Most indigents, who provided the shop's primary demographic, were at table in the church's dining hall. The Swami greeted the monk, Brother Vitus, whom he knew slightly, with a nod. Brother Vitus nodded in return, scarcely looking up from his devotional reading. Brother Vitus was scrawny from much fasting, and sour of countenance from much prayer. His large nose dominated his almost chinless, gaunt, face. He wore the rusty black robes of his order. He sniffed at intervals, perpetually tortured by uncontrolled sinusitis.

The Swami prowled the room, passing the racks of used trousers donated by folk of good will who hoped to buy a little more from whatever deity they worshipped. He walked, holding his breath, past the books. Most were from clergy libraries, doomed to lie on the shop's tables until they moldered into heaps of mildew. In the back, beyond the fugitive plates from old wedding china sets and the chipped glasses and bent flatware that still might serve a street person, the Swami found a shelf of pious objects. St. Francis and the Madonna predominated. Though his own faith was most eclectic as to participant saints, the Swami wanted to maintain an Oriental décor.

Set on a shelf below, amidst cracked moustache cups and grimy carnival glass he found them. Three Kuanyins, obviously a set. He lifted one, and then the next, and then the third, before he found a price. Ten dollars. He winced. That meant broth and noodles for a while, until he could finagle donations from someone. He had tapped out his regular donors out for the month. He frowned. Then his face cleared, and he chuckled softly. Brother Vitus had a weakness of prejudice.

He carried the three statues to the desk where Brother Vitus and his devotional guarded the cash register.

"Good afternoon, Brother Vitus," he said. Brother Vitus looked up. His glacial blue eyes peered around the contours of his nose.

"Yes?" he said.

"Do you know the provenance of these statues?"

"No. What are they?"

"Objects of worship from heathen temples in China. I'm surprised to see them here."

Brother Vitus shrank back, as though the Swami offered him a vial of bubonic plague. The Swami pretended not to notice.

"See," he said, pointing to a smoky streak on one of the statues, "Here's where the smoke from heathen incense has marked the thing. Someone must have used it frequently. Lots of heathen prayers uttered here." The Swami looked at Brother Vitus with a wide-open innocence. "Have you had these in your shop for a long time?"

"No. Just came in this morning. Some estate dumped them here." Brother Vitus was rubbing his fingers against his robes. The Swami guessed Brother Vitus had priced them and put them on the shelf. "Be glad to get rid of them."

"I'll give you a dollar apiece for them."

"Done, if you put them in a bag yourself."

The Swami took out three one-dollar bills and handed them to Brother Vitus, who feared no contamination from mere money. He handed the Swami a bag. The Swami put his purchases into the bag and left Brother Vitus moaning prayers behind him in the shop.

### Shir Li Makes Statues (From the _Book of Bygone Days_ )

It was June of 1900, and China was in flames. The I Ho T'uan, the "Righteous Harmony Bands," whom the missionaries, in their foreign devil speech called "Boxers" were pushing out the foreigners and those who followed their religion.

Shir Li, old now, with yellow stains in his white beard, and his queue gray with age, modeled three figures of Kuanyin in Pearl River clay. He had modeled the Buddhist saints all his life. He used the clay of his native Ningwu near the Great Wall's shadow in Shangsi Province. When the troubles began, the missionary had brought Li's son, Shir Ting and his wife King Ki, to this foreign semi-tropical China near Guangzhou.

Li did not like Guangzhou. He was an old man. In the dry mountains of Ningwu, his bones had not reminded him too often of his age, except on the coldest and snowiest of nights. Here, where the rivers, marshes, and seas all breathed dampness, Li's bones breathed pain. And the food was not to his liking. He preferred wheat or millet to rice, and lamb to the ubiquitous chicken and fish of this coastal area. He didn't like the missionary very much, either.

Li did not expect to enter the missionary's Heaven, and did not want to enter it. Perhaps Nirvana one lifetime. Or perhaps the Old Master, Lao Tzu was right, that one might be in the wheel of change and transform oneself out of it by embracing it. Philosophical and theological splitting of hairs was no more an interest to Li as his sore and stiff fingers shaped a Kuanyin around the vial he had put in its center. The Kuanyin would be one of a set of three Kuanyins, meant to go with his son and daughter-in-law when they fled China.

Secretly Li sympathized with the antipathy of the I Ho T'uan to the foreigners. Li was an old man who had seen many die for reasonless causes under the heavy and grinding heels of the Qing Dynasty. He had no wish to see any one die in a war over which god to worship. Away to the North, in Shangsi, many had died, and here now was news coming from Peking of war and troops of the foreigners battling in Peking. Resistance was ineffective. Did not a sacred one somewhere say one became what one resisted? Resist the foreigners and China would become foreign.

Li shook his head. He put the last smoothing on the Guangzhou clay and set it aside to dry. Then he made a second and third Kuanyin. The set would go over the great water with Ting and Ki and their missionary friend. It was the missionary who had persuaded Li to come with them out of Shangsi just before the trouble started. They had ridden on the railway. Ah! The screeching of that machine, and the long lines of cars, like a dragon wounded and howling through the countryside of China, still haunted Li. As did the battles to fill the rice bowls along the way. Now he would die in this stinking place of rivers and marshes while weird water birds wailed in the wet winds.

One Kuanyin's head inclined to the left, one's head to the right, and one was upright for the center place between the other two. When his trembling fingers had put the last details on the Kuanyins, Li sat back to eat his cold rice while the statues baked in the sun. Li understood the missionary had meant to be kind as an expression of his God's commands. Yet Li had wished to die in Ningwu in Shangsi Province to be buried among the graves of his ancestors. Alas, not now!

Two days later Li took paints and a small brush. He painted each of the clay statues with the bronze base-paint. When the paint dried, he put a second coat on. To a careless eye they would have seemed bronze. Anyone who lifted them would know them to be of a lighter material. The waterproof vials in them added an odd balance to their heft.

Li scraped the last of his rice grains into a heap in the bottom of his bowl and counted them. There were nine, the sacred number. Reverently he scraped them out on the ground, and a small Mandarin duck came and took them one by one. Then the duck bowed three times to Li, and Li, without rising, inclined his head to the duck. The duck waddled away. Night was coming. He would read a little in the books of poems, which the missionary had, translations of religious poetry from his own barbarian tongue, and then he would sleep.

Shir Ting and King Ki wept for Li when they went to wake him in the morning. Li would not rise again to make statues or to paint them. Ting and Ki presented the statues to their missionary friend, the Reverend Philo Zinner, in remembrance of their father. They declined to go with the missionary. They decided to stay with a young friend they had met named Sun Yat Sen and overthrow the Qing Dynasty.

Reverend Zinner took Li's Kuanyins, with their implanted vials, away with him to the City. They remained in his family until the death of his son, Fowler Zinner, when Fowler's heirs donated them to the St. Edmund's Dining Room Thrift Shop.

Shir Ting survived to a great old age. King Ki had died of a swamp fever in 1907. Shir Ting was instrumental in organizing the Chinese Republic. He was with Mao on the Long March. For long years he did not think of the three Kuanyins his father had made. During World War II he met a man from Ningwu who knew Li. The man told him that his father had had a great Chinese treasure. Ting deduced that this treasure was small enough to be secreted in the Kuanyins.

It was 1972, and Nixon had come to China. Shir Ting asked a Western reporter to help retrieve the Kuanyins. When the reporter returned to the United States, he hired a detective from the City who called himself Quigley Drye to search for the statues. Quigley quickly became obsessed with the task, and adopted the persona Fu I for undercover work.

In Beijing, Shir Ting lay on a bed in a government hospital. Around his shriveled figure stood several persons in white medical clothes. The medical persons gravely wagged their heads in unison in the manner of medical persons worldwide. One of Shir's hands periodically rose and clawed at the air, and then fell to his side and scratched at the sheets. They applied more steel needles to vital areas and his arm grew still. His breathing worsened. The doctors wagged their heads periodically. The enemy they never conquer won again. Shir Ting's breath rattled in his throat. He died. The People's Doctors wagged their heads over him several minutes before they noticed. Then one signaled another who closed Shir's eyes. They all wagged their heads as they left in single file.

In the course of time, Quig Drye determined the Kuanyins had remained in the Zinner family for nearly seventy years, but that family had donated them to St. Edmund's Thrift Shoppe. The round-faced monks could not remember who had bought them. No, no one deemed them valuable enough to record in the sales book as anything other than miscellaneous.

### Scene on a Country Road

Some other clergy wife filled the Presbytery position, though Vanna did interview for it. She had broken through a barrier, though, in her own mind, and in Dickon's mind. She persevered in her job search until she found work with Quigley Drye, a private eye in the City. The freedom and excitement of a world outside the church paid for the long commute. Vanna did not forget, however, Dickon's opposition. From the first day, she had an independent check in her bank she vowed to leave him, and then to destroy him. Evil spirits heard her vows, and recorded them.

Today the sun was low in the eastern sky, shrouded in retreating mist, as though reluctant to face another day's trip across the heavens. Moisture dripped from the eucalyptus trees onto the windshield of Dickon Shayne's old Plymouth. Every time he passed a grove he had to turn the wipers on. Silently he wished he had a newer car, one with intermittent wipers.

Vanna fumed beside him. He felt her tension like a third presence in the front seat. "Can you drive a little faster? I don't want to be late. Mr. Drye gets all out of joint if I'm late," she said.

"Up ahead, where the road straightens, I can go faster."

"You'd like me to be late, wouldn't you? Late, so I get fired." Vanna leaned forward and glared at the twisting road.

"Vanna, the road is slick from the fog last night. That's all. I'm going as fast as it's safe to go."

"Yeah, right."

Vanna subsided into the passenger's seat. She stared out the side window at the passing pastures. Here and there a few cattle or sheep dotted the hillsides. Vanna hated the country. For her it was a prison she feared she could never escaped. And Dickon, damn him, thought it was a wonderful place.

"Look, Dickon, we'll never have anything if we try to live just on your income. Churches just don't pay, at least not country churches."

Dickon sighed heavily. He frowned sidelong at Vanna. "Don't start up again, Vanna. I asked you to quit, and you said no. That's the end of it."

Vanna spat her words at Dickon. "I'm not going to be a good little church wife, Dickon. Church wife is a church mouse. I'm not a mousy type."

Dickon spoke with all the weariness of a wheel turning without moving forward. "No, Vanna. I know that."

Vanna pointedly stared at her watch. "Better make good time on the straightaway. I'll be late otherwise."

Dickon increased the car's speed. When he reached the straight stretch, he floored the accelerator. The Plymouth groaned and crept forward to a faster pace. "I'm pushing this old crate as hard as I can," Dickon said.

"Okay, okay."

Vanna kept silence until they reached the bus station. She leaped from the car and dashed for the bus without saying goodbye. Dickon sighed. He knew the bus wouldn't leave for another five minutes. Vanna had plenty of time to get on, and get to the City in good order. Not that this secretarial position with a private eye paid particularly well. Vanna didn't like her boss. She'd described him, more than once, as a pig. Vanna was seldom happy with anyone, these days.

Dickon rounded the block and aimed the Plymouth for home. As he drove the stale anger Vanna had left behind slowly drained from the car and from his day. He could work on Sunday's sermon this morning, then, in the afternoon, he could help Ray Sincaine clean the church windows. A quiet day, at least until Vanna came home. He started to whistle a hymn tune as he entered the twisting stretch.

A jangling telephone greeted Dickon when he got home. "Hello," Dickon said.

"Hello yourself!" a grating voice Dickon recognized immediately responded. "Beautiful mid-morning isn't it! Have you been outside yet?" Dickon groaned silently. Ray Sincaine was a pest who called almost every morning to chat with Dickon. Dickon cordially detested the man.

"No, Ray," Dickon said. "I hadn't woken up yet. I was in Las Tumbas late yesterday."

"You have time to chat?"

"Not really, Ray. I've got to get ready and go over to Los Albaricoques later this morning. I have a Presbytery Parish Welfare Committee meeting at noon."

"What's that all about? Not thinking of leaving, are you?" Dickon wondered what brought this to Ray's mind, and then shrugged off the thought. Deacon Sincaine was a quirky thinker.

"No, just a routine consultation. It's the Presbytery's way of keeping its finger on the pulse of the parishes."

"Well, give us a good report, then. You'll remember how much we increased our mission giving?"

"Yes, Ray. I'll make a point of that, and tell him about the increase in Sunday School attendance, too."

"Right you are, Reverend." Dickon heard the gratification in Ray's voice. Ray's recruitment efforts had brought three more children into the Sunday School. That was a significant increase for a small rural congregation. "Still on for cleaning windows this afternoon, Reverend?"

"Yes," Dickon said. "I should be back about three."

"I'll be at the church at three," Ray said. "Ringing off, now." The phone clicked. Dickon heard the dial tone return as he was putting down the receiver. He groaned. A committee meeting followed by Ray Sincaine promised a stressful afternoon. He fervently hoped Vanna came home in a mellow mood.

### Mission

Salvación Mandor swept the stoop before her mission at 112 Lost Lane. It was her pre-lunch ritual. She looked at the sky, trying to gauge how long the fog would linger. She heard the muted Carnival music from the Avenue, and sighed. She had not felt young and carefree like that Carnival for many years--not since Lieutenant Shinn sailed from Lima and disappeared.

Today she felt especially burdened. Unease prickled in her back-brain. She tried to shrug it off, but it persisted. The unease nagged at her subconscious through the noon meal. Then the sun found Lost Lane and brightened the mission's interior. La Señora left the volunteers to complete the washing up, and went to her cell, as she called her office, closed the door, and fell into a meditative trance. Somewhere in her trance, she linked with the unicorn mind.

The unicorn was a unique creature; it passed most of its days disguised as a llama, currently resident in the zoo. On occasion, when cosmic need merited, the unicorn shed its llama skin, and, using the toes on its left foot, screwed in a unique unicorn horn it kept in the llama shed behind an old board. Most times, though, it just communed with Salvación at a sub-intellectual level.

The llama-unicorn was part of Salvación's inheritance from her Quechua mother. It was her spirit guide, soul's companion, and strengthening presence. Just now, her link with the unicorn was sparking with trouble. Something big and bad was coming her way.

Salvación relinquished her meditative trance and returned her spirit to her body in its cell. The visions the unicorn with the unique horn sent were often unclear. This time it had sent Salvación no vision at all. She had gotten only dark gray psychic fuzz with random sparks of multicolored light in it. Salvación did not know how to interpret this sending, except as a warning to prepare the mission with food, blankets, and other necessaries. When in doubt, be prepared, her mother had often quoted. She left her cell and went to find a volunteer to take a list at her dictation.

She found Willy. He had come to her mission about a month earlier, dressed in very ragged briefs with shackle and manacle marks on his wrists and ankles. He spoke not a word when La Señora encountered him at the gates to the mission. He simply shivered in the cold morning air and raised pleading eyes to her. She could not turn him down, of course; sanctuary was his for the asking. He had proven a useful scamp, good as a messenger and a general "dog's body" around the mission.

La Señora had discovered he commanded an adequate vocabulary for most normal transactions, though he was slow to speak, and slower to answer questions. When La Señora tried to determine where he had come from, all she could get by way of description was that he had run away "from the place where they hurt me." He admitted to no name. La Señora chose to call him Willy Waugh, after the williwaw winds that blow from land to sea around Cape Horn. They were wild, feral, winds, and Willy reminded her of them.

La Señora considered his scrawny frame; a month's worth of feeding had put some flesh on him, but not much. She wished he could write. She didn't know if he could or not, but now wasn't the time to find out.

"Find me a volunteer," she said. "Anyone who can write will do." Willy nodded, his customary response to a request or command, and scurried away. There was something furtive about his movements, as if he feared a blow might fall at any moment. At least she had persuaded him he needed to wear some sort of garment around his waist at all times; his natural mode was nudity.

When the volunteer, Anne Tenor, came, La Señora began to dictate a list of emergency supplies to lay in. Everyone at the Mission who was able spent most of the balance of the day shopping and storing emergency blankets, food, and the like.

### Mountain Magic (From the _Book of Bygone Days_ )

Clouds writhe and wreathe around the peaks of the Andes, making sport in the sky with the sun. Taller they seem than the sky itself. Here, far from the prying eyes of science and commerce (even whole cities may hide among the foliage of the cloud forests), the happenings of older, mystic truths may play out their courses unimpeded by that degraded, mundane, reality we all accept as true.

This is the land of the Quechua, and their predecessors. The authority of the Spanish governments is nominal here. The rule of the llama god takes precedence over the suffering Christ of the black-robed priests. The folk are faithful at mass, true, but faithful to their own cosmology, not to the imported Roman vagaries.

One who lived here the people called simply "El Curandéro," the healer. No one remembered his name, neither the Quechua name nor his Spanish name. To all authorities of the government and church he was a simple llama keeper who dabbled in herbal medicines on the side. Since his medicines did no harm, and sometimes even worked, no one in power was the least distressed about his practice.

El Curandéro had fathered a daughter on a woman of Lima. Once he had left his refuge among the peaks. He had walked many days on the old roads of his ancestors until he came to the Spanish city. Once there he sought out a woman of easy virtue, paid her fee, and got on her a child. Then he returned to his mountain and its thick foliage.

When the woman of Lima determined she was pregnant, she set out to find the man who had given her the child. As the fetus waxed within her, she walked ever eastward and upward, mindful of the life within her, homing by instinct on the hut of El Curandéro.

El Curandéro practiced divination in the brown waters of the Urubamba that frothed and churned over the rocky streambed at the foot of his mountain. He read from the frantic flamenco zapateado of the white foam as it leaped over the rocks what was to be. He knew the woman approached him, and that her time was almost upon her. He went upriver to Ollantaytambo and greeted the woman.

"Señora," he said to her in the narrow streets the Incas had lined with stone houses, "welcome." He led her into a stone house where old women lived. "This is the mother of my child," he said to them. "Her time is almost upon her. Help her to bring forth her babe." Then he left and went up the mountain to meditate.

In her time the woman brought forth a girl child. The child was healthy. The old women sent word to El Curandéro that he had a daughter. He came down again to Ollantaytambo to bless her and name her. He could not heal the child's mother. Her odyssey from Lima had come at the end of a dissolute life that sapped her strength. She died in the child's first year. El Curandéro left it to the women of Ollantaytambo to raise the child, though he often visited with her and played with her. When she was old enough to cook for him, he invited her to live on the mountain with him and his llamas. She didn't stay long.

A young Spanish policeman enticed her away with promises of riches. Once he had had his way with her, he abandoned her in the slums of Lima. There she made the unfortunate acquaintance of an Episcopal bishop on holiday, who smuggled her into the United States and a life of white slavery.

El Curandéro could see, when he read the rapids of the roiling river at the foot of his mountain that a holy man had prostituted his daughter. He grieved for her, and entered a weeklong trance of prayer and cosmic manipulation. One of the woman's customers married her. She sent him a letter, dictated to her husband, and read to him by a woman of Ollantaytambo. She told him she was with child.

El Curandéro knew when his granddaughter was born. He did not see her birth in the divining waters. He was attending a llama, one of the oldest she-llamas in his herd. She labored to bring forth her young. He had thought her past the age for bearing offspring, and had marveled at her pregnancy. The delivery was long, and difficult, for it was not a llama that the old one produced. It was a unicorn with a unique horn.

El Curandéro tenderly wiped the afterbirth and other fluids from the foal. The llama was too tired to care for the infant animal. Gently El Curandéro introduced the foal to its mother's teats. The foal suckled. El Curandéro found special grasses for the mother llama to build her strength. It was several days before she could stand. Meanwhile, her foal grew stronger.

The girl's mother christened her Salvación. She had a way of winning hearts with her smile. She was graceful as a gazelle, and often laughed as though she heard secret jokes in the ether of the Cosmos. Perhaps she did; she and the unicorn grew in stature and understanding, and each dwelt in the spirit of the other.

### Emma Chooses to Act

Emma calmed after a while. Mother's often-preached self-control was too habitual for Emma to cast it aside for very long, even alone in her own home. Emma began to ponder. She pondered for three days. Emma consulted her rolodex, and then dialed a number. The telephone on the other end rang three times before someone picked it up.

"Hello?" queried the voice on the other end.

Emma answered. "Cousin Salvación? This is Emma Freed, Notta's daughter. How are you? How are things at your mission?"

"Emma! It's been a while since I heard from you. I'm well. Matters go forward about as usual here. How are you?"

"Feeling rebellious."

"Rebellious? About what? Can I help you with that?"

"I hope so. I want to spend a day in the City. With an escort."

"I see. What can I do for you about that?"

"Do you know a safe and reliable service?"

"Well, that's not common knowledge for a woman who runs a mission for the homeless."

"I don't want to consult the yellow pages."

"I do have an acquaintance that might help. Do you know the Wong Brothers' Emporium?"

"Yes. I've bought a couple of small things there."

"Mae Ling who clerks there has a service on the side. It's the only place I can think of."

"I know Mae Ling. I bought a small Buddha from her once. Mother hated it. It's a place to start, Cousin Salvación. Thank you."

"You're quite welcome. Keep in touch."

"I will, Cousin. Goodbye."

"I'm off to see the Zoo," she said to the rhododendron by the porch. "It's where Mother got me." She went to the bedroom to dress. She put on her best white blouse and her apricot linen suit over her best lingerie. She selected shoes with a low, sensible, heel. She went out and locked the front door. She went to the bus stop. Mother had never let Emma learn to drive.

Mae Ling was behind the counter when Emma entered Wong Brothers. She saw no sign of Shu or Way, the two brothers who owned the Emporium. She presumed they were in the back doing their books.

"Good morning, Miss Freed," Mae said. "We have not seen you for a long time."

"My Mother has been ill. I've had to care for her."

"That is a difficult thing to do, Miss Freed. How is she doing?"

"She died about two weeks ago," Emma said quietly.

"I'm sorry for you. The death of one's parent is always distressing."

"Yes. I'm just beginning to learn how to live without her."

"How may I help you, today?"

"I have decided to go to the Zoo. I've never been, you see. Mother would never take me, or allow anyone else to take me."

"The Zoo is a very fine place, I'm sure. One purchases a ticket, I believe, at the gate. We do not, of course, sell them here."

"No, I didn't think you would. Perhaps, though, you can tell me where I might find an escort for the afternoon. Someone to go with me? You see, I've not been out on my own very often, and I think I'd feel better if I had someone trustworthy with me."

"Well, it is not common knowledge among our customers, but the Brothers Wong do occasionally suggest a gentleman or lady for good customers who wish to hire a companion. Would you like me to see if we have someone who could go with you? There is a charge, you understand."

"Of course. Yes, please; I'd feel much safer being with someone approved by the Wong Brothers."

"Let me make a few discreet inquiries. Please browse the shop. I must go in the back to telephone."

"Of course," Emma said. She perused the ivory carvings (all carefully labeled as being "fossil" ivory). She went on to look at the jade necklaces, and craned her neck to stare at the embroidered bamboo panels high on the walls. She was beginning to edge toward the door, thinking an escort was too risky when Mae returned.

"A very fine young man, Mr. Haakon Spitz, will be here in half an hour. Would you care to take a cup of tea while you wait?"

"Thank you. Tea will be very pleasant indeed. I am a novice at this. How do I pay the charge, to Mr. Spitz?"

"No, you may pay it here. We accept all major credit cards. We identify the purchase, discreetly, as jewelry." Mae quoted a price per hour. Emma asked for ten hours. Then Emma took her rarely used credit card from her purse and handed it to Mae. Mae wrote up the charge slip, Emma signed it, and took her copy. Then Mae made her tea while they talked of inconsequential things.

### Emma Meets a Man

Haakon Spitz surprised Emma. He was much younger than she had expected. She guessed he was in his twenties, at least ten or fifteen years younger than she was. Exercise had sculpted every muscle on his body for maximum beauty. His finely drawn face conveyed both strength and sensitivity. His hair was golden wheat. His blue polyester matched his blue eyes. His smile was at once boyishly open and mysteriously manly. Emma wondered if he had stepped off the cover of a romance novel.

Mae introduced them. Haakon took her arm and escorted her out the door. She knew she had "rented" this man for a ten-hour period. What, now, was she going to do with him all that time? Ten minutes seemed like a lengthy time. She had told him twice about her work at the library.

Haakon had told her to relax and to enjoy what she was doing. He assured her that she could tell him at any time if he did something she didn't like.

"Be patient with me, Mr. Spitz; I've never spent a day with a man before." Emma blushed.

"I'd guessed that," he said, patting her arm. "If you just relax, you'll have a lot of fun. Would you like to lunch first?"

Lunch sounded safe. "Lunch first, I think."

Mr. Spitz took her to a Chinese restaurant. She let him order. He seemed quite knowledgeable about Chinese dishes. While he spoke to the waiter, Emma worked at quieting her inner turmoil. It had seemed so easier to do this morning, under the shock of her mother's letter, this coming to the City and renting a man.

Spitz smiled at her and she blushed again. He put the tip of his finger on her hand for an instant. The warmth from it lingered.

"Do you make your living solely as an escort, Mr. Spitz?"

"Please call me Haakon. By calling I'm a painter. Escorting charming women about the City is a pleasant way to supply my palette with paints and my easel with canvasses."

"Mae Ling hadn't mentioned that you were a painter." Emma felt a slight chill of fear that was also deliciously naughty tingle along her spine. She knew from reading the romances at the library that artists were often wilder and more dangerous to a girl's virtue than poets were. A half smile played about her lips. "What do you paint, Mr. Spitz— Haakon?"

"Mostly portraits of Saint Sebastian. The arrows fascinate me." He looked over her shoulder. His eyes focused on some distant scene. "St. Sebastian was martyred twice, you know," he went on, caught up in his subject. "According to the legends, anyway. Diocletian had him shot full of arrows, but he survived, with the help of a widow, St. Irene." Emma let him drone on about Saint Sebastian while she daydreamed about going to bed with him.

### The Zoo

After lunch Haakon asked her, "Is there somewhere special you'd like to go?"

"Yes," Emma said shyly. "I'd like to go to the Zoo. She blushed. "If it's too gauche, we don't need to go."

"I haven't been to the Zoo since the first month I was in the City." He smiled at her. "My clients usually want to tour the bars, the motels, the theaters, the nightclubs. The Zoo sounds like fun. I get very tired of touring bars, dancing, that sort of thing."

"I don't care for bars and dancing," Emma said primly.

"I didn't think you came here just to have a fling you couldn't have in the suburbs. You're running from something or to something, aren't you?"

Emma stared at her teacup a long moment. The question embarrassed her.

"You aren't like most of the other women I escort, Emma," he continued. "You are very diffident. That makes you mysterious."

Tears stood in Emma's eyes. Haakon took her hand between his.

"Haakon," Emma said, her breathing broken as though she strangled on stifled sobs, "My mother died about two weeks ago. Since, I've had unsettling news about my mother's past. Today I'm in limbo. I think tomorrow I will be back at the library. Yes, I am running—from what to what I'm not sure." Emma's tears welled up from deep inside herself.

Haakon stroked her hand to soothe her. "Come run in the sun with me, Emma," he said. "Come play with me at the Zoo." He signaled to the waiter for the check. His own emotions disturbed him. He was, contrary to all his ordinary feelings on the job, sexually attracted to Emma. She piled her hair in a bun on the top of her head. Gray speckled it. Her face spoke of severe discipline only newly relaxed. Perhaps her naiveté attracted him. His usual clients were suburban matrons who ran to the City for an hour to blot out husbands, children, dishes, vacuums, poodles, and church socials. Emma Freed was innocent and her innocence refreshed him.

They entered the Zoo and strolled through the exhibits. Near the llamas, Haakon took Emma's hand. It had seemed so natural to Emma once she was past the first shy brushing of fingers. Haakon sensed her fear and shyness. Sensitivity was part of his gigolo skill set. He tenderly took her hand in his. His first touch had been feathery, tentative until he felt Emma return a slight pressure. He touched her a little more boldly. Emma squeezed his palm. He responded in kind. She looked at his profile out of the corner of her eye. He was godlike in his blue polyester double knit and his golden hair. He was hired, but skilled, beautiful, and gentle.

The llamas paid no attention to the couple outside their pen. The llamas had seen enough couples holding hands to dull their prurient instincts. Even the humor of these situations had gone past boredom into non-existence. The llamas were busy exchanging rumors of a scandal among the lions. There had been a fight between a lioness and a lion. One of the llamas had understood the lion made a snide remark to which the lioness had retorted with profanity. Llamas are communal beasts, and consider any dispute public property.

Kangaroos bore easily, and take any entertainment that comes along. Ordinarily they dozed in the mid-afternoon sun, unless something extraordinary happened. Kangaroos, even zoo kangaroos, perceive almost anything a human being does as extraordinary. Kangaroo brain wave cycles parallel human emotional wave cycles. The Zoo's kangaroos sensed Emma Freed's innocence and Haakon Spitz's worldliness were beginning to harmonize. The kangaroo mothers settled their joeys in their pouches and leaned back on their tails to watch, ready for either a good laugh or a good cry. The kangaroo fathers were at a boxing match.

Emma stared at the llamas, and did not see them. Haakon looked at the kangaroos. He turned to study Emma's profile. He thought he saw tears pooled in her eyes. He leaned forward and touched her hand with his lips.

"Emma, I want you to have an afternoon to remember," he said to her. The kangaroos watched the young man put his hands ever so gently on the woman's shoulders. He drew her to him. She put her arms around his neck. They kissed a long kiss. Several kangaroos raised their paws and dabbed at their eyes. One half-grown joey scratched at the fleas in his fur. His mother laid a heavy paw on him to quiet him. He settled at once. Far away the lion and the lioness exchanged disgruntled roars. A tiger snarled at them to be quiet so a friendly neighborhood cat could sleep in peace.

"Oh, Haakon—" Emma's face darkened. "Is this part of your pitch, Mr. Spitz?" She pushed herself away from him and glared at the moist-eyed kangaroos. The unicorn slipped into the shed, shed its llama disguise, and screwed in its horn. Then it came forth and pranced about the llama pen. Haakon and Emma did not notice.

"No, Emma," Haakon said. "This is not part of my pitch. Will you look at me?" Haakon tenderly took her chin in his hand and softly turned her face toward him. Emma saw the tenderness in his eyes. Her tears began to drop. Several kangaroos blubbered. The joeys yawned and stretched in their mothers' pouches. Emma closed her eyes to slow the tears.

"Will you look at me, Emma?" Haakon asked again. He drew her to him. She stiffened, resisting, and then put her arms around his neck again. Many kangaroos raised their paws to dab at their eyes. The half-grown joey scratched at the fleas in his fur again.

When Emma had spent her tears, Haakon stepped back from her. She clung to his arm. "Emma," Haakon said, "I am a hired lover. I escort bored women around the City. They bore me. I do this to buy art supplies and pay my rent. You are different, Emma, something new and fresh in my afternoons." The kangaroos twitched their ears, which was their way of expressing skepticism.

"Come play with me, Emma. Let your hair down," he continued, as he took out the ivory pins and comb holding her bun in place. He loosened her braid. Her hair fell thick wavy and to her shoulders. The gray speckling shone silver in the afternoon. The kangaroos applauded.

"I should brush my hair, and my nose is stopped up," Emma said. The kangaroos leaned forward to better hear. Emma's voice was husky with the tears tangled in her throat. Haakon dabbed at her nose with his handkerchief. She smiled a watery smile at him and took his handkerchief.

"I can do it myself," she said, and blew her nose. "Will you stand by the bench over there and hold my compact mirror for me?"

"Yes, I will," Haakon said, and kissed her forehead. The kangaroos sighed and smiled. The half-grown joey yawned widely and loped away. The lion muttered a half-roar and cuffed a cub lying nearby. Haakon sat down and took the mirror from Emma. She tossed her head and shook her hair several times before she flipped it in front of her face and began brushing the inside. Twenty-five strokes for each strand she counted. As she brushed her hair, it began to shine as though it had captured the sunlight. Her aura expanded until it filled the Zoo cages and glossed the kangaroos' fur and the llamas' coats.

Haakon saw the sun glow in Emma's hair. The kangaroos saw only the misty tears in their own eyes. The llamas, for politeness' sake, bent their heads to graze. As Emma finished brushing her hair, the unicorn whirled one last pirouette into the shelter. There it unscrewed and stowed its horn, and pulled on its llama suit. Haakon gave Emma the mirror. She tossed her hair behind her and put the mirror and the brush in her purse.

"There," Emma said; "I feel like an entirely new person."

"You are lovely with your hair down," Haakon said; "your face is more relaxed, and softer. Much lovelier."

"Oh, Haakon," Emma said, pushing away, and then drawing him to her. Then she kissed him. "I'm afraid we put on quite a show for the llamas and the kangaroos."

"I suppose so," Haakon said. He kissed her. The llamas went on grazing. The kangaroos clapped to see such sport. The lions snored in the afternoon.

The fog that had lain all day a gray blur on the Western horizon began to tumble, bubble, and boil as though witches off the coast had overturned their brewing kettles. The wind rattled the eucalyptus leaves. Haakon squeezed her. She squeezed him back. "I am a new woman," she said. The kangaroos sighed in unison, as the man and woman walked away.

### Noah Count Collects Collateral

Noah sighed. The Swami was being difficult. "Look," he said. "I've already given you a clergy discount, and then I extended you credit for the past month. It's time to pay up, Swami, and no more herbals until you do."

"How can I continue my proper devotions without the herbals?" the Swami asked in a pleading tone.

The Swami deemed the herb integral to his devotions. The authorities deemed it illegal. Noah survived by supplying folk like the Swami what they needed in defiance of the authorities. Noah had no charity to waste on customers. Noah advanced the Swami, and one or two other regulars, small amounts of herb on credit. If they were slow to pay, Noah demanded items as collateral he was sure they would redeem with their first bit of money.

"Not my problem. Your gods need you stoned, let them supply you with the grass, man. I'm just a small businessman, trying to make a living. I have to keep my suppliers happy, don't you know. They don't give me credit."

"Just until the first of the month, Noah. I just need until the first of the month."

"That's nine days from now. I've got a shipment coming in I need to pay for. I can't keep carrying you."

The Swami slumped in his chair. Part of the money he owed Noah he had in his saffron robe's pocket. It was only part. The Swami had been hoping to use it for something besides rice and weary vegetables for his dinner (his beliefs did not exclude eating meat, though often his budget forbade it).

"I can pay you part of what I owe you," he said, sighing.

"How much?" Noah asked.

"Twenty."

"Twenty out of thirty, and you want me to carry you for ten more. Can't do it, not without collateral. What happened to the other ten? You said you'd have the whole amount for me today."

"I spent it on objects of devotion."

"What objects?"

The Swami gestured at the statues he had bought at the St. Edmunds Thrift Room. "These."

Noah picked one up. It was the statue whose head inclined right. "Quite the 'objays-dart,'" he said. "What are they worth?"

"At least thirty dollars. That's what the Thrift Shop priced them at."

"Tell you what. Give me the twenty you've got, and one of these glorious statues. I'll hold the statue for ten days, give you time to raise the cash to redeem it. You don't redeem it, I'll sell it. Understand?"

"Yes," the Swami said. His eyes followed the statue into Noah's coat pocket.

"Here," Noah said, tossing a small bag of dried green leaves on the Swami's altar. "Worship yourself into oblivion. Some god should tell me why I take a chance on the likes of you. Ten days, remember?"

"Yes," the Swami said. "Ten days."

Noah left the mission, the statue dragging down his pocket. It made him feel lopsided. He contemplated tossing the stupid thing into the bushes, but he had promised to hold it for collateral. Besides, it might be worth more than the Swami knew. Treasures sometimes wound up in thrift shops, and the old monks didn't always know what they had for sale.

Shu could tell him. Shu and his brother Way ran a shop that sold crap like this. Shu knew the genuine stuff from the knockoffs and cheap stuff. Besides, Shu might be about ready for re-supply; that would be a little more cash in Noah's pocket. He turned his steps toward Wong's Import/Export Emporium.

Fortunately, Shu's brother, Way, was out of the way. Noah showed Shu the statue, which Shu immediately pronounced a genuine antique of no great value. "Maybe twenty-five, thirty dollars," he said.

"I don't have any place to keep something like this," Noah said. "I'll give you a discount on a baggie, if you'll stash it on your shelves for ten days, or so. It's collateral from another customer, don't you know." Shu agreed, put a price sticker on the statue, and set it at the back of the shelf. There it reposed until Quigley Drye spotted it on the day of the Big Temblor, and bought it from Way Wong.

The Swami walked along the zoo's gravel path toward his favorite place, a bench in the shade between the llamas and the kangaroos. The long emerald tassels on the cord he wore as a belt swayed against his saffron robe as he walked. His skin was no longer elastic or soft; it was leathery from long exposure to the elements. Many hot suns had faded his blue eyes to a pale ghost of color. His arthritic right knee popped at odd moments when he walked.

### The Meandering Mandarin

The Swami often sought the zoo when trouble disturbed his spirit. He was troubled today because he had pledged one of his Kuanyins as security to Noah. The Swami sat down on a bench in the shade and began to drone a soft mantra to himself and any listening deities. He sought serenity, and a plan to find money for Noah.

He found distraction. A man and woman were holding hands at the llama pen. The man was young, with golden hair. His every muscle rippled with power under the tight blue polyester leisure suit he wore. The woman was older, by at least a decade, perhaps more. Her hair hinted at gray under its brown, and her figure had softened and filled with maturity. She wore an apricot linen suit with an ivory blouse. The Swami guessed the woman was a librarian or secretary from the suburbs. He guessed the young man was an escort for hire.

The young man turned to the woman and touched her lips with his. She did not respond until he tenderly took her chin in his hand and softly turned her face toward him. She began to weep. Several kangaroos joined her. The joeys yawned and stretched in their mothers' pouches. Joeys prefer comedies or action thrillers to romances.

The young man said something else the Swami could not hear, and reached out to the woman. He undid the pins and ivory comb that held her hair in place and shook it loose. Her hair fell about her shoulders in thick waves. The gray shone like silver in the afternoon sun. The kangaroos wept openly. The joeys dozed.

The Swami smiled his most beatific smile. The young man offered the woman a handkerchief. She dabbled at her nose with it. She smiled a watery smile at him. He smiled at her, radiant with youth and flushed with desirability. The woman took a brush and compact from her purse. Then she handed purse and compact to the young man. He tucked the purse under his arm and held the mirror for her to look in while she brushed her hair. Her hair glistened brighter and brighter as she brushed it. The Swami began chanting again. He watched the woman's aura brighten until it glossed the kangaroos' pelts and the llamas' fleeces with lustrous light. He timed his chant with the woman's brush strokes. Fragments of the universe coalesced.

One of the llamas went into the shelter and shed its fleece. It took from behind a loose board, a gold and silver horn, the two metals spiraled around each other. Using its left foot, it took the horn between its toes and screwed the horn into a socket in its brow. Then it stood on its hind legs and began to dance. Only the Swami saw this. The young man was losing himself in the woman's eyes. The woman concentrated on her brush and her hair. The kangaroos saw only the misty tears in their own eyes. The llamas, for politeness' sake, bent their heads to graze and did not watch the unicorn with the unique horn.

As the woman finished brushing her hair, the Swami softened his murmured chant to a whisper, and then stopped. The unicorn with the unique horn whirled one last pirouette and went into the shelter. There it unscrewed and stored its horn, and pulled on its llama suit. The young man gave the woman the mirror and her purse. She flipped her hair behind her and looked in the mirror. She smiled, and put the brush and mirror into her purse. The young man took her arm and led her toward the distant elephant pens.

The Swami watched them go. He took up his mantra again, waiting for enlightenment. A disturbance in the astral plane interrupted his meditation. A man in a red dressing gown with gold and silver dragons embroidered on it hurried past the llama pen. Some part of the man's appearance was out of the ordinary. Not the red Mandarin dressing gown, that was common enough, though seldom used for street wear. Nor was it the glued on goatee and mustache.

The Swami sat up and craned his neck to watch the man hurry toward the elephant pens. Ah! That was it. The man carried a pistol in his right hand. That was definitely uncommon, even in the City Zoo. The Swami got up and hurried after the man. Perhaps he could prevent some disaster. The llamas went on grazing. The kangaroos crowded into one corner of their pen to watch the disappearing stranger and Swami.

An elderly guard slept on a bench across from the camel yard. He didn't notice the man in the Mandarin dressing gown or his pistol, or the rotund Swami in pursuit.

One camel spat at the Mandarin as he passed. It was nothing personal; camels spit for the sake of perversity, or to relieve a dry mouth. The Mandarin forbore to spit back. The Swami nodded to greet the camel as he passed it.

The Mandarin took a bus headed downtown. The Swami caught the same bus and sat where he could watch the Mandarin unobserved. The Mandarin had tucked the gun into his sleeve, where it bulged heavily at the elbow. None of the other passengers seemed to notice.

The Mandarin pulled the cord and got off in the lower downtown. He swiftly walked into a bar, the Wounded Cherub, notorious for the plaster cast of a cherub over the door that had lost its perky little genitalia one night to an armed fundamentalist who thought it obscene. The Swami waited outside until the Mandarin re-appeared, a cloth jacket draped over his dragon-bedecked gown. The man now had a satchel made of carpet. The Swami followed him as he walked quickly down the street toward the bus station. In the bus station, the Swami watched the man put the pistol in the satchel and the satchel into a locker. The man closed the locker and put the key in his jacket pocket, unaware it had a hole in it. The key fell out at the Swami's feet.

### Beau Delivers

Beau rubbed sleep from his eyes. Noah had a disconcerting habit of showing up in the morning, well before Beau's favored rising time of 2:00 pm.

"Get your pants on, Beau," Noah said.

"Will you buy me a cup of coffee, or something?" Beau asked.

"Later, Beau, later." Noah looked thoughtful. "Right now I need to collect on the favor you owe me." Beau sighed. Noah's favors often involved real work, something Beau did not like very well.

Beau stepped into his white linen trousers and drew them up, and began buttoning the white plastic buttons through the frayed buttonholes.

"What favor?" he asked.

"Tuck in your shirt. And, Beau, put on some shoes. The sidewalks are pretty hot in the sunshine."

"What do you want me to do for y'all today, Noah?"

"I want you to recover an item I loaned a friend," Noah said. Beau rolled over and snored.

"Wake up, Beau. This is important."

"Yes sir!" Beau said, and snapped to attention and saluted.

"I want you to go to Shu's store and get a plaster statue."

"Why don't you go?"

"I want to cash this check before the banks close. Also, I don't think Shu's brother will let me in the store again, don't you know. He thinks I'm trying to seduce Shu."

"Are you?" Beau sat up, shoving his sheets aside.

"No"

"Why? He's cute enough."

"He isn't interested, don't you know." Noah gestured at Beau to stand.

"Ah think I remember him," Beau said. "He was talking 'bout that weather girl on TV." Beau stretched lazily, and stood when he saw the angry glitter in Noah's eyes.

"Move it, Beau," Noah said, waving his extended index finger under Beau's nose.

"Is what y'all want me to do legal?" Beau looked around for his clothing. It lay in untidy heaps on the floor.

"Yes. I want you to get the statue Shu is taking care of for me."

"What if he isn't there?"

"Wait for him." Noah sighed in exasperation. "Take the cable car at California and go to Wong's Export/Import Emporium at Kearney and Washington."

"Noah, I have a problem," Beau said, feeling through his pants pockets.

"Here's two dollars - that'll get you there and back. Now scoot along; I've got to have that thing early as I can." Noah stood by the door. "Remember, it's at Wong's Import/Export Emporium, Kearney at Washington."

"Where shall I meet you," Beau asked Noah as they shut the door and started down the stairs.

"In my place on Larkin. You know where the key is." When they got down to the street, Noah turned left and pushed Beau to go right. "Meet you in about two hours." he said. Beau nodded.

Beau shrugged his shoulders and walked to the trolley stop. The trolley came along quickly. It was not very full and he sat down gratefully. He soon fell into a reverie about those days when he used to swim in the bayous and frolic with the alligators and garfish.

Ah, those were the days, swimming and sunning in the hot, languorous afternoons. Watching the crinoline clad belles moistening under their big pink and white parasols. And the cotton fields! Blooming pink and white among the dark, glossy green leaves. And then the bolls, bursting white, even the pink blossoms. He remembered asking Mammy, dear old Mammy, one day why the pink blossoms that now and again came among the white, made white balls of cotton, too, instead of pink. Mammy, out of her infinite folk wisdom, told him that the sun bleached them white, that the sun bleached everything, excepting folks, and it just made folks, black or white, darker.

Beau started when the conductor put a heavy hand on his shoulder, said, "End of the line, buddy," and jerked his thumb to motion Beau off. Beau got off and mingled with the crowds. The sad reality of the City in the seventies assailed him. He wept silently for tall white columns gone to decay and magnolias run riot over rotting ruins under the warm rains of Louisiana. The fat tourists and the thin tourists glanced at him and hurried past lest a weeping man contaminate them.

Beau turned to get a bus toward Chinatown. He had promised Noah he would get something for him in Chinatown, and he'd better do it before he forgot about it entirely. He remembered so poorly these days, his war wound (in the head, you know). Turned a man a mite forgetful, that Damnyankee (twelve syllables) shrapnel in the temple.

Beau had not felt capable of riding a cable car back to Chinatown. He knew that both routes went near to Kearney Street, but he was afraid he'd drift off again and miss his stop. The shock of finding himself in the City with a mission to perform instead of on recreational leave addled him. He chose to walk. His mind was not as clear as it once was, in the days before Vicksburg.

Ah, what a stirring time that was, that final siege under the gallant Pemberton withstanding the incredible pressures of Grant and Sherman (that same rascal who had burned his way from fair Atlanta to the Sea, God curse him for a Damnyankee (12 syllables) scoundrel! Beau remembered that late night call to Pemberton's quarters, the commander's thin drawn face, and the calendar at July 3. Beau knew then in his heart that the Confederacy was doomed.

Pemberton had handed Beau a private dispatch for Jeff Davis himself, and asked him to slip out through the Union lines and away to Virginia. The dark smell of decay in the swamps north of town, lingered in his memory. Through the cannonades overhead, despite the stray shred of shrapnel that pierced his temple, Beau had won through to Jeff Davis. That weary and kindly man, destined for defeated greatness, had thanked him personally for his effort and sent his own physician to tend Beau. Beau, proud though he was of his service, had never quite cleared up his thoughts again. He was just another veteran of that noble gray line that, for all its courage at the last, had not stopped the vicious blue flood.

And here Beau stood at a foreigner's shop in a far Western city on a mission for a crazy artist. He saw a half-consumed cigar on the sidewalk. He picked it up. It had gone out. No matter—a gentleman always looked better with something in his hand, a julep, a cigar, a rose for a lad. Beau began the long swim up to semi-consciousness. A young Chinese man asked him what he wanted.

"I'm here," he said in his thickest drawl, "to get an item for our mutual friend, Noah." Beau was a believer in the dictum that it was necessary to speak very slowly and distinctly so that foreigners could understand one. The slower he spoke, the deeper his south got and the muddier his meaning. Shu, however, was accustomed to dealing with peanut merchants and other southern dignitaries who had the same opinions and Shu had learned their language. He thought it a little more difficult than transferring from the Taiwanese dialect he spoke to the Cantonese so common in the City, but not much.

"Yes, just a moment," Shu said. He went to the Kuanyin part of the shelf. He carefully moved aside the various ceramic Kuanyins. Noah's Kuanyin was gone. Shu closed his eyes, bowed his head, leaned on the shelf and pondered.

Shu Wong explained to Beau that the item he had come to get for Noah was missing. Shu repeated the strict injunctions Noah had laid down about this particular clay statue. Beau was remembering the last time Noah got angry with him.

"Beau," Shu said, "where is Noah waiting for us?"

"He said he'd be at his place on Larkin," Beau looked pleadingly at Shu, "will you come too, and tell him what happened?"

"Yes," Shu said, "as much of it as I know. He said he had taken the Kuanyin as a pledge that was to be redeemed tonight. He seemed to think it was important to return it."

"I'm so glad y'all are coming with me," Beau said. "Noah scares me when he gets angry, and his eyes flash fire, like the pickets shooting rabbits at Anita."

Shu shook his head. "Stay in the twentieth century for a while, man," he said.

### Bad News

Beau LeSieupe and Wong Shu stiffened as they heard Noah's key turn in the lock. Beau had just gone through Pickett's charge up Missionary Ridge at Gettysburg again, and that always left him shaken. He drifted into Georgia, still burning from Sherman's march to the sea.

Shu was afraid that Noah would call the police or display some anger that they were in his apartment unasked. Despite Beau's having the key, Shu felt like a housebreaker when they entered the apartment unbidden, and hid in the afternoon shadows.

Noah surprised them both. He came in and did not turn on the light for several seconds. They heard scrabbling sounds. Beau thought Noah was trying to light a match. Shu thought a rat was trying to climb the wall, and felt like following it. The scrabbling on the wall continued. It was Noah fumbling for the light switch.

"Damn," Noah drawled, "where's the light?"

"Up a couple of inches," Beau said.

"Thanks," Noah said, and turned on the light. Then he stood facing the door with his head bowed and his shoulders slumped. Then he shook his head slowly, one might say he wagged it from side to side like an elephant testing the jungle floor for herbaceous dainties. He had smoked a joint from his latest purchase. It was stronger than anything he could remember ingesting for a long time.

"Before I turn around and find out that no one's here, who's here?" he said, and grinned into the bright shining brass of the doorknob.

"It's Beau, Beau LeSieupe," Beau said.

"And Shu." Noah looked so comic staring at the doorknob that Shu was fast losing his fear of his temper.

"Oh Wow!" Noah said, and put his hand to the side of his face, in the process brushing his hand against the pictures on the wall over the light switch, thereby straightening some that his earlier fumbling had disarranged. "That stuff is powerful." He turned around and waved at them with his left hand weakly flopping at the wrist. "Cheerio," he said. "Wish I'd bought more," he said to the wall.

"Noah, "Beau said, "are you all right, or have you finally fried your brains?"

Noah was swaying on his way across the room. He had stumbled on the edge of the carpet. Then he had brushed a table lamp that stood on the floor and almost knocked it over. For a moment it swayed in rhythm with him. Surreptitiously Shu looked up at the draperies; he sighed with relief when he saw they were not swaying. City folk often thus checked for earthquakes.

"Noah," Beau said, "what's wrong?"

Noah mumbled into his shadowy apartment. He collapsed into the overstuffed armchair by his ashtray. He picked up the half-smoked herb cigarette and contemplated it, raising his eyebrows alternately. "Strong little so and so," he said, "You've knocked me for kayo, that's for sure-o."

"Noah," Shu said, "you high?" He peered at Noah. Noah had the reputation of being less affected than any other human in the City by the various and sundry chemicals folk smoked, drank, swallowed, chewed and otherwise ingested and introduced into their metabolic processes. Noah himself granted honors to one or two pigeons in Union Square and a gray gull at Oyster Point. He often said they could handle more synthetic mescaline per ounce of body weight than he. There was only Noah's word for the birds' prowess. He was fond of his reputation, though, and unlikely to lie about such a thing.

Noah regarded Shu a long moment before he replied, "What are you doing here Shu? I expected Beau; I didn't expect you."

"We had a problem, Noah," Beau said. Noah turned to focus on Beau.

"Oh?" Noah seemed to be sobering up rapidly.

"The Kuanyin you left with me has disappeared," Shu answered. Noah glared at him a long moment. Inwardly Shu trembled. Noah's eyes glittered cold and hard. Shu thought of a cobra's glittering eyes, and the jeweled eyes of an idol in an old movie he once saw. Shu wished to look away from the glitter of Noah's eyes, and yet he dared not, as if, by hypnotizing Noah with his eyes, he kept Noah from striking. Or had Noah hypnotized him?

Noah broke the spell. He laughed, no great belly laugh, neither a ha-ha-ha, but a great giggling laugh, a profound silliness. Nervously Beau joined Noah's giggle. Shu sat impassively, still shaken by Noah's eyes.

"I'm confused," Shu said, "by your laughter, Noah."

Noah stifled his giggles long enough to wave his hand and gasp out, "I'll explain in a minute," and he giggled anew. Very swiftly, his giggles turned into sobs, and he buried his head in his hands and wept loudly for a couple of moments. Then he lifted his head and looked at Shu and Beau with tear-glittered eyes. He sucked in air and blew it out across the room. It swirled the stale smoke in the afternoon-gloomy room.

"Excuse me," Noah said. "I had to get that out of my system. What did you say about the Kuanyin?"

"We lost it," Beau said.

"Where?" Noah snapped.

"In our shop," Shu said stiffly.

"Damn!" Noah said, and stood up with a swing of his fists against the armchair as he did so. He put his chin in his hand and his other hand under the elbow to support his chin-cupping hand. He wrinkled his brow and hunched his shoulders.

"Now I can think," he said. Beau giggled, and Noah smiled.

"What is to be done, Noah, about this Kuanyin?"

"What do you mean, what is to be done?" Noah said.

Shu said, "Last night you suggested that the Kuanyin you left in my safekeeping was an important bit of statuary. You commended it to my most careful safeguarding. I assumed it was important."

"It is," Noah said, "and I'll quit clowning around, I'm loaded, as you might have guessed. I got hold of some dynamite stuff this afternoon. Sorry if I've screwed you up." He grinned.

"That statue was a pawn for some goods I delivered to old Swami Fendabenda. It's part of a matched set of three that he owns. It's probably not worth much, that is, to anybody but him. You've got a lot of those things in your shop. Just take one and pass it off on him. He'll never know the difference."

"He may," Shu said. "He certainly would, if that one were a part of a set. That one was not cast; it was modeled by hand, I'm sure. Probably mission work from early in this century. It could have some value; I'd have to ask an expert."

Noah stared at Shu. "You're bulling me," he said, and grinned.

"No," Shu said, and Noah's grin faded. "I'd guess that Fendabenda fellow has a treasure whose worth he doesn't know. I'd also guess you won't fool him with a replacement from my brother's shelf. They're all ceramic, not clay."

"Do you know where you lost the statue I gave you?" Noah asked, his eyes hard and round.

"No," Shu said. "My guess is that my brother sold it. To whom I do not know."

"Damn!" said, and struck his fists at the empty air beside his hips several times. "We'll have to ask your brother about it," he said.

"That will cost us," Shu said. "My brother seldom gives anything. He will want to know why I had the statue and why I hid it there, why you had it, and why you gave it to me to keep. My brother is accustomed to getting answers."

"I'll tell him that I took it in pawn for some herbs. No problem."

"And he will immediately call Chief Inspector Pryor and inform him he had a dope dealer in his shop. He is narrow-minded about dope dealers."

"Can he be bought off?"

"No. Our mother died in an opium den. Way has no sympathy for narcotics, not even nicotine and alcohol."

"Well, then, I'll lie, and say it was pawn for a picture until someone can pay me for it."

"You can try that," Shu said. "If he will let you in the shop, that is."

### Enter the Sinister Fu I

The door cracked open. A shoulder entered the room. It was a massive shoulder, although at no unusual height from the ground. The rest of a fat man with Occidental eyes followed the shoulder. A long string mustache drooped from the corners of his mouth. Red silk clothed him. Dragons, embroidered in gold and emerald thread, intertwined their tails. They had fierce eyes and great wings. In the corner of the cuff of the sleeve, a tiny damsel and man were embroidered. A tiny damsel and man embroidered on the cuffs were oblivious to the dragons as they bowed to each other. A black Mandarin cap embroidered with red and gold characters rode on the man's head. He folded his arms above his broad stomach, inserting his hands into the sleeves of his robe, faced them, and bowed.

"So sorry, please," he said. "This most unworthy person leaned a moment against your honorable door to rest his unworthy self after climbing the stairs and his unworthy bulk put too great a strain on the hinges which gave way. So sorry, please." He bowed again.

Noah laughed. Beau giggled, took off his white colonel's hat (which carried his white colonel's wig with it) and made a sweeping bow. The strange fat person delicately elevated his right eyebrow.

"Who are you," Shu asked; there was an edge of anger in his voice that the obese intruder acknowledged with another wriggle of his left eyebrow. "You are not Chinese," Shu said, "except on a Hollywood set."

"Call me Fu I," the stranger said, and bowed again. "You are right that I am not Chinese by birth. I have, however, adopted China as my spiritual home, and sometimes I wear the dress of her history." The man stood straight and looked at Shu, Noah, and Beau. Then he withdrew his right hand from his left sleeve and pointed a pistol at them. "Now. You were talking about a Kuanyin, which has disappeared, most unfortunately, from Wong Brothers. One of a matched set of three, I believe."

"What do you want with it," Noah said.

"What I want with it is no concern of yours, guttersnipe," the pudgy pistol holder snapped, and clicked the safety off on his weapon.

"Mr. Fu I," Noah said, "we don't know where the Kuanyin you want is. Shu's brother sold it to somebody, and we don't know who. We were just talking about it, wondering how to ask him."

"Where did your brother get it?" Fu I said. "He will tell me, I am sure."

"He will laugh at you, fat one, in that get-up, for all you call yourself Increasing Wealth." The man in red grinned. Shu stopped the smile on his lips. The grin did not offer much comfort to him.

"I chose the name hoping my bank account will continue expanding as my waist does," Fu I said. "As for your brother," he continued, "I have my persuader here," and he waved his pistol, "and I think he'll answer my questions carefully."

The man moved the muzzle of his weapon slowly so that it covered each of them in turn. "You will now proceed ahead of me down the stairs and into the street. We will walk, you three side by side, and I just behind. My pistol has an extraordinary range for one of its diminutive size, and I am willing to use it. My car is parked outside on Geary Street. You will walk to my car. I will give you instructions when we reach my car. Do you understand?"

Noah nodded, and grinned nervously. Shu nodded impassively. Beau moaned, and reached out behind him to get the half-cigarette from the ashtray. His hand encountered the drawer of the desk. Fu I's attention was on Shu and Noah. Beau slid the drawer open silently and slowly. Fu looked at him and gestured with the gun.

"All right, go now," Fu said. Quickly Beau felt in the drawer behind him and moaned again. "What's wrong with him?" Fu I said.

"He's not quite there," Noah said, rolling his eyes and twirling his finger beside his temple. While Fu I was watching this performance, Beau's fingers closed over the plastic bag with its leafy contents. Quickly he slipped it into his pocket. Noah would thank him later for bringing this. Noah hated dealing with things without his herb. And, if Noah didn't want it, Beau knew that he would probably want some himself. They set out, the three men in front and the pseudo-Mandarin behind like a red bloat upon the stairs.

They emerged onto the street and turned south. The three walked ahead of Fu I, Beau in the middle, and Shu on the left next to the street, Noah on the right next to the wall. They had their elbows linked. Only one person paid them any attention, though several people looked up at the waddling Fu I. As they turned onto Geary Street Noah began to sing, "We're off to see the Wizard," from The Wizard of Oz. This attracted no attention, though Shu and Beau joined him. One or two people looked around for TV cameras and any one of a dozen detectives whose shows sped through the streets of the City but they saw no cameras. They shrugged, and went on their way.

At the third corner, Fu I directed them to cross the street. They set out just before the little white person turned into a red hand. A stubborn Volkswagen intervened between the three friends and Fu I. The Volkswagen almost shaved a few inches off Fu I's belly. While he was thus distracted, Noah pulled Shu and Beau into a bus scheduled to go to the Zoo. Fu I got to the bus stop just in time to see where the bus was headed, but too late to board it. He patted his sleeve, to be sure he hadn't lost the one Kuanyin he had bought at the Wong Brothers Import/Export Emporium, caught the next bus headed toward the zoo, to pursue the three friends.

### Butterfly in Pink Granite and Malachite

Ben slept late deliberately. He could save money if he only ate twice a day. A late breakfast kept him full until early evening. A modest meal then carried him through the night, especially if he slept. He thought the fair would offer an opportunity for something to eat. He had never tried several food items advertised. Ben loved experimenting with new foods.

The fair was not so crowded today; the parade yesterday had drawn more people to the area than the fair alone drew. Ben wandered the alleys, looking for the bolo booth. He hadn't marked its location as closely as he had thought, or it was gone. He did find another booth, one that specialized in rings and belt buckles. He stopped and looked through the ring trays. The woman behind the booth watched him closely, but said nothing. The majority of the vendors tempted passers-by with conversation and invitations to look at other merchandise deeper into the booth. This woman nodded, silently, and went back to her magazine. Ben appreciated her silence, and lingered over the belt buckles.

One piece caught his eye; it was Zuñi-style inlay of polished pink granite and malachite shaping a butterfly. He lifted it. It delighted him when he saw it was a bolo. The non-traditional stones in the inlay intrigued him.

"How much?" he asked the woman.

"Ten bucks," she said.

Ben dug into his pocket. "I'll take it," he told her, and gave her the bill. She put the bolo in a small plastic sack and handed it to him.

"Wear it in good health," she said, and took up her seat again to watch the crowd.

Ben carefully withdrew the bolo and put it on. He looked for a mirror to see how it looked on his chest, but couldn't see one.

The earth hiccupped under his feet. Ben fell on his knees, hard, and tears came to his eyes. The buckle booth swayed and fell, trapping the vendor under canvas and metal poles. Ben started to push himself to his feet when the earth heaved and rolled, and booths all around collapsed in rubble heaps. A wind chime booth nearby rang an alarm loud enough to raise Hell-fiends. Ben prostrated himself and covered his head with his hands.

A third shake tumbled a booth of tough pots onto the alley. Some shattered; others began rolling. One struck Ben's foot and bounced into the air far enough to clear his heel and land on his calf. It was a large pot. He carried the bruise for days.

A flash of red, gold, and blue went by his head. Another pot was rolling toward a crazy heap of umbrellas in a tottering umbrella stand. The pot bowled them over. Long moments after the upheaval Ben lay still, fearing another rumble of the earth would land him flat again. Slowly he became aware of someone moaning. He finally located the source; it was the vendor in the buckle booth. He pushed himself to his knees, and then to his feet, and struggled toward the collapsed booth. He began pulling canvas and poles off her.

Len looked out from the dressing room tent toward the fair. He had been planning the orderly dismantling of the tent and booths for several hours. The ground under him rolled once, twice, three times. He said afterward that it had been the longest temblor of his life. He expected the heavy canvas to crash down on him and smother him. By some quirk of placement, structural integrity, or flexibility, the tent held, though most of the booths in the fair crumpled and crashed. Weavings, pots, and pictures mingled with broken rods, canvas flaps, and broken ropes in the shambles that had been the fair.

Ben heard, "You okay, mister?" He looked up. A short man with curly red hair was bending over him. Ben recognized him after a moment. It was the man he had bumped into the day before.

"What the hell happened?" Ben asked.

The red-haired man said, "Earthquake, I think. You sure you're okay? I'm a doctor, if you need one."

"I'm okay. I don't know about the guy in the bolo booth, though."

"I'll check." The short man went toward the bolo booth.

The City's wisdom in requiring the cooking booths to be at a remove from the craft booths proved out as first one, and then another, cook stall flared up where barbeque barrels and gas camp stoves had ignited the tumbled walls. Len ran toward the fair booths. He knew some must be hurt. As he went he commandeered fairgoers who were ambulatory, and began directing them in dismantling the wreckage. He organized a brigade to stack the poles in one place, and the canvases in another. Items like blankets and carpets he confiscated. Two medically trained fairgoers improvised litters from some of the canvas and poles, and directed others in carrying the wounded into the tent.

"We need something to put this fire out," the little man said. "Is there an extinguisher anywhere?"

"There's a tank of lemonade, and another one with some kind of purple juice. Let's try that. Maybe it will knock the flames down," Ben said.

"We'll pour it slowly. We don't want to spread the propane."

Ben found a large pan with flour in it. "Maybe we should dump this flour on the pool of gas, and then use the liquids to kill the flame on the canvas."

"Let's try it. Maybe there's a shutoff on the tank. If we can shut off the gas, we can slow down the fire."

Ben dumped the flour on the propane. Then he shut off the valve on the tank. The other man, who had said he was a doctor, took the tops off the beverage tanks. Then, with Ben's help, he poured the contents on the burning canvas. Steam and smoke rose up in a great cloud. Len came walking through the fog.

"You guys got that fire under control?"

"Pretty much," Ben said.

Len looked them over. "I need people to help with folks that are hurt," he said. "We've got a big tent on the other side of the street fair." He gestured toward it. "It survived the quake. We're going to use it for a hospital tent. Now all I need is a doctor and some nurses."

"I'm a doctor," the little man said. "That is, I'm a psychiatrist, but I'm a fully trained physician, as well. Dr. Chester Field, at your service."

"I don't know a lot about medicine," Ben said, "but I've worked with a lot of wounded animals over the years."

"Right now I need a doctor, and somebody to boil water."

"I can boil water, too," Ben said.

"Great. I can use you both. Let's go."

It was not until long after night had settled in that Len realized one of the civilians he so immediately pressed into service was the young man he had met the day before.

Ben was feeding wood scraps and debris to the fire under the cauldron of water several volunteers with buckets had filled. The boy came up to him. He was teetering on the edge of adolescence, and wore very little clothing. His ribs showed at his sides like ladder rungs. He wore cutoff jeans, very short, with the side seams split up almost to the waist, and sandals. Several adults followed him.

"Hi, Mister," the boy said. "You know who's in charge of these booths?"

"No, I don't."

"We're taking them, then. La Señora needs them to shelter people."

Ben looked at the boy and the adults following him. "You sure they're going to be used for shelter?"

The boy bristled. "La Señora doesn't lie. She says we need them to shelter the women and the kids that are gathering in the park."

A man among the adults chimed in, "The kid's right, mister. Anybody needs to know where the stuff is can find it in Lost Lane Park."

Ben considered. "It's not mine to say take it or leave it. I just boil water."

"So, it's okay by you if we take the stuff?" the boy asked.

"I won't try to stop you," Ben said. He was quite sure he couldn't, not all of them.

"Okay, ladies and gents," the man who'd spoken before said. "Let's take the booths apart and move them to the park."

Ben watched the boy and his helpers dismantle the booths, and roll the poles and ropes in the canvas. He mentioned the occurrence to Mr. DeLys. Mr. DeLys assured him it was all quite okay. La Señora was a known missionary presence over on Lost Lane.

### Vanna on the Job

Vanna Shayne watched her boss, Quigley Drye, Private Eye, close the door behind his broad rear. "Perspiring porker," Vanna thought after him, and turned to her filing. She had taken this secretarial job a few months ago, because it was the only one available. She did not like her boss, or the work, but found both preferable to staying at home to play pastor's wife with her husband, Dickon. In time, she hoped, she'd save enough from the job (she told Dickon it paid less than it actually did) to get away from Dickon and his religious connections. She had naively married him expecting he'd make a living and gradually rise through the church ranks to a position of some power and income. Influence and affluence, those mattered to Vanna, but not, apparently, to Dickon, who had just taken his second non-descript country parish.

When Vanna finished the filing, she began exploring the office. Even though she'd been over it before, several times, she was sure it held some secret she might use. Quigley had locked his desk, as usual, but Vanna took a paper clip, untwisted it, and opened the master drawer. The usual clutter of scribbled phone numbers, candy wrappers, and rapid transit tickets with just a few cents left on them greeted her. She started to shut the drawer in boredom when she noticed the side bottom drawer had opened just a little. Quigley had forgotten to lock it!

Trembling with eagerness, she drew the drawer open. Pint whiskey bottles, mostly cheap bourbon, mostly empty, filled it. Vanna was about to close the drawer when she realized the front suggested it was much deeper than the whiskey bottles' height suggested. She explored the drawer's bottom with her fingers, pressing here and there, looking for a hidden spring, with no luck. Then she noticed a small, stained ribbon at the back of the drawer on the bottom. She looked around, and went to the front door and locked it. She turned the "Open" sign to "Closed" and pulled down the shade on the door.

She went back to the drawer and lifted the whiskey bottles out, carefully duplicating their arrangement in the drawer as she stacked them on the floor. Then she tugged on the ribbon. The bottom of the drawer lifted up. In the cavity below the false bottom, Vanna saw four wads of currency (all large bills) and a black notebook. She took out the notebook and opened it. It was gibberish to her. Some sort of code, she supposed. She put it back, and then caressed the money. She wondered what Quigley was keeping it here for, instead of in a safe place, like a bank. Ill-gotten gains of some kind? She'd have to explore further. She glanced at the clock--almost four. Time to close up the office and go home to Dickon. He would have her dinner ready when she got home.

She had just started putting the whiskey bottles back when the floor heaved like the sea in stormy agony. The file cabinets, unattached to the walls in defiance of OSHA rules, topped like shallow rooted trees in a forest. Wires snapped and sparked, and the sprinkler system deluged the room until the water main broke out in the street. The front door buckled at the hinges and fell, ripping the lock out of the frame.

Vanna crouched under the file cabinet that had toppled onto Quigley's desk. She looked over at her desk; had she been sitting in her chair, it would have flattened her. Quigley's desk had held, though it was cracked. All the whiskey bottles had tumbled over, some cracking and chipping the others. Vanna stared down at an Old Crow label, still in shock. The crow leered at her unconcerned. It and the false drawer bottom were the only guards of the money and the notebook in the bottom.

Without quite thinking anything through, Vanna tossed the Old Crow bottle on the heap of tumbled bottles, yanked the false bottom out of the drawer, and began stuffing the cash into her blouse. She took the black notebook, with its gibberish contents and stuffed it in too. A button on her blouse popped as she carefully crawled out from the cave made by the leaning cabinet and crawled to her desk. Her purse was on the floor, in the kneehole, and she carefully dragged it out. She transferred the padding in her blouse to her purse. Fortunately, she had brought her large purse today. It closed over the cash and the book. She pulled herself to her feet, the purse dragging at her arm with its weight, and stumbled on shaking legs to the door. She pushed it and it fell into the hall. She stepped over it and made her way down the unsteady stairs to the street. She smiled to think of Quigley Drye and his considerable girth on these quivering stairs. Then she hastened down. Mr. Drye had her number, if he needed to reach her.

The City was chaotic. In the first three blocks, Vanna saw more building facades on the ground than she saw standing. The neighborhood had been mostly Victorian warehouses and small office buildings, primarily brick construction, and many had crumbled during the temblor. Vanna fastidiously ignored the questionable fluids flowing out from under several piles of bricks. She didn't want to know what they were. She told her brain not to hear any moaning or cries for help; she was never sure, afterward, whether she just hadn't heard any because there weren't any to hear, or whether she just hadn't heard.

### Between the Chaplain and the Hard Man

Dickon Shayne and Deacon Ray Sincaine had been washing the church windows. They had begun outdoors, and were finishing up indoors when Dickon looked up and noticed the large wooden cross suspended from the chapel ceiling was swaying slightly. Before he could say anything, he felt the chapel floor roll under his feet. He braced himself against a pew and looked at Deacon Sincaine.

"That was a big one," the Deacon said. "Must have hit the City, too." Deacon Sincaine's moon face showed more excitement than worry. Dickon frowned.

"I'd guess so," he said. "I hope Vanna's okay." He eyed the suspended cross. Its swing was slowing.

"She's at work in the City?"

"Yes."

"Reverend, when is she going to quit that job? It's not right, a pastor's wife, working way off in the City. She belongs here, helping you with the Lord's work." Dickon gritted his mental teeth against the whine in the Deacon's voice. Dickon suspected the man had been born with that whine. It even came into play when Ray said something as simple as "Please pass the potatoes."

"She needs the chance to prove herself, she says." Dickon spoke as patiently as he could. He'd had this discussion with Ray, and with other parishioners, before.

"Doesn't look good for the church, though," Ray went on. "Looks like we're too poor to pay you enough. Can't you rein her in?"

Dickon allowed a touch of asperity to tinge his tone. "She's not a horse, Ray." He bent over to gather the cloths they had used from the floor.

"You young people do things in strange ways," Ray observed, again, not for the first time. "In my time a woman did what her man told her to do." Dickon diplomatically avoided pointing out that Ray Sincaine was the most henpecked husband in the county.

Instead, he said, "I suppose things _have_ changed. I figure she'll get tired of commuting to the City, sooner or later. Shall we put the buckets and things away? I'd like to go call Vanna, make sure she's okay. That was a pretty big shake."

"You go ahead, Reverend," the Deacon said. I'll clean up here. Make sure your wife's okay." Dickon left the church. Behind him he heard Deacon Sincaine gathering the buckets and squeegees.

In the manse, Dickon tried for some time to get a dial tone without success. About three hours afterward, a heavy after-shock rumbled through. Dickon tried the telephone yet again, and got a dial tone. He dialed Vanna's office number, and let it ring twenty times before he gave up. He at last commended Vanna to God, and went into the bedroom for a troubled sleep.

### Disembus

"Amigos," Noah said, "the fat one will be on a bus just behind us. This schedule runs every five minutes. When we get to Rotaruta Park, let's get off. We can cut through the park to get a trolley going the other way."

"Clever idea, Noah," Shu said. Beau grinned.

"General Johnson once performed a similar maneuver to outwit that fierce beast, Sherman. Sadly, he went on to burn Atlanta and ravage Georgia to the sea at Savannah."

"Yes Beau. We've all heard about it. That's where I got the idea."

"Do you think the fat man will burn the City?"

"I'm sure I don't know, Beau. Now get ready to get off." Noah pulled the signal cord. The bus stopped at the park entrance. The three friends hurried off. They quickly disappeared behind a copse of rhododendrons. When Fu I's bus passed the same stop, he was tapping his knee impatiently with his lacquered fingernails and peering urgently ahead, willing his bus to catch up to the other bus. The bus took Fu I to the Zoo. He got off there and walked into the Zoo. He drew his pistol.

The three friends caught a clanging trolley on the park's far side. It took them back toward the City. They got off the trolley. Then they took a bus going at right angles to the trolley route. Then they changed trolleys and directions four more times before they felt safely out of Fu I's sights. Their last trolley rolled toward the City center from the western hills. The trolley began to sway. It nearly toppled onto its side. The contact wheels on the lines overhead fell off. The trolley lost power. The motorman applied the brakes carefully to keep the vehicle upright. He could not keep it from slamming into a car. That car slammed into three others. This effectively stopped the downhill plunge of all the vehicles. The trolley shuddered again, but remained upright. Fallen bricks littered the sidewalks on one side of the street. The other side was littered with broken windows.

"Must be some earthquake," Noah said.

"Or the Yankee artillery," Beau said.

Shu silently got up and started for the bus exit. He manually pushed the doors open and stepped to the street. Noah and Beau followed him. The herb the men had smoked was wearing off.

"I got the munchies," Shu said.

"Me, too," Beau said.

"There's a mission near here," Noah said. "La Señora's place. If I know her, she'll have something organized. Food, at least." Grimly silent, Beau and Shu nodded. They followed Noah's lead and went toward the mission, carefully picking their way through the rubble and tangled trolley wires that still shot sparks out at random. They were silent until they got to the mission.

"I'm going to the store," Shu said. "Way will need someone to sweep up broken things."

"Good luck, buddy," Noah said. He wiped his cheek with a hand that had somewhere picked up ash or some other black dust. It smeared his cheek. Beau laughed and pointed at it, and began weeping.

"This is worse than Anita," he said.

### The Plaster Disaster

A Michener might begin with the crack-up of Pangaea, the Ur-Mother continent. We, gentle reader, begin more modestly with the tension clustered between the faces of a fault line in the bedrock under the City. It was afternoon, not yet near dusk, when the earth's clutching fingers slid from each other. The sudden release roared through the earth, shaking the City and its environs. It was not the first such temblor the City had experienced, though it was violent beyond scientific predictions. Damage spread widely.

In the City old men trembled and young men fainted. Women shuddered and wailed. Panic set in as tall buildings seemed to leap into the air at a single bound and freeways flew through the air with the greatest of ease. On the waterfront, ships and ferries bobbled like couples copulating on waterbeds. The Bay gurgled like a draining sink. On the solid rock hills buildings swayed. Gargoyles and gewgaws fell from the older buildings to shatter and clatter on the pavements below. Some crushed pedestrian crania before they reached the sidewalks.

On the landfill areas, buildings shook, trembled and quivered. One tower, built on earthquake absorbing springs and rubber pads, leaped up and down. It reminded an observing proctologist of a penis in orgasm. He commented on this to a lay bystander. Soon after, wherever folk gathered to reminisce, one or another would claim the tower ejaculated a lady who had climbed to its top. Some said it threw her forth to spill on the ground. Others claimed the lady floated gently to earth on the wings of a snow-white dove. The proctologist never re-appeared to confirm any part of the tale.

In the Plaster Peacock, the plaster dust and rotten wood dust began to sift into the smoke filled air silently, almost as though it were frost falling on cold clear night. Elke Hall, at her table near the door café door, covered her half-eaten hamburger with her napkin to save it from the plaster crumbles. In the kitchen, Rosa Krushan looked up as tiles tumbled from the ceiling into the ragout she was simmering for the evening trade.

The Plaster Peacock Café was a monument to the decorative plaster art. It was the creation of a little-known City architect, Bill Yuss. Originally, it was a brothel owned by an Episcopal bishop. Four peacocks, beaks touching in the center, tails outspread to the four corners of the room, decorated the ceiling. The plaster artist had re-created David's Rape of the Sabine Women in full and buxom gypsum on the back wall. Nymphs and satyrs surrounded the entry door, and various cupids, cherubim, seraphim, and voluptuous female figures crowded the side walls. Each plaster figure was hued in brighter-than-life color. Friezes of hearts and grape clusters ran around the walls.

The rumble of the moving earth shook the plaster nymphs to dust. Dust, then larger pieces rattled on the tables and the floor. The central beam, held together for many decades by one nail, collapsed with a loud crack in a shower of splinters, and the nail dropped to the floor with a soft ping. The plaster peacock eyes on the ceiling scintillated in shimmering colors in the wildly weaving ceiling lamps. Several lights sparked and burned, snapping like a campfire. Then they all went dark when the electric lines failed.

The ceiling gave way, and Rosa Krushan's apartment descended into the bar. Her large overstuffed chair came first. It fell half on, half off, a marbleized table, closer to Elke Hall than Elke liked. The boom deafened Elke. A small side table followed it, bounced off the chair, and across the nearby tables to fetch up against the back wall. The reading lamp that had stood on that table hung by the cord swinging over the rubble in the cafe. Ecru antimacassars drifted through the plaster dust. The antimacassars came to rest on the bosom of one of the about-to-be-raped Sabine women. Elke ran from the Café. A sideboard twisted and fell on three wire chairs entangling them like macramé. A clatter of broken crockery followed Elke out the door.

Rosa Krushan left the kitchen. She had never before been in a smoke filled room like her cafe was now. It numbed her. The front and back walls shed their friezes. The granulation of the peacocks enveloped her. The pulverization of the cupids and buxom maidens darkened her vision. The crumbling of the rosebud-decked satyrs happened outside her ken. She did not notice the plunge of a mammoth mammary past her shoulder.

Someone began to sob. Rosa realized after a while she was the one sobbing. The Fault howled again, and shuddered. Large chunks of plaster, no longer recognizable as manly bosoms or peacock tails, began falling. Lathing and rotten beam fragments danced among the plaster chunks.

The toilet that had leaked for years broke loose from its moorings in the old floor and fell into the kitchen sink. For a long moment, more the earth shuddered under the City. Then there was stillness, stillness of the earth, the air, and the people. Only plaster dust danced in the air. The flow of time interrupted eternity's standstill. The floor under Rosa's TV gave way, and it came crashing down on a table, narrowly missing her. The shattered silence resumed.

Rosa Krushan brushed the remnants of a cherub from her hair and shoulders. The resultant dust caused her to sneeze. She sneezed out a purple cloud of fragments of a hitherto unnoticed grape cluster across the room. Debris filled the shell that had been her livelihood. She wept. From somewhere far away she heard a siren wail.

Elke Hall saw Rosa kneeling in the dust. Overhead bits and pieces of Rosa's private life dangled dangerously above her. Lacy lingerie spilled from a broken drawer. The headboard, mattress, and box springs teetered on the edge of the broken floor, about to plummet onto Rosa. Elke, despite her great fear, went back into the café to get Rosa.

"Come out," she said. "It's safer outside."

Rosa looked up at her through lashes whitened with plaster dust. A tall woman, firm-breasted and buxom stood over her. She had an air of command, as though she carried a sword, though Rosa couldn't see one. Light from the doorway fell around her, dressing her in a yellow glow with white sparkles. Rosa remembered an angel that stood in a niche in her childhood church.

"Are you my guardian angel?" Rosa asked.

"No, just somebody who wants to get you out of here."

"Everything's gone, isn't it?"

Elke looked around. "Yes, pretty much gone. Things are about to fall on our heads. Come on, now, let's go outside."

Rosa allowed Elke to urge her up, and putting one shaky foot in front of the other, let Elke lead her out. Elke and Rosa turned right and began walking down the street. Two blocks down, they encountered a policeman in uniform.

The policeman advised Elke to move along to the park, where rescue workers were setting up tents and a kitchen. Elke did not know the City well. She was terrified, but she stopped to comfort Rosa. It was better, for Elke, than collapsing hopelessly herself into the dust.

Rosa welcomed the strong arm around her shoulder, and the close embrace that allowed her to weep out her sorrow. She also managed to weep out a lot of plaster dust, so she could see more clearly. When she calmed a little, and opened her eyes, she liked what she saw. Arms around each other's waist, the two women stumbled toward the park, Rosa providing directions, Elke providing the strength.

Salvación was on the street in front of the mission when the temblor struck. She rode the bucking sidewalk as though it were a ship at sea in a storm. The mission's foundation was on solid rock foundation; the building held together. At the end of Lost Lane, the park's trees performed a graceful hula. None fell. Inspiration struck Salvación. The park was an excellent place to set up kettles over large fires to cook stews, beans, and whatever else they might salvage. Yesterday's Carnival tents and booths should still be near; she'd send a volunteer for the organizer, DeLys his name was, for permission to use the canvas to give people a place to sleep. She called to Willy who was in the Mission.

"Find Mr. DeLys," she said. "You know who he is?"

Willy nodded. At least today he had trousers on.

"Take a note from me to him," Salvación continued. She took a pad and pencil from her pocket and wrote hastily. She folded the note and handed it to Willy. "Now go!" she commanded. Willy ran on his bare feet, dodging bits of glass and masonry on the sidewalks. Salvación went into the mission to count her foodstuffs. She doubted she could feed very many, but those she could feed she would feed.

When she came out again, she saw some few people had begun gathering in the park. Two women stood on her side of the street looking across into the park. The blonde woman was supporting the dark-haired woman. Salvación felt a nudge from the unicorn. She approached the women.

"Do either of you know how to cook for groups?" Salvación asked. The dark haired woman answered.

"I do. I run the Plaster Peacock."

"Good. You're chief cook. What can you do?" she asked the blonde.

"I'm good at getting things organized," the blonde woman said. "I'm Elke, Elke Hall. This cook is Rosa Krushan. Who are you?"

"Salvación Mandor. I run this mission. You can call me Señora, most everyone does. Can you help me get ready for the people who'll be coming?"

"Yes," Elke said. Rosa nodded.

"Come see what's in my pantry," Salvación said to Rosa. "Elke, I'll show you to the blankets, soap, and medical supplies."

Willy Waugh found Len DeLys setting up large kettles to boil water. He tapped Len's arm, and handed him the note. Len took it, shouted some orders toward a group of young men stacking wooden debris in one corner, and then read the note.

He shook his head. He had already promised the big tent for a hospital. Then he looked at the booths. Some had fallen in the temblor; others were in good shape. He called again to his young men.

"Take these booths apart. Stack the goods for the booth owners as carefully as you can. Then run these booths up to the Park and set them up for Salvación Mandor; she's running a kitchen and shelter out of her mission there." Willy Waugh waited at Len's side. Len looked at him and grinned. He knew Willy slightly, and knew he wasn't much for words. "I'll write a note for you to take to Salvación," he said. Willy nodded. When Len gave him the note, he sped away on his tough bare feet to the Mission.

La Señora had begun to receive refugees within an hour after the quake. She received Len's note just before the first of the booths arrived with able-bodied men to re-erect them in the park. Elke Hall organized the construction effort, while La Señora allotted the available housing to the neediest.

Willy stood by La Señora's table, waiting for instructions. Rosa Krushan noticed him there, and asked La Señora if Willy could help her in the kitchen. La Señora said yes. Rosa fixed a stern eye on Willy.

"Willy, will you help me? I need someone to peel vegetables for me. I can't do it all by myself."

Willy nodded solemnly at Rosa. His eyes were very large and fear showed in them. He took a great breath, puffing his chest out, and expelling a noisy sigh, he said, "But you have to show me how. Never peeled nothing."

"I'll show you," Rosa promised. "Come with me." Willy followed her. La Señora shrugged with relief. One less responsibility to watch. And the boy would help, if he could. He seemed very grateful for food and shelter, though he shed his clothes at any opportunity. If he did so now, at least he'd be in the kitchen, out of sight.

### The Key Incident

The Swami picked up the key. He opened the locker with it. He looked inside the satchel, and discovered a large quantity of very fine smoking herb. The Swami guessed the Mandarin man was a dealer in fine herbs. Well, spoils of war, and all that. He took the satchel but left the pistol, for he was a man of peace who eschewed violence.

At the doorway to the bus station, a hand reached out and stopped him.

"Open the satchel," an official voice commanded. Someone flashed a badge at him. Suddenly the satchel was snatched from him. His hands were forced behind his back and handcuffs clicked around his wrists.

"Fu I, also known as Quig Drye, you are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent..." The Swami didn't hear the rest of the warning, though he nodded that he understood. Great shame blackened his astral plane. Only later did he realize that Chief Inspector Pryor had arrested him in someone else's name, that of the Mandarin carpet bagger. Let the record note that Chief Inspector Pryor knew only that the dealer he sought was dressed in "Asian" robes. Specific ethnicity had not been spelled out for him.

The jail smelled of old urine and stale fear. Despair pooled in its shadowed corners. After booking him as Quigley Drye, the police caged the Swami in a one-person holding cell. The Swami didn't know that this was an honor reserved for especially feared prisoners. The police had been told Quigley Drye was prone to violence. That's why they gave the Swami the number-one-bad-man cell.

The Swami called on all his spirit guides for deliverance. They did not hear; sometimes parties on the astral plane interfered with spiritual guidance. The Swami huddled in a corner, abject in his misery. He gave himself up for lost.

Late in the afternoon the ground trembled, shook, and then the jail collapsed around the Swami. A falling telephone from the second floor knocked the police sergeant in the head. The Swami pushed aside some light rubble lying on him. He stood and hobbled out of the jail cell through its broken door. He stopped to check on the desk sergeant. The Swami could feel no pulse in the Desk sergeant's neck. He bowed to pray. "Great Power of the Universe, walk with the spirit of this man through the in-between places. Help him find his new body when it's his time. And don't hold his old profession against him. It's a mean job, but somebody's got to do it. Amen."

The Swami bowed three times to the corpse, dusted off his saffron robe, and walked away, mildly bruised by falling bits of the jail, but otherwise unharmed. Several other prisoners un-stunned by the falling cells determined this a good time to go on holiday.

The Swami picked a way to his temple through the fallen rubble of balconies and facades. His temple and its venerated plaster figures were crumbled dust. Not even one of his statues appeared to have survived the temblor. He especially mourned the two Kuanyins that were part of a set of three. To his mind they had special holiness. Forlorn, he joined other refugees in the park.

La Señora and Elke Hall were handing out blankets. The Swami walked up to them. "Hello," he said.

La Señora spoke to him with a weary authority. "Hello. Please wait in line for your blanket."

The Swami asked her, "Is there anything I can do to help?"

Elke snapped at him. "We've got things in hand."

La Señora laid an admonishing hand on Elke's arm. "What we need is somebody to keep the kids busy."

"I know a few magic tricks," the Swami said. "Simple things."

"Can you collect them over there, under the trees?" La Señora asked him. "Keep them busy?"

"I'll do what I can."

"Thanks."

The Swami began to gather a few kids around him. When he judged he had a core audience, he began to sing, in a loud voice.

"On a tree by a river a little tomtit/Sang willow, titwillow, titwillow! /And I said to him, Dicky-bird, why do you sit /Singing willow, titwillow, titwillow!"

More children joined the children around him. Some adults joined, too. The Swami continued:

"Is it weakness of intellect, birdie, I cried, /Or a rather tough worm in your little inside? /With a shake of his poor little head he replied, /Oh, willow, titwillow, titwillow!" The children and gathering adults clapped and whistled their delight as the Swami made a particularly gruesome face.

La Señora said to Elke, "Well, that worked, at least."

"I'm glad," Elke said. "He looks wild in that saffron robe."

"He must have a good heart, to charm the children," La Señora said, and went back to distributing blankets.

While capered and conjured, the Swami contemplated his miraculous release, and determined to start his life over yet another time. Later, he gratefully accepted a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt from another volunteer. He gave his robe and tasseled belt to a shivering mother and her babe to use as a blanket, and faced into the chaos and night to meet his new life.

### Hospital Hospitality

Ben worked his way between the cots with the water bucket. Bandaged patients lay, some asleep, others awake and moaning or mumbling. Ben didn't notice Len in the shadows at the side of the tent watching him.

"Water? I boiled it myself," Ben said to one patient with a white cap of gauze. "Clear cool water." The patient, Ben wasn't sure whether it was a boy or a girl, tried to rise to drink. Ben swiftly set the bucket down, supported the patient under the shoulders, and held the dipper to the person's lips. The person sipped at the water, then gestured that it was enough. Ben smiled, and helped the patient lie down. Then he went on to the next patient.

"I'm out of water. I'll have to get more. Be right back," he said. Len stopped him on his way to the vat of cooled boiled water.

"How are you holding up?" Len asked him. "You're the man who just came to the City, right?"

"Just got here yesterday."

"And today you get a quake. Rough welcome, man. Moving here, or just visiting?"

"I think, moving here. If I can find a job."

"Anything special?"

"Depends on what's available. I'm willing to start low and work my way up."

"If you don't mind dumb work, I know of an opening. Indigent Aborigine Insurance needs a mailroom worker. By the way, what's your name?"

"Ben. Ben Soul. Mailroom would feed me, and maybe pay rent."

"Right. I'm Len, Len DeLys. Take my card. You got a pen?"

"Yes." Ben felt in his pocket, found his pen, and pulled it out.

"Give it to me," Len said. Len wrote something on the card. "There. See Minnie Vann. I put her name and extension on the back. Tell her Len DeLys sent you." Len smiled. "Now, I'd better let you deliver more water."

"Thank you, Mr. DeLys. I appreciate it."

"Thank you, Ben. You've done your bit to help. Call me, sometime, and we'll have coffee and a Danish."

"Yes, thanks. I'd like that." Len nodded, and walked away.

The tent hospital operated for three more days before the City's hospitals were able to take in the severe injuries. By then, the lesser injuries were ambulatory, and up and on with their lives. Ben sat with Noah Count on a bench near the tent's opening. "Well, all this is coming down tomorrow," Ben said. "The City's getting back on its feet."

Noah, whose name Ben never learned, said, "Yes. Do you know what you're going to do next?" Noah's arm was supported in a sling. His wrist had a splint on it.

"I've got a job interview appointment tomorrow."

"Still thinking of staying in the City?"

"Yes. I don't have a lot to go back to Colorado for. A few friends, maybe. My brother and his wife have the farm, and they're welcome to it. I was never much of a farmer."

"I've never been on a farm. What's it like?"

"It's a lot of work, a lot of dust, and, if you've got livestock, a lot of manure. Chickens, for example, are full of shit, and they drop it all the time."

The other man chuckled. "I'll stick with the City. There's shit here, too, of course. Lotta people don't clean up after their dogs."

"Most people don't clean up their own messes, according to a professor I had."

The other man stood up. "Well, if I'm going to get home tonight, I'd better get a bus. They aren't running too late, not until things are back to normal."

"Nice working with you."

"Likewise. See you around."

"Right. See you around." Ben watched Noah walk away, then got up and went in the tent. There were a few minor chores to take care of before he'd feel the job was finished.

## Aftershocks

### The Chief Inspector Eats a Sandwich

Chief Inspector Pryor sat at his desk eating a sandwich. His telephone rang. He sighed and answered it. "Chief Inspector Polk N. Pryor here," he said.

"This is Lieutenant Frank Lee, Denver PD," a young-sounding voice on the other end said.

The Chief Inspector shaped his tone to be as business-like as he could, yet still convey curtness. "Yes. What do you want from the City PD?"

"We're trying to catch up with a bank loan officer who absconded with some important bank ledgers," Lieutenant Lee said. "We think he may be in the City."

"Why?"

"The owner of the bank in question, Neighborhood National, had to fire a loan officer a few days ago. The man is known to have bought a bus ticket for the City."

"This loan officer got a name?"

"Yeah. Benjamin Dover Soul."

"This bank owner sure this is his man?"

"Yeah, _he's_ sure. Says the guy's some kind of sexual pervert, that's why he fired him. Probably is, since he's coming your way."

The Chief Inspector heard the undercurrent of sneer in the Lieutenant's tone and grimaced. "Yeah, right. We do encourage diversity," he said as pompously as he could. Let the Lieutenant interpret his meaning as he would. "You don't sound so sure he's guilty," the Chief Inspector said.

"Not enough evidence to form an opinion," the Lieutenant said. "Could be one or two other loan officers, I'm thinking."

"Well, I can look around for him," the Chief Inspector admitted, "but it's not going to be a priority. We had an earthquake here, yesterday. Things are a mite upset."

"I understand. We're under a lot of pressure about this, you understand. Fuller Grace, the bank owner, owns half the city council. When he says jump, we flex our knees real fast."

"Tell him the chase has my undivided attention, when I'm not working earthquake issues."

"Okay if I decorate that a little? Just to keep him off my back?"

"Fine, as long as you don't tell him it's my only priority."

"Understood. Thanks. My number is 303-555-1894, extension 7."

"Got it. I'll get back to you. Bye."

"Bye."

The Chief Inspector put the receiver in its cradle and groaned. "Just what I need," he said to his sandwich fragments, "a fugitive chase in the middle of chaos. Maybe Lee will find him, or another crook, before I have to do something about it." He took up the pickle spear that had come with his sandwich and bit into it. Its sourness puckered his tongue. He squeezed his eyes shut, but whether in ecstasy or agony, no casual observer could have told.

It was a couple of days later that Chief Inspector Pryor came into the tent looking for Len. "Mr. DeLys, someone said you have a young man here from Colorado. Is that right?"

"Yes, I do. Ben. His name is Ben."

"Or, that's the one he's given you. Has he mentioned why he's here in the City?"

"Something about a lost job, at a bank, I think."

Chief Inspector Pryor looked around the almost-empty tent. "Is he here right now?"

"No, he's gone back to his motel to take a shower. We're short of water here, you see. All we have we have to boil ourselves."

The Chief Inspector took out a notebook and a pen. "What motel would that be, sir?"

"I think he said it was the Dancing Pixie. Why are you interested in him?"

"Just some police inquiries from Denver he may be able to help clear up."

"Is this about anything serious? Ben's been a big help, here. Willing to do any crappy job that I needed done."

"That's a good character reference. I'm not sure what the Denver police want to ask him. How long has this Ben been gone?"

"About twenty minutes, I think."

"Good. He's probably still at the motel. That's over on Hauser Street, right?"

"It was, the last time I checked."

"Thanks for your time" the Chief Inspector said. He shook Len's hand, and left the tent. Len watched him go, a concerned expression on his face.

It was late afternoon when Ben returned to the Dancing Pixie Motel. The clerk was behind the desk. Lanterns dimly lit the desk. A radio muttered in the background. Ben couldn't quite make out the broadcast. The clerk said, "Hello, Sir. Room 501?"

"Yes. I need to shower. Is the water working here?"

"Yes, but it's not hot. We don't have gas to fire the boilers."

"If it's wet enough to wash the smoke and stink off me, I'll be okay."

"You'll have to use the showers in the gym. It's at the back of the Motel. The pressure's too low to reach your room. Use as little as possible. According to the radio the Fire Department needs to conserve water to fight fires."

"Okay."

"You seem to have survived the quake without too much damage."

"Yeah. A couple of bruises. I've been helping out at a tent hospital. Boiling water over open fires."

"Sounds like a movie cliché."

"Well, I suppose. At least I'm not birthing babies."

"Right. Have a nice quick shower. The Languishing Langoustine is closed, but I hear there's sandwiches in the machines at the bus station."

"I ate at the tent hospital. Some of the food booths at the street fair survived. They cooked for us."

"Here's your key. It opens the gym, too. Get a good night's sleep."

"I hope." Ben went to the gym, rinsed the detritus of the day from his body, dried quickly, and went to his room. It was eerily dark, without the flashing Languishing Langoustine sign.

The Chief Inspector entered the Dancing Pixie's lobby. "Good afternoon, sir. I'm Chief Inspector Polk N. Pryor of the City Police," he identified himself to the clerk.

"Yes, Chief Inspector," the clerk said. "How may I help the City Police?"

"Do you have a young man registered here, a Benjamin Soul, from Colorado?"

The clerk consulted his register. "We have a Mr. Benjamin Soul, who lists his home address as Denver, Colorado. Is that the man you want?"

"Very likely. Is he in his room?"

"No, he's in the gym, taking a shower. The water pressure's too low to reach the fifth floor".

"Where's the gym?"

"It's behind the desk, here. Go to my right, your left, and down the hall to the end. Do you need to show me a warrant, or something?"

"Not in this case. The gym's a public room in a public establishment. Besides, we only want to talk to this Ben."

"Here's a key that will let you into the gym. We keep it locked to keep the street riff-raff out."

"Right you are. Thanks." The Chief Inspector took the key and started down the hall. The clerk stared curiously after him.

Ben had wrapped in a post-shower towel around himself. He was standing over his clothes when Chief Inspector Pryor startled him.

"Are you Benjamin Dover Soul?"

"Yes."

The Chief Inspector showed Ben his badge. "I am Chief Inspector Polk N. Pryor. I need to ask you a few questions."

"Yes?" Ben let the question hang in the air.

"I understand you are a resident of Denver, Colorado. Is that correct?" The Chief Inspector spoke with his most official voice.

"I have been. I'm thinking of moving out here," Ben said.

"Is it true you were recently dismissed from the employment of the Neighborhood National Bank in Denver?"

"Yes." Ben felt the hairs on his neck rise.

"Did you take from that bank certain ledgers or other documents belonging to the bank?" The Chief Inspector was careful to avoid sounding accusatory.

"I didn't take anything," Ben said forcefully, "not even a paper clip, that wasn't mine."

"Do you have bank documents in your possession?"

"Only the stub from my severance pay draft." His anger started to rise. "I've stolen nothing from the bank."

The Chief Inspector continued with a conciliatory tone in his voice. "A Lieutenant Frank Lee of the Denver PD telephoned me. He has asked me to arrest you pending investigation. He's forgotten to forward a warrant."

"I've done nothing wrong," Ben said defensively.

"Will you voluntarily come along with me to the precinct? We'll get Lieutenant Lee on the phone and see if we can clear this up." The policeman was careful to frame his sentence as a request.

"To 'assist the police with their inquiries?' Chief Inspector?" Ben spoke with irony.

Chief Inspector Pryor smiled. "Something like that," he said.

"Let me get dressed." Ben dropped his towel and began putting his clothes on. Since the Chief Inspector didn't seem inclined to leave, Ben decided to let him watch.

Chief Inspector Pryor said, "Thank you," and sat on a bench while Ben drew on his briefs and trousers, pulled his shirt over his head, sat to put on his socks, and laced up his shoes. Then he preceded the policeman out the door and into the City where the early evening played pearlescent fingers across the cracked facades of buildings.

Ben sat beside Chief Inspector Pryor's desk while the policeman telephoned the Denver Police Department. He asked several questions of the person who answered. From his frown Ben could see he was frustrated. When he was put on hold, he turned to Ben and said, "Sorry, Mr. Soul, about the delay. They're trying to find Lieutenant Lee.

"Okay," Ben said.

"He'll be back when?" Pryor said into the phone. "That's Denver time? Okay, I'll call back."

"This Lieutenant Lee's not around?"

"No. Sorry for the delay. They don't seem to be very professional back there. You can wait by the Information Desk, if you'd like. I can get you some coffee, if you want."

"Thanks for the offer, but I don't drink coffee. Water would be nice, though."

"Water fountain's by the Information Desk." Ben walked over to the Information Desk and used the water fountain. Then he sat on a bench along the wall. A woman came in, a narrow-faced woman with eyes that frightened Ben. Frozen fury glittered in them like coiled rattlesnakes. Ben turned away from her glance. She went to the Information Desk.

"I need to speak with someone in charge," she said.

"About what, Ma'am?" the desk policeman asked.

"I've found evidence of criminal activity," she snapped. "I think it's my duty to bring it to the attention of the authorities."

"Let me see what you have." The woman handed him a little black book. He glanced at several pages.

"I think it's a record of illicit transactions," the woman said.

The desk policeman leaned over to the intercom on his desk. "Chief Inspector Pryor, please come to the Information Desk," he said. The Chief Inspector came at once.

"Sir, this lady has brought us some evidence of possible criminal activity."

"It looks like a ledger of drug transactions. Where did you get this, Ms—I didn't get your name?"

"I'm Vanna Shayne. I got the book from my employer's desk. It was in a locked drawer that broke open when a filing cabinet fell on his desk."

"During the temblor?"

"Yes."

"That was three days ago. Why have you delayed coming in?"

"I didn't realize what I had until today," she said with great dignity.

"You are quite right to bring this to us," Chief Inspector Pryor said. "Who is your employer?"

"Mr. Quigley Drye, Private Eye."

"Are you aware Mr. Drye is deceased?"

"No," she said. Ben saw no emotion on her face or skating over the ice of her eyes.

"His brother identified his body earlier today. But thank you for bringing this to us. Please leave your name and a place where we can reach you with the Information Desk here."

"Yes, Chief Inspector," Vanna said.

The desk policeman said, "Call for you, Chief Inspector. I see your phone's blinking."

"Thank you, Ms. Shayne. This officer will take your information. I'm sure someone from narcotics will get in touch with you, soon." Vanna nodded, and began giving the details of her address to the desk policeman.

Chief Inspector Pryor called loudly to Ben and waved at him. "Mr. Soul, please come here," he said. Ben got up and went to the Chief Inspector's desk.

"Yes, Chief Inspector?"

"Mr. Soul, I've just got off the phone with Lieutenant Lee. You're off the hook. It seems another bank officer stole the missing documents. He pointed the finger at you. He wanted to hold the documents for ransom from the bank."

"Did the Lieutenant say who it was?" Ben asked.

"Somebody named King."

"Joe King. He was my boss." Ben shook his head.

"Lieutenant Lee asked me to apologize to you." The Chief Inspector spoke with asperity. "Cheap so-and-so couldn't stay on the line long enough to do it himself. You might have a lawsuit, if you want to pursue it." He looked up at Ben.

"Why make an attorney richer?" Ben asked.

The Chief Inspector smiled at him. "Good attitude. You're free to go. With my apologies, as well."

Ben smiled and shook the man's hand. "Thank you, Chief Inspector. You've been a gentleman in doing your duty." Ben walked out the station house door and went "home" to the Dancing Pixie. He had a life to prepare for.

### Post Temblor

Vanna was more distressed by the temblor than she realized. She stumbled along the street, not quite sure whether it was the ground or her legs that were shaking. At a corner she did not recognize, she saw a lighted bar, the Clown's Closet. A large neon clown bobbed and weaved with laughter like the cowboy sign in Las Vegas. For long moments Vanna stood on the street swaying in synchronous mirror image with the clown. Dizziness forced her to stop. Sudden clarity struck her brain. She needed a drink. Perhaps, also, they had a telephone where she could call Dickon. Surely an earthquake was reason enough to get a night away from home and husband. Vanna went through the grubby door into the smoky room.

She stopped just inside long enough to let her eyes adjust. The bartender and the patrons silently observed her. Vanna felt like she'd just wandered into a new church for the first time. Both places offered the same silent, staring group. Only the background music was different. Vanna almost turned and left. She'd had enough of churches in her recent past to more than satisfy her. Then the bartender nodded, as if to welcome her, and the three older men at the bar turned back to their drinks. Vanna took a seat by a small table. When the bartender came over, she ordered a gin and tonic.

"Do you have a public phone?" she asked the man.

"Not working, at least not a while ago. You can try it again, if you want. By the men's room." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder in the general vicinity of the bar's back shadows.

"Thanks," Vanna said. "I'll try later." Let Dickon mumble prayers for a while, she thought. He was better at that than at most things.

The bartender brought her gin and tonic to her table. A man came in and sat at a nearby table. The bartender brought him a drink, and chatted with him a moment. Vanna overheard enough to realize the man lived in the neighborhood and managed an apartment complex, or something, with rooms in it. She smiled at him when his eyes turned toward her. He smiled back. He was handsome in a dark-haired, sharp-nosed way. He had green eyes, a noticeable tan, and broad shoulders. His shirt was casual, open at the throat, and dark curls dark peeped out like mischievous children. He was drinking something brown.

"Quite a shaker," she said. "Worst I've ever been through."

"Survive intact?" he half asked, half said.

"Yes."

"Your first quake?"

"No, just my first big one, up close. The building where I was working is half-collapsed, may be crumbled rubble by now. I was lucky to get out alive." Vanna shuddered.

"I've been through quakes before," the man said. "They always leave me feeling like the world's rules have been suspended."

"Interesting—I hadn't thought of that." Vanna leaned forward a little. "How do you mean, the world's rules have been suspended?"

"You know. Almost dying, being helpless, all that. Makes you think. What about all the stuff you never got around to trying? What if it's too late to try things?" The man sipped his drink. His green eyes watched her over the rim of his glass. It was almost empty.

"Would you like another drink?" he asked her.

"Yes," Vanna said. "I would. My nerves are still wobbly."

"Gin and tonic or something new?"

"Gin and tonic. Mixing drinks makes me very loose." The man signaled the bartender. "Two more, Morrie," he said. "On me."

"What kind of new things did you mean," Vanna asked. "Do you mean food you never tried, places you've never been, forbidden love you've never sampled?" Vanna watched his face; he caught her clue; she saw it in his eyes. Now to reel him in.

"All of that. Maybe more, like enjoying the sun, watching the moon with somebody romantic. Even reading books you'd never got around to," he said. He grinned at her. "Maybe not books, not on my list. Too much life to live to spend time reading about it."

"I've always held close to the rules," Vanna said. "My upbringing was in the church, very strict."

"Catholic?" There was a slight tremor. Everyone in the bar looked up at the hanging lights. They scarcely swayed.

"No, Presbyterian. Different clothes, similar rules."

"I've avoided religion, myself."

"I should have."

An aftershock rattled the glassware behind the bar. The man dived under his table. So did Vanna. Even though the aftershock didn't last long, or do much damage, before it was over Vanna was in the man's arms.

"Hi," he said. "We haven't been introduced. I'm Clarence, Clarence Sayles." He wore spicy cologne. Vanna breathed it in.

"Hello yourself," Vanna said. "I'm Vanna...Vanna Dee." She chose her maiden name. Let Dickon keep his, for tonight, for forever.

Clarence helped Vanna to her feet. She picked up her drink from her table and drained the glass. Clarence did the same. His strong arm supported her around her waist. She did not shrug him off, though she was quite able to stand by herself.

"Let me buy you another," Clarence said to her. She could smell the brown drink on his breath mingling with the cologne.

"Well—I don't know. I've got to find a place to stay tonight. Do you live near here?"

"Yes. I manage the Penn du Luz Arms hotel next door. It's really an apartment house; most of our tenants are long-term."

"Do you have a room I could rent for the night?" Vanna tried batting her eyelashes for Clarence. Fortunately, he had looked away just then to get the bartender's attention. Vanna had not practiced batting her eyelashes, and her performance was more comic than alluring.

"I can arrange a bed for you," Clarence said. Vanna looked into his green eyes. His invitation was plain. It should be a warm bed. For one brief instant she thought of Dickon, and dismissed him. She imagined his portrait in her mind fading like Banquo's ghost.

"Well, maybe one more," she said. "Just to relax me. My table or yours?"

"We'll use mine. Morrie, two more please, doubles?" he looked at her; she nodded.

"What kind of work do you do?" Clarence asked her.

"Secretarial. For a private eye."

"A private eye? Really? Sounds romantic."

"It's typing and filing and answering the phones, and doesn't pay much. I'm just trying to get a grubstake together, so I can work on an exciting job."

"What's an exciting job, for you?"

"I'm still working on that." Vanna yawned; she heard Clarence slur his words a little. She didn't want him too drunk to perform. Now or never, she had to break with her past, with prayer mumbling Dickon and all the rest of that church stuff. What a little pond that was to play in!

"I'm going to have to get some sleep soon," she said. "I started my day before daylight this morning, and it's been an exciting one. How much is the room you've got to rent."

"I'll show it to you," Clarence said, standing. He swayed a little. Vanna guessed he'd been drinking before he came to the bar.

At the door to his apartment, Clarence looked at her and smiled. His teeth were very white in his dark face, and seemed to sparkle in the dim light of the hall. All the rules she had grown up with dissolved in that smile. She went into Clarence's apartment a liberated woman.

In the wee small hours the telephone rang. When Dickon answered it, Vanna spoke to him. "Dickon, I'm fine," she said. "I've got a place to stay. I'm at the Penn de Luz Arms. The manager's taken in several stranded people." She neglected to tell him that Clarence Sayles, the apartment manager, was on the bed with her, or that she had discarded almost all her clothing, or that Clarence had no clothing at all.

"I've been worried, Vanna," Dickon said. "It's been almost sixteen hours since the temblor hit."

Vanna let impatience color her tone. "I know. I'm sorry you've had to worry. It's pretty chaotic over here. The television stations all say it's going to be a couple of days before anybody can leave the City for the northern suburbs."

Dickon gulped. "A couple of days? Because of the bridges, I suppose."

"Yes. Just don't worry about me. I'm in a safe, dry, place," Vanna said. She used the hand not holding the phone to stroke Clarence's penis.

"If you hadn't gotten that job, you wouldn't be in this predicament. Do you have enough money?"

"I'm not going to argue with you about the job, now, Dickon. And, yes, I have enough money."

"Is there a number where I can reach you?"

"No, not one I can give you tonight. When I see the manager in the morning, I'll ask. Okay?"

"Okay. Call me when you can. I love you."

"Yes. I'll call when I know about coming home. Goodbye, Dickon. Other people want to use this phone." She hung up the phone before Dickon could say his goodbyes.

Clarence asked her, "Everything okay there?"

"Yes. I'm sure the quake didn't damage much that far out. A couple of upset plants, perhaps. No buildings hurt."

"You giving your man the brush off?"

Vanna leaned over and kissed Clarence. "Don't worry about him, right now. Now is for you and me. We'll let tomorrow be tomorrow, tomorrow."

Clarence drew Vanna to him. "Come here, you white whirlwind." They shoved the sheets down to the foot of the bed again, and coupled. Dickon put the receiver back on the hook, scratched an itch in his groin, contemplated getting a glass of water, and dozed off waiting for daybreak.

On Sunday Dickon preached on how one must go on trusting God even in the face of disasters like the recent temblor. Vanna had not come home, yet, though she promised to try this afternoon. The congregation was a little larger than usual, which cheered Deacon Sincaine. "Good message this morning, Pastor Shayne," he said. He only occasionally expressed approval of Dickon's sermons.

Dickon replied, "Thank you."

"I'll be around this week to fix the faucets," the Deacon said.

"Yes. I don't know if I'll be around to help. I've got several things to do for the Presbytery."

"No matter. I'm used to doing plumbing alone. When's Mrs. Shayne getting home?"

"She called me again today. She expects to catch an afternoon bus."

"You'll be glad to have her back, I reckon."

"Yes."

"Talk to her about giving up that job."

"According to the paper, her employer died when a piece of a freeway fell on him." Dickon had seen the item just this morning.

Deacon Sincaine smiled with satisfaction. "It's the Lord's will, no doubt. If she really feels the need to work, maybe she can find something closer to home.'

"We'll see. For now I'm glad she's coming home."

In the City, Vanna took her leave of Clarence just about the time Dickon was closing the church after services. "I don't know just when I'll get back into the City" she told Clarence. "I have things to work out before I can get away from Dickon. And I have to find a job, too, since Quigley Drye's dead."

"A job in the City will help. Check with Hank O'Hara, my boss. He knows which desks are vacant in City Hall."

"It should be better than typing for that fat moron private eye."

"It should pay better, too. You've got my number, if you want to get hold of me."

"Yes. I've had a great vacation in your bed, Clarence."

"God bless the earthquake," Clarence said with a grin.

"Yes. It shook me loose." She kissed him on the cheek and walked away.

"You've been useful, Mr. Sayles, in your fashion," she said softly to herself. "You may see me again, and you may not. It depends on whether I need something from you." She felt in her purse for Quigley's money. It was still there. She walked happily along the street. "I'll be free, soon. I'll never let a man own me again," she promised no one in particular.

### Making Connections

The hospital tent was dim and quiet. Almost all the patients had gone, the seriously wounded to major hospital facilities, and the less injured back to their lives. Dr. Chester Field came out and sat on a bench. He rubbed his temples and forehead. His ginger red eyebrows tangled as he rubbed. Len DeLys came out and sat beside him. He towered over the Doctor, even seated next to him. Len's face was as lined and tired as Dr. Field's. For a little while the two men sat in companionable silence. Then Dr. Field spoke.

"Well, that's been quite an experience," he said.

"Where were you when the quake hit?" Len asked him.

"At the street fair, where you recruited me."

"I'm glad you were there. You're a competent doctor, Chester. Where's your practice?"

"I don't have a medical practice, actually." He smiled into the night. "I'm a psychiatrist. I've had medical training, but this shakeup was the first time I've really used it to splint bones and bandage cuts."

"You're good at it." Dr. Field inclined his head to acknowledge the compliment. "Where do you practice psychiatry?"

"Des Moines, Iowa."

"Like it there?"

"I've never known anywhere else. This is my first time out of the state of Iowa."

"Well, I hope it's been exciting."

"It has." Dr. Field grinned again. "Much better than the conference I came here for."

"Were you with that Conference of Helping Professionals?"

"Yes. It was rather dull. I've enjoyed the City, though."

They were silent for a short while. It was Len who broke the silence. "When do you go back to Iowa?"

"I'm not sure I will, at least not to live." Len watched Chester search for words. "This City has kind of gotten under my skin. I don't know why, but I can breathe better here."

Len sounded a cautionary note. "We've got a god's plenty of psychiatrists here. You'd probably have to work for a government agency, instead of starting your own practice."

"No problem there. Government agencies tend to pay regular salaries."

"I can give you a recommendation, if you want. I know an assistant to the mayor."

Dr. Field turned to look directly at Len. "Thanks," he said. "I'll take you up on that."

"Later on, in the daylight, when I've rested up and can write a readable sentence. I'll write out the name and telephone number, okay?"

"Yes. That'll be great."

"Mention my name when you call," Len said.

"Thank you."

"Now, do you have some place to sleep?"

"Yes," Chester said. "My hotel's even got hot running water again."

"Have a good night, then. I'll be here in the morning." Len watched the little man walk away. There was buoyancy in the man's step. Len chuckled. "Strike another blow for the magic City," he said softly to himself. He went in and stretched out on a cot in the tent.

### Recognition

It was mid-morning when Hank O'Hara from the mayor's office came by. He asked Len to come outside the tent. "Len, the mayor wants me to thank you, personally, for all your work here setting up this temporary hospital," he said.

"It's more a first aid station, really. We've sent any serious cases on to the hospitals."

O'Hara took hold of Len's arm to emphasize his serious message. "You and your team have helped a lot in this emergency. You'll be up for a commendation of some kind, when we figure out what to do for people like you."

"In this kind of disaster, everybody has to help, or we all go down."

Benjamin Dover Soul walked by, carrying water into the hospital. He nodded and smiled at both men.)

"Nice looking young man," Hank said.

"Yes. New in the City. Just got off the bus the day before the quake."

"A tourist and he's volunteered, too. I should get the reporters over here."

Len said, anxiously, "Please, don't."

"Why not?"

"I'd like to keep this one under wraps, if I can. There's something about him that I like."

"Aha! The dirty old man seduces the bright young boy just in from the country, eh?"

Len shook his head. "No, nothing like that. I think he needs sheltering, at least until he's got a few months under his belt. I'm referring him to Minnie Vann."

Hank chuckled. "Oh, she'll bring him up right, I'm sure. I thought maybe you were going to keep him for yourself."

"I'd like to, but he's too young for me."

"It's hell to be forty, isn't it?"

" _Almost_ forty."

"Right. Almost. What, a couple of weeks away?"

"Several weeks away." Len spoke with asperity.

"You can always dream."

Len determined to change the subject.

"Oh, while I think of it, I'm sending another newcomer to you. A psychiatrist. Dr. Chester Field. Maybe there's a place with the City for him. He's not here right now, or I'd introduce you to him."

"Okay. Send him over in a few days. I'll interview him."

"I've got to go back, finish up here," Len said. "Tell the Mayor hello for me."

"I will," Hank said. "Once again, he thanks you for all your help."

"Okay," Len said, waving as he ducked into the tent. Hank O'Hara watched him go.

"Wonder if he'll survive a recognition ceremony," Hank said, and walked away laughing.

### Ben Takes a Job

Ben went to the motel. At the Dancing Pixie the clerk asked Ben, "Will you be staying with us longer?"

"Just a few nights, until I can find a place to rent."

"You're staying in the City, then."

"I've got a job interview tomorrow."

"I've got a friend who has a studio apartment for rent. Over on Never-Maiden Lane. It's clean, the neighborhood's safe, and the rent's cheap."

"Do you have a telephone number for your friend?"

"Yes. I'll write it down for you." He took a card for the motel, wrote the name and number on it, and handed it to Ben. "Here. He's usually home in the evening."

"Thanks. I'll call tomorrow, if I get the job." Ben took his key and went to his room. He laid out a shirt and suit to wear to a job interview on the chair in the room, turned down the covers, and went to sleep.

The next day Ben found the commercial district. He studied the card he held. He looked up, frowning, at the street signs. The street wasn't the right one, but which way to go? Then he saw a policeman on the corner. He went to him. "Can you tell me how to find this address, officer?"

The policeman pointed the out directions. "Yes. Go down the hill two blocks, turn right and Indigent Aborigine Insurance is in the middle of the block."

"Thank you, Officer."

"We're here to serve the public, sir."

Ben followed the policeman's directions and found the Indigent Aborigine Insurance Company with no problems. He went into the marbled lobby and approached the receptionist's desk. She said, "May I help you, sir?"

"Yes, please. I'm scheduled to see Ms. Minnie Vann at 10:00 o'clock."

The Receptionist glanced at the clock. It read 9:50. "Yes, sir. You are a little early." Before Ben could reply, the receptionist pushed a button on an instrument on her desk and spoke into it. "Ms. Vann, your 10:00 o'clock is here."

Minnie said, "Okay, I'll be up in a minute. Tell him to wait."

"Ms. Vann will be with you shortly. Please have a seat." She gestured toward the lounge. Ben took a seat on the lounge across the lobby. He picked up a magazine and thumbed through it. Precisely at ten Minnie Vann came out of the elevator. She approached Ben.

"Mr. Soul?" she said. Ben looked up, and got to his feet. The woman who had addressed him was squat, with a short haircut. Her eyes danced with the humor of life, and Ben took an immediate liking to her.

"Yes. Ms. Vann?" he said, as he took her outstretched hand.

"Yes. Please come with me."

They walked toward the elevator. "Len DeLys says you've just come to the City?" Minnie asked.

"The day before the quake. The City's given me quite an introduction."

"Sometimes the City's a drama queen." The elevator doors closed on them. Ben felt it drop, carrying him to a new life and a new career. Minnie offered him a job in the mailroom after a brief interview.

To celebrate, Ben went to a burger joint for lunch. Garish red and yellow plastic covered the booths and tables. Ben asked for the fish and chips the menu promised. The counter boy told him the afternoon cook didn't know how to cook them, so Ben ordered a hamburger and fries, and a lemon-lime soda. He took his drink and sat in a booth to wait for his burger and fries.

The counter boy brought the meal to him on a cracked red tray. "Here's your burger and fries," he said. "Need a refill on your soda?"

"No, thanks," Ben said. The carbonated concoction tasted like someone had scraped the white stuff off a lemon peel to make it. It was very bitter. Two older men, Ben guessed them to be in their late fifties or early sixties came in. They were holding hands, and gazing at each other with adoration.

The boy waiter jerked his head at the older couple. "Don't mind the aunties," he said. "They come in about twice a month. Always lovey-dovey like that. You'd think they just met, drunk, wouldn't ya?" The boy shook his head. "Boss knows them," he went on. "Says they've been together thirty-five years."

"They seem happy enough," Ben said.

"I suppose." The boy looked at Ben. "I can't imagine them doing anything, ya know what I mean? Old farts like that?"

"Like have sex?"

"Yeah. Disgusting picture. They must be way over forty."

"Is forty some kind of cutoff age?" Ben chewed on a cold fry.

"Forty's way old. You ain't forty, yet, are you?"

"No, not for quite a while."

"Good. I wouldn't want to screw up my tip, ya know." The boy went to take the couple's orders.

Ben marveled at how sour the kid was, even though Ben doubted he was twenty yet. Ben saw how happy the couple was. An epiphany struck him. I want to be part of a couple when I got old, he thought, half of a pair that has a history. Mr. Bee flitting from blossom to blossom really wants to settle down in a hive with a queen of his own. Ben paid his bill, left a small tip, and went out to find Mr. Right.

### Vanna Returns to Dickon

On Sunday, Vanna reluctantly made her way home to Dickon. She had left a brief message on the answering machine after her first night with Clarence that told Dickon she was alive and camping in a park with other refugees. She promised to come home to him when transportation out of the City resumed. She had stalled for two days, but she could not delay her return any longer. She turned homeward to the little manse smelling of mold and the bland Dickon she'd married.

Dickon met her at the bus station. He welcomed her and she tried to provide enough enthusiasm about being home to fool him. Nonetheless, he sensed her irritation. When he said for the third or fourth time how glad he was she had survived, she snapped at him that of course, she had survived; she was a grown woman, after all. Dickon fell silent, and said very little for the rest of the evening. Vanna scarcely noticed; she was planning how to find time to count the money she had taken from Quig Drye.

Dickon was busy with church relief efforts and Vanna blessedly soon had time alone. She made use of the time, counting the money she'd found in Quigley Drye's office and puzzling over the black notebook. She tried to telephone the office, but it was soon among the non-working numbers. An article in the newspaper described the damaged block of buildings that had included the office, and listed their demolition schedule. Another article listed the identified dead, including Quigley Drye. The article did not mention next-of-kin, so Vanna presumed there was no one to mourn Quigley, or to look for his money.

The money amounted to more than $125,000.00. Vanna split it among accounts at ten different banks. She did not mention to these banks that she was a married woman; neither did she advise Dickon of her windfall. Dickon, she presumed, was too busy being a pastor to notice the distance in Vanna's attitude. One afternoon she announced she was going to the City to look for work the next day. She asked Dickon for a modest amount of cash to buy new clothing and accessories. Dickon dipped into their savings and provided her the cash she asked.

Vanna spent a modest sum on stylish clothing and accessories, and met Clarence for several afternoon trysts. She used his contacts to get a job that would require her to live in the City, at least during the week. He had contacts at City Hall, and arranged an interview for her. She landed a position with the Mayor's office arranging parties and social events, public and private, for visiting dignitaries. She took a hotel room in the City, and then told Dickon.

Dickon protested, but gave in to Vanna's arguments about how helpful the money would be. She insisted she needed to be in the City to do the job, since she had to be on call.

"Just a call girl," Dickon punned. She glared at him; he shut up, and helped her pack her clothing and other items she needed into an old truck he borrowed from a parishioner. He drove her to the Penn du Luz Arms. She introduced him to Clarence without telling him who Clarence was to her. Clarence knew she was married to Dickon. Vanna enjoyed Clarence's discomfort. Soon after she moved in, she dumped Clarence for an aide to a City Councilman. Over the next several months, Vanna settled into her job in the City. During the evenings, she studied the little black book she found at Quig Drye's office, until she deciphered its code. As she had come to hope, it contained names, addresses, and awkward incidents about the lives of several prominent City leaders, including the mayor and some of the Council. Eventually Vanna tired of Clarence, and dumped him for an aide to a City councilman. From the Councilman's aide she went to the Councilman. Some weekends she went "home" to Dickon.

Dickon came to accept the growing distance between himself and Vanna. Marriage to her had never felt quite right after the first honeymoon glow. Vanna had been so dissatisfied that Dickon wanted no part of rising to be a church power, and was content to consider being a rural pastor for the rest of his life that, from the beginning, she had made misery for him. She had a genius he had not recognized during their courtship for finding just the right inflection of voice or choice of phrase to irritate and upset others without ever quite seeming to do so. As their marriage progressed into habit, Vanna's frustration with Dickon's lack of ambition became more and more obvious. Then came the temblor. And Vanna took a job in the City.

### Farewell at the Ferry Landing

Reality must intrude, at last, on romance. Haakon woke first from the post-coital drowse, and gently roused Emma. Afternoon shadows had grown long; they cloaked the City, temporarily hiding its bruises and broken bones. Haakon brushed gypsum crumbles from his body and Emma's. He became aware of a breeze blowing softly across them. A great gap in the wall of their room where the window had been admitted the outdoors.

Haakon looked about for his underwear, and, when he could not find it, slithered into his now dusty pants and shirt, and scrabbled under the bed for his shoes and socks. When he had dressed, he spoke.

"Emma," he said. "It's time to get dressed. I don't think it's safe here, if there's an aftershock the building could go down."

"Aftershock?"

"Yes." He stroked her hair, as he picked bits of gypsum out of it. "We've had an earth temblor, you see."

"My earth has certainly shaken today," Emma said drowsily. She caught Haakon's hand, squeezed it, before she opened her eyes and looked at the room. It was a shambles. "Oh!" she said. She covered her breasts with her hands. Haakon stood and turned his back. He picked up her clothes, brushed as much dust from them as he could, and, piece by piece, handed them to her behind his back. She drew them on.

"How do we get out of here?" she asked, suddenly practical and worried.

"The stairs were in the center of the building. I'm hopeful they've survived," Haakon said. "If not, someone will be along to rescue us, I'm sure. It's been a little while since the quake. Surely rescue crews have been organized." He was reassuring himself as much as he was comforting Emma.

Emma slipped her pumps on. She left her nylons twisted on the floor. They had no meaning, now. Haakon wrenched the room door open (the jamb was badly out of trim) and peered into the hall. Dim emergency lighting showed them their way down the corridor to the stairwell.

The stair was dark, but by carefully feeling their way with their feet, and clutching the dusty banister, they found the ground floor. There was no one at the desk or in the lobby. Shredded wallpaper fluttered in the breeze blowing through the broken windows. When he could not open the door, Haakon carefully helped Emma exit through one of these broken windows.

The street was as much an obstacle course as a passageway. Debris and automobiles barricaded the sidewalks and the narrow street. No functioning streetlights made picking one's way a guessing game, until they had negotiated the two blocks to Harbor Parkway. Here the lights still worked, though random lamps were broken, leaving dark puddles in the lighted throughway. Other people were here, walking and talking and marveling and commiserating. Emma clutched Haakon's arm, certain any of the passersby could tell what she and he had just done. That none of them cared, even if they guessed, made no impression on Emma's mind. Suddenly she wanted to be home, holding a cat (though no cat lived with her).

"Take me to the Ferry," she said. "I think I should go home now."

"Certainly," Haakon said. He had seen it before in his clients, this sudden guilt and fear of exposure that prompted a woman to race for home, as if she could hide from her experience with him in the comfortable obscurity of her suburban walls.

The ferry landing was strangely empty. There were a few refugees seeking to escape the City, but most people hadn't yet absorbed how great the damage was, since both television and radio were unavailable to large parts of the populace. Rumor, ever swifter than mere electrons, at first down-played the magnitude of the temblor and the extent of the damage in some quarters of the City. So, Haakon was able to get a ticket, with Emma's money, to take her across the Bay and home. He stayed with her until the ferry began loading.

"Thank you, Haakon," she said, and kissed him lightly on the cheek, like a sister.

"Go carefully," he said. "The other side of the Bay may be just as broken up as the City."

"I will," she said, and walked onto the ferry. When she got to the upper deck, she went to the rail to wave goodbye at Haakon. He had already turned and begun walking up Harbor Street. She could just make out his blue-clad back in the crowd. The captain sounded the whistle, and the ferry pulled from the slip onto the heaving bosom of the Bay.

### False Conviction

Haakon knew it would be some time before the banking system had restored function enough for him to collect his fee for this afternoon's work from Mae Ling. He trusted her, and the Wong Brothers, in financial matters. Business would not be ordinary for at least three or four days, he guessed. Wisely, he complimented himself, I have provided a haven for myself.

Haakon commonly roomed in hotels and motels supplied by his clients. On those rare occasions he had no work, he repaired to an illegal room in the basement of a friend's house. Here Haakon kept a backup supply of food, money, and clothing. From Harbor Street he turned right, up the hill, on Salmon Lane. Here, where the land was more solid, the houses were less shattered. Even here, of course, the wary pedestrian had to navigate around fallen cornices, gargoyles, and other impedimenta that had recently decorated the facades and rooflines of the buildings.

Haakon was so concentrated on finding his way safely that he didn't notice the frequent passage of the police in a patrol car. During one of their traverses of a parallel street, he found his basement hideaway and let himself in. Once inside he quickly extracted his cash and the small gold cross that had been his mother's from their hiding place behind a brick and stuffed them in his pocket. Then he went to the cupboard to count the cans of beans he kept as an emergency ration.

The police made him drop the beans when they shone a bright flashlight on him and shouted at him to drop whatever he held. Slowly he raised his hands into the air. He tried in every way to cooperate with the police whenever they questioned him. Haakon firmly believed anybody with a gun was dangerous, whether uniformed or not. When he could not produce any papers to prove he lived here (he had never registered to vote, nor gotten a driver's license, nor a receipt for rent on this illegal apartment), the police presumed he was a looter. His flashy blue polyester outfit marked him a petty criminal in the police mind. When Haakon could not produce any receipts for the money in his pocket or a bill of sale for the gold cross, the police assumed he had stolen them, as well as the beans.

The police incarcerated Haakon. During his booking, conducted by a desk sergeant who was heavily medicated, his name was written down as Haven Fitz. It was under this name he was later tried.

In the weeks following the Great Temblor, the City Administration made a great show of punishing looters. An ambitious young politician, Assistant District Attorney Dayton Mann made a great noise prosecuting suspected looters. He fancied himself not only a brilliant prosecutor, but also a wondrous draw to the ladies. Very few of the prosecutors, and none of the ladies, agreed with his self-assessment. At the time he was drawing up the charges for Haakon, under the name Haven Fitz, he was also pursuing Vanna Dee. He frequently maneuvered himself into a seat at her cafeteria table in City Hall. During one lunch, as Vanna stoically ate her salad, crunching the lettuce between her teeth with force and fury, Dayton complained that he could charge only a few looters with felonies. Most had been caught with goods whose value was too small to qualify as more than a misdemeanor.

Vanna said, "Do you include anything they've got with them, such as a watch, or rings, that kind of thing?"

"Well, no," Dayton said. "We can't prove those things don't belong to them to begin with."

"When they cannot produce a receipt or bill of sale for any item of jewelry, such as a watch, that they wear, this constitutes de facto proof they've stolen the item. Include that in the charges. Let them prove different." Dayton smiled his smirking smile. Vanna concentrated on her salad, lest she be ill.

"Wonderful idea!" Dayton said. Then he invited Vanna to accompany him to dinner that night. She developed an immediate ill relative who needed her attention, and thereafter seldom took lunch in the City Hall cafeteria.

Haakon wore an expensive gold watch a grateful client had given him. That, with the gold cross, and the cash he had had in his pockets, allowed Assistant District Attorney Mann to charge him with felony looting. To be certain the amount was enough, Mann even added the value of the seven cans of beans to the supposed loot total.

The judge, Molly Fyde, was Mann's maternal aunt, and nearly as interested in Dayton's career as he was. Haakon made the mistake of believing honesty would win the day (too many movies when he was young), and defended himself. Judge Fyde sentenced him to twenty years in State Prison at La Lechuga without possibility of parole. So Haakon Spitz went to prison as Haven Fitz.

In prison he strove to keep a low profile. He was too handsome to succeed. Within weeks guards moved him to the cell of one Percival Algernon Hurr, known in prison as Butch Hurr. Butch was a large man, born to be mean, a quality exacerbated by the name an unfeeling mother and father foisted on him. For the rest of his imprisonment Haakon catered to the moods, whims, and needs of Butch.

He lost his good looks over time, but Butch did not cast him aside for another, younger, companion. Some lost spark from who knows where fixated Butch's attention on Haakon until the day a younger, meaner, bigger con erupted in fury and beat Butch to death. By then, nearly through his sentence, Haakon actually mourned Butch's passing.

### Vanna Dumps Dickon

Dickon met Vanna at the Chow Down Cafe. It was a favorite place of Dickon's. Vanna did not like it as well. She always suspected that there were dirty places hidden from public view that probably contaminated the food, a paranoia she had learned from her father.

Dickon suspected, though he had never researched it, that some entrepreneur had created the restaurant by blocking off the ends of a short alley between two larger buildings. The kitchen occupied the ground floor. A narrow staircase at the left led to the dining areas on the three floors above the kitchen.

Hung Sam ordered them upstairs. Hung Sam, the owner and chief cook, brooked no liberties from his guests about their opinions or desires being more important than his own. Seating choice was his prerogative. So they went to the third floor.

Marbleized linoleum covered the third floor tables. It matched well with the real marble window ledge at the single small and dirty window. Through the dirt on the outside of the window one could see the neighboring brick wall. Dickon took the seat with his back to the window. That way he could watch the other people who came into the room or went. Since they were lunching late, there were no other people in the third floor dining area except the young waiter. Vanna sat down opposite Dickon.

"Thanks for coming to lunch with me," Dickon said.

"You're welcome, I'm sure," Vanna said, with that little twist of her mouth that she used to express her disapproval. Dickon felt something shriveling inside himself.

"How did your morning go?" Vanna's temper often brightened when Dickon asked her about her work.

"Oh, so-so," she said and shrugged.

"What's wrong?" Dickon asked her. She glared at him. Her voice, when she replied, was quiet. Dickon had to strain to hear her over the muffled surf sound of the traffic that came through the closed window.

"I'm wrestling with a decision," she said.

"Can I help clarify it?"

"No, I can't talk about it. Company Confidential," she said, and smiled at him. Dickon had an immediate sense that she was lying to him. Inwardly he scolded himself for his uncharitable thought. There was much about her job that Vanna couldn't tell, or shouldn't tell. She had told him many confidential things, and had often helped her work through problems with her subordinates. He knew she didn't tell him everything; she was in many ways a very secretive person.

"What do you want to eat?" he asked her.

"You order—it all tastes the same to me in this place." Dickon signaled to the waiter, and when he came, ordered two servings of tomatoes and beef with chow mein noodles. The waiter brought a teapot and left them alone. The teapot was white and glazed on its side was the Chinese character for tea in muddy green. Dickon sighed at the tea. It was also green.

"Green tea," he said, and reached for the small gray cup without a handle that was in front of Vanna. She smiled with something approaching pleasure.

"I wish we had something besides Lipton's at home," she said.

"We can have green tea, too, for you," Dickon said. "I don't like it too often, but you could have all you want. I could get some on the way home tonight."

"No, that's too much trouble," Vanna said, and twisted her mouth in disapproval again. Dickon lifted the teapot to pour Vanna's cup.

He spilled the tea.

Dickon was of the private opinion that potters specifically made teapots in Chinese restaurants to dribble tea across the table. He could seldom pour from one without spilling. Vanna seldom had difficulty. On several occasions, she had watched his pouring methods to determine what slight twist of his wrist or what uplift of his pinkie caused the trouble. She could not, and. When she had tried to imitate his movements, she had not been able to make the tea spread out from the spout in the way Dickon did. Today she was not patient about the tea.

"Here," she said, taking Dickon's cup, "let me pour the damned stuff or you'll have it all over. This new dress cost me a lot. I don't want tea stains on it."

Dickon's hurt must have shown on his face. Vanna assumed a contrite air.

"I'm sorry," she said. "What does that Chinese character on the pot mean, do you know?"

Dickon understood her question for the apology she intended.

"It's one of the ones I know," he said. It's ch'a, which means tea. I think the short horizontal line with the two little strokes above it means 'plant.' The shallow inverted vee stands for person. It probably indicates a sound or something in this character. The diagonal strokes in the lower quadrants indicate tree. All put together it means the noble tea."

Dickon looked up at Vanna. Horror and anger contorted her face. It frightened Dickon.

"Vanna," he said urgently, "what's the matter?"

She did not seem to hear him. She was staring at the window behind him. Dickon turned to look. There was a fly fluttering in the corner of the window where a spider had built its web. The web and the fly were on the outside of the window in the dirt. There were several dead flies and parts of flies in the web. Other than that, Dickon saw nothing.

"Vanna," he said to her again, "what's wrong?"

"Traps," she said, after a moment, "traps everywhere, and no way out. It's no use, no use at all."

"What?" Dickon said. When Vanna didn't answer he said, "I don't understand what you mean."

The waiter brought their plates with the cream noodles surmounted by dark brown beef, bright red tomato and bits of green onion. Dickon thanked him and looked at Vanna. Her face was an impassive mask, and she did not look at him. She looked at the colorful plate in front of her.

"Yech!" she said. "This doesn't even look good."

"Vanna," Dickon said sharply, "what's going on?"

She glanced up at him, her head averted from her plate.

She took up her chopsticks and chased a wedge of tomato over the noodles before she got hold of it to lift it to her mouth.

"Sometimes I think you'd be much better off without me," she said.

"No!" Dickon said fervently.

"You would, you know." Vanna's eyes were hard and brittle.

Dickon felt a cold and chilly uneasiness start somewhere in his ankles and begin to spread up his body.

"Anyway, you'll have to try it."

"What?" Dickon choked the word out around the cold lump in his throat.

"I'm leaving you, Dickon. I can't take any more of you"

"Why?"

"I want more out of life, money, power, things like that. You're a poor fish. You'll always be poor. I can't be bothered anymore." Vanna's face looked like a block of glacier ice. He saw no mercy in her eyes.

"I'm dumping you with all the other trash in my life and starting new. Goodbye, Dickon. I'll call you about divorce details." Vanna stood, her purse swinging over her scarcely touched plate. Dickon was mute, and crumpled in on himself. He fought to keep the tears from his eyes. Vanna stared at him a moment, and then went to the staircase. Her heels clicked on the grubby floor. The sound faded into the clatter of rising from the kitchen.

Dickon shuddered and drew a deep breath. He reached over and took the uneaten part of Vanna's meal. She had left him the check, and a pastor's income only went so far. Mechanically Dickon consumed all the chow mein, staring unseeing at the web-caught flies through his tears.

### Malcolm Drye Gets a Call

The phone rang. Malcolm Drye extracted a handkerchief from the pile on his nightstand and wrapped it around the receiver to lift it. The dust was still settling two days after the quake.

"Hello?" he inquired sleepily.

The voice on the other end identified itself as a Chief Inspector Pryor of the City's Police Department.

"Yes?" Malcolm was still not quite awake. The temblor and its aftermath had wearied him beyond the normal. "What do you want, Chief Inspector?"

"Do you have a brother, Quigley Drye?"

"Yes. I don't often see Quig, though."

"Is it normal for him to wear Chinese Mandarin garb? My Chinese sergeant says it's from the Qing Dynasty."

"I'm not sure of the dynasty, but he frequently wears a red silk robe embroidered with dragons."

"May we trouble you, sir, to look at a body? It may or may not be your brother's."

Malcolm sat up. He frowned at his clock, and sighed. Quig had always caused inopportune trouble. "Yes, Chief Inspector. I will come. Where is the body?"

"We have a makeshift morgue on Pine Street, the 500 block. Just identify yourself to the sergeant at the door. He'll let you in."

Malcolm wrote down the directions, and assured the Chief Inspector he would be there as rapidly as he could. His rapidity was relative; it took Malcolm a half hour to shower, and longer yet to dress in his three-piece dove-gray suit, and even more time to find a clean handkerchief. At the end he had to compromise on his gloves; the left had a tiny smudge on the inner thumb. A corsage, of course, was out of the question. The temblor had interrupted flower deliveries to the City for some days now.

Malcolm found the makeshift morgue without trouble, and the sergeant passed him in. A silent man in a white coat and trousers, smirched with grime and questionable materials, took Malcolm's name and address, wrote them down in an old-fashioned ledger, and gestured for Malcolm to follow him.

Mounds lay on makeshift tables right and left. The room was cavernous, its light dim, and its air chilled. Malcolm extracted his handkerchief, lightly scented with oil of cinnamon, and held it to his nose. Despite the refrigeration, the room reeked of death.

The man in dirty white consulted his notepad. Then he looked at a tag on a toe, and shook his head. He went a little farther, checked a toe tag again, and nodded. With a dramatic flair his phlegmatic stoicism had never suggested, he threw back the covering sheet. A man's body, dressed in a scarlet Mandarin gown with embroidered dragons stared sightlessly up at the ceiling. Malcolm looked long at the face.

"It's Quig," he said. "It's my brother." The man in white grunted, the first sound he'd made since asking Malcolm's name and address.

"Back to the office," he said to Malcolm. "You can sign for the effects and the body. Find somebody to give him a decent burial."

"Thank you," Malcolm said. "What happened to him?"

"Earthquake dumped a freeway on him."

"Do you have any details about where he was found?"

"Talk to Chief Inspector. He'll want to talk to you, anyway."

The man in white scribbled in the ledger. "Chief Inspector should be here in a few minutes. Said you was to wait. Wants to go through the effects with you."

Malcolm took a seat on the bench along the wall. He clutched the bag the man in white had given him. It was rather heavy. Malcolm dozed while he waited for the Chief Inspector.

The Chief Inspector called his name several times to wake him.

"I am Chief Inspector Pryor," he said, when Malcolm showed signs of consciousness. "I'm sorry for your loss."

"It's no great loss, Chief Inspector. Quig and I shared a family name and a distant affection for Mother Vera, the woman who raised us. We were not blood kin. After Mother Vera Drye died we had little reason to keep up the family ties. I didn't like Quig, and he didn't like me."

"When did you see him last?"

"About three years ago we ran into each other on a street corner. We spoke polite helloes, how-are-yous, that sort of thing. Maybe five minutes conversation, in all."

"Can you explain why your brother was dressed in Mandarin robes?"

"Not for sure. He was always fond of conspiracies and disguises, though. He wasn't quite in his right mind, you see. Where did he die?"

"Under an overpass leading to the bridge. A piece of concrete struck his head. Probably died instantly."

Malcolm chuckled. "Quig often said it would take a real knockout to take him down. He was referring to the gentle sex, of course. Not so concrete an example."

Chief Inspector Pryor grimaced. "Will you open the bag of effects?"

"Certainly." Malcolm undid the official sealing tape and extracted a wallet, two sets of keys, a comb still carrying hairs and dandruff, a penknife, a money clip with a few dollars, some coins, a lavender notebook, and a Kuanyin statue. He looked up at the Chief Inspector with an inquiring eyebrow raised.

"It's the notebook that we question," the Chief Inspector said. "It's apparently written in cipher, one we haven't had time to decode. Can you tell us anything about it?"

Malcolm opened it. He glanced down a page. "I can decipher it," he said. "Quig devised this cipher when we were boys. It's clever, because it's based on the phonemes of English, not on the alphabet."

"What are phonemes?"

"The sounds that English speakers recognize as individual sounds. Sometimes a phoneme actually includes several related sounds, but the speaker of a particular language only hears one. Makes problems only when one tries to understand a foreign language that has two or more phonemes attached to sounds one's own language identifies as a single sound." Malcolm's tone was dry and lecturing. Chief Inspector Pryor sighed inwardly, remembering dull college lectures.

"Can you give me an example?"

"Two. In English, the sound we associate with the letter 't' is actually a group of up to twelve different sounds. Those sounds have separate identities some languages of the Indian subcontinent. Conversely, the sounds 'l' and 'r' have distinct meaning in English, but sound the same to speakers of Japanese or Chinese, whence the origin of the comic stage pidgin much abused in past centuries."

"Oh. I see, I think. Can you read this notebook?"

"Yes." Malcolm scanned the first few pages. "This notebook outlines a conspiracy, Chief Inspector. A conspiracy, I'm sorry to say, between Quig and some agent of the Communist Chinese—a certain Fu I." Malcolm read further.

"I'm mistaken, Chief Inspector. Fu I is an alternate identity Quig assumed to conspire with a Chinese terrorist. Quig takes great pride in adopting a name meaning 'Abundant Increase,' since he hoped to get very rich off this venture. This Kuanyin is part of the booty he was selling to the terrorist. Some sort of historical importance attached to it. It's one of a set of three. Quig hoped to get the complete set. He believes the other two were in some downtown drug dealer's possession."

"They're probably dust by now; that area's leveled, and bulldozers are shoving the debris into the Bay. Anything else?"

"No, the rest of the pages are blank."

"I will have to confiscate the notebook and the Kuanyin, but you may take the rest of the effects with you."

Malcolm stood. "When may I bury Quig? Mother Vera loved him. I owe her that much, to see Quig properly out of the world."

"Any time you can arrange it. The quicker the better, actually. We have more bodies than we can handle. Try any mortuary; give them the reference number on the toe tag. They're expediting burials for the sake of the general health."

"Thank you, Chief Inspector."

"Thank you, Mr. Drye. We have your number. We'll call you if we need further information."

"Certainly, Chief Inspector." The Chief Inspector waved him out the door. Malcolm left to arrange Quig's funeral.

### The Kuanyins Surface

Alfred Bynoh, Al to his friends, rolled a chunk of brick and mortar about the size of a basketball onto his shovel, and lifted it into the dumpster beside him. He grunted with effort; the dumpster was almost shoulder height for Al. He was not tall. His complexion was rather dark. He was a wiry little man, and not particularly handsome. His blue eyes would have startled the casual observer if they had not been buried in a perpetual squint. Al needed glasses he couldn't afford.

He'd been shoveling rubble most of the morning and half the afternoon across the street. Some bigwig had dropped by, made some comment about the pile of rubble on this side of the street, and bingo! Al was by himself shoveling a huge mound of debris. That was good, in one way. Al was away from the boss. Distance from bosses was always a plus in his view of things.

It was a week since the temblor. The air over the City still smelled bad. It wasn't decay, exactly; it was more the smell of stale secrets buried in building foundations for decades that the temblor had cast into the skies. Alfred Bynoh adjusted the breathing mask on his sweating face. It kept some of the smell, and the dust, out of his nose.

The pile of rubble before him elicited a sigh from him. It was a heap of broken brick, crumbled plaster, and shattered lathing. The building it had been had not been up to code, maybe not even at its construction early in the twentieth century. No matter. Al's job, to put gravy on his grits and a bit of bacon in his breakfast, required him to clear away this rubble a shovelful at a time. He knew, as did everyone in the City, the work was the Mayor's idea to give people on assistance a sense of worth. Al thought he could feel just as worthy simply taking the cash or free food and lodging. The system was the system, though. Going along with it was easier by far than fighting it.

Al moved another shovel of plaster and mortar dust. He opened a small cavity in the rubble. He dropped to his knees, praying there wasn't a body in there. It looked large enough for a cat or small dog, maybe even a baby. Foul smells drifted up pockets in the ruins of the City's collapsed buildings. One's nose got numb to them. This one emitted an almost floral spiciness.

Al bent over and peered inside the cavity. He couldn't see anything, so he took the small flashlight he carried, and shone it around the cavity. There were two statues, Chinese or Japanese (Al wasn't sure what the difference was between the Chinese and the Japanese—his education hadn't extended that far). In front of them, crushed, was a small bronze burner that smelled like cheap perfume. Al glanced around. The boss was still across the street. Al slipped the two statues out of the cavity and hid them in his lunchbox by the dumpster. Then he went back to his slow and cautious shoveling.

When he got off work, Al decided to go to Chinatown to sell his find. Some places didn't ask too many questions, not that Al knew which those were. He chose Wong Brothers' Import/Export Emporium at random.

Mae Ling was alone in the store. The Wong brothers had family matters to settle, so he had asked her to stay later than she ordinarily did. Al Bynoh came in. Mae Ling guessed at once that the laborer was not likely a frequent customer.

"May I help you?" she asked.

"Maybe," the man said. "I've got a couple of statues I found. Maybe you can tell me if they're worth anything." The man set his lunchbox on the counter and opened it. Stale banana smells erupted from it. Mae held her breath. The man took out two bronze-painted statues and set them on the counter. Then he mercifully closed his aromatic lunchbox and put it on the floor. Mae breathed again.

"These are the guys," he said. He looked hopefully and anxiously at her. Mae raked her eyes over his grimy work clothes. Underneath the gray-dusted rumpled denim she could tell he was a muscular, though small, man. She warily picked up a statue.

"This is a sacred Kuanyin," she said. "I'm not sure just which one. It's a clay copy, of course, probably early twentieth century." She set the statue on the counter and picked up the other one. "These two appear to be part of a set." She turned them over. "This one is labeled one, in Chinese." She took up the other one. "This one is labeled three. One is missing."

"These two are all I found," the man said. "What are they worth?"

"About ten dollars, total, without the missing one," Mae said. The man shrugged.

"That would be ten dollars I didn't have before."

"Do you want to sell them, then?"

"Yes."

Mae struck a key on the cash register and extracted ten dollars. She gave it to the man. "Do you need a bill of sale, or other paperwork?"

"No," he said, scooping up the ten-dollar bill, and bending to get his lunchbox. "Thanks." He left the store hurriedly. Mae contemplated the statues, turning them over several times. Something drew her to them, broken though the set was. On a hunch, she went to her purse, took out ten of her own dollars, and put them in the register. The statues she wrapped in a bag, and put beside her purse. When she went home, the bag went with her.

### Dickon Lunches with Rev. Bobbo Link

The chow mein sat like lead in Dickon's stomach as he caught the bus north. By the time he got home the icy numbness of his shock and grief was beginning to melt into his anger.

"I'm not trash to dump!" he shouted at the manse door. "I'm not trash at all! How dare she!" The walls did not answer him. The dingy and worn furniture, most of it cast-off by church members, stared silently and dully at Dickon. He wanted to throw knives at Vanna, and rocks and sticks. How had he ever been dumb enough to fall in love with her?

Vanna was not in front of him, and he had nothing to throw but his car keys. Those he threw at the gray-green sofa. They fell onto a cushion with a soft, unsatisfying, clink. Dickon clenched his fists by his sides, squeezed his eyes shut, and fought to control his temper long enough to plot his next move.

Presbytery. What would Presbytery say? What would the congregation say? Some of the congregation liked Vanna a lot. What would Dickon say this Sunday morning? Dickon could do nothing about Vanna. He had learned long ago when she decided to do something, she did it, without regard to consequences or bleeding bodies in her wake.

Dickon's mind raced through all the evidence he had since the great Temblor. Vanna's taking rooms in the City. This Clarence who had found her work with the City administration. Dickon began imagining scenes between Vanna and Clarence. Other names and faces from past years whirled through his mind. He needed to interrupt the flow. Some distraction—he needed help. He took down the Presbytery address book and dialed the Reverend Robert Oliver Link, whom everybody called Bobbo.

Bobbo was just going out to a meeting an hour's drive away. He would be near Dickon on the following day, though, and arranged to have lunch with Dickon at the Crusading Cow, a family restaurant at a crossroads near Dickon. Somehow, Dickon felt better, just knowing someone who cared was within reach. When his mind began to spin through possibilities and might-have-beens again, Dickon drank two bottles of wine to put himself to sleep. As he drifted drunkenly off, he hoped he hadn't scheduled any meetings or counseling sessions for tomorrow. He was sure he had no weddings or funerals. Those he'd remember.

Dickon woke late to a vicious headache and nausea. He got up, took three aspirin, used eye drops to clear the red from his eyes, showered, shaved, and dressed in casual clothes. Reverend Bobbo would probably have a coat and tie. Dickon's throat was too raw to welcome the constriction of a tie. As he drove toward the Crusading Cow, the throbbing in his head eased. He had put the aspirin bottle in his glove compartment just in case. Now he hoped he wouldn't have to use it.

Rev. Bobbo Link was standing at the restaurant door when Dickon drove into the parking lot. Dickon checked his watch. He wasn't late, thank goodness. He parked his car and hurried toward the door. He was in a suit and tie, both brown. His straight brown hair was wind-disordered, and straggled down one temple. He nervously brushed the stray locks into place with his left hand.

Dickon raised his hand to his own red hair. It was reasonably in place, despite the breeze's toying with it. When Bobbo held out his hand, Dickon took it and shook it. "Have you been waiting long?" he asked Bobbo.

"No, not at all." Bobbo looked him up and down. Dickon wondered if he should have gone for the tie after all. Too late now. At least the shirt was clean, so the collar wouldn't show a ring.

"Let's go on in," Bobbo went on. "You sounded pretty upset last night," he continued as a young woman in a very short, very tight, red dress led them to a red and gray plastic booth with a white and chrome table. She twisted a rod to close the blinds on the window. The sun had heated the vinyl upholstery to almost the blister point. "Are you doing better this morning?"

"Yes, a little, thanks."

"Is it trouble with the parish?"

"No," Dickon said, staring at the unopened plastic menu in front of him. A hamburger with red ketchup eyes and a mustard tongue stared back at him. Below the hamburger's picture a cow stood in a green field carrying a sword in one upraised hoof. "The Crusading Cow" spread across the menu in red and gray letters.

Dickon cleared his throat twice, and couldn't force the words out.

"What is it?"

Dickon cleared his throat again. More hoarsely than he expected, he said, "Vanna's divorcing me."

"Oh." Bobbo frowned. "Any chance of reconciliation?"

"No, not according to her. She said she was dumping me, along with all the other trash in her life."

"That's harsh." Compassion softened Bobbo's voice. "Did she say why?"

"Because I'm not ambitious enough. Because she just can't be bothered with me anymore. Maybe because she's crazy. I don't know, for sure." Dickon fought back the tears. A waitress, middle aged, dressed in a teen's miniskirt and straining blouse, came to take their order.

"Give us a few minutes, please," Bobbo said. She grimaced, nodded, and went to a nearby table where and elderly couple placed their order in loud voices. Dickon's stomach churned when he heard the man order liver and onions.

"Let's look at the menu," Dickon said. He wanted a break to get his feelings suppressed. Around him the clatter of diner diners chattered in his ears. The Crusading Cow specialized in beef dishes, particularly varieties of hamburgers. After a few moments with the menu, Bobbo caught the waitress's eye, and, when she came, ordered a mushroom and Monterey Jack burger. Dickon toyed with ordering the jalapeño mushroom burger, but decided on the milder gringo chili and cheese special. They both had plain fries and iced tea.

When the waitress went off to hand in their order, Bobbo asked him, "What about the congregation? Do you think they'll be troubled by Vanna's leaving?"

"I don't know. She wasn't very involved with them. She's been getting more distant from the church for the past couple of years. Just like she's been getting more distant from me." The waitress brought their iced tea. Bobbo squeezed lemon into his, and added sugar. Dickon drank his tea plain.

"You could consider a leave of absence."

"But how would I make a living?"

"I can recommend an interim position in the City. Also some counseling, to help you through this rough patch."

"I don't know that I'm ready for that much change."

"Think about it." The waitress arrived with their sandwiches. As so often happened to Dickon, he got Bobbo's order and Bobbo got his. They exchanged plates.

Bobbo bowed his head to say grace and Dickon felt compelled to follow suit. Public displays of religion troubled Dickon. They reminded him of uncomfortable moments in his childhood when a friend of his mother's would begin proclaiming the Gospel in a loud voice in the most public places. Bobbo was thoroughly at ease with his religion, and let it show anywhere and everywhere.

For a while they ate silently. Dickon hadn't realized how hungry he was. His chow mein and humiliation meal was almost twenty-four hours behind him, and he'd had nothing else except the two bottles of wine.

"Presbytery will have to examine your divorce, of course," Bobbo said. Dickon looked up, startled.

"I thought that rule had gone by the wayside."

"It doesn't take effect until three years from now. That means it doesn't apply, yet." Bobbo picked up another French fry and dipped it in the ketchup pool he'd poured on his speckled white plate.

Dickon groaned. "I suppose they'll want Vanna to participate." Tears rose to his eyes. He bid them sink back in their ducts.

"Oh, yes." Bobbo looked up at him with compassion. "In most Presbyteries we could get by with a token examination. Unfortunately, the Reverend Phil E. Buster chairs this presbytery's Ministerial Relations Committee. He's got strong feelings about divorced clergy serving in the church."

"I've met him. He seemed pleasant enough." Dickon cut his dill pickle in bite-sized pieces. He forked one into his mouth.

"He's very old school about divorce. He'll put you through a ringer, especially if you want to stay at Two Tree Presbyterian. That's part of why I suggested an interim position somewhere else, like the City." Bobbo's tone was businesslike. He expressed his compassion through his eyes.

Dickon spooned some of the chili from his burger and raised it to his mouth. Suddenly, the plastic and glass room seemed to spin around Dickon. He dropped the spoon with its chili on his plate. Red spatters dotted his white shirt. Hamburgers with ketchup eyes and mustard tongues started dancing on chrome table legs on the counter. A great wave of stale coffee smell mixed with liver and onions congealing in grease rose up and clouded his breathing. Feeling like a swimmer in a pool of molasses, Dickon fought his way back to consciousness. Bobbo stared at him.

"Are you all right?" Bobbo asked. "You looked like you were going to pass out."

"I think I'll be okay," Dickon said, dabbing at his shirt with his napkin. "I took a sedative last night, and it's left me a little shaky. I'm not used to them." He thought it better not to mention the sedative had been two bottles of wine. Much of the Presbytery's clergy abjured alcohol even though world-class vineyards grew within the Presbytery's bounds.

"What about taking an interim position?"

"I don't know, Bobbo. I'd have to think about it. That's more change than I can handle, here, today. How soon would I have to decide?"

"Within a few weeks, I'm sure. The Ministerial Relations Committee meets in two days. They'll probably want to talk to you, and try to talk to Vanna. They'll want to talk with the congregation, too. Have you told anybody at Two Tree yet?"

"No. Vanna just told me yesterday." Dickon ate the last of his French fries.

"Do you want dessert?" the waitress appeared to ask. Dickon marveled again that mere cloth could restrain all that mammary flesh.

"None for me," Dickon said.

"Nor me," Bobbo said. "Our check, please." The waitress slapped it on the table. Bobbo picked it up, scanned it for accuracy, and got up to go. Dickon got up, too. He followed Bobbo toward the door. Bobbo paid the check then led Dickon outside.

"I'll be in touch," Bobbo said. "Keep a handle on yourself, but do find some time to break down, in private. You've had a hell of a blow." Bobbo shook his hand. Dickon had hoped for a hug. In a church meeting, such physical contact would be acceptable. Not here, though, in the Crusading Cow's parking lot. "I'll pray for you," Bobbo said, and turned toward his car.

Dickon set off to learn to be alone.

### New Boy in Town

_June 1, 1977  
Professor John Dilbert Doe_

_Dear Dill,_

_I promised to write you to let you know where I am. I'm in the City, at the address on the envelope. I have a room, and I've found a job._

_I was here for the earthquake; I felt it. I was at a street fair, looking at bolos and belt buckles, when the ground rolled under me and knocked me down. I wound up under a bunch of pots and the remnants of a street booth. A few light bruises, nothing more. I spent the first several days after the Quake helping at a shelter set up in a big tent that was part of the Carnival parade and street fair. I mostly boiled water and carried things around for people who knew what they were doing with broken bones and damaged flesh._

_Flesh. Yes, it's here. I wish I had listened to you, and not wasted a year in law school in Denver. Men are everywhere here. Gorgeous squads of them roam the Street, and one meets the nicest looking studs on the busses and the Metro. Even if I haven't connected, yet, (yes—I'm still shy), I've seldom had better dreams. I'm free here. Thanks to you, Dill, and your school for young men. Until later._

_Ben_

A job secured Ben's inclination to remain in the City. He had found work as a mailroom clerk at the Indigent Aborigine Insurance Company's City offices. He was paid weekly, and after the third week, he had some cash left over from paying his bills. He began to dress for an evening on the town.

Ben carefully adjusted the steer's skull belt buckle at his waist so its brass nose pointed directly to the exposed button on his jeans fly. The jeans were carefully abraded to show wear at strategic high points. His boots were high-heeled riding boots that made him stand a little taller. His cowboy shirt was black, with an embroidered red and white rose on each shoulder and two entwined on the yoke in back. He secreted his folding money and identification in clever pockets on the sleeves so no wallet bulge marred the outline of his buns. His jeans were too tight, anyway, to give room to a wallet. Ben had dressed to bait a mate for the night.

On the Street he drew stares and whispered comments from passersby as he strode toward his first objective, the bright neon sign of the Carmine Canine Saloon. He was aware of the stares that came his way; he could not hear the whispered comments. It was as well. Ben's seduction garb was not suited to the City in that season; the Western look had been passé two seasons back.

This was his first foray into the mad world of boy finds boy for the evening. He entered the Carmine Canine Saloon. The bouncer summarily asked him to leave at once. A large man with muscles on his muscles indicated to Ben in very plain English that only beachwear was permitted tonight. Western wear would be permitted only on the second Tuesday of next week. His face as crimson as the roses embroidered on his shirt, Ben left, and returned home crumpled in spirit and trampled in ego.

Ben didn't leave his rooms for the rest of that weekend. During his workweek at the mailroom his co-worker, Minerva Vann observed his sadly deflated demeanor. On Friday she invited him to share a lunch break with her. They bought the sack lunch at the company cafeteria and took them back to their cubbyhole office. As they opened their brown paper bags to gnaw on dry sandwiches and weary apples, she said, "What's up with you? You've been gloomy as a rainstorm all week."

"Sorry," Ben said. He brushed his dark brown hair back from his eyes where it liked to fall.

"What's got you bummed? Tell old Minnie." She shifted her considerable middle-aged bulk on the wooden desk chair seeking to be more comfortable. The chair groaned. It had been groaning for years when Minnie sat in it. Minnie took a bite of her sandwich and chewed on the dry bread and juiceless tuna salad with persistence.

Ben considered a moment. His need to connect with other human beings was so strong he chose to confide in Minnie. He looked at her round face and read compassion and mild concern in its lines.

"I went out last weekend," Ben said around a mouthful of dry sandwich. "I just wanted to meet some people, since I'm new and all. It didn't work out very well."

"Wrong place, wrong wardrobe, wrong timing? What?" Minnie crunched on her red apple. Her bite left a white scar that rapidly began browning as she laid the apple on the napkin.

"Wrong wardrobe, for starters. I got thrown out of a bar for inappropriate dress." Ben hung his head, his partly eaten sandwich trembling in his hand.

"Forgot to wear leather to the leather bar? Didn't know to wear skimpy trunks to the Carmine Canine? Something like that?"

"Something like that," Ben said and blushed.

"You just need some information. You said you were from Colorado?"

"Yes."

"The City has its own set of codes about what to wear where and when." Minnie leaned back in her chair. It creaked and threatened to crack. She took another huge bite of her sandwich. "You need to do some research," she said.

"How do I do that?"

"Get a copy of the _Street Rag_. There's a column inside the back section that tells which bar is requiring what costumes for the week. Lots of good ads, too. For a man new to the City it's the best source."

"Where do they sell it?"

"Not for sale. It's free in any bar, or any other business along the Street. Just pick one up." Minnie attacked her apple with a series of small bites that quickly reduced it to a spindly core. For some reason Ben thought of piranhas in a nature movie he had seen in grade school.

"Thanks for the tip," he said, and fell to work on his sandwich. Large mouthfuls of tea helped him get it down.

"Want my apple?" he asked Minnie.

"Sure," she said, and quickly reduced it to a spindly core as well. The half hour chimed on the clock.

"Back to the mail room," Minnie said. "Time to get the afternoon shipment ready for the post office. You can take it, if you don't mind; my feet are sore."

Ben smiled. "Of course, Minnie," he said. Ben liked going to the post office. It was a four-block walk, and on the way he crossed one of the busiest intersections with the Street. Unless the afternoon's incoming mail was a large bundle, he could loiter for a few minutes of window-shopping among the studs parading up and down the Street. Maybe he could even find a copy of the _Street Rag_. He took up the basket with the outgoing mail and left the mailroom with a lighter heart.

Later he wrote to his old professor in Colorado.

_July 12, 1977  
Professor John Dilbert Doe  
1868 Forgotten Lane  
Greeley, Colorado_

_Dear Dill,_

_Summer here is very cool. Fog comes in every afternoon and stays around until midmorning. The weather forecasts here speak every day of "fog and low cloud moving inland night and morning." I've decided there must be a dragon off the coast, called "Falcminam" that breathes in and out, moving the fog ashore. No one here appreciates my fantasies._

_I'm delighted to hear Highland Ewall has moved in with you. Hi is a wonderful guy and I hope you two will be very happy. How clever of you to have an apartment to rent to him with a connecting door! I hope the carpenter that modified the house was "understanding" about men's needs._

_I have had several brief liaisons with guys I've met in bars. Nothing serious, just good sex. I admit I'm a little lonely. Someday I want to settle down._

_I've found a permanent job with an insurance company. I'm a mailroom clerk. More later._

_Ben_

### Ben's Mr. Right Is All Wrong

Ben had learned the dress codes, thanks to Minnie Vann. Tonight he wore jeans a size too small, carefully abraded to show wear in the proper places. A tank top completed his ensemble. The tank top was faded (several turns in the washer with strong bleach) and too small for Ben. His brown hair was carefully cut in a current fashion, with slightly curly sideburns. He showed everything he had to offer. At this point in his life, he was still slim, with a reasonable Vee to his waist, tight buttocks, moderately broad shoulders, and an air of mystery in his gray eyes. More than one head turned to look at him.

Before hitting the bar scene, Ben deemed it prudent to take a little something to eat. He chose to stop at the Fegele's Bagel for a plain bagel with cream cheese and chives. When he walked into the brightly lit shop, he stopped, cold, in the doorway. A vision of power and beauty stood at the counter.

The man's face was bent over the trays of bagels, searching for the best choice. His shoulder and back muscles rippled under his faded orange Tee shirt as he bent from side to side to survey the shop's offerings. His butt was small, but so perfectly formed, it almost sang symphonies. All this body stacked on two muscular legs that stretched the faded denim covering them to thread breaking. Ben forced himself to start breathing again.

As nonchalantly as he could Ben walked up to the counter to stand beside this god in human flesh. Ben pretended to study the round breadstuff on display. He bent his head to check out the god's package. It was, like his legs, strong and muscular. Ben felt his heart slipping from him. The blonde turned and looked at him, and smiled. The man's teeth sparkled, and his soft brown eyes drew Ben's soul in.

"Hi," the man said. "Do you know anything about these bagels? I've never had one. I don't know what to order."

"Well," Ben said, "you could start with a plain one, and put things on it you like, like cream cheese, or tomato, or even lunch meat and mustard."

The man turned to him, standing upright and displaying his flat stomach and broad chest. Ben noticed especially how his large nipples filled out his Tee shirt. Ben tried not to stare. "How do you have your bagel?" the man asked, smiling shyly. He pretended not to notice Ben's interest in his body.

"I usually have a plain one, toasted, with cream cheese and chives." Ben looked at the man's chiseled chin and shapely nose. The brown eyes drew him in again. Ben wanted to plunge into them and swim for eternity.

"That sounds good," the man said. "That's what I'll try, too." He signaled to the scrawny girl behind the counter. "I've decided," he said. "I'll have a plain bagel, toasted, with cream cheese and chives." The girl turned to start preparing it. Ben looked at his feet, wondering how to continue the conversation.

"I'm Justin, Justin Thyme," the blonde said, and held out his hand. Ben took it. His hand felt dwarfed in the blonde's hand.

"I'm Ben, Ben Soul," he said.

"Are you doing takeout?"

"No, I'll eat my bagel here." He turned toward the girl. "I'll have a plain bagel, too, with cream cheese and chives." She nodded, took out another plain bagel, sliced it, and started both bagels through the toaster. Then she went back to slicing tomatoes.

"Do you live near here?" Ben knew his opening was lame, but he couldn't think of any other way to prod the conversation along.

"Yeah," Justin said. "And you?"

"About six blocks away. I was on my way out for a night on the town," Ben said. He felt a rush of excitement swirling in his throat and chest.

"So was I. Do you have a favorite hangout?" Justin's smile dazzled Ben again.

"Not really, not yet." Ben felt like his breath was running away from his body. "I've only been in the City since last spring. I'm still exploring."

"You've got a job? And a place to live?" Ben tried to read Justin's eyes, but they were guarded.

"Yes. Took care of that right after the big temblor cleanup was done." Ben took a deep breath. "I got here just before the quake."

The girl brought their bagels to them. Each paid her for his bagel. Then they took them to a small table in front of the window. Justin took a bite of his bagel. Ben marveled more at how white Justin's teeth were.

"Do you have a steady?" Justin asked.

"No," Ben said. He smiled shyly. He was beginning to choke up. Not now, he thought to himself. Play it cool. "I'm in the market, when Mr. Right comes along," he said.

"Do you play around while you're waiting?" Justin's smile was teasing, and Ben read a mocking invitation in his brown eyes.

"Yes," Ben said, "sometimes."

"Have to try out the merchandise, right?"

"Yes," Ben said, hoping he was coming off as a man of the world.

"Are you free tonight?" Justin's voice dripped with seduction.

Ben considered. He didn't want to appear too easy, but it had been several weeks since he had had any intimate contact. "Well, I did, but they fell through. That's why I'm here at the Fegele's Bagel," he improvised. "The guy I was going to date got sent out of town on his job."

"Bummer," Justin said. He ate more of his bagel. Ben nibbled at his bagel. "I'm free tonight," Justin went on.

"You? A hot guy like you?" Ben blurted.

"You're sweet to say so. Yes. Want to go visit some bars?" Ben thrilled.

"Yeah, sounds like fun," he said.

They finished their bagels, and made their way to one bar after another. Ben was careful not to drink too much at any one bar, but he was mildly drunk by the end of the evening. When Justin invited him home for the night, Ben said yes without any hesitation. That night was as glorious as Ben had hoped. He and Justin parted over breakfast bagels at the Fegele's Bagel. Justin gave Ben his number. Ben gave Justin his number.

Later that week Ben dialed the number Justin had given him. A battered women's shelter answered. The receptionist was rude, presuming Ben was a battering spouse looking for a battered wife. She had his phone call traced. Fortunately, he had called from a pay phone, so the police didn't harass him.

The next time Ben saw Justin he had a bubbly redheaded boy on his arm. The boy was staring up at Justin with adoration. Justin walked right past Ben and didn't notice him. Ben gave up bagels for years.

Later he wrote Professor Doe a short letter.

_December 21, 1977  
Professor John Dilbert Doe  
1868 Forgotten Lane  
Greeley, Colorado_

_Dear Dill,_

_I apologize for going several months without writing. I've been involved on the job and in my private life. I met a guy I thought might be Mr. Right. Justin Thyme. Blonde, six-foot tall, swimmer's build, hung. We had great sex for one weekend. We exchanged phone numbers. He gave me a phony one. I've seen him once or twice around town, but he never sees me._

_My job is going rather better. I've gotten a promotion, from managing the console to providing technical support. I'm learning how the system works, both the computer part of it and the paper part of it. At least my little gray cells are challenged._

_You and Hi Ewall sound so happy. May your every holiday be as happy as this Christmas is._

_Ben_

### On the Street Where We Met

"April Fool's Day party," Minnie Vann said to Ben. "Are you going?"

"What?" Ben looked up from the stack of 9 X 12 envelopes he was sorting.

"Are you going to the April Fool's Day party?"

"Didn't know there was one. Haven't been invited, anyway." Ben turned back to his envelopes.

"It's open house," Minnie said. "At the Groovy Garter."

"That's one I hadn't heard of."

"It's a girls' bar, a block off the Street."

"I don't think a girl's bar is quite the place for me. I don't do drag."

"I need an escort. My girlfriend's got to work. I could pass you off for a real butch girl."

"I'm flattered, Minnie, but 1 don't think I'm quite that tough."

"What you going to do, stay home again? Feel sorry for yourself, like you have since you tangled with that Justin whore?"

Ben put the envelopes aside. When Minnie was in a confrontational mood, he'd learned it was better to deal with the matter right then and there.

"Minnie, I happen to know your girlfriend is not working tomorrow night. You told me so yourself, just yesterday. Why are you worried about my social life, anyway?"

"You're so sad; you bring the room down just sitting there. Just trying to brighten the corner where you are."

"With all due respect, Minnie, a date with a bunch of Lesbians isn't likely to do much for my social life."

"How long has it been since you went somewhere on a weekend?"

"I usually go to the library on Saturdays."

"Yeah, and your nose is buried in books the rest of the week. Big thrill. Young man like you has a lot of juice. You should be sharing it."

"Yes, Minnie, I suppose I should. I just haven't felt like going anywhere."

"Douse that torch you're carrying. It's not lighting your way anywhere but down in the dumps." Ben took up the stack of unsorted envelopes and began tucking them into the proper bins.

"You hear me, Ben Soul," Minnie said, shaking a finger at him, "you better spend at least a couple of hours out of your apartment, and out of your library and books, this weekend. I want a full and detailed report on Monday!"

"Yes, Minnie," Ben said, sighing the phrase as he had sighed "Yes, Mommy," as a small child.

"Ben!" Minnie said. He looked at her, almost cowering in his chair. "A full report!" He nodded, and sighed inwardly. He would sacrifice one of the quiet evenings with a good book he had planned for this weekend on the altar of sociability.

Ben determined to get Minnie's mandate over with quickly. After work he stopped at his favorite Chinese restaurant, The Pregnant Prawn. Szechwan Beef and steamed rice filled him up. Then he went for a stroll on the Street, just to look at window displays of condoms, sex toys, young muscle studs in erotic poses, and the latest in fashions for men. None of it stirred him to excitement as it once had done. By now such displays were part of the comfortable background of the quarter. So were the buff bodies in tight jeans and small Tee shirts, leather chaps, and even the occasional business suit. So much sex on display that the truly remarkable figures were the few that sagged out of shape, or were too thin, dressed wrong, or otherwise anomalous to the parade endemic to the Street.

That was why he noticed Len, or Mr. DeLys, as he thought of him then. Len was dressed in sports slacks, and a dress shirt with the collar open at the throat. His waved hair was touched with gray at the temples. He was altogether too old looking, despite his trimly muscular figure, to be part of the pageant of promenading pansies.

"Mr. DeLys?" he said, stopping next to the man who was looking over the street scene.

"Yes?" Len said. "Oh. I know you. It's Ben, isn't it? Ben Soul?" Len extended his hand.

"Yes," Ben said. "I helped with the earthquake relief"

"I remember," Len said. "Your first week or so in the City, right?"

"Yes."

"Quite an introduction," Len said. "You decided to stay, I take it."

"Yes. Not much point in going back to Colorado. I feel like I belong here."

"Are you with someone this evening?"

"No, just out walking and looking."

"Same for me. I've been down south for several months. I just got back last night. Thought I'd come out and reacquaint myself with the City."

"Welcome home, then."

"Do you have time for a drink? There's a bar on the corner where I go when I'm in the City. The Patriotic Pirate."

Ben knew of the bar; most of the young men around the Street scoffingly referred to it as the Glass Coffin, or the Bar of the Last Resort. Mostly older guys went there (older defined as forty or more years old). Ben had been curious about the place, but never had worked up the nerve to stand and stare through the windows that made up the bar's wall along the Street. "Sounds good to me," he said. He checked his pocket for money as Len turned and started for the Patriotic Pirate. He had more than enough for a payback round or two. When they went in the bar, Ben was suddenly self-conscious in a way he hadn't been since he first got used to the City's bars. Every eye in the place seemed to be raking his clothes from his body. None of the patrons appeared to be as young as he was, and some of them were quite old indeed. Gray heads and bald ones abounded, with evident sagging abdomens and wrinkled necks and hands. Geriatric clientele made Len look like a youth.

Len felt Ben stiffen at his side under all the scrutiny. Len appreciated Ben's modesty, as so he interpreted the man's hesitation.

"Down, girls!" Len said to the assembled barflies. A general murmur of merriment meandered around the room. The assembled company turned back to their drinks and conversations. Thereafter those who glanced at Ben and Len did so discretely enough to avoid discomforting Ben.

"What do you drink?" Len asked Ben.

"Rye and Seven," Ben said. Len ordered for them, and led Ben to a quiet table near the back. The bartender brought their drinks while Ben and Len were doffing their coats and settling in.

### Time Flies at the Bar

"Quick service," Ben said.

"Always is, here. Some claim the management wants to get the drinks to the clientele before they go on to the next world."

Ben chuckled, uncomfortably.

"What have you been up to since I saw you last?" Len asked.

"Well, I found an apartment, on Never-Maiden Court, and a job, with Indigent Aborigine Insurance Company. A subsidiary of Bumbershoot Corporation. You suggested I try there."

"I've heard of them. Mailroom, stock boy, file clerk, what?"

"Mailroom. I wish I could say something more glamorous, but at least it's a job. Nice people to work with, too."

"You work with Minnie Vann?"

`Yes. You know her well?" Len nodded. "I like her, a lot."

"Just about everybody does," Len said. He sipped his bourbon and water. He put the drink down and looked toward the window. Daylight was fading into the nighttime neon of the Street. He looked back at Ben.

"I've wondered what happened to you," he said. "Ever since we finished the cleanup after the temblor."

"You've wondered about me?"

"Yes. I saw you, the day before the temblor. Watching the Carnival parade. From the look of wonder on your face, you'd never seen a parade with almost-naked men in it before."

"I hadn't." Ben took a large swallow of his rye and Seven. He breathed heavily to stifle the cough. He seldom drank hard liquor. His head threatened to swim. He promised himself to slow down. "I haven't seen another one since, either."

"Wait for Carnival. You'll see another one." Ben grinned. Len took another swallow of his drink. "Is there any way you could advance on your job?"

"Well, Minnie has suggested I take a test they're offering for computers. Running the machines, I think." Ben took another swallow of his drink. This time his throat was already numb and the booze went down smoothly. "I think I'll try it. Computers sound like fun."

"Some claim we'll have them in our homes someday."

"There are kits on the market now for building home computers, small ones. They're toys, really."

"Do you have one of these toys?"

"Not yet. They cost too much. I'll get one someday, maybe. I put a stereo together once."

"Did it play music?"

"Yes. It still does. I've still got it."

"On Never-Maiden Lane with you?"

"Yes." Ben smiled. "Of course, it's hopelessly outdated, now. It has tubes, not transistors. It still plays records, though."

"Outdated? Tubes?" Len shook his head, and took a long swallow of his drink. "The first radio I had was a crystal set that my father put together." He frowned into the melting ice and dregs of his drink. He signaled the bartender, who brought another round.

Ben paid for the new round. He finished his first drink hastily. The bartender took the empty glasses away. Ben noticed the room was blurring a little, and promised himself he'd take this second drink very slowly.

"Have you had dinner?" Len asked him.

"Yes," Ben said. "At the Pregnant Prawn."

"Do you have dinner plans for tomorrow night?"

"No," Ben said. He had been working steadily at his second drink. Without quite noticing, he had nearly emptied his glass.

"I know a place near the downtown area, if you like seafood. We could meet there tomorrow, say about 7:30?"

"I like seafood," Ben said. "Where is it?"

"It's called the Floundering Flatfish," Len said. "On Periwinkle Lane."

"I can find that."

"Can I get you another drink?"

"Well, one more, but that's my limit. Beyond my limit, I'm afraid." Ben drank the third drink, and then paid for a fourth round. By the time he finished the fourth one, his head was swimming, and he was telling Len about the wonders of listening to opera on the farm tractor radio. Len seemed to be fascinated. Len had to go, though, he said, to another appointment. Ben bid him goodbye, and stumbled toward Never-Maiden Court.

### Examination

Dickon surveyed the Judicial Commission Presbytery had appointed to examine him. They were a tough group to face. Reverend Phil E. Buster had got himself appointed, of course. Ruling Elder Anne Tenor was someone Dickon didn't know. Shea Mauna Hughes and Andy Maime were staunchly conservative. Bobbo Link was the fifth presbyter.

"Let us pray," Reverend Phil E. Buster said. Everyone bowed a head and closed their eyes.

"Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father, guide us today with thy wisdom and compassion that we may fairly judge this man's fitness to be your servant in the gospel ministry. Set aside all human jealousy, bitterness, and partisanship, from our hearts that we may truly render the verdict the Spirit moves us to arrive at. We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen."

The rest present chorused, "Amen," raised their heads and opened their eyes.

"Reverend Shayne," Phil said, "you understand you are here so Presbytery can review the circumstances of your pending divorce?" Dickon could smell the mouthwash on the man's breath; it was so pungent it plunged across the table. On its back it carried the sickly lilac scent of the pomade that kept his gray coiffure rigorously swept in its temple wings and forehead wave.

"Yes, I am."

"Why do you seek a divorce?" Phil's voice oozed oil. Dickon opined, silently, the man would have been perfect as an undertaker.

"I don't. My wife wants the divorce." Dickon felt the dryness in his throat, and took a sip of water from the glass in front of him.

"Why?" Shea Mauna Hughes asked. Accusation riddled her tone. Her lace dickey quivered at her plump throat as she spoke. With her ample bosom and short stature encased in gray wool, she reminded Dickon of a fat pigeon.

"She says it's because I'm insufficiently ambitious," Dickon answered. He barely choked back a crack in his voice.

"Strange reason," Andy Maime said. He made a note on the pad in front of him. Dickon tried to read it upside down but couldn't.

"Surely there's more you can tell us," Bobbo said kindly.

"I can't tell you any more about her reasons, because that's all she has shared with me," Dickon said. "I'm not sure she knows all her reasons, herself."

"Have you sought counseling?" asked Phil. Again the unctuous tone reminded Dickon of a funeral parlor.

"Not together; Vanna refuses. I have consulted Reverend Link, and will find Christian counseling for myself based on his recommendation." Dickon heard himself rushing his words, and reminded himself to slow down in his next answer.

"I would recommend Dr. Senda Sicknell," Bobbo said.

"Her Christian credentials are impeccable," Phil said. "Will you see her?"

"Yes, I will," Dickon promised.

"What effect has this divorce had on the Two Tree congregation?" Rev. Hughes asked. "Has anyone from Presbytery contacted them?" Dickon sensed a hidden malice in her question. It puzzled him. They had always got on well enough, before.

"We have a letter from the Session," Phil said sententiously.

"Please read it," Anne Tenor said. The others nodded agreement.

_Session of the Two Tree Presbyterian Churchp12765 Two Tree RoadpTwo Tree, CA_

_Brothers and Sisters of the Presbytery:_

_We, the elders and deacons, in joint session, have severally voted, as required by the Book of Order, on the contents of this letter._

_Let the Brothers and Sisters know, that we the elders and we the deacons have deeply appreciated Reverend Shayne's contributions to our congregation in his time of service among us. He has supported the expansion of the Sunday School, preached scripturally based sermons, founded a choir, and increased the membership and budget of the church, counseled the troubled, visited the sick, and challenged our youth to commit to Christ and the Church._

_It is with deep regret, therefore, that we feel compelled to request him to resign. While his service has been above expectations, his recent personal difficulties have made him unacceptable as a role model in a family-oriented congregation. We pray for him a new beginning and a new ministry in another situation, perhaps campus ministry._

_Sincerely,_

_Ray Sincaine  
Clerk of Session  
Two Tree Presbyterian Church._

"A very charitable letter," Andy Maime declared. His voice was hoarse. Dickon wondered if he had strained it calling hogs. He popped a mint in his mouth and crunched down on it. His craggy face and scalp showing through straggling white hair were red as a lobster shell. His frame had once carried considerably more weight; now his skin hung, wherever visible, in creviced folds and wattles. Dickon pictured him nude, and shut down the image immediately. He had enough horror in front of him as it was.

"What could you have done to prevent your divorce?" Anne Tenor asked. Dickon looked at her, and saw compassion on her soft face. Her gray hair framed it with gentle waves. Her blue eyes were piercing, and radiated kindness, at least at the moment.

"Nothing that I know of, at least right now. I may learn more as I go through counseling."

"I think we can recognize," Reverend Buster said, "that at times the finger of evil stirs in another's soul, and we are powerless to prevent its disturbances."

"Hmph!" Reverend Hughes snorted. She glared at Reverend Phil E. Buster.

"Other times," he went on smoothly, "we do not recognize our own cooperation with the stirring, until it is too late to reverse an occurrence. That is why we pray for mercy." The commissioners nodded piously, even Shea Mauna Hughes.

"Reverend Shayne, have you anything else to say about your divorce?"

"Only that I wish it weren't happening." Dickon stared down at the table willing his eyes to stay dry.

Reverend Buster waved his hand at the door. "Then we will dismiss you to the other room. When we have deliberated, we will advise you of our decision." Dickon got up and left, closing the door behind him.

In the outer room he sat quietly, hands folded and head bowed in an attitude of prayer. Inwardly he was fuming. No condolences, no words of consolation. More implied condemnation than compassion. And where could he go? How could he earn a living?

After what seemed an hour, but was only ten minutes, Reverend Bobbo Link came and got Dickon. He ushered him into the examination room. Dickon took his former chair.

"We have decided that the most prudent course to follow, for you and for the congregation," Phil E. Buster said, "is for you to take up other employment in a decent and orderly fashion. Elder Tenor has a suggestion."

"A good woman I know, Sister Salvación Mandor, operates a mission in the City. She has need for a one-quarter-time assistant in her work of feeding the poor. This Commission will recommend this as an approved position. It will pay you enough to live on, while you sort through your life and the direction of your future ministry."

"And we can arrange for you to do graduate study at the City College," Bobbo Link said, "tuition free."

Dickon felt a rush of gratitude; the Church had not entirely abandoned him!

"In one year," Phil E. Buster went on, "we will meet again with you to assess the future path of your ministry."

"I accept," Dickon said. "Do I need to write a letter resigning from Two Tree?"

"No," Reverend Buster said. "We will deal with this as a call from one position to another."

"Then my record remains clear," Dickon said. "When will this all happen?"

"Within the month. Do you have any questions?"

"Not at the moment."

"Then let us pray. Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father, bless this Commission, and bless Dickon Shayne, that we may serve Thy plan, and not the false desires of our own hearts. Shed Thy Grace upon us, and bless us. We pray this in the name of Jesus, Amen."

### Poached Halibut at the Floundering Flatfish

The Floundering Flatfish was busy, as usual, on Saturday night. Len came in through its elegant mahogany and leaded glass doors. The headwaiter greeted him with a smile. "Do you have reservations, sir?" he asked.

"Yes," Len said. "In the name of Len DeLys. For a party of two at six." Len pointed to his name on the headwaiter's list. He showed just the right amount of linen below the cuff of his blue blazer.

"You are Mr. DeLys?"

"Yes, I am. Has my guest arrived yet?"

"No one has requested a seating in that name. I could seat you, sir, and bring your party to you when she comes."

Len shook his head. "My party is a man," he said. "I'd rather wait here for him. He should be along soon."

"Do you care for a drink from the bar?"

"No, thank you, not until I'm seated. I only drink standing up at cocktail parties where there are too few chairs and I have no excuse to leave."

"Just as you please." The headwaiter turned to the next party and, after verifying their reservations, briskly walked before them to seat them. Len admired the man's butt as he strode with the pomp only headwaiters and pallbearers seem to muster easily.

Ben rushed in. He was breathing heavily, as if he had run. His tie was slightly askew, and Len thrilled as he straightened it. Ben's rushed demeanor brought out his boyish traits. He smiled apologetically at Len. "I'm sorry to be late. I miscalculated the bus schedules. They run less often on the weekend."

Len looked around. They were alone in the reception area. He leaned over and kissed Ben on the cheek. Ben blushed. "No harm done," Len said. "You're here, and the night is young. That's good enough for me."

The headwaiter returned. His swift, knowing, glance took in Ben's fading blush. A brief smile crossed his face. "Is this your party?" he asked Len.

Len said, "Yes, it is. We're ready, sir."

"Right this way, gentlemen. Your server tonight will be Mario." He led them to a table near the center of the room. It was set with two goblets for each of them, one smaller than the other. The small round table was swamped with a mound of linen tablecloth and napkins. A bus boy, whose dark good looks and youthful figure gleamed in tight trousers and a white shirt surely tailored for his torso poured water for them as the headwaiter seated them.

Ben said, "This is a beautiful place," as he tried to watch both the headwaiter and the busboy hurry away in opposite directions.

Len replied, "It's one of my favorites. The food is good, and the waiters are nice to look at."

"I noticed. What do you recommend?"

"To eat or to watch?"

"To eat. I'll keep an eye out for what to watch."

"The halibut poached in orange juice is excellent. So is the Blue Cheese Halibut. If you prefer salmon, I can recommend the Cilantro Salmon. Even the Sole Florentine is good here."

"The halibut poached in orange juice sounds good."

Mario came to the table, his pad and pen at the ready. "Are you gentlemen ready to order?"

Len replied. "Yes. For my companion, the Halibut Orange, and for me, the Sole Florentine. A bottle of Leaping Lizards Gewurztraminer to go with the fish."

"Which dressing would you like on your salad?"

"The house vinaigrette for me," Len said. "For you, Ben?"

"The house vinaigrette for me, also."

"Thank you gentlemen. I will return with your salads."

Len and Ben watched Mario walk away. His buttocks moved with the fluid grace of the young under the tight black fabric of his uniform.

"Lovely sight," Len said, smiling at Ben.

"Yes, yes indeed," Ben said. Mario brought their salads. He flashed them a smile that hinted at conspiracy. The salad plates were deliciously chilled. The vinaigrette was neither too sweet nor too sour, with just the right hint of lime to give it an unexpected piquance. Ben watched Len to see which fork to use for the salad. Len noticed that Ben waited to follow his lead. Ben's naivete charmed Len.

Mario returned with sourdough bread and a spread of sun-dried tomatoes, garlic, and basil pureed in extra virgin olive oil. Mario swished his hips ever so slightly. Ben and Len grinned at each other. Again, Ben watched Len break off a slice of the bread and dip it in the olive oil puree.

"You said you came from Colorado," Len said. "Why did you leave it? There's supposed to be an active gay scene in Denver."

"I connected with it, but it cost me my job. I grew up on a farm, near a town called Berthoud. I worked in Denver, after college, but I didn't make many connections. Too shy, I guess."

"You? Shy?"

"Yes. Me. Shy. At least in college. My philosophy professor, John Dilbert Doe, brought me out. One day he stopped me after class, and called me into his office. He confronted me with my sexuality. Scared the hell out of me, actually. I couldn't deny it, especially after he came out to me."

"That is pretty direct, I guess."

"He invited me to a party, at his place. A gay party. I went, terrified, that first night. It was the grandest party I ever went to. For the first time in my life, I knew I was like some other men. It set me free."

"Pretty bold of your Professor Dill, to make you an offer like that. He could have lost his job."

"I think he was pretty sure of his target. More sure than his target was of himself."

Mario brought their entrees. Ben's halibut was garnished with a flower made of orange slices. Len's sole rested in a bed of lightly sautéed spinach.

Len asked Ben, "Did you have an affair with this professor?"

"Not really. A one-night stand. He was already falling in love with Hy Ewall, his partner, and didn't really want a complication on the side. There were others, nearer my age. We all experimented." Ben took a mouthful of his halibut. He savored its tart sweetness on his tongue.

"Young men are full of juice, and it must come out," Len observed.

"Over, and over. Have you always lived in the City?"

"No. I've lived a lot of places. I started out in Minnesota. I got out of there as soon as I could."

"Why?"

"Too damn cold. Ever scraped frozen chicken crap off a coop's floor at twenty below?"

"No, never moved it under those conditions. I've shoveled a lot of chicken crap, though. Not my favorite chore."

"Yeah, it's a rock in the winter and a slushy river in the summer. I ran away when I was sixteen. I couldn't take any more of the cold, and the chickens, and my so-called uncle sodomizing me every night."

"Oh. That's heavy."

"That's the past," Len said. Ben didn't know quite what else to say. Len steadily ate his sole.

"There's a free concert in the park tonight," Len said after he had eaten most of his fish, "if you like Gilbert and Sullivan. It's a concert version of _The Mikado._ We could have our dessert, and just be in time to walk over to the park."

"I like _The Mikado,_ " Ben said. "That sounds like fun." The bus boy cleared away their plates. Mario came to inquire about dessert.

"I'll have hot tea, please. A black tea," Ben said, "and a small cheesecake."

"Coffee for me," Len said, "and the cheesecake, also."

"Okay, gentlemen." Mario got their desserts and beverages. "If you want anything else, please let me know," he said.

"You've been in the City more than a year, haven't you?" Len asked Ben.

"Yes. It was a year last May, on the earthquake anniversary."

"Do you like it here? Or are you just earning a grubstake before you go on to the next city?"

"I like it here. I want to stay. Maybe someday I'll find Mr. Right, and I can settle down with him. It's what I dream of, anyway." Ben swirled the teabag in his cup, then lifted it, held it on the spoon, and wound the string around it to press the last of the flavor out.

"What is Mr. Right like?" Len peered at Ben over his coffee cup.

"I don't know. Sometimes I dream he's a blonde swimmer. Other times I dream he's a dark and mysterious Latin lover. Sometimes I don't see him at all."

"Hard to settle on one type, huh? So many men, so little time?"

"He's always kind. He's always honest. He's never perfect. His looks are less important than his character is."

"Have you ever met anybody who stood a chance of measuring up?" Len studied the liquid in his cup.

"Yes. One man. I don't know that he'd be interested, though." Ben glanced quickly at Len, and then studied the arrangement of silk roses that adorned their table.

"You won't know if you don't ask him," Len suggested.

"When the time's right, I will. What about you? What do you want?"

Len held up three fingers, folding each one down as he iterated his list. "First off, good health. Second, enough money to live on. Third, and most important, somebody to share life with."

"Have you ever had a long-term affair?"

"Yes. His name was Rick O'Shea. We were together for almost eight years." Len shrugged. "He ended it."

"What happened?"

"A young blond, female. And the pressure of his family. He got married. It didn't last long. She found out about his past with me and divorced him. He killed himself. Drove his Ford into a Texas river."

"That's a sad story."

"It's an old one. I found out after he was gone he wasn't very monogamous. I've been better off without him."

"Is that important to you? Monogamy?"

"Yes. I'm not sure why, except it's less complicated to live that way."

"I think I'd prefer monogamy, too. One man, one love."

Len looked at his watch. "We'd better go, if we want to catch the overture."

"Yes, a walk would be good for me. The meal was superb, Mr. DeLys. Thank you for it."

"Please don't call me Mr. DeLys. It makes me feel like I'm your father's ancient friend. I'm not that old, you know."

"I'm sorry. I only wanted to be polite."

"Call me Len."

"Okay, Len."

Len signaled Mario to bring the check. He scanned it, took some bills from his wallet, put them on the tray, and handed it to Mario. Then he and Ben walked out into an evening tingling with promise.

The concert delighted them both. The audience sang along with the most familiar numbers, such as "Flowers that Bloom in the Spring" and the Titwillow song. Ben and Len could hear the orchestra playing the overture as an encore as they walked away after the performance. Away from the concert band shell, the park was a place of dark shadows intermittently interrupted by turquoise lamplight. Len slipped his hand around Ben's. Ben almost drew away, unaccustomed as he was to displays of affection in public places. There were no observers around to see. He let himself walk just a little closer to Len.

"Thank you, Ben," Len said. "I've enjoyed this performance. Not so many people like Gilbert and Sullivan these days."

"I'm old-fashioned about some things, I guess." I'm old-fashioned about a lot of things, Ben thought to himself.

"Old-fashioned is good, sometimes." Len's voice was almost caressing. Ben's hand was growing warm in Len's. They walked on, not talking, through the intermittent cones of light and large swatches of dark. From somewhere came the scent of jasmine. Ben snorted as softly as he could. He found the perfume cloying. It reminded him of urinal deodorant cakes.

When they reached the edge of the park Len said, "I think it's time for me to head home, Ben. I've got a heavy schedule tomorrow. The auditors are dropping in on our department. That always stirs things up."

"Right," Ben said. "Some sleep would be good for me, too. Which bus do you take?"

"The number seven," Len said.

"I'm on the number thirty-four," Ben said. "I go right to get to the stop."

"I have to go left." Len kissed Ben briefly. Blushing Ben watched Len walk toward his bus.

"Good night, sweet prince," he said softly, and turned toward his own bus.

### Shrinking Dickon

Dickon presented himself at Dr. Senda Sicknell's office just five minutes early. He had spent long hours filling out personality tests, intelligence tests, aptitude tests, and Rorschach tests. The preparatory work for this interview included writing four essay answers to such questions as "Where will you be in 10 years/20 years/30 years?" and "What is the purpose you see for your life?" With all the trauma of his divorce and losing his job, Dickon lost interest in the process, and just reacted. Supposedly, this gave more accurate test results, anyway. The essay questions he answered in a free form stream of consciousness kind of prose quite unlike the balanced Johnsonian sentences he usually favored.

Now he had the interview with the good doctor. She called him to her office exactly at the appointment time. He got up and went through the door the receptionist had indicated. Dr. Sicknell was behind a large mahogany desk on which nothing sat except a green-shaded accountant's lamp, a telephone, and a fat manila folder. Dickon guessed the folder held all the paperwork he had completed prior to this interview.

"Sit down, Reverend Shayne," Dr. Sicknell said crisply. Dickon took the chair across from her. Dr. Sicknell resembled a bleached prune. Her hair was white, with a few black strands woven through it. Her stylist had carefully waved it to frame her wrinkled face. Dickon wondered if she'd spent her early years on a farm, or had smoked heavily. Her eyes were blue ice. Dickon wondered if she ever smiled; she had not smiled to greet him.

"Your responses indicate several anomalies that you may wish to address," she said. Her tone was hard, just short of angry. Dickon wondered what she was angry about. Maybe her feet hurt, or her hemorrhoids itched. Her face powder was rose perfumed; it clogged Dickon's nostrils, suggesting suffocation to him. He forcibly slowed his breathing, taking in as much air through his mouth as he could without seeming to. Somehow, he felt appearances were very important in this interview. Gasping like a beached carp wouldn't play very well.

"Anomalies?" he inquired.

"First," she said, opening the folder and extracting a sheet of paper covered with marks, "your Meyers Briggs score is off the scale on intuition. I have never seen a man score so high on the intuition scale." She glared at him. "Even among the clergy, who commonly score higher on this scale than the average population, I have not found so high a score. This is, after all, a feminine characteristic." She waited for a response. Dickon didn't know what to say. She was stirring currents deep inside him. He erected his weapons shields.

When Dickon said nothing, she went on. Taking up another piece of paper, she said, "You are accident prone. You do not focus well on reality. You dream too much and plan too little. This all shows in your test scores." She laid the second paper on the first. She showed neither to Dickon.

"I have also read your essays." She frowned at the papers in front of her. Dickon could see upside down that they were the answers he had scrawled to the four questions. He girded his loins.

"These are most disturbing. Your penmanship is a poor sample of what you can write. This demonstrates agitation with these questions. One wonders what you fear in answering them." She looked at Dickon as if she would peel back the layers of his skin to get to his brain. Dickon guessed she'd enjoy the peeling more than his mind.

'They are most significant for what you do not mention. Do you know what I mean?"

"No," Dickon said. He felt the word tear through his clogged throat. He wished he had a fan to blow her face powder back in her face. He could see speckles of it on the navy blue collar of her suit. They were too small, round, and uniform, to be dandruff flakes. Dr. Sicknell probably slew her dandruff before it could fall.

"You do not mention wife or children in your future."

"Oh. I'm still sorting that out."

"Sorting what out?"

"Whether I want to get married again. Right now I'm still dealing with letting the last marriage go."

"I understand the grieving process requires its own time for each person. That does not explain why you indicate no expectation that sometime in the future you will re-marry." Dr. Sicknell's blue eyes flashed frozen fire.

"I don't know that I'll marry again. This divorce has hurt so much that I'm unwilling to risk another go-round." Dickon spread his hands on the Doctor's desk. His fingers streaked the wax as he spread his hands.

"Nonsense! Your attitude has nothing to do with fear of being hurt. It's all quite clear in here, Reverend Shayne. You are a candidate for the lockup ward. You have, sir, latent homosexual tendencies!" Dr. Sicknell pounded her wrinkled fist on the desk. More speckles of powder shook loose from the crevices of her jowls and sprinkled themselves across her collar. "I am recommending to the Presbytery that you be enrolled in long-term psychiatric care."

Dickon sat stunned. She had penetrated his shields, firing photon torpedoes that they could not keep out. Unaccountably he remembered Larry Ott and Benny Fitz in high school, and the sexual explorations they had made under the bleachers during the interminable football games teen culture had required they attend. Shame reddened his face. He stared at her, shock immobilizing his green eyes.

Dr. Sicknell watched him for a long moment. "You may go now," she said. "You know my opinion."

"Yes," Dickon said. "I know your opinion." He stood, praying his knees would hold him.

"My office will send you a written copy of your results and my conclusions. It will be a copy of the documents I will send to the Presbytery Ministerial Commission. That's all." She waved her hand at him, dismissing him.

Dickon walked out, fragments of his inner self floating in a miasmic soup within him.

### Minnie Inquires

Ben was just leaving the mailroom with a stack of mail in his cart when Minnie spoke to him. He looked back at her.

"So. Where you off to?" she asked him.

"This is the executive floor mail. It's high priority." Ben started out the door again.

"Not that urgent." She gestured at his chair. "Sit down for a minute. You've got some answers to give old Minnie."

Ben chose to surrender to her command with a quizzical "Old Minnie?" response. He knew she prided herself on looking younger than her forty-five years.

"Don't get wise. So I watched old movies this weekend. What did you do? Burn oil in the library?" She glared at him with ferocity only she could summon.

"No." Ben bit the word off short, and made to rise.

Minnie forestalled him with a glance. "Well, out with it. You've been buzzing like a happy bee in a bed full of flowers. What happened?"

Ben replied, with all innocence, "I went out, like you told me to."

"Where?"

Ben equivocated. "Just walking, Saturday."

Minnie slapped the table in front of her for emphasis. "Walking where? Do I have to get forceps to pull it out of you?"

"I went walking along the Street. Met a man I knew from the earthquake relief. He knows you, too."

"Who?"

"Len DeLys. He's the one who sent me to Indigent Aborigine to look for work."

"Of course, I know Len. Unattached, a little older. How's he doing? Did he buy you a drink?"

Ben grinned. "A couple of them. That was Saturday. He bought me dinner on Sunday, at the Floundering Flatfish."

Minnie raised her eyebrows for emphasis. "Oh ho! Expensive place. Good food, too. Lot of cute waiters, if you're into guys."

"Then we went to a concert performance of _The Mikado_."

Minnie shook her head slowly, wonderingly. "Len DeLys and you. Who'd have thought?"

Ben looked bashfully at his mail cart. "I don't know what it'll come to."

Minnie put on her wise-old-woman voice. "Enjoy it while it lasts. Better get that mail upstairs, now. The muckety-mucks have to have their letters."

"Right," Ben said. Minnie watched him go, a smile playing hopscotch on her lips.

For the next two weeks Ben had to handle the mailroom by himself, since Minnie had to fill in at the central reception desk for the receptionist who was on vacation. He didn't see much of her until he went one day into the lunchroom to eat. She was sitting at a table with a space available across from her.

Minnie grinned at him. She was decked out in a formal business suit, because she had to keep up the corporate image as the interim receptionist. Ben thought the garb looked uncomfortable on her. He had a brief vision of the suit jumping off Minnie and running away in terror. He thrust it aside.

"Mind if I join you, Minnie?" he said.

"No. Sit down. Didn't you have plans to eat out? Or was that another day?"

Ben wondered how she knew his plans, and then remembered he had mentioned he might need help for an hour to their boss. "Yeah, but Len called," Ben explained. "Said he couldn't make it for lunch, so we're going to supper together."

"Been seeing quite a bit of him, haven't you?"

"Yes."

Minnie said solemnly, "Maybe you're falling in love with him."

Ben frowned. "I don't know...he's a lot older than I am."

"Only in young queer years. He's not forty yet. That's not a lot older than you are."

"Almost twelve years. That's quite a lot. He's old enough to be my older brother."

"In twelve years that won't mean so much."

"What?" Ben spooned his soup into his mouth while Minnie answered him. "I mean, when you're forty, fifty-two won't be so far away. And that Len's a looker, for a man."

"I don't know that he's interested in me, not in that way."

"Have you asked him?"

"No. I don't know how."

"Open your mouth and let the words roll out. Been to bed with him yet?"

Ben blushed. "No," Ben said.

"Want to?" Minnie chuckled.

Ben thought for a moment. Then he said, "Yes, but it's not just sex. I like being with him, and doing things with him, talking to him."

"Is there anybody else you'd rather be with?"

"No. I've spent a lot of time with Len. I haven't been meeting other guys."

"Yup. Like I thought. You're falling in love. Never mind how old he is."

"I don't know, Minnie. You come up with some far-out ideas sometimes."

"I've been around, Ben. I know some things when I see them. Eat up. You've got a bundle of stuff to distribute downstairs, I imagine. I've got to go receive people." She stood, gathering her dirty dishes on her tray. "Just ask, Ben. Len's a gay man. I'm sure he's interested 'that way' in you." She marched off, tray borne before her like a platter with a severed head on it. Ben watched her go, smiling ruefully to himself at her commanding him.

### Chance Meeting

Vanna jumped in startlement as a man sat down beside her on the bus and said, "Well! Hello, Mrs. Shayne!"

She turned and looked. It was, of all people, Ray Sincaine from the Two Tree church. Vanna disliked him almost as much as Dickon did.

"Hello, Ray," she said, as civilly as she could. "Fancy meeting you on this bus line."

"How have you been? Coping with the single state?"

"Yes." Vanna hurried on to ask a question. She didn't want to answer any more of Ray's probing than she had to; anything she said the townsfolk of Two Tree would wildly distort. "How are you, and all the rest of the Two Tree church doing?"

Ray, easily deceived into believing Vanna really cared about the congregation, began telling her about the new pastor, the increase in Sunday School attendance, and went on to the marryings and buryings in the community. Vanna pretended to listen while Ray rattled on. She was grateful she seldom rode this bus line; Ray let her know he was regularly consulting a physician in the City whose offices were on the route.

"You know about Dickon's new position," Ray said. Vanna turned her attention to Ray's talk.

"No. I haven't talked to him since the divorce was final."

"He's working in the City, now, you know." Ray beamed; he always liked to have news his trapped listeners hadn't heard.

"No, I didn't know."

"He's helping at a mission for poor people on Lost Lane. And going to the City College. He assists the college chaplain. I thought he'd be good at campus ministry." Vanna pursed her lips.

"I suppose he's still grieving over the divorce?" she asked, smiling a false smile of concern.

"No, I don't think so. When I saw him, he said he missed the dog more than he missed you or the congregation." Malice sparkled in Ray's eyes. He felt Vanna stiffen with anger beside him.

"That sounds like something he would say," she responded through clenched teeth. "Please excuse me, Ray. This is my stop." He stood to let her exit the seat.

"Nice to see you," he said. "Good luck."

"Nice to see you, too, Ray," she said as she flashed him an insincere smile and got off the bus. She had an extra three blocks to walk, but she preferred that to any more of Ray Sincaine's baiting. Vanna was little inclined to introspection, but even she wondered a little bit at how angry she felt on hearing Ray's news. That Dickon was succeeding at something, however small, infuriated her. She hated him for not being what she wanted in a husband. Quite irrationally, she blamed him for every wrong thing in her own life, not that things were going badly. She had money, a job, influence in the City government, and sufficient sex to satisfy her body. Perhaps Ray had exaggerated Dickon's happiness. Vanna vowed to find out.

It took her several weeks to learn that Dickon was succeeding at the Mission and as an assistant to the City College chaplain. Dickon had a compassionate touch that relieved and invigorated both homeless street-dwellers and the often confused and pampered students at City College. Dickon, it seemed, was happy. Vanna's fury grew. She thought about ways to interrupt his happiness.

Fate helped her. She had recently taken a job as a social worker with the City. Some of her clients faced criminal charges. Vanna had power to influence the diminution or dismissal of these charges. The system assigned a certain young man, one Vincent Decatur, to her as a client. Mr. Decatur was a nominal student at City College, which he used for cover to earn his living as a male hustler. Vanna discovered he knew who Dickon was, and, indeed, rather admired Dickon. Vanna recruited Vin Decatur to embroil Dickon in a sexual scandal. After all, she thought to herself, nothing stirs religious people up like sex does.

Vanna regarded the young man before her. He had a lean face, with a sharply defined nose. Probably in his early twenties, his face lines were clean and sharp under his black, tightly curled, hair. Vanna thought he would look like a crafty ferret by the time he was forty, especially given his occupation.

"I see, Mr. Decatur," she said severely, rather looking down her nose at the slender Vincent across her desk, "that you are accused of prostitution at City College."

"False charge. I'm a student there. The person in question simply made me a loan. The cops saw it, and got the wrong idea." He shifted in the hard wooden chair.

Vanna leaned back in her padded executive chair and stared at him. His eyes were as black and hard as obsidian chips. Vanna's gray eyes were chips of marble.

"Don't give me that," she said. "You are an obvious type. Do you do men or women? Or both?"

"I admit nothing." Vin spoke sullenly to the floor. His voice was small and hard at the same time.

"Pity," Vanna responded in chill tones. "I need someone at City College to perform a small chore for me. It could be beneficial to the performing party."

Vin looked up. This bureaucrat spoke his language. "What kind of chore?" he asked.

"I need to get some embarrassing evidence on a man there, a sort of assistant chaplain. Dickon Shayne."

"Why Dickon Shayne? Everybody at the college likes him."

"Why doesn't matter. It's a long story for some other time, some other place."

"Right. Keep my nose out of it."

"Can you arrange some sort of scandalous situation that I can use against this man?"

Vin's eyes glittered. "I usually negotiate price before I commit to anything."

"You're facing criminal charges," Vanna said, "if I send a report that describes you as irredeemable. I'll send that report, unless you cooperate."

"You should be on the streets, lady. You drive a hard bargain."

"I function quite well where I am."

"You want me to get this Dickon Shayne into a sexually compromising position? Then give you evidence of it? For that, you'll send a good recommendation to the District Attorney?"

"You've stated it quite well."

Vin stood and held out his hand. "Give me a few weeks? These things can be difficult to arrange on the spur of the moment."

"There's a little time. Do it right."

Vin withdrew his hand and stuck it into the pocket of his denim jacket. Vanna had made it obvious she wouldn't shake on the deal.

"I'll let you know," Vin said, "when the deal's done."

"You know where my office is. Goodbye."

Vin hunched his shoulders and turned to go out the door. He was already plotting his further moves.

### Riesling Rising

Supper at the Floundering Flatfish led to more dates. Meanwhile, with Minnie Vann urging him on, Ben applied for, and passed, the test for computer operator at the Indigent Aborigine Insurance Company. He got an advance in position, a notable increase in income, and a major boost in his self-confidence. More and more he was coming to rely on Len's advice. Len was twelve years older than Ben was, and had a lot of business experience.

One evening, not long after Ben's conversation with Minnie Vann, he invited Len to dinner at his apartment. He covered the worn table in the alcove that served as his dining area with a pale blue cloth he had bought just for this occasion. He got deep blue cloth napkins to go with the tablecloth. On it he set the table with a pale peach plate and salad plate combination he had found in a discount store and brought out matching knives, forks, and spoons. He was glad he didn't have to set a service for more than two. He didn't have that much that matched, yet.

For an entrée he had decided to broil steaks. With them he'd serve a salad with vinaigrette and potatoes buttered with parsley and basil butter. For dessert he had a chocolate brownie magnificent in its decadence. Tea and coffee, tea for him, coffee for Len. Along with the entrée he'd serve a Merlot. The wine counter salesman at the supermarket had promised him it would go well with the steak.

Ben dressed his bed, too, with clean sheets and a nice coverlet. If the evening went as he hoped, Len would spend the night with him. Then Ben dressed himself, choosing a lavender shirt and soft brown trousers. He made sure, before he dressed, that he and his underwear were clean and sweet-smelling. For a cocktail he had Len's favorite bourbon. Len took preferred his whiskey with ice and just a little water, so mixers wouldn't be a problem.

When the doorbell rang, Ben took a deep breath, and moved swiftly to open it. He was most disappointed that it was not Len who stood there. His neighbor, a woman he didn't know, handed him some envelopes.

"Letters put in the wrong box," she said. "Tell the damned postman I don't get his union wages, so he should damned well get it right next time." She then began to complain about the weather. Ben murmured appropriate "Mm-hmms" until he could gracefully get rid of her. He promised himself to avoid the woman in future.

The doorbell rang again, shortly after he had closed the door. He opened it, once again to disappointment. It was the paperboy wanting his monthly payment. Ben got the money for him, chatted idly for a moment, and sent him on his way. Len was just coming up the stairs when the paperboy left. Ben waited for him, hoping he wouldn't appear too anxious.

"Hi," Len said to him. "I brought some wine for your collection. It's a Riesling. I know you like the white ones better." He handed Ben the bottle.

"Would you prefer this, or the Merlot I've got chilling, with your steak dinner?"

"Oh, let's be Lesbians tonight, and drink the red." It was a strange opinion Len had expressed on more than one occasion that only Lesbians and straight Italians drank red wine and everybody else preferred white wines. Ben still didn't know Len well enough to be certain whether he was joking or serious about the point. "Put the Riesling back for yourself."

"Okay," Ben said, and stood aside so Len could enter.

"Weather's pretty hot," Len said. He took off his jacket. It was a casual windbreaker. Under it Len wore a polo shirt, in a pale blue-gray that set off his blue eyes. It was the first time Ben had seen him in something that informal.

"I like your shirt," Ben said. "It's a good color for you."

"Thanks. I just got it. I don't usually go for something this casual, but, what the hell, it's summer time."

"Casual's good for you," Ben said. He took the Riesling to the refrigerator and laid it on its side on the bottom shelf. Who knows, he thought, we may want a second bottle of wine tonight. Over his shoulder he said, "Rare, medium, well-done—how do you like your steak?"

"Medium," Len said.

"Would you like a cocktail before dinner? I have bourbon."

"Not tonight, thanks. I had a drink with Hank O'Hara after work. He insisted he owed me one." Ben had met Hank, and knew he was as straight as God makes them. He still surprised himself by feeling a twinge of jealousy.

While Ben broiled the steaks, Len came into the kitchen and watched. "You like to cook, don't you?" he asked Ben.

Ben opened the Merlot to let it breathe. The wine clerk at the supermarket had insisted this was an important step. "Yes, I do. My Dad never understood it. He'd do a lot of things, like run a vacuum, or mop a floor, to help Mom. He said he owed it to her, because she helped him in the fields and barns when he needed it. He wouldn't cook, though. Mom always told us we should be glad he didn't." When the potatoes were done, Ben made the herbed butter and them in it.

"You said you lost both your mom and your dad. How?"

"A car wreck, my freshman year at college. They were on their way back from a doctor's appointment in Fort Collins, hit an icy patch, and spun out and rolled over. The patrolman said it was probably a quick death for both of them." Ben plated the steak and potatoes. "I think I told you I've got a brother and sister-in-law in Colorado. They live on the family farm." He took the salads from the refrigerator and drizzled the vinaigrette over them.

"How about your family?"

"I don't know."

"Don't know?"

"I left home when I was sixteen, like I told you. I didn't want to know then, and I don't want to know now, what became of all of them. They weren't my biological parents, anyway. Nobody knows who they were. The people who raised me just wanted a chicken poop scooper. They probably replaced me the next time the social worker went through town."

Ben didn't quite know what to say to Len. He spoke of the whole thing as though it were a distant event. Maybe for Len it was. "Shall we eat?" Ben said. Over their food they let their talk roam from subject to subject as their whims took them. They were even silent for a few moments at a time, and at ease with one another.

After dinner they sat in Ben's small living room to watch television news. There were no news programs on, and Ben shut the tube off. He put his hand over Len's hand on the sofa cushion and caressed it. Len responded by turning his hand over to grasp Ben's.

"Will you stay over?" Ben said.

Len leaned over and kissed him. "I thought you'd never ask," he said. "Sure, I'll stay. I don't have my pajamas with me, though."

"I don't think you'll need them," Ben said.

### Encounter at the Eleemosynary Eel

For some weeks Dickon waited for his copy of Dr. Sicknell's papers to reach him. After they came, and he read them, he waited for some comment from Presbytery. Nothing came. After several sessions of midnight prayer, he left a solution up to God, and let the papers recede in his mind.

Students came to him, grappling with the eternal problems of love lost, gained, requited, and unrequited, as well as the turmoil of success and failure and the confusion of being self-responsible at last. At Roman Hands' suggestion, Dickon had commandeered a corner table at the Eleemosynary Eel, a favorite campus coffee shop and snack bar. There he held a kind of confessional, round table discussion, and general offer of availability from an older, perhaps wiser, but not quite a one-foot-in-the-grave person.

The Eel, as the students affectionately abbreviated its name, was a moderate sized room with twenty-five round-topped tables. When the shop opened in the morning, each table had six chairs around it. By ten minutes after opening, the chairs were shuffled among tables to accommodate various groups larger than six. Counter personnel and waiters fought a losing battle all day to restore the opening configuration of chairs.

Eels in a great mural that covered two walls watched the dance of the chairs. The eels writhed and wriggled through a great green and blue body of painted water. Each eleemosynary eel bore in its mouth a basket loaded with shrimp (in cocktail dresses), or crab legs, or a bottle of wine. Two eels, centermost on the back wall, writhed around each other. College students were quick to suggest the eels were mating; the artist had been called back to put a ball gown and tuxedo on the pair, to firmly suggest they were dancing. The garments did not deter the student imagination.

The afternoon was warm. Dickon had ordered an iced tea, and was sipping it slowly to make it last. The college students behind the counter knew who he was, and why he was here. They left him alone to do his thing. Most of the tables were empty. It was a Wednesday, the favorite afternoon for mandatory attendance lecture classes where weary professors droned on about the insights of Western civilization to drowsing students.

A wiry young man, dressed in faded jeans carefully sandpapered at the crotch, and at least one size too small for him caught Dickon's eye. The man was obvious in his sexual display. His tee shirt stretched almost to the ripping point over his lean chest. His pectoral muscles molded the thin cloth. Dickon could see, from across the room, how the cloth puckered around his nipples. His curly black hair rode like a Greek god's helmet above his almost too-thin face. Despite the sharpness of his features, something young and vulnerable drew Dickon's attention. Dickon let himself savor the stirring in his loins without becoming obvious.

Dr. Sicknell, whatever her intent, had brought Dickon to an epiphany. For the first time in his life, he accepted that he preferred to think of sex with men rather than sex with women. The idea of ever again mating with a woman mildly disgusted him. Celibacy did not appeal to him. So he watched the unsuspecting young men passing by. At night, he remembered Larry and Benny, or fantasized about someone he'd seen on the street.

The young man with curly black hair looked at him and flashed a smile that lit up his face. Dickon caught his breath. The smiling face was approaching him. The young man stood by his table.

"Are you Reverend Shayne?" he asked.

Dickon cleared his throat. "Yes," he said, "I am."

"Mind if I sit down?"

"Please do." The young man pulled out a chair. Dickon felt a wave of heat from the man's body. He could smell musky cologne. Sternly he set aside his imagination and called on the preacher within.

"I'm Vin, Vin Decatur." The black eyes glinted with a secret amusement. Vin realized his prey would be easier to corner than he had thought. No need to hire a female third party. Closet case, maybe, but a player in Vin's own court.

Dickon's voice came out strained, as though he spoke through split pea soup. "What can I do for you?"

Vin's grin broadened. "Maybe a lot of things. We'll have to see."

"I'm sorry. I don't follow you." Dickon felt rising excitement flushing his face. He looked down at the table, wondering if his reaction was all too obvious.

"I think maybe you do, but you don't know you do." An insinuating tone in the young man's voice prickled in Dickon's fluttering psyche.

"Look, guy, I don't know what you're talking about," he snapped.

"You do, but you don't want to know." Vin shifted in his chair, so his knee briefly touched Dickon's. Dickon flinched, but did not withdraw his knee. Vin smiled again, and let his knee brush Dickon's, ever so slowly. Dickon felt heat redden his face. He couldn't drag his eyes from Vin's face.

"Yes," Vin said. Dickon felt a barrier inside crumble. He drew a long breath. Perhaps this was the sign he had waited for.

"What are you suggesting?"

"I've got something you want to find out about. Am I right?" Again the subtle rubbing of knee against knee.

Dickon stared at the sharp face so delightfully framed by the curly black hair. "How do you know?" he whispered.

"Gaydar," Vin said. He grinned again, confident, and in charge. "My place or yours?"

"I can't do this," Dickon said, and turned away. Vin's fingers touched Dickon's knee. He felt them burning through the denim.

"I live in a mission room," Dickon said. "Not very private, especially in midday."

"My place, then," Vin said.

"I shouldn't." Dickon strained to get the words out through the thickness in his throat. Vin stroked Dickon's other knee.

"Why not? I can tell you want to." Vin's hand increased its pressure. Dickon felt his tumescence rise. Vin stood up. "Coming, Reverend?"

"Not quite, but close," Dickon said and stood. He hoped his arousal wouldn't be too obvious in his dark trousers. Vin glanced at his crotch and laughed.

"You'll be okay until we get to my place," he said. "Use your briefcase to cover up." He inclined his head toward the door. "Shall we go?"

### Emma Delivers

After several weeks, Emma learned she was pregnant. She was most confused by this turn of events, though she might have expected it after her tryst with Haakon. She sorely missed her mother, even though she could imagine the scorn and shame her mother might heap upon her. Emma was frightened, a little, too. She had never been close to any friend who had gone through a pregnancy, nor had she sisters or cousins to consult. Her doctor, Ringda Bell, was from India, and not a man she could easily approach about the more intimate feminine mysteries of pregnancy.

A new complication soon surfaced. One morning, shortly after opening the library, Emma took a call from Dr. Erma Geddon, her supervisor. She was "commanded" to appear at Dr. Geddon's office the next day.

Emma stopped at Gowns Galore, Purveyors of Fine Female Garments, to buy a new dress that would fit her a little better than her apricot linen (which, by the way, had one or two small smudges the dry cleaners despaired of removing safely). After much trying on of dresses and suits, Emma settled on a dark navy dress with white piping around the modestly high collar and modestly low hem. This she wore for her interview with Dr. Geddon.

Dr. Geddon's office was in a County Office Building on Fourth Street. The room was modest sized, and Dr. Geddon's desk overwhelmed it. A large mahogany slab perched on eight Greek columns, with an ornate landscape inlaid in light oak on the modesty panel that faced the visitor. A huge chair, heavy with black leather, provided Dr. Geddon seating. Dr. Geddon was a tiny woman, and the chair swallowed her as if a python swallows a mouse.

"Sit," she said to Emma, indicating the dark oak chair on the visitor's side of the desk. Emma perched on the edge of the uncomfortable chair. She knew from past visits that leaning back in the chair would cause the rungs to probe her spine with harsh bumps and knobs.

"Thank you for coming in," Dr. Geddon said. As always, Emma marveled how the woman's voice belied her tiny size. Though her tones were soft Dr. Geddon's words could cut through the noise of large lecture crowds or raging jackhammers. Dr. Erma Geddon, at fifty, packed a lot of personal dynamic power into her very small package. She was notorious for working six eighteen hour days a week, with Sundays set aside for twelve-hour stints of volunteer work in soup kitchens, missions for the derelict, teaching immigrants English, and other good works.

Emma answered several questions about the library, especially her work with the children's summer program. She was a little puzzled; Dr. Geddon could have asked these questions over the telephone without bringing Emma into her office.

"Emma," Dr. Geddon said, suddenly very serious, "how did you become pregnant?"

Emma stared at her supervisor. How on earth had she figured out Emma was pregnant when Emma had just learned it for herself?

"Please don't deny that you are pregnant," Dr. Geddon went on. "I could tell it the moment I saw you in the grocery last Saturday." Vaguely Emma remembered waving to Dr. Geddon across the produce section.

"I won't deny it," Emma said. "I just confirmed it with my doctor a few days ago."

"And when were you going to mention it to me?"

"I hadn't thought that through, yet." Emma wrung her hands in her lap. She wished she'd worn gloves with this dress. Her palms were sweating.

"The County Library System is quite severe about expectant mothers working with children. This is even more the case with unmarried mothers. I ask again, how did you become pregnant?"

Emma choked and coughed. She spoke in a tight dry voice that strained her throat. "It was the result of a chance encounter on the day of the Great Temblor." She cleared her throat. "It was my first such adventure."

"And, I hope, your last." Dr. Geddon frowned severely. "Will the father support the child?"

"I don't know. I don't know how to get in touch with him," Emma said. She heard the whine in her voice. She swallowed hard. "It was, as I say, a chance encounter."

"No doubt brought about by the stress of going through the Great Temblor." Dr. Geddon nodded. "You are probably only one of many to succumb to the stress of that event by seeking more intimate than usual companionship." Dr. Geddon folded her hands together, raised her index fingers in a steeple and touched those fingers to her lips.

"Do you intend to find the father?"

"I'll inquire," Emma said. "I don't have much hope of finding him."

"Good luck with that," Dr. Geddon said. "Now, as to what we do with you, your work with the children's program is, of course, no longer possible. You would be too scandalous for our rather conservative parental population."

Emma shrank in on herself. She waited for Dr. Geddon to go on, to fire her. Dr. Geddon appraised Emma. "I think," she said, "you'd best take up another position."

"I don't know where to go," Emma said. "I've always been a librarian."

"And a very fine one, too. The children's program you've developed is an excellent example of your work. Yet, I must put you where you won't shock your clientele, or worse, their parents."

Emma looked up. Tears trembled at the corners of her eyes. "Do you know of a place that's open?"

"I would like to re-assign you to the University Library. We manage it under contract to the University. Would you like to work there?"

"Yes," Emma said. "Yes, indeed." The commute was a little longer, but if that proved onerous, Emma could always move. The University also had a day care center that provided discount rates to University employees and contract employees.

"Then we'll arrange it to start next week. Good luck with your new position." Dr. Geddon waved her hand.

Emma recognized a dismissal. She stood, clutching her purse, and thought about bending over the desk to shake her supervisor's hand. She realized the impracticality of their arms bridging that vast distance, so she smiled, instead, and said, "Thank you, Dr. Geddon, for being so understanding."

"You're quite welcome. Do not mistake my understanding for approval of what you've done. I knew your mother well, and know how stressful this would be for her, if she knew."

Emma kept her knowledge of her mother's behavior to herself. No need to shock Dr. Geddon any more than she had.

"I am glad that you will take on the burden of your action, and bring this child to term. If you decide to keep it, be as good a mother as your own mother was. Now, goodbye."

Emma left the supervisor's office with a lightened heart. She reported to the University library at the beginning of the next week, and, at the allotted time, Notta Freed was born in the stacks between moldering volumes of obscure Victorian poetry and mildewed heaps of turn-of-the-century cycling periodicals.

### What Kind of Fool Was He?

Thinking himself several kinds of fool, Dickon followed Vin out the door, admiring the fit of his jeans while berating himself for taking such a chance. He was amazed to discover he was trembling as he walked beside Vin, his briefcase firmly in front of his telltale bulge.

The sexual encounter was not, as Dickon would later realize, much more than a kind of mutual masturbation. It was the emotional release that Dickon wondered about. A lifetime spent resisting this truth had not prepared him for the rightness of man on man sex. Forever after, even in his bitterest and darkest moments, Dickon could hearken back to this moment of liberation, a small sweaty encounter in a drab dormitory room in mid-afternoon.

Dickon pursued the connection well beyond that afternoon, of course. He slipped from liberation to infatuation to love in about twenty-four hours. Vin promised to see him again, and did meet him for dinners Dickon provided and hasty sex in odd corners of bathrooms and alleyways. Dickon was too naïve to notice Vin did not return any affection, that it was always sex between them, mechanical on Vin's part, passionate on Dickon's. Nonetheless, Dickon had his season of euphoria. Despite all that followed, he remembered the time as a glorious episode in his mundane life. Then Vanna contacted Chief Inspector Pryor.

Dickon was sitting in the Eleemosynary Eel, hoping Vin might drop by. It had been three days since he had seen Vin. Father Roman Hands surprised him by dropping into the seat next to him.

"Forget we had a staff meeting this afternoon?" the Father asked him. Dickon blushed.

"Yes," he said. "I forgot, completely."

Father Hands nodded. "Been a bit distracted, haven't you."

Dickon felt a cold chill start at his tailbone that crept up his spine.

"He isn't worth it, you know," Father Hands went on. Father Hands studied the table in front of him. He wanted to allow Dickon some time to get past his shock that someone had found him out.

"I..." Dickon coughed. He cleared his throat.

"I know what's been going on," Father Hands said. "You may think you've been discreet, but I have contacts in certain clubs. One of them recognized you. Recognized Vin, too."

Dickon was rigid with embarrassment and fear. His voice shook when he spoke. "What are you going to do?" he choked out.

"About you? Nothing." Father Hands looked at Dickon with great compassion. "I'm willing to consider the whole matter an aberration brought on by grief over your marriage breaking up. You're not the first assistant I've had who has strayed, one way or another." He smiled kindly at Dickon.

"You will, of course, not see the man again," Father Hands said with steel authority in his voice. "My source will remain discreet out of his own need for discretion," he went on. "I'm afraid, however, Vin's role in life is entirely too public now." Father Hands drew a newspaper clipping from within his cassock.

"Here," he said. "Read this." Dickon took the clipping and read it slowly.

_Hustler Arrested_

_The City, July 23, 1978_

_Police today arrested a male prostitute for soliciting a policeman in a restroom at City Hall. "Bold as brass, he was," Chief Inspector Polk N. Pryor, the arresting officer, said. "Touched me inappropriately, in front of a witness." Chief Inspector Pryor identified the man as Vincent Decatur, of the City, and discovered, upon booking him, that he was on probation for similar offenses in the past. Chief Inspector Pryor did not identify the witness. "He'll spend a few years in City Jail now," Chief Inspector Pryor said. "One more pervert off the street."_

"I need to go to him," Dickon said, and half rose from the table.

"You do not. By no means will you go anywhere near him, not if you value your career."

"Jesus said something about visiting the imprisoned was like visiting Jesus himself."

"He'll have spiritual guidance, if he'll accept it. You don't understand, do you?"

"Understand what?"

"Vin Decatur's a male prostitute, pure and simple."

"A male prostitute? Vin?" Dickon's chest was tight, as though a boa constrictor was squeezing him.

"Yes. My discrete contact says Vin's been a working rent boy for at least five years in the City."

"I had asked him to move in with me. He was thinking about it."

"Be glad he didn't move in. How much did you pay him?"

"I didn't. I bought him a few meals, a few drinks, that's all. No cash exchanged hands. Not even expensive gifts. I don't have the money for that."

"You're probably the only contact he's had in five years who hasn't had to pay him. Why, God only knows." Father Hands studied Dickon's face.

"Take the rest of the day off," he said to Dickon. "You've got some praying and penance to do." He saw a student approaching. She often came to debate theology with either Dickon or Father Hands. "Not today, Ophelia," he said. "Reverend Shayne is not well."

"No, I'm not, Ms. Payne," Dickon forced out. "I think I will go home, Father Hands." He got up slowly. Pressure still squeezed his chest until he thought his lungs would collapse. "Please excuse me," he said, and walked toward the door and the impossibly bright sunshine burning outside the Eleemosynary Eel.

La Señora was waiting for him when he got to the Mission. She looked stern and her eyes glittered. Dickon thought of the three Fates, especially Lachesis, who wields the shears that cut the thread of a man's life.

"Come in to my office," she said. Her tone was neutral, as if she had forced all feeling from her voice. "Sit down," she said, indicating the chair she reserved for guests and interviews.

"I've just got off the phone with Father Hands," she said. "He has told me quite a tale involving you and a male prostitute." She frowned. Dickon felt a blush begin somewhere in his bowels and rise up his body to flush his face. He sat still, waiting for a blow to fall.

"Was this your first foray into such a relationship?" La Señora's voice had an edge to it now that brooked no evasion.

"Yes," Dickon said. He choked the word out and cleared his throat. "I didn't know Vin was a hustler." He looked up at La Señora. "I thought Vin was an answer to a prayer."

"Oh? Explain." La Señora's eyes were steadily studying her fingernails.

"When I went to see Dr. Sicknell, she told me I was homosexual. And should be locked up for it."

"Yes. I remember your caustic comment on her compassion in your report to the Presbytery that you showed me."

"I should have been nicer."

"Perhaps."

"Well, she had a point. I'd tried to change myself for years. I put a lot of prayer and psychology into changing. Soon after I saw Dr. Sicknell, I just asked God to give me a sign, so I'd know whether I should be forever celibate, find a boyfriend, or try another girlfriend. I thought Vin was the sign."

"Did the sex seem natural to you?"

"Yes, more than anything I've ever experienced."

"You got your answer, then. Dangerous thing, leaving things up to a god. Too much truth involved, I think." She smiled at Dickon, a smile at once rueful and kindly.

"Do you have any way to make a living besides being a preacher?"

"No."

"Look for one, then. You will probably need it at some point. Not because I'm going to say anything. I'm nobody to judge somebody else's way of loving. Leave that to whatever gods may be. The world's a dangerous place, Dickon Shayne, and sometimes you are awfully naïve. Go to your room. You've got room and board here, as long as you need them, in exchange for your work with the derelicts we serve. Don't worry about Father Hands. He's got too much darkness in his own past to pass trouble along for anybody else." She waved toward the door.

"Get some sleep, brood, weep, whatever you need to do. Just don't get drunk. Our clients do enough of that."

Dickon got up to go. "Thank you," he said.

"Don't mention it."

He left the office and went to his room.

### Trial

Dickon's year of introspection had been tumultuous. He grieved he could not share so much of his spiritual growth, especially with Vin. Presbytery had no tolerance for that kind of spiritual growth. He had worded his Statement of Growth very carefully. He hoped it was sufficient.

Presbytery had gone through another of its frequent re-organizations, and now the Ministerial Commission consisted of three permanent members and two members appointed for a year. The three permanent members were Reverend Phil E. Buster, Reverend Shea Mauna Hughes, and Ruling Elder Andy Maime. Anne Tenor and Bobbo Link were no longer part of the Commission. In their places were the Reverend Thruston Pyston, a beaming blond side of beef, and Ruling Elder Chuck Lett, a pinched cruet of vinegar, neither of whom Dickon knew. Thruston Pyston had only recently joined the Presbytery from the Central Valley, and Chuck Lett was serving his first term as an ordained elder. Dickon wondered how two such newcomers had gotten appointments to one of the Presbytery's most sensitive committees.

Something cold wandered through the Sunday School room where the Commission was doing its business. It clashed oddly with the frolicking lambs and beaming children pictured on the pale green walls. It seemed to settle in an icy halo around the print of Salsman's Head of Christ mounted over the door.

"Let us pray," Phil began, bowing his head. Everyone else in the room bowed their heads. "Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father, grant that we do justice here today, to glorify Thy name. Amen."

"Let it be recorded," Phil intoned, "that this meeting has opened with prayer." Andy Maime made a note on the yellow legal pad before him.

"Dickon Shayne," Phil went on, "you have had the year this Commission promised you for introspection and self-examination. You have submitted, as we requested, a paper describing your spiritual exploration over the past year. We have all read that document, and prayerfully considered it." Dickon wondered why Phil had to orate to a few people around a table in the same orotund oratorical style he used for a congregation of one thousand plus on Sunday morning.

"In addition we have consulted your employer, Señora Salvación Mandor, as to her estimate of your progress. She thinks you have done well." Dickon responded with a brief smile to Thurston Pyston's grin that seemed permanently frozen on his fleshy lips. No one else smiled.

"We have also received information from other sources," Phil went on, "information that troubles us deeply." He coughed into his hand; some frog had interrupted the flow of oil in his throat. He extracted a snowy handkerchief from his dark suit coat pocket and coughed again, using the handkerchief to cover his mouth.

"Perhaps you will continue, Shea?" he said. "I'm having allergy troubles."

"Certainly." The lace Reverend Hughes wore with her black dress today was either ecru or deliberately coffee-stained to resemble ecru. It was uneven in color. Her pigeon pout bosom heaved as she sighed.

"We have first the report of Dr. Senda Sicknell," Shea said. "She notes in her interview your distress over your divorce, and pays particular attention to your repeated statements about not finding another woman to replace your wife."

Dickon raised an eyebrow. He knew what was coming. He stared at the frolicking lambs and found no help in them.

"Dr. Sicknell," Shea said, homing in on her point like a falcon dropping on a rabbit, "suggests in the strongest terms this attitude indicates a latent homosexuality."

"So she said to me," Dickon replied with a flash of anger. "She also said I should be locked up in a mental ward because of it. I disagreed." He spoke through tight lips. He was keeping his control as smooth as he could.

"She notes you were not receptive to therapy on this point." Andy Maime scratched notes on his legal pad. His voice was dry as desert sand.

"I thought she was out of line," Dickon said, "in her approach, and I don't agree with her assessment that homosexuality is a mental disorder."

"It is a sin, not a sickness," Thruston Pyston said, his voice a pale golden echo of honey.

"And one you are guilty of," Chuck Lett said as he thumped his fist on the table. His voice was gravel and grating hinges.

"What?" Dickon said. The attack was a complete surprise to him. None of these people could know about Vin Decatur. That episode in his life was completely distinct from all the rest of it, and thoroughly private.

"We have a document accusing you," Phil said, his voice box recovered. "From your ex-wife."

"Vanna? She communicated with the Presbytery? How did you make that happen?"

"She wrote voluntarily. Read the document, Andy."

"We had offered her the chance to tell her side of the breakup," Andy said. He spoke slowly. "She responded several months after your last session with us. She wrote this letter to us."

_Commissioners of Presbytery, I have been reluctant to respond to your inquiry about my broken marriage with the Reverend Dickon Shayne only because I wish him no more harm than he has already caused himself._

_Briefly, while the law allowed me to cite incompatible differences, you should know that Reverend Shayne's sexual predilections do not tend toward the normal, but toward the perverse. He has fixed his affections on men. I did not understand this was the root cause of our disharmony until some months after I had chosen to leave him. I observed him one night at a restaurant in the City in the company of a certain Vincent Decatur. I would not have thought much about this, except that this same Vincent Decatur came to me soon afterward to consult me in my role as a City social worker._

_It seems Reverend Shayne, whom Mr. Decatur did not know was my former husband, had seduced him into a perverted sexual relationship. Sadly, I suspect Reverend Shayne is not suited to ministry in the Presbytery._

Andy Maime looked up. "She gave us Mr. Decatur's address, and we contacted him. He wrote us this response." Andy shuffled the papers.

_Yes, I was sexually involved with the man you identify as the Reverend Dickon Shayne. He approached me at City College where we were both students. Against my better judgment, and to my continuing regret, I allowed him to persuade me to enter into a sexual liaison of several weeks duration. I was not aware he was a clergyman until after I broke off the affair._

"Do you deny these accusations?" Phil asked in a chill tone.

"I deny that I initiated the relationship with Mr. Decatur, and the implication that he was somehow too naïve to fend me off is ridiculous. Mr. Decatur is a hustler, something I didn't know until several weeks after he seduced me." Dickon struggled to keep his tone even, and not let his fury overcome him.

"Did you have a sexual liaison with Mr. Decatur?" Thruston Pyston's voice no longer held honey. Now it was steel.

"Yes." Dickon saw no reason to fight any longer. He knew his church days were numbered. He surrendered the church.

"And this liaison continued for several weeks?" The steel voice drilled on.

"Yes," Dickon snapped.

"And you willingly participated in these sessions?" Shea Mauna Hughes asked this, almost shuddering with her disgust.

"Yes," Dickon said, feeling his anger rise in his throat.

"Are you aware of the Scriptural passages condemning to such activities?" Thruston Pyston's steel voice rang like a closing trap.

"I know several that are so interpreted." Dickon fought back his urge to shout.

"Don't split hairs," Shea snapped. She stared at him with disgust. Her nose twitched like she smelled a foul sewer.

"Do you repent this involvement?" The question from Elder Chuck Lett startled Dickon.

He thought carefully. "No," Dickon said. "It has been liberating for me to acknowledge a truth about myself. I find God's healing hand in recognizing my affectional orientation." There it was. Let them deal with it.

"Blasphemy!" expostulated Shea Mauna Hughes. Her bosom heaved with such indignation that Dickon expected the pseudo-ecru lace to fly across the room. He hoped her seams were strong enough to prevent an unseemly escape of her bosoms. The thought of their being loose and flapping appalled him.

"You are not fit to be a Minister of the Gospel," Thruston said, pursing his fleshy pink lips in disapproval. "Mr. Chairman, I move we recommend to the Presbytery that Dickon Shayne be defrocked for gross impiety and irreparable breach of morals."

"Second!" Chuck, Shea, and Andy chorused.

"All in favor say 'Aye'" Phil said.

Dickon sat stunned for a moment, feeling more divorced than he had when Vanna had dumped him. At least then, he thought numbly, I had chow mein to keep me occupied. He stood slowly, leveraging himself up from the table with his fists. I will not shout, and I will not weep, he promised himself. Not until I'm out of this nest of asps. He stared at each of the committee members in turn.

"You have spoken," he said. "I leave it to a just God to judge you. Do what you will. So be it. "Let the Presbytery do its worst. It can do no more to me than you have already done in its name." He turned, holding his fragile dignity about him like a suit of armor. He walked to the door, yearning to say something crushing. It came to him.

"I learned more about love from that hustler, Vin Decatur, in six weeks than I learned in fifteen years from the Church. When it comes to betrayal, you're equal teachers." He opened the door and went through it, closing it quietly behind him. The lambs frolicked and the children beamed on the walls as Andy Maime wrote the official minutes of the meeting.

### A Letter in Dickon's Box

Dickon took the mail from his mail slot in the Mission's office. It had the usual sheaf of advertisements for book clubs, credit cards, missing children, and grocery stores. Tucked between a sheet of pizza coupons and a fried chicken ad Dickon found an envelope scrawled with his name and address in an unfamiliar penciled handwriting. The postmark was La Lechuga. No return address.

Dickon took the envelope to his room and carefully slit it open with his souvenir Chinatown letter opener. He drew out four sheets of cheap notepaper covered in the same penciled scrawl. He unfolded the sheets, taking care not to smear the graphite words beyond legibility. The letter opened with just a salutation, and plunged right in. No date.

_Dear Rev. Shayne,_

_A pal, one of the inmate nurses, is writing this for me. I can't manage to write for myself anymore. Got in a fight, got shafted with a shiv. The docs here tell me I'm about done for. Was bound to happen sooner or later. Never could keep my notions to myself when I should have._

_The local padre tells me I should "unburden my soul" before I go. Doubt it'll do much good. I'll burn in Hell for all my sins anyway._

_But, for what it's worth to you, you should know I was real touched when you wanted me to move in with you. Wouldn't have worked, Rev, not the way you wanted, but it was a nice thought. I've been way beyond loving and being loved for a lot of years._

_You're the only guy I did for a long time without charge. Maybe you've heard enough about me to know that was unusual. Well, I didn't do you without charge, I just didn't charge you. Some woman named Vanna hired me to get you in a situation she could use against you. I did. She didn't pay off. Turned me in to the pigs, instead. So here I am, dying in the joint's infirmary, surrounded by cons and cockroaches. Proper end for Mrs. Decatur's little mistake, I guess._

_I'm sorry I messed up your life, but at the time, it was my life or yours. I was never unselfish. If you ever think about me, think kindly sometimes._

_Vincent Decatur_

A one-inch newspaper clipping fell out of the last sheets. The headline read "Inmate Dies." The body said:

_An inmate of State Prison, Vincent Decatur, serving a five-year sentence for male prostitution, died Friday from wounds suffered during an exercise yard brawl. Warden Roy L. Payne commented, "Male hustlers don't last long in this man's prison." An investigation was unable to fix blame for the stabbing._

"Take him in," Dickon murmured, to no god in particular. He was too numb, just then, to sort out his feelings. He had known about Vin's betrayal since the Presbytery defrocked him. Only long after did he come to understand Vin had given him a great gift, in freeing him to be himself, a lover of men. By then he had forgiven Vin his betrayal, and prayed peace for the man's troubled soul.

### I Never Promised You a Thornless Rose

They had been sleeping together about three months when Len came by Ben's place on Never-Maiden Court one afternoon. Ben answered the importunate doorbell with some irritation. He was studying for a major examination in computer operations.

Len stood at the door, his hair waved impeccably, as always, and his shirt and trousers crisply pressed and in place. Ben felt very sloppy indeed in his sweat pants and athletic shirt that was two sizes too big for him. Len held a rose, perfectly petaled, with a crystal drop of dew trembling on the lip of its center petal. Ben never learned how Len accomplished that on a warm summer afternoon.

"Hi," he said when he opened the door. "What brings you by?'"

"For you," Len said, handing him the rose. Ben took it.

"Ouch," he said, and grasped it carefully with the thumb and forefinger of his other hand. He sucked at the thorn prick on his wounded thumb.

"Roses have thorns," Len said dryly.

"And silver fountains mud," Ben said.

"What?" Len asked.

"Just finishing the Shakespeare line," Ben said, "from the sonnets."

"If you say so," Len answered.

Ben stood back so Len could enter. "What brings you by today?" Ben asked. "I hadn't expected to see you until tomorrow. And why the rose?"

"I had a thought," Len said. "I know you are preparing for your computer exams." He sat down on Ben's sagging couch. "I promise I won't stay long. Didn't you say one of the operations centers is across the Bay, in the suburbs?"

"Yes. That's the one they're having trouble recruiting for."

"My company is moving across the Bay. Not too far from Bumbershoot's computer center, as it happens." Len sat back and folded his arms. "That's going to make a long commute for me." Len had a small house three blocks from the sea just south of the City. "I'm thinking of moving over to the east side."

"Of the City?" Ben had gone to the kitchen cupboard to get a plain glass for the rose.

"Of the Bay," Len said. Ben felt an odd sense of loss rise up in him. If Len lived and worked in the suburbs, Ben would see less of him. He walked back into the living room, carrying the glass and the rose.

"I thought you might like to move in with me," Len said.

Ben stared at Len, as he sank onto the couch with him, still holding the glass and the rose. "I don't have much to put down on a house," he said. "I'll have to think about it, Len."

"I've got some I can lend you. And with your new job, you could pay me back pretty quick." Ben heard an urgent undertone in Len's voice. He's afraid I'll say no, Ben thought, and I want to say yes.

"I know I'm a little older than you are," Len began, looking studiously away from Ben.

"That's got nothing to do with it," Ben said. "It's all about the money, whether I can come up with enough. Yes," Ben said, "my answer is yes, if I can swing my end financially. I don't want to be a kept man, Len." Len leaned over toward Ben and kissed him.

"No, I wouldn't expect you would," he said. "We'll have to spend some time looking for the right place, you know. We can get a decent-sized place, I'm sure. Property is less costly across the Bay."

Ben got up from the couch. He took the glass and the rose. He ran water into the glass, and put the rose in it. He brought it back into the living room and set it on the table by his favorite chair. "Let me get through my exam," he said. "I'll be finished with that tomorrow. Then we can plan how to go house hunting." He leaned over Len and kissed him.

"Thanks for the rose," Ben said.

## The Quiet Passages

### Letters from Osso Del Oso

Ben kept in touch with his professor, John Dilbert Doe. All of Ben's other acquaintance in Colorado were either childhood companions, known to him only because they had all lived in the same town, or people he had known at the bank. None of these chance relationships survived Ben's move to the City, nor had he wanted them to. Professor Doe, or "Dill" as Ben called him, was another matter. Dill had shown Ben there was a door on his closet, and a way out. So it was that Ben wrote first to Dill to tell him about Len.

_Professor John Dilbert Doe  
1868 Forgotten Lane  
Greeley, Colorado  
April 17, 1978_

_Dear Dill,_

_Remember I wrote you about helping with earthquake relief right after I got here? I met a man there, Len DeLys, who was in charge. I only found out later it was because he decided somebody had to be in charge, and took over. Anyway, he directed the emergency hospital set up in the dressing tent for the Carnival Parade. I came to admire his stamina; for an older guy, he could keep very long hours. He's not bad looking, either._

_Well, I ran into him a few months back. He was outside the old auntie's bar on the Street. He invited me in for a drink. I felt obliged to accept his kindness, since I was thirsty and had no plans._

_I felt very strange walking into that group of older men. Many of them ogled me as though they were ready to drool over me. I'm not quite a twink, myself, anymore, but that group sure made me feel like one. Len took a quick look at my face; I suppose my embarrassment showed. "Down Girls!" he said. That got a laugh, and the crowd turned away to leave us to ourselves._

_He bought me a drink, and then I bought him one, and he bought me one, and I bought him one, and back and forth. We started off talking about the weather and reminiscing about the quake. When the evening came, he invited me to have dinner with him the following night. We had seafood, and a couple of glasses of wine. I was pretty loose when we got through. We saw The Mikado, in the park. He kissed me, and we went to our separate bus stops. I thought that was the end of it._

_About a week later, he showed up at my door, apologizing for not calling, because he didn't have my phone number. He had a dozen roses to present to me, and an invitation for another evening on the town, to include dinner and a movie. We've dated steadily ever since. Next month we plan to find a house together. I'm in love, and, for the first time, I think it's meant to last._

_Vital statistics: Len is taller than I am, over six feet, solid build, with a handsome head of hair and a profile like Michael Caine. He's "well-endowed," as well. Face on he's all himself. He's a tender and considerate lover, and a persistent one. Be happy for me, Dill._

_Please say hello to Hi for me._

_Ben_

Len and Ben spent several weekends looking for a house across the Bay. They finally found a place that suited them both in Cowpens. It had three bedrooms, a small but well-planned kitchen, a living room, and family room divided by a wide arch, and two baths. It was convenient to public transit for both their jobs. When they had moved in and unpacked all the essential boxes, Ben sat down to write his brother in Colorado.

_Hardin Soul  
Box 27  
Rural Route 2  
Berthoud, CO  
May 4, 1978_

_Dear Hardin,_

_I have found a life's companion. He is twelve years older than I am, with a strong muscular body and a face that shows his kindness. His eyes are blue-green, and usually have thoughts dancing in them. His hair is the rich brown color of a strong cup of tea. He's all-around handsome, is what I'm saying. I'm moving in with him at the end of the week. My address will be:_

_817 Lost Sombrero Lane  
Cowpens_

_Len is well established in his career. He manages events for various clients in the City, events such as street fairs, carnivals, business luncheons for visiting dignitaries, that kind of thing._

_I hope you and Enna can come to the City to meet Len. Or, maybe, we can come there. Have a good summer, and write when you can._

_Ben_

Ben's letter shocked Hardin. It gnawed at him, and he began to doubt Ben's many kindnesses toward him. Big brother couldn't be one of those, those man lovers! It had to be a corruption, maybe something in the water or the lifestyles in the City. What else could have turned Ben?

Enna, Hardin's wife, was outraged when she saw the letter. Hardin had not intended for her to see it. His shame for his brother was too great. Enna explained it as she explained so many unpleasant things in life. It must be the influence of Satan. She dictated Hardin's reply. He wrote the three sentences with a heavy heart and a stumbling pen. Then he mailed it to Ben.

Hardin's reply was a stinging rejection. "We're all shamed by your behavior. You will burn in Hell. Even a merciful God can't forgive sodomy!" Merely that; no salutation, no closing, and no date. Ben tore up the letter before Len could read it. Len had brought the mail in, though, and guessed that Ben's brother had written. Bit by bit he teased the facts out of Ben, and comforted him. Eventually Ben calmed enough to write back to Hardin.

_Hardin Soul  
Box 27  
Rural Route 2  
Berthoud, CO  
May 21, 1978_

_Dear Hardin,_

_Your letter was very harsh. I didn't know you had such strong opinions. I'm no different than I've always been. I thought you knew I am a man for men; I've been active since my college days._

_Dear brother, I am not going to Hell because I love a man. I do not molest little boys, and I do not expose myself to innocent women in the parks. I am what I am, your brother, who is homosexual. No, I will not change, nor would seeking a lost Jesus change me. If God made me, he made me gay. I still love you, Hardin. Don't break contact with me._

_Ben_

Hardin hid Ben's letter from Enna. Inwardly, confused and disgusted as he was, Hardin felt Enna had pushed him too far. Thereafter he sent Ben a card every Christmas, and Ben sent him one. What Ben could not know was that Hardin sent the cards secretly so his wife, Enna, couldn't raise a protest.

### Gathering

The weeks following the Great Temblor kept La Señora and her volunteers very busy. It was some days before the authorities could entirely organize relief efforts. Had it not been for La Señora, Len DeLys, and others like them bringing together the various volunteer and self-help efforts, starvation and disease could well have destroyed the City.

Slowly, the workload decreased; the homeless found housing, the hungry could again buy and sell in the work places and marketplaces. La Señora returned to helping only the most indigent and undesirable of the human flotsam floating on the City's sea. Elke and Rosa remained with her, as did Willy.

Elke, between organizing efforts, courted Rosa with gentle persistence. La Señora observed and said nothing. Rosa, whose upbringing had included several doses of restrictive religion, struggled against her attraction to Elke. One evening she came to La Señora for guidance.

"Señora," she said, after La Señora had welcomed her in, "I lost my mother many years ago, and I have no one else to turn to. Please be understanding with me."

"What troubles you Rosa?" La Señora asked, fairly certain she knew what the matter was.

"I have strong feelings, romantic feelings, toward Elke," Rosa said in halting phrases. La Señora waited for her to go on. Rosa searched La Señora's face for condemnation; La Señora kept her expression carefully neutral.

"I don't know what to do," Rosa said. She spread her hands helplessly.

"What do you want to do?"

"I want to be with Elke, to touch her and have her hold me, and I want to run away, far away."

"Have you mentioned how you feel to Elke?"

"Oh, no--she might be offended!"

"I somehow doubt it," La Señora said. "I think Elke is a woman who prefers women."

"There are women like that?"

"Yes."

"It isn't right, though, is it? For a woman to love another woman, that way I mean?"

"It isn't wrong to love. Turning away from love can be destructive." La Señora looked into a far distant place. "I turned away from love once, at my father's urging. I've never had another chance to love anyone, romantically, since."

"You? I thought you were dedicated to God."

"I'm not a nun, for all I dress like one. I have other spiritual connections, not the expected church connections. I use their uniform simply as a cover in a society that doesn't understand much beyond its own navel."

"So, you think I should talk to Elke?"

"Yes. The worst that can happen is she says no to you. Talk to her." La Señora smiled at Rosa, and patted one of her hands. "Nothing ventured, nothing gained," she said, once again thankful for the power of a cliché.

"I will, Señora, I will. Bless you." Rosa turned to go. "Oh, can I get you anything, tea, perhaps?"

"Not right now. I may send Willy along later to fetch me something."

La Señora turned back to her desk and the pile of paper on it. She sighed. Willy came out of the shadows in a corner of her office. He stood mutely by her, dutifully wearing the shorts she insisted on. He didn't speak for a long time.

"Señora," he said, "when were you in love?"

La Señora started. She hadn't head Willy's approach. He so seldom initiated a conversation that his question particularly startled her. She took a deep breath before answering.

"It was long ago," she said, "in a city filled with flowers under a pearl gray sky beside the green ocean." Willy waited mutely, his shining eyes begging her to continue. She looked at the pleading boy and recognized this was a new step for him, to take interest in someone other than himself and something other than cookery.

"The city was Lima, in Peru, my mother's country. In a part of that city, the people grow many flowers. So many flowers that section's name is Miraflores, which means 'look at the flowers' in Spanish. I was a guest there, in the home of one of my father's friends, when I met him."

"Him?"

"Reggie. O. Reginald Shinn. A 'leftenant' in the British Army. He worked at the Embassy in Lima. He was so handsome, blonde, and blue-eyed, with the form of a god. So wonderful to look at in his uniform. And a dancer, lighter on his feet than any feather on the breeze. When I danced with him, I became a feather adrift on the wind." La Señora sighed.

"He escorted me to all the major social events that season. And then my father and mother came to bring me back here, to the City. Reggie promised to write me, but I never got a letter. I was so disappointed with Lt. O. Reginald Shinn I vowed never to fall in love again, and I haven't." Tears stood in La Señora's eyes. Willy stood on tiptoe and kissed her on the cheek. He handed her a tissue from the box on her desk, and softly left the room. La Señora sat in the gathering shadows, remembering the pearly light of Lima.

### The Pitts

La Señora read the letter the tall, awkward man in front of her had presented. It was from the Rev. Bobbo Link, whom La Señora had long respected for his judgment and kindness to various strays. One was Dickon Shayne, who had come to her down on his luck, and stayed to help the homeless and hopeless find new life within them. Now Rev. Link had sent her another case. She looked up from the brief letter. True to his discrete nature, Bobbo Link had not detailed the troubled history of Harry Pitts to her.

"Rev. Link says here," she said to the man in front of her, "that you will tell me your history. You are, he indicates, fresh from the Central American Mission Field?"

"Yes, in Belize." The man mumbled.

"You were asked to leave?" La Señora inquired. The man stared at her with a look of almost terror. She looked severe in her black dress. Its neckline was high, and unrelieved with lace, brooch or pectoral cross. She wore a black poke bonnet on her head. Other times she wore a scarf. The poke bonnet she thought of as her "Salvation Army" outfit. The scarf she thought of as a wimple substitute. Either gave her an air of nineteenth century dignity and puritanical righteousness. She found the costumes useful theater in dealing with the alcoholic indigents and drugged homeless who formed such a large part of her clientele.

"Why were you asked to leave?" she said. The nervous man in front of her shuffled his feet, and cleared his throat several times, before he answered.

"Because of the boy, Ma'am," he said.

La Señora stared up at him over the tops of her reading glasses. It increased the severity of her black eyes measurably. "The boy?"

"A boy my sister rescued, just a babe he was."

"For an act of your sister's charity you were asked to leave your mission?"

"Yes, Ma'am."

"Please explain."

"The Mission Board listened to gossip, and misunderstood," Harry Pitts said. "Olive, my sister, went into the highlands to train the women of several villages in elementary sanitation and other housewifely improvements. She was gone nearly seven months. While she was there, she found Hiram, that's the boy, alone in a hut with his dead mother. She brought him home." Harry stopped. La Señora sighed.

"How was that misunderstood?" Harry blushed deep red and cringed.

"The Mission Board took it that Hiram was my son, begotten on my own sister." Harry's misery was evident.

"Why?"

"Rumors, we guess, or jealousy." Harry bowed his head and studied his hands rolling and unrolling the papers he held. "We don't know how the talk started."

"Where is Hiram now?"

"The Mission Board took him from us, to provide him a Christian home. We aren't allowed to know where he is." The man looked La Señora straight in the eye. "We would still serve, if you have a place for us."

La Señora folded the letter and put it in the envelope. She tapped a corner of it against her teeth. Harry Pitts waited quietly in front of her.

"I think I may find a place," she said. "Do you have living quarters?"

"Not as yet. The Mission Board offered us no stipend."

"I can't pay you, but I can offer you food and shelter for a little while, in return for practical help with my work here at the Mission. You and your sister can move in tomorrow."

"Thank you, Ma'am, and God bless you."

"She already has," La Señora said, and pretended not to notice Harry's shock at the gender she gave the Divine Pronoun.

When Harry and Olive came the next day, they had only two battered suitcases each. One held clothes for Harry, another clothes for Olive, the third held a skillet, a pot, and two place settings of heavy earthenware and a small set of stainless steel flatware. Someone had wrapped these items carefully in bath towels and hand towels. The fourth suitcase held books and papers, primarily Biblical tracts and engineering books on primitive septic system construction. La Señora saw this poverty because she helped Olive unpack.

Olive Pitts could have been a pretty matron, had she not eschewed cosmetics and styled hair. She wore her hair in a severe bun. La Señora privately labeled Olive's coiffure the "Missionary Position" hairdo. Olive's face, just a few years past its petite and pretty youth, teetered on the brink of pinched spinster. She said very little, until La Señora mentioned the baby she had left behind in Belize. That opened a torrent of talk that did not stop until Harry returned from some errand he had invented in order to avoid the unpacking. Only days later would La Señora learn Olive was an accomplished plumber and electrician.

### Last of the Kuanyins

Malcolm took a call from Chief Inspector Pryor.

"Mr. Drye? Chief Inspector Pryor here."

"Yes, Chief Inspector. What may I do for you?"

"I've consulted with my superiors. They see no reason for us to keep the black book or the statue. By rights they're your property."

"Oh. All right."

"By the way, do you have a sister?"

"Heavens, no, Chief Inspector. Mother only raised boys."

"A woman called, said she was your sister, Vanna Dee."

"She's mistaken, at best, or up to no good. We Dryes never had a sister."

"She claims she has a receipt from a Wong Brothers Import/Export Emporium in Chinatown for the statue."

"Quig may have had a secretary. He was devious enough to hire a devious secretary. Is there any way to get that receipt?"

"Yes. I'll tell her I need it for verification, or something. Then I can 'lose' it."

"If you'd do that, Chief Inspector, I'd be most appreciative."

"Glad to foil a scam, sir, any time." The Chief Inspector rang off.

Two days later, he came by Malcolm's apartment and brought the receipt and the statue, as well as the black book. Malcolm, being at leisure that day, sat down and deciphered the book. He learned that the statue was one of three, and that it contained some kind of treasure. Quigley's notes were vague about the nature of the treasure, but he had guessed it must be small to be contained in the three statues. Quigley, of course, had hoped it was gems.

Malcolm set the little black book aside and thought. He took the statue out of its Wong Brothers bag and turned it over and over in his hands. He saw nothing to indicate what, if any, treasure it could hold. He got his coat and a bowler, took up his cane (which he carried for effect) and the bag with the Kuanyin. He caught the bus for Chinatown.

Mae Ling was at the cash register when Malcolm came in. The Wong brothers were in the back, reviewing their inventory.

"May I help you?" Mae asked.

"Yes," Malcolm said. "I have a receipt from your shop. My brother had it in his pocket when he died in the recent quake."

"My condolences on your loss."

"Thank you. We were not close."

Mae kept silent. She did not want to explore anyone else's troubled waters. Her own pond was ruffled enough with conflict. Her father disapproved her pretensions to authorship. He wanted her to take over aspects of the family business.

"My brother had evidently purchased this item," Malcolm went on. "It is supposed to be one of a set of three." Mae held her face immobile. She recognized the Kuanyin's style. It matched the two she had taken home.

"Did you wish to return the item?"

"I don't know...if the other two are available, I'd like them, I guess."

Mae leaned over the counter. She exposed her small cleavage to good advantage. Malcolm carefully averted his eyes. Bosoms were not to his taste.

"Did Ms. Dee send you?" Mae's voice was sharp.

"Who?"

"Ms. Vanna Dee. Did she send you?"

"Absolutely not. I don't know Vanna Dee. Has she been here trying to pass herself off as my sister?" Malcolm's anger thickened his tenor voice to almost a hoarse base. He was growing red in the face.

"She said she was the secretary of the original purchaser, and wanted to come by to pick the article up. I checked with both of the Misters Wong. The purchaser had taken it with him."

"Was the purchaser a large man, perhaps dressed in a red dragon robe?"

"Mr. Wong, Mr. Waylon Wong, waited on him. He remarked that the man was a Caucasian dressed as a Chinese Mandarin of the T'ang Dynasty. He thought it in very poor taste."

"That sounds like my half-brother, Quigley Drye. Quig had no taste." Malcolm unconsciously brushed an imagined speck from his right lapel. "This artifact was among the possessions he carried when he died."

"He is dead?"

"In the quake. Part of a freeway overpass fell on him. Quite flattened him."

"Ms. Dee wished to have me be an agent for her in acquiring the other two for her employer."

"Quig employs no one, now. I shall have to contemplate legal action against Ms. Dee; I have already advised the police of her fraudulent representation of herself as a Drye sister."

Mae spoke in a low, conspiratorial voice. "I own the other two statues. A street thief brought them in a few days ago. Without the third, they are worth little. Even as a set, they are crude Qing Dynasty work. I do not know how this shop got the one you have; the ones I bought obviously came from some of the rubble in the City."

"According to the notes my brother kept, they were worth a great deal to someone in China," Malcolm said, "but only as a set of three."

"This is not a good place for us to talk; I do not want to jeopardize my employment with the Wong brothers. What is your name, sir?"

"Malcolm. Malcolm Drye."

"Mr. Drye, I am Mae Ling." She wrote an address on a piece of paper. "Come tonight to see me at this address. It is public enough we may both feel safe, and private enough we may conduct business in private. Perhaps we can discover what makes these clay figures valuable, and come to some agreement about sharing their value."

Malcolm took the piece of paper. He recognized the address of the Palace of the Jaded Concubine, a discreet restaurant that catered to a clientele desirous of privacy. He had used it himself on those few occasions his date for the evening required absolute discretion.

"I know this place. I'll be there," he said. "At what time, and for whom shall I ask?"

"At seven, I think, before the place is too filled and busy. Ask for White Lotus. You may identify yourself as the Lesser Dragon. I will arrange for our meeting. The owner is a relative."

"Done," Malcolm said. "Until seven, then." He waved as he left the shop.

### News from Greeley

Ben received a news clipping and obituary from Highland Ewall, his professor's lover. A graduate student, furious that his wife was having an affair with a professor, shot and killed John Dilbert Doe by mistake, thinking him to be the adulterer. Ben read them in shock.

_Ben Soul  
817 Lost Sombrero Lane  
Cowpens, CA  
July 7, 1979_

_Ben Soul:_

_It is my sad duty to tell you our beloved Dill has passed away, the victim of mistaken identity and a murderer's bullet. We buried him in Denver June 30th. I've enclosed a newspaper clipping with further information._

_In sad sincerity,_

_Highland Ewall_

_Professor Slain_

_Greeley, CO, June 21, 1979—A professor was shot today on the CSC campus. Professor John Dilber Doe was walking from one class to the next when a graduate student leaped from a spireia hedge and fired three shots at the professor. One shot struck him squarely in the heart. He died instantly at the scene._

_Campus police apprehended the shooter after a short chase. The shooter, as yet unidentified, claimed Professor Doe was romantically involved with his wife._

_The shooter's wife, also unnamed by police, admitted she was involved with a professor on campus, but vehemently avowed it was not Professor Doe she was involved with. Police investigation continues._

Ben wrote condolences to Highland.

_Highland Ewall  
1868 Forgotten Lane  
Greeley, CO  
July 18, 1979_

_Highland Ewall_

_Your news shocked me. I have trouble imagining all that vitality stilled. Dill was always so vigorous. I can still hear his laughter. I can still hear him boring through the bullshit to make a profound point. I will miss him._

_Let this be my testimonial to him that you ask for. I wandered into his class because I thought he was a dynamo, not because I had any interest in philosophy. Within a lecture or two, he had me fascinated with playing ideas against each other. Soon he included me in several informal seminars at his home. He confronted me with my sexuality._

_I was profoundly disturbed that anyone had divined my difference. He helped me understand what a gift my difference could be by telling me his own life history. I've learned since he'd done similar things for a lot of other young gay men who were struggling to come out. How ironic it is, for him to have died for the reason he did._

_How did that graduate student ever mistake Dill for the professor who seduced his wife? Well, leave that to the law to punish._

_Do take care of yourself, Hi. If you come this way, drop by to see me and I'll introduce you to Len._

_Ben_

Ben did not hear from Highland Ewall again.

### At the Palace of the Jaded Concubine

The Palace of the Jaded Concubine did not advertise its presence with neon. One entered its foyer through a small red door set in a brick wall along an alley of the City. In the foyer a young man dressed in what Malcolm thought of as a Fu Manchu costume, a long black robe, a stiff black square hat almost like a mortarboard, and long drooping moustaches, obviously false, greeted him.

"This is a private establishment," the young man intoned.

"The Lesser Dragon is here to dine with White Lotus."

"Of course, sir. Right this way."

The young man led Malcolm through a discreet black door behind a richly embroidered wall hanging. The interior of the Palace, reserved for the privileged, was a long corridor flanked on either side by booths of dark rosewood. Dim lights provided only enough illumination to keep one's feet on the dark red carpet. Many of the booths had curtains made of glass bead strings that distorted and deflected both sight and sound from within the booths.

A portly man of solemn mien came out of the men's room at the far end of the corridor and entered a booth near the point Malcolm and his escort had reached. The portly man brushed aside the beaded curtains, and said "Hello, Peter," to someone inside. The portly man's voice oozed mellifluous menace.

The person inside said, "I've been waiting for you, Sidney." Malcolm guessed the accent was possibly French; his voice held a perpetual whining undertone as menacing as the portly man's mellow tones.

Malcolm's escort knocked discreetly at a solid door on the right hand side of the corridor near the end with the restrooms. A voice said something Malcolm couldn't quite make out.

"I bring the Lesser Dragon," his escort said.

Mae Ling opened the door. To Malcolm's surprise she wore a simple sheathe, dark green in color, with matching pumps. He had expected something more ornate, more like a geisha's kimono and obi. She peered at him, and nodded.

"Come in," she said. "I have ordered for us. A chef will serve us soon. We may discuss business after we have eaten." She stood aside so Malcolm could enter. Yellow ginger jar lamps with red paper shades lit the room dimly. Malcolm thought it dark and mysterious. Incense had burned in the room, though none was burning now. Malcolm thought the stale sweetness in the air stuffy and the psychic atmosphere threatening. He took the seat Mae indicated for him. Again a discreet knock at the door.

"Enter," Mae Ling said.

A man, neither old nor young, yet somehow more boy in appearance than man, opened the door and pushed a small metal cart in. He swiftly pushed the cart into a corner. Malcolm recognized him from previous visits. He was the one they called Toy Boy. Malcolm had not realized he was also a chef.

"We will begin," Toy Boy said, "with sliced jellyfish and Golden Wontons." He opened his cart to reveal a work surface and a burner with a wok. First Toy Boy lit the burner. Then he stooped, took out ingredients from behind the doors of the cart, and put them on the work area. The jellyfish was already sliced and on chilled plates. Toy Boy set these plates before Mae Ling and Malcolm. Chopsticks lay beside their place settings.

"Enjoy," Mae Ling said, and deftly picked up a ring of jellyfish with her chopsticks and brought it to her lips. Malcolm followed suit, though not so deftly. The jellyfish was rubbery, had no discernible flavor, and somehow intrigued the palate. While they chewed on the jellyfish rings, Toy Boy took wonton wrappers, put a dollop of ground shrimp, pork, and scallion in the center of each, folded them over, crimped them, and dropped them in the wok where the oil was already bubbling.

When they were golden brown, Toy Boy took the wontons from the oil, put them on a rack attached to the wok to drain, and poured two sauces into the hollows of a divided dish. He set the dish on the table. "Hot sauce," he said, pointing to one side, "sweet and sour sauce," he said, pointing to the other side. Then he gave each of them a plate with three golden wontons. To boiling stock, he added beaten egg white, allowing it to just float on the surface. Over the egg white dollops he sprinkled finely minced ham and scallions. He seasoned the soup with salt and pepper and put it before them. "Floating Blossoms Soup," he said.

As they enjoyed the wontons and soup, Toy Boy busied himself at his wok.

He prepared a dish of small beef slices in a sauce over fried cellophane noodles garnished with scallions. Toy Boy set up a bamboo steamer over a second burner. Then he rolled ground pork balls in rice and dried onion flakes. He set them on a plate in the steamer. Then he arranged chicken slices and ham slices in the center of a serving dish, and surrounded the mound with parboiled broccoli. He mixed a clear sauce in the wok, and poured it over the dish. On another serving dish, he arranged cold cooked asparagus, dressed it with chili and sesame oil, and garnished it with toasted sesame seeds. Again, using his wok, he stir fried shrimp marinated in oil infused with gingerroot, first lining the wok with chili paste and sesame oil, and, when the shrimp were pink, he added green peas and chopped scallions. He stirred these together for another minute, and dished them up on a bed of steamed rice. As each dish was completed, he put it on an electric warming tray built into the cart. When all was ready, he turned to serve them.

"Ants on the Hill," Toy Boy said, as he served the beef dish to them. "Baroque Pearls," he said, and set the steamed pork balls before them. "Dragon and Phoenix in the Forest," he called the dish of ham, chicken, and broccoli. "Asparagus Salad," he said, indicating the salad. "Stir-Fried Szechwan Shrimp on steamed rice," he named the last dish. "Eat, enjoy. Your dessert shall be litchi ice cream. Ring when you are ready for it," he showed Mae Ling the button to push, "and I will bring it for you and clear away the dishes."

"A truly intriguing menu," Malcolm said. "You have chosen with skill."

"I am glad you think so," Mae Ling said. They busily plied their chopsticks, sharing the food with murmurs of appreciation for its delicate balance of flavors.

When they had completed their meal and rung Toy Boy for the litchi ice cream and a fresh pot of green tea, Malcolm said, "I've been looking through my brother's notes on the statues. It seems they are Kuanyins, Buddhist saints of some sort. Why they are so valuable to certain un-named officials in the Chinese Government is something Quig did not know. He only understood they were willing to pay well for their recovery." Mae Ling held up her hand. She coughed, and pointed vehemently to a spot near the door. Malcolm stared at her in consternation, until realized Mae Ling was pointing to a tape recorder.

"Oh, Malcolm, sweetie, don't talk about those dull old statues now." Mae Ling pressed the pause button on the recorder.

"Someone wants to know what we say," Mae Ling said. We shall give them something to think about, in a little bit. First, though, I need to recall Toy Boy." She rang the buzzer. When a young man knocked discreetly, Mae Ling said, through the closed door, "Send Toy Boy in here at once, no matter what else he is doing."

"Yes, Madam," the young man said and withdrew.

### Toy Boy's Redemption

Soon, Toy Boy knocked timidly on the door. Mae Ling opened it, and let him in.

"You left something when you went," she said. Toy Boy looked at the table. There were no dishes to clear away. "Not dishes," Mae Ling said sternly. "This." She pointed to the tape recorder.

"I'm so sorry," Toy Boy said. He cast his eyes at the ground.

"Why? Why have you betrayed the trust my father places in you?"

He raised his eyes. Suffering filled their black pupils. "For the green card, Madam. The INS is pursuing me. She said she could help."

"She who?"

"We call her the Empress with Talons in the kitchens. She is a very fearsome lady. She comes here often."

"Do you know her name?"

"Not for sure. Once I heard a man call her 'Vanna'."

Malcolm groaned. "Vanna again! Damn!"

"Perhaps we can spike her guns. When were you to give her the tape?"

"Tonight," Toy Boy said, "after White Lotus and the Lesser Dragon had completed their activities."

"You will take this Empress with Talons a tape. The Lesser Dragon and I shall make it for her. If you wish to redeem yourself, bring me three clay pots from the kitchen. Bring me the size you use for individual potted chicken. The cost of these clay pots, you understand, will come out of your wages. Do this, and I will recommend to my father that he keep you on staff."

Toy Boy looked gratefully at Mae Ling. "Thank you, Madam."

"Go now, and be quick about returning with the pots."

Toy Boy left in haste.

"We will put on a bit of a show for this Vanna," Mae Ling said. "I will urge a sexual liaison. You will urge we examine the statues. We will then break the clay pots, claiming we are breaking the statues to get at whatever is in them. There will be nothing, of course, as we shall say to our dismay for the tape recorder. Do you agree?"

Malcolm considered. "Yes," he said at last, "do you think we'll fool her?"

"We can but hope."

When Toy Boy returned Mae took the clay pots and dismissed him. She smiled conspiratorially at Malcolm.

"Shall we begin?" she said. Malcolm nodded. Mae Ling released the Pause button on the tape recorder.

"Oh Malcolm, such a dinner puts me in a romantic mood. And you are such a handsome gentleman." Mae Ling batted her eyelashes at Malcolm. "Don't rush into business. We can take a little time to get well acquainted, can't we?"

"Madam, I am old enough to be your father."

"I so adore a mature man." Mae Ling made a kissing noise on her hand. Malcolm blenched.

"Ms. Ling, please. Control yourself. I'm here only to do business."

"Oh, don't be so cold to me. I'm a lonely lady, and I'm not unpleasing to look at."

"You are a most attractive woman, Ms. Ling. And quite clean, I'm sure. I am not moved, however, from business by a woman's attractions. Please, let us discover the secret of these statues."

"They've waited three quarters of a century. They can wait three quarters of an hour."

"Madam, they could wait three quarters of a millennium, and I still would not wish to become intimate with you in the fashion you are suggesting."

Mae Ling made weeping noises. "Am I so undesirable, then?" she quavered.

"Not at all, Ms. Ling. I'm no experienced judge in such matters, but I think you'd please many men. I am not one of them, but it is no flaw in you. I don't do women, you see."

"Oh, Mr. Drye. I am so embarrassed. I mistook your orientation."

"No harm done. I can, and do, do business with any reasonable person."

"To business, then, Mr. Drye." Mae Ling grinned, and closed her thumb and middle finger in a ring to specify excellence.

"What is the value of these statues?" Malcolm asked.

"I doubt it is their artistry. They are peasant work from the late Qing Dynasty, perhaps even the beginning of this century. Personal idols scraped from the clay for a peasant's hut, there are hundreds littering China."

"Do they contain something?"

"Perhaps. Dissidents often used such things to carry messages. We might find a bit of history, perhaps a note from Sun Yat Sen. That would be worth money. We'd have to break them to find out."

"Break them?"

"Yes. They are worthless as they are."

"Break one, then."

Mae Ling pounded a clay chicken pot with a serving ladle, until it cracked into pieces. "Nothing here," she said. "What do we do now?"

"Break the others, I suppose." Malcolm pounded another clay pot with the serving ladle. "This one's empty, too."

Mae Ling took up the ladle again. "This one, too," she said, and scooped the pieces onto the floor. They clattered and shattered further.

"We have destroyed a possible fortune," Malcolm said.

"Or three worthless bits of clay," Mae Ling said. She buzzed for Lee. When he came, she ordered him to send in Toy Boy to clean up the mess. When Toy Boy came, she paused the tape recorder again.

"Clean up this room, and then take the tape and the recorder. Deliver them as you promised to the Empress with Talons."

"Yes, Madam," Toy Boy said. He stepped into the hall to get a broom from the nearest closet. Mae Ling released the Pause Button on the tape recorder, and then she and Malcolm noisily left the room, blaming each other for destroying the valuable statues. Toy Boy was waiting outside. He went in, shut off the tape recorder, and put the tape in his pocket.

Later that night Toy Boy furtively met a slender Caucasian woman in the alley by the noisome trash dumpsters. The pale lamplight glittered in her eyes. Her eyes reminded Toy Boy of the rats whose glittering eyes he saw late at night around the dumpsters when he made his way home to his small room. He shivered.

"Cold?" the woman asked. Her voice was chill.

"Your tape," Toy Boy said. "Where's my green card?"

The woman took the tape and handed him a plastic laminated card. He took it and hurried into the Palace of the Jaded Concubine. Toy Boy could not read English, and only a few ideographs of his native Chinese. The large red word "Specimen" across the card held no meaning for him.

### Consultation

In the foyer of the Palace of the Jaded Concubine Mae Ling stopped Malcolm.

"Mr. Drye," she said, "I would like to consult my father and my grandfather about these statues. They are quite knowledgeable about late Chinese statuary, and the history of China."

"This will mean diluting any reward we get for the statues," Malcolm said, "and the value of the contents."

"Consider me and my family as one unit, with a two-thirds share, since I have two of the three statues," Mae Ling responded.

"And I have the other third?" Malcolm considered. "Yes. Let's consult your father and grandfather."

"Then come with me," she said, and led him through another door behind a shabby tapestry. The door was ornately carved rosewood, but the light was too dim for Malcolm to make out details. Dragons and a phoenix dominated the scene. Intricate blossoms twined about the main panels. The door led to another small lobby, with an elevator at one side and a guard at a desk on the other. When they entered, Malcolm tightened his nostrils against the backwashed odor of mildew and ancient dust.

"Good evening, Madam," the guard said.

"Good evening, Bai Lo," she responded. "Is my father in?"

"Yes, Madam."

"Thank you Bai Lo."

"Yes Madam."

Mae Ling pressed the button for the elevator. It came slowly. Malcolm could hear the cables squeaking and weights clanking as it traveled toward them. At least the elevator smelled of metal and some lubricant rather than mold. The door, when the elevator arrived, parted with a noisy sigh, as though the elevator was irritated at being disturbed. Mae Ling and Malcolm entered. Mae Ling pressed the button for the top floor, and the doors sighed shut. Slowly the elevator began to rise, complaining all the way like an arthritic elder climbing stairs. It was scuffed and scarred inside, and the dim bulb threw shadows that accentuated its blemishes.

After a long wheezing jiggle up and down, it settled at the top floor, and the doors opened onto a short, poorly lit hall with a dusty carpet so faded its design was unclear. The ancient dust smell was strong here. It seemed to leap up out of the carpet. Only one door opened off the hall. Mae Ling went to the door and knocked three times. A small peephole opened, and closed. Malcolm heard bolts being thrown back; he counted three of them. Then the door opened. A gust of spicy incense blew out of the apartment.

"Come in, Daughter," a woman's soft voice said. "Your father is in his office. Do you wish to see him?" The woman was a slightly older copy of Mae Ling; indeed, except for some very fine wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, she could have been Mae's twin. She even wore a similar sheathe dress, blue, with matching pumps.

"Yes, Mother."

"Go along, then. Oh, you have brought someone with you."

"Yes, Mother. Our guest is Mr. Malcolm Drye," Mae said. "This is my mother, Fu Ling. We have some business to transact with Father."

"Do come in, Mr. Drye, and be welcome."

Malcolm followed Mae Ling into an opulent room appointed with Chinese jade sculptures in various shades of green and white mounted on black marble pedestals. Scrolls, softened with age, hung on the walls. The lighting was low, but accented the treasures in the room. At the opposite end, a corridor began. Mae Ling led Malcolm along this richly carpeted hallway, their steps lost in the carpet's softness, to a black door. She knocked, and entered when a voice from within bade her do so.

"Father," she said, as she entered. "I come with a friend."

"Yes, daughter. I see you have a guest." Mr. Ling had achieved an age where he appeared both old and young.

"This is Mr. Malcolm Drye," Mae said. "Mr. Drye, this is my father, Faw Ling." Mr. Ling rose from his desk. He was dressed in an impeccably tailored black suit, with a pearl white shirt and a subdued yellow tie. His closely barbered hair bespoke skilled professional attention. His hand was cool and dry as he shook Malcolm's hand.

"Welcome, Mr. Drye. Will you take tea?" Faw Ling gestured at a pot and cups on his desk.

"Yes, thank you, sir."

"Please, be seated. What brings you here, Daughter? Your visits are few, and precious."

"We come to ask your advice, Father."

"A wise child heeds her parents," Faw Ling said. "How may I advise you?" Malcolm detected a carefully covered apprehension in his host.

"We need your opinion of the value of these statues," Mae Ling said, and put her two on the desk. She gestured for Malcolm to do the same. He did. He also saw his host relax. What had the poor man expected? That Malcolm was a suitor, or a loan shark?

"I can tell you they are probably an amateur's work, from the late Qing. The style is, I believe, Northern." He lit a powerful lamp on his desk. He took one up and examined it under the lamp. "The clay is not usual for Northern China." He pursed his lips, considering. He set aside the first statue, took up another, and looked it over. "These Kuanyins are crudely made. The detailing is coarse, and carelessly applied. I do not think they have any great value in and of themselves."

"Could they hold something inside that would be of value?" Malcolm asked.

"Perhaps. We could have them X-rayed." Faw Ling patted one statue gently with his carefully manicured hand.

"Perhaps Grandfather Foy could help us?"

"Yes, perhaps. I will see if he is willing to consider them. If you will excuse me, I will consult with him." Faw Ling rose from his chair and went through a door at one corner of the room.

"My Grandfather, Foy Ling, is very venerable," Mae Ling said. "He is also fragile. Perhaps he is having a good day, and can assist us." The door through which Faw Ling had gone burst open. A tiny man with many wrinkles and only a few wisps of white hair burst through the door like a cannon ball. He wore faded blue jeans, and a rumpled blue chambray shirt with rope sandals.

"Welcome home, Little Cricket," he said, and flung his arms around Mae Ling. "Your old Granddad loves to see you."

Faw Ling followed sedately through the door and closed it. "We have a guest, honored Father," he said. His cultured tones were the opposite of his father's piping voice.

"I know, I know, I can see the fellow for myself. Not here to marry my grand-daughter, are you?"

"No, Grandfather," Mae Ling said.

"Good. Don't need any gwailo blood in the family. No offense, Mister, nothing personal. Just want to keep my descendants pure."

"I take no offense, Venerable Sir."

"Call me Foy, boy. Call me Foy."

"Foy, then."

"Grandfather, we have brought some statues for you to look at. A wicked woman, one Vanna Dee, has tried to buy them from us, and has even suborned one of our servants."

"Tell me of this false servant," Faw Ling commanded, so Mae Ling told him about Toy Boy's perfidy and her reprimand and punishment of him. "You are too lenient," Faw said, when she had finished. "Toy Boy will return to his native Fukien."

While Mae Ling told her story, Foy Ling had been examining the statues under the bright lamp on his son's desk. When she was through, he borrowed a dime from his son and inserted its edge into the middle line of the character for three (≡) on the bottom of one statue. He twisted. The statue made a tiny cracking noise, and a plug fell out. He repeated the process with the statue marked with the Chinese character for one (–). A similar plug fell out. Bits of clay dust shone in the lamplight on the polished desk. For the last statue he borrowed a second dime, and put each dime into the one of the two strokes for the Chinese character for two (≈), and twisted. A plug fell out of the last statue.

"There," he said. "As your Father has no doubt already told you, these statues are amateur sculptures, made in a Northern, probably Ningwu, style, of Southern Chinese clay, probably from the Guangzhou region. Given the upset times at the end of the Qing Dynasty, not surprising a Northerner might be in the South. The maker has inserted bamboo sections plugged at each end with wax into the wet clay, and thus fashioned the plugs I have just removed. This was a common way to smuggle valuables in and out of various provinces and warlord territories. With tweezers, Son, I should be able to pull these loose." Faw opened a desk drawer and extracted a pair of tweezers, ornately decorated with tiny cloisonné roses, and handed them to Foy.

Foy delicately wedged the tweezers around a bamboo vial in the first statue. He squeezed and twisted. The vial came out. He laid it on the desk. He repeated the extraction operation with the other two statues.

"Now," he said, "let's see what these saints have had blocking their bowels these past decades." He picked up a silver dragon and tilted its horns, revealing a cigarette lighter. He lit it, and carefully melted the wax at one end of one of the bamboo vials. The melted wax dripped on the rosewood desk. Faw watched in dismay.

When the wax had melted from one end of the bamboo, Foy probed gently with the tweezers. "Aha!" he said, as he extracted a tiny scroll. Carefully he unrolled it.

"I need a magnifying glass to read this," he said. He held out his hand to Faw, who sighed and took a cloisonné-decorated magnifying glass from the desk drawer. Foy snatched it, and read eagerly. He made a happy noise that Malcolm decided must be a chortle.

"This is a treasure, indeed, Little Cricket," he said to his granddaughter. "Not worth many dollars, I'm afraid, but invaluable to scholars of Song Dynasty poetry." He grinned again. "These are the lost poems of Bu Ti, a poetess of great renown, whose works were thought destroyed in a civil uprising in Ningwu. What a find!"

"Why would the People's Republic be so anxious to get these poems?" Malcolm asked.

"Perhaps they did not know what the vials contained," Faw said.

"It is appropriate that these manuscripts return to the People's Republic, but only after I have copied them and translated them," Foy said. "If there is any compensation offered, I will, of course, take it on your joint behalf."

"By all means, do so," Malcolm said. "Give them the statues, too. The one has been nothing but trouble for me ever since Quig died. Maybe this will get Vanna out of my life, too, if the tape we made for her doesn't dissuade her."

"So be it, then," Mae Ling said. "Honored Grandfather, translate the poems. We will offer them in this country, as well. Perhaps we shall make some small contribution to the world's betterment that way."

"Perhaps I should go, now," Malcolm said. He offered Foy Ling his card. "Here is my address and telephone number." Foy waved the card toward Faw, who took it. Malcolm stood; Mae Ling stood with him.

"I will see you out," she said. Malcolm shook hands with Faw, waved goodbye to Foy, who was mumbling translations from the texts under his magnifying glass.

At the door of the building, Mae Ling bade Malcolm goodbye, recommending the White Jade Cab Company as transportation home. Malcolm did not see her again, until he and the Ling family received invitations to the Chinese Consulate to hear the thanks of the Chinese people for returning a national treasure.

### Nephew News

Hardin wrote Ben to tell him he had a nephew, Lawson. Ben didn't know Hardin had written him surreptitiously, without Enna's knowledge.

_Ben Soul  
817 Lost Sombrero Lane  
Cowpens, CA  
October 11, 1980_

_Ben:_

_This is to let you know you have a nephew. He was born yesterday at 11:30 pm. in the Berthoud Hospital. He's healthy, and Enna's doing fine._

_If you ever change your ways, come home. Get away from that awful City._

_Hardin_

Ben wrote a reply that ignored Hardin's second paragraph.

_Hardin Soul  
Box 27  
Rural Route 2  
Berthoud, CO  
October 20, 1980_

_Dear Hardin,_

_I'm delighted that you and Enna have made me an uncle at last. I look forward to the time I can come east to meet nephew Lawson._

_I am glad Enna survived the birth. Tell her, for me, I think she's a brave woman._

_I'm enclosing a Quit Claim Deed to my half of the farm. Consider it Lawson's birth gift. May Lawson turn out to be the farmer's son you want._

_As for me, I know I'll never be a farmer, let alone the good farmer you are. I've made my life here, on the Coast, a life I know you don't approve. Please, don't lose touch. Let's keep exchanging cards at Christmas._

_Peace and blessings to you, and Enna, and little Lawson._

_Ben_

Hardin carefully filed Ben's Quit Claim Deed in certain farm papers he knew Enna wouldn't examine. When the time seemed right he would tell her about Ben's generosity. If the time never became right, she'd have the paper after he died. She could have her hissy fits then. Hardin hated confrontations with his wife.

### Doctor Field's Secret Journal

I have a new client. I have met this man. Unlike most of my clients, he is not an obscure nobody. He is famous along The Street; I have seen him often entering or leaving one or another of the shops or bars that line The Street. Once he and I were victims of a practical joke Noah played on us. That incident led to my relocating to The City from Iowa.

Most folk call my client 'Colonel,' or 'Beau.' His full name, according to the referral sheet, is Colonel Beauregard LeSieupe. I suspect that name is one he has adopted for his own purposes. He promenades on The Street in a white linen suit, a black string tie, and a white hat and shoes. He looks like a walking ad for fried chicken. According to the referral sheet, he asked for assignment as my client. The Court sentenced him to rehabilitation for drug use. I am to see him tomorrow.

My first several sessions with the Colonel were not productive. He sat on the couch and trembled. He mumbled unintelligible responses to my questions, and avoided looking at me. I offered him water; he begged for whiskey. I prescribed a tranquilizer for him. I hope it is not among his addictions. Toward the end of our fifty minutes he wept, silently and stared at his clenched hands in his lap. When his time was up, an orderly urged him to his feet. He shuffled out of my office like a slave in chains.

I have made a very tiny breakthrough after the sixth session. Something jelled over the weekend for the Colonel. I asked him, as I have each session since the second one, why he asked for a referral to me. He responded that I was the only Damnyankee he'd ever met who was any damned good. Immediately after this statement, he curled himself into the chair and moaned. He said nothing else for the rest of the session. I spoke as reassuringly to him as I could. I sensed it was unwise to probe him any more for this session. He at least does not tremble so noticeably; the tranquilizer mitigates the physical addictions he has. This is a curious case, indeed.

The medications have calmed the Colonel. In our eleventh session, I asked him to tell me how he achieved his rank. He refused to tell me that, and, instead, launched into an incident from his childhood.

"You shrinks always want to know about a boy's mother. I was just a boy when my Mama died. She lay with a fever for a long time. The servants came and went with slippers on their feet to avoid disturbing her rest. I was maybe six, maybe seven."

[Pause]

"I remember hearing her breathing in the night. It was like a saw going through soft wood, rasping and ragged. Sometimes I'd hear cypress trees rattling in the night wind, and waken and wonder if it was Mama trying to breathe. That's why I moved away, away from the bayous. That sound was too sad to live with."

[Pause]

"I have never liked rustling sounds, paper, leaves, or mice in the walls."

[Pause]

"Mama. I called her Mama. They came and took her away. Those men, the ones in the white coats, they took her away. I was in the kitchen with the servants. They didn't want me to see, but I looked out a window and I saw them take Mama away.

[Tears and then silence]

I have never been the same since."

Beau refused to provide more detail, or to speak on any other subject. He stared at a point above my head until our time was up.

***

Several sessions later, I again asked Beau about his military title. He responded with this incident:

"When it came time for me to meet my draft board and hear my country's call, I was a little under the influence of the grape. The secretary of the draft board was profoundly impressed to have a recruit with so honorable a family name. He was Louisiana-born, and complimented me on being such a fine specimen of Southern American manhood. He asked me to take the traditional step forward. I took it, and, overcome with excitement, I flung my arms around his beefy body and kissed him loudly on the lips. He recoiled in horror, and promptly reclassified me 4-F. I suppose he retreated after I left to scrub his lips with cleanser or something. That's how I dodged the draft."

Encouraged that he had responded, even if obliquely, I asked him how he came to The City.

"I came on a bus, a Greyhound Bus. It was a big one, with a long dog painted on the side."

He curled up on the chair and withdrew. I got no further response from him for several sessions.

When he chose to respond again, his remark was unrelated to anything he had mentioned before. By now, he was in reasonable control of his body; his movements were fluid and normal, no longer jerky or out of context. We were listening to Vivaldi's _Autumn_ from the _Four Seasons_ when he spoke.

"Can you make the others go away?"

"What others?" I asked him.

He did not respond until the closing phrase of the music.

"My head is full," he said. "Too many of us."

Our session was at an end. The orderly came to take him away.

"Tomorrow," I said. "We'll work on that tomorrow."

He nodded and left the room. It was over a month before he consented to any further therapy.

When Beau met me the next time, he had lost weight, his complexion was sallow, and he gave every appearance of illness. I suggested he be tested for HIV; he consented (the test was negative). I asked him what troubled him. He muttered he couldn't sleep, because "they" kept arguing. He wouldn't identify who "they" were. I talked with the orderly for his ward, and discovered Beau had had a private room for over a week, since the discharge of the two patients who shared his room. "They" were evidently in his mind.

We went on some weeks without any breakthrough occurrences. Some days Beau animatedly talked about his Louisiana boyhood. Other days he was silent and withdrawn, responding with gestures, or monosyllables, or not at all.

One day Juan came out. Juan Loosa lived in Beau's body, but inhabited it stiffly, not with the languid loose-jointed manner of Beau.

"I am Juan Loosa," he said. "I control this body. When I choose, I show. I don't often choose." He spoke with a light Spanish accent.

"Hello, Juan," I said.

"Understand, Doctor, that Beau handles the world far better than I do, or than Luis does."

"Who's Luis?"

"Luis Cruz. He was the first one in this body. He doesn't come out at all."

"Why not?"

"It hurts him too much." Suddenly the patient's joints loosened, and the Beau persona returned.

"He's been out, hasn't he?" Beau drawled.

"Who?"

"Juan."

"Yes."

Standard theory at the time confronted multiple personality disorder with the desire to integrate the personalities into one "healthy" personality. I explained this to Beau. I also explained it to Juan. Luis refused to listen, or to come out, claiming he couldn't understand English. My Spanish was too accented for him, he reported. That is, Juan reported for him.

This is a transcript of a statement made to me, Dr. Chester Field, by Noah Count, a longtime friend of my patient, Beauregard LeSieupe.

_"I was there when Luis became Beau. It was a dark and stormy night, don't you know. I had seen him around the bars and on the Street. He was just another one of the pretty bodies in the City in those innocent days before the Plague. I hadn't paid him much attention. He wasn't my type. I preferred blondes to the Latin look."_

_"My usual hangouts were livelier than the Wounded Cherub, but I was on the upper Street when the rain started. The Cherub was handy, so I went in. Luis was the only patron in the bar. He was crooning to his beer. I took a stool and ordered my own brew. He looked up when he heard my voice, and said something about the weather. Then he introduced himself as Luis. His drawl surprised me. It was the kind that could make 'Damnyankee' a twelve-syllable word. We stumbled around in a conversation, drank several more beers, and became friends for the night. Late in the evening, we wound up in the Marina under the palm tree. He re-introduced himself to me as Beau after we'd had a few hits of weed."_

_"Beau passed me the joint. We were sitting under a palm tree planted in a big tub on the sidewalk. The rain had stopped, but the leftover drops were still sliding off the palm fronds. We were careful to keep the wet off our dope."_

_"A guy dressed up for a fried chicken promotion stumbled along the street. We watched him lie down under another palm tree in a tub. We tried to hear what he was mumbling to himself, but couldn't make any sense out of it. He rolled against his tub and fell asleep. His hat fell off, taking the attached wig with it. Beau and I laughed. The drunk snored louder."_

_"The drunk's outfit reminded Beau of his childhood in Louisiana. It sounded like the plot of a movie I'd seen somewhere some time. He said he was the last son of a French family that had lost their plantation in the Civil War. They had never recovered their fortune, but had never lost their dignity. He claimed a lot of his older male relatives had dressed, like the drunk, in white linen suits."_

_"I asked him how he got to the City, and he told me about his encounter with the Selective Service. When it came time for him to meet his draft board and hear his country's call, Beau was drunk. The secretary of the draft board was profoundly impressed with so honorable a history, and complimented Beau on being such a fine specimen of Southern American manhood."_

_"When he asked Beau to take the traditional step forward, Beau did, and in his excitement, flung his arms about the beefy sergeant and kissed him loudly on the lips. The sergeant recoiled in horror, and promptly reclassified Beau 4-F."_

_"' This army is for men, you hear?' the sergeant raved as he propelled Beau out the door, and then went to wash his mouth. It wasn't possible to live in the Parish after that, Louisiana being what it was, so Beau drifted west to the City, and found a home."_

_"I spun my own yarn about growing up on a ranch in the Rockies, and being dispossessed by the Forest Service. I borrowed from Beau's story, and gave it a cowboy twist. It was a good night for bullshit."_

_"As the moon went west it made the restoration scaffolding cast black skeletons on the sidewalks. The drunk snored louder."_

_"Beau gauged the man's height and weight."_

_"' I do believe, Noah,' he drawled, 'that suit would fit me.'"_

_"' Try it on,' I said. Beau passed the joint back to me."_

_"' Take care of this,' he said, and went over to the drunk. He shook his shoulder. The man didn't respond. Beau removed his jeans and plaid shirt and put them on the rim of the tub. Then he removed the drunk's shoes and pulled his pants off him. The drunk muttered something. Beau patted his shoulder and said, 'That's all right, honey. Go back to sleep. I'm just making you comfortable.'"_

_"Then Beau put on the pants._

_"' They fit nice,' he said; 'help me get the shirt and jacket.' I put the roach on the edge of our tub and went over to hold the man up while Beau pulled the linen jacket, the ruffled white shirt and the little string tie off him. Beau tried them on. They fit him better than they fit the drunk."_

_"I rescued the hat and its white wig from the sidewalk."_

_"' Colonel, Sir, your hat,' I drawled in my best Texas phony and put it on Beau's head. Beau neatly folded his jeans and plaid shirt and covered the drunk's chest with them."_

_"We were halfway down the block when Beau remembered the mustache and goatee, and that his wallet was in his jeans. He felt. The drunk's wallet was in the suit he was wearing. He told me we should go back to exchange the wallets and get the mustache and goatee."_

_"We exchanged the wallets easily, but the beard and mustache were a different matter. We woke the drunk peeling them off, and only with difficulty were we able to persuade him that we meant no harm. Finally we gave him a dollar to buy another bottle of cheap wine."_

_"Beau, from that night, never wore any other kind of costume. He became a fixture on the Street. We all came to call him 'Colonel.' He was the Street's mascot for several years. He recognized newcomers right away, and welcomed them to the City. He'd sleep anytime anywhere with anyone. This was before the Plague, when the Street was two miles of party and the City was Paradise."_

Over several months, I pieced together Luis/Beau/Juan's development. Luis Cruz was born to a farm worker's family in the Pedernales Valley of Texas. He grew up much as any other small Hispanic boy might have in that time and place, scorned by the Anglos around him. The pain of prejudice gnawed at him more than it did at most of his peers. When he left the Pedernales Valley, he invented Beauregard LeSieupe, scion of a Louisiana plantation family, together with its Civil War history. He used this persona plus his dark good looks to hitchhike across the West to the City. Here Beauregard became a full-blown personality in his own right, and little Luis Cruz submerged in the safety of Beau's subconscious.

Juan never appeared until Beau's hospitalization. Where Beau was all Southern charm and hokum, Juan Loosa was a stern, unhappy control freak, fiercely devoted to protecting Luis. After full discussions between myself as therapist, Beau, and Juan (Luis refused to participate), we determined to try electroshock therapy to assist in integrating all the personalities into one. I cautioned them the treatment was experimental and controversial, and Beau and Juan both signed the statement. We chose a date and time for the procedure.

When the time came, I wished each personality, including the reclusive Luis, good luck, attached the electrodes to the body's temples, and turned on the machine. Just as I was adjusting the voltage, the lightning struck. A surge of power crackled through the body's brain in excess of the recommended dosage.

The upshot was that Juan and Beau and Luis never integrated. The surge fried out Juan's control over the other two personalities. One could not predict when one would greet the whimpering Luis, the aristocratic Beau, or the somber Juan. I conferred with specialists in several mental disciplines, and we concluded Luis/Beau/Juan was not dangerous, to themselves or others, but incapable of surviving on their own. I felt responsible for their condition, and determined to be their caretaker from that time.

### Office Romance

Dr. Field greeted Beau, the personality who came in that day. He had said little more than the usual "hello and how are you" sentences when Juan emerged. Dr. Field knew at once that Juan had replaced Beau. Beau habitually wore an easy expression, one that suggested he was about to break into a smile or a laugh. Juan's face was always serious, with his mouth set in a tight, straight line. Beau's muscles flowed like silk scarves fluttering in the wind. Juan's movements were like a clock, proceeding forward in measured jerks.

"Good morning, Chester," he said. Dr. Field frowned at him. He wished to discourage too much familiarity. He saw the hurt in Juan's eyes. Juan had become more and more familiar over the last few sessions.

"Juan," Dr. Field said, "I must insist you recognize my professional position when wwe're having a session." He folded his hands under his chin.

"Doctor," Juan said, "I don't think I'm your patient. Beau is. And maybe Luis. I'm not." He stared intently at Dr. Field. "I'm your co-therapist in this. I'm your only hope of keeping Beau and Luis out of some institution where they'd rot." Agitation trembled under the even surface of Juan's voice.

"And where you would rot as well?" Dr. Field was careful and controlled in his tone.

"Yes. I admit my stake in keeping this body free." Juan waved a hand at the far corner of the room.

"Please address me as `Doctor' then." Dr. Field strove to put the right amount of severity and command in his voice. The effect was lost on Juan.

"I don't think of you as my doctor. You're Beau's doctor. He's the sick one; he has the hallucinations, imagines himself living a hundred years in the past. I don't have any illusions."

"You're hardly human, if you have no illusions." Still careful and controlled.

"Oh? Our great Doctor has illusions? About what?" Juan almost sneered the words at Dr. Field.

"1'm not the patient here." Dr. Field allowed a touch of anger to tinge his tone.

"Neither am I," Juan stated flatly.

They stared at each other for long moments, neither willing to yield to the other. Juan was the first to look away.

"Damn it, Doc," he said, irritation roughening his voice, "I don't want to be just some clinical case to you. I have deeper feelings for you."

"Have I explained the dynamics of transference to you?"

"Don't psychobabble me! I'm a reasonably sane human being, who functions moderately well in the world I inhabit. Just because I share this body with two other people doesn't make me the crazy one." Dr. Field opened his mouth. Juan forestalled his comment with an upraised hand.

"Let me go on, Doc. It's time to get this out in the open. I want to be more than your friend. You know and I know Beau and Luis will neither one ever be able to live on their own. A little jolt of electricity's made that impossible." Juan ran his hand through his hair. "Lifetime care is what they need. I can take care of myself when I'm in charge, but every now and again, I have to give Beau his turn. Luis wants a turn someday, too. Meanwhile, this body's not getting any younger. It has needs, too. Maintenance needs, if you know what I mean." Juan looked at the frozen-faced doctor. Juan thought he looked like a wild creature mesmerized by headlights.

"Damn it, Chester," he exploded, "I'm proposing to you, man!"

Dr. Field swallowed hard. "This is awkward," he choked out. "I'm supposed to be professional enough to handle these situations." He frowned at his desk. "I've had patients come on to me before;" he said, "not often, but a few women have made passes." He sighed and looked out the window. Two pigeons pecked at some unseen tidbit on the windowsill.

"What's different for me, this time, is that I want to respond, not as a doctor, but as a man. I don't know what to do about that."

Juan beamed. "What's stopping us?"

"Ethical propriety."

"I don't think you've unduly influenced me, Chester." Juan spoke quietly.

"I need to consult some of my peers," Dr. Field said.

"To know if you're in love?"

"To know if I'm behaving properly or badly." Dr. Field looked at Juan. "I'm going to terminate our session for today. I need time to sort myself out."

Dr. Field stood. Juan stood, too, and opened his arms to hug Dr. Field. Dr. Field sidestepped the hug. "Not now, Juan, not till I've sorted things. I don't want to start something I can't or won't finish. Be patient, Juan."

Juan sighed. "Okay, Chester," he said. "You're the doctor, for now." He left the room. Dr. Field turned back to the window to stare at the perpetually pecking pigeons.

### The Shrink Shrunken

Dr. Chester Field lay back on the couch Dr. Amanda Tory provided her patients. He stared up at the ceiling, counting the dots in the soundproof panels. He kept losing his place and having to start over again. It was a valuable mental exercise Dr. Tory had assigned to him to keep him from rehearsing his problem over and over. Her secretary had called her away just as Dr. Field's session with her was about to begin. Some emergency with another client. Dr. Field had almost drifted into sleep when Dr. Tory returned.

"Sorry about the delay, Chester," she said. Dr. Field jerked to full awareness.

"I understand, Amanda," he said. "I've just been resting my eyes and my mind while you were busy." He sat up on the edge of the couch. Dr. Tory loomed over him. She was almost six feet tall. Her hair was black as shoe polish, and Dr. Field had wondered from time to time if that's where the color came from. Her face was long and oval, with a point to her chin that gave her expression a certain severity. Her eyes, though, were soft and brown, and shed compassion and kindness on all she looked at. She took her seat in a large wing-backed chair upholstered in maroon leather.

"Lie down, if you'd rather," she said to Dr. Field; he did. "Tell me what's bothering you," she went on.

"I have a patient who presents most uncommon symptoms," Dr. Field began. "My patient is three personalities in one body. All the personalities are male."

"Have you considered electroshock therapy to help the personalities meld?"

"I tried that, Amanda. Unfortunately, a power surge at just the wrong moment sent too much current into the temporal lobes. I think, now, the personalities will not meld. At least the literature discourages further electroshock therapy." He sighed. "I'm beginning to doubt electroshock does much good for anyone."

"That's an argument for a large symposium. We also need a lot more research, as well."

Chester went on. "I am responsible, of course. I insisted on the shock treatment. I feel myself obligated to provide for the patient's care and well-being."

"Can the patient function in the regular world?" Amanda asked.

"One personality, Beau, has functioned in the world after a fashion, and had done so for many years. He was, however, severely addicted to any narcotic or hallucinogenic substance he could get his hands on. That's what bbrought him into the system. I don't think his physical health would hold up very much longer if he were to return to the regular world he knows. Another personality, Juan, has only recently emerged, and has no saleable work skills."

"How did this patient make a living?"

"The functional personality worked as a male prostitute. With the multiple diseases now rampant, he's lucky to be out of that game."

"What about the third personality?"

"Luis? I've met Luis only once. He refuses to emerge. He speaks only Spanish; he is permanently stuck at about fifteen years old, and seems to be simple-minded on top of that. So, you see, Amanda, this patient, or these patients, need a full-time caretaker."

"What institutions are you considering?"

"None."

"Oh?"

"I am aafraid my patient would be ignored in an institutional warehouse. And, I've become very close to him." Dr. Field put his hands behind his head and locked them. He stared up at the ceiling.

"Close in what way, Chester?"

"Most of the time like a father, or an older brother." He continued staring at the ceiling. Dr. Tory waited. She sensed Dr. Field was at a break-through point. After a while Dr. Field continued.

"I'm also attracted, a lot, to one of the personalities. Sexually attracted, I mean, and romantically." Dr. Field let out a long breath; it almost whistled as it came out of his throat. "One of the personalities is attracted to me."

"And the other two personalities?" Dr. Tory inquired, and scribbled furiously in her notebook.

"The personality who attracts me, Beau, doesn't seem to feel one way or another for me, or for anyone else. Juan is the one who has propositioned me." Dr. Field's face was almost as red as his hair.

"Chester," Dr. Tory said, "you've got two or three threats to your license and your practice of therapy buried in what you've just told me. Do I have to list them for you?"

"No," Dr. Field said. "I know, doctor/patient liaisons are forbidden. With good reason."'

"The twisty truth is, that's probably not as serious as your admitting an attraction to another man." Dr. Tory sighed and stared at her notebook, looking for words. "I know there's controversy in the profession about whether homosexuality is a disease or a natural occurrence. It was only three years ago, in 1973, that the APA removed it from the list of mental disorders." She gestured toward the journals racked on her bookshelves.

"You know how it is, Chester. Many professionals will accept it in patients, but not in colleagues. I'm not sure what position I hold on the subject. I do know it's a syndrome no one wants in a professional therapist, especially the institutions that hire therapists." She frowned at her notebook. "What do you want to do about this mess with your patient?"

"The right thing. I don't want to have an affair with any of the personalities. I don't think that's right, for any of them or for me." He sighed, turned it into a cough, and sat up. He looked at her. "How do I dissuade Juan's romantic impulses? As he puts it, he's proposed to me."

"I presume you mentioned doctor/patient relations are forbidden?"

"Yes. It didn't have much effect." Chester rubbed his forehead with one hand. "I don't know what else to do."

"All you can do is tell him 'no' until he runs out of yesses. Or turn his ttreatment over to somebody else."

"What about Juan's argument that he isn't a patient?"

"Holds no water. The various current understandings of this disorder don't permit the therapist to separate the personalities into separate persons. Either turn this ppatient over to another therapist, or get this romantic entanglement out of your system by finding somebody or something else to focus your sexual needs on." Dr. Tory's stern face hardened into stone. "Keep me posted. You will need to work on this for some time."

"Thank you, Amanda, for reinforcing my own understanding of ethics." Dr. Field stood. So did Dr. Tory. His face was on a level with her modest bosom. He realized he was looking right at it. He stifled the distaste he suddenly felt for her anatomy. He raised his eyes to her face. "I'll make an appointment with your secretary on my way out," he said.

### Juan's Fear

Dr. Field welcomed Juan into his treatment room. Juan didn't wait for the usual helloes and other social amenities. His face fixed in a worried frown, he asked, "Did you talk to your peers, Doc?"

"Yes, Juan, I did," Dr. Field said. "Please, sit down."

Juan took his place in the client's chair. It was large enough he could have curled up in it (some clients did—the one time Luis had emerged, he'd curled up like a small child and avoided looking at Dr. Field, or anythin in the room). Juan perched on the edge of the chair. He had his knees pressed together. His elbows were tightly wrapped against his sides. He clasped his hands in his lap; his knuckles went white with the tightness of his grasp. Dr. Field read anxiety in every one of Juan's muscles. Even the scalp muscles on his shaved head seemed knotted.

"My peers agree with me that three personalities in one body make up just one person."

"So?

"So, you are, just like Beau and Luis, my patient. I cannot have a different kind of relationship with you than I have with them." Juan sagged. Dr. Field could think of no other word for it. The man's shoulders slumped, he hunched forward, and the muscles in his jaw went slack. For a moment Dr. Field worried another new personality might emerge, so great was the change in Juan. Even Beau at his most casual, legs spread wide and leaning back in the chair, never had seemed as boneless as Juan did now.

"What to do? What to do?" Juan said to his feet. He had gone somewhere that shut out the room and Dr. Field.

"I'm sorry, Juan," Dr. Field said. He doubted Juan heard him. Juan drew his knees up to his chest, clasped his arms around them, and commenced rocking on the edge of the client chair. Dr. Field waited. Either Juan would calm down, or one of the others would emerge. Occasionally, Dr. Field looked out the window. No pigeons pecking the ledge today.

Juan rocked for several minutes before he stopped. He looked at Dr. Field. "What will it take?" Juan asked. His stare fixed on Dr. Field. The doctor wanted to cringe under the veiled anger and fear in that stare. He steeled himself to remain the calm therapist.

"What will what take?" he asked Juan.

Juan went on staring at him, now as immobile as a catatonic patient. Long minutes passed while Dr. Field waited.

"What will it take to get a safe place?" Juan said suddenly, and in a loud voice. He stood up, waving his arms in agitation, and began pacing back and forth in the small space between the client chair and Dr. Field's chair. "What will we do to be safe?"

"Juan," Dr. Field said with authority, "sit down!" Juan collapsed onto the floor, a heap of troubled person.

"What do you need to be safe from?" Dr. Field went on in his reasonable therapist mode.

"Want, starvation, homelessness, the cruel ways of the world." Juan drew his knees up to his chest again and began rocking. This time he moaned a three-note tune as he rocked.

"Juan!" Dr. Field said sharply. He repeated Juan's name three times before the man stopped rocking and moaning. Juan looked up at the doctor.

'Now, Juan, a question. Did you proposition me because you have romantic or sexual feelings for me, or because of something else?'

"Something else," Juan said. "I don't know much about how things work," he said, "but Beau always got food or money or shelter by having sex."

"There are other ways, safer ways. I'm understanding you correctly, if I say you propositioned me because you thought I'd make a good meal ticket?"

"Yes," Juan said. "I know you and trust you. I don't know anybody else, not well enough to trust them." He smiled ruefully at the doctor. "To tell the truth, I don't want to have sex with anybody, really. That's Beau's bailiwick, not mine. But I've got to keep this body going. We both know Beau will only run it to ruin in no time, and Luis doesn't even know what to do with it."

"And you feel responsible for the body?"

"Yes, and the other two, also. They can't take care of themselves at all. I guess I'm not much smarter.''

"Juan, get up. Our session's almost over. I promise you I'll find a way to help you make your safe place. No more sex offers, though. Agreed?"

"Agreed." Juan stood up. "See you later, Doctor."'

"Yes. Later." Dr. Field walked him to the door.

Later that week, when he went for his follow-up session with Dr. Tory, Dr. Field happily reported the resolution of his patient relationship problem. Dr. Tory advised him such complex interpersonal interactions seldom resolved themselves in a few days. She urged him to seek further therapy around his lack of professional distance from his patient. She also urged him to seek treatment for his "latent homosexuality" before it cost him his career, and offered to refer him to a discreet male therapist. Dr. Field wisely declined the opportunity. Some treasures he wished to keep for himself.

Some months later Dr. Field wrote to Dr. Tory.

_Dr. Chester Field  
Memorandum to: Dr. Amanda Tory  
July 10, 1980_

_Amanda,_

_You have been a good friend and colleague. I bless you for it. I have completed my official resignation letter from the City Institute for the Mentally Destitute. I plan now to retire. My income from my maternal grandmother, Eva Green's, legacy will provide a comfortable, if somewhat austere, living for myself, and Luis-Beau-Juan. Additionally, a friend, Señora Salvación Mandor, has offered me a low-rent cottage in a seaside village north of the City. I think it will be an ideal place for Luis-Beau-Juan to heal as much as he/they can heal._

_Be assured, I still maintain the doctor-patient relationship, or at least, a father-son relationship. I've moved myself, with your excellent therapuetic help, beyond any unseemly behavior with Luis-Beau-Juan. He's now convinced, I hope, that my care and concern for him will continue without any sexual payoff. Thank you for all you have done for me, and for us. Perhaps, now, between watching the gulls and the fog, I'll have time to write one or two monographs on psychiatric subjects._

_Your friend, and former client,_

_Dr. Chester Field_

### Vanna Reads the Paper

Vanna Dee opened the second section of her newspaper. She poured a second cup of strong black coffee and began to peruse the headlines. One caught her eye:

_Ceremony at Chinese Consulate_

_The City, June 27, 1977._

_The People's Republic Consul, Dong Ding, honored two residents of the City today. Malcolm Drye and Mae Ling, both of the City, turned over to the Consul rare manuscripts containing poems by Bu Ti, a noted Chinese poetess, whose works scholars thought were lost in the time of the Boxer Rebellion._

_Mr. Drye and Ms. Ling recently obtained three small clay statues. When Ms. Ling took them to her grandfather for appraisal, he discovered that, while they had little value in themselves, they concealed a treasure of great worth to the People's Republic. Dr. Foy Ling has made an English translation of the poems, which will be available at the Tickling Feather Book Store on July 1._

_Consul Dong Ding praised Ms. Ling and Mr. Drye for their noble gift to the People's Republic and celebrated them at a banquet. As a further reward, he awarded them the statues that contained the poems._

_Mr. Drye is a well-known dahlia breeder in the City. Ms. Ling is an employee of the Wong Brothers Import/Export Emporium. Dr. Foy Ling is a co-owner of the Palace of the Jaded Concubine, a famous Chinese restaurant in the City._

_Consul Dong Ding told reporters the Chinese Government will house the manuscripts in a Beijing museum under carefully kept under climate-controlled conditions, so future generations may study them._

The paper trembled in Vanna's hands. Toy Boy had lied to her. The tape he had given her, which clearly carried the sound of the statues breaking into pieces, was a fake. How much might the People's Republic have paid for these statues, or at least their contents? And these fools just gave them away for a banquet and a few measly words of praise. Fury flamed in Vanna's bosom and incarnadined her face. She vowed to get even.

It took her the better part of the morning to devise a plan. Each time she wanted to stop to think about what to do, a client or co-worker interrupted her plotting with one or more inane questions she could not ignore.

At last it came to her. Toy Boy would pay! She took the telephone book, looked in the government pages, and dialed the INS.

Ophelia Payne sat at her boss's desk to answer the telephone over the lunch hour. She had just come to the INS offices as an intern, supplementing her college knowledge with on-the-job experience. When the telephone rang, she answered it.

"Hello," she said. "Immigration and Naturalization Service. Ophelia Payne speaking. How may I help you?"

"Ms. Payne?" the woman on the other end said.

"Yes. Ophelia Payne."

"May I call you Ophelia?"

"Please do."

"My name is Vanna Dee. I work in the City Social Department. Recently I have discovered someone working illegally in the City. Is this the proper desk to report that information to?"

"Yes, it is. Do you have a name and home address for the person in question?"

"I have his name. It's Toy Boy. I don't know where he lives. He works at the Palace of the Jaded Concubine."

"Oh, yes, the notorious restaurant. We've been suspicious for a long time about that place. The name is Toy Boy?"

"Yes."

"How do you know he's in the country illegally?"

"He showed me a green card he'd recently purchased. It was obviously a fake." Vanna, of course, didn't mention she had provided the card to Toy Boy.

"How could you tell? Was it such a poor forgery?"

"That I don't know. But, it had the word 'Specimen' in bright red letters across its face. Surely that isn't part of the standard green card."

"By no means. Do you have any idea whether the employer, the Palace of the Jaded Concubine, has knowledge of Mr. Boy's immigrant status?"

"That I can't say. You'll have to ask them."

"Thank you, Ms. Dee, for your information. It is citizens like you who make our country so strong and safe."

"Just glad to do my civic duty." With that, Ophelia and Vanna said their goodbyes, and rang off. Ophelia began to draft a memo for her supervisor, and then thought of a better plan. She drew a pad of investigation request forms toward her and patiently began filling in various blanks. Among other things she entered, was that she, not Vanna, was the source of the information. When she had finished the form, she slipped it, in its quintuplicate copies, into a stack of papers waiting her supervisor's signature. Later that afternoon her supervisor signed the form without reviewing it, and thereby set in motion an investigation of the Palace of the Jaded Concubine.

In short order the investigation turned up evidence that not only Toy Boy and several other employees of the restaurant were in the United States without proper visas and papers, but so were Mae Ling's parents and her grandfather. Ophelia joined the raid task force that arrested the Lings and most of their staff. Wisely, the task force leader let the customers who were in the restaurant at the time of the raid go without taking their names or requiring them as witnesses. A notable slice of the City's elite could thus deny ever knowing the immigration status of the Ling family.

The INS had hoped to quietly deport the whole Ling family, but the family's prominence brought a great deal of media attention to the hearings. Foy Ling, Faw Ling, and Fu Ling could not prove either citizenship or legal residence. They had slipped into the country underneath the Immigration radar. Mae Ling, however, had been born in the City Hospital, and had the papers to prove it. Under pressure from City officials who had no desire to force the Lings to tell secrets, lawyers drew up papers to transfer the entire Ling holdings to Mae Ling, so they would not be forfeit. Then the rest of the family agreed to peaceable deportation.

Mae Ling promptly sold the family real estate. She sent a large share of the proceeds to her dear deported kin, keeping only enough to start a bookstore in Lost Lane near La Señora's mission.

### Letters from Osso Del Oso

Ben and Len moved south because their jobs moved. Ben's job included a promotion, and Len found a job better than the one he had in the City. They both left friends and acquaintances hoping to make new friends and acquaintances. Ben wrote Hardin and Minnie Vann.

_Hardin Soul  
Box 27  
Rural Route 2  
Berthoud, CO  
December 5, 1980_

_Dear Hardin,_

_I'm moving to a new home in the Southland. My company has built a new data processing center at a town called Osso Del Oso. Len has found a job with the county as an office administrator. It provides him medical and pension benefits far better than he got when he worked for Shocker Electric._

_My new address is:_

_1589 Camino Esqueleto  
Osso Del Oso_

_I hope your first Christmas with Lawson is a great joy for you. Please give my regards to Enna._

_Your brother,_

_Ben._

_Ms. Minnie Vann  
1217 Free Radical Lane  
The City  
December 7, 1980_

_Dear Minnie,_

_Well, Len and I have moved at last. It seemed the packing was going on forever. Now the unpacking begins. That promises to take even longer. As a "new kid on the block," I'm assigned to the night shift. It's not so bad; we do batch processing, and are busy enough to keep awake. I sleep all day, while Len's at work. We have our evenings together, and then he goes to bed and I go to work. Kind of stifles romance, but we're an old married couple now, so we survive._

_The climate here in the Southland is rather dull after the changing microclimates of the City and its suburbs. There are lots of palm trees, unrelenting sunshine, and a lot of dust. The air is hazy most of the time, and smells like an old car's exhaust. Len has had some trouble breathing; he may have incipient asthma._

_The traffic is heavy on the freeways, but we both are lucky because we can drive to our jobs on surface streets. Most of them are wide boulevards that no one uses, except on weekends._

_We have rented a small house in an older neighborhood. Many of the people here are older couples who have raised their children. It's quiet, except when grandchildren visit. The yard is small enough we can keep it up. There's a bit of grass in front, and a large redwood deck takes up most of the back yard. We'd probably enjoy the deck more if we could breathe the unfiltered air._

_Gay life is minimal here in Osso Del Oso. That is to say, there isn't any. We have to drive about a half hour to the nearest bar, a little neighborhood watering hole called Joe's Blowhole. It has a nautical décor. We don't go often, since one of us has to stay sober to drive home. Our work schedules make partying difficult as well. I work ten days through, and then have four off._

_Len has a job with the county administering their secretarial force. It pays about what his job in the City paid, and offers superior health and pension benefits. He has already made a place for himself in the county staff. As you might expect, he's already active in local causes. He has joined a committee to preserve the historic town center, which dates way back to the 1920s._

_Before I forget, I should give you our address:_

_1589 Camino Esqueleto  
Osso Del Oso_

_We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Please come visit us when you can. We miss you and all our friends in the City very much._

_Ben_

Len wrote Elke Hall, whom he had come to know through earthquake relief.

_Ms. Elke Hall  
112 Lost Lane  
The City  
December 14, 1980_

_Dear Elke,_

_Ben and I have moved to Osso Del Oso. Indigent Aborigine has promoted him to the data center they have built down here. He has almost doubled his income. It was too good an opportunity to pass up. I was able to get a job with the county as a secretarial pool administrator. A decent salary and better benefits than I had working for Shocker Electric._

_We have a small bungalow, with palm trees. The place looks a lot like a movie set from the 1940s except it doesn't have climbing roses. The yard is small, and doesn't require too much upkeep. The house is small, too, and needs a lot of dusting. The desert's nearby, and "travels in on the afternoon winds" as Ben puts it._

_Ben works nights and I work days. So far, we haven't got much of a social life. I have joined a committee to preserve the downtown area. That provides me some contacts outside work. Ben has almost no contact with anybody except people he works with. Social life will have to wait until Ben's on day shift (about six months away)._

_Our new address is:_

_1589 Camino Esqueleto  
Osso Del Oso_

_I trust your work with La Señora's Mission is going well. You folks serve a real need in that part of the City. I've always admired La Señora's dedication. Please say hello to her for me. Also, give Rosa a kiss from us. How we wish she were running a restaurant in Osso Del Oso! No one makes bouillabaisse and ratatouille to match hers. Give yourself a hug, and keep your health._

_Until next Christmas,_

_Len_

### Developments

Mae Ling bid her family goodbye at the docks. They all wept openly, knowing the separation would be for many years, and maybe forever. The INS hearings had been brutal, and their so-called justice swift and severe. Despite the Ling lawyers' efforts, many of the Ling properties were forfeit to the INS, others to the City. Some they had successfully put into Mae's name, to provide for her financially. They sold several others, especially those held in obscure subsidiaries of the family business, and spirited the funds away to China. Much of the Ling property had gone to greedy government agencies, but enough remained for the Lings to start over.

Mae left the docks before the vessel carrying her family and their servants set sail down the Bay toward the sea. She did not want to watch the wake billowing behind them; it would have made her loss too keen. She needed now to establish herself on her own. Aside from arranging for a trusted family financial planner to handle her investments, Mae needed an occupation. Even though her income from her investments would be sufficient for comfort, her nature did not admire idleness. She needed to be doing something.

Some days later, as she went about inspecting properties in her portfolio, she came to Lost Lane. The property included three shop fronts, all available for rent. She said "Hello," to the small, middle-aged lady in a long black dress who was sweeping the stoop in front of the soup kitchen next door.

La Señora looked at her. "Hello," she said. She took in Mae's conservative business suit, a navy blue with a narrow skirt and wide lapels to the jacket. "What can I do for you?"

"Have these shops been empty long?" Mae asked, making conversation. She could have got such information from her management company if she really needed to know.

"Yes," La Señora said. "One on the left, on the corner, used to be a Mom and Pop grocery. One in the middle was a hardware store. The one on the right, here, next to my mission, was a lot of different stores. The stores all closed up when the owners died and the neighborhood changed from families to what you see." La Señora started sweeping again, careful to avoid dusting Mae's navy blue slippers.

"Perhaps a book shop would be good here, next to the mission."

La Señora looked up from her broom's path. "Perhaps it would. We don't sell tracts, pamphlets, or bibles. We concentrate on feeding the hungry and clothing the naked, practical matters like that."

"I know others," Mae Ling said. "They may also be interested in opening shops in the other store fronts."

"Neighbors would be nice," La Señora said. "Shops might even provide occasional employment for some of the people our mission serves." She leaned her broom against the wall. "I don't know who owns this building," she said.

"I do," Mae Ling said. "I inherited it from my father. My name is Mae Ling."

"Welcome, then, Mae Ling. I'm Salvación Mandor. My folk call me La Señora. If you check our accounts, you'll find our rent's been paid on time every time."

"I'm sure," Mae Ling said. "I'll check back with you later. I must go attend to other business for now."

Mae Ling provided La Señora a small bow, and went down the street. Over the coming days, she contacted several of her acquaintance, and finally persuaded Malcolm Drye to open a gardening shop in one storefront, and the Swami to open a stationery store in the other. The stores prospered in a small way.

### Slash and Burns

Mae Ling looked up as the red-haired man came into her shop. Something about his swagger annoyed her at once. She concealed her annoyance behind a mask of inscrutability. Annoying people spent good money on books. Extremely annoying people spent no money on books, only smudged the pages as they "browsed" along.

The red-haired man's trim body was just beginning to run to fat. His face was youthful, but lines had already eroded his cheeks. On the whole, it made him dissipated looking. He nodded at her.

"Ms. Ling?" he inquired. His voice was pleasant in the way a third whiskey is pleasant, smooth, but promising an edge of pain later on. Mae Ling kept her heart-shaped face carefully neutral as she pasted on a professional smile. Her black eyes filled with suspicion. The red-haired man did not seem to notice.

"I am Ms. Ling," she said, adopting a slightly singsong accent she'd learned Caucasians had come to expect.

"My card," the man said. He came to the counter, his hand extended. Between his forefinger and second finger his snowy white card rode. Mae took it from him and read it. It said, "Cutter Slash and Forrest Burns, Developers, Slash and Burns Corporation" with a telephone number under it. She handed it back to him.

"Are you Mr. Slash or Mr. Burns?"

"Burns, Forrest Burns."

"What kind of book may I get for you, Mr. Burns," she asked. He did not take the card.

"I'm not here to buy books," he said. "I'm here to ask who owns this property."

"My landlord."

"And who is that?"

"I do not know. I pay my rent to the Tumbleweed Terrace Management Association. You will have to ask them who the landlord is." Mae smiled professionally at Mr. Burns.

"Where may I contact them?"

"I will write out their address for you," Mae said. She took a small note pad and wrote the address on it. She deliberately gave Mr. Burns the post office box where she sent her rent check. She did not tell him that one Salvación Mandor emptied that box and deposited the rent to Mae's secret account. Mr. Burns thanked her for the information she gave him, and went next door to The Swami's stationery shop. He gave Mr. Burns a similar answer, as did La Señora at the Mission, and Malcolm Drye at the garden store. No one wanted to cooperate with a person who identified himself or herself as a developer.

In her office at City Hall, Vanna Dee reviewed projections for City Renewal activities. The map in front of her was marked with yellow highlighting on blocks ready for redevelopment with high-rise offices, stores, and condominiums that would enhance the City's tax revenues. Several of the blocks so highlighted were either empty, or had a large proportion of boarded up and abandoned buildings. General consensus agreed that these blighted areas should be re-developed.

Vanna picked up her phone. She consulted a card from her Rolodex, and then dialed William Ding, Developer. When his secretary had put her through to him, she said, "Did you have any luck finding the owners of the Mission Block?"

"No. Do you know anything about a Tumbleweed Terrace Management Company?"

"Only that it's a front bleeding heart do-gooders use to shield namby-pamby landlords. Is that the lead the people gave you?"

"Yes."

"Even the Mission leadership?"

"Yes."

"I'll check the property tax rolls. I'll get back to you."

Vanna replaced the receiver, and then lifted it and dialed again. This time her call went to the City's property tax office. She soon knew the property deed was in the name of Fa Ling. She smiled at the Venus Fly Trap a friend had given her for her desk. The plant shriveled under her smile. Fa Ling's property was forfeit to the City under his deportation sentence. This piece had not transferred into Mae Ling's name with the others. Vanna called Rome Burns and gave him the news. Within two hours, Slash and Burns had offered the City a reasonable bid on the property. By nightfall of the next day, escrow had closed. Slash and Burns worked well within the City's bureaucracy.

Mae Ling, The Swami, Malcolm Drye, and La Señora learned of the change of ownership by registered letter two days later. Mae Ling immediately called the City to protest its confiscation. She got no satisfaction. The Ling lawyer (a distant cousin from Fukien) had missed this insignificant piece of property when he registered things in Mae Ling's name. The City had, by INS assignment, the right to sell the property. The new owners had the right to evict the tenants and raze the old building.

### Resort to Retreat

La Señora cleared her throat and looked around her living room at her invited guests. Their small talk quieted. Elke and Rosa sat closely together, holding hands in the folds of Elke's skirt. Willy Waugh, clad only in briefs, sat at Rosa's feet. Dickon sat in a shadow, his lowered lids hooding his green eyes.

Dapper Malcolm Drye sat perched on his chair, as though he might get up and run out at any moment. La Señora did not think he would; he commonly sat on the edge of a chair because he was too short to be comfortable with his back against the chair's back.

Next to Malcolm, The Swami, dressed in his customary blue chambray shirt and pinstriped overalls leaned back in his chair, arms folded over his chest. Next to him Mae Ling sat in silence, her hands folded in a steeple that propped up her nose.

"My friends," La Señora began, "Let me first introduce my cousins, Emma Freed and her daughter, Notta. They are at a crisis point in their lives just as the rest of us are." Emma Freed held Notta Freed on her lap. They sat between Mae Ling and La Señora. Brown hair crowned Emma's round face. Her figure was not quite plump, though no longer girlish. Notta appeared to be about eight years old. Her face mirrored her mother's. Notta's brown hair was coiffed in sausage curls, a current fashion among girls her age. It was a lighter brown, streaked with golden threads, as though the sun had carelessly shed its whiskers on her. Her eyes were blue, and looked warily at the assembled group.

Several people murmured "Nice to meet you" or nodded recognition of Emma and Notta.

"You all will soon lose our shops and some of you your homes," La Señora continued. "I must close this mission. I have consulted attorneys, and there is no way to stop Slash and Burns from razing this block to build their new high rise." Several people muttered angrily.

"We have in these past years since the Great Temblor become a community. All of us, that is, except Emma and Notta. My friends, I do not want to break our community apart."

"How can we stay together?" Elke asked. La Señora turned to her.

"I may have a way. Slash and Burns are offering each of us a cash settlement if we do not sue. If we invest the money wisely, we can provide a basic living for ourselves."

"The amount is not very large," Malcolm said. "I doubt it will provide enough return, conservatively invested, to pay more than the rent or the grocery bill, but not both."

"Yes. Therefore, we need to eliminate one or the other," Dickon said. "Either don't live anywhere or don't eat. It's simple." He smiled a twisted smile.

"I can offer a different solution," La Señora said.

"What is that, Señora?" Rosa asked.

"I own a property on the North Coast. At a place called San Danson. It is run down, but title to it is free and clear."

"Does it have a building large enough to accommodate us all?"

"The property was a resort, of sorts, my grandfather owned. It has several cottages, a large home on the hill, a small building we call the Chapel, and, on the highway, a shop, a restaurant, a motel with six rooms, and a gas station."

"It sounds like a bit of paradise," Mae Ling said. "Far away from the madding crowds, and all that."

"Terribly remote, is it?" Malcolm Drye asked. "On the coast?" He frowned. "Dahlias might not do too well in such a place."

"No, but African Violets will," Rosa Krushan interjected.

"True," Malcolm said.

"Are the shop, motel, gas station, and restaurant open now?" Elke asked.

"Only the gas station and motel, and then only in the summer driving season," La Señora said.

"What rent would we owe you?" Emma asked.

"Repair and maintenance of the cottages, until each of you can establish a further income."

"Won't jobs be hard to come by out on the coast like that?" Dickon asked.

"Yes, but Pueblo Rio is only a half hour's drive, and Las Tumbas about twenty minutes more," La Señora said. "Either community would offer several opportunities for augmenting one's income."

"As for me," Mae Ling said, "I have a series of children's books in mind. I can write as well or better on the coast as I can in the City."

"There are certain problems," La Señora said. "The Coastal Commission wants to condemn the property, as they do any property right on the ocean's shore. The Village comes with acreage along the coast to the north. I will offer to sell that to them at a modest price, in return for keeping the resort property free and clear. I think I can sway the Commission. Particularly if I tell them we are converting it to a private community."

"Converting it?" Dickon asked.

"From its former, shall we say, 'resort' use to a series of private residences."

"It was a resort of ill repute," Emma said, "back in the day."

Dickon chuckled. "Sounds like a good place to resort to," he said. "There should be an ambience to the place that gladdens the hearts of men."

"But not women," La Señora said sternly. "I do not approve Grandfather's income source. I do like to have the property."

"The wages of sin," Dickon said, and seemed about to say more, until he saw La Señora's stern face. "Sorry, Señora," he muttered.

"When should we plan to move?" Elke asked.

"We have sixty days here," Malcolm said.

"And, I suggest we make the most of it," La Señora said. As the others left, talking excitedly about the future, she asked Dickon and Willy Waugh to remain.

"I have a further problem," she said. "I may need assistance with a clandestine operation." Dickon grinned. Willy looked puzzled.

"We may have to do something sneaky," Dickon interpreted for Willy. Willy grinned.

"My mother's people willed several llamas to me. They are currently in the City Zoo. I wish to take them to the resort, to be free on the mountain. Jackson Hoff, the Zoo Director, opposes me in this. I may have to liberate the llamas without his authorization. I need someone to work at the Zoo, to discover how secure it is at night. I suggest you both apply; maybe at least one of you will get a position there."

"Sounds like fun," Dickon said. "And a way to earn a little extra cash."

"Okay," Willy said.

### The Codfather

La Señora consulted the small scrap of paper with the slip number and vessel name on it. Yes, number 39, and the vessel, a 60-foot long fishing boat, named the _Half Shell._ Rosa Krushan had been enthusiastic recommending the vessel's owner, Captain Anna Locke, as a knowledgeable coastal sailor. La Señora wondered, perhaps too late, how able a judge of seamanship Rosa might be. The cabin of the vessel had lace curtains at the windows. A wreath of plastic yellow daisies hung on the cabin door. An odor of harbor water prickled in her nostrils.

La Señora looked for a means of boarding the ship. There was a foot wide gap of green water between the wharf and the vessel. Bits of refuse floated on it. Where the sun struck it, the dark and mysterious green turned to a sick olive color. "Hello the _Half Shell,"_ La Señora called. She waited. Just as she was about to call out again, the door with the daisy wreath opened, and a very petite woman came on deck.

The woman's hair was intensely white, whiter than sheets in a detergent ad. It was carefully styled in gentle waves that framed the delicate features of an ebony face. The woman wore a tailored green suit with a pale rose blouse whose lapels overlapped the green jacket's lapels. Nylons and matching green pumps completed the outfit. The woman wore three strands of lustrous pink pearls around her neck that softened the bright sunlight into a palette of bright shadows.

"Are you from the Dock Authority?" the woman asked. Her diction was precise almost to the point of affectation. Her accent wasn't quite British, and certainly not West Coast. "I've told Ms.Dee I will move my vessel at the end of the month, when my lease to dock at this slip is completed."

"I am not from the Dock Authority," La Señora hastened to assure her. "Are you Captain Anna Locke?"

"Yes. Who inquires, if one may ask?"

"One may. I am Salvación Mandor. I believe we have a mutual acquaintance, one Rosa Krushan." La Señora put out her hand, until she realized she could not reach Captain Locke's hand to shake it. She dropped her arm to her side.

"I know Ms. Krushan. Why does she send you to me?"

"I am in need of a vessel to transport certain cargo to San Danson Cove." La Señora smiled as winningly as she could. "She assures me you are profoundly knowledgeable about coastal sailing."

"I know where San Danson Cove is. I do not know if my _Half Shell_ can enter it. I must consult my charts and other resources."

"I know a ferry used to enter the cove in my grandfather's day. I will pay a reasonable fee."

"I need a place to dock more than I need a fee. Is there a wharf at the Cove?"

"There used to be."

"What manner of cargo do you want me to carry?"

"Llamas."

"Odd. How many?"

"Six or seven."

"I will research the waters in the cove. Many of the small inlets along this coast undergo significant changes in depth over the years. Without regular dredging by either machine or streams with a strong current, they frequently silt up. My _Half Shell_ is shallow draft, but I must be careful. When did you want to ship your llamas?"

"As soon as may be. We'd have to load them near the Zoo. Are there docking facilities near there?"

"Yes, at the foot of Windflower Way, though using them will require some expense."

"I don't think I can parade llamas through the heart of the City to this dock. The Windflower Way dock will be better. It is, I take it, not too far from the Zoo?"

"About a mile, all downhill. Leave it to me to make arrangements, if my boat can enter the Cove. My research will take some hours. How may I contact you?"

"Call Rosa Krushan. She says you have her number. I'm available at the same number."

"You're that missionary lady, aren't you?"

"I have been. Thanks to the City Development Department, I'm out of that business."

"I'll contact Rosa later tonight with the results of my research."

"Thank you. I will wait for your call." Captain Locke turned abruptly and went into her cabin. She closed the door. The daisy wreath quivered in a passing breeze, and stilled. La Señora smiled grimly to herself. An abrupt woman, for all the elegance of her manner and dress. La Señora left the dock and started the walk up the steep hills to her soon-to-be-razed mission.

Captain Locke allowed her eyes to adjust to the dimness in her cabin. Despite the lace curtains, its tiny space was sparsely furnished. She had a chair at a small table with a tiny two-burner portable stove on it. This sat under one window. A case containing charts occupied the wall under the other window. On the wall with no windows, a bunk rested on a row of latched cabinets. Over the bunk another row of latched cabinets ran.

Captain Locke carefully unlatched the pearls from her neck. She put them in a case she took from a cabinet over the bunk. The suit and blouse she hung in the tiny closet at the end of the bunk. Her nylons and pumps went into a drawer at the bottom of that closet. She extracted jeans and a sweatshirt from another cabinet, this one under the bunk. These she drew on. For the time being, she left her boots and socks on the floor and lay flat on the bunk. She closed her eyes and began to chant softly in a dialect known only to her. Bit by bit she slipped into a trance, and her chanting slowed to a stop.

She linked with the Codfather.

Water moved past in all its myriad flavors. Squid had been here; now they nourished the Codfather. Shadow and light chased each other across the rocky seabed. From a thousand tiny sensors in its skin, the Codfather knew how far above the surface roiled with waves. The Codfather was dreaming of spraying its milt over eggs. It was a favorite dream of the fish.

Its long body and flat, ugly head jerked as Anna Locke linked with it. Her body jerked in unison. "Welcome," it communicated to her. "The squid have been plentiful."

"May it always be so," she communicated back to him. "I, too, have eaten well," she thought at him, sending pictures of vegetables to him. Even though he was, like all his kind, predatory on other fish, including, on occasion, other fish of his own species, she had never dared offend him by suggesting that she ate fish.

"What do you require, daughter of the waterless world?"

"One of my kind would have me carry goods for her into San Danson Cove. I do not know the bottom there. Is the channel deep enough for my boat to enter?" The ideation rendered here as a coherent sentence some mystic process translated into piscine images for the Codfather. He had no real concept of boats, or cargo, or cooperation, or providing services. Anna did not understand the mechanics of translation that made the link work. She didn't care to understand it. She only cared that getting the information about the coastal seabed she needed was possible by this means.

The Codfather withdrew partially from its link with Anna. Anna thought of this part of the process as being on hold while the Codfather searched its data banks. By some process beyond her comprehension, the Codfather gathered information about the depth of San Danson cove, and the channel leading into the cove between Obaheah and Obadiah. Martyr's Creek had cut away the seabed in a broad curve that allowed entry from the north side of the cove. From there Anna would have to guide the _Half Shell_ in a broad sweep by the south shore of the cove to a dilapidated wharf near the mouth of the creek. She reviewed the route twice with the Codfather, beamed her thanks to it, and withdrew from the link. Slowly she exited her trance, got up, and went ashore to telephone La Señora.

### Llamas on the Half Shell

Jack Hoff, director of the City Zoo, glared at the small, determined woman in front of him. She did not wilt, as even the most recalcitrant of lions in the Zoo might have done before his glare. Her glare overmatched his. Her black garb, very like a nun's habit, further agitated him. He remembered with bitterness a series of Sisters Mary Margaret armed with finger-snapping rulers from his childhood. This woman's defiance caused his upper lip to quiver with fury. This set his walrus moustache shaking as though a great wind blew through it. He was, after all, no longer a schoolboy to be intimidated by some wimpled crone.

"Mr. Hoff," she said in a voice brittle with anger, "I will take my llamas from this Zoo. You will not stand in my way." She stood upright, holding her black umbrella at an angle that almost, but not quite, threatened Mr. Hoff with attack. His anger incarnadined his jowls. They began to quiver in counterpoint to his moustache. His beefy frame puffed up rather like those Australian fringed lizards that frighten away their rivals with a great display.

"Ms. Mandor," he said, his voice also tight with anger, "I have no record that any of the Zoo specimens is your property." He ran the thick fingers of his right hand through his thinning gray hair. Perspiration beaded his brow.

"Search your files," she said. "I allowed my llamas to enter your Zoo in 1954, August 10th, with the specific proviso that I could remove them from your care at any time I chose. I have given you a copy of the agreement signed by your predecessor, Dewey Little."

"None of the llamas out there is old enough to be from 1954. Llamas don't live that long."

"The agreement specifically states that my llamas, and all their progeny, are to return to me at my demand."

"Ms. Mandor, you may leave now, under your own power, or I will call Security."

"I will have my llamas," she said. Jack Hoff started to rise from his chair. La Señora froze him in a half crouch with her gaze. "You will not thwart me," she said. Then she turned and left his office with her umbrella over her shoulder.

Outside the Director's office Willy, Rosa, Elke, and Dickon waited for her in the shelter of the bus stop. A light rain was still falling.

"What did the Director say?" Elke asked her.

"He refused to release my llamas," she said.

"We do it tonight, then," Willy said. Glee brightened his young face.

"Yes," La Señora said, and sighed. "We shall liberate them. Do you have a hiding place picked out, Willy?"

"Yes, Señora," he said. "By the elephants. Some ferns and bushes make a nice cave. Little rain like this can't get in there."

"I've made you a sandwich," Rosa said, withdrawing a brown bag from her capacious reticule. "I've put a banana in, as well." Willy wrinkled up his nose. "I know you'd rather have an apple or a pear, but bananas are all I had today." Willy sighed. She rubbed his head, a gesture he shrugged off. Rosa loved to mother him, and, like many boys, he found it embarrassing to endure affection in public. "I'll fix you a proper meal when we're through," she said. He brightened at that.

"We'd best go now," Dickon said. "Good luck, Willy. We'll be back tonight." Willy nodded, stopped by the elephant paddock, and, when no one was looking, plunged into a small opening in a clump of ferns and bushes. He made his passage so carefully that very few raindrops shook loose from the leaves of his hideaway. The others proceeded to the gate, discussing possible legal remedies against Jack Hoff and the City Zoo. The ticket taker watched them go with sleep in her eyes and hope of a hearty lunch in her heart.

Willy passed the tedious waiting hours with mind games he had invented when he was still a chained child in his dark past. Night fell, and later the moon rose. When the slivered moon was at its zenith, Willy crept from his clump of bushes. Keeping to the copious shadows, he made his way as stealthily as he could to the main gate. Willy soon had the gate locks undone and the chains noiselessly dropped. Then he opened them just enough to let La Señora, Rosa, Elke, and Dickon in.

"This way," he whispered, and led them by dark paths to the llama pens. He scaled the fence, and picked the lock to open their gate. The party crept in, bridles in hand, and, with the telepathic help of the unicorn with the unique horn in its llama disguise, they haltered the llamas that belonged to La Señora Mandor. There were eight of them, five females (two obviously with crías on the way), two males, and the unicorn in disguise. As the others set out, La Señora took the unicorn's horn from its hiding place and stowed it under her cloak. Willy led them back to the gates, opened them just enough for the llamas to pass through, and then closed and locked them. Then he slipped from enclosure to enclosure within the Zoo, opening gates and portals wherever he could free non-predatory beasts. When he had liberated as many creatures as he thought it safe to let loose, he slipped from the Zoo and hurried to catch up to La Señora and the others.

In the morning Jack Hoff and his staff came to a Zoo where the pachyderms had broken into the hay barns, the kangaroos had hopped into the flowerbeds, the llamas (those that did not belong to La Señora) feasted on the rhododendrons, the zebras ate the zinnias, and pandemonium reigned. It took three days for the great cats to quiet down, for they had had to remain caged while the other creatures roamed free. Director Hoff ordered his staff to collect the animals and cage them again. It took two days for the attendants to complete their roundup. Visiting schoolchildren, delighted to be so close to the Zoo's inhabitants, kept freeing them again. One gaggle of geese refused any further incarceration, and eventually became unofficial mascots for the Zoo.

Jack Hoff, of course, immediately called the police, requesting an all-points bulletin to catch La Señora and her gang, and the police did watch the roadways for trucks bearing llamas. Several columnists and television pundits mined the incident for material for a week, and then moved on to other interesting oddities in the City's life. No one paid attention to a battered houseboat, the _Half Shell,_ making its slow way up the coast to obscure San Danson Cove. The great llama escape passed from the newspapers into Zoo legend, and thence into the mythic fabric that shrouded the City's history in glamour no other City boasted.

### On the Waterfront

Llama hooves, though not as noisy as horse hooves, do make a clicking sound on hard pavements. La Señora and her crew crossed Tiger Parkway in front of the City Zoo fearing with every step they'd wake the sleeping residents of the high-rise apartment complexes that fronted on the Parkway. All who dwelt therein must have been innocent as babes, or heavily drugged, as none awoke to see the llamas on the lam.

There was no better option, La Señora believed, than taking the llamas with her to San Danson. If she left them in the Zoo's care, she'd be too far from her old familiar friend, the unicorn with the unique horn. Although the link between them could stretch across the planet, La Señora wanted to be near to provide for the unicorn's creature comfort and well-being. The other llamas were the unicorn's animal family, and they belonged with her. And, La Señora reminded herself, the City's bureaucracy has turned me out of my home and work by applying a heartless technicality—by no means do I want to leave them with any other advantage.

Across the Parkway La Señora raised her hand to halt the procession. She took strips of cloth from her reticule, allotting four per llama. She passed them to her crew, who then tied them about the llama's feet. This, they hoped, would muffle the clicking and clopping of hooves on pavement, as well as protect the llama's tender feet from the wear and tear of pounding over the sidewalks. The llamas protested this treatment with various bleats, and one even spat at Dickon. The spittle missed him, landing instead on a decorative cement angel by one of the apartment house's doorways. There it dripped in foul excrescences from the concrete halo onto the molded feathers of the concrete wings. Alas, when the supervisor scrubbed the mess away in the morning, it left a permanent black complexion on the angel, thus integrating the neighborhood.

Willy Waugh joined them, coming up softly on his bare feet. One of the llamas snuffled a greeting at his approach. All the llamas calmed when Willy arrived; they had come to trust him over the past few weeks he had been one of their caretakers.

La Señora whistled, softly, to alert her crew, and they set out for the docks. The street, like so many in the City, plunged toward the Bay with a dizzying steepness. Had it not been for the cloths, the llamas' feet might have slipped out from under them, for, though llamas are sure-footed in their native Andes, the polished surface of City pavements offered little purchase for their steps on the descent.

About four blocks from the Zoo, La Señora halted the column again. Windflower Way was a hard street to find, especially with little more than shadowy light from the remnant of moon to illuminate the signs. La Señora wanted to use this side street, since it was too narrow and twisting for automobiles. She deemed it safer than wider streets. Willy scouted for Windflower Way, and, once he found it, led the group and the llamas onto the twisting path.

The brick walks were slippery with the fog that had settled over this part of the City. Windflower Way residents prided themselves on their flowerbeds, planting every available bit of dirt with roses, heliotrope, jasmine, rhododendrons, nasturtiums, azaleas, and, frequently, very expensive and rare flowers from far corners of the world. Most of these flower gardens glowed in the mist because they were lit with various low-voltage yard lights. Even though the dim lights drained the flowers' colors, making them various shades of gray, their aromas were not compromised.

The llamas were hungry, especially one llama whose cría was close to term. She had the heft, and the strength, to stop Rosa Krushan, who held her lead, in her tracks. A frost-tolerant frangipani (an especial cultivar created by a local botanist) caught her attention. She stretched her long neck up and took a large mouthful of leaves and flowers. Rosa tugged on her halter. She ignored Rosa. Rosa whimpered. Willy looked back, saw the problem, and came to Rosa's aid. He put his considerable weight and strength into a downward pull on the halter, forcing the llama to break off eating, instead of breaking off more branches. As he held the llama's head down, he said softly to Rosa, "Keep going. She'll follow now."

Rosa continued down Windflower Way, praying there were no more frangipanis on the way. While Rosa had struggled with her llama ward, the rest of the herd had availed themselves of the opportunity to sample the roses, hydrangeas, and lilies lining the sidewalk.

"We'd better keep them moving," Willy said to La Señora as they progressed down the hill.

"We are leaving quite a trail of destruction," Dickon said. He grinned. La Señora, who was leading the unicorn with the unique horn, stepped up their pace. Fortunately, no one, llama or human, slipped and fell on the brick walkway; the llamas even negotiated the occasional series of steps in the steep street.

Windflower Way, at its lower end, connected to the pedestrian tunnel under the Harrington Expressway. The unicorn balked at entering this dark and noisome place. The smell of old urine, and who knew what other filth, nauseated La Señora, as well. None of them had thought to bring along a flashlight, and the lamps that were supposed to light the tunnel had all burned out. The City Park Service had not bothered to replace them; every time they did, homeless people sheltering in the tunnel threw rocks or bullets at the lights until they broke.

"Is there any other way?" Dickon asked. "Do we have to go through this tunnel?"

"There are other tunnels at other points," La Señora said. "None of them would be any better than this."

"If we go two blocks east," Willy said, "Van Winkle Street crosses the Expressway."

"It is well-lit," Rosa said.

"With a lot of traffic," Elke said.

"Will anybody notice?" Rosa asked.

"Llamas on Van Winkle Street? Probably," Dickon said.

"There's nothing for it," La Señora said. "We cannot force them through a place we're afraid to go. Let's chance Van Winkle Street." They turned east, making their way toward the bright lights that marked the thoroughfare. In the shadows, just before they went on the street, La Señora paused to study the traffic flow. Automobiles were very occasional at this dark hour of the pre-dawn.

"We'll chance it," she said. She stepped out into the yellow lamplight. The unicorn followed her, unconcerned. One by one the rest of them, leading their llamas, followed La Señora. Only one car passed them. The driver seemed not to notice the llamas on the bridge. He did notice them, but thought them simply another drug-induced hallucination better left unexamined.

Once across the bridge, La Señora led her little band west again. The dock where Captain Anna Locke had promised to wait lay at the foot of Windflower Way, which was a narrow street accommodating cars on this side of the Expressway. The buildings here had no flowers; for the most part they were machine shops, or body shops, with an occasional dilapidated house scattered among them. As they got closer to the shore, warehouses filled the district.

Less than a block from the dock trouble struck. A guard dog, large, black, and filled with white teeth, began furious barking at the chain link fence. Although the dog was behind the fence, the llamas, and the people, were so startled they began to run. The dog chased them along its side of the fence. They had barely run out onto the dock when a gruff voice snarled curses at the dog. The owner of the voice threatened to discharge his weapon at random into the night. He was sufficiently intoxicated that he only managed to place a bullet beside the little toe of his right foot. This seemed to satisfy him, and quiet the dog. Still shaking, the merry band made its way to the _Half Shell_ tied up at the end of the dock.

Captain Anna Locke stood on the deck. She had hired a sailor to assist her. The sailor's papers gave the name as Dijee Tully. Most people, when they first met Dijee were unsure whether they met a man or a woman. Dijee was barrel-bodied, with a noticeable pair of breasts that might or might not be accoutrements of a stocky man. Dijee kept her hair cut very close to her head, so close the irregular lumps and bumps of her skull were apparent. The voice, as well, was androgynous, husky and low, for a woman, gravelly and high for a man. Dijee's strength was not in question. She (for biologically Dijee was female, a fact recorded on her sea person's papers) heaved the heavy ramp that made the _Half Shell's_ gangplank onto the dock without assistance or ropes.

"Come aboard," she growled. La Señora led the unicorn on. The others followed, leading their llamas.

"I've reserved the aft cabin for the cargo," Captain Locke said. "Who among you will go with these beasts up the coast?"

"I will," Willy said.

"Do you have warmer clothes?" she asked him. Willy was dressed in the thin cotton uniform issued to Zoo workers.

"This is more than I need," Willy said. "I usually don't wear this much."

"Dress as you like, then," Captain Locke said. "But stay with the cargo at all times. Don't come on deck in anything less than you're wearing now."

"At sea, Willy," La Señora said, "the captain's word is law. Stay inside with the llamas. They will need you to reassure them."

"Yes, Ma'am," Willy said. He went into the aft cabin, leading his llamas. The others brought their llamas in. Willy assigned each of them stalls, reserving the most comfortable for the llama with cría.

On deck Captain Locke and La Señora made final arrangements. La Señora and the rest of the Villagers would make their way to San Danson with moving vans. It would take at the most three days to load, drive there, and unload. Each resident had reduced the clutter of his or her life to a minimum. Captain Locke estimated five to seven days to sail northward, not that her vessel couldn't cover the distance in far less time, but that she wanted to proceed slowly, as though she was searching for fish schools, to throw off any pursuit.

To cries of "Godspeed" on all sides, La Señora, Dickon, Elke, and Rosa left the _Half Shell._ Dijee heaved the gangplank aboard the ship, untied the docking ropes, and the _Half Shell_ slowly backed away from the pier. La Señora and her friends watched it make its way onto the Bay, and turned to walk toward the Mission, to begin packing their old life into the new.

### Later Letters from Osso Del Oso

Afterward, when he had time for remembering, Ben realized the years he and Len spent in Osso Del Oso were years of great contentment. He continued advancing with Indigent Aborigine, going from computer operations into programming, and from programming into managing software projects. The small house they rented began to cramp them after a couple of years, so they bought a larger place in a new section of Osso Del Oso. Ben discovered he greatly enjoyed landscaping the larger yard. A dog, Roscoe, of uncertain parentage and a great shaggy tail, came to own them and discipline their lives.

When the plague came, Len was able to use his county work connections to help establish an early AIDS victim help organization. He wrote to Elke about it.

_Ms. Elke Hall  
San Danson  
April 11, 1986_

_Dear Elke,_

_Long time no write, I know. We've been busy here. Ben's been working overtime (some program to control a lot of other programs, due, as always, yesterday) and I've taken on some volunteer responsibilities._

_I'm working with a charitable group that has formed to bring meals and company to people shut in with AIDS related diseases. We discovered none of the county programs had funding to cover meals for the large (surprisingly large to this straight-laced county) number of people, mostly gay men, who have lost their jobs because they can't work, or because some deleted expletive fired them for having the disease. We're making some difference, anyway. Part of our plan is bring one hot meal a day to these shut-ins, and also to spend a half-hour to an hour visiting with them._

_Ben was going to help out, too, until his job consumed him. I'm hoping he's freed soon. So does Roscoe, our dog. He's lonesome._

_Our new home has three bedrooms, one of which Ben promptly turned into a computerized office. I'm only allowed in there under supervision._

_Your small village sounds impossibly remote and peaceful. The peace I could handle, for a few days. The remoteness would drive me crazy in no time. So far to go to get a loaf of bread or a dozen donuts!_

_Blessings for you and yours,_

_Len_

Ben and Len found time to romp with Roscoe in the nearby deserts, and occasionally on the distant beaches along the southern coast. They prospered, not only in material things, but in the intangibles that come from love growing comfortable as an old pair of jeans that fit every bulge of one's body. Roscoe brought them joy, and they brought him treats, and all was well with their little world.

### Llamas at Sea

Willy spent the first twenty-four hours at sea helping one of the pregnant llamas deliver her cría. None of the llamas liked the pitch and roll of the _Half Shell_ under their feet. Only the calming influence of the unicorn with the unique horn kept the herd quiet. Gradually they got used to the movement, and Willy was able to snatch naps in the llama hold. He was just waking from one when Dijee Tully came in with a bowl of stew.

"Hello, youngster," she said. "Food. Eat. Good for you." She set the bowl on the floor beside Willy. Willy took the spoon and tasted the stew. Miracle of miracles, it was palatable. Rosa Krushan had trained Willy's palate to appreciate the exquisite delicacy of her cuisine. Dijee's stew was adequate for the hungry adolescent. He did wish he had a couple of Rosa's feather-light biscuits to sop up the gravy, but he didn't say so. Dijee's size intimidated him. She watched him eat, standing over him. Her overall cuffs were frayed above her deck shoes. She wore no socks.

When he had finished the stew, Willy looked up at her face, lined with fine stress wrinkles and settled into a permanent mask of ferocity. "Good stew," he said. "Thanks for bringing it."

Her smile transformed her face into a glow of good will. This emboldened Willy. He pushed his slim body to his feet. He still wore the thin cotton uniform from the Zoo. It was an unrecognizable color by now. The cría's birth and the upset stomachs of the llamas had contributed a muddy rainbow of colors to the clothes. They also had an odor. Dijee narrowed her nostrils against the miasmic vapor that wafted from Willy.

"We'll have to clean those in the sea water," she said. "Take them off." Willy hesitated. He had only the smallest of briefs on under the loose trousers.

"If I take them off," he said, "I can't go on deck. Captain Locke won't like it."

"I'll wash them for you," Dijee said. "There's a trick to washing in salt water, anyway. Be best if I do it." Willy began to disrobe.

"Dijee, is 'Dijee' a boy's name or a girl's name?" Dijee looked at Willy from under fierce eyebrows.

"In my case, it's a girl's name," she said, "though I never met anybody else who has it." She contemplated Willy's eager young face with its pouting lips and dark eyes. "It's not really a name," she said. "It's what my niece called me when she was little. I've always used my initials, D. G., and 'Dijee' was as close as she could get."

"Oh," Willy said. "What do the D and G stand for?"

"Promise you won't make fun of me."

"I promise."

"Desdemona Gertrudis. That's what they stand for."

"I see," Willy said. "La Señora tells me I'm named for a wild wind that blows off the mountains of South America."

"Yes, the williwaw."

The engine changed tone. So suddenly had it changed from the familiar background grinding noise to a bell-toned groan that even the llamas were startled.

"What the..." Dijee said. "Why's she stopping here?"

"Ahoy the _Half Shell,"_ a booming male voice called. "Heave to."

"Pirates?" Willy asked. He had discovered adventure fiction in the past year.

"No, worse, more than likely," Dijee said. "No pirates around here. Probably the Coast Guard." She put a finger to her lips. "Stay here," she said. "I'll go topside to help the Captain."

When Dijee had left, Willy stationed himself by the open door to listen. The booming male voice was closer this time. "Prepare to be boarded," it said.

A man in a blue Coast Guard uniform heavily decorated with gold braid and pierced by the pins of many medals came over the rail. His face was lined with very fine wrinkles from years of exposure to the vagaries of the sea winds, and slightly ruddy, as if it were permanently sunburned. His figure was tightly muscled and trim, except for the stomach, which was an untidy bulge that rolled over his belt.

"Captain Keane," Captain Locke greeted him. "What business does the Coast Guard have with the _Half Shell_?"

"We've been advised that some Zoo animals have been smuggled out of the City. I know you have connections with several skippers who might take on such an unsavory cargo. Have you heard anything?"

Captain Locke was silent for a long moment. Then she said, "I'm not sure, Captain, but I heard Wiley Roos was up to something. He was taking the _Rosy Crab_ out not long ago, with some sort of mysterious cargo. My sources didn't say what."

"Any idea where he was headed?"

"South, I think, San Diego or Mexico."

"I see. And what are you carrying, Captain?"

"Sheep from Peru. They're bound for Oregon, Coos Bay. Some rancher up there thinks he can cross-breed them with American breeds. Make more wool, or something, per sheep." Willy stuffed his hand in his mouth to keep from laughing out loud.

"Well, then, Captain Locke, carry on. I presume you have all the necessary permits from the Agriculture boys."

"I do have, Captain."

"Well, ta-ta, then."

"Ta-ta, Captain."

Willy watched the man climb over the rail and down the ladder toward the boat that had brought him from his ship. His protruding abdomen snagged on a spike at the rail, and he lost a button on his shirt. Willy heard his muttered curse.

When Dijee came in with Willy's cleaned clothes, she was grinning with glee. "That Captain P. G. Keane is a fool," she said. "He believed Captain Locke's lie about Wiley Roos. Wiley's actually sailing the _Rosy Crab_ to Alaska to take on a load of dead fish." Willy laughed with her.

"Why didn't Captain Keane come here to check the cargo?" he asked.

"The pompous fool has the hots for Captain Locke. If she's doing something under the table, he'd rather not know." Dijee grinned. "She gets away with a lot, that way."

"I see," Willy said. Captain Locke called for Dijee to come on deck.

"Bye," she tossed over her broad shoulder, and hurried to meet the Captain.

The llamas went back to munching hay as Captain Locke re-started her engines and plowed slowly northward to San Danson Cove.

### A Conclave of Cameloids

Captain Anna Locke carefully steered the _Half Shell_ into San Danson Cove, following the route the Codfather had impressed on her mind. The llamas kept Willy Waugh busy during this passage. The surf crashing near Obaheah and Obadiah rocks particularly frightened them. The new cría moaned pitifully, sensing the fear in its mother. Even the unicorn with the unique horn, who had traveled by sea before, was uneasy with the roaring waves. At least when they entered the cove the noise diminished, and the herd grew quieter.

Dijee Tully leaped from the _Half Shell_ onto the wharf. It was decrepit, and the board she landed on cracked audibly under her foot. She immediately pirouetted to another board, this one thankfully sounder, and lashed the _Half Shell's_ line to a substantial piling. Then she walked with great care along the wharf toward the boat's stern. Captain Locke threw the stern line to her. Dijee caught it neatly and lashed it securely to another piling. Then Captain Locke threw Dijee another line, which the sailor used to pull a gangplank onto the wharf. Dijee carefully tested it, and determined it sat on a sound part of the pier.

Meanwhile Willy had haltered all the llamas, except the new cría, who would follow its mother. The unicorn with the unique horn needed no halter. She would lead the way as the lead llama, trusting Willy to discreetly bring her horn along. Willy led the llamas out onto the wharf one at a time. Dijee and Anna held them by their halters until Willy had off-loaded the full herd. Then the unicorn led them up the wharf to the shore by Martyr's Creek, crossed the creek on the beach where it was shallow, and up the hill to a row of cottages. Willy stopped them there, and removed their halters. For a time, they milled around, sampling the grasses along the Village path.

With a cry the unicorn gathered them together. They each settled comfortably to a lying down position and began to commune with one another. She-Who-Prefers-Blue-Eyed-Grass opened with a statement in favor of staying near the Village. "Perhaps we can break into one of these structures for shelter against the weather," she urged.

He-Who-Is-Always-Randy enthusiastically endorsed She-Who-Prefers-Blue-Eyed-Grass's idea. "It's level here," he said, "and we have the big water to protect us on one side. Also, we have drinking water nearby."

"I don't feel safe here," said She-Who-Trembles-At-Every-Noise, "especially with a new cría to guard." He-Who-Is-Always-Randy snorted in disgust.

"I agree with She-Who-Trembles-At-Every-Noise," said She-Who-Seldom-Speaks. "We need a safe place, and that means high ground."

As often happens with cameloid conclaves all the llamas started chattering mentally and bleating verbally to argue the relative merits of the flat land and the hillside. When this had gone on for several minutes, growing more confused and noisy as the time passed, the unicorn with the unique horn sent out a blast of mental energy that stopped the chattering and bleating as though someone had switched off a radio.

"We will go up the hill," the unicorn told them. "Near the top we will find a place to bed down. Follow me." Her command got all the llamas to their feet and started them up the hill. Near the top they discovered a group of rocks that provided a natural fortress, and, wonder of wonders, had a small spring that formed a shallow pool for drinking water. Even He-Who-Always-Complains declared it a satisfactory habitat. Since the day was drifting toward twilight, the llamas snatched a few mouthfuls of grass, and bedded down for the night inside the circle of rocks. Willy Waugh found them here, and made his own bed under an overhang of one of the rocks. When the fog climbed the hill, it shrouded the rocks a soft silence that soothed the sea-wracked nerves of the boy-man and the llamas alike.

Dijee Tully and Anna Locke used the cold waters of Martyr's Creek to wash themselves. They had no effective pumping equipment, so could not sluice the llama dung from the cargo space.

"Let it be, Dijee," Anna said. "It should dry out in a few days, and then we can sweep it up and dump it overboard." It was a chore they never got round to doing. Rainy weather moved in for two days, and no dung dried in that time.

Two days later, clouds from the north assaulted the City, promising rain as an Allen touring car led a caravan of trucks and cars with rented trailers across the northern bridge. La Señora drove the touring car. Dickon drove a truck, as did Elke Hall. Mae Ling, the Swami, and Malcolm Drye each drove a car pulling a rented trailer. The drive up the coast to San Danson station was slow. The rain required careful driving. The trucks labored on the many upgrades, and crept along on the downgrades, lest the drivers lose control of them. All the vehicles took the sharp curves of the Coast Highway with caution.

The rain cleared and the evening sun was painting rosebuds on the clouds as the caravan reached San Danson station. For that night each of them had a room in the motel. Tomorrow they would unload their belongings, each taking the cottage La Señora had assigned them. Then they would drive the trucks up the hill, using the Coastal Commission road, and unload the furniture for the manor house.

The unicorn with the unique horn knew, of course, the moment La Señora arrived. Willy Waugh, comfortably clad in only his briefs, did not find out until the next day. Elke came looking for him, and immediately put him to work unloading furniture. Only a nourishing lunch from Rosa Krushan's efforts in the kitchen mitigated his loss of autonomy.

Several weeks of sweeping aside dust and cobwebs, punctuated with repairs to windows, doors, and roofs, followed. The llamas discovered where the best grasses grew. They soon settled into a grazing routine. The people allotted the cottages among themselves, and agreed on certain simple rules of courtesy. Thus did the Village of San Danson begin to shape itself into a community.

### Later Years

Ben received a great honor when he was asked to re-write the control program for the disbursement software. For three years he worked nights, days, and weekends, to perfect the program. He eventually completed the great control program and went on to other projects with Indigent Aborigine that consumed less of his time. He had time to join Len in a program to visit AIDS patients in the Osso Del Oso Rosebud Memorial Hospital. In the ward for terminally ill convicts he recognized Joe King, his old boss at the Neighborhood Bank in Denver. Joe didn't recognize Ben; Joe was beyond recognizing anyone. _Toxoplasmosis_ had worn away his brain. Ben wrote to Minnie Vann about it.

_Ms. Minnie Vann  
1217 Free Radical Lane  
The City  
July 12, 1991_

_Dear Minnie,_

_I had an odd experience today. I was in the prisoner's ward at Rosebud Memorial. They'd brought in a new patient. He was in a bad way, I could tell, right off. He intrigued me, because he was so familiar, but I couldn't place him. I tried to talk with him, but all he could talk about was the cockroaches eating dead rattlesnakes. I thought he was getting agitated, so I walked on to the next bed. While I was talking with him I suddenly realized who the first man reminded me of. My old boss at Neighborhood National in Denver._

_I went back to the first man and read the name on his chart. It said Joe King. That's who it was, my old boss. The man in the next bed on the other side had been watching me. He asked me if I knew Joe. I told him I thought it was a former boss I'd had. He told me Joe had survived in prison by being the "bitch" as he put it of a series of boss-cons. He reckoned that's how Joe got the virus._

_It's a sad end for the man. I used to hate him. Then I realized I'd never have had my life with Len if Joe hadn't ruined my life in Denver. I suppose I owe him some gratitude for that. I'll probably go to his funeral, by way of thanks._

_On a more cheerful note, we're planning Len's retirement in a few months. I keep hoping Indigent Aborigine's early retirement offer comes through for me soon after. Then Len and I can travel, like we've wanted to do for so long._

_One more note. Roscoe, our dog, is growing arthritic. He has trouble running, and doesn't quite understand why it takes him so long to get from place to place. We're going to take him in to the vet soon._

_Peace and blessings, Minnie._

_Ben_

_Minnie wrote back:_

_Ben Soul  
87866 Via de la Vista  
Osso del Oso  
August 1, 1991_

_Le the past be dead, Ben. This Joe King got his, and who knows why? You don't, I don't, and God probably don't give a damn. Len, retired! Who'd a thought? When are you retiring?_

_The news here is all about the corruption in the City government. The mayor and half the council have been caught with their hands in the City's cookie jar. Every one of them claims the scams they've pulled were the work of someone with the initials V. D. Venereal Disease is what that means to me. Anyway, lots of heads are rolling. We the people will make a clean sweep of things, and turn the whole shooting match over to some new bunch of rascals. 'Twas e'er thus in human affairs._

_I empathize with Roscoe. My joints want to freeze up. I keep them moving, mostly with liniment and aspirin. Write me when you can, Ben._

_Minnie_

What no one knew at the time, except a few federal agents, was that V. D. was Vanna Dee, and the whole scandal had been engineered by her, with the help of those federal agents, to bring down the City's liberal leaders. The conservative renegades in the Federal system were suitably aggrieved when the people elected an even more liberal set of councilmen and a mayor to replace the old regime. Disappointed in Vanna, the federal agents arranged for her appointment as Coastal Commissioner in Las Tumbas.

### Minor Article

On the morning Dijee Tully left, trudging up the bluff into the mists that swirled around the highway, Captain Anna Locke started the _Half Shell's_ engines and put to sea. She sailed along the North Coast until her vessel was over the home of the Codfather. Quietly she prepared herself with meditation and chanting. When she felt her soul had centered, she stripped off her garments and plunged her ebony body into the dark green seawater. Down she went, her lungs bleeding air, arms and legs driving her downward, to the home of the Codfather. He waited for her.

When the small woman entered his sensory range, he opened his great maw to welcome her. She swam headfirst into his mouth. He closed his mouth. She let her spirit flow into his. Her flesh melded with his. Her bone joined with his bone. Joy flooded from them into the dark waters and lit them, as though a sun had fallen into the sea. In the tidal pools starfish turned cartwheels among the stones. In the depths, the great cuttlefish swirled in the ink they had joyously released from their siphons. Even the plankton danced with the waves.

In his ecstasy, the Codfather's tail lashed at the waters, stirring a current that undermined the overhang that had sheltered his nest for the long time of his life. It toppled slowly through the water, creating an undersea temblor, small, local, and scarcely noted by anyone except the seismologists. The Codfather and Anna did not notice it either, in their ecstasy. The landslide buried them. Someday a future paleontologist may wonder at the strange skeleton of a mammal inserted into a great fish.

Dijee Tully read the article in the City's newspaper, and shook her head. "She really did it," she said to herself. "God bless her courage. I hope she found what she wanted."

_The City, November 28, 1981—The Coast Guard today discovered a small coastal trader, the Half Shell, adrift off the North Coast. No one was on board. There were no obvious signs of struggle. However, there were several neat piles of llama dung in the cargo hold._

_Coast Guard Captain P. G. Keane was at a loss to explain the empty vessel. "Her tanks had plenty of fuel," he said today. "Her Captain, Captain Anna Locke, was one of the savviest coastal navigators around. I fear, though I have no official proof, that Captain Locke has met foul play. We may never know what happened to her."_

_Captain Keane described as unlikely the possibility that the llama dung in the Half Shell's hold indicated Captain Locke had any connection to the recent theft of llamas from the City Zoo. "Anna Locke was as honest as the day is long," he said. "She'd never be involved with anything illegal. Captain Locke's last cargo was Peruvian sheep. I know; I inspected the Half Shell on her voyage north. I have it on good authority the dung pellets of Peruvian sheep are often mistaken for llama dung."_

_Salvage crews have towed the Half Shell to the City dry docks for refitting, and, if Captain Locke does not surface, sale to the highest bidder._

Dijee rolled the paper up and stuffed it in a trashcan. She went to the Seaman's Hall and put her name on the board to ship out on the next available freighter. She took ship for Singapore, and then Calcutta, and drifted into the mysterious lanes of ocean commerce where she lived out her life.

### Dining Out

Late in 1992, Roscoe had to be put to sleep. What they had presumed was arthritis turned out to be spinal cancer, incurable and inoperable. That was a sad Christmas and New Year for both Ben and Len. Len had said it best, one night when the winter rain was droning on the roof. "We don't have many ties here, in the Southland. Almost thirteen years here, and our closest friend was Roscoe."

"And he's gone," Ben said. "We don't have much to hold us here, except our jobs."

Len smiled. "I could take retirement at any time, you know. The County would be glad to get rid of me and get some new blood in."

"I can't retire, yet," Ben said, "much as I'd like to. Two more years, at least." Ben found another way. In the new year, as spring was prompting the daffodils to bloom, Ben applied for a job in the north, near the City, with Indigent Aborigine. It was only a lateral move, but Ben knew that he'd not qualify for any more upward movement. Younger management wanted to get rid of older workers for cheaper, and presumably more vigorous, younger workers. Before his application went through, Indigent Aborigine offered an early retirement program Ben could accept.

He wrote to Minnie Vann.

_Ms. Minnie Vann  
1217 Free Radical Lane  
The City  
April 17, 1994_

_Dear Minnie,_

_You've no doubt heard about the Company's recent retirement offer. I'm taking it. I'll get more this way than I would if I stayed two more years under the regular retirement plan. Whoopee!_

_Better news on top of this. Len and I have decided to move back north, probably into the eastern suburbs (real estate in the City itself is too pricey for us). But we'll be back where we both feel like we belong. We've never quite blended in down here in the Southland. Sun and sand and surf don't replace redwoods and fog moving inland nights and mornings._

_I'll wind things up at the Company in May. Len's staging our house now for going on the market. As soon as it's sold, we're on our way north._

_Think good thoughts for us, Minnie. We're coming home._

_Ben_

Their home sold more quickly than they had expected. They found a modest house in a suburb east of the City and moved in. Ben spent his first few months redecorating. When they bought it, the interior was carpeted in red, a color Len opined should be restricted to brothels. It was stained with undefined black marks that no cleaning agent could lift without bleaching out the red. In its place Ben chose a soft blue gray that blended well with many hues. He repainted the dead white walls a delicate cream color that suggested the villas of Italy or Mexico. Most of their furniture was wood. The various finishes blended well. A few bright pillows for accents made the home comfortable for them both.

In December Ben wrote to Hardin.

_Hardin Soul  
Box 27  
Rural Route 2  
Berthoud, CO  
December 20, 1994_

_Dear Hardin_

_You will see by our postmark we have moved. We are in the north now. I have retired (an early retirement package). Len and I plan to travel while we are still able._

_Our new address is:_

_11905 Willow Acres Way  
Arroyo del Nueces_

_I imagine Lawson is nearly full-grown. It seems strange to think of him as fourteen years old._

_May you have a good Christmas, and a prosperous new year._

_Ben_

It was well into January before the postal system forwarded Hardin's Christmas card to Ben. Hardin hadn't written a note on it. Ben felt an old familiar tug of sadness, and put the card away with others he had kept.

To celebrate their return to the City area, Ben and Len went into the City on the Metro. From the Deepingwell station they caught a bus to the Floundering Flatfish. Ben had urged Len to go, in celebration of their twenty-fourth year together. Len had resisted. He was not fond of sentimental displays, as he called them, such as celebrating anniversaries. Ben privately thought it was because Len didn't keep dates in his own history straight.

The ambiance had changed utterly. The Floundering Flatfish was nothing like its former self. Leaded glass and mahogany and the snowy linen were also gone, melted away like the snows of yesteryear. Red plastic, accented with a livid green vinyl trim, all supported on brushed aluminum filled the dining area. Waitresses in very tight bodices stretched to the tearing point over their large breasts pranced throughout the room. Their skirts were high enough to reflect the booming internet market bubble, and barely long enough to cover their panties. Gone were Mario and the bubble-butt busboys. The elegant quiet was gone, too. The new Floundering Flatfish was as noisy as a Bangkok fish market, and smelled almost as heavily of fish.

"We came all the way over here for this?" Len said.

"It's a disappointment," Ben said. "Some good things shouldn't change."

"Yeah, right. Let's go somewhere else," Len said.

"Anywhere else. I feel like a rejected leftover here," Ben agreed. He went to the maitre de and cancelled their reservations. The woman, severe in her basic black sheath with a strand of false gray pearls, raised her left eyebrow as if in shock that anyone would reject her trendy eatery. Ben started to feel guilty, and then felt angry.

"Let's go," he said to Len. "At least we've still got each other."

"Yes. Where will we eat, though?"

"I don't know," Ben said. "I don't think any of the restaurants we knew are likely to be still here." He thought a moment. "Let me call Minnie. She'll know, if anybody does, what's available in this neighborhood."

"Okay." Ben took out his cell phone, a recent acquisition, and dialed Minnie's number. She answered on the second ring.

"Hello, Minnie?" Ben said.

"Yes. That you, Ben?"

"Yes. I'm in the City. Len and I came in to celebrate our twenty-fourth anniversary at the Floundering Flatfish."

"Yeah, and you found out it should be called the Plastic Catfish, didn't you."

"It was so bad we turned around and walked out."

Minnie growled. "Some Texas outfit bought it a few years ago. It's bad. You're smart not to eat there. The décor's way better than the food."

"We have a problem, Minnie."

"You want to know where to eat. Have to be seafood, or would a steak joint do?"

Ben put his hand over his phone's mouthpiece end and spoke to Len. "Do we want to stick with seafood, or would a steak do?"

Len said, "After smelling that place we were just in, a steak sounds a lot better. Invite Minnie along, if she's free."

"Minnie," Ben said into his phone, "the steak place."

"It's the Cow and Banger. It's two blocks over from the Flatfish, on Sequoia Street. They do great steaks, and serve up damn good sausage, too."

"Thanks, Minnie. Len and I wonder if you'd join us."

"Sweet of you to ask, boys, but I've got a hot girl on the griddle. Another time, maybe."

"We'll make a date for it," Ben said. "Have a good time, Minnie."

"I will Ben. _Buon appetito_ to you and Len."

"Bye."

"Bye."

"Minnie says the Cow and Banger does great steaks and sausages. Shall we go?"

"Yes. But don't walk so fast, Ben. I can't keep up."

The Cow and Banger had none of the old Floundering Flatfish's elegant décor. Chrome and plastic dominated this restaurant, as it did so many of the newer places in the City. This time the colors were a restful green and beige. The clamor was subdued, as well, by the sound absorbent tiles in the ceiling and on the upper walls. It did have a maitre de, who seated Ben and Len in a booth along one wall, and then signaled their waitress to bring them hot tea. Their waitress, thankfully clothed in a decent-length skirt and a blouse whose buttons were not strained, recommended the porterhouse steaks. "They're real fresh," she said. "You can have them with mushrooms, or onions, or jalapeños, or all three."

"What else does the meal include?" Ben asked.

"You get your choice of potato, baked, French fried, or mashed, you get green beans with bacon bits, and a salad, with the house dressing. Oh, and dessert."

"What is the house dressing like?" Len asked.

"It's vinaigrette with dill and caraway. Pretty good, actually."

Ben looked at Len. Len nodded. "I'll have the porterhouse, medium, with all three toppings, French fries, and the house salad. Can we select our dessert later?"

The waitress wrote down Ben's order, and then said, "Sure, honey." She turned to Len. "What for you, sir?"

"I'll have the porterhouse, medium, too," Len said, "with mushrooms and onions. No jalapeños, please! Mashed potatoes, and I will select my dessert later, as well."

"Certainly, sir." She winked at Ben. "Your Dad's real cute," she said and walked away to place their order. Len looked after her, thunderstruck.

"I suppose," Ben said dryly, "that from now on I'll have to call you Cute Daddy."

"You do, and I'll break something on your body." Len snorted. "I'm not that much older than you are."

"The woman is barely out of girlhood, Len. I don't think she meant to be unkind."

"Well, it should come out of her tip, anyway." Len turned their talk to where they might go on vacation, now they were both retired. They talked of Bangkok, Angkor Wat, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Guangzhou, Beijing, Shanghai, Hiroshima, Osaka, and Tokyo.

The waitress brought their salads. "We'll just have to plan a long Asian tour to cover all those places," Ben said. Their salads were limp. The greens had been away from the chill of the refrigerator too long, and had softened more than they liked. The dill and caraway, each present in small amounts, blended well in the vinaigrette base.

The waitress brought their steaks. "We can, you know," Len said. "We have the time, and we don't have responsibilities." Len tried his mashed potatoes. He closed his eyes and murmured in ecstasy.

"Let's think about it," Ben said. "I'll go online and see what I can find out." He cut into his steak. It was cooked perfectly to his specification. The interior was just delicately pink. The outside was seared to hold in the juices. He would have preferred more piquance in his jalapeños, but had learned long ago that his taste in peppers was more advanced than the average restaurant dared serve. His French fries were crisp, too, not greasy. The green beans with bacon bits were mercifully firm.

For dessert Len chose a cheesecake topped with apricots and crystallized ginger. Ben selected a tiramisu infused with a coffee liqueur. They shared bites of each other's dessert. Ben put down his credit card to pay the bill. When the waitress returned, he calculated the tip, entered it, summed the bill, and signed.

As they went out, Len said, "I hope you didn't overdo the tip."

"No, Cute Daddy, I didn't," Ben said with a grin. Len snorted his disgust again. After they walked about a block in silence, Ben stopped Len in front of a closed leather goods shop.

"Len," he said, "after tonight, let's promise each other we won't try to relive the past again."

"What brought that up?" Len arched his left eyebrow. "I wasn't trying to relive the past."

"Thinking we could go back to the Floundering Flatfish, all that romantic stuff. At least I had that in my head."

"I didn't expect much, except a good meal. I got a good meal at the Cow and Banger."

"Okay, so maybe I'm the romantic."

"I guess you are. I haven't got time to moon around over yesterday." Len began walking again. "I don't have time for the past. I don't think I have that many today's left to me. I've got to live each one for all I can get out of it." Ben looked at Len. Len's face showed little emotion, at least in profile. Nonetheless, Ben felt a trickle of tension trace his spine.

He asked Len, "Do you mean anything special by that comment?"

Len cleared his throat and replied, "When I saw the Doctor a while back he said my heart is wearing out. That's why I get tired so easy."

Ben put his hand on Len's arm to stop him. "What are you supposed to do for that?"

"Take things easier, stop worrying, get regular exercise, take his damned pills." Len shook off Ben's hand. "Don't worry about it, Ben. I'll go on for years." And, Len did go on, for three more years. He and Ben traveled to Southeast Asia, cruised the Nile, and even toured Macchu Pichu, though the altitude almost did Len in. Then came the year Len declined. First leaving town became difficult. Then leaving the house became difficult. Toward the end, leaving his bed became a major chore for Len.

### The Last Spaghetti Supper

Len's face looked old, older than Ben had ever seen it. These past months since the doctor had diagnosed Len's heart problems Ben had watched Len wrinkle into an old man. He couldn't quite wrap his mind around Len's disability. Len couldn't walk across a room without stopping to lean on something and rest while he caught his breath. His face had deep lines worn into it, as if he was collapsing in on himself. His white hair still covered his head with a great mane, but now it only dwarfed the man underneath it. Ben felt tears sting his eyes. He brushed them away. Len called to him from the living room.

"Yes?" Ben said, coming into the room with its oxbow chairs lined around the walls. "What do you need, Len?"

"I just wondered where you were," Len said. His voice that had commanded a room when he spoke was querulous and wavering. "I couldn't hear you."

"I was just in the kitchen," Ben said. "I'm making a quickie marinara sauce for supper."

Len smiled "Sounds good," he said. "Can you help me walk in there? It's lonesome in here by myself." Len had a walker, but did not trust its fragile tubing to hold him.

"Sure," Ben said. "Put your arms around my neck and I'll lift you." Len wrapped his arms around Ben's neck. Ben felt them quivering. He put his arms around Len's shrunken chest and clasped his hands behind Len's back. He lifted. Len grunted as he got to his feet. Ben held him with one arm as he slid to Len's left side. Slowly they shuffled toward the kitchen.

Once they got there Ben helped Len sit in the kitchen chair. Then he went to the counter and continued peeling the onion. He carefully deposited the flyaway onionskin in the trash. He cut the onion in half, then sliced the halves and diced the slices. He put these in his skillet with some extra virgin olive oil and turned the heat to medium.

"Strong onion," Len said, wiping at his eyes. "Got me tearing up clear over here."

Ben glanced at Len. Some strong feeling struggled to express itself on Len's face. Ben pretended not to notice. "Maybe your eyes are extra sensitive today," Ben said, "or mine aren't as sensitive as usual."

Len didn't hear Ben. He was looking out the window. "A few daffodils left," he remarked. "I wonder if the cannas will come back."

"They've already put out leaves..."

"They should bloom, then."

Ben put the pasta kettle to boil. He decided to use spaghetti tonight, after briefly considering fettuccine and discarding the idea. He crumbled ground beef and mild sausage into the perspiring onions. Len watched him stir and brown the meat. When the meat was nearly cooked through, Ben took canned tomatoes, tomato sauce, and tomato paste from the cupboard. He opened the cans.

"Making enough for your breakfast?" Len asked Ben.

"Yes," Ben said, "just like always." He stirred the tomatoes into the browned meat. When the mixture came to a boil, Ben added the tomato sauce and the tomato paste and lowered the heat. He stirred the sauce while it simmered.

The timer dinged. He drained the pasta, catching the cooking water in a bowl. He set the colander of drained pasta over the hot water in the bowl and covered it with the pasta kettle's lid. He looked at Len. Len seemed to be asleep.

When the sauce had cooked to a thick and smooth texture, Ben took basil, oregano, rosemary, cinnamon, and parsley from the spice cupboard. He cast in a generous amount of each. Then he went back to his cutting board and crushed several cloves of garlic. He chopped these finely, and stirred them into the marinara sauce.

"How's it coming?" Len said.

"Be ready in a few minutes," he said to Len. "The sauce needs to simmer a little longer. Do you want a salad?"

"No, not tonight," Len said. "And, please, only a little spaghetti to start. You know how my appetite is these days, Ben."

Len looked out the window again. "I wonder if those daisies will be back this year," he said. "You know the ones I mean? The yellow ones with orange stripes?"

"Oh, yeah, the gazanias."

"I call them daisies."

"They should show in a few days, if they're going to." Ben checked the sauce. "I think we can eat now," Ben said. He took plates from the cupboard and placed a generous amount of spaghetti noodles on one, a small amount on the other. He topped each plate with sauce, and sprinkled parmesan/romano cheese he had grated earlier that day on top. He brought the plates to the table, and helped Len draw his chair up. Len slowly fed himself his few forkfuls of supper while Ben ate his larger meal.

When they had finished Ben got up and put the leftover pasta and sauce together in a bowl. He wrapped plastic over the bowl and refrigerated it. Then he helped Len back to the living room. He turned on the low light over the television.

"Stay with me a while," Len begged Ben. "You can clean up later."

Ben hesitated. "Okay," he said. "Want to watch TV?"

Len shook his head. "I'd rather have it quiet, for a little space," he said. He leaned his head back on the chair and closed his eyes. Ben sat in a chair near Len. Len was soon snoring softly. Ben considered getting up to clean the kitchen, but sleep overtook him, too.

It was full dark outside when Ben woke, certain something was wrong. The house was too silent. He roused himself when he realized he couldn't hear Len's breath rasping in and out. He leaned over Len. Len sprawled in the chair, an oxbow chair carved from rosewood. His eyes stared unseeing at the ceiling. Ben felt Len's neck for his pulse. Len had none. Fear rising in him, he checked Len's wrist. No pulse there, either. Great sobs choked Ben's throat. Ben closed Len's eyes, tears blurring his own.

He had known it was coming, this time when Len was not. He had thought himself prepared. He wasn't. He choked back his grief. He looked for the telephone. It was lying on a bookshelf near the television. Ben picked it up, and wondered what number to dial. He had thought about what to do when this moment came. He had once started to write out a list of things to do. He didn't know where the list was. He started to dial, and dropped the phone. For a long moment, he stared at it lying by his feet. Then he bent over and picked it up. He dialed 911, and the sympathetic operator helped him start contacting the proper authorities.

While he waited for someone to come, he sat in his chair and tried to plan what to do, step by step. He couldn't plan. His brain was numb. The doorbell rang. Ben looked at his watch. It had been only a few minutes since he had hung up the phone.

The ambulance crew came and took Len's shell away. Uniformed people politely questioned Ben. He answered, not sure what he said. Whatever he said satisfied the uniforms. Other people thrust papers at him. He signed them, accepting the people's explanations of their contents at face value. Some helpful functionary cleaned off the rosewood chair where Len's passing had left the last traces of his corporeality.

When the bureaucracy of death departed, Ben called Minnie Vann to let her know Len was gone. He wanted to hear Minnie's voice. She was out. Ben left a message on her recorder. Then he went to his kitchen to clean it up. When the pots and pans were washed and put away, he got out the cold spaghetti, put some in a bowl, and soothed his soul with his favorite food. He fell asleep at the table, and slept until the gray morning knocked on his eyelids to waken him.

Ben spent the three days before the memorial service calling friends and acquaintances with the news and making necessary arrangements. In after years he remembered very little of that time except his numbness. He wept little. By doing all day and drugging himself to sleep at night, he got through it. Several well-meaning friends remarked on his courage. He knew better. He knew he was simply in automatic pilot because he had to be.

Setting up the memorial service itself was easy. He and Len had put it together soon after Len's diagnosis came back. The cremation preceded the service, so Len was present only as ashes in an urn and a large photograph. Len had written a list of his life's highlights, and the accomplishments he was proud of. He concluded it with a two-paragraph goodbye to his friends. A chaplain read it, so Ben didn't have to. The chaplain included a couple of short prayers, and read the twenty-third Psalm. Ben endured the religious frills, as he thought of them. Neither he nor Len had much faith in any religion.

Afterward Ben greeted the people who had come. Many of them were friends and professional acquaintances Len had made over the years. Ben didn't really know many of them. He thanked them for their condolences, and let them pass by. Several of his friends and acquaintances, and people he and Len had known together also came. They all murmured words they meant to comfort Ben. Ben was too numb to feel their comforting. He thanked them anyway.

The last mourner in line was Minnie Vann. Gray speckled her hair. She had grown stouter over the years, but today she had encased herself in a tight-fitting and sober black dress with an ankle-length hem. She said nothing at first. She grabbed Ben and squeezed him. Her powder (When, Ben wondered, had Minnie taken to using cosmetics, especially powder?) folded him in a claustrophobia-inducing haze of rose scent. Ben sneezed, twice, hard. Then his tears came in rivers over his cheeks. Minnie patted his back and held him. When he had cried out his grief for that time, she released him, and handed him her handkerchief. True to Minnie's form, it wasn't a lacy bit of nothing. It was a man's handkerchief. When all the mourners except Minnie had gone, the funeral director brought Ben the urn and the photograph. Ben took them. Minnie led him to his car. He put the photograph and urn on the seat beside him. Minnie leaned in the driver's window to kiss his cheek.

"Do you want me to go with you?" she asked. Ben shook his head. "Then go home, Ben," she said. "Go home and face the emptiness. You'll never fill Len's place in your life, but you may find somebody else someday." Ben grimaced. Minnie patted his arm. "Don't fight it off, when it comes," she said. "And don't complain if it doesn't come. Take every day as it comes."

Ben drove home with Len's ashes and his photograph. He went in and put Len on the coffee table. "Until I can get you to the columbarium, rest here," he said. The silence bore in upon him like a great weight of ice. He went to the kitchen to make a cup of tea. In the yard he noticed the gazanias had begun blooming. "Hello, daisies," he said, and let his tears drop. When he was done with tears for that time, he held his breath and listened to the deafening hush.

## Down to the Sea

### Ben Finds San Danson

Ben drove north, into the redwoods, to dissolve his gloom in their shadows. He had wearied of listening for footfalls that would not come. The whirring furnace fan and the wheezing refrigerator only accented the silence Len's passing had left in his home and life. He sought release in driving the forest roads. By afternoon, the sun streaked the dark trees with watery gold. He took a twisting road over the mountains to the Coast Highway. He turned south on the Coast Highway, toward the home, even though he was uneasy driving where the cliffs plunged to the surf.

Ben did not remember driving this bit of highway before. The Coast Highway cut inland across a point of land. The sun was setting in a golden and gray ocean. He had been driving longer than he realized. Night gathered purple shadows on the eastern hills. Three small mountains stood darkly against a white-gold sky on the west. Ben pulled off on a wide patch of gravel and shut off his engine. He got out and leaned against his car to watch the sunset sky.

A ground squirrel ran up on a rock and stared at Ben with a glittering black eye. "Hello, Squirrel," Ben said. The squirrel cocked its head to listen. Ben looked up at the sky. On the third hill, Ben saw a unicorn silhouetted against the sun. A line of llamas followed it westward, down the far side of the hill.

"Some strange livestock around here," Ben remarked to the squirrel. "I've never seen a unicorn before." The squirrel chittered something unintelligible and leaped from the rock into the shadows. "I don't believe in unicorns," Ben said. "It must be some trick of the light." The squirrel raced up on the rock again, chattered a brief phrase, and ran away. Ben watched the hill until the light faded, and then got in his car. He drove two miles more San Danson Station. He stopped for the night at the one motel.

The desk clerk was a man in his late sixties or early seventies. Life had worn grooves in his face. His life had used him hard. The nameplate on the motel counter said his name was Harry Pitts. Ben could see, upside down, that Harry was studying Jeremiah. Harry said no more than necessary to check Ben into a room. He took Ben's credit card and made an imprint, and gave him the key. "Number seven, Mr. Soul," Harry said. "It's down near the end."

Two other cars occupied slots in the motel lot. The adjacent café, the Café of the Four Rosas, was dark. Ben bought a stale sandwich and a coke from machines in front of the shuttered gas station and ate in his room. Then he went to sleep. No dreams troubled his sleep.

He woke early the next morning and dressed. His face showed his sixty-two years in the cracked bathroom mirror. He had lines around his gray eyes and across his brow. He was not wrinkled, but time had etch-a-sketched his character on his face. He kept his dark brown hair, threaded with silver, cut short, partly to accommodate its thinness. He was glad the mirror was small. It didn't show his thickened waist and sagging pectorals. Too much pasta over too many years had stayed with him.

He quietly closed his room door, so as not to wake the lodgers in the other two occupied rooms. A closed sign decorated the door to the motel office. The adjoining Café of the Four Rosas and Wong's Import Export Emporium, Post Office, and General Store also sported closed signs. San Danson Station did no business at dawn. A passing car's tires rumbled on the Coast Highway outside the parking lot. First light slowly bled the night's black from the green meadow along Martyr's Creek. An arrow-shaped sign labeled "Beach" pointed down a bluff.

The gravel path Ben took was rain-rutted at the sides. The pebbles glistened with fog. The path declined steeply down the twenty feet of bluff, so he set his feet down carefully. At sixty-two, he wasn't as goat-footed as he once was. The gravel gave way to loose sand at the bottom. Nearer the surf, Ben found sea-hardened sand. He turned left and walked along the packed sand, glad his footprints marked his way. The bluff soon disappeared in the fog.

Some minutes walking brought him to where the creek cut across the beach toward the cove. A chill breeze had sprung up to swirl the fog. The sky grew lighter as the fog thinned. The salt smell of the cove tingled on the wind. Ben decided to return to the Inn for hot tea. He always carried the makings in his luggage.

He followed his own footprints in reverse, looking for the trail up the bluff. The breeze freshened, thinning the fog over the cove. The sun came through the fog's filter. Ben could see now that the trail came down the bluff at a low point. The bluff rose as it went toward the ocean. A sudden wind shift cleared the fog from the beach like a giant mitten wiping away the raindrops on a windshield. Through a landward break, the rising sun's white golden light danced on the cove like a school of silver fishes.

The lifting fog revealed cliffs on the south side of the creek. They seemed to be flat on top. Instead of a beach, the cliff's toes were broken rock and tide pools. A mountain rose on his side of the creek above the beach he was walking on. The fog still wrapped its top in gray. At its foot, on the ledge that topped the bluff, sunlight flared off the windows of several buildings set among twisted trees. Smoke curled up from chimneys.

Two sentinel piles of black rock stood off shore just beyond the cove's mouth. Surf curled against their foundations breaking the ocean swells into the cove's wavelets. Ben, warmed in the sun, decided to walk the beach to its end, past the houses. His shoes squeezed water from the packed sand. Ben could see only broken rocks and tidal pools where the beach ended. From there the surf flailed at the foot of cliffs like those across the cove.

Someone had built a stair of logs and packed sand at this end of the beach. It twisted in hairpin fashion up the bluff and onto the ledge. Ben climbed the stairway. He came out between two modest cottage built of brown shingles and logs. Smoke came from the landward chimney. A light in the other cabin silhouetted a man who was beginning to dress. The man was in good shape. Ben stood and watched him draw his boxer shorts up and wrap a short robe around him. Ben blushed at his voyeurism when watching the man stirred a mild sensation in his loins. The man turned out the light and disappeared into the cottage's shadows.

Ben walked as quietly as he could, not wishing to disturb anyone's privacy. He came to a broader path that led back toward the Inn. It passed several rustic cottages set among trees obviously planted to protect them from wind.

Ben was almost at the Inn, when he saw the "For Rent" sign on a cottage. He'd have missed it if the sun hadn't lit it up for him. On a whim, he turned up the path that led to the porch between the high grass and coastal flowers to peer in the windows. The kitchen had a small stove, and an old sink along one wall. A refrigerator stood to one side with the door propped open. The next window to the left was frosted; Ben guessed the room was a bathroom.

He pushed through the grass and flowers around the cottage to the left. Two windows on that side opened on two rooms. One had a bed, stripped to the mattress. The front of the cottage looked toward the cove. A small porch covered the front door. A picture window next to the front door allowed a clear view of the cove from the cottage parlor. Ben could make out a dusty couch and an empty bookcase. The floor was dusty, too. The chimney suggested a fireplace.

The place charmed him. He imagined himself sitting in his favorite recliner with a mug of tea steaming beside him. He imagined the bookcase filled with his favorite volumes. He needed a place to contemplate his life without Len, a place Len had not been, a place to begin again to be his own person. This cottage could be the place for him to renew himself. He looked for a telephone number, or address, to apply to rent the place. The rental sign simply said "For Rent." He decided to return to the motel to ask about renting the cottage.

The motel office was still not open. A hand-lettered sign on the door advised clients to go to the Café of the Four Rosas to check out. Ben walked over to the Café. He was ready for a hearty breakfast. The stale sandwich had not lasted. He took a booth by a window. Harry Pitts came out and said, "Good Morning," then ducked back into what Ben took to be the kitchen. He reappeared with a menu and a coffee pot.

"Regular or Decaf?" he asked.

"Tea, if you have it," Ben said. "I gave up coffee several years ago."

"Herbal?"

"Black tea, Lipton's if you have it."

"Lipton's it is." Harry took the coffee back in the kitchen and came back with a mug and a pot of hot water. The pot of hot water was ample; it had at least four cups in it. Ben silently blessed Harry when he saw that Harry had already put a teabag in the pot and poured water over it. It was already coloring nicely.

"Our breakfast menu," Harry said, and put the plastic sheet before Ben, who glanced at it. It was a standard breakfast menu.

"Sausage and eggs, the eggs sunny-side up," Ben said, "with hash browns and sourdough toast, please."

"Got it. Be a few minutes while Rosa cooks it," Harry said, and went back to the kitchen. Ben took the bag out, squeezed it against the spoon, and sipped his first cup of tea. It was very good after strolling in the brisk air to warm his innards with hot tea.

Ben's mind churned with thoughts about the cottage. He mentally listed reasons for and against renting a retreat, for and against even retreating. The cold fist that had knotted below his diaphragm when he first realized Len was dying relaxed its fingers a bit. He had held himself tightly together for Len's sake. Now he could let go, a little.

Ben had sipped more than halfway through a second cup when the Harry brought his breakfast. His eggs came cooked just as he liked them. The sausage was savory. Harry brought ketchup and hot sauce to Ben's booth. Ben soon demolished his breakfast. Ben finished his meal and sat, savoring his tea. When he was done, he went to the cash register by the door. There was a small bell beside it. Ben rang it. Harry came out.

"Breakfast okay?" he asked as Ben handed him a ten.

"Very good," Ben said. "I went walking, this morning, along the beach. This is a beautiful place."

"We like it," Harry said, as he rang up Ben's meal and handed him his change.

"I came back along the bluff. I saw a cottage for rent. Where would I inquire about renting it?"

"That's Señora Mandor's cottage," he said. "She lives in the big house up the hill." Ben had not seen the big house. It must have been lost in the fog had wreathing the mountaintop.

"Do you have a phone number for her?"

"She doesn't like to give it out. I can call the house, though, and tell her you're interested."

"I'd appreciate that." Ben stood at the counter while Harry placed the call.

"Hello, Elke? Harry Pitts here; I've got a man who wants to ask about renting the Señora's cottage in the village. Is she interested?" He nodded. "His name's Benjamin Dover Soul, according to his credit card. He stayed last night at the Inn." He nodded again, and looked at Ben. "Are you interested in the place for a long term, or just for a week or two?"

"For several months, at least."

"He says for several months."

Harry stared at his shoes while Elke, whoever she was, went to check with the Señora. He stood suspended for three or four minutes. Ben quietly wriggled his toes in his shoes.

"I'll ask him," Harry said, straightening up. Evidently, Elke was back.

"Can you stay around until this afternoon?"

"Yes. I'm retired, and my time's my own."

"He'll stay. I'll tell him. Bye, Elke." He carefully replaced the receiver, as if the telephone were a carton of eggs.

"La Señora will see you at tea time today. Her secretary, Elke Hall, will meet you here at 3:30 sharp, this afternoon."

Ben did some quick calculation. If the interview lasted more than a few minutes, he'd be too late to get home before midnight. "I should probably plan to spend the night here," he said.

"No problem this time of year. I'll hold your room."

"Thanks." Ben looked at his watch. It was 9:30 in the morning. He decided to drive around the countryside. He saw cows, vineyards, one llama guarding a flock of sheep, but no unicorns. When he returned, he went to the Café for a cup of tea.

### La Señora

Elke Hall came into the Café promptly at 3:30. She was born to play Brünhilde in _Götterdammerung_. She was tall, buxom, and muscular. She had braided her blond and gray hair in a helmet on the top of her head. Her eyes were stern blue, and seemed to cut to one's core through whatever surface one presented. Ben thought she would look thoroughly at home carrying a shield and spear.

She extended her hand to him. "I am Elke Hall, La Señora's secretary and companion. We will take the funicular," she said. Her speech echoed Boston, not Berlin.

"I have a car," Ben said, "if there's a way to drive."

"We use the funicular. There is a road to La Señora's home, but the Coastal Commission has it locked with three gates. We do not pander to the Coastal Commission, and they do not unlock gates for us without a great deal of bureaucratic bother."

"Certainly," Ben said. He had read many articles about how unpopular the Coastal Commission was among coast people. Elke escorted him behind the Café to a low building. She unlocked a small door between two large ones and reached inside to turn on a light. "This is the garage," she said. It held a blue Chevrolet, vintage 1956, and an Allen touring car that probably dated to the 1920s. Elke locked the door behind them. They crossed the garage to the back, where Elke unlocked another door and motioned him through.

"The funicular is here," she said. He went through to a small shed, open at the uphill end. A cable ran in a slot between the two sets of rails. A car waited on the right.

"Please sit on the uphill side," she pointed, "as I must operate the controls from the other seat." Ben took the uphill seat, which immediately leveled under his weight. He sat a foot or so higher than Elke. She got in and released a lever. The car began to rise slowly.

"A funicular railway," she said by way of conversation, "is one where two cars are joined by a cable. As one descends, the other ascends. Their weight is approximately counterbalanced." He nodded at her, unsure how to respond to this information. The funicular's motion was less steady than one could want. He was glad she had mentioned the other car, however, when its shadow fell over them suddenly as it passed on its way down. Ben had expected spectacular views of the cove, or the sea, but the funicular was on the landward side of the mountain, and all he saw were bits of sky and gray-green shrubs.

"What is Señora Mandor like?" he asked as the funicular lurched along.

"La Señora is like herself, and unlike any other I have known. It is best you should form your own impression." The funicular jolted to a halt. "We are at the top," she said.

Elke unlatched the door, and gestured at him to get out. He got out. The car had stopped in a shed, open at the downhill end, with a door at the uphill end. Elke opened the door and they went through onto a brick-red patio made of concrete. A few fine cracks ran through it, and small green weeds poked up in the cracks. Behind the patio stood a single story Spanish Mission style house with a red tile roof. Something about its air suggested the innocent excess that marked the silent film era. Two wings stretched left and right from the front door.

"La Señora is waiting," Elke said. She led him to the front door. Carvings of floating mermaids, spouting whales, and leaping porpoises crowded together on its varnished redwood panels. The effect was at once fantastic and comic. Ben smiled.

"La Señora's grandfather carved the door," Elke said, and opened it. They came into an entry hall, painted cream color. A long hallway ran to the left, dim in the afternoon because no windows gave onto it. A closed door on the right probably opened onto a similar corridor. Directly opposite the front door was a large painting of the Virgin of Guadeloupe in a dark and heavy wood frame. The closing door revealed a small umbrella stand, shaped like an elephant's foot. Ben reached over to touch it.

"That is a plastic replica," Elke said. "No elephant was harmed by its manufacture. Please wait here," she said. "I will tell La Señora you have arrived." She went briskly down the left-hand hall toward the end, knocked on a door on the left, and went in. Ben contemplated the painted Virgin, trying to determine if her smile promised ecstasy or covered up agony.

Elke returned after several minutes. "La Señora will see you in the library," she said. "Follow me." She turned and went back down the left-hand hall. Ben followed.

"Mr. Soul is here, Señora," she said as she opened the library door. She gave him a gentle push in the small of my back. "Go on in, Mr. Soul; stand just to the left of the door until La Señora tells you to sit." Feeling like a herded sheep, Ben went into the room and stood at the left hand side. The room was very bright with the afternoon sun, and his eyes watered as they adjusted after the dim hall. It took a while before he could see anything. A delightful old-book smell tickled his nose. The silence seemed to stretch out to touch forever.

"Mr. Soul," La Señora said, "please take the leather chair to your right." Her voice was firm, with a hinted lilt of Spanish accent. Ben looked to the right and saw a great brown leather armchair that was more a throne for a cattle queen than mere armchair. He settled himself into upholstered comfort, and immediately felt less like a sheep and more like a child in a playroom fortress.

His hostess sat across from him in a chair twin to the one he occupied. Ben's first impression was of steel wrapped in black velvet and lace. She was a diminutive lady. Her hair was white and glowed in the afternoon sunlight. Her thick gray brows hovered like iron shields over the fire in her black eyes. He had met raptors with less stern eyes. Her heart-shaped face, though wrinkled with fine lines, was still beautiful with a great dignity. The great chair she sat in did not shrink her. She commanded the room.

"Your aura is scarred with old wounds, Mr. Soul, and shows recent damage, as well." She folded her hands under her chin, and gazed at him. "You have recently lost someone you loved very much." Ben realized she was not questioning him, she was commenting on him. He didn't know what to say to her. He was not conversant with auras; he wasn't sure he believed in them. She regarded him for a long moment. He felt her probe rooting through his core. Elke's penetrating gaze was a cursory glance compared to La Señora's stare. He knew at once that he could hide nothing from this woman.

"I understand you own the cottage for rent on the bluff above the beach," he said, hoping to distract her with business. "I'm interested in renting it."

"I own all the cottages on the bluff," she said. "We call it the village." Elke came in with a tea trolley. "We'll discuss business after our tea."

"Your tea, Señora," Elke said.

"Thank you, Elke. Do you wish to join us, or do you have other matters to tend to?"

"I have other matters, Señora."

"Very well, then, Elke. I'll be mother and pour. Go do what you need to do."

"Yes, Señora." Elke left.

"Do you take cream or sugar, Mr. Soul?"

"Neither thank you."

She took up a delicate porcelain teapot decorated with tiny roses and poured his tea. "It's English Breakfast, despite the hour," she said. "I prefer a hearty black tea, myself. If you'd rather, I can have Elke bring you something else."

"I like a strong black tea, Señora," Ben said.

"Have a bit of cake." She passed him the plate. He took a small slice, and a napkin. The cake was rich, almost like a fruitcake. She poured her own tea, took cake, and settled herself into her leather chair.

"The cottages on the bluff, this house, and the beach along the cove are my patrimony," she said. "My great-great-grandfather bought this land, and most of the two mountains beyond this one, after the gold rush. He was an ensign on the _Obadiah,_ when it shipwrecked here. He fell in love with the place. The station and the village are named after him, in a way."

"In a way?"

"He was Coast Guard Ensign Danson Mann. He used the title proudly all his life, even after he settled here. When the railroad came up the coast in the late 1800s, my great-grandfather asked the railroad to include a flag stop named for his father. The railroad clerk had poor hearing. He heard 'San Danson,' a typically California saint, not 'Ensign Danson.' The stop became San Danson Station. When my grandfather built the cottages as a resort in the early 1900s, he named the village after the station. All through the 1920s, visitors came from the City to summer here. The family had to sell most of the land to the Coastal Commission in the 1960s, but the Commission allowed us to keep the village, since it had been here so long." She sipped at her tea, and nibbled at her cake.

"It is a beautiful place," Ben said.

"One of many along the coast," she said. "I have made it a refuge for the distressed. More tea?"

"Thank you, no. I'm just fine."

"Tell me about yourself. What scarred your aura?" Ben felt again that he could hide nothing from this woman if she wanted to know it.

"I don't know," he said. "I don't know how to read or understand auras."

"It was not long ago, I think. You had a spiritual crisis, perhaps a divorce?" She leaned toward him to catch his answer.

"No," Ben said; "I've never been married."

"Have you have lost someone, perhaps recently?"

"Yes. I've lost Len, Leonard DeLys, my long time companion. We'd been together twenty-seven years."

"I knew of a Leonard DeLys, many years ago. Did a great deal of civic work during the Great Temblor. Did you meet him in the City?"

"Yes, just after the Great Temblor. We got together about a year later. Right from the first we fit together."

"That happens once in a while for some people. One is fortunate when it does." He glanced at her. She was looking out the window. Ben wondered if she saw a face from her past in the afternoon light. La Señora said nothing of what she saw. She turned to him again. "Why do you want to rent my cottage?"

"I need a place to reflect, and to heal. The home Len and I shared echoes with the silences where he used to make sounds. I need to be in a different place for a while, a place that does not have his imprint, so I can figure out how to go on from here."

The Señora nodded. "I see." She studied him a moment more. "Let me think about this overnight," she said. "My village is a refuge for those in spiritual and emotional need. I need to consider what your aura tells me, and how you might meld with the others who are already resident. Are you staying in the area?"

"I'm staying tonight at the Inn," he said.

"I'll send my decision there in the morning," she said. "And now, Mr. Soul, if you'll excuse me, I must rest." She rang a little bell on the table beside her. Elke must have been near. She came very quickly.

"Elke," the Señora said, "please obtain Mr. Soul's references, and then take him down on the funicular. I have promised him my decision in the morning."

Ben got out of his chair and went to her, holding out his hand. "Thank you, Señora," he said, "for considering me." She took his hand. Her grip was firm. Her touch transferred power to his hand.

"Until tomorrow," she said as she released his hand.

"Come with me," Elke said, "to the funicular." She turned and led Ben out of the room. Near the main entry, she opened a door on the left of the hall and ushered him into her office. "Here are paper and a pen, Mr. Soul. Please give me three references, one financial, one personal near your home, and one personal, if you have it, from someone in this county."

He leaned over the desk and gave her the information she asked. Ben had no trouble with a personal reference from his home in the East Bay, but had to think a while before he remembered the Rev. Robert Oliver Link, a long time friend of Len's, who lived in this county. Ben knew him a little.

Elke took up the paper and read the list of names. "I see you know our friend, Rev. Bobbo," she said.

"We are acquaintances," Ben said. "He knew my late companion, Leonard DeLys, quite well."

"Oh. You're that Ben Soul. I knew Len; we used to correspond at Christmas. We'll talk with Rev. Bobbo. Please, now, we should take the funicular down. I do not like to leave La Señora for long."

"Certainly." They went out the door to the funicular. Ben sat on the uphill side again.

Elke said to him on the way down, "If you are staying at the Inn tonight, I suggest you have dinner at the Four Rosas. The special for tonight is roast beef, one of Rosa's best presentations. Be sure to get there before seven-thirty. Rosa closes at eight."

"Thank you. I'll try it." The trip downhill seemed to take less time. Perhaps it had something to do with the weight distribution. When they reached bottom, Elke led him through the garage, and then bade him goodbye. He went to his room at the Inn, and lay on his bed. He meant to muse, but fell asleep instead.

At the manor, Elke consulted her archived correspondence. She extracted an old letter from Len DeLys and took it to La Señora.

_Len DeLys  
817 Lost Sombrero Lane  
The City  
Ms. Elke Hall  
112 Lost Lane  
The City_

_Dear Elke,_

_Yes, the rumors are true. I have a spouse, Ben. He's got a great body, and he's a great guy. I met him during the great temblor. I'd noticed him the day before, across the street from me at the Carnival Parade. His hair is brown, and his eyes are gray. When I look into them, I can see myself in their mirrors. Wish us happiness, Elke, as we wish for you and Rosa._

_May your coming year be a good one. Ben and I are looking forward to a bright future. Blessings on you and yours._

_Len DeLys_

### Acceptance

It was near seven when Ben woke. He hastily made himself presentable and walked quickly to the Café. It was about seven-twenty when he entered. Two of the tables had diners finishing up dessert. A third awaited clearing. Harry Pitts led Ben to a clean table.

"Our meal tonight is roast beef," he said. "We've got potatoes and vegetables with it, soup or salad to start it, tea or coffee to go with it, and dessert to end it. It's eight ninety-five. If you want something else, I'll bring you a menu, but everything on it will cost more." He smiled at Ben.

"Elke, that is, Ms. Hall, recommended the roast beef," Ben said. "That's what I'd like. With tea, please, and the salad, oil and vinegar dressing."

"Good choice. Be a few minutes." He went to the kitchen and put the order in. The people at the other two tables got up about the same time and went to the cash register. Harry came out and took their money, rang up the receipts in the cash register, warned them about fog on the road, and went back to the kitchen. He came out again with the salad. It was small, but cold, crisp, and fresh. Ben enjoyed it thoroughly. The meal, dark rich beef in a darker and richer gravy, crisply sautéed zucchini and carrots, and melting mashed potatoes made up the entrée. A rich fudge cake topped the meal off.

"Enjoy the meal, Mr. Soul?" Harry asked.

"Yes," he said, "very much."

"A good cook is more precious than rubies, yea, than much fine gold," Harry said. Ben looked up at Harry. "My own translation from Proverbs," he said. Ben nodded. Len's friend, Bobbo Link, claimed almost anything could be attributed to Proverbs or Leviticus, because nobody read them if they could help it.

"Did you have a good interview with La Señora?" Harry asked.

"It was successful, I hope," Ben said.

"La Señora is a good woman, looks out for others. She's careful to keep the souls balanced in the village, for everybody's sake. If she rents to you, remember that."

"Yes. I will." Then Ben paid his bill and went to his room. He watched some television before he drifted off to sleep. Harry woke him in the morning knocking on the door. Ben had fallen asleep with his clothes on, so he didn't need to get dressed. He answered the door.

"I've got a message for you," Harry said. He handed Ben an envelope addressed in a firm script. "I think it's from La Señora herself."

"Thank you, Harry," Ben said and took the envelope. Harry stood waiting for him to open it.

_"Dear Mr. Soul:_

_Please understand we ordinarily accept tenants only when certain people we know well refer them to us. We do this because we established our community for those who need healing. We are, therefore, careful of our balance of personalities. You are the first in a long while to approach us to rent a cottage without a prior reference._

_We have consulted your references, and they are favorable. We will grant you, therefore, a three-month lease on the cottage. Should you, at the end of those three months, wish to stay on with us, I will make a final decision with input from the other villagers. Should you wish to leave at any time before that three months is completed, you will be liable for the entire three months' rent, plus any damages and cleaning costs associated with your residence in the cottage. If these terms are acceptable, please advise Mr. Pitts to contact me. We will account your three-month lease to begin at the first of next month._

_Sincerely,_

_Sra. Salvación Mandor"_

Ben wondered why, if La Señora only rented to referred residents, she, or someone, had posted a sign on the cottage. "Señora Mandor has offered me a three month lease," Ben said to Harry. "She told me to ask you to give her my answer. Please tell her I accept."

Harry smiled and held out his hand. "Welcome, Mr. Soul. La Señora is very particular, but she's an excellent and kindly woman. I hope you'll like it here."

"Thank you, Mr. Pitts. I'll check out in a few minutes, if you don't mind. I've got several things to arrange at home before I can occupy the cottage."

"Right. Moving's a complicated business. Good luck with it. I've got your charges on your credit form. You don't owe any extra, so just drop the key in the slot when you're ready to leave."

"Okay."

Ben gathered his few things together and put them in the car. He dropped the room keys in the slot on the door, and walked back up on the bluff for a last look at the cottage. Smoke came from the one cottage nearest San Danson Station. Ben considered knocking, but didn't. He looked up at the hill on his way back to the car. A white and tan llama came over a swell, a smaller black one following it. Ben went down to his car and drove home to the house so empty of Len. He spent the next two weeks getting a gardener, finding a house sitter (one of Len's distant cousins temporarily in need of shelter), and selecting the minimal set of books, CDs, and household utensils to take to the cottage.

### Butter's Tale

The rough rubbing removed the warm slickness from the pup's coat. She sensed warmer and cooler. Others wriggled next to her. Greater warmth lay in front of her. She opened her mouth and began to nurse. The rough rubbing continued. She knew security. She slept. She woke. She ate. She slept. In time, she learned to move around. Light, dark, and sounds began to supplement her sense of smell. The greater world around her began to beckon. She learned to eat solid food, and to wander on her four legs. Mother was still her center, but every few hours she explored further into the garage that was their home.

Wisdom she needed to survive came to her. She learned to trust the large, strange smelling, beings who brought food to her mother. She learned to drink water from the bowl they kept filled. She did not prepare to leave her family. She did not know she needed to.

Another of the big beings came. This one smelled different from the two who fed them. This person had the effrontery to pick her up and hold her close. The experience frightened her, and her bladder turned loose. The person dropped her. Only the quick action of one of her own persons saved her from a bad fall. The persons made loud noises at each other, and the newcomer left. She felt the floor under her and scampered to her mother, who began licking her to soothe her.

A day or two later another stranger came. This stranger smelled like garlic and roses. The smell excited her. She waddled up to this person to sniff more closely. The person rubbed her head gently and crouched down. She waited for it to pick her up. It didn't. She stayed by the person's feet, enjoying the touch. One of her own persons made noises. The newcomer responded. Someone wrapped her in a towel and handed her to the newcomer. The newcomer seemed sure of itself. She nestled, wrapped in the towel, against the newcomer.

One of her own persons put her into a box by herself, and closed the lid. The sudden darkness startled her. She whimpered. Distantly she heard her mother whine. Then the box began moving. She braced herself against its swaying. She whimpered again. Her mother did not answer, this time. The box kept swaying and bouncing. Then there was a series of banging noises, and the box stopped swaying and bouncing. The newcomer person made soothing noises, and her heartbeat slowed.

A roaring and a final bang followed a great grinding sound. The floor began to move. The movement went on and on. A rhythmic whining noise accompanied the movement, and seemed to become a part of it. Eventually it lulled her to sleep. Only the sudden stopping of the noise woke her. She barked, twice, and heard no response. The person who had taken her away had left the car.

She returned after a little while, frightened and screaming. The dog could smell the fear on her. Another person, loud and angry, and a little afraid, kept barking. The person who had taken her away let out a loud scream, mingled fear and pain in her voice. The stale beery smell of the other person suddenly replaced her scent. Something slammed on the car, shaking it. She could hear the nice person weeping. The sound puzzled her. The grinding noise came, followed by the roaring, muted this time, and the floor began to move again. This time the speed seemed much greater. Butter whimpered steadily. She did not know the term, but she had been carjacked. The nice young woman who had been taking her home to a new life sat, injured, on the parking lot asphalt. She had stopped at a store to buy dog food and a water bowl.

The speed slowed after a time, but now the box she was in began sliding around the car as it raced around sharp curves and turns. She yelped when a particularly sharp turn slammed her against the side of the box as it fetched up against the car's door. The bad-smelling person made loud noises. The car slowed a little, but now she felt the box lift into the air. Her feet skidded out from under her as she swayed in the air. The person made loud, angry-sounding noises again. He shook the box. Her bladder failed her again. The box, reeking with the smell of her own urine, became her trap. She yelped and howled as loud as she could. The box fell on the seat as the person dropped it. The car slowed, jerked to the left, and came to a stop. The person opened the car door, jerked the top of the box up, and dumped her on the gravel. She ran for the shelter of the nearest building. The person slammed the door and sped away, spitting gravel from his tires as he left.

We have little more to say of him. The police caught him and put him in jail pending arraignment. He complained to his cellmate, a very large and very sentimental man, about the dog, and how the authorities had caught him (as he saw it) because he'd had to stop and dump the dog on the way. The cellmate's only childhood friend had been a dog. He liked dogs better than he liked people. He put a homemade knife in the villain's back. The courts prosecuted the big man, but the deed was marked as righteousness on his account in the Eternal Treasury of Merit.

The dog, shivering and terrified, crept under the building into a low crawl space. She could hear cars going by on the highway. Cars terrified her. She connected them with the bad-smelling person and the trauma of separation from all that she had known. The rear of the building was quieter. It emitted interesting smells. Food smells. People food smells. Although she had never eaten people food, she knew a good smell when she encountered one. She went to the door where the smells were the strongest. She whined. She scratched at the door. A person came, who smelled of onions and gravies and garlic. It was Rosa Krushan, chef at the Café of the Four Rosas.

Rosa had little use for dogs or cats. She was not inclined to let any kind of pet or person own her. Something about this stray touched her kindly side.

"Starving and thirsty, are you, pup?" The dog wagged her tail. Rosa's crusty heart softened just enough. "Wait here," she said, and went into the kitchen. She returned shortly with a small Styrofoam plate of mashed potatoes and gravy and a plastic bowl with fresh water. She edged the door open, keeping her foot well in the way so the dog could not enter her kitchen. No knowing when some inspector or other might happen by. The dog retreated before her feet, but not far. Potatoes and gravy offered too much attraction for her to go very far.

Rosa put the plate and bowl down where the dog could reach them. "Have at it, pup," she said, and went back inside to her range and refrigerator. Later, when she checked, the plate was empty, and the water bowl nearly dry. She refreshed the water in the bowl, and locked up her restaurant for the night.

Rosa had grown up without pets, and did not understand that once one has fed a dog that dog will return for more food. So she was surprised when she opened her restaurant in the morning to see the dog sitting on the stoop. She brushed the dog off the stoop with her foot, gently, opened the door and went in. The dog did not stay brushed off.

"Harry," Rosa said to Harry Pitts, her waiter and general factotum, "how does one get rid of a dog on one's doorstep? I gave it food and water last night, hoping it would go away, but it's still here this morning."

"And it will stay around hoping you feed it again. Got any scraps we can share with it?"

"I don't want it in my restaurant."

"I'll feed it out behind the trash bin. I saw it this morning. It's just a pup. Either it got away from a family that it belongs to, or some wicked person dumped it. We can share enough to keep it alive for a few days, until we know whether it's lost or dumped."

Such a long speech from Harry surprised Rosa. The taciturn former missionary seldom strung more than a few words together, unless he was talking about his beloved Bible. On those rare occasions, shutting him up was difficult indeed.

"You deal with it, Harry. I don't have time or patience." Thereafter Harry made sure the pup had food and water every morning. Other than basic feeding and watering, he didn't spend any time petting the dog, talking to it, or otherwise encouraging it to think of him as pack.

The dog thrived. After the first week, she began to widen the horizon of her world. She never went near the highway. Cars passed there. Cars meant terror and disruption to her. So she went west, as though Horace Greeley moved her, and found San Danson village. Emma noticed the dog a couple of times. Once she put out water, for the sun was very high that day, and she saw the dog panting. Of course, Emma didn't tell Prime Pussy what she had done; Prime Pussy was a jealous cat.

In her second week, the pup also made the distant acquaintance of Dickon. Dickon "inadvertently" dropped bits of wiener and bun where the pup could find them. The dog began sleeping under the porch of a vacant cottage near Emma's house. The dog was waiting, waiting for she knew not what.

One morning in the fourth week of her isolation, when the mists sharpened all the scents on the hill, the dog began to climb toward the crest. She encountered a strange-smelling creature, a scent of sheep mixed with violets. Stillness came over her, and she sat before the creature. It was as if she had come into the presence of the One Who Sniffs All Things, and the dog recognized a holy moment. The stillness flooded through her, warming her. The dog understood her waiting was near its end. She would soon have pack to be her family. She had a mission.

She turned and trotted down the hill. She went to the cottage she thought of as her cottage. Instead of crawling under the porch, she went up on it and sat to wait.

The dog knew when the bag-burdened man started up the steps of the porch that her person had arrived. The sense the strange creature on the mountain had given her of impending pack and family now felt fulfilled. Naïve as she was, she expected the man to know it immediately, too. Her first lesson in people training was the discovery that persons are not as wise as dogs about the things of the heart and spirit. Over the coming weeks, she would learn that dogs could love their people through almost all conditions. This was the particular strength and wonder of dogs.

She wagged her tail as the person approached her. He set a bag down on the porch. She sniffed it for courtesy's sake. The man extended his hand to her. She sniffed it, glorying in the smell of her person, and licked his hand. Before he could rub her head or scratch her ears, or otherwise show her affection, as she fully expected him to do, another person came up behind the man and spoke. The dog recognized her scent as that of the woman who had provided her water. She wagged her tail for the woman, as well, despite the musky odor of cat that clung to her.

The people wanted to enter the cottage. The dog politely stepped aside for them, and followed them in before the woman, her hands encumbered by a plate of people-food, could shut the door against her.

The dog wagged her tail again, and put her most appealing look in her eyes. The woman bent over and stroked her head. She spoke some words to the man. Then the woman sat on a chair by the table. The dog moved closer to her. The woman stroked the dog's head. The man busied himself making tea. Then he sat to eat with the woman while they talked. After a time the woman got up to leave. The dog stayed quietly where she was.

Now, perhaps, she could begin training her person. However, the man went out, and returned after a little while with more bags. He did this several times. The dog was bored, and took a nap. She was more comfortable inside the cottage than she was under the porch. The man seemed to have forgotten her. He took things out of the bags and put them in cupboards and on shelves. Eventually he worked around to where the dog was sleeping on the hearthrug. He insisted she get up and go out. Reluctantly the dog went.

She lay on the porch in the bright afternoon sun, waiting. As the sun began to slip behind the fog standing just off shore, she whimpered. She went to the screen door, and whimpered more loudly. The man came.

### Moving In

The morning fog had retreated seaward by the time Ben got to San Danson Station with his small library of books and CDs. He had selected only a minimum of what he liked to have around him because he knew he had to carry each ounce up the bluff over the path to the cottage. He also had to allow for clothes and a few cooking utensils. He had packed everything in brown grocery bags; he learned years before that a bag of books was quite enough weight to carry.

Ben stopped at the Inn, where Harry Pitts gave him the key for the cottage. Harry said no more than "Hello," and "Here's your key" to Ben. He wondered at Harry's lack of welcome, but when he saw Harry was immersed in his Bible, he put the lack of enthusiasm down to that and Harry's naturally laconic nature.

Ben took a small load for the first trip. His first bag held his favorite cooking pans, one for pasta, one for frying, and a small one for vegetables. He planned to make most of his meals at home; the Café was the only nearby restaurant, and Ben knew, no matter how good its cuisine, too frequent sampling would make it pall.

Ben's first real welcome came from a small dog on the cottage porch. It was obviously a young pup, a little past weaning. "Hello, pup dog," Ben said. The dog wagged its tail. Ben saw it was a female. It was brindle, with a mask of lighter hair around its eyes and a feathered beige back end. Ben put his bag down on the lower step and held out his hand. The dog sniffed it and licked it. Its tongue was soft and warm, and only a little raspy. The dog's ears still flopped over.

"What's your name?" Ben asked the dog.

"Doesn't have one," an older woman said. Ben straightened up suddenly and looked around. A woman stood on the path behind him. She wore a flower-sprigged dress and a red-bordered white apron, one that flowed over her ample bosom and down her stout front. Her hands held a plate of cookies. Chocolate chip cookies. She had won her way to Ben's heart. Smile-wrinkles crinkled her round face.

"I'm your neighbor, Emma Freed." Her eyes twinkled.

"Oh, hello," he said. "I'm Ben, Ben Soul."

"I know. Elke said you'd be here today." She smiled at him. "I've swept the place, washed the windows and basins, and things."

"That's very neighborly of you. Thank you."

"Elke hired me to do it. The cookies are my offering, though." She held them out to Ben. He took them; chocolate chip were his favorite cookies.

"Come in," Ben said, "if the pup dog will let us go in. I think I have some tea in the bag here. Surely we can find a pot to boil water in." Ben grinned at her. "Chocolate chip cookies should be eaten in company, you know. They're as addictive as booze. Same principle. Never drink alone; never eat chocolate chip cookies alone."

"I'll have to remember that," she said. "I'm very fond of chocolate chip cookies, too. I'd never realized they were addictive."

"I have it on the best authority. My Mom."

The dog stepped aside for them; then she followed Ms. Freed in as Ben held the door for her.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Ms. Freed said. "The dog has followed me in."

"It's okay by me, I like dogs. Is it your dog?" Ben shut the screen. The dog stood, wagging its tail slowly, asking for acceptance.

"No, I've never seen it before last week. I'm afraid somebody dumped it on the highway. People are so barbarian."

"Much more so than dogs are, for sure. Where shall we sample your cookies?"

"The kitchen's the best place. There's a table and two chairs there."

"Right you are." They went to the kitchen. The dog followed them.

"This poor dog needs a home, I think," she said, reaching over to pet it. She took a chair at one side of the little table. The dog sat next to her.

Ben went to the cupboard, found a pot, and put some water in it. He lit the stove and set the pot on the flame. Then he went to his bag and dug out the tea.

"There are some mugs in the cupboard on the left side of the sink," Emma said. "Just rinse them out, and they'll be fine." She was scratching the dog behind its ears. "This dog needs a place to live," she crooned to it, "a warm place with lots of treats."

"Will you take it in, then? Or do you know someone who needs a dog?"

"No. I can't take in a dog. Prime Pussy wouldn't approve. She disdains dogs, you see."

"I take it Prime Pussy is your cat?"

"Yes, a tough orange tabby with a fierce temper. I suppose I let her get away with too much."

"I suppose dogs need people," Ben said. "I've been owned by a couple of dogs over the years."

"You could consider letting another dog take you over."

"Perhaps. I'd have to ask La Señora." The water boiled. He made the tea.

"La Señora thinks pets are therapeutic. She won't make any problems."

Ben set a cup in front of her, and sat down with his cup opposite her. She pulled back the plastic wrap from the plate of cookies and waited for him to take one. He did, and bit into it. It was wonderful.

"Delicious!" Ben said, closing his eyes in ecstasy.

"Thank you," she said. "How did you come to stay in the village?"

"I was walking by, saw the place for rent, looked in, and knew I needed to be here for a while. I inquired about renting the cottage, talked with La Señora, and here I am."

"La Señora has never put a rental sign up before. Perhaps that Coastal Commissioner woman required it. The rest of us are here because La Señora invited us."

"Invited?" Ben ignored her reference to the Coastal Commissioner woman.

"Usually on recommendation. For example, I'm her third cousin once removed. Dickon Shayne is a clergyman she rescued from the church. That kind of thing."

"Are the other villagers kinfolk as well?"

"No, only me. The rest are here for other reasons."

"Who all lives in the village?"

"Harry and Olive Pitts run the Inn and the gas station. They help out at the Cafe of the Four Rosas, too. Rosa Krushan does the cooking and manages the finances for both the Cafe and the Inn. The Wong brothers run the Emporium. In the village proper there's me in the first cottage, you in the second, and the Swami in the third. Malcolm Drye has the fourth cabin. Mae Ling has the fifth cottage. She's away in the Mediterranean right now. Dr. Field and Juan have the sixth cottage. Quite a tale to tell there."

"Oh?" Ben made his monosyllable as inviting as possible.

She smiled, and shook her head. "Another time I'll tell you about them. Dickon Shayne's in the seventh one, just this side of the Chapel."

"A chapel?"

"More of a community building, really. Of course La Señora and Elke are part of our community, but we don't think of them as being in the village or the station." She kept offering him cookies as she talked.

"I see. They're mansion people."

"One might say so." By now, they had eaten nearly all the cookies. Emma looked at her watch. "I really must be going," she said. "I've a lot to do today."

"I appreciate the cookies, and your welcome," Ben said as she got up. "I feel a lot less like a stranger, already." He stood.

Emma went to the door. Ben followed her. The dog didn't.

She looked back at him from the door. Her eyes were pools of kindness. "If you need anything, come by and ask. There's so few of us we have to hang together to take care of one another."

"Thank you, and thanks for the cookies. They were very good."

She went next door to her cottage. Ben closed the door behind him and went to his car. He made several trips back and forth bringing in his bags before he remembered the dog. The dog was sleeping on the hearthrug when Ben brought in the last load. He shook his head. Did he really need a canine companion? He thought not. Ben called the dog and put it outside. The dog was reluctant to go, but obeyed.

Ben set about shelving his small library of books and CDs as the afternoon wore on. He looked up from time to time at the cove. He plugged in his CD player and put some Mozart on while he hung his clothes and stashed the sheets, towels, and underwear. The fog stood just off shore, and the sun perched on top of it like a sunflower peering over a fence. The cove's ripples sparkled with afternoon zircons.

Ben heard whimpering. The dog was on the porch, begging entrance. Ben shrugged his shoulders and decided he did want a companion. "Oh, all right," he said. "I guess you're right. I need a dog to own me." He opened the screen and let her in. He rooted around in his cupboard and got a bowl down to give her water. Another bowl he set aside while he pondered what to feed her.

He sat down to talk to the dog. She immediately bumped his hand with her head. She wanted to encourage him to stroke her. He obliged. She began to feel hopeful, after all, about training this person. It must be a matter of finding just the right stimulus to get the proper response.

"What's your name to be? Pup Dog? No. Too generic." Ben scratched her ears. He took his hand away to rub his itching nose. When it dropped at his side, the dog began butting it again. "Could call you something like Rover or Spot, but those dog names are over-used."

He tried several more names before he settled on Butter. She had played him smooth as melted butter, and spread her sweetness over the dry toast of his soul. That's what he decided, later, to tell everyone. He really named her Butter because the minute he sat down she started butting his hand with her nose, to encourage him to pet her. He turned and looked at her. She butted his hand again, because it had stopped moving. He grinned at her. She rightly interpreted the grimace as affectionate. "Butting my hand again? How about I call you Butter?" She wagged her tail. "Butter it is," he said, and so she came by her person name, and soon learned to respond to it.

Ben shared his box dinner with Butter, and then took her out for a turn around the yard. She did what was necessary and followed Ben into the cottage. Ben sat down to read in a comfortable chair. Butter soon sat on his lap. Ben was never remembered whether she had jumped up uninvited, or he had lifted her. That night, however, they established between them that Butter sat on Ben in that chair. In coming days, she would learn to avoid sitting on other chairs, because Ben got very upset when she did. This one chair was special. She could use it when Ben was not in it and when he was.

Bedtime came. Ben took an old blanket he had brought, folded it several times, and put it on the floor next to his bed. He showed it to Butter, and told her to lie down on it. She did, but it was cold, and she felt distant from her person. She whimpered. The man ignored her. She whimpered louder. He stirred and sighed.

Sleepily he said, "You win." He reached down and lifted her onto the bed beside him. She snuggled up next to him where she could hear his heart beating. She drifted happily off to sleep. Outside, in the cove, waves lapped against the shore. On the hill, the unicorn with the unique horn nodded her llama-disguised head in satisfaction.

### Grocery Shopping

In that way dogs have, Butter soon centered Ben's life on her. They got up in the morning, went for a walk either along the bluff or on the beach, came back, had breakfast, and then Butter slept on his lap while he read. They had lunch when the spirit moved them, and took a short nap. In the evening, Ben read again while Butter slept at his feet. She'd ask for a nighttime turn around the yard before they went to bed. Allowing her to organize his life relieved Ben of an aimlessness that had threatened to swallow him up.

For almost a week, Ben didn't speak to another human being. He saw no one when he went out. He hadn't gone back to the Four Rosas. He preferred to live on his own quickie meals out of boxes and cans. Near the end of the week, however, he knew that he and Butter needed supplies. He decided to go to the local store, Wong's Emporium, to see what it might offer. He also thought he'd take lunch at the Cafe.

Butter moaned with great grief when Ben told her to stay in the cottage. He was certain she wouldn't be welcome in the store, and was afraid she'd be hurt or stolen if he left her on the stoop in front of it. He hadn't got her a leash yet. It was on his shopping list. He told her all this, explaining the matter in detail. She, of course, only perceived her abandonment.

The fog had lifted, but not gone back to sea, so the morning was gray and cold. Ben was glad he took a jacket as he walked past Emma's cottage and down to the Station. Emma's chimney showed no smoke. Ben wondered where she might be.

Coming to the highway was a shock. The noise of occasional traffic re-connected Ben with the mental state he had cast off in his week at the cottage. He wanted to go back and read a book while Butter slept on his lap. San Danson Station was no urban center, but even its bit of traffic noise rasped on his nerves. Ben took a deep breath, and braced himself against the noise.

Wong's Emporium was a general store. A redolence of old and mysterious spices, perfumes, and medicines greeted the customer's nose. The dim interior had shadowy piles of merchandise on tables and shelves ranged around the walls. A door into another room, brighter than the rest of the shop, showed the corner of a butcher's showcase. As Ben started into the room, the lights came on, throwing the interior and goods into sharp relief.

"Welcome, Mr. Soul," someone said.

Ben looked around, but couldn't see anybody.

"Over here by the cash register," the voice continued. "I'm Shubert Wong, one of the proprietors. Folks from the village call me Wong Shu." Ben spotted the speaker. He was perched on a stool behind an old-fashioned mechanical ornate cash register covered with brass curlicues. Wong Shu was short enough or sitting low enough that the cash register hid him from entering customers.

"Hi, Shu," Ben said, going over to him. "How did you know who I am?" Ben could see Shu was Chinese by ancestry, though his speech was pure American. He guessed Shu was somewhere between thirty and eighty years old. His face was unlined, except for a few laugh lines around his eyes.

"Elke described you, so we'd know you're from the village," he said. "You'll be wanting some supplies, I suppose, for one man and one dog?"

"Yes, for me and for Butter."

"Butter? That's what you call her?"

"Yes. It seems to fit, somehow."

"Better than Spot or Rover, I suppose. Try the Happy Dog canned food and dry. Mix half a can with a cup of the dry, feed her once a day. It seems to please most dogs best."

"Where is it?"

"On the third shelf down just left of the door."

"And a leash?"

"Same area, just to the left of the food."

Ben went over, selected three flavors at random, and got a good stout leather leash with a leather collar.

"You can put them on the counter here while you get your food. My brother, Waylon, will help you in the grocery."

Waylon looked like Shubert's twin. He grunted and waved by way of greeting and continued stocking shelves. Ben selected a cauliflower, a head of lettuce, a few potatoes, some onions, and some carrots. Then Ben scanned the tiny meat case. Nothing appealed to Ben except a rasher of bacon. He asked for a pound. Waylon weighed it for him. Ben selected a dozen eggs and a block of cheddar cheese.

"You got it all?" Waylon asked him. His voice was high-pitched where his brother's was normal.

"Yes, I think so."

"Cash or credit?" he inquired as he came over to the register.

"Cash," Ben said.

"Okay by me." He rang up Ben's vegetables and proteins. "How much on your side, Shu?"

"Seven ninety-five," Shu shouted back. "I'll be right in with it."

"Moved in okay?" Waylon asked.

"Yes, thank you," Ben said. He realized his activities were probably common village gossip, and promised himself to be discreet. Shu brought in his bag of dog items, and Ben promised the brothers Wong he would stop by next week to replenish his larder.

### Nap on the Beach

When Ben got back, Butter wanted to go for a run. He put his groceries away. It was not quite noon. Ben considered lunch, but the cove beckoned. The cold pasta in the refrigerator did not. He snapped his fingers and Butter raced to the door, her tail a whirlwind of eager delight. Ben stooped over and buckled her new collar around her neck. She shook her neck and head a couple of times trying to get the feel of it. Then he snapped the leash on her collar. Butter lunged through the door. The leash brought her up short. She looked back at him and whimpered for him to hurry.

The sky was a mother-of-pearl color, gray and white with hinted shimmers of purples and roses. The sun probably wouldn't disperse the overcast today. Ben opened the gate and Butter bounded out. She stopped and waited for him at the end of the leash, aquiver with eagerness. He smiled, not for the first time, at his pure joy in her company. They turned left at the gate and went west toward the upper end of the village. None of the neighbors showed. They kept to themselves most of the time.

Butter sampled the scent on several trees and fence posts as they walked. They turned past the most seaward cottage toward the beach stairs. Ben released Butter from her leash. She bounded down the stairs, ready to race the surf. She had discovered that harassing the surf was great fun. She loved to chase it out into the cove, and then run from it as it turned and chased her. She frolicked along, scattering the sandpipers as she went. Ben followed.

They meandered toward the cove's mouth and the ocean. They hadn't gone that direction before. The surf grew louder as they ambled. Ben could see the two sentinel rock piles clearly. The one on the south side was close to shore; the one on the north was a little farther out. Gulls wheeled and cried overhead. Some scrap of fish to fight over, he supposed. On the cliff above, he could just make out the line of a roof. He guessed this was the Chapel Emma Freed had mentioned. The beach ended where the cove met the sea. A tumble of black rocks defined the shore a few feet before the cliffs began. Ben could see the shelf that held the village ended just past the Chapel, too, in a great rib of the mountain. Butter, of course, had to explore the rocks. She loved splashing in puddles. He whistled to her. She carefully ignored him until his third, most piercing, whistle. Then she turned and raced back to him, tail in a whirlwind spin. Her legs were wet, and the sand stuck to them. She shook the water from her coat. A lot of it landed on Ben. He hoped she'd dry out enough to knock the sand off on the way home.

She raced away again. Ben heard her barking. He jogged toward her. When he caught up with her, he saw what had disturbed her. A man in a broad-brimmed hat stood at the edge of the wet sand gesticulating at the seagulls wheeling overhead. Ben hushed Butter, with some difficulty. The person took no notice of them. Ben approached, to apologize for Butter.

When he drew nearer, he could see the person was a stocky man dressed in a white linen suit with a black string tie and a broad-brimmed hat. He had a white moustache and a goatee, and white hair straggling from his hat brim. He looked ready to sell fried chicken. He was shouting at the seagulls in a very Southern drawl, calling them "Damnyankees" (which he made a twelve-syllable word) and "Carpetbaggers" (which he made a six or seven-syllable word).

Ben called to him in a loud voice, to penetrate not only the sigh of waves and wind, but also the ferocity of his attack on the seagulls. The man shook a final fist at the wheeling seagulls, and turned to Ben. He held his hands, palm up, as if to stop any approach, and then ran for the stairs up to the village.

When he got to the top stair, he turned around, removed his hat, and bowed to Ben. The white hair straggling from the brim came off with the hat, revealing a shaved head. He stood upright, put his hat and hair back on his head, and disappeared into the village trees.

Ben called Butter, but she wasn't through with her run. She was racing back and forth, barking at the seagulls. Ben considered insisting she come home, but she was so joyful he didn't. After all, he had no reason to hurry home. The strange man whose hair was part of his hat puzzled Ben. Emma hadn't mentioned any unusual people living in the village. Then, again, she was familiar with them all. She might consider the man's behavior ordinary. Ben determined to ask her, the next time he saw her, who the man was. Elke and Emma both had indicated very few strangers ever came to the cove. It wasn't as easy to find, for most people, as it had been for Ben.

Butter tired of chasing waves and annoying seagulls. She lay down on a dry patch of sand, panting, to wait for Ben. He walked toward her. She didn't rise, so he chose to rest with her. He plopped himself on the sand and re-attached her leash. They gazed together at the ballet of the cove waters through half-closed eyes. Ben drowsed. Butter slept.

### Ben Meets Dickon

Butter barked a sharp warning. Ben woke. A man was walking toward him from the ocean end of the cove. His head was bare, and his jacket was black and shiny. He wore blue jeans and white sneakers. Ben hooked his fingers in Butter's collar and waited for the man to come to him.

Ben judged the man's stomach was still flat under his coat. He filled out his jeans well. His hair was red speckled with gray. His face came clearer as he got closer. Ben guessed his age to be fifty plus. He had character lines around his mouth and eyes, but his cheeks and brow were smooth, and slightly ruddy. His eyes carried wariness in their green deeps. His face spoke a pleasant nature, though he was frowning a little at Ben. Or, perhaps, squinting. Ben wondered if he was myopic, and had forgotten his glasses. He stopped near Ben, looking at him.

Butter growled. Ben stroked her head to soothe her. The man studied Ben for a long moment then said, "Whose little boy are you?"

"I belong to the highest bidder. Who owns you?" Butter wagged her tail tentatively, making a fan shape in the sand.

"Various demonic forces. Are you Ben Soul?" Butter whined, and stood and stretched to reach the man's hand.

"Yes. You are?"

"I'm Dickon Shayne. Mind if I join you?"

"Okay with me, if Butter doesn't mind."

"I don't think she will. We're acquainted." He reached his open hand to Butter. She licked it. He rubbed her skull behind her ears. "Butter you call her?" Ben nodded. "Unusual dog name."

"She answers to it at dinner time," Ben defended his choice.

"Dogs do answer pretty well at dinner time. She went catch as catch can for a meal for a while before she adopted you. I fed her a couple of times, but she didn't stick around." He sat next to Butter and stared out at the shimmering wavelets on the Cove. "I think she was meant for you."

"Oh?" Ben looked at Dickon's profile. His nose was a little large and sharp, and a second chin had just begun to form, but his skin was clear. He looked at Ben, and smiled. Ben looked out at the Cove, embarrassed to be caught studying him. The silence seemed to swell between them like a black balloon. Ben looked sideways from the corner of his eye; Dickon was studying him. Ben took a chance and looked directly at him. He didn't drop his eyes. Ben saw a hesitant invitation in their green pools.

"Have you lived here long?" Ben asked him.

"Several years. I've been here since La Señora came here. What brings you here?"

"I've been a little lost since Len, my lover died. I came here to sort things out."

"How long were you together?" He looked at Ben again. Ben closed some windows inside himself, to cover places he wanted to keep private. He hadn't talked with anyone for so long. He was afraid he'd let too much show. People get hurt that way.

"Twenty-seven years."

He whistled. "That's a long time."

"I'm not quite used to being alone, yet," Ben said.

"Takes time, whether it's a breakup or a death. Did he have the virus?" Dickon's tone was quietly conversational.

Ben tossed a chip of driftwood toward the water. "No. We neither of us ever had that. We got together before either of us was exposed. It was his heart. It just wore out and stopped. Len was older than I am by twelve years. You'd never know it, until near the end. Even when he died, his hair wasn't as gray as mine is, and he had more of it on his head. He was tired all the time, the last few months, and had trouble breathing. We knew the end could come at any time. He went one evening after a spaghetti dinner I'd fixed special for him. He ate a little bit and went to bed. I guess he died easy compared to some ways people die."

"People think heart attacks are easier." Dickon stared out at the wavelets on the cove. A light breeze had sprung up to ruffle them. Ben felt the sadness swelling in his throat. Some things were still too near to talk about easily.

Ben let the silence hang for a while, and so did Dickon. He stretched his legs out and braced himself on the sand with his hands behind him. He considered the sky. Ben looked up to see what attracted his attention. He saw blue hazed with gold from the afternoon sun. Dickon didn't say what he saw. Butter whined, eager to go again.

"Guess I'd better take her home," Ben said, and pushed himself to his feet.

"Yes," Dickon said. "See you around, I'm sure, Ben." Butter tugged on her leash.

"Yeah, see you around." Ben wondered how many other eccentric souls there were in the village. Then he wondered if he qualified as eccentric. Ben watched Dickon walk seaward toward his end of the beach and the village. He guessed Dickon must be the man he watched getting dressed through that cottage window on the morning he had discovered the village. Butter whined beside him and tugged on the leash. She wanted to walk.

"Okay, girl," he said to her. "Let's walk." They turned east toward the Station.

"What do you think of this Dickon," Ben asked her. "He's easy enough on the eyes, isn't he?" Butter wagged her tail, and turned her head slightly toward him, but kept urging him forward. They were getting close to her evening suppertime. They rounded the corner and climbed up the trail to backtrack toward their cottage.

"You seemed to like him well enough," Ben said to Butter. He was panting just a little with the effort of keeping up with Butter. Nothing inspires a dog so much as mealtime. "You do like Dickon, don't you?" She wagged her tail again when Ben spoke his name. He took this for a good sign. "Dad often said, 'Never buy from a salesman the dog doesn't like.' If you like Dickon, he must be a little bit okay." Butter and Ben went in to supper.

### Supper at the Four Rosas

The next evening, over Butter's protests, Ben went to the Four Rosas Café for his supper. The special for the evening was a filet of beef with capers and black pepper. Rosa's famous zucchini fritters, dripping with butter and redolent with garlic and thyme, made the side dish. Emma had spoken of them ecstatically. Ben was eager to try them.

Harry greeted him with a tight little smile, no words. Ben had come to appreciate that Harry's tight little smile was a lavish greeting granted familiar faces. He escorted Ben to his favorite table in the far corner of the dining room. Harry laid a menu in front of Ben. Ben gave him his order. Harry got a teapot and teabags for him. While he waited for his tea to steep, Ben picked up a menu. The menu included a brief history of the café's origins.

_How a Café Got Its Name_

_The Café of the Four Rosas was a dream my mother and three of her friends had. They were nurses during World War II in the Pacific Theater. My mother, Rosa Terghi, and her three friends, Rosa Lamb, Rosa Biff, and Rosa Rhee, patched up a lot of sailors and marines from the Battle for Guadalcanal. The Navy gave them a week's recreation and recuperation in Honolulu to reward them for their nursing._

_While they were on leave, they went to a little tea shop on School Street in Honolulu. They got to talking about "after the war" and what they'd do with themselves. None of them was keen to marry, at least not right away, and they made a vow to open a tea shop together somewhere in the States. They agreed to call it the Café of the Four Rosas._

_Fate would not have it. Rosa Biff died off Iwo Jima of a blood poison she contracted tending wounded marines. Rosa Lamb fell overboard when her hospital ship lurched in a typhoon. Rumor had it she was leaning over the rail dreaming about a certain sailor she'd met. My mother, Rosa Terghi, and Rosa Rhee made it home. Rosa Rhee had a religious vision and joined a convent. My mother, desperate for food, agreed to marry my father, River Krushan. He was much older than she was, and soon died. She had his widow's pension to raise me on. I grew up with the story of these four Rosas. When I came to operate this café, I chose to honor these four women._

_Rosa Krushan, Prop._

Ben nodded as he finished reading the history. He thought it a charming tale. He leaned back to sip his tea and watch the other customers.

Several couples, tourists, sat at tables near the cash register. None of them was particularly remarkable, although two young men, obviously in the first throes of love from the way they gazed all gaga at each other, took Ben's eye for a moment. The young men left soon after he arrived. Ben reflected that watching them wasn't good for him, anyway. It made him miss Len in ways he hadn't missed him for a long time. Ben didn't want to stir up all those feelings again, not here in the corner of the world he'd chosen for his retreat.

Ben was halfway through his filet and fritters when a magnificent specimen of young manhood walked in. He was slender, with coffee colored skin, curly black hair, delicate features, and large brown eyes that were pools of mystery. He moved with the tight grace of a prowling panther. He was in a sheriff's uniform. He stopped to talk with Harry. Ben was too far away to hear what either of them said. Harry shook his head a couple of times, and the young man left. The room seemed suddenly jaded and dowdy when he had left, as though someone had turned on too many lights in a dark and romantic bar, showing the cracks in the plaster and the dust in the corners.

Harry came back to pour Ben more water for his tea. Ben was about to ask him who the young man was when the door opened again. A woman came in. The young man followed her. It looked to Ben as though the young man was trying to dissuade the woman from something. Harry excused himself and hurried to the door.

Ben studied the woman. Her hair was short, carefully coiffed in sculpted waves. She was dressed in a black sheath that outlined her figure. Her face was sharp, honed to an edge as though she used a grindstone to sharpen it. Her bust was not large, yet she thrust it forward like an advance cavalry. He shrank into his corner involuntarily, lest she see him and turn her scrutiny on him. He couldn't read auras, as he'd told La Señora, but this woman emanated hostility the way the young man emanated sex and beauty.

Her jaw line proclaimed determination as she said something to Harry. Harry cringed. The young deputy intervened. The woman turned an angry look on him. Even his charm went dim in the fury of that glance. He urged her to leave. She resisted, but then turned and charged out the door like an evil spirit thwarted in its wrongdoing. The young man gave Harry a rueful look over his shoulders, shrugged, and followed the woman out. Harry took in a deep breath, and let it out slowly. Ben couldn't be sure in the Café's light, but he thought Harry was trembling.

Ben turned back to his filet, almost cold by now. It had lost its savor. So had the fritters; he had let activities in the restaurant distract him from his meal. He thought of asking Harry to have Rosa warm his food again, and Butter's soulful brown eyes impressed themselves on his inner eye. He knew she would enjoy whatever he chose to share with her, warmed over or cold.

Harry had disappeared when Ben looked up to ask for a doggy bag. He was about to get up when Harry emerged from the kitchen with dessert, a scoop of green tea ice cream in a sherbet dish. Harry also had a plastic container.

"Thought you might need this," he said as he set the container on the table. "Your dog, she'd like what you can't eat, I'm sure." He used Ben's flatware to put the steak and fritters in it.

"Thanks, Harry," Ben said. He took a spoonful of the ice cream. It was delicious and cool. "Was that a deputy sheriff, that young man?"

"Yes. He had business to present for that woman."

"Who is she?"

Harry grimaced. "Local politician and pain in the derriere." He closed the container; the locking tab squeaked as he pushed it into the foam box. "Don't like her, around here."

Ben was about to ask her name when Harry took up his now empty plate and shuffled away toward the kitchen. "Need more tea?" he asked over his shoulder. Ben shook his head no, picked up the container, stopped at the counter to leave the cost of his meal and a little something for Harry, and went out into the night.

### Dickon Stops By

Ben and Butter saw Dickon several times to wave to, or say hello to, but didn't have any chats with him for several days. Ben talked to Butter often every day, talking the hurt, loneliness, and exhaustion out of his spirit. He told her about what Len had meant to him. She, in wise canine fashion, took in all Ben told her, and then put her head on his knee or went to the door to suggest a walk.

One day Dickon stopped by a little after lunch. Butter and Ben were in the yard, playing ball. Dickon waved, and stopped by the gate. Butter rushed over to greet him as a long lost friend.

"Hi," he said, as Ben followed Butter. "How are you today?"

"Doing well," Ben said. "I've spent a lot of time with Butter, getting settled in. Want to come in for a cup of tea?"

A little breeze rattled the trees. It had a touch of the summer's cold in it, as though to encourage Dickon to stop.

"Don't mind if I do," he said, opening the gate. Butter wagged an enthusiastic greeting and jumped up at him. Dickon grabbed her paws gently and eased her to the ground. "Down," he said firmly to her. To Ben's surprise, she dipped her head and looked sheepish. "Good dog," Dickon said, and she circled him, barking joyously.

They went in and Ben put the water on. He got his caddy of teas out. Ben used Lipton's by preference, but kept bags of Darjeeling, Earl Grey, and English Breakfast in foil pouches on hand for his guests. Dickon chose Lipton's, too.

"Sugar or cream?"

"No, black is the color of my true cup's tea." Ben smiled at the twisted quote. "How are you getting along in the village?" Dickon went on.

"Well, I've talked with Emma Freed next door, the day I moved in. She brought me chocolate chip cookies."

"Her cookies have put a lot of pounds on the villagers," Dickon chuckled, "including quite a few on me. I think the chocolate chips are the best, but the oatmeal and date cookies are a close second. Then, of course, her lemon bars are outstanding, as well."

"I'll continue to cultivate her acquaintance," Ben said. He put a cup on a saucer with a spoon in front of Dickon. Dickon took out his teabag, held it against the spoon, wrapped the string around it, and squeezed. Ben got himself a spoon; he used his fingers to squeeze his teabag when he was alone, but company required better manners. Ben let his cup go on steeping a while. He liked a very strong tea.

"I haven't met anyone else in the village, except you."

"Most everyone around here is fair game for gossip, you and me included."

Ben nodded. "What about Harry at the Café and Motel?"

"What about him?"

"What's his story? He's the most taciturn man I've met in a lot of years."

"He's a quiet one, for sure." Dickon scratched behind Butter's ears. It was obvious to Ben Butter approved of Dickon. He felt a small stab of jealousy. After all, he fed Butter, provided her his bed to sleep on, his chair to sit in, and walked with her every day.

"Harry and Olive are brother and sister. They wanted to be missionaries from early childhood. They went to some small Bible College run by an obscure evangelical denomination. Graduated with honors, I understand, both of them. Harry learned agricultural skills. Olive learned about domestic improvements possible in primitive conditions. Then they went overseas, to Belize." Dickon's cup was nearly empty, and so was Ben's. Ben put the kettle on again, and took out some store cookies he had bought.

"Evidently Harry was quite a preacher, full of fire for the Lord, and all that."

"Harry the Silent One?" Ben raised his eyebrows in exaggerated surprise.

"Yes, that Harry." Dickon smiled. His green eyes invited Ben to plunge into their pools. Ben wrenched his attention back to his words.

"Olive went into the hinterland for several months, to help some of the remote villages improve sanitation. Did quite well at it, too. She's got a knack for engineering. She's completely revamped the village's septic system since she's been here. Actually got it up to code, to Vanna's disgust."

"Vanna?"

"Vanna Dee, the Coastal Commissioner. Also my ex-wife."

"Oh?" Ben got up to pour a second cup over their teabags. He put the cookies in front of Dickon, who took one, bit into it, and went on.

"It's not a kind story. When Olive came back, she had Hiram with her. He was a newborn. And, she had put on quite a bit of weight. The Missionary Board put two and two together, and came up with five."

"Five being they thought it was her child?" Ben let his scorn come through in his voice.

Dickon frowned. "Yes. Religion breeds narrow minds all too easily. What's worse, the Board members decided Harry was the father."

"Sticky stuff, eh?"

"Yes, and probably untrue. Hiram was obviously not Caucasian. In his pictures he looks like a Mongolian, which suggests to me he was Mayan. Harry and Olive both run to tall, lean body types. Mayans are among the world's shorter people, and tend to ovoid body shapes."

"This wasn't obvious, then, when he was a baby?"

"Not to religious administrators intent on finding a sin in every hut. Harry and Olive went through a church trial, were convicted, and shamed out of the denomination."

"And Harry doesn't like to talk about it."

"No, he doesn't. He looks on it as a trial of his faith sent upon him by God, sort of like Job's trial. Olive sees the world differently. She bitterly hates the situation. She has decided no just God would ever damn a faithful believer for a good deed done. She refuses to trust any god, just or unjust." Dickon shook his head sadly.

"Olive has a major point," Ben said.

"Nonetheless, it's hard on Harry, for his sister to be so angry with God."

"I suppose. You were married to the Coastal Commissioner?"

Dickon grimaced. "That's a long story for a gloomy day," he said. "Maybe some other time."

"I saw a man on the beach, dressed in a white linen suit. He was screaming at the gulls."

"That was Beau, the Colonel. He lives with Dr. Field."

"Emma mentioned him. She suggested there was quite a history there."

"There is." Ben waited. Dickon did not go on. He ostentatiously sipped his tea.

"Okay," he said. "I guess it's not for me to hear."

"Not that," Dickon said. "It's just that it's Dr. Field's story to tell. It involves more people than the Colonel." He looked earnestly at Ben. "I should be going, now, I suppose. I've got to go up to Pueblo Rio today to transact some business." He finished his tea and stood. Butter bumped his knee. He scratched her head behind her ears. Ben saw him to the door.

"Thanks for the tea," Dickon said.

"Thanks for the company. Drop by again," Ben replied, and watched Dickon walk away, admiring how the man's still firm buttocks filled his jeans.

### Lunch with La Señora

Several days later La Señora invited Ben to lunch. Emma advised him it was more command than invitation. "La Señora is evaluating you for permanent residence," she told him. He doubted it; he had been in San Danson only a few weeks, and he suspected it took more than short acquaintance to win La Señora's approval. On Emma's advice, he dressed in his Sunday-go-to-meeting best and met Elke just before noon at the garage in front of the funicular. This time he knew where to sit. Elke said nothing more than good morning to him until they got to the manor.

When they got out of the funicular she said, "Please, Mr. Soul, remember La Señora is an old woman, and tires easily. If she asks you to leave, don't take it wrong. It will simply be her weariness talking."

"I'll take no offense," he said. They entered the house. Elke took him to the second room on the right. This was the dining room. A large hutch held a variety of dishes, most of which looked very old. So did the dirt on their edges. He gathered the household seldom used them. A massive dining table, surrounded with four side chairs on each side and two captain's chairs at the ends dominated the center of the room. An elaborate sideboard stood on the far wall.

His eyes must have bulged with surprise, because Elke said, "Take heart, Mr. Soul, we'll be eating in the breakfast nook. La Señora seldom uses this room." She took him then through a door into a comfortable smaller room. "In the house's glory days," she said, "this room was a staging area between the kitchen and the grand dining room. Now we use it to take our meals. It's much cozier for two or three."

He observed the table could easily have seated six. This table was set with delicate china patterned with bluebells and pink roses. It, too, looked old, but was very clean. The silver flatware was ornate and heavy. Intertwined roses wreathed its handles. La Señora sat at one end of the table, dressed today in lavender lace and gray cotton. Her gown was elegantly cut, and fashionable in the 1940s. It was a more modern style than Ben associated with her.

"Welcome, Mr. Soul," she said. "Please forgive me for not rising. My knees are not cooperating today."

"Certainly, Ma'am," he said. "Knees can betray one at the most inopportune times."

She smiled. Little sparks of humor danced in her eyes. "I attribute my patellas' weakness to too many hours on the prayer bench in my youth."

"I attribute mine to arthritic ancestors," he said. "One of the lesser gifts of my genetics."

"Please, Mr. Soul, sit here, to my right. Elke, please serve the soup, now."

Elke went to the kitchen, returned with three soup plates filled with beef broth delicately infused with fresh marjoram, and very thin shiitake mushroom slices. They took up their spoons and fell to work. The mushrooms were just cooked enough to be tender, not mushy. The beef broth had a gentle background of garlic, carrot, and onion that aroused the piquance of the marjoram.

La Señora made obligatory comments about the weather over the soup. As Elke brought in the salad of crisp lettuces and refreshing cucumber lightly dressed in lime vinaigrette, La Señora said to Ben, "I understand a dog has adopted you."

"Yes," he said, "I call her Butter. She's a great companion."

"Dogs are better than people," Elke said as she put his salad in front of him.

"Elke is jaundiced about her own species, Mr. Soul," La Señora said. "She has always preferred dogs and cats to people."

"I like people better than scorpions," Elke responded. The conversation had the feel of an old joke often played out between the two women. La Señora took a forkful of salad, and they said no more until they had cleared their plates.

As Elke took away the salad plates, La Señora asked Ben, "Were you here for the great quake in '77?"

"Yes," he said. "I had just come to the city. The quake hit in May. I was terrified, and excited, all at once."

"I was living in the City at the time, myself. Did you lose your home?"

"No, I was in a hotel that survived. I went downtown to help. That's how I met Len. He organized a brigade of volunteers. I tended the fires for boiling water with broken bits of furniture, paneling, and the like. The triage clinic used the water to sterilize their instruments."

"Ah," she responded. "So you, too, had a significant event happen because of the quake."

"Yes, I suppose so."

"We shall talk more of that later. I regret to say, Mr. Soul, that our luncheon is a modest one today. We have only one entrée, a medallion of pork, in a Marsala sauce, with saffron risotto and new peas. If this doesn't suit your palate, perhaps Elke can arrange something else for you."

"Señora, it sounds delicious," he said. Elke served it, and it was delicious.

"Elke," La Señora said when they had finished their entrees, "I think dessert in the library, with English Breakfast tea."

"Certainly, La Señora," she said. "Let me help you rise." She pulled back her chair and provided a stout arm for La Señora to use to lever herself up. Then she handed her an ornate ivory and ebony cane, fashioned like the head and neck of a llama.

"Your arm, Mr. Soul," La Señora said to Ben. He offered it, and they walked through the dining room to the corridor and along it to the library. La Señora smelled like roses and vanilla. He assisted her in settling into the great armchair, and then sat where he had on his interview visit. Elke brought their desserts, a light meringue baked with almond slices embedded in it, and their tea.

"Your cook is excellent," he said.

"Yes," La Señora said. "He's also an excellent llama herder. He could make a fortune in a City restaurant, if he were not so averse to wearing clothes."

"Oh?"

"Willy Waugh, my cook and general servant, wears nothing more than a pair of briefs in all weathers. I tolerate his lack of modesty because he is so valuable with the llamas I keep."

"You have llamas on the mountain?"

"Yes. They are from my mother's side of the family. She was Peruvian, you see, and she inherited them from her father. That was all long ago, and a tale for another time. Tell me about your Len. You were together a long time?"

"Yes. We met during the aftermath of the quake, as I said. He was a take-charge kind of guy. It wasn't until several days later I realized he had organized the volunteer brigade with no more authority than his bearing and his voice. He was a handsome man, six foot three, and quick to find solutions for problems. I asked him once how he commanded people so well. He said he expected them to follow reasonable orders, and most people did. Especially in a crisis."

"Did you fall in love with him right away?"

"Oh, no. I wasn't sure enough of myself to love anybody when I met Len. He had to teach me to find that in myself. I didn't see him for almost a year. I dated him more than a year after that before we became lovers."

"Prudent, to become acquainted first. So many men I have observed begin with lust, and do not complete the transition to commitment easily."

He nodded, not quite sure what to say to this. He sipped at his tea, using its astringency to rinse the meringue sweetness from his mouth.

"Was he as commanding as a lover as he was with relief effort volunteers?"

"No, though sometimes the commander in him came out. I'm not easy to command, and we learned to balance our personalities. He prodded me to be all I could. I'd never have gone so far in computer software without his urging. Funny thing, he never got entirely comfortable with computers, though he learned to use them in later life."

"He was older than you are?"

"Yes, by twelve years. It didn't seem like a great gap, even at the beginning. We had sufficient outlooks in common to share most opinions. We both loved Gilbert and Sullivan, and county music. It was a great shock to me when he turned old. It seemed to me he got old years before he should have. He had always been so vital. Then the heart trouble started. He grew stooped and had trouble walking and standing. It's as if everything in his body wore out at the same time." Ben's cheeks were wet. He had not realized he was still so sad.

"I have probed a painful place, Mr. Soul."

"It's a familiar pain," he said. "I just keep it wrapped up, most of the time." He took out his handkerchief and wiped his eyes. He thanked himself internally for remembering to put a clean fresh handkerchief in his pocket. It was habit Len helped him form.

"It's good to let it out," he went on. "Only a few people bother to listen. I think most of us are afraid of looking at suffering."

"Yes, we are. Old age is a painful thing, often. The pain drives out the joy and peace that reflection on a life well-lived can bring."

"Yes. When I wake up aching in every joint, I forget to be grateful I've wakened at all."

La Señora chuckled, a dry, rattling sort of chuckle. "Yes, Mr. Soul. I often wait for afternoons to be happy about another day." She poured him tea. "I think San Danson village has been good for you, Mr. Soul."

"It has," he said. "Some frozen part of me is thawing. Slowly, perhaps, but thawing. Butter has a lot to do with it."

"Dogs are one kind of blessing." She smiled at him. He was a little surprised her severe elegance could sport such a genuine and human smile. It lit her porcelain face with a glow like moonlight.

"Elke has warned me about tiring you too much, Señora. Please tell me if I'm overstaying my welcome."

"Not yet, though you are kind to pay attention to Elke's fussing. Do stay a little while, if you can. I'd like to tell you something."

"Certainly, I can. I'm at my own leisure, within the limits Butter puts on me."

She leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. A dreaming look came over her face, again softening its severe elegance, and stripping twenty years from her features.

"My mother was Quechua, born high in the Andes. Her father was a priest, a sort of curandéro, of a religion older than the Incas. The Spanish hierarchy in Peru, of course, proscribed the rites and beliefs of all indigenous religions. My grandfather practiced his beliefs in secret. Of my grandmother, I know nothing. Mother never spoke of her."

"Mother quarreled with her father over a young man she favored, a Spaniard from Lima. She ran away with him to Cuzco, and later, to Lima. He betrayed her, after stealing her virtue, as they said things in those days. Eventually she fled Peru for the City. A Bishop of the Episcopal Church helped her get to this country. Sadly, he was less honorable than a godly man should be. His mission work was a front for a white slavery ring."

"I do not know my mother's Quechua name. Nor do I know her Spanish name. In the City brothel where the Bishop sold her services, she took the name 'Fancy Danza.' That was the name my father knew her by, and the name she used the rest of her life."

La Señora opened her eyes and looked at Ben. He nodded, to encourage her to go on. "My mother was a good woman, and abhorred her forced prostitution. She met my father in the course of her business. He was, I fear, no better than many unmarried men of his time were. My mother gave her heart to him, and he gave her his. Much to the scandal of my father's family, he married my mother."

La Señora put her hand on the teapot. Evidently, it was sufficiently warm for her to take more. Ben declined a refill.

"When I was born, my father's family came to accept my mother. They kept her past from the neighborhood gossip, mostly by saying nothing about her time before she knew my father. The community came to accept her as well. She lived out her life in a comfort and a love she had not dreamed of as a child."

La Señora set down her teacup, took her cane for a prop, and gestured to Ben to help her stand. He went to her and helped her up.

"Thank you, Mr. Soul," she said. At my age shifting my bones is necessary to keep mobile." She took his arm for support. "Come to the window," she said. "I like to look out on the cove." He went with her to the window.

"I was nearly grown when a lawyer from Lima contacted my mother. Her father had died some years earlier, and had willed her all his property. It consisted of several ritual objects, which are now in a museum in Lima, a herd of llamas, and a modest sum of gold coins. My grandfather's will was most specific that my mother must take in the llamas. Fortunately she had my father's ranch to pasture them on." She pointed with her face and chin at a spouting whale in the cove.

"I do hope that whale doesn't get stranded on the low tide in the Cove. It's such a bother to keep them alive until they can swim out again."

"Does that happen often?"

"Once every few years, at the most. It's been seven or eight since the last stranding." She began to turn. "Please help me back to my chair. I cannot stand too long." They made their way to her chair. He helped her sit again. "You are very patient, Mr. Soul, with an old woman's infirmities." She smiled her serene, moonlit smile again.

"One of the llamas, my mother discovered from documents my grandfather left her, is no llama at all, but a unicorn in disguise." He looked at his hands to hide his startlement. He wondered at this lucid La Señora slipping so quickly into a dotty dowager moment. He hoped she hadn't seen the shocked arch of his eyebrows. She had.

"I understand you don't believe this, Mr. Soul. If it were not for the evidence of my own experience, I wouldn't either. Once or twice a year, usually at Midsummer's Night, the llama removes its disguise, screws in its horn, and bathes in the Cove's waves. We commonly celebrate the night with a beach party. Your aura suggests you should be a villager, not just a resident of the village. The unicorn with the unique horn concurs. Please reserve Midsummer's Night to be with us."

He decided humoring her was best; she was, after all, his landlady. "Of course, Señora. I shall be honored to attend."

"Thank you, Mr. Soul. And now, I must rest for the afternoon." She rang for Elke. "Please forgive me for being too weary to converse any further." She rang her small bell.

"Yes, Señora, by all means."

Elke entered then.

"Please see Mr. Soul to the Station, Elke," La Señora said.

"Of course," Elke said. "Mr. Soul?" He got up to go.

"Señora, thank you for a most delicious lunch, and a fascinating conversation. I hope you recover from your exertion."

"You are most welcome, Mr. Soul. We shall meet again, on Midsummer's Night."

"Until then, Señora." He followed Elke out to the funicular.

Outside the house Ben asked, "Elke, is La Señora prone to flights of fancy when she's very weary?"

"She told you about the unicorn with the unique horn."

"Yes."

"Wait until you see it," she said, and started the funicular on its downhill run. She said no more to him until they reached the bottom, where she bid him good afternoon, and immediately returned to the manor. Ben went home to a lonely Butter, and had to take her for a walk to redeem himself with her.

### Further Visit with Dickon

Butter and Ben took to strolling along the beach every day after lunch. By then, most days, the fog had retreated to the sea or at least into the sky, and one could see out to sea, past the two great rock piles that guarded the cove. He had learned the names of the rock piles are "Obadiah" (on the south) for the ship that discovered the cove and "Obaheah" (on the north) just for the fun of it. Sometimes he saw other villagers, most often at a distance that kept interaction to a friendly wave. The beach was a place for solitude.

Butter and Ben went down to the beach one blustery afternoon. The fog had gone skyward, to color it with unpolished steel. It had the feel of winter skies on the High Plains, heavy and oppressive. There, of course, such a sky would portend snow or sleet. In San Danson, it portended only fog and low cloud extending inland nights and mornings.

He began a chain of memories of his childhood winters. He drifted with recollections of bitter cold searing his lungs and numbing his fingers. From those memories, he subsided into what the Victorians called a "brown study," dark, dreary, and depressed. Butter sensed his subdued mood, and walked quietly at heel, occasionally touching his left hand that hung at his side with her nose.

He stared mostly at his feet making prints in the sand, and might have stepped on Dickon, if Butter had not begun prancing around the man. Dickon sat quietly in shelter of a driftwood stump that Ben had sometimes used for a backrest and windbreak. He looked up at Ben, smiled, and patted the ground beside him. Butter immediately sat beside him and he rubbed her ears. Ben took a place next to Butter. He avoided acknowledging the small thrill of delight that stabbed him when he saw Dickon.

They sat quiet for some minutes and stared out at the steel waves ruffling the cove. Dickon broke the silence. "Days like this I used to leave the house and sit anywhere outdoors that I could. I didn't want to be near other people, especially my mother. Days like this depressed her, and she'd spend hours weeping and sniffling. The outdoors was fresher and cleaner than the stale air in the house." Dickon hadn't mentioned his childhood before.

Ben let the wind whisper a little while. When the silence stretched a little long he said, "Skies like this used to mean snow where I grew up. Cold, unloving snow."

"I've always wondered what it's like to live in snow country. I grew up in the fog and the rain."

"Snow's a harsh adversary."

"It looks so clean and white and pure on TV."

"It doesn't stay clean and white and pure. Doesn't take long for footprints, tire tracks, or soot to smirch it." He drew his knees close to his chest and wrapped his arms around himself remembering winters. "I've never understood people who liked to play in the snow."

"I think it's romantic to be snowed in with someone you love, just the two of you."

"Only if you can stay warm, have plenty of food and drink, and don't have to get up in the morning to slog off to work."

"Where did you grow up?"

"In Berthoud, a few miles north of Denver. It was a farm town then. It's a suburb now. I haven't been back for a long time; most of my family's dead, and I'm not much for visiting graves."

Butter whined; both Dickon and Ben had stopped rubbing and stroking her. They both began immediately to pet her again. Several times Dickon's hand brushed Ben's hand. Ben found he was hoping the contact would last a little longer than it did.

"How did you get to the Coast?" Dickon asked.

"Usual story. I wanted to be myself, and it was a lot easier to do in the City then than anywhere east of the Rockies." He scratched Butter's back where her tail joined her body. He knew she especially liked that. "It was easy, when I got fired for going into a gay bar."

"On company time?"

"On my own weekend."

"There used to be a lot of that kind of crap. I grew up on the Coast, up in Seattle. It was pretty straight laced when I was young."

"How did you get into the church business?" Ben asked.

"I was in college, starting an engineering major, when I woke up one night dreaming I was a preacher. It seemed like a 'call' as we say. I transferred to the state University to study English Literature. I eventually came to the City to go to Seminary." Dickon sighed.

"Did you like Seminary?"

"No. It was hell, especially the first year. My classmates were all philosophy and theology graduates from church colleges. The work was pretty easy for them; they'd been exposed to a lot of convoluted arguing before they ever got to Seminary."

Dickon stood, brushing the sand from the seat of his jeans. Ben stood and did the same to his clothes, wondering what it would be like to help brush the sand from Dickon's jeans.

He continued, "I didn't fit in very well at Seminary. I came from a poor home, and I had to work to pay my way through college and Seminary. Not quite their class, dears." He stretched his arms over his head.

"I persevered, though, and made it through. The second year was easier; I made some friends among the new class members, who weren't quite so old church." He lowered his arms. "Want to walk a little way?" he asked.

"Yes," he said. Butter raced out ahead of them to chase some sandpipers that were waltzing with the waves. They followed her, talking of minor things, until they came round to the village trail again.

### Beach Party

When Ben let out Butter one morning, he found an envelope thumbtacked to his screen door. It was an invitation, in a spare, elegant, hand, to the Midsummer's Night beach party. Ben went to consult Emma.

"Emma," he said, when she answered his knock on her door, "I've just received an invitation to a beach party. From La Señora."

"Oh, yes," Emma said, and smiled. "She said she was going to invite you especially. You're to be a guest of honor."

"Me? The guest of honor?"

"A guest of honor. Mae Ling, who's just back from a book tour overseas, will be honored also."

"What should I wear? La Señora seems to lean toward the formal."

"Oh, just casual clothes. It's only the Village, after all. By the way, leave Butter at home. This event is not for four-legged people."

"Thanks, Emma," Ben said.

"Can you come in for a moment? I've some lemon bars, just cooled from the oven."

"Thanks, but I've got to take Butter to Pueblo Rio to the vet for her shots. Another time, maybe."

"I'll bring you some lemon bars later, then."

"Thanks. I'll enjoy them, I'm sure."

When the night came round, he dressed in his best jeans and sweatshirt. Despite a strong offshore flow, the beach could get chilly by dark. Often, too, the offshore flow dropped at nightfall, and the fog crept onto the beach, even if it couldn't penetrate the trees. Butter howled after him, protesting his going out without her. He had given her a ball to play with. She scorned any ball without a human to throw it.

He was warm enough before the sun went down to wish he had worn a thinner sweatshirt. He was perspiring by the time he got to the beach. La Señora was already in place near a roaring bonfire. Elke hovered near her. La Señora was thoroughly regal despite the rustic setting. She sat in a Morris chair that properly belonged in a museum. He wondered who had carried it down the mountain.

"Welcome, Mr. Soul," La Señora said, as he came up to her to pay her court. Her "casual" attire was a severely styled dress that covered her to the ankles, with long puff sleeves that reached her wrists. It was gray, and touched at the throat with a little ribbon of ecru machine lace. "Please stand with me; I want to introduce you to the others as they come."

"Certainly," he said, and stood, with his hands folded in front of him, next to her chair. He felt very much on display. Elke Hall was laying out dishes of food on a folding table not too far from the fire. Willy Waugh, still clad only in white briefs, struggled down with a second hamper of food. It seemed La Señora meant to put on quite a feast.

The first villager to arrive after Ben did was Mae Ling. He had not met her. She was a small woman with an iron rod for a backbone. Gray lightly frosted her black hair and brows. As so many Asian women do, she had maintained her figure in a girlish hourglass. She was warmly dressed in a blue jumpsuit with red piping on various seams. She carried a matching bag. It was large enough to hold a full meal for four people.

"Good evening, Señora," she said. La Señora introduced her to Ben.

Mae Ling asked him, "What do you do for a living, Mr. Soul?"

"I'm retired."

"From what?"

"Computer programming in an accounting department."

"How fortunate you are to be retired."

"Thank you."

"I write children's literature."

"That sounds fascinating," he said, watching Willy Waugh in his tighty whiteys setting out the food from the hamper he had brought.

"I have been quite successful," Mae Ling said.

"Mr. Soul," La Señora said, "have you read any of Mae Ling's books?"

"No, Señora, I haven't, I don't think."

"Let me lend you one," Mae Ling said. She extracted a book from her bag. It showed a colorful picture of a southwestern pueblo, with a coyote in front of it. The title was _Kiva Tales for Children._

"Thank you," he said. He glanced up from the book. Willy Waugh was gone. Two figures were coming along the beach.

"Here come Dr. Field and Juan," La Señora said. She waved to them, an action that startled Ben as far more girlish than anything he had seen La Señora do before.

"Welcome, Doctor, Juan," she called to them.

The shorter man came first. A jerky kind of energy just barely under his control animated him. His face and head were round, with prominent ears. Where his hair was not gray, it was red. It sat in a fringe around three sides of his skull, like wagons circled to fend off an attack in the Old West. His eyes were quite piercing blue and masked pain with their merriment. His figure was rounded, but not fat. La Señora introduced him as Doctor Chester Field. Ben wondered where Colonel Beau was. The man with Dr. Field was surely someone else. It was only several days after the beach party that Ben realized this Dr. Field was the same man who had helped Len at the hospital tent.

The other man seemed to be holding himself together over great inner turmoil. His head was bald, or shaved; Ben wasn't sure which. His brown eyes were masks of whatever was going on inside him. He was dressed, like Ben, in jeans and a sweatshirt. Ben thought he had met him somewhere, but he couldn't place him. La Señora introduced him as Juan Loosa. He was a silent man, and seemed to want no conversation.

The Swami came down the stairs with Malcolm Drye next. They suggested Tweedledum and Tweedledee carefully dressed to be opposites. Rotund best described them both. The Swami had a few wisps of gray hair across his gleaming skull. He wore overalls and a blue chambray shirt with tennis shoes on his feet. No sock tops showed above the shoe uppers. Malcolm Drye wore a natty gray three-piece suit, and black patent leather shoes that matched the dye in his slicked down hair. Ben wondered if he had covered both his footgear and his cranium from the same bottle. La Señora introduced them to Ben. They acknowledged him, and went to the table to survey Willy Waugh's feast.

Dickon came from the Station. A woman walked with him. Ben saw in their manner with one another an easy and long familiarity. He wondered if this was the Dickon's ex-wife. La Señora disabused him. "Oh, Dickon has brought Carrie with him. I'm so glad to see her." She turned to Ben. "Carrie is the Reverend Carrie Oakey. She's a great friend of Dickon's."

Dickon and Carrie came up to La Señora and greeted her. La Señora introduced Carrie to Ben. She was a woman about his age, severe of countenance, with merry eyes. She wore her hair in a gray helmet. Dickon later described the style as "putting on the whole armor of God above the neck."

Emma came soon after. He wondered if she had put on weight since he had first met her. Only when she got close did he realize she had layered her clothing against various degrees of chill. She took off several layers and laid them on a bench.

"Harry and Olive will not be with us tonight," La Señora said. "As usual. They do not wish to compromise Harry's faith." Several heads nodded. "Rosa Krushan will join us a little later, when the Café closes." Again, several heads nodded. La Señora gestured at the table. "Let us eat, now. Reverend Oakey, will you lead us in grace?"

Carrie Oakey said, "Let us pray each according to her or his beliefs." She bowed her head. After a moment of silence she said, "Hear what our hearts say, Divinity, and bless us each in the way most appropriate to us. Let it be so." One or two guests muttered amen.

"Come, eat," Elke said. She led the way. Willy (Ben presumed it was Willy) had prepared a feast of picnic foods. Willy had prepared all the food at the house, and brought it down in a series of insulated containers. Ben started with dilled potato salad, went on to cocktail shrimp with lettuce and an Italian dressing, corn on the cob dripping with butter and salt and garlic, and a hamburger replete with onion, sliced tomato, mustard, dill pickles, and ketchup. On his second pass, he had pasta salad with bell peppers and olives dressed with tangy mustard and mayonnaise and minced red onion accompanied by a hot dog with chili relish. He could not make a third pass, though Carrie Oakey, The Swami, and Malcolm Drye did so easily. Mae Ling managed a fourth plate.

True to his custom when in a group where he knew few people, he listened politely to several conversations, added a few non-committal comments, and drew back to protect himself. Reverend Oakey would have none of it. She sought him out.

"What are you hiding from?" she asked.

"I'm not hiding," Ben said.

"You are. You've got an opaque shell covering you. Sort of like a social condom or something." She took a forkful of chocolate cake from her plate and ate it. It gave him a few seconds to formulate an answer.

"I moved here to retreat and reflect," he said.

"Why? What are you running from, to rephrase my question?"

"I lost my lover. I'm still sorting out who I am now."

She frowned at the remnant of frosting on her plate. "Elke tells me your lover was Len DeLys. Is he the same one who ran the emergency hospital during the quake?"

"Yes. That's where I met him." He could hear the strain in his voice covering up the sore place in himself.

"You're that Ben, then," she said, "the twink that stole his heart."

"I hardly qualify as a twink!"

"Not now, perhaps," she said. "I grant it's been a few years since the quake." She scraped the frosting from her plate with her fork and licked it off the fork. "What happened to Len?"

"Heart attack."

"That's quicker than some things. How long ago?"

"Not quite two years."

"Time for you to mix into the world again."

"Perhaps."

"The village is a good place to start. You seem to fit in well, from what Dickon's said about you."

"Have you known Dickon long?"

"Years and years. We were in Seminary at the same time." She looked for a place to put her empty plate and used fork. "He's in an opaque shell, too. The two of you should get together. At least you could hide in the same shell, save on shell upkeep." She smiled at Ben over her shoulder, and turned to answer some comment The Swami made.

Toward the end of the meal, when they all were half drowsing and half conversing, a woman came from the Station end of the beach. She was statuesque, Rubenesque of figure, and wore an evening dress whose chief feature was a ruffle that began just over her left breast, ran under her right breast, around her body at the small of her back, curved round her left buttock, under her derriere, and down to her right ankle. On most anyone else, the effect would have been gross. On Rosa Krushan, the effect was magnificent. Elke went to Rosa, and kissed her. Rosa returned the kiss with restrained passion.

Willy Waugh appeared from the gloom along the cliff and began to pack away the picnic things. Elke and Rosa helped him, talking in low tones. Willy said nothing. Willy packed the hampers with leftovers and stacked them against the cliff. Then he brought two large thermoses, one of tea, and one of coffee. He served each of them, seeming to know what each wanted without asking. When he came close, Ben could smell the clean outdoors on his skin over the aroma of the tea he offered.

La Señora suddenly said in a penetrating voice, "It is nearly time." The group turned toward the stairs that led from the beach to the village. Ben turned with them. The northern sky glowed, as though the moon were rising in the north. Whiteness lightened the dark. Then the unicorn came down the stairs to the beach. Its whiteness was the whiteness of stars and moons and pearls. It paid them no mind, but went down to the waves and strode into the surf, going deeper into the Cove waters, until only its horned head rose above the wavelets. When it reached the middle of the Cove, the waters turned silver. He glanced up at the distant forest east of the Station. The moon had come up from behind the trees. It perched on the top of one tall redwood, like a cluster of angels dancing on a pin's head, poised to soar through the night.

The unicorn turned and came to shore not far from them. They watched it rise from the sea, shedding the Cove waters like droplets of molten silver as it came onto the beach. It turned and looked at them, nodded three times, and bounded up the steps and beyond the village to the Mountain. At sea great waves crashed into Obadiah and Obaheah. White spume curled and broke on the rocks.

"Perhaps," La Señora said, breaking the awed silence that held them, "we should light the fire and toast marshmallows now."

### Kokopelli Dreaming

Ben went home to Butter and his waiting bed. He opened Mae Ling's book and began to read. His eyes soon closed, and he slept.

He has hoed weeds between the bean rows for hours, and the hot sun has drenched him with sweat. He looks up, and the rows of beans seem two times longer than they were when he started hoeing in the cool morning.

A line of shrubs with gray-green leaves marks the river's bed. On either side, canyon walls rise above the river's summer trickle. Buff and white layers sandwich brown basalt and red sandstone layers to make the cliffs.

He hears a flute caroling on the wind that whispers over the sands beside his bean field. The melody haunts him with an almost familiar pattern. It calls to him in his bean field, bidding him leave his hoeing until another cool morning. He slings his wooden hoe over his shoulder and turns toward the mesa and the town on its top. His short shadow walks ahead of him on the dry path from the river to the mesa.

The sun glints on the pebbles, fragments of the distant mountains. The river has tumbled and polished them as it rolled them down. One, a bit of shale with an embedded speck of turquoise, scintillates in the sun. The bean weeder stoops to pick it up. Perhaps he will make an ornament from it.

The flute is closer. The melody changes. Before the melody echoed the melancholy wind; now it sings of the sun's power. The bean weeder knows now who plays. It is Kokopelli, the wanderer, come to visit the mesa town. He hastens his steps. Kokopelli will have trade goods and news of other towns along the river. Tonight they will dance and feast.

He comes to the switchback trail that climbs the mesa's cliff. He signals the guards who watch from hiding places along the way. They know his face. They know he is of the People. Ahead of him, Kokopelli climbs the steep path as he plays a light, pure tune that celebrates the unclouded blue sky.

Night comes. The bonfire blazes beside the Kiva. The young men dance the deer-hunt dance. The young women murmur together as they cook cornmeal mush and roast venison. Kokopelli flutes for the dancers, stamping his feet to mark the rhythm. He is bent-backed as always, yet more vital than any of the young men. Fire and desire flare in his eyes as he sways his head to the melody he plays.

Elders choose mates for the young men. An elder with a long nose and shaggy hair brings Two Spirits to the bean weeder. Two Spirits is a young man who lives as a woman among the women. The bean weeder thanks the elder and gives Two Spirits the token rattle he carries. Two Spirits shyly takes his hand and smiles at him. The other elders grumble; the town disapproves such unions. The long-nosed elder falls on his hands and serenades the moon before running into the night. Coyote, the trickster, laughs at the joke he has played on the elders. They shake their fists at the howling spirit.

Butter barked at the door. Ben had slept through the night in his chair. Ben put down his book and went to the door to let Butter out. Dickon was passing and waved from the lane. Ben waved back. Butter ran to greet him. He stopped to rub her head, and sent her back to Ben. He walked toward the station, obviously intent on some business there.

Ben's dream held his mind. He let Butter back in. "Butter," he said, "you do like Dickon, don't you?" She laid her head on his knee and gazed up at him with her deep brown eyes. When he said Dickon's name, she thumped her tail on the floor twice. He took that to mean yes. "He is pretty likeable, isn't he?"

### Dickon Goes Berserk

Ben saw Dickon a few days later when he went to get his mail. Dickon was getting his mail, too. Ben was ready to make his move; he had Butter's approval, and he had the urge. While he plotted an approach, he went to his postal box. He had a single letter and two catalogs. He put the catalogs in the trashcan. He looked at the letter's return address. It had a state office logo on it, and a name.

"Dickon," he said, "who is Vanna Dee?"

"Coastal Commissioner, among other things," he said. "What brings her name to your sweet lips?"

He opened the envelope and scanned the letter inside. "She's asking for an appointment with me. Something about the legality of my residence."

"Watch out for her. She's a wily one. She'll try to get you in a corner, and turn the tables on you. I think she's a witch, maybe." Dickon's voice was harsh.

"That's pretty strong talk, coming from you."

"I know the woman all too well. She'd love to shut San Danson down, turn it into an environmental paradise for some murrelet or other." Dickon threw his junk mail in the trashcan. It slapped against the catalogs Ben had discarded.

"What's a murrelet?"

Dickon scowled. "A small chubby diving bird. Several species inhabit the North Pacific. Ms. Dee" he made the name sound like a curse "thinks one species was here, on the cove, when the early explorers came. She thinks it ought to be re-introduced."

"Is that so bad?"

Dickon nodded emphatically. "Yes, if you take her corollary, which is, that everybody west of the highway should be evicted, the cottages torn down, and the non-native trees and shrubs grubbed out. Most of all, she wants to kill off La Señora's llamas."

"She sounds a little bit fanatic," he said.

"Fanatic doesn't begin to describe her. It's got as much to do with revenge on La Señora and me as it does with anything environmental. Vanna hates La Señora for taking me in. I was married to Vanna, once upon a time. The murrelets are just a convenient excuse, not her cause." Dickon leaned against the bank of postal boxes next to the closed post office window.

"Married to her?"

"It's a sad old story. Promise me something," Dickon said. He moved close to Ben and shook a parental finger at him. "Promise me you won't let that woman take you in. Remember, she's slick, she's sly, and she's dangerous." Dickon's eyes glittered with his intensity. His gaze bored into Ben's brain.

"Really, Dickon, can she be all that bad?" Ben backed away from Dickon. Dickon followed him.

"Yes. She is. I ought to know. I was married to her for ten hellacious years. Promise me you'll be careful, or, better yet, that you won't even see her."

"Dickon, I'll go into any meeting with her with my full radar on. I promise you I'll be careful. You make her as fascinating as a rattler's eyes in a noonday desert. I have to see something like this." Ben backed away a little from Dickon.

"Don't believe a thing she says, not even if she says rain's wet." Dickon gripped Ben's shoulder. Ben could feel bruises forming. Dickon frightened him; he wanted to get away from him. "You're too nice a guy to tangle yourself in her toils," Dickon said. "Promise me you'll be careful!"

"I will, Dickon, I will," he assured him, as he disengaged Dickon's hand from his shoulder. Then he fled. He wanted to re-think how involved he should be with Dickon.

### Ben Meets Vanna

Ben went to Las Tumbas to keep the appointment Coastal Commissioner Dee had set for him. Her office was in the downtown area, in a state building, so he left early, because he knew parking would be difficult.

The morning was gray, and the redwoods lining the road up the River wept tears on his windshield. Nothing is darker than a redwood forest in the fog. It wasn't until he got to the vineyards above the resort towns that the sun broke through, though even then it was pale and weak, as though it had missed morning tea.

The traffic thickened as he came close to Las Tumbas. The noise and smell oppressed him. Three months at San Danson had cleared his sinuses more than he realized. Las Tumbas was fast filling them again. He had forgotten how loud civilization can be at rush hour. The whizzing cars and howling trucks on the freeway unnerved him. He was glad he had only a couple of miles before he could get off into the downtown. Not that it was much better, but at least it swirled at a slower speed.

He found a lot to park in, at a price a little smaller than the national debt. It was only two blocks from Vanna Dee's office. He squared his shoulders, and took to the sidewalk with great resolve. Only one person accosted him, an older man with a face wracked by long indulgences and a body devastated by time. He had a spread pictures out for sale. A small sign on the sidewalk by the pictures said, "Works by Noah Count." Ben brushed by the pictures and the artist, mumbling something about having no wall space for pictures. He got a vague impression of stylized creatures, perhaps llamas, as he went by.

The state office building was a grim example of modern architecture. It had few windows. Concrete bollards half-blocked the front entrance. Metal detectors guarded the doors. The state seal was laid out in mosaic on the floor. The elevators were stainless steel set in a white wall and reasonably polished. He looked up Ms. Dee's office number on the notice board; she was on the third (and top) floor. He took the elevator up.

Non-descript beige carpet, thick and lush underfoot, covered the corridor floor. The walls were institutional cream. The doors were the same color. Only by the protruding brass doorknobs distinguished the doors from the walls. A discreet brass plate marked Commissioner Dee's office. Ben turned the knob, and went in.

A gray-haired secretary commanded the desk that lay athwart the room like a beached cargo container. She had no nameplate on her desk, so one didn't know how to address her. She could have been a robot, except robots are usually less stiff. This woman was all corset and iron.

"May I help you?" she inquired in a mechanical voice.

"I am Benjamin Soul. Commissioner Dee is expecting me, I believe."

"One moment." She pressed a communicator button on the telephone. Some electronic magic made it impossible for Ben to hear what she said. She nodded, and put the receiver back on the cradle. "You are seven minutes early, Mr. Soul. Commissioner Dee is in conference. She will call for you in a few moments. Please take a seat."

He looked behind him. Near the door where he came in, he saw an uncomfortable looking straight-backed chair. He discovered it was uncomfortable when he sat on it. A large clock hung on the opposite wall, above Ms. Secretary Steel. It showed he was, indeed, seven minutes early.

Twenty-two minutes later, the telephone buzzed. Ms. Secretary answered, and then rose and said, "Follow me, Mr. Soul." She marched to a door she opened at the right and held it open for Ben. "Mr. Soul, Commissioner," she said, and closed the door behind him. The click sounded so final.

"Sit, Mr. Soul," Commissioner Dee ordered him. He sat. He recognized the sharp-faced woman he had seen in the Café of the Four Rosas. She began interrogating Ben without pretense or preamble of courtesy.

"Is it true you are renting a cottage at San Danson village?" Her voice was coldly neutral. Her face was a mask. Her eyes were alive with suppressed fury. The controlled emotion in them struck him so he neglected to note their color.

"Yes, it is," he said.

"How long is your lease?"

"I'm renting on a month-to-month basis."

"Then you can easily leave at any time?" Her voice commanded an answer.

"Not easily. Moving's a pain." He shrugged and spread his hands, hoping to inject a little human warmth into the room.

"Yes. Are you aware you are renting in a restricted area?"

"Restricted? How?"

"San Danson village and its mountain are the only breeding grounds of the San Danson marbled murrelet, _Brachyramphus marmoratus, variety Sandansoniensis,_ an endangered variety," she pontificated. He wondered what encyclopedia she was quoting.

"Variety, not species?"

"Variety. The marbled murrelet is an endangered species. Cream-colored throat, nape, under-parts, and scapulars distinguish the San Danson variety. Other marbled murrelets are white on those parts. The variety only breeds in the cliffs near San Danson village." She might have been a robot with a recording inside for all the expression on her frozen face.

"If they use the cliffs, how does the village interfere with them?"

"By being there. The murrelets are shy." She pointed to a picture on the wall near her desk. "Soon this great beauty of nature will be gone, if we do not get rid of the llamas and people at San Danson."

"How do the llamas interfere with the murrelets?" he asked.

"They drop foreign dung on the hillsides. It upsets the natural vegetative balance. This pollutes the waters on the coast. That in turn poisons the fish the marbled murrelets eat." It sounded far-fetched to Ben, but he didn't dispute her.

"I haven't seen llamas on the mountain."

"There are at least seven. They may breed more. Llamas belong in the Andes, not in North America, and especially not in the breeding zone of the San Danson marbled murrelet," she pronounced, as though reading the law of God.

"What does all this have to do with me?"

"I'm urging you to terminate your rental agreement and go back where you came from."

"But I've only recently moved to the village. I need a place to rest and sort myself out. It seems perfect to me."

"You are endangering your mental health by staying with the crazy people in that village." She snapped the comment at Ben with fire in her voice, the first time she'd broken from her cold mechanical speech. He jerked his head back, as if to avoid a blow.

"They seem quite nice to me," he said. "Everyone I've talked with has welcomed me."

"Stuff and nonsense! They are all mentally disturbed, and shelter there only because Mrs. Mandor wishes to spite me and thwart my rescue of the murrelets." Ben thought of Dickon's reaction when he learned Ben was to see Vanna. Perhaps mental disturbance was contagious, but who had infected whom, Vanna Dickon or Dickon Vanna?

"They are involved in some strange cult, I'm sure," Vanna continued, "centering on llama worship. Don't let them draw you into their ways; escape while you can. Mrs. Mandor, of course, we cannot move out, because her family has owned the land far longer than the Coastal Commission has existed." She leaned toward Ben. He was glad the substantial desk remained between them.

"I have heard that her people have been there a long time," he said to Vanna.

"They have. The old blood has worn thin in her." A strange light glittered in Vanna's eyes. "She's half-crazy, I believe, and has surrounded herself with misfits and malcontents." Ms. Dee's eyes blazed. Ben drew back, fearful their fire might start an inferno in his thinning hair. "Leave, Mr. Soul, while you can!"

"I'll take your words under advisement," he said. His stomach roiled with suddenly released acid. "If you have no further business with me, I shall be on my way." He put as much force into his voice as he could muster.

"No. Not now," Vanna said. "I will contact you to find out when you plan to move out." Monotones veiled her voice again. She had suppressed the fury in her eyes. "Go now. Think long and hard about what I have said."

"Good day," he said, as he got up. He didn't offer to shake her hand. She had already turned to the papers in front of her on her desk. He closed her office door behind him, nodded at the Iron Maiden secretary who did not nod in reply, and left that cold office for the blessed warmth of the fog that had settled in again on the street level. He was glad to hide in it.

### Cookies with Emma

Ben fumed at the slow speed limits in the river resort towns. He needed space between him and the ice woman in her sterile office. He pitied poor Dickon, trapped into a marriage with the likes of her.

When he got to his cottage, Butter greeted Ben with that combination of enthusiasm and implied guilt (his) that only a dog or a mother can induce in a man. He gave Butter her "Yes, the boss is back" treat, and then gave her another because he was so glad to be with her again. She looked expectantly at him for a third, but he steeled himself to refuse. Butter's waist was not as slender as it ought to be. Too many treats and too much people food. He silently vowed to be a more conscientious dog servant in future.

Butter ran to the door and barked just as Emma knocked on the screen. Butter dearly liked Emma. Sadly, Butter and Prime Pussy didn't like each other at all. Irreconcilable inter-species differences.

"Hello," Ben called through the screen. "Hush, Butter. Emma doesn't need your noise." Butter whimpered and wriggled in delighted anticipation.

"Hello, Benjamin," Emma said. "Do come over; I've just made a batch of chocolate chip cookies, and I need help eating them."

"A man can't refuse an offer like that from a gracious lady," he replied. "Butter, stay here. I'll be back soon."

Butter whined in protest, but stayed. She was a biddable beast, though vocal about her disappointment. He had not been in Emma's cottage. They commonly met by happenstance when they were in their yards. He entered, expecting flocks of frilly doilies and ranks of ruffled curtains. Emma preferred tailored furnishings. Her curtains, though lace, were cut simply, without ruffles. Her couch was simple in its lines, and her recliner was a classic overstuffed chair. She limited her use of pink to the occasional touch. Her living room had few of the little old lady touches Ben had pictured.

Her kitchen was friendly, warm with pale yellows and green accents. It was made for eating cookies. Emma produced a plate of them with a modest flourish. Her graying curls framed her round face with a girlish touch that was, somehow, altogether appropriate.

"Eat," she said. "I understand you saw our Coastal Commissioner this morning. You need and deserve some supplement to build back your strength."

"She was a bit of a terror," he said. "Perhaps the coldest woman I've met in a long time. So is her secretary. They're a matched pair."

"Bertha's only that way at the office. She can be human elsewhere."

"Bertha?"

"Bertha Van Nation, the secretary."

"Oh. I still don't want to meet her on a dark and stormy night."

"She does the formidable act well." Emma put a kettle to boil. "What did Vanna have to say?"

"She talked about the threat to murrelets. Then she told me to move out. When I demurred, she warned me about everybody here being crazy followers of some llama cult."

"Her hatred runs deep. It's been festering since she was born. I don't think she knows how to stop hating." The kettle whistled. Emma got up to make the tea.

"I understand a little better why Dickon was frothing and fuming about her. He was in the post office when I opened her letter summoning me to an interview."

"Dickon's never quite gotten over being married to her. It nearly destroyed him, you see." She brought their tea and gestured at the cookies. Ben took another one.

"How?"

"She took his marriage, his calling, his job security, and his dignity. Then, when he'd lost everything, and re-invented himself, she took his first lover, that Vince Decatur. Dickon had just come out, and Vince was his first. Vince was no prize, I've heard. If a person represses his true nature for years, and then embraces it, he's so likely to go overboard. One gets to make all the silly adolescent mistakes in compressed adult time."

"I think I know what you mean." He took more cookies.

"Vin Decatur was a weak man, easily led by the strongest will in the room. After she rejected Dickon, Vanna ignored him until she discovered he had happily embarked on a new life. Then she sent Vince in. Vanna hired Vince to compromise Dickon with the church, according to La Señora."

"It's hard to believe anyone could be so vicious."

"Viciousness is in Vanna's genes." Emma drained her teacup. "Dickon needs someone, someone he can trust." Ben finished his cup and set it down.

"We all need to have people we can trust," Ben said. There were only a few cookies left, far fewer than he thought there should be. He wondered how many he had eaten.

"I think Dickon's ready to fall in love again," Emma continued, "with a kind and caring man." He began to feel cornered. What is it about some motherly souls that they have to pair off every single body?

"Have you noticed, Benjamin, how he looks at you when you're not looking at him?"

"No."

"Are you at all interested in Dickon?"

"I like Dickon, but I'm not sure I'm up for an intimate relationship with anybody."

Emma got up. "I think tea is not enough, today. You've been with the wicked witch this morning, and need more fortification than cookies and tea. Do you take bourbon, scotch, or gin?"

He was a little surprised. Emma seemed more like a sherry person than a hard liquor drinker. "Either bourbon or scotch," he said, "though it's a little early in the day for me."

"It's happy hour somewhere, London, or Cairo, or New York. We'll celebrate that." She went to the cupboard and took out two tumblers. Then she took a bottle of bourbon from another cupboard. "Three fingers each, I think," she said, and poured them. Emma had short wide fingers. He suspected he'd have an afternoon nap.

"Here," she said. "I prefer mine neat, but I can get you some rocks if you want."

"I'll try it neat," he said, feeling a bit like British gentry in a cozy murder mystery. He sipped at his drink, letting it linger on his tongue. Emma swallowed more than he did.

"I think you need someone, too," she said. "Dickon's available. I suggest you try it out."

"Emma," he said, and sipped a little more bourbon, "I haven't had much urge to be with anybody else romantically since Len died. Death's an ugly thing to watch when you love the dying person."

"Death is ugly," she said, "more a matter of flies and bad smells than dignity and released souls. We're alive. Of course we hate death." Did he imagine it, or was she slurring her words? Perhaps Emma wasn't used to strong spirits either.

"Did Len suffer a lot before he died?"

"Not too much. His heart failed him. He got old all of a sudden. Then he died." He felt tears welling behind his eyelids. As he'd gotten older, alcohol induced the maudlin in him.

"And now you should let him rest, and take up with a new life." Emma was emphatic.

"I have. I've moved here, and, despite Commissioner Dee, I'm planning to stay, if La Señora permits me to."

"I think she will." Emma took another long swallow, coughed gently, and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Her eyes were sparkling. "I fell in love once, Ben. It began and ended in a day, but it gave me my Notta."

"Your daughter?"

"Yes." She got up and went into the sitting room. She soon returned with a picture of a lovely young woman. "This is my Notta," she said, wiping the glass with her sleeve. She handed it to Ben.

"Feminam pulchram matrem pulchrior," he quoted, looking at the

"What?" The sudden shift to Latin confused her.

"It's from Horace's _Odes_ ," he said. "Translated it says, 'Lovely daughter of a lovelier mother.'"

"Ah, my cookies work, you silver-tongued rascal." Emma finished off her bourbon. "Anyway, I fell in love for a day with Haakon, Notta's father. That was the Big Quake day. I never saw him again."

"And you never found anybody else?"

"No." She stared at her empty tumbler. "I haven't thought about Haakon for a long time," she said. "Finish off your bourbon, Ben, and join me in another."

His own tongue felt a little thick and awkward as he swallowed the sizable remnant of his drink. He felt it spread fire in his stomach as he held out the empty tumbler to Emma. This time she poured four fingers each.

As she set the glass in front of him she said, "Word of advice in your pink and shell-like, Benny." She stood swaying slightly. "Have a date with Dickon. See where things go. I think you two belong together." Emma sat down suddenly. She took a small sip at her bourbon. Ben sipped at his. Prime Pussy leaped into Ben's lap. They swapped stories of Prime Pussy and Butter, and drunkenly compared the relative merits of dogs and cats as pets.

### Dinner with Dickon

When Ben toddled home from Emma's, Butter greeted him with a perplexed whine. It was time for their stroll, but went right to bed. He slept several hours, and woke with a headache. He had not drunk so much for years. He immediately swore off drinking ever again with women owned by demanding cats. However, he did not swear off eating cookies with them. Reform is all very well, if not overdone.

Butter demanded he take her out, so he got her leash and they went for a walk in the misty moonlight on the beach. The air was still, an uncommon occurrence by the sea. The mist veiled the sky discreetly. Butter got her romp, and Ben cleared his head.

Emma's admonition that he should date Dickon stuck in his mind. He discovered he was excited at the idea. He diverted his thoughts to other matters, such as Vanna's talk of llama cults, but they kept returning to a date with Dickon. But what to suggest? Dinner and a movie would require nearly an hour's drive each way. Dinner at the Four Rosas was a possibility, but then everyone would know everything that happened. He wasn't ready to show any romantic interest that openly until he knew he had some reason to expect a response in kind.

"Butter, should I have a date with Dickon?" She wagged her tail vigorously, as she commonly did when he mentioned Dickon. He took it for a yes. "It should be a quiet evening, so we can explore each other without a lot of pressure from other people's expectations. I could ask him to dinner with just the two of us." Butter indicated enthusiasm with her tail. Ben wondered if "dinner," or "Dickon" motivated her. He decided it was the latter, because he wanted her support.

Next day he went to the post office, hoping to find Dickon there. He wasn't; Harry Pitts told Ben Dickon had gone to Las Tumbas on business. The keenness of his disappointment surprised Ben.

"He'll be back tomorrow," Harry said. "Want I should tell him you were asking for him?"

"No," he said. "I'll catch up to him when I see him."

He was going to wait until he encountered Dickon, to make the invitation seem casual, but when he said something to Butter about waiting, it suddenly seemed ludicrous to wait. He walked over to Dickon's place and left a handwritten invitation tucked into the screen door. The next morning Dickon left a note on his way to the post office accepting Ben's invitation.

Ben served the meal family style. He made fusilli with white clam sauce, lamb chops seasoned with rosemary, a lettuce salad dressed with lime vinaigrette, and broccoli spears sautéed in extra virgin olive oil. For dessert, he brought in chocolate cake from Wong Brothers.

Dickon brought a bottle of Johannesburg Riesling. "Everything smells good," Dickon said. He grinned at Ben. "Including you," he added.

Ben nearly blushed. "Let's hope it all tastes good, too," he said. He brought their salads, individually made. He brought the vinaigrette in a salad dressing bottle. He shook it before he offered it to Dickon. "Don't pay attention to the label," he said. "It's something I put together. It's convenient to put it in a recycled bottle."

"Interesting," Dickon said. He poured a generous amount over his bowl of mixed greens. "Do you do things like this often?"

"What?"

"Do you make your own salad dressings, that kind of thing?"

"Yeah. I got the gay cooking gene, somehow or another." Ben poured dressing on his salad.

"That one passed me by," Dickon said. "I can put out a passable meal, but nothing fancy. I'd probably be lost without a can opener."

"Good things can come in cans," Ben said. "Beer does."

"Beer's better in bottles."

"True." They were quiet while they ate their salads. When he had finished his, Dickon said, "Excellent, my good man, excellent. A perfect start to a proper meal."

Ben went to the oven. He took the fusilli, clam sauce, and broccoli out of the oven where he had been keeping them warm. He put the fusilli in a bowl, then poured the clam sauce over it and stirred it around. He scattered a light dusting of grated asiago cheese over it. Then he put the broccoli in a bowl. He got serving spoons for each. He took these to the table. Then he went back to the stove and plated the lamb chops. Lastly he poured the wine.

Dickon helped himself to fusilli and took some broccoli. Then he passed the dishes to Ben. "Scrumptious," he said, around a mouthful of pasta. Then he ate a sliver of his lamb chop. He closed his eyes, and sighed in ecstasy. "Where did you learn to cook like this?"

"Oh, just a little bit by little bit, over the years. I've got a limited repertoire, but there are a few things I can do well."

"I'll have to try some of the others."

"We'll arrange it." Ben looked up just as Dickon looked up. Electricity sparked between Ben's gray eyes and Dickon's green ones. They both laughed softly, over no discernible joke.

Over the rest of the dinner, they talked only a little and that mostly about the weather. Afterward, Dickon helped Ben clear the table, and Ben served dessert. Then he offered Dickon an after-dinner cordial. Dickon declined that, and asked for a cup of tea instead. Ben went to put the kettle on.

Dickon seemed relaxed and mellow until Ben mentioned Vanna had strongly urged him to move out. Dickon's face twisted with pain when Ben's spoke her name.

"That woman!" he said bitterly.

Ben asked him, "How did you ever come to marry her?"

"Clergy need wives. Also, I earnestly believed a man's primary purpose in life was to marry and beget children. That shows I had absorbed the attitudes of my upbringing."

"You think something else is a man's primary purpose?"

"Yes. To be one, whatever that means for any individual."

"I'm not sure I understand."

"I can only describe it in the context of my own life. God, if God is, didn't make me to be a married man. I just don't have the hardwiring to screw women."

"How long were you married?"

"Almost ten miserable years."

"How did you get through it? I can't imagine working myself up for sex with a woman."

"A lot of fantasizing she was a guy. Younger men, at least the younger me, could turn on mechanically well enough to get by. As I got more familiar with the process, it got more difficult to pretend. I was working against who I am. In those days, I was much more religious, and kept bargaining with God that if He made me heterosexual, I'd be His ever more faithful servant. I've gotten a little wiser since then."

"Wiser?"

"If God is, I don't expect Him to yank the universe around to suit my perceived needs. The first spiritual lesson, I guess, is to accept what is as what's so." Ben looked puzzled, so Dickon said it another way. "I mean, instead of wasting time wishing things were different, or trying to find somebody to blame for the way things are, accept that whatever situation and condition one is in, that's where you start off from now. Don't change the past, it's hopeless. Start off from now to find the future."

Ben had a different question. "You keep saying 'If God is.' What do you mean by that?"

"One can't prove God is. One can't prove God isn't. One can only believe one way or the other, or admit one doesn't know what to believe. Once upon a time, I believed God is. Now I know I don't know."

"That must make it awkward to be a preacher."

"Yes, it would. I suspect it's a problem a lot of modern clergy wrestle with, the ones with honest minds, anyway."

"What's the second spiritual lesson?"

"That 'Why?' has no absolute answer."

"I don't understand."

"Questions like, 'Why do bad things happen to me?' and 'Why do people suffer?' have only relative answers. If I have smoked all my adult life, and contract lung cancer, the relative answer is smoking causes cancer. However, I may never have smoked, and still may contract lung cancer. The relative answer then will be something very different, pollution, or genetics, or the like. That's not the absolute answer that the 'Why?' really asks, which is, 'Why me?'"

"The third spiritual lesson," Dickon went on, "is that life has no purpose except to be. Any purpose to my being, or your being, is a construct we fashion to justify ourselves to ourselves. If God is, God only 'cares' that we are."

Ben shook his head. "It sounds like you're saying we just happen, and then we die."

"Yes. But what goes on between can be endlessly fascinating. That's the fourth spiritual lesson. Be interested always, and enjoy."

"Even dark things, like people you love dying?"

"Yes, if you can. Enjoy that you're still alive to mourn the dead."

"I'll have to think about that."

"If you want to, do. It's just the way I see things tonight."

Butter put her head on Dickon's knee, looking at him with that canine longing that moves mountains. He invited her up into his lap, even though she was large for a lap dog.

"Ah, Butter," he said, "Ben didn't invite me here to philosophize. I think he had something else in mind, don't you?" She wagged her tail with enthusiasm, thumping Dickon's lap. Dickon raised his green eyes to look right into Ben's gray eyes.

"Ben, I think you're half turned on to me. I'm half turned on to you. Am I right?"

Ben blinked; such plain speech was unfashionable among the couples he and Len moved in. He plunged. "Yes, Dickon, maybe more than half on my part. I just don't know, yet, how far I'm ready to go with this."

"That's a relief. I'm interested, too, but unsure. Maybe we should spend a little more time together."

"Yes, I'd like that."

"Do you like Thai food?"

"Yes, I do."

"I know a nice little place in Pueblo Rio. Maybe this Saturday?"

"Yes, that sounds good. What time?"

"I'll come by a little after six."

"Okay."

"And now, Butter, I'd better go. May I trouble you to get off my lap?" Butter looked at him with mournful eyes. "I'll come back some time, and you can sit on me longer." Butter continued to look at Dickon with mournful eyes.

"Butter, down!" Ben said. She got down, and stood right in front of Dickon stretching herself. He laughed, and rubbed her behind her ears. Then he got up and stepped over her.

"Thank you, Ben, for dinner. You cook well, an excellent skill in a sexy man." Dickon kissed his cheek. "Until Saturday, then."

"Until Saturday," Ben said, and brushed Dickon's cheek with his lips.

"Good night," Dickon said, and went out the door.

"Good night," Ben called after him.

After he washed the dishes and put them away, he let Butter out for a night run. When she was done, he called her in to bed. She slept soundly. He woke two or three times, grinning, from his dreams. Dickon slept little. His conversation with Ben opened cupboards in his mind stuffed with his darker memories.

### Eviction Notice

Ben answered the knock on his door. Butter danced with delight. Dickon stood on the porch. Ben, had he been a little less formal, would have danced with Butter.

"Come in, Dickon," he said, opening the screen. He stooped and grabbed Butter's collar, so Dickon could enter unimpeded.

"Hi," Dickon said, and came in. "Sorry to break into your morning, but I thought I ought to warn you."

"Warn me?"

"They're coming."

"They?"

"Vanna and the Deputy Sheriff. The cute one."

"Deputy Sharif?"

"The same."

"How do you know that?"

"Harry Pitts told me a few minutes ago, when I was in the Café. He told me he heard Vanna insisting the Deputy serve papers on you. She thinks she can evict you."

Ben motioned toward a chair. "Have a seat," he said. "I talked with a lawyer, at La Señora's suggestion. Only La Señora can evict me, since it's her property. The Coastal Commission has no jurisdiction here. Why would she even try?"

"To get back at La Señora, maybe. Maybe just because she hasn't screwed anybody around lately. Who knows? Who's the lawyer?"

"John Diss," Ben said.

"Oh, yes. Arthur I.'s boy. He's good."

"When is Vanna supposed to be here?"

"Any minute."

Butter could wait no longer. She leaped into Dickon's lap and settled down. He began stroking her back. "Sorry I couldn't give you more notice," Dickon went on. "She'll be pushing you with threats, or cajoling you with promises she won't keep."

Ben heard footsteps on the path. Butter jumped from Dickon's lap, using his stomach as a launch pad. Dickon said "Oof!" Butter ran to the door and began barking with authority. Ben hushed her and waited for the knock. When it came, he held his breath a long moment, and then opened the door.

DiConti Sharif stood there in his tailored uniform. Ben took a long look for the sheer pleasure of looking. Then he said, "Yes, Deputy?"

"Are you Mr. Benjamin Dover Soul?"

"I am."

"I have a notice of eviction to serve on you, sir." Deputy Sharif was all formality and courtesy.

"La Señora has not advised me I am behind in the rent or otherwise an undesirable tenant."

"Ms. Mandor is not the complaining party in this action," the Deputy said. "This notice is served on behalf of the Coastal Commission."

"According to my attorney, John Diss, the Commission and its officers have no standing to request my eviction."

"That, sir, is a matter for the courts. I'm only required to hand you the notice, and inform the other parties to it that I have served you."

"All right, then," Ben said. He opened the screen door and went out on the porch to take the paper. Butter slipped out and ran down the path to the gate. She stood at the gate and growled a low long growl. Her tail switched back and forth in slow motion as she pointed her nose at the right side of the gate. She flattened her ears against her skull. Vanna stood motionless in the cypress shade that covered the gate.

"Come, Butter," Ben called. Deputy Sharif put the papers in his hand. Ben took them, still calling Butter. Butter ignored him. She knew evil when she smelt it. Vanna kept the fence between herself and Butter.

Dickon came out to see what was going on. "Hello, Deputy," he said.

"Hello, Mr. Shayne."

"Butter, come here!" Ben commanded. Butter looked at him over her shoulder and whined. "Come, I said, right now!" She turned reluctantly, and came to the porch. "Sit! Stay!" Ben said. Butter sat, facing the gate, next to Ben. She continued to growl. Dickon sauntered down the path toward the gate.

"Why, hello, Vanna," he said. "Don't trust the Sheriff's department to do your dirty work without supervision?"

"You are still drawn to trouble, I see, Dickon, like flies to dung," she said. Ben could see the angry glitter in her eyes. He thought of a coiled cobra.

"You drew me, once upon a time, Vanna." Dickon's voice was quiet.

"You are the same maddening boy you've always been, Dickon Shayne. One day you will get your comeuppance."

"You're wrong to be here, Vanna. Ben hasn't done anything wrong. It's only your obsession with those birds that brings you. You need a shrink, Vanna. You always have."

A panther's snarl could not be more vicious than the furious twist that contorted Vanna's face. Ben guessed this to be an old insult that struck deep at Vanna's vanity. He was unprepared for Vanna's next move. She opened the gate and punched Dickon in the stomach. Her fury and natural strength doubled the poor man over. Butter lunged for Vanna. Vanna scooped up a stone and tossed it at Butter, narrowly missing her. Ben had had enough.

"Ms. Dee, leave my residence. You are not invited," he said, advancing on her. She aimed a kick at Dickon's shins. "Deputy, escort her away."

DiConti moved toward Vanna. This sort of scene depressed him. Butter tried to nip Vanna's ankle. She kicked at her, narrowly missing. Ben ran down the path, DiConti racing beside him.

"Don't do anything rash, Mr. Soul," DiConti said. Dickon had fallen to his knees. Vanna's right knee, aimed for where Dickon's groin had been, cracked on his chin. It hurt her as much as it hurt him, and she staggered back to lean against the fence, panting heavily. Her left shoe stuck to Butter's most recent offering. It was still soft, and most malodorous. Butter had shared Brussels sprouts with Ben the night before. Her step had gone into the pile with such force it oozed up the sides of her pump and onto the nylon exposed by a cutaway.

"Damned dog!" She looked about her, as if for something to throw.

"Ms. Dee," DiConti warned her, "cease and desist. This behavior doesn't help your cause." Slowly the berserker fury in Vanna's eyes dimmed. Her ice showed.

"You are a fool, Mr. Soul," she grunted, "to consort with this faggot preacher. He'll destroy you."

"Dickon is the right man for me, Vanna Dee, and way too much man for you," Ben shouted at her. "I'll consort with him, hell, I'll be his consort, if he'll have me, you malignant witch!"

"On your head be it," she said, and turned her back on him to leave.

Butter lunged at her again. Ben caught Butter's collar in a lucky grab. "Don't stain your teeth, Butter," he said.

"Deputy, escort me out of this place," Vanna commanded. "I believe my life's in danger.

"Please do as she asks, Deputy," Ben said. "I believe my life's in danger, while she's here."

DiConti nodded noncommittally at a neutral point between both speakers, and took Vanna's elbow. Ben, still grasping Butter's collar, took grim pleasure in watching Vanna favor her right knee and wince at the smell of her left foot as she limped away on the deputy's arm. Ben went to the kneeling Dickon. Dickon's eyes glazed. He still gasped.

"Nod if you're okay; shake your head if you're not, Dickon." Ben tried to keep his worry from his voice. He was not successful. Dickon slowly shook his head and groaned as he did so. He tumbled over onto his side in the grass. Ben trembled. His heart seemed to have invaded his throat to sit there, pulsing frantically.

"I'll get Dr. Field," Ben said, and released Butter's collar. "Stay, Butter, and guard Dickon," he said. Butter stayed. Ben ran toward Dr. Field's cottage.

### Ben Nurses Dickon

Dickon was conscious when Dr. Field and Ben got to him. Dickon grimaced at Dr. Field as he performed his examination. Butter was licking Dickon's ear, patiently, steadily. Ben hoped Butter's solace was getting through to Dickon. When Dr. Field knelt down beside Dickon, Butter moved away, but stayed close enough to guard Dickon.

Dr. Field carefully felt Dickon's neck. "No broken bones," Dr. Field said, "but Dickon's going to have a mighty bruise on his chin. You say she kicked him?"

"No. She used her knee, full force. Punched him in the stomach, too." Ben heard his voice shake. A clinical, detached, part of him wondered at how stirred up his feelings were—fear of and anger at Vanna, fear and tenderness for Dickon. "I wasn't close enough to stop her."

"That woman is a menace to humankind." Dr. Field probed gingerly at Dickon's chin. His voice grated with anger. "Dickon's lucky his jaw isn't broken." Dr. Field palpated Dickon's stomach.

Dickon groaned. Butter went to him at once, and licked his face. Dickon's eyes fluttered. Ben noticed how long and lovely the red lashes were.

"Is she gone?" Dickon asked.

"You mean Vanna?" Dr. Field said.

"Yes, I mean Vanna."

"She's gone," Ben said, kneeling beside Dickon. Butter continued licking Dickon's face. "How are you?"

"Wet."

"Wet?"

"From doggy-love. That's enough, Butter." Dickon raised a hand and rubbed Butter's ears. "Vanna kneed me, didn't she?"

"Yes," Ben said.

"Dickon," Dr. Field asked, "do you know where you are?"

"Yes, at Ben's place." Dickon raised his hand to touch his chin. "Ow," he said. "Hurts." He dropped his hand.

Dr. Field nodded. "You need some ice on that chin. Who is the president?"

"The wrong man." This was Dickon's standard response to this question.

"You seem to be okay. Ben, can you take Dickon in for tonight, and keep an eye on him? Are you okay with that?"

Dickon started to smile, but then he groaned again. "Okay," he said. "Get up?"

"Yes," Dr. Field said. "Take it slow; you might be dizzy." Dickon slowly levered himself into a sitting position.

"Dizzy?" Dr. Field asked.

"A little."

"Sit still for a minute. Breathe."

Butter sat beside Dickon, to shield him from the breeze blowing in from the sea. Dickon put his arm around her and held her close. "You're a good dog," he murmured to her. "Thank you for protecting me from that vicious woman." Butter's tail thumped the ground. "I've never known Vanna to be so violent before," Dickon said. "She's been angry with me for years, and I don't know why."

"Projection of her own dark evil onto you," Dr. Field said. "Classic Freudian behavior."

"God forgive her. I can't."

"Nor can I," Ben said, "for what she just did to you."

"That's far from the worst of it," Dickon said. "I'll have to fill you in on the details some time." He bent forward, as if to push himself to his knees. He groaned as the muscles contracted over the knot of soreness in the pit of his stomach.

"I'll try standing now," Dickon said, "but I may need some help." Dr. Field and Ben each got up and extended Dickon a hand. He shakily got to his feet, and stood, swaying. "God, my chin hurts," he said.

"I've got some ice in the house. Put your arm around my shoulder," Ben said. "I'll help you in."

Dickon tried to smile, groaned as the pain hit him. Dr. Field shouldered Dickon's other arm, and slowly the three stumbled up the steps and into the living room. Dickon collapsed on Ben's sofa. Butter jumped up beside him.

"Must have bumped something else," Dickon muttered. "My backside is sore, too."

"Probably happened when you fell," Ben said. "Vanna packs a hell of a punch."

"Yeah."

"Is it near your tailbone?" Dr. Field asked.

"No, more all over."

"If it still bothers you after a couple of days, better get to the hospital and get X-rayed for a cracked coccyx."

"Can I have something for the pain?"

"Aspirin, acetaminophen, ibuprofen, nothing stronger. No booze. We can't completely rule out the possibility of concussion. Sorry."

"I'll start for home as soon as I get my legs under me."

"No you won't!" Ben and Dr. Field said simultaneously. Dickon stared at them in surprise. Their vehemence startled even Butter.

"You need to be with someone for the next twenty-four hours," Dr. Field went on to explain. "Just in case you have hidden damage that takes a while to surface."

"Oh. I could get Emma or Elke to come in, I suppose."

"Or you can stay right here," Ben said. "I've got the room, and I've got the time." He glared at Dickon. "No arguments." Ben surprised himself at the urgency he felt.

"Yes, sir!" Dickon said. "I'll be a good boy, sir!"

Ben started laughing. Dickon tried to laugh, but his chin stopped him.

Ben stopped laughing. "I'll get the ice," he said, and went to the kitchen. Dr. Field instructed Dickon to stretch out on the couch. Dr. Field lifted Dickon's shirt. When Ben came back to the living room with the ice in a towel, Dr. Field was palpating Dickon's stomach. Ben felt a stab of jealousy. Quickly he assured himself Dr. Field had a medical purpose, not the romantic one Ben might have had.

"I forgot to check his stomach for damage," Dr. Field said. "Nothing feels out of place, but it's sore. If you eat anything in the next several hours, eat a light meal. Soup or something like that."

"And I was going to fix a five course meal," Ben said, smiling at Dickon.

"Another day," Dickon said. "Tea for now okay, Doc?"

"Yes, a cup will be okay for you. No signs of internal injury that I can find. Not too likely from a single fist blow, anyway."

Ben offered to make tea for the three of them, but Dr. Field declined. "I've got to get back. Juan was waning when I left, and Beau gets into so much trouble if I don't watch him. Come by if you need me."

"Thanks for your help," Dickon called after him.

"Good man, Dr. Field," Ben said. "I didn't know there were three people in his cottage."

"There are four. I'll explain sometime. I'd like that tea now, if you're still offering."

"Coming up, right away." Ben went to put the kettle on. When he came back with the tea, Dickon was dozing. Ben put Dickon's tea beside him on a table and sat in a chair across the room. Ben dozed a while, too, dreaming about Dickon and himself romping on the hillside with the llamas. Butter also treated the situation as a napping opportunity.

Dickon must have wakened some time, because when Ben woke up, Dickon's tea was gone. Butter did not drink tea. Ben watched Dickon through half-closed lids. Dickon appeared to be sleeping. Ben yearned to reach out and stroke Dickon, anywhere and everywhere. He took joy in having Dickon here on his couch. Ben got out of his chair as quietly as he could, but Dickon heard him.

"Good morning, or evening, as the case may be," Dickon said. His words were careful, almost slurred, as though his tongue had thickened. Perhaps it had, Ben thought; Vanna's knees had big knobs.

"I'll fix us some supper," Ben said.

"Something easy to chew," Dickon suggested.

"Soup okay? And do you like flan, for dessert? I've got some in the refrigerator."

"Soup's okay. I love flan. Sorry I sound so funny."

"Just rest. I'll bring you a tray."

"No," Dickon said. "I can get up and walk. I already have. I hurt like the fury of a scorned woman, but I'm not dizzy anymore." He stood. Ben watched him for swaying, but Dickon didn't sway. He made his way to the kitchen and sat at the table while Ben rooted through the cupboard for broth and noodles to make a soft soup. Ben took the angel hair pasta he found, and broke it into short pieces. Angel hair cooked quickly, and was good in soup. Ben added onion powder, garlic powder, and powdered ginger. "It would be better with real onion, garlic, and ginger root," he said to Dickon. "Don't have those on hand, sorry to say, so you get what I call Government Issue chicken soup."

"Smells good. Easy to swallow," Dickon said.

When the pasta had cooked for four minutes, Ben ladled the soup into two soup cups. He took down crackers and put them on the table. Then he set the cups of soup on the table for himself and for Dickon. "Would you rather have a straw?" he asked.

"No, I can manage the spoon better, I think." Ben got them spoons. They began to eat. Dickon slurped his soup, and looked apologetically at Ben.

"Don't worry. Doesn't bother me, doesn't bother Butter. Make all the noise you want." Dickon started to grin, and then thought better of it. He nodded delicately. They finished the soup in slurping harmony.

"I heard what you said to Vanna," Dickon said as he finished the last of the soup. "We need to talk. I've got a lot of history to share."

Ben cleared away the soup things. His hands were steady but his internal state was shaking. "Ready for flan?" he asked.

"Yes." Ben could tell Dickon's chin was swelling. It had a nasty bruise on its underside.

"How did a nice guy like you ever get tied up with a villainous villainess like Vanna?"

"Naiveté. Hers and mine." Dickon savored the spoonful of flan he had maneuvered onto his swollen tongue. "She was church-raised, very sheltered, or so I thought, when I met her. I didn't want to get married, but I knew a preacher had to have a wife to succeed. She knew church things, I thought, and how to survive and be happy as a pastor's wife. Survive, she could. Be happy? Not Vanna. Not then, not ever." Dickon scooped up another spoonful of flan and carefully put it in his mouth. He let it melt.

"I think she thought I was on my way someplace, Clerk of General Assembly, or pastor of Riverside Presbyterian, New York. I was a sad disappointment to her. I wanted to work in farm towns and dying churches. Dead end parishes. She never forgave me for being so lacking in ambition."

"Did you take a wife just for the church?"

"I had counselors suggesting it was the only available cure for my sexuality. Gay preachers bug churches, probably because we're too spiritual."

"Poor Dickon." Ben looked at him. Dickon stared at his flan. Ben saw the pain in them, anyway.

"In the end, the church betrayed me as much as Vanna did." Dickon's voice rasped, as though the flan stuck in his throat.

"Some of us are better off without women," Ben said.

"Yes. Ben? Do you mind if I have some aspirin, and go to bed now? I'm tired. I can sleep on the couch."

"No, you'll sleep in the bed. I'll crawl in beside you when I get sleepy." Dickon stared at Ben. Ben thought he saw fright in Dickon's eyes. Ben felt confused.

"I'm not ready for anything, Ben. I've got to think about things before I commit myself."

Ben's inner disappointment felt like lead in his stomach. "That's fine, Dickon. We've got a lot of time to think about things." He gazed at Dickon. "I shocked myself with what I said to Vanna. I didn't know it was in me." He realized as he spoke it was true. He'd gotten way beyond his comfort zone. "It's just the bed's a lot more comfortable than the couch, and you need to rest as comfortably as possible."

"Thanks, Ben, for understanding." Dickon used the table to push himself to his feet.

"Need any help getting ready? I'm sorry I don't have pajamas to offer. I never use them."

"I never do, either." Dickon waved and went toward the bedroom. Ben followed him.

"The sheets are clean, if that matters to you. Butter usually shares the bed, if you don't mind."

"Not at all. It's big enough for three of us. See you in the morning."

"Good night, then." Ben left the room, closing the door. He yearned to peer through the keyhole to watch Dickon get ready. That, he knew, would be a breach of faith. Dickon needed space, room, time, whatever, to sort things out. Well, he, Ben, needed it, too. If it were meant to be, it would be. If not, something else would happen. Later, when Ben went to bed, he slipped under the covers and waited for the bed to warm. Butter leaped onto the bed, did her three circles, and slept virtuously between Ben and Dickon, insuring their chastity and her warmth.

### Dream a Little Dream with Butter

Butter twitched her paws as though she were running the mountainside. She dreamed she was chasing a pink rabbit through the sagebrush. The rabbit stayed just ahead of her quivering nose. When Butter lay down, panting, to rest, the rabbit stopped, just out of reach, and danced a jig.

Feigning indifference, Butter glanced out over the moonlit cove. When she deemed the pink bunny wasn't watching her, she leaped, like a cat, ready to pounce. The rabbit flashed ahead, just out of reach, still jigging in the moonlight. Butter howled, and gave chase. The rabbit stayed ahead of her, always just out of reach. Butter moaned in her sleep. Ben stroked her ears in his sleep. Butter calmed.

Suddenly, she was sitting side by side with the rabbit in the presence of the unicorn with the unique horn. The thrilling scent of sheep with violets filled her nostrils again. Ferrets, lizards, murrelets, and llamas were there also. They were all attuned to the unicorn in their minds. The horned beast warned them and reassured them in the same message. They all lay a long time warming themselves in the glow from its horn.

The pink rabbit popped out of existence with a curious noise. Butter's dream took her to her kitchen. She ate a large bowl of fried rice and ham, her all-time people food favorite. Dickon moaned in his sleep. Ben murmured an unconscious reply. They woke Butter. She licked her lips, stretched, turned around three times, put her nose to her tail, and went back to sleep. Now she dreamed of naps in warm laps.

### Dickon Equivocates

When Butter woke Ben the next morning, she leaped lightly off the bed. Ben got up as gently as he could. They didn't want to wake Dickon. Ben pulled on his trousers and opened the back door for Butter. She slipped out into the yard to take care of her business. Ben stood on the small back porch looking out over the cove. Gray skies and steel gray water this morning, as most mornings. A light breeze blew from landward, promising to disperse the fog and low cloud early in the day. It carried the spice of redwoods on its breath. When she had completed her business, Butter came back in. She wagged her tail. Then she sat staring at the cupboard where Ben kept the doggy treats. Butter got one every morning. Ben got it down for her and she took it off into the living room.

Ben opened the refrigerator. He'd need to go to Wong's again, soon. He had eggs, but dessert and meat and vegetables were scant. He took the eggs out to let them come to room temperature. Ben would make Dickon scrambled eggs. Easy to chew. Ben's torso was chilled; he returned to the bedroom to get his shirt. Dickon was awake. Butter lay beside him.

"Hi, Stud," he said to Ben.

"Ready to have breakfast, or do you want to sleep in a little longer?"

"I can manage breakfast, if it's not too hard to chew. Chin's sore."

"I should think so." Ben stooped to pick up his shirt. He put it on and began to button it. Dickon sat up, reached for his shirt, and buttoned it. He modestly kept the covers over his lap. Ben kept him under observation out of the corner of his eye. Dickon reached over and put his feet in his jeans. Then he stood swiftly and pulled them up. Ben got only a very brief glimpse of Dickon's buttocks; the shirt had a long tail. Ben reminded himself to back off, leave space, etc.

Dickon sat down again on the bed. He must have sat harder than he expected. He grunted. He looked up at Ben and said, "Tailbone's still a little sore, too."

"Scrambled eggs okay?"

"Sounds chewable. No toast, not yet."

"I usually have tea for breakfast."

"Tea's fine."

"Come when you're ready," Ben said, and went to the kitchen.

Dickon took time to tie his shoes. He didn't know how to start explaining to Ben. He wasn't quite sure what he needed to explain to Ben, or why he was so hesitant about committing to anyone. Raw places still lingered on his psyche under the scabs he had grown over them.

Ben was stirring the eggs when Dickon got to the kitchen. Water had begun to steam in the teakettle, though it hadn't come to the boil yet. "Hi, again," Ben said, not looking up from the bowl he was stirring the eggs in. "Food and drink in a few minutes."

Dickon sat down carefully. Butter came up to him and laid her head on his knee. He stroked her head and ears. She half-closed her eyes in bliss. Dickon could smell the bacon fat Ben was pouring the eggs into, and mingled with it the smell of the teabags.

"Like your eggs dry, or wet, or in between?"

"In between." Dickon sensed a tension in Ben he couldn't quite place.

"Ben," he began, and stopped. He didn't know where to take the sentence.

"Yes?" Ben asked, turning his head partway to glance at Dickon without neglecting the eggs.

"After breakfast," Dickon said. The kettle began to whistle. "I'll make the tea." Dickon carefully looped the strings and tags around the mug handles. He got up, unplugged the kettle, and poured boiling water over the bags. He carried the mugs to the table.

"Eggs look right?"

"Just fine," Dickon said.

Ben portioned out half onto each plate. He got forks from the drawer, put one on each plate also, and brought the plates to the table. "Ketchup?"

"No thanks. Just the eggs, today." They ate silently, each staring at his plate. Only the clinking of forks against stoneware stirred in the room. The tea steeped and gave off its scent, perfuming the morning. When they had both finished, Ben took their plates and rinsed them in the sink.

"Tea on the veranda?" he said. Maybe he could talk to Dickon easier if he sat beside him staring out at the cove, instead of staring at him across the table.

"Yes," Dickon said. Where could he find the words to say to this man who wanted him?

Ben spoke as they settled themselves on the veranda. "I didn't mean to push you, yesterday. As I said, I surprised myself. I'll take it back, if you want me to."

"No, don't take it back, unless you thought about it and decided you didn't mean it."

Ben shifted his weight. The cold damp that lay over the wood in the morning was penetrating his pants. The redwood spice of earlier had been replaced by the salt tang and fresh fish smells of the cove. The wind had turned again. The fog might not leave very quickly.

"I have thought about it, Dickon, and yes, I meant it. I still mean it. I guess I'm proposing."

"You need to know a lot more about me, Ben." Dickon shifted carefully. He swallowed a mouthful of tea. A gull wheeled over the beach before them, crying an arcane call that only gulls could interpret.

"Maybe. Maybe not."

"I'm bruised merchandise, Ben. Bruised and scarred."

"Who isn't, by our age?"

Dickon looked down at his bare feet. Their chill was just short of uncomfortable. "I have trouble trusting people, Ben. Dogs I can trust. People, not very easily."

"Trust and Rome aren't built in a day," Ben said. He watched Butter sniff around the bushes at the back fence.

"No, and it generally takes more than a day to destroy them." Dickon looked at Butter as she watched a butterfly pass outside the fence. When the dog turned and came up to them, he held out a hand to her. She licked it, and lay down on a lower step by Ben's feet. The both caught the odor of damp dog, pungent, yet light enough not to offend. Ben let Dickon sit silent. Ben ached to put his arm around Dickon and comfort him, and maybe himself. He suddenly discovered a great yawning void in himself. The discovery shook him.

"Vanna was my first, and only, wife," Dickon said. "She was a schoolgirl when I met her. I thought she had a kind of innocence then. Maybe I smashed it. She claimed once I had." Dickon's voice was hoarse. He cleared his throat and went on. "When we drifted apart, I didn't understand what was going on. Nobody in my family had ever gotten divorced. You see, I learned to love her. A lot. Looking back, I know I should never have gotten married. That was the church's idea. That was how to save myself. Well, it didn't work. I damaged me, and I damaged her." The regret in Dickon's tone was something Ben could almost touch.

"I used to say that I wasted my youth on celibacy and religion," Dickon went on. Bitterness entered his tone. "The church betrayed me, too. Vanna found Clarence Sales, and man after man after that. She dumped me, of course, for Clarence, and then dumped him very soon after for some city councilman. I lost track, after that, for quite a while." Dickon stretched. He grunted when a stomach muscle protested. He swallowed more of his tea. Ben waited for him to continue.

Dickon reached out and scratched Butter's rump just above her tail. Ecstasy filmed her eyes. "The church was upset, of course, that I was divorced. They got even more upset when the congregation asked them to replace me with a married man, since even six months after the divorce I wasn't actively seeking a wife." Dickon attempted a wry smile. "A friend of mine, Rev. Bobbo Link, warned me I might have trouble. The Ministerial Relations Committee called me in to examine me about the causes of my divorce."

"But wasn't the divorce Vanna's idea?"

"That didn't matter, not to the Ministerial Relations Committee. Especially the three clergy that sat on it that year. Reverends Phil E. Buster, Shea Mauna Hughes, and Andy Maime were determined to keep all divorced and unmarried clergy away from parishes. That included me. I might have starved, if Bobbo hadn't found me a position with La Señora that Presbytery would accept as valid. She ran a mission in the City then." Dickon stood, using the porch railing to lever himself up. He had a damp stain on the seat of his jeans. "Can I have some more tea?"

"Yes," Ben said. "Come on in, Butter."

The kitchen was dim, almost restful, after being outdoors. Even though the fog covered the sky, the sun made it glisten with a brightness the eye didn't register until it had found a dimmer place. Ben filled the kettle and plugged it in. Dickon went to the bathroom. Ben stood at the window and looked out at the sky and the cove. Dickon came in behind him and startled him by putting a hand on his shoulder. The weight of it was warm, wonderful, and heavy on Ben's shoulder. He held his breath.

"As I said, I'm scarred, Ben. I'm afraid to take a chance on loving somebody, and I haven't been able to talk myself out of it." Dickon went to the table and lowered himself into a chair.

Ben turned and looked at him. He felt tears gathering behind his eyes, and wasn't sure why. "How vicious people can be," Ben said. He put new teabags in their cups.

"I'm telling you this because I don't know if or when I'll be able to be a full partner in any kind of relationship, Ben." Dickon's voice was small. "The other thing I'm afraid of is that I somehow caused Vanna to become what she is. She seemed so sweet and innocent when I first knew her."

"You aren't the only one with baggage," Ben said. The kettle whistled. He poured the water over their teabags, and brought the cups to the table. He sat down opposite Dickon. "How old was Vanna when you met her?" Butter looked at each of the men, decided there weren't any bits of toast or other provender about to fall from the table. She went to the door into the living room to lie on the rug, well within earshot of the table.

"Seventeen. We got married within the year."

Ben took a deep breath. "Look at me, Dickon." When Dickon didn't respond, he repeated his statement with more force. "Look at me Dickon." Dickon raised his eyes to Ben's face. Ben's gray eyes bored into his green ones. "No one could make Vanna what she is except Vanna. She did it to herself. Got that?" Dickon nodded, not quite convinced. "Keep saying that to yourself, Dickon, until you get that it's what's so." Ben broke eye contact. Too much pain swirled in the green pools of Dickon's eyes. "Don't put Vanna's black shade between us, Dickon." Ben took a long swallow of his tea.

"That's what I've been trying to say," Dickon said through the choke in his throat. "I don't know if I can banish Vanna."

"Maybe you need an exorcist? Does your church do that?" Ben smiled at him.

"No. Different branch specializes in that stuff." Dickon tried to smile back. His chin still hurt.

"As I said," Ben went on, looking at the floor, "you're not the only one with baggage." He cleared his throat. "I have my own ghosts, too."

"Of lovers past?" Dickon asked.

"Of lovers past." Ben smiled. "Len and I were good together. Where he was strong, I was weak. Where I was strong, he was weak. We were like two halves of a grapefruit rejoined. Most of the time, anyway." Ben felt the tears swelling again behind his eyes.

"He was with me through half my life, the important half." Ben bent his head down and away from Dickon. Ben did not cry easily or publicly. Dickon felt like public to him, just then.

"I had a professor in college," Ben went on, "Professor John Dilbert Doe. We called him Dill." He smiled. "Dill helped me come out. He substituted for the father I'd lost, only better, because he was gay, too, and knew how to help me accept myself. Len built on that. I know I can't love anyone else the way I loved him. I'd have to love anybody new in my life in a new way."

"Second marriages are more convenience than romance," Dickon observed. "Read that somewhere, probably in a woman's magazine." He stared at the refrigerator across the room. "Sounds sad, doesn't it?"

"When you've been with someone for years, like I was with Len, and you lose him, there's a hollow place that never fills up. I guess I've lost the capacity of being complete by myself. I thought I wanted to be alone, on my own, but it's not enough." Some plaintive note in Ben's tone brought Butter to him. She stared up at him with soulful eyes. "Some times not even a dog is enough." Ben reached out and scratched Butter behind the ears. She thumped her tail gently on the floor.

"I'm saying, Ben, I'm not sure I can be part of a couple again. I've been mostly on my own for a long time now. Except for Vanna, and later, Vin, I've never tried anything long term." Dickon looked at Ben's bent head. "Not even with a dog." He stood up. "You've been great, Ben, taking me in the way you have. I think I should be alone for a while. I know we'd talked about going to the Thai restaurant tonight, but that was before all this. For one thing, I'm too bruised to leave the village until my chin clears up."

Ben stood up too. "What am I hearing, Dickon? Are you saying 'no', or 'not yet'?"

Dickon looked at Ben. He could see Ben was near tears. "I think, Ben, I'm saying 'not yet'." Dickon sighed. "I never expected to get this close to some one again, not in such a whirlwind way."

"Whirlwind?"

"Seems like it to me." Dickon frowned at the table. "You offer something too overwhelming for me to decide in a hurry. It'd be easier, if you were a one-night stand, or a one-week fling. You aren't. Be patient with me, Ben."

"You sure you'll be all right, by yourself?"

"Yes. I'm sore, but I can manage. I'll see you in a couple of days. Thanks again, Ben." Ben reached out to hug Dickon. Dickon hesitated. Then he accepted Ben's hug. Ben could feel the distance between them. He mentally cursed Vanna for the scars she had left in her wake.

### Down River Drive

Dickon had needed a ride to Las Tumbas when Ben was going that way. Dickon suggested stopping at the State Park for a rest. The road into the park soon brought them into a pocket of fog. Ben crept forward until he found the parking lot. There were no other cars there. They got out into the muffled world of fog among the redwoods.

"We've never shared much about ourselves, Ben," Dickon said.

"No, we haven't. Where should we start?"

"How about where all queens start, with 'How I Came Out'?"

"You are so right, Dickon. Poor straight people, they miss out on so much, never having a closet to burst out of."

"Do you want to go first, Ben?"

"Okay. My story's nothing unusual," Ben began. "I grew up in Colorado, on a farm, went to church and school like all the other kids. I knew I was different from the first day of school, of course."'

"You already knew you were gay?"

"No, just that I was different. I could read. Nobody else in my class could. Nobody else really wanted to." Ben sighed. Then he grinned wryly. His round face and gray eyes lit up. "I was lucky in my parents. They weren't bothered about a son who liked to read, like some of the farmers around."

Ben sat down on a bench beside a picnic table. He got up again immediately. The fog had left wetness on the silvery wood. "I learned early to love the countryside, the regular march of the seasons, and the majesty of the Rocky Mountains just to the west of town. I never got very fond of farming. Too much work."

"Did that disappoint your parents?"

"Not too much. My younger brother, Hardin, loved the farm. They thought it was a good split. I could probably make a career at something, maybe even go to college, and he could take over the farm. It could only support one family, anyway. Early on I discovered listening to symphonic music over the airwaves from Denver." He laughed softly. "My family didn't mind, as long as I kept the volume down. Radios didn't have earphones in those days. Saturdays, though, when I wanted to listen to opera, they all insisted I stay out of the house to do it. I spent a lot of time on the tractor on Saturdays, to listen to the Texaco broadcasts." He shook his head. "I didn't listen to much opera during the winter." He went on. "There were girls around in junior high and high school. I had a reputation for being shy. Mostly I just wasn't interested. I had a date, of course, for the senior prom. Where I lived, going to the prom was as mandatory as death." He coughed. "Doesn't all this bore you?"

"No," Dickon said. "It fascinates me, because it's about you."

"Well, I took the girl home early. Enna Pinch was her name. Her family lived at the third farm west of town. She was only a junior, and nice enough. I didn't even kiss her goodnight. I didn't know I was supposed to." Ben looked at Dickon, gray eye to green eye. "This was a traditional night, I found out from Hardin, for girls and guys to lose their virginity."

"Did Ms. Pinch ever forgive you?"

"Oh, yes. She married my brother Hardin. He took her to the prom the next year, when they were both seniors."

"Did he take her virginity on the traditional night?"

"I never asked and they never said."

"You still haven't said how you came out."

"I'm getting to it," Ben said. "You're right; it isn't easy to talk about myself to you."

"Okay, I get that. Same back at you."

"I went 'away' to college, to the State University, forty miles away. It was a different universe than I grew up in. I hadn't formed any clear idea, yet, of what I wanted to be when I grew up. Most anything sounded good if it didn't include pitching manure or trolling tractors around a field."

"I wish we had some coffee, or tea, or something," Dickon said. "I'm feeling the cold and damp."

"Sorry, I don't have a teapot in the car."

"Go on. Tell me more."

"I didn't date much in college. I wasn't interested. I told myself it was because I had to work to pay my way, as well as work to get the grades, but the truth was, I just wasn't interested in chasing around with women. I got more pleasure out of reading an extra book or doing an extra assignment."

"Let's get in the car," Dickon suggested. "It will be warmer than this foggy picnic ground."

"Okay," Ben said.

Once they were in the car, Ben was silent for a long while. He stared at the dashboard. Dickon thought to prompt him two or three times, and held back. Something in the set of Ben's shoulders said let him work his own way back into the conversation.

"My junior year was rough," Ben said. "First off, I had to select a major. I sort of tossed a coin, and it came up philosophy." His voice hoarsened. "Then," he choked a little, "then," he began again, "about a month into the semester, my folks died in a car crash."

"Oh," Dickon said. He waited; after all these years, Ben didn't need murmured words of compassion.

"My faculty advisor was Professor John Dilbert Doe. He started out helping me cope with my parents' deaths." Ben stared out the windshield into the fog. A tender smile played on his lips.

"We called him `Dill'," he said, "Dill Doe." His smile broadened. He looked at Dickon. "Dill looked into me and recognized right away that I was born to be gay. By the end of my junior year he had taught me not only what Kant could do, but what I was as a sexual human being."

"You had sex with him?"

"Yes. He taught me a lot about giving a man pleasure and getting pleasure from a man. He also introduced me to gay life, such as it was, in that small university."

"You could have ruined him."

"Why would I? He gave me a great gift. I could have stumbled around for years before I learned who I was."

"I get that. I did stumble around for years."

"Coming out wasn't as easy for you, was it?"

"A lot of it was hell." Dickon was silent. "Can we go on to Pueblo Rio?" Ben raised an eyebrow. "I'll tell you about it, but I need to work up to it a little. Not because I'm ashamed of anything, but because it hurts, a lot, still."

Ben carefully drove down out of the State Park. He kept silence to give Dickon space. The sun was higher, and the dazzle and black of its light through the redwoods less startling to the eye. Ben made a mental note to try to be home before the afternoon sun created problems driving the River Road.

It was lunchtime when they got to Pueblo Rio. Both Ben and Dickon were hungry. "Hamburgers or a big meal?" Dickon asked.

"Either," Ben said. "Any suggestions?"

"Well, we could have both, you know. About a mile farther on there's a side road. It goes to a small town called Nueces del Rio. Its one claim to fame is Boogie Man Burgers. They've got a dinner-plate sized hamburger, with fries, and a little salad. It's cheap, good, and a lot of food."

"We wouldn't have to cook much tonight, then?"

"No."

"Where's the turnoff?"

"About a quarter mile ahead." Ben found the turnoff and took it. The narrow road went for a mile up an equally narrow canyon. The canyon opened out into a small valley. Houses stood at scattered intervals along three parallel streets, each about two blocks long. Ben pulled up to the Boogie Man Burgers restaurant. It was the only restaurant in town. They got out of the car and went into Boogie Man Burgers. The waitress' nametag identified her as Flo Withette. Dickon knew her.

"Hi, Flo, how's everything with you?"

"Fine, Pastor Shayne. Haven't seen you since the possums woke up. Where you been?"

"I live in San Danson village, now. I'm pretty much retired."

"Shoo, you're too young to retire. What can I get you?"

"Two Boogie Man's Woogie Specials, one for me, and one for my friend. Everything on them."

"Comin' up." Flo went to hand in their orders.

"Flo was active in a little church in Wine County where I used to guest preach," Dickon explained when she had gone to hand in their order. "She was regular as the tide about coming to church. A very gracious human being, Flo."

In a very short time, Flo returned with two enormous hamburgers. They did equal the size of the dinner plates under them. A substantial mound of fries and ketchup and a generous salad, dressed with mayonnaise, accompanied them on another, smaller, plate. Ben's eyes boggled at the amount of food in front of him.

"I'll probably skip breakfast tomorrow, too," he said. Dickon grinned. They fell to and soon demolished the hamburgers, the crisp fries, and the salad. Dickon paid the bill, leaving a generous tip for Flo.

"So much food makes me almost sleepy," Ben said. "I should walk around a little bit before I try to drive very far."

"There's a park on the other side of town. We can watch the squirrels, or walk around the paths, whatever suits us. And I'll tell you about my coming out." Ben looked sidelong at Dickon's face. The elfin shape of his ear struck Ben anew. Something fey, almost puckish, about it. Ben wondered if the shape of Dickon's ears connected genetically to a predisposition to go wild at whiles.

"I knew, from childhood, I was different. How many stories start out that way?"

"Yeah. Even some straight ones."

"Right. We're all aliens, maybe, in some way or another. I knew from about five that my difference was dangerous to talk about. I once tried to explain it to my father. I horrified him."

"Was he a preacher, too?"

"No. Just real religious. Didn't go to church much, but read the Bible a lot. Didn't often understand what he'd read, either."

"I kept my fascination with the male of the species well hidden. I had asthma as a kid, so I didn't have to do a lot of sports and gym. My disease 'explained' a lot of differences. I was sorry when it disappeared as I grew older." Dickon looked at Ben. His green eyes were pools of sadness. Ben wanted to hug him, right there in front of God and the squirrels. His ingrained restraint prevented him.

"It wasn't until high school that I made any sexual contact with anybody. Everybody had to show up for all the football games. We got an unexplained absence mark on our records if we didn't. Unless we had a signed note from the Doctor, of course. He was a big football fan, and couldn't understand why anybody wouldn't want to go." Dickon put his hands behind his back and clasped them. He bent forward and gazed up at an oak tree shedding its leaves. A squirrel chattered at him angrily.

"I met Larry Ott and Benny Fitz my senior year of high school. We fooled around under the bleachers during the games."

"Fooled around?"

"Fondled each other. Jacked each other off. That's as wild as we got. I graduated, went to college, and never heard from either of them again."

"Then what?"

"While I was in my first year of college, in engineering, I 'received the call' as we say in Presbyterian circles. I woke up one night, convinced I should enter the clergy. I switched my major to English, and prepared myself for Seminary."

"All this time you didn't have any boyfriends?"

"No, nor girlfriends, either. It was easy to waste myself on celibacy and religion. That way I didn't have to explore my fantasies about guys in tight jeans with big cocks. Religion teaches the unwary mind to thoroughly compartmentalize." Dickon unclasped his hands and brought them around in front of himself. He massaged his left hand with the long sensitive fingers of the right hand.

"I prayed a lot, of course, about it all. Kept bugging God to make me straight. Same thing in Seminary. Then I met Vanna. She seemed like a perfect choice for a preacher's wife. Love didn't enter into it, of course. Not on her part., and not on mine. I did fall in love with her, eventually. In some small way maybe I still love her." Dickon looked up at Ben. "I'm a fool that way," he said. Ben didn't know what to say, so he said nothing.

"We were married almost ten years," Dickon said. "A lot of the time I was miserable, and didn't know why. Even after Vanna dumped me, I didn't let myself go exploring. Not until Dr. Sicknell."

"Dr. Sicknell?"

"Dr. Sicknell. The Presbytery sent me to her for grief counseling. The damned old harridan ripped my closet open and told me the church should lock me up for being homosexual. This was in the seventies, of course. A lot of therapists thought that way. She was more of a bitch than most about it. Probably a frustrated dyke."

"Probably," Ben said. "Dangerous breed, frustrated dykes."

"Well, she pulled the closet door open, but I shut it again as fast as I could; only it wouldn't really stay shut. I couldn't lie to myself anymore. I was wired for guys, not women." Dickon smiled ruefully. "That complicated my feelings and dealings with the church, of course."

"I can imagine. Churches are mostly narrow." Ben started to reach out to touch Dickon in sympathy. He sensed armor around Dickon, something he'd never sensed before. He let his hand drop. Now was not the time for touch.

"Not all of them, not these days. It was worse, then. Vin Decatur brought me out, finally. An unwitting gift from Vanna, I later found out."

"A gift? From Vanna?"

"Unwitting, as I said. I was an assistant chaplain at City College, part time. Vanna found out, and it infuriated her. She recruited Vin to embroil me in some kind of scandal. It worked out Vin was my first serious lover."

"What happened to him?"

"Vin was a hustler, pure and simple. I didn't realize it, until Father Roman Hands, my boss, showed me an article about Vin's latest arrest. For soliciting a policeman. I can't prove it, but I suspect Vanna set the whole thing up." Ben was startled to see a tear in the corner of Dickon's eye.

"He went to prison, down at La Lechuga. He didn't last long. Somebody stuck a knife in him. He had time to write me a letter, before he died. I never got the chance to thank him for what he did for me. Kind of like what your Professor Dill Doe did for you."

They had circled the track in the park, and come back at the car.

"So that's my big tale," Dickon said. "At times I've considered it a crucifixion with a happy resurrection ending."

"Religious to the end, Dickon?"

"In some ways, Ben."

"Let's go home, Dickon. It's time. The human soul can only take in so much confession at once." They got in the car, and drove in companionable silence down river to San Danson Station.

### Ben Breaks

After Dickon left, Ben could hear the silence walk in and sit right down like an elephant. Without quite realizing it, he strained to hear Len's footsteps in another room. He shook himself, went to the living room, and sat in Butter's chair. She leaped up in his lap and settled down for a nap. He let himself drift.

He began recalling his life with Len, the high moments, like the time Len first asked him out, the time they spent in Egypt, the time they spent in China. He smiled to himself as he remembered Len caught in an upper bunk that folded up on his tall body, thus trapping him against the ceiling of their cruiser cabin in Alaska. Ben had found the whole thing so funny he laughed for several minutes before he could muster the strength to help the by-then also laughing Len unwind himself from the tangled bed and bedclothes.

The elephantine silence overwhelmed him again. Only Butter's very soft breathing stirred in the room. Loneliness oppressed Ben. The loneliness he had run from crashed in on him. Not even the warm sleeping dog on his lap could fend it off. Tears that had stood unshed in his eyes for months spilled out and ran down his cheeks. Ben did nothing to squelch them. He let himself experience the absolute aloneness everyone must endure at times going through life.

Butter, still on his lap, raised her head and looked at him. With that wisdom dogs have, she put her head down and slept again. Ben began stroking her back as if his life were at stake. It was at stake. He yearned to run from the void that gaped within him, that empty place that needed some other to fill him. How he had hoped Dickon was the one! How had he missed noticing how much he had hoped Dickon would open to him?

Suddenly he pushed Butter off his lap. Ben needed to move, to walk, or run. Fury with Dickon was rising in him. Anger at the way life had robbed him of so much by taking Len from him stirred him. His round face contorted with his anger and distress. Anyone watching him would have seen childlike hurt settle over his frown-wrinkled face. His tears had stopped, for the moment at least. He determined to walk off his frustration. He got Butter's leash, snapped it on her collar, and took her out to walk, not toward Dickon's end of the village, but toward the creek that flowed across the sand.

Emma waved to him as he went by her place, but he didn't see her. She looked after him, concerned, for Ben was generally very affable. "Private trouble," she thought, and let it go. Ben continued down past the tantalizing smells coming from the Four Rosas Café, past the distant noise of traffic on the highway to the path onto the beach. He slowed his pace, lest he slide on the gravel and fall. Butter, still tuned to his moods, didn't pull at the leash as she so often did when he slowed. Ben turned southeast, toward the creek, plowing through the sand, wearing the anger out of his system with the force of his pace.

At the creek, Ben turned to walk upstream along it. He hadn't come this way before, always preferring the open beach to the dark redwoods. Today the redwoods suited his mood better. And, he admitted to himself, made it very unlikely he'd run into Dickon on the beach. Looking carefully each way, Ben led a nervous Butter across the highway. A little way beyond the highway, he found a stump and sat down to lean against it. Butter sat at his side.

Martyr's Creek was at its autumnal low. The shrubs along its banks were yellowing with leaves primed to fall. Some aquatic creature splashed softly, apparently disturbed at Ben's or Butter's nearness. The weighty stillness redwoods generate bore down on Ben.

"Butter," he said to her, "I don't know why I keep on going." She leaned into him, and turned to lick his ear. He smiled at her, and stroked her side. "I miss Len," he went on. "I know you didn't know him, but he'd have loved you, too, as much as I do. He gave out more doggy treats, too."

Butter listened to the rumble of Ben's voice. Her canine intuition told her he was in a delicate state, and that she could only reassure him with her presence. She waited for him to stroke her side again.

"You see, Butter," Ben said, "guys like me need some other guy to be with. It doesn't have to be about sex, that's not so important. A guy can buy that, if he's got the need. It's about being with someone, and that someone being with me. I always thought I was so independent, until I met Len." Ben leaned toward Butter, resting his chin softly on her back.

"You see, Butter, I'm not made to be alone. Oh, I need my quiet time to myself, just like you do. But I need to matter to somebody who matters to me." Ben lifted his head and stared out at the woodland. "I'd hoped Dickon and I could be that for each other." Ben muffled a sob that welled up from some raw place in him. Then he let it go. Only Butter was here to hear his hurt, so again he wept. As his tears flowed, Butter licked them from his face, her cold nose and warm tongue teasing his cheeks.

They sat there for a time Ben never measured. He let his tears wash the hurt and fear and anger from his psyche as long as they needed to flow. Butter stayed with him, pouring comfort through her skin and tongue to this person who was her center.

The sun was slanting in low under the trees, brightening the redwoods with warm afternoon light when Ben and Butter got up and started back toward home and supper. A light wind sprang up as they crossed the road and approached the beach. It had fog on its breath, and hinted at winter to come.

### Strange Awakening

Ben opened his eyes. He was lying on gravel next to a concrete curb. Shakily he pushed himself into a sitting position and stared ahead of him. A distorted face stared back at him from stainless steel. He wondered whose advertising logo he was looking at. The face was oval, with blood trickling down one cheek. The eyes slowly blinked at Ben before he realized he was looking at a reflection of his own face. A horn blasted in his ear. Ben turned to his left to see a car bearing down on him. He scooted himself up on the curb between two stainless steel objects, banging his head on the black hoses hanging on their sides. The car pulled up to a stop beside the curb. DiConti Sharif got out.

"Mr. Soul," he said anxiously. "Why were you crawling on the gravel?"

"I don't know," Ben said. "I just woke up, and there I was."

"You're hurt," DiConti said. "Give me your hand. I'll help you get up and get into the Café."

"Where am I?"

"At the gas station in San Danson." Ben looked wonderingly around. The stainless steel that distorted his reflection was a gas pump. He was still confused, but at least some things were falling in place. "Take my hand," DiConti said again. Ben took the hand, feeling the young strength in the deputy's warm brown hand flow into his own weathered white one. Using his other hand to brace himself against one of the gas pumps, he levered himself up until he could lean against the other pump.

"Thanks," he said. He put a careful hand to his head, and then took it away. He stared at the blood on his hand.

"How did I get hurt?" he asked DiConti.

"I don't know sir. You were already down when I drove up." Ben swayed. DiConti put an arm around him to steady him. Quite irrelevantly, Ben's libido danced a mental jig. His vision blurred, suddenly, and then cleared.

"Do you know why you are at the Station?" DiConti asked.

"I think I was on the way to get my mail," Ben said. "Then I was going to the store, to get something for me and Butter to eat."

"You have endured a nasty blow to your head. How did you come by that?"

"I have no idea."

"Can you walk?"

"I think so. Slowly."

"Put your arm around my shoulder," DiConti said, "and I'll support you at your waist." Ben's libido leaped again. "We'll head for the Café. One step at a time. Okay?"

"Yes," Ben said, his breath short in his throat. Ben didn't know whether he was closer to shock, or to arousal. The sharp scent of DiConti's cologne tingled in his nostrils. Remembering it afterward, Ben thought of that walk as one of the longest he had ever taken. DiConti assured him it was less than two or three minutes, since they weren't far from the Café door. Harry Pitts greeted them at the door, and helped DiConti get Ben to a seat in a booth. Then Harry went for tea while DiConti examined Ben.

Rosa rushed out from the kitchen with a basin of warm water and paper towels. "Here," she said to DiConti, "this will help clean him up." DiConti took a paper towel, dipped it in the warm water, and gently dabbed away the blood on Ben's temple.

"Maybe you scraped your head on the gravel when you fell," he said. "It doesn't look like a direct blow." Patiently DiConti continued washing away the blood and grit in the wound.

"I was just on my way to the post office," Ben said, "and the store."

"Yes, I understand." DiConti finished washing the wound. Rosa handed him a tube of antiseptic ointment, which he carefully applied. "Sit here a while," he said. "I'll go see what I can find at the pumps." Harry brought Ben tea. Rosa hovered over him a moment, decided he would survive, and returned to her kitchen.

"I'll get your mail, if you want," Harry said.

"Thanks," Ben said. He leaned back in the booth and closed his eyes. He had not yet recovered his sense of being in the world. He may have dozed, or even drifted into a transcendental state to escape the stinging pain on his temple. He woke with a start when he heard the Café door bang behind Harry, who was coming back with his mail. Ben looked at his face in the shimmering surface of his cup of tea. He looked at once hollow and gaunt, and moon-faced with too fat cheeks. His reflection fascinated him. He almost forgot to thank Harry for getting his mail. Ben forced himself back to his current reality.

His mail was primarily advertisements for cell phones, credit card applications, and mortgage lenders. He shuffled the clutter to the side. One envelope from his attorney, John Diss, looked important. He opened it.

_Mr. Benjamin Dover Soul  
San Danson village  
September 17, 2003_

_Dear Mr. Soul:_

_This is to inform you I have obtained a restraining order against one, Vanna Dee, requiring her to remain one thousand feet from you at all times. I also wish to inform you Ms. Dee has obtained a similar order against you and your dog, Butter, requiring you to stay at least one thousand feet from her at all times. Please be careful to maintain this distance, as you will be subject to fine and/or incarceration should you contravene the terms of the order._

_Yours sincerely,_

_John Diss  
Attorney at Law_

Ben smiled grimly. He could imagine the field day two attorneys would have determining which of them had broken the law if he and Vanna got too close to each other. DiConti returned to the Café. He had a palm-sized stone in his hand. He sat down across from Ben.

"You are the victim of an unfortunate accident," he said, "as I piece the evidence together." He carefully laid the stone on the table. It looked like blood and dirt covered its rough surface. "You can see here," DiConti went on, "that blood and skin particles adhere to this stone. They are probably yours." DiConti turned the stone over, carefully holding it with his fingertips, so that he did not destroy the evidence he had just shown Ben.

The other side of the stone was smooth, and a black smudge scarred one edge. "I think this is tire residue," DiConti said, pointing to the black with his free hand. "I think what happened is this. A passing car struck this stone a glancing blow. That flipped it at you at just the wrong moment. Fortunately, it grazed you, instead of striking you directly. It stunned you, and you dropped down beside the gas pumps."

Ben shook his head, very gently. "It's not safe to walk, some days, I guess."

"Freak things happen," DiConti said. "Do you feel okay?"

"Yes, except for my sore temple," Ben said. "I think I should do my grocery shopping, and then go home and rest."

Rosa came out of the kitchen. "I've got some beef stew left from last night. There's enough for you and Butter to share tonight. On the house." She put a Styrofoam clamshell in front of him. "Do your shopping tomorrow," she said. "Rest this afternoon. Harry, walk Ben home, will you?"

"Yes," Harry said. "Come along, Ben. We'll do it slow and easy." Harry picked up Ben's mail and the clamshell. He helped Ben slide out of the booth and rise. He took Ben's elbow in his free hand to steady him.

"I'm okay," Ben said, pulling his elbow from Harry's grasp.

"You sure?"

"Yes. Let's go, Harry. Thanks, DiConti, for helping me, and explaining what happened."

"My job, Mr. Soul. Take care; get medical attention if you have dizzy spells, or any other bad symptoms."

"Will do." Harry and Ben set out for Ben's cottage. True to form, Harry said nothing until he was taking his leave of Ben at the cottage door.

"Want Dr. Field to come by, later?" he asked Ben.

"Not necessary, Harry. Thanks."

"Sleep in Jesus' arms, then." Harry's religious phrase startled Ben. He knew Harry was a pious man, but Harry seldom spoke his religion to Ben.

"Inshallah," Ben said. Harry nodded, and turned back to the Station. Ben went in, gave Butter a share of the stew, and put his portion in the refrigerator. Then he sat in his and Butter's favorite chair. She jumped into his lap, whined softly, and they both settled down for a nap.

### A Knock on the Door

Twilight pooled under the chairs and in the corners of the cottage. Butter adjusted herself on Ben's lap. Neither woke. The twilight began a slow advance from the corner shadows toward the room's center. Someone knocked. Butter launched herself, barking, from Ben's lap. Ben, startled from his grogginess, got up to answer the door. He tried to quiet excited Butter as he opened it. He could just make out Dickon's face in the fading daylight.

"Oh, hi," he said. "Come on in." He opened the screen.

"I just heard," Dickon said as he entered, "that you've had a nasty crack on the head."

"A passing car flipped a stone at me; at least that's what DiConti thought." Ben indicated a chair for Dickon. "Just grazed my temple and knocked me out for a moment."

"Let's see," Dickon said as he switched on the Kokopelli shaped lamp by Ben's chair. He tenderly touched the sore temple. "You'll have a nasty bruise in the morning," he said. His examining touch was almost a caress on Ben's face. "Did you see the car?"

"Not the one that flipped the stone, not for sure. I remember DiConti's sheriff's car. DiConti pulled up just as I was coming to." Ben wrinkled his face in thought. "There was another car on the road, before that, a red sports car of some kind. Maybe that's the one that flipped the rock at me."

"Vanna drives a red Jaguar," Dickon said, "and the Coastal Commission is meeting on the mountain behind the village this afternoon. Something about murrelet habitat." Dickon glared at the room. "I'll bet that flying rock was no accident," he said. "I'll bet Vanna threw that at you on her way to her meeting."

"Now, Dickon," Ben said, we've no way to prove such a thing."

Ben sat in his chair. Dickon took the chair across the room. "It's the vicious kind of thing she'd do," Dickon continued. "I can suspect her of anything."

"She sure hurt you, I can tell."

"Yes." A long silence stretched between them. Dickon stared at a small seascape on the wall across from him. Ben, at right angles to him, stared at the darkening window obscured with shrubbery. The soft light of the lamp built a pool of bright yellow against the darkness. The shadow of Kokopelli danced in it. Nothing rippled the silence, yet it was not oppressive. Dickon shook himself gently and broke it. "Yes, she did, but she won't go on hurting me. I've decided." Dickon stared at his hands. Butter came to his feet, turned around three times, and lay down.

Ben waited for Dickon to explain. Dickon took a deep breath, began to speak, but then frowned, puzzled at how to say what he wanted to say. Ben waited, not daring to breathe heavily, for fear of disturbing Dickon's concentration. "I don't know how to say what I want to say," Dickon finally said in a strangled voice.

"Just say it," Ben said. "You don't have to be eloquent."

Dickon shrugged some emotional weight off his shoulders, and took a deep breath again. "I've been thinking, examining myself, ever since I left here the other day. I've had to admit to myself I haven't let go of Vanna, even after all these years. I've been nursing the hurt, twisting the thorn in my flesh. Apologies to St. Paul; that makes me sound quite the drama queen." Dickon smiled a rueful smile. Ben smiled back.

"We're all queens in our own dramas," Ben said, and cursed himself for a platitudinous fool.

"I'd like another chance with you," Dickon said, and looked up into Ben's face. Under the manly lineaments of Dickon's face Ben saw the frightened boy taking a big, daring step.

"You've got it," Ben said. They both sat awkwardly, waiting for the other to move.

"What now?" Dickon said.

"Either I come over there, or you come over here," Ben said. "Or we can have a cup of tea and talk."

"Or we can get right to the sex." They both laughed.

"That will come in its own time," Ben acknowledged. "Maybe pretty soon." They both stood, and moved toward each other for a long kiss. Butter thumped her tail on the carpet as Dickon stepped over her, knowing something right had just happened. When they loosed their embrace, Ben smiled at Dickon.

"How about some tea? I've got some of Rosa's beef stew I can share."

"Well, I haven't eaten," Dickon said. "Tea's the proper beverage, of course, for every occasion."

"Well, most," Ben said, moving toward the kitchen. Butter, of course, followed him. She preferred the kitchen to all other rooms in the house. Ben switched on the kitchen light and put on the kettle. When he took out the stew, he realized he had been quite generous with Butter, and what remained wouldn't feed two hungry men very fully. Ben put the kettle on, glanced through his bare refrigerator. Then he thought of cans he had in his cupboard. Quickly he crossed, opened the cupboard door, and took down a can of pork and beans and a jar of sauerkraut. These he apportioned, with the stew, onto two plates, which he heated serially, Dickon's first, and then his. Dickon got out a fork and a spoon for each of them. The kettle boiled, and Ben made tea.

"Don't have anything for dessert," Ben said, as he sat down opposite Dickon. "Sorry the meal's not fancier."

"I haven't had pork 'n beans with sauerkraut since I was a kid," Dickon said. "It was a lunchtime favorite in our house."

"I haven't had it for years, either," Ben said. They began to eat. Neither spoke until they had finished their meal. Ben suggested they take their tea into the front room.

Dickon stared into the brown liquid in his cup. Ben wondered if there were stray tealeaves for Dickon to read. Or, was it the bubbles? Some people believed they also predicted the future.

"Ben," Dickon said, "please understand. I'm groping my way forward."

"Grope me, Dickon," Ben smiled.

"Puns aside," Dickon went on, with a wry twist to his mouth, "I don't know if I know how to be part of a partnership. Somehow, you matter very much to me, and I don't want to blow it. The relationship that is," he said, grinning.

"Now who's punning?" Ben considered. "We have to work things out step by step," he said. "Tell me if I'm going too fast for you, or too slow. I'll tell you, too."

"What if we aren't ready to go at the same speed?"

"Like I said, we'll have to work it out, step by step. I remember reading once, a quote: 'We meet. If we get together, great; if we don't, sometimes things just happen that way.' I don't think you can do more than ten or fifteen percent of making relationships happen; the rest of them just have to evolve."

"You seem pretty sure of yourself."

"I'm groping too."

"You had a long, good relationship, with Len."

"It was good. It was long. It wasn't perfect. And, it changed over the years as we changed. Len taught me to listen, and to express my side. He blessed me with that, among other things."

"I haven't been very good at relationships," Dickon said.

"You mean Vanna?"

"For one. You can see how bad that was. She twists and torments everything, somehow." Dickon sighed. "Then there was Vin. I thought I was so in love with him. Then Vanna used him to turn the church against me. That's another love affair gone sour."

"Vin?"

"And the church."

"And the church? I'm sorry, I don't understand, Dickon."

"Vin testified against me at the Presbytery Commission that recommended my expulsion. Vanna put him up to it."

"Oh." Ben searched for words.

"I'm not sure I'm a good risk for a partner, Ben."

"I'll take my chances. It's always a matter of taking chances. It'd be worse if I'd never taken a chance."

"I think I can fall in love with you, if I can get over being afraid."

"One small step after the other. Do you want more tea?"

"Yes, another cup." Ben went to put the kettle on. Dickon followed him, and, when he had set the kettle on the stove, put his arms around him and held him close. Ben turned and kissed Dickon's cheek. Dickon nuzzled Ben's ear.

"Still want tea?" Ben asked.

"Later, maybe." Ben turned off the stove, and moved slowly, Dickon's arm wound around his waist, toward the bedroom. Butter bounded before them. They began to explore each other's body in intimate ways. Butter wanted to participate. Eventually Ben put Butter out of the bedroom and closed the door. Butter whined accompaniment to Ben and Dickon's exploration of each other.

When they were through, they opened the door and went to the kitchen for their delayed tea. The night was cooling, rapidly, so they put on robes (Ben had a spare in the closet) and talked, mostly with their eyes and touches, while they drank the tea.

"Stay the night?" Ben asked.

"Yes," Dickon said. In due course Ben and Dickon finished their tea, and went to bed. This time Butter slept on the outside edge of the bed, as there was no space between Ben and Dickon.

### The Lost Resort

"What kind of place is this resort?" Ben asked as he drove up the river toward Pueblo Rio. He carefully kept his gray eyes alert for traffic from the frequent shops and bistros that were scattered along the river road like mushrooms in a forest glade.

"It's a men's resort," Dickon said. "It has a bar, and restaurant, and a swimming pool. And rooms, of course. An old acquaintance of mine, Harry Kerry, runs it for the owner."

"Should we have made reservations?"

"Not in mid-week in October," Dickon said. "They've usually got rooms to let this time of year. Out of season for the City guys."

Pueblo Rio was a small town, wedged between the mountains and the river. It was about a mile long, and four blocks wide. The Lost Resort lay near the middle of the town's mile, hard against the mountains. It was in a little cul-de-sac nature had carved out of the mountain's toes. Great redwoods, second growth, but awesome in their height and girth, framed the gouge in the mountain. A brash neon sign identified it as "The Lost Resort."

The resort's buildings were modest plywood roofed with inexpensive composition. Lavender and purple paint, with white trim covered every surface. Flowers rioted around a fountain at the gate. Ben could see the cement scars of repairs underway on the fountain. No water danced in it.

The office was in a small kiosk-like area attached to the restaurant on the left. To the right the pool area and a hot tub filled the center. A building at the inner edge of the pool area advertised various beers in neon. A row of doors stretched from the restaurant around the left side, across the back, and up the right side of the square the resort formed. Dickon opened the door of the office and went in. Ben followed him.

A tall man, with a mane of white hair that started in the middle of his head and drifted a third of the way down his back beckoned to them. Ben thought he looked like a wizard in a fantasy movie, except that he was dressed in scuffed jeans and a worn flannel shirt. The shirt was open at the throat half way to the man's navel. Frosted chest hair peeped through the unbuttoned opening.

The man peered at Dickon. "Well, boy," he roared, as though they were a half mile away from him, "it's about time old Harry's black eyes saw your green ones. Where have you been keeping yourself? Down on the coast, in that dead little village of yours?"

"Something like that, Harry," Dickon said. "I've been busy enough. Haven't been much of anywhere or seen much of anyone for some months."

"Not around here, that's for sure. You keeping well? Fall in love yet? Tell old Harry."

"Harry, meet Ben. Ben, meet Harry."

Harry grabbed Ben's hand in both of his. The frail and knobby fingers crushed Ben's stubbier hand. Ben's joints re-arranged their calcium under the pressure. Ben winced.

"I've got some love potion number nine," Harry roared. Ben wondered if Harry were deaf. "Condoms in every room, too."

"Thanks," Ben said, not knowing what else to say. He retrieved his hand from Harry, put it a little behind him at his side, and let it tremble with pain.

"We need a room for tonight," Dickon said.'

"We've got one," Harry said. "Not much going on until Halloween. Be full of bears and cubs this year." He took down a key. "I'll give you number twenty-three. It's upstairs, away from the bar and the pool. Not too many folks around. Some locals come in to get drunk. They can get noisy, sometimes." Harry grinned at Ben. "Have a good tryst, my friend." Harry waved them out. Dickon led Ben toward the back.

"I hope Butter's going to be all right," Ben said. He felt guilty for abandoning her, even though Emma and Notta had promised to look in on her several times, and take her for walks along the beach. Ben hadn't been away from Butter overnight before, except when the vet had spayed her.

The room was rustic. It was clean, but the furniture showed a lot of wear, and the spread on the bed had seen a lot of use. The sheets were fresh, though, when Ben turned the blankets down, and nothing smelled moldy, stale, or unwashed.

Dickon came up behind Ben and put his arms around him. He leaned his head on Ben's shoulder, his long face a contrast to Ben's round one. He murmured in Ben's ear, "Sweet nothings." Ben giggled, and collapsed on the bed, with Dickon on top of him.

"Only two condoms?" Ben remarked. His fall had brought him down with a view of the nightstand.

"We'll run to town and buy dozens more," Dickon said and squeezed Ben's waist. He got up suddenly. Ben rolled over and looked at the serious green eyes.

"We should talk," Dickon said, his voice strained as though he was strangling. "We've been careful so far," Dickon went on. He cleared his throat. "I need to ask, what is your HIV status?"

"Negative," Ben said. "And yours is?"

"Negative," Dickon said. "I think."

"You think?"

"I haven't been tested for a couple of years. I've had one encounter in that time, with protection, but I'm not absolutely sure."

"I haven't been with anybody but Len since before we knew about the plague."

"I should get tested," Dickon said, "before we do anything bareback. Just to be sure."

"I'll get tested with you. That's the best way to do it. It's like the breeders, getting married. They have to pass tests before they can get a license." Ben batted his brown eyes flirtatiously at Dickon "Meanwhile, we've got two condoms to start with."

"Slut," Dickon said, and grinned. "We can drive up to Las Tumbas tomorrow, if you want, before we go home. I know a clinic there. Fully confidential and all."

"It's a date," Ben said. "Now, shall we get some lunch, or shall we play around?"

"Lunch, I think," Dickon said. "Remember my asking you to have dinner at a Thai restaurant, the Thai Hwan Awn?"

"Yes. You touted the food as fiery and sweet all at once."

"Thai cuisine. Anyway, it should be open. It's about two blocks from here. We can stop at a drugstore on the way back." Dickon held out his hand to Ben. Ben admired the long fingers of the hand, and grasped it. Dickon pulled him up into a kiss, and let him go.

"I love you, Ben Dover Soul," he said, "but confess I love my stomach, too. Right now, it's empty and I'd better fill it. Your turn, maybe, later."

"I'll hold you to it," Ben said. He picked up the keys and led Dickon out.

### In the Spirits

The Thai Hwan Awn cafe was not open, neither was the drugstore. Dickon and Ben returned to the Lost Resort. It boasted an outdoor hamburger and hot dog counter, The Bare Buns, back of the bar away from the swimming pool. The fry cook made their burgers to order, offered them a choice between chips and fries, and directed them to the bar for their beverage.

Over their beer and burgers, they chatted about inconsequentials and commented softly on the flesh passing in various scanty swimsuits. Ben relaxed tension he hadn't realized he had. When they had finished their beers and burgers, and reviewed all the man-flesh on display, Ben said, "Well, we could find out where to get an extra condom or two."

"Let's ask Harry at the desk," Dickon said. They went to the office. Dickon put his arm around his waist. Ben stiffened in discomfort, even here in the safety of the ghetto. He was ill at ease with public displays of affection. He and Len had always been circumspect in their demonstrative behavior. Ben willed his body to relax into Dickon's half-embrace.

Harry Kerry was not in the office when they got to it, but they didn't need his advice. A large punchbowl stood on a pedestal just inside the door. It was full of condoms. "Free condoms to keep you plague-free. Take what you need" a sign on the side said. Dickon took out a small handful. "What we don't use," he said, "we'll leave on the dresser for the next guests."

"Okay," Ben said, wondering how much sex Dickon had in mind. Ben fought to keep himself open in mind and spirit, lest his orifices clamp shut. Dickon dropped the condoms into his hip pocket. They made a telltale bulge in his jeans. Ben again reminded himself where he was. The obvious lump in Dickon's pocket would shock no one here.

"Let's get another beer or two," Dickon said. "I'd like to relax a little more. I don't often have a chance to get a little tipsy in a safe place."

"Well," Ben began to temporize, and thought better of it, "does this mean I'm the designated walker?"

"I think we can both stumble to our room, if we're careful not to overdo our imbibing." Two other patrons had taken barstools at the far right end of the bar. They were each engrossed in a video game in front of them, and didn't look up when Dickon and Ben came in. The bartender was about forty and still trim. Crow's feet around his eyes marked his age. Ben and Dickon ordered another beer each, and Dickon paid for the drinks. Ben looked at the television sets, four of them, one in each corner of the room. The sound was muted. A CD deck played show tunes disguised as elevator music. Each television had captions running across the bottom of the screen.

One set displayed the news. Dickon and Ben watched the day's tally of dead and wounded in Iraq crawl across the screen under the solemn face of the newscaster. Dickon sipped at his beer. Ben felt tears in the corner of his eyes. He had begun avoiding the news; there was so much sadness in it.

Dickon ordered up a second round for each of them. The news show had turned to the sporting events, which no one in the bar cared to notice. The other three sets showed the Discovery Channel, a news magazine, and a football game. None of these shows interested the bar patrons, either. Ben felt the beer rising to his head. His tolerance for alcohol was less than he remembered from his days with Len. After a third round, which Ben bought, he said to Dickon, slurring his words, "I think I need to stop drinking for now. My head's spinning. Do you want any more?"

"Maybe later," Dickon said. "Let's go to the room, and lie down. See you later," he commented to the bartender.

They were not to get away so quickly, however. Harry Kerry came in just then. "Dickon!" he roared. Ben decided Harry needed a hearing aid. "Let me buy you and your man a drink. Something with some teeth in it. A double rye and soda for everyone, on the house, Max," he said to the bartender. Max obliged. Ben tried to protest, but Harry couldn't hear him.

Dickon shrugged, and smiled ruefully at Ben. "Please?" Dickon said silently. Ben nodded, took his rye and soda, and followed Dickon and Harry to one of the small tables at the back of the room. Harry began reminiscing about the old days in the City, remembering wild orgies and extravagant love affairs.

"Now don't think, handsome," he said to Ben, "that your sweetie, here, did much carousing. He was always very proper, very well behaved, a real gentleman. I tried to get in his pants many a time, with no luck. When I couldn't make a lover out of him, or even a sex toy, I made a friend out of him." Harry clapped Ben on the back to emphasize his point. Ben flinched. Harry didn't notice. Neither did Dickon.

Harry regaled Dickon and Ben with stories of his salad days on the Street in the City, and before that, in the village in New York and along the beaches in Venice and Santa Monica. Ben worked on his rye and soda, craving oblivion. Harry was more than happy to oblige, by ordering another round, and a third, and a fourth. Ben's head swam; his bladder threatened to burst. At last he mumbled to Dickon, "I think I need to get some sleep."

"In a bit," Dickon said. Harry ordered a fifth round of rye and soda. Bleary-eyed Ben wobbled on his stool, and set to work sipping the drink in front of him. Dickon and Harry seemed unaffected by the alcohol they had consumed. More practice, Ben thought to himself.

His stomach lurched. He slid off his stool, and braced himself against the table. "Need the key, Dickon," he said. "Gotta use the facilities."

"Okay," Dickon said. He extracted the key from his pocket. "Walk easy," he said, and turned back to Harry, whose narrative, a long and complicated tale of an orgy past, flowed on unabated.

Ben made several tries before he was able to unlock the door, climb the stairs, and find their room. The floors and steps refused to stay in one place. He nearly fell several times before he reached the safety of the room. Once in, he went directly to the bathroom. When he had finished and flushed, he bent over, still seated, to start pulling his pants up. He almost passed out. At last he got his clothes pulled up far enough he could stagger to the bed, where he collapsed with his underwear around his thighs and his trousers around his knees. He passed from the world for a time.

### Long Night's Journey into Day

Ben woke before the day broke. His clothes were off him, neatly folded on the chair in the room. Dickon snored softly beside him. Ben's head hurt. His body hurt. He needed to get up and use the bathroom again. He presumed Dickon had stripped him and folded his clothes. Dickon did not stir or wake when Ben flushed the toilet. Ben crawled back in bed and drew the covers up over himself and Dickon. Sleep did not come at once. The light in the room, though dim, was enough to keep Ben awake. The noise around him, wind in the trees, the distant traffic on the highway, Dickon's snoring, conspired with the glow of the neon outside the room to chase his sleep away.

Worry contributed, too. Ben wondered just what he had let himself in for. He'd thought he knew who Dickon was. Tonight had shown him a different Dickon, drunken Dickon, prone to lewd conversation and flirtation. Ben dimly remembered Harry recounting Dickon's extended courtship of a goddess-worshipping Lesbian. Ben's conventional soul was reeling in shock.

He and Dickon had come here to get better acquainted, Ben said to himself. He shouldn't be surprised that it wasn't quite what he had anticipated. He had expected to explore, with all tenderness, deeper physical contact between them, and deeper emotional sharing of their vulnerabilities. In a few hours, now, they would be on their way back to San Danson village. All he had learned about Dickon was Dickon could drink him under the table, and was very much at home with an old roué like Harry.

Ben raised himself up on one elbow to look at the sleeping Dickon in the dim neon light. Was there some sign of character he had missed? Dickon's clear complexion didn't betray a propensity to heavy drinking. There were no broken veins leaving little red tracks on Dickon's aquiline nose. True, he had incipient bags under his eyes, shadowy pouches forming, but Ben knew from frequent glances at those green orbs that the pouches were as recent as the night's debauchery.

Dickon was, after all, in his mid-fifties, from what he had said about himself, but his stomach was still reasonably flat, even at its most relaxed, like now. His legs and buttocks were firm, from frequent walking, and the roll of fat around his waist was small for a man his age. Ben only wished his waistline were as small.

Ben lay back and thought. He had seen Dickon in a wild moment or two, mostly connected with Vanna's behavior. He had not guessed that wildness lurked elsewhere. And yet, what had Dickon done that was so outrageous? Ben knew from long exposure to gay men that flamboyance, flirtation, and rebellious behavior were common. He'd even had an occasional moment himself. Why did Dickon's drunkenness trouble him so?

Dickon rolled over on his side, with his back to Ben. Ben's gray eyes caressed the curve of Dickon's buttocks. Dickon had flung the sheet back, or never drawn it up. He had shed his underwear before getting into bed. Ben fantasized waking Dickon with a sexual invasion. The fantasy stirred him to incipient tumescence.

Then Dickon cried out, a wordless cry that carried terror and sorrow at the same time. He twitched and shook, his breath rasping in his throat, and moaned "No, no, no, no..." Ben touched his shoulder, just to let Dickon know someone was with him. Dickon shuddered with a great sigh, and was still. Ben wondered if Dickon's cry had wakened anyone else. He then decided it could have been mistaken for a cry of passion as likely as for a cry of terror. Ben spooned himself around Dickon and held him. Dickon's breathing calmed, became rhythmic. Ben's breathing began to synchronize with Dickon's, and Ben was soon asleep.

Dickon woke to gray light thinning the neon light in the room. He felt Ben's breath on his neck and a chill in his legs. No covers. He wondered through the fog of his semi-wakening which of them had pushed the covers down. Ben was warm at his back, of course, and Dickon nestled happily into Ben's curve. Dickon could feel Ben's dream-induced arousal and thought about impaling himself on it. He thought of Ben's reticence, and that held him back.

Last night with Harry Kerry had been a blast for much of the evening. When Ben didn't reappear after an hour or so, Dickon realized something was wrong. He'd finally excused himself from Harry's company. Harry was still talking to the table and the empty glasses as Dickon left. When he got to the room, Dickon found Ben soundly either asleep or passed out from the drink. Dickon spoke to him, but Ben didn't answer. His breathing was regular enough, so Dickon decided he just needed to sleep off the booze. Vaguely he remembered Ben mentioning how hard an afternoon's drinking with Emma had hit him.

Ben had been out for years. He surely wasn't a novice to the gay life, even if he'd been part of a couple for as long as he said. Dickon didn't often cut loose like he had this past night, but stodgy pursuits wore thin after many days, and he needed to be a little wild. He had expected Ben to need the wildness as much as he did. Maybe not. Ben seemed to be so much more together than Dickon felt. He didn't have any obvious hang-ups about being gay. Yet he drew back from displaying affection, at least in public. Just when he was getting to know Ben, or thought he was, this whole new side showed up.

Dickon had no objection to monogamy, though he and Ben hadn't really talked about it. After all, neither one of them had much temptation to wander in San Danson village. Maybe they had plunged too quickly into this affair, without talking about limits and expectations enough. Dickon sighed. He really hated talking about affairs, instead of just letting them unfold. He knew, because Carrie Oakey had told him often enough, that his laissez-faire attitude had doomed potential relationships in the past. He sighed. He'd have to figure out some way of talking with Ben about these intimate things. He yawned, and assessed the pressure in his bladder. Yes, it was enough to force him to get up and relieve it.

When he came back to bed, Ben had rolled over on his other side. Dickon got in bed gently and pulled the covers up over them. He drifted off to sleep, waiting for the pre-dawn to turn red and gold with daylight.

Ben woke first. Day was streaming into the room through the small window over the dresser. He blinked his eyes against the intruding light. He could hear the pool boy clanking tins of chemicals. He got up, stretched, and moaned. His last night's alcoholic debauchery fired mortar shells in his head. He hoped Dickon had brought some aspirin. Or, better yet, some Alka Seltzer or Pepto Bismol. His stomach was also at war with itself.

Dickon heard Ben get up. For a moment, he pretended to be asleep, but then decided it was too late in the day to play that game long. He yawned and stretched on the bed.

"Hello, Handsome," he said to Ben. Ben's round face grimaced with a frown. His gray eyes were shot through with red.

"Hello yourself," he grated.

"What time is it?"

Ben bent carefully over the dresser, supporting himself on his hands, to peer at the clock. "Almost ten," he said.

"You kind of disappeared last night."

"I was too drunk to stay up. Besides, you and Harry were reminiscing about a life I never lived. I felt lost." Ben hoped he wasn't sounding to self-pitying. He was angry, he realized, under all the hangover discomfort and queasiness.

"I thought we were including you."

"I think you meant to. I just didn't fit. Like I usually don't fit." Ben pushed himself up from his dresser support and looked at Dickon who had raised himself to one elbow. Dickon's green eyes were red-rimmed. Ben was glad Dickon was suffering, too.

"We need to talk some things out, I suppose," Dickon said. He sighed. "I'm not very good at talking things out." He pushed himself to a sitting position. "I suggest we take a shower and get some breakfast."

"The shower, yes. Breakfast? I don't know. I poisoned myself last night. I should have quit a lot sooner."

"I poisoned myself, too. I can't keep up with the likes of Harry anymore. My head's swimming. You shower first, or me?"

"I'll go first. I'm already on my feet." Ben grinned weakly.

Dickon grinned back. Hope fluttered in him; maybe they could salvage something yet. "Okay," he said. "I'll get used to sitting up."

When they had each showered and dressed, they went downstairs to the Little Boys' Room Restaurant attached to the Lost Resort. The waiter took one look at them, and silently brought them a concoction to drink. It contained egg white, a mildly sweet juice—mango, Ben guessed—with dashes of nutmeg, cayenne pepper, and one or two ingredients they couldn't identify. They sipped it while the chef prepared their omelets. By the time their omelets arrived, their stomachs and heads were ready for food. Dickon tried to get the recipe for the hangover cure from the waiter, but he declined, claiming it was proprietary to the restaurant.

"Let's check out," Dickon said. "We can stop at the State Park up river a few miles. A stroll through the trees could clear our heads. Then we can go on to the clinic in Las Tumbas, if we still want to."

Ben got behind the wheel. The play of sun between the dark redwood trees dappled the road, making driving difficult. At the turnoff to the State Park he slowed. "Maybe it's better if we keep on going, Dickon."

"Okay," Dickon said. "Maybe so."

### In a Dog's Ear

The sun still rode above the sea as Ben and Dickon arrived at San Danson Station. Long afternoon shadows stretched east, waiting to touch the cloaking night. Ben's back-brain was uneasy. He knew he needed to be by himself for a while. Too much had happened in too short a time. Dickon spoke as they drove into the garage area. "Fancy a bit of dinner at the Four Rosas?"

"No," Ben said, "thanks anyway, but I've been away from Butter too long. She needs some one-on-one companionship tonight, I think."

"And you need some space, I think," Dickon said, with a sigh.

Ben thought about equivocating, but said, "Yes, Dickon, I do."

Dickon opened the car door and put one foot on the ground. "I'll open the garage," he said. He looked at Ben. "When should I come around again, or should I?"

"I'm not sure. A few days?"

"Whenever, then," Dickon said, and swung out of the car. Ben wondered if Dickon was angry. Then he decided he didn't care right then. Ben pulled the car into the garage as Dickon loped off. He shut off the engine and sat in the dim building listening to the motor tick as it cooled. When he judged Dickon had had time to collect his mail and start up the path toward the village, he got out, locked the car, and closed the garage door.

Harry had stopped by to let Butter out for a run. He had also made sure she had water and food. He hadn't spent a lot of time being a companion. Butter had been lonely. She went into spasms of barking joy when Ben put his foot on the porch. She pranced around him in circles as he made his way to the treat cupboard for her boss-is-back treat. Ben was surprised at how glad he was to see her. He had missed her very much, indeed. Ben fixed them both a simple supper. Then they went into the living room and sat in their chair. Ben rubbed Butter's back, scratched behind her ears, and stroked her in other ways she delighted in. She snuggled down on his lap and drowsed contentedly. Her world was good, and, for a change, she enjoyed having Ben all to herself.

"Oh, Butter," Ben said, "I'm not sure what to do." Butter wisely did not respond. Ben kept on rubbing her soothingly. "Dickon showed parts of himself I hadn't suspected existed," Ben went on. Butter kept her ears pricked up, listening. She knew Ben was distressed.

"I was careless," Ben said into the air above Butter's ears. "I let myself get involved without finding out enough." He sighed. "Too long out of the dating game, I guess. Not that I was ever that good at it, or had that much practice." He was quiet for a while. Butter raised her head and looked at him, as if to urge him to get back to the point.

"I didn't guess Dickon was a heavy drinker," he said; "I was sick with all I had to drink." He was quiet for a moment. "It wasn't the boozing that bothered me so much as Dickon spending time with that Harry Kerry on what was supposed to be our romantic getaway." Ben's voice roughened. He laughed without humor. "All those condoms he scored, and we never got around to using even the ones on the dresser. So much for romance."

Butter gently wagged her tail once or twice. Ben stared moodily into the shadows of his room. "I should have known better, Butter," he said. She wagged her tail again when she heard her name. "I should have asked up front about his HIV status. I'm glad we haven't gone too far. Kissing and mutual jack-off don't spread the virus."

Ben frowned at the lurking shadows. "I don't know if I'll try to go on with him." Ben grimaced, and turned up the lamp by his chair. The brighter light chased away the shadows. "I hope no harm done," he said. Weariness sat like a pair of walruses on Ben's shoulders.

"Bed time early tonight," he said to Butter. She followed him when he went to the bedroom. Ben undressed and got into bed and under the covers. "Damn you, Dickon," he said into the darkness. Butter pirouetted three times, before lying down on her own side of the bed. She fell asleep immediately. Ben ran angry feelings through his mind until his exhaustion overcame him.

Dickon sat up late in his cottage, pretending to read.

## Flies Enter the Ointment

### The Little Gate at Lechuga Prison

The great prison gates do not open to let released prisoners out. No, the warden reserves those gates for incoming human detritus only. Released prisoners exit through a small, one person sized gate on the north side. Outside that gate a dirt road leads back to the freeway and freedom.

Haven Fitz had served his time. He stood quietly while the guard inserted a key into the lock and turned it. The lock screeched as the key turned and the tumblers groaned as they fell into place. Maintenance seldom oiled the lock. The hinges on the gate cried out as the guard drew it open just enough to let the released prisoner through. The warden wanted released prisoners to walk away with those sounds in their memories. He believed it had a salutary effect on recidivism. No scientist has ever documented this as truth.

Outside the gate he cast off Haven Fitz to be Haakon Spitz again. He stood a long moment on the dusty roadside looking up at the brassy sun in the bald blue sky. No one would come to pick him up. He didn't know anybody on the outside any more. His former life hadn't lent itself to establishing long-term relationships. The only relationship he had had in prison ended shortly before his release when another con knifed his master, Butch Hurr, in the laundry room.

Haakon shrugged his shoulders inside the cheap blue suit the warden had given him. It fit him poorly, but, slumped as his posture was after twenty years inside, no suit would fit him well. The pallor on his face betrayed his abode for the past two decades; only fish bellies and prisoners ever had that shade of white for complexion.

Haakon sighed. The dust had already marred the polish on his black shoes. Once he tears or fury would have overwhelmed at such a desecration of his footgear, but now it didn't seem to matter. It was like the slow wind whistling through the chain link fence behind him, just something that was. He felt in his jacket pocket for the ticket the warden had given him. It was still there. A one-way ticket from Lechuga to the City. Haakon nodded to himself, took one last look at the lettuce field across the road, and started trudging toward the highway and its bus stop.

At least there was a bench, with a bit of shade from a rough wooden shelter. No schedule posted, though. Haakon sat on the bench, after dusting it off with his hand. The suit wasn't much, but it was all the clothes he had. Aside from the clothes, the warden had provided him, and a snapshot of Butch Hurr as a boy, he had come out of the prison with nothing. His life inside hadn't allowed for collecting a lot of artifacts, and he had no desire to come away with the two books they had allowed him, a Bible and Booth Tarkington's _Penrod_. He stuck his hand in his right pocket. He was surprised to feel something there. Carefully he withdrew the paper to look at it. It was a roll of bills. Haakon was surprised. Maybe the chaplain had put it there.

There was a note folded into the bills. Haakon read the note. "This is money you earned while you were here," the note said. It was signed "Roy L. Payne, Warden." Haakon slowly counted it. It was fifty dollars. Not bad for twenty years.

When the dusty Greyhound came, Haakon got on and presented his ticket. The driver punched it, and motioned toward the back of the bus. Haakon found an empty seat and stared out the window at the fields of vegetables passing by. He was asleep by the time the bus reached the Coastal Range of little mountains that bounded the Lechuga Valley.

The City shocked Haakon. The cars were smaller than he remembered cars being. Strange names on them, too. Foreign names. The sheer numbers of lights and sounds overwhelmed him, even in the insulated quiet and darkness of the bus. The City's buildings twisted and stretched the shape of the hills she occupied.

The bus station had not changed. The same row of hard benches under sheet metal sheds that had always defined it stood in place, more decorated, now, with pigeon dung, perhaps. Twenty more years of pigeons relieving themselves had deepened and enriched the patina of poop that made up the murals and sidewalks of the station. It even smelled the same. Haakon was glad of it all. It brought some small stability to his disoriented self.

Vaguely remembering directions, Haakon left the bus station by its south gate and walked two blocks to a non-descript alley called Prostitute Place. As he remembered, there was a flophouse here, called the Whore's Open Arms. The building was still there, but the name on it said Dot Com House. One glance into the lobby persuaded Haakon he didn't belong in that place. Crystal chandeliers glittered from the ceiling. Marble tiled the floor.

Haakon turned away. Now he noticed the alley was clean. The dumpsters that used to line it were gone. Windows with elegant lettering fronted the alley on both sides. Gentrification had swept away a little bit of Haakon's history. Haakon went to the corner and peered out at the street in both directions. He saw nowhere to go for a night's sleep. A man on the street pushing a grocery cart stopped to watch Haakon. He waited a moment, and then pushed his cart over.

"Just out of the joint?" he said. Haakon turned to him. The man was scruffy, but didn't smell too bad. He must have bathed at least once in the past two weeks.

"How'd you know?"

"Your suit, man. I've got one just like it, in my cart. Spent ten years inside. Came out with the same pasty face you got. Took a couple of years outdoors to get my color back." The man wheezed a little chuckle through his throat.

"I used to bed down at an old hotel in this alley," Haakon said. "It was a cheap place, and the cockroaches were friendly."

"Yeah, I knew it. The Whore's Open Arms we called it. Dotcommers came along, gentrified the whole alley."

Haakon wondered what dotcommers were. Before he could ask, the man said, "If you need a place to bed down for tonight, try the Salvation Army over on Seventh Street." He jerked his thumb in the general direction of that thoroughfare. "A little religion along with your stew, but the stew's good, and the beds are clean."

"Thanks," Haakon said. The man ambled off, whistling a tune Haakon didn't recognize. Haakon went toward Seventh Street.

### Recruited

Haakon Spitz went into the next street where the Salvation Army mission was supposed to be. He found, instead, it was a soup kitchen. Brother Vitus, a small crabbed friar of ancient years with a great hooked nose that almost touched his chin, managed it. Haakon wondered how the poor man ate; his nose appeared to block his mouth. The brother sniffed loudly, and regularly. His rusty black robe was crusty with dust. Small strands of gray hair wandered randomly across his scabbed skull. When he spoke, Haakon heard the cell doors at Lechuga prison screeching shut.

"Come in," grated Brother Vitus. "We feed all sinners here." He gestured with a palsied hand at the steam tables at the right side of the room. "Line up. Lunch soon." There was no line; Haakon took a tray and flatware, put them on the track, and stared at the steaming water in the steam table. Obviously, it was ready to keep food warm, had there been any food to keep warm. Soon other men and a few women began to file in to line up behind Haakon. Brother Vitus greeted each one with his litany about feeding all sinners here.

Haakon's nerves frazzled under the repetition of the grinding phrase and repetitive sniffing. He was about to go when a man in monk's robes brought out a tray of savory smelling meat mixed with carrots and potatoes, put it in the first steam table slot, covered it, and went back through the kitchen doors. He soon emerged with a tray of green stuff that looked a lot like over-cooked broccoli. He went back to the kitchen and came out again with a tray of biscuits. Then he took a plate, put a large spoonful of stew on it, a larger spoonful of the green stuff, and a single biscuit on it. Then he bent his head while a sonorous voice in a far corner of the room boomed out a blessing on the food, the assembled hungry, and the Holy Mother Church. When the Amen's last echo rattled the silverware, the monk behind the counter handed the filled plate to Haakon.

" _Ess in gesundheit,"_ the monk said in a surprising falsetto. He waved Haakon on and began filling the next plate. Haakon took his plate to the table another monk indicated and sat down.

"New here," the sonorous voice stated. Haakon's eardrums quivered under its assault. "Eat first, and then interview with me." When Haakon opened his mouth, the priest presumed he was about to protest. "Part of the rules of the place. The priest on duty interviews newcomers. Today that's me, Father Roman Hands."

"I'm Haakon," Haakon said. The name fell unfamiliarly from his tongue. In prison he'd been called by one or another nickname, or by his cell number.

"Welcome, Haakon. Eat, and then we talk." The priest beamed at him, and moved on to boom at another man. Haakon took up his spoon and ate; no one ate near him. The savory stew meat was un-nameable, but nourishing. The carrots and potatoes were soft all the way through. A bit of tomato might have enhanced the mélange of spices, but the stew was palatable. Haakon choked down the apparent broccoli, carefully setting his mind on other things than its texture. The biscuit was hard, and probably Haakon should have softened in the stew. At least Haakon didn't break any teeth on it.

When he was done, he looked for where to put his dishes. A heavy monastic hand on his shoulder drew his attention; the monk's other hand pointed toward an opening that had appeared in the dining hall wall. Another monk stood there, scraper at the ready, with a rack for dishes beside him. Haakon put his tray on the counter, trusting his dishes to the monk's tender care.

"Where is Father Hands?" he asked the monk behind the counter.

"Office," the man said, and pointed to the right. Haakon turned and went to the right. Near the corner he found a door, half-open. He knocked.

"Come in," Father Hands intoned.

Haakon expected a desk, but there was only a small file cabinet in one corner and wobbly card table in front of a painted-over window. The table groaned as Father Hands leaned on it. His pink and cherubic face framed in a fringe of wondrously light white hair held two piercing blue eyes that bored into Haakon like a dentist's drill.

"How long have you been out?" Father Hands asked him.

"About six hours," he replied.

"Don't have a job yet, I take it?"

"No." Haakon hadn't even thought about jobs; he had never really held one, not with time clocks and regular hours. He'd always free-lanced before going into prison.

"Got much experience?"

"I worked some in the laundry at prison, and in the library for a little while. Mostly, though, I just followed Butch around."

"Butch?"

"My...keeper, I guess you'd say. He didn't like me to be gone for long, so he bribed the guards to keep me with him."

"I see," Father Hands said. Fire sparked in his eyes. "A man must do many things to survive in prison."

"Yes."

"I can offer you a job," Father Hands said, "if you can leave the City."

"I'm not on probation. I've finished my sentence."

"Paid your debt, eh?"

"And then some. I was convicted of looting my own property after the Great Temblor."

"I see."

"What kind of work is it, this job?"

"It's in Las Tumbas. Some sort of surveillance, I believe."

"How much is bus fare there?"

"Your fare is provided for." Father Hands got up and opened the file cabinet with a key he wore on a chain at his waist. He took out a strong box and put it on the table. He sat down and opened it with another key on his chain. He took out a bus voucher, wrote the destination on it, and handed it to Haakon, who hadn't decided yet to go.

"This voucher," Father Hands said, "cannot be redeemed for cash, only for a bus ride."

"Who do I see in Las Tumbas?"

"Ms. Vanna Dee, in the Coastal Commission office. It's only two blocks from the Las Tumbas bus station."

"What if she doesn't want to hire me?"

"She will provide you with a similar voucher to return to the City by bus. Busses run every hour on the half hour from the City, and every hour on the three-quarters hour from Las Tumbas. Good luck." Father Hands waved Haakon out the office door. Haakon went on out of the mission, leaving the relative quiet of chattering diners and clattering dishes for the cacophony of the street traffic. He looked for a clock, and didn't see one, so hurried on to the bus station. He got there with ten minutes to spare before the next bus left for Las Tumbas.

On the bus, Haakon tried to look out the window as the bus traversed the City. Weariness from the unaccustomed activity and stress of new things bore down on him. He fell asleep, and so didn't see the great bridges of the City or the green and gold hills of the counties north of the City. He woke when the bus driver kicked his feet.

"Las Tumbas, buddy. That's all your ticket bought. Got it? Okay, get off." Haakon stumbled sleepily off the bus, quietly feeling his pockets for the fifty dollars. It was still there.

The bus station in Las Tumbas was a little sister to the one in the City. Even the layers of pigeon dung were similar. Haakon searched the rack at the small ticket office for a map, and finally stood in line behind a woman with very poor English skills who was trying to buy a ticket for somewhere in Mexico, and couldn't understand why the man couldn't sell her a Mexican bus ticket. At last she gave up, and Haakon stepped up to the counter.

"Yes?" the man in the booth said.

"How do I get to the Coastal Commission office?"

"Go out the front door; turn right for two and a half blocks. Then look left. You'll see a government building. Looks like a prison, some say. The Coastal Commission Office is in there."

"Thanks," Haakon said.

"Don't mention it," the man said and took up the book he was reading. It had a dragon hurling lurid fire at a unicorn on the cover. The title was some nonsense word. Haakon left the booth and went out the front door. He turned right, walked the two and a half blocks, and looked on the left. Yes, there was the building, looking a lot like Lechuga Prison. Haakon sighed and walked toward it.

### Spy for Hire

The state office building was very like a prison. It had few windows, concrete bollards half-blocked the front entrance and metal detectors greeted one at the doors. The lobby was painted white, with the state seal picked out in mosaic on the floor. The elevators were polished stainless steel. Haakon found Ms. Dee's office number on the third floor. He called the elevator. When it came, he entered the gleaming cage and pressed the button for the third floor. The elevator doors closed very quietly. There was no jerk when it started and no jerk when it stopped. The doors opened onto a corridor carpeted in a non-descript beige that was thick and lush underfoot. The walls were institutional cream.

The office doors were also cream. It was difficult to distinguish one office from another. Only the discreet lettering on the brass nameplates clued one in to who worked behind the cream doors identifiable only by the protruding brass doorknobs. Methodically Haakon read each nameplate until he found Commissioner Dee's office. There he turned the brass knob, and went in.

A gray-haired woman glared at him from behind a desk. She and her desk dominated the room. In one corner, a forlorn plant languished in a marble urn.

"Ms. Dee?" Haakon inquired. The woman's desk had no nameplate. Haakon waited while the woman examined him. He imagined her stare stripping away his clothes, peeling back his skin, and boring through to the very bones of his face.

"I am not Ms. Dee," she said. "I am her secretary, Bertha Van Nation. Who are you?"

"I'm Haakon Spitz. Father Roman Hands sent me here to interview for a job with Ms. Dee."

"Is she expecting you?"

"I thought she was. Father Hands gave me this letter of introduction." Haakon took out the folded sheet Father Hands had included with the bus voucher and handed it to Bertha.

"I see," she said. She took it. "I'll consult Ms. Dee. She may be able to include you in her schedule today." When she saw the light of hope flare in Haakon's eyes, Bertha went on. "She may not, however, have time today. Please seat yourself and wait here."

After several minutes, Bertha returned.

"Ms. Dee will see you," she said. "Her time, however, is limited, so do not waste it. Follow me."

Bertha led him into an office. Behind its desk stood a sharp-faced woman with piercing black eyes and black hair rolled in a severe bun at the back of her head. She did not hold out a hand to him.

"Mr. Spitz?" she said.

"Yes."

"Sit down." He took a seat across from her. She sat.

"I need a man for a few days to do some surveillance work. It's on the coast. Do you have camping equipment?"

"No, I'm sorry to say."

"I'll provide you with a key to a Coastal Commission tool shed. It has a cot in it, and a small stove. There's also a supply of dehydrated food, and water piped into the shed. You'll be all right for a few days."

"Is it heated?"

"The shed? No. There's a sleeping bag on the cot. You can use that to keep warm at night. Do you have clothing more suited to out-of-doors than that suit you're wearing?"

"No, I only got out this morning. I haven't had time to go shopping yet."

"I'll provide you with twenty dollars. You can go to the thrift shop one block over and get yourself some things better suited for out doors. I'll have Bertha, my secretary, drop you off at the Commission Park. She lives out that way."

"What or who am I watching?"

"Watching?"

"You said this was a surveillance job. What or who am I watching?"

"There's a neighbor who harbors a llama herd. I think they are destroying habitat for the marbled murrelets who live on San Danson Mountain. I want you to find evidence, whatever evidence you can, that the llamas are destructive. Report to me in one week. I'll pay you a hundred and fifty for the week, and I won't charge you for food or lodging. Acceptable?"

"Yes, Ma'am." Vanna pressed the button on her communicator.

"Bertha, please come in." Bertha entered almost at once. "Get twenty dollars from petty cash and give it to Mr. Spitz. Take him to the thrift store on the next block and then drop him off at the Coastal Commission Park on your way home. You may leave now. We'll take up our work together again in the morning."

"Yes, Ms. Dee." Bertha looked at Haakon with a measuring eye. "Come along, Mr. Spitz. I'll just get my purse and your cash, and we'll be on our way." Bertha stopped at her desk, took a cashbox from a drawer, and extracted a key and some cash from it. She replaced the cashbox and locked the drawer. Then she led Haakon to the elevator. When they got to the street, Bertha handed Haakon forty dollars and a key.

"Here," she said. "Ms. Dee often underestimates the cost of things, even at the thrift store. Get some warm jeans, a flannel shirt, and a jacket. The weather could turn cold before the week's out." Bertha walked with him to the store. He went in, selected a gray flannel shirt, a worn but serviceable pair of jeans, and a light jacket. Vanna's forty dollars needed five of his own to cover the expense. At least she had promised him food.

After he made his purchases, Bertha escorted him to her car, and drove out toward San Danson Station and the Coastal Commission Preserve. She didn't say much until Haakon asked her, "What should I look for?"

"Well, I'd say any sign that the llamas are polluting the nesting areas of the marbled murrelets. I know Ms. Dee has spoken of her concern in that area. Also, any sign that the residents of the manor house are breeding the llamas. You know, like crías, that sort of thing."

"How would llamas pollute the nesting areas of these murrelets?"

"With their dung, Ms. Dee says. Between us two, I think it has more to do with an old family feud than it does with murrelets and llamas, but don't quote me." She pulled up to a great chain link gate in a chain link fence.

"You get out here," she said. "Take the trail on the other side of the gate to the top of the low ridge, there. You'll find the tool shed at the end of the trail. Unlock it, go in, and there's a cot and a hot plate. Dried food is in the cupboard, and there are pans, spoons, and things to eat with. Clean up your mess. Oh, and the water's outside; there's a faucet next to the restrooms. Good luck." She motioned him out. "Please close the car door," she said. "I'm already late getting home." Haakon shut the door. Bertha waved at him, and sped away.

Haakon tried the key in the lock on the gate. It didn't fit. Sighing, he climbed over the gate and dropped down on the other side. He twisted his ankle dropping, and had to limp slowly up the trail toward the tool shed as the cold gray fog crept over the first glimmering stars in the evening sky.

### A Tool among Tools

The tool shed was small. It sat upwind from the rest rooms, which was a blessing. No matter how clean, rest rooms in the wild carry a wild odor. Haakon held his breath as he passed them. No one had cleaned them for some time.

The lock on the tool shed yielded to the key Bertha Van Nation had given him. He opened the door, fumbled for a light switch. After a moment he realized it was a chain suspended from the socket holding a naked bulb in the ceiling. He pulled the chain. The light clicked on with a harsh and blinding glare. The room that slowly swam into view as his watering eyes focused was lined with hoes, mops, spades, rakes, and other tool paraphernalia for maintaining the wilderness outside.

A second room sat in shadows behind this first one. Haakon went toward it slowly. He looked for another ceiling light, only to discover a switch on the wall. The bulb in this room was soft pink, and of a much lower wattage than the glaring light in the tool room. This room had a cot, with two folded khaki blankets at the foot. The small desk held a hot plate whereon sat a small pan. A little cupboard over the desk opened to reveal several packets of dried food, all fortified with textured vegetable protein supplement. Haakon selected one labeled "chili" and laid it on the desk. Then he went outside and approached the odoriferous rest rooms and the faucet behind them. At least the water was clear, and had no smell of its own.

Haakon carried it back, read the directions on the packet he had selected, and put the water to boil. When it boiled, he added the dry material from the packet. It miraculously blossomed into beans and a thin red sauce. One or two whiffs of spice and tomato rose from the steaming mess. In a drawer of the desk, Haakon found a spoon, and used it to slowly eat the "chili." Despite the promising whiffs of flavor, it tasted only of textured vegetable protein supplement.

That first night Haakon carefully removed his clothes and slept under the blankets in his underwear. He expected the windowless room to be chilly, but he had not expected the fog and dampness that intruded through a small series of openings that ran along the top of the wall above the bed. That wall was on the shed's west side, and the sea breeze, this high above the surf, was wet with the ocean's breath. Haakon shivered, half asleep, through the night. When he judged daybreak was coming, from the slight graying of the fog in the room, he got up, dressed, and went out carrying the pot he'd cooked the "chili" in the night before.

Day had broken, a white glow masked with the fog. Haakon took the pot to the faucet and washed the residue from it. Then he filled it with clean water, took this back, and put it to boil. One packet had "EGGS" on the label. He presumed this was appropriate for breakfast. He rummaged through the cupboard and found a bowl. He put the yellow powder from the packet in the bowl and poured the suggested cup of hot water over it. With the remaining water, he made a cup of instant coffee. Then he took up his spoon and tried the eggs. They tasted exactly like last night's chili. As his time in the tool shed lengthened, Haakon learned the labels on the packets meant nothing; everything tasted like textured vegetable protein supplement. He longed for ketchup, the universal flavoring agent of prison food. A search of the cupboard yielded none.

When he had breakfasted, Haakon washed out his dishes and set them on the desk to dry. Then he carefully closed the tool-shed door behind him, felt in his pocket to be sure he had the key, and locked the padlock. He turned toward the sea, and began to look for llamas. He had only a vague notion which way they might be; Bertha and Vanna were so familiar with the San Danson area they forgot to tell Haakon to go south. He might still have gone wrong; Haakon's world had never included places without streets and street signs to guide him.

He wandered all day, at times lost, though he finally realized that if he walked away from the shed with the ocean on his left, keeping it on his right going back he'd eventually find it again. He saw many birds, some large and white and flying and screaming, some down on the bits of beach that sheltered between the surf pounded rocks that were very tiny and played "catch me if you can" with the waves, others that wheeled and called in the sky. He knew no gull from any murrelet from any killdeer, but all the birds he saw were apparently healthy and, he presumed, satisfied with their lives.

As the sea slowly swallowed the sun in bloody gold, Haakon found the tool shed. He went in, hungry enough to eat textured vegetable protein supplement in whatever guise came to hand. A dark green Coastal Commission truck stood outside the shed. A large florid man in a khaki uniform was in the doorway. He watched weary Haakon struggle up the hill to the shed.

"See any llamas?" he asked. His voice was high pitched and grated on Haakon's nerves.

"No," Haakon said. He came to a stop at the side of the truck, breathing heavily.

"Go up the coast?"

"I went that way," Haakon said, and pointed to where he had been.

"Llamas are down coast, the other way," the man said. He pointed. "Nothing to report, then, to Commissioner Dee."

"No." Haakon held out his hand. "I'm Haakon Spitz, sometimes known as Haven Fitz. You are?"

"Billy Bong," the man said. "William for official, Billy for everyday." He shook Haakon's hand. "New at this outdoors stuff?"

"Yes. Spent most of my life in cities and big towns."

"Outdoors will be good for you. More healthy. By the way, Bertha had me bring you some canned goods to go with that dehydrated junk the Commission supplies." He gestured toward the back room. "Hope there's something you'll like."

"Thank you. Any change will be for the good."

"Commissioner Dee says write down what you see. I put a notebook in with the canned goods. I'll pick it up when I come by. I'll be going, now. Check back with you in about a week. We don't get out here too often, this time of year." Billy walked around to the driver's side of his truck and got in. He leaned over and opened the passenger window. "Watch out for the weather; TV's saying a storm could come in later this week."

"Thanks, again." Haakon watched the truck disappear into the trees that went down the mountain toward the highway. He sighed, and thought of the supplement to his provisions. He went in, switched on the light, and examined the three cans Billy had left. One held tuna, another beans, and the third had Spam. Haakon accounted them a treasure.

After another cold and foggy night huddled under the blankets, Haakon woke, dressed, and went down the coast. He saw no murrelets, not that he'd have recognized them if he had. It was not time for them to be ashore. Llamas he did find, and he watched them for the next four days as they grazed, well away from the coast. The animals seemed undisturbed by his watching them.

Every evening he returned to the tool shed, slept in the cold, foggy room, and hoped he was gathering the information Commissioner Dee wanted. On the fourth evening, the rain began before he got back to the shed. He slept wet that night. On the fifth day, when his supplies of beans, tuna, and Spam were gone, he woke with a nauseous headache, and decided to forego the "waffle with included maple syrup" that was all that remained of the breakfasts in the cupboard.

He went out into the cold gray morning. He lost his sense of direction, and eventually came down to the Chapel. He thought it was the tool shed, and forced his way in. He was weak from hunger, and feverish, and collapsed on the chapel floor before he realized where he was.

### Emma and Notta Reminisce

Emma and Notta were finishing their morning coffee in Emma's kitchen.

"Your neighbor seems like a nice man," Notta said to her mother. It was the morning after Ermentrude's invasion of Butter's cottage.

"He is," Emma said. "I've enjoyed feeding him cookies. And his dog, Butter, is so sweet to me." Emma brushed the toast crumbs by her plate into her hand and dusted them onto her plate.

"I don't think Butter took to me." Notta reached down and rubbed purring Ermentrude's ears. Prime Pussy rumbled discontent from Emma's feet.

"Well, she maybe smelled Ermentrude's scent, or something else she'd rubbed off on you." Emma shook her head. "That cat's a pill, for sure."

"Yes, but she's my pill. She's a wonderful companion to me."

"At least she's not as wild as that first cat you had, Riggertigger. He was a terror on four paws." Emma chuckled. "It's a wonder the curtains and drapes survived him!"

Notta smiled. "He meant so much to me. I was so sad when he disappeared. I've always wondered if Barry, next door, did away with him. He scratched Barry so badly, you know."

"Barry probably had it coming. He was a lot like Riggertigger. Wild. Never thought he'd settle down like he has."

"Barry Cooda? Settled down?" Notta's eyes widened in surprise.

"Yes. He's an assistant district attorney in Las Tumbas. Quite a promising career, I understand. Not married yet, either."

"No woman would have him, I suppose."

"He's turned out quite handsome, if his picture in the paper is any sample. Would you like some more coffee?"

"No, Mother, I've had quite enough. I'll be wired for the day." Notta stood up and took her cup and plate to the sink. Then she collected her mother's dishes and rinsed all the dishes. "We can wash these later," she said. "Right now I'd like to go for a walk."

"Yes. Do put Ermentrude in her carrier. We don't want her braving Butter's wrath again." Ermentrude, of course, in typical feline fashion, chose that moment to avoid capture. Only after several minutes of laughing and chasing did Emma and Notta trap the wily pussy and lock her in her carrier. Ermentrude commenced howling in great anguish. Prime Pussy switched her tail and jumped onto her favorite windowsill. Emma and Notta got jackets and went for their walk.

"I see why you love it here so, Mother," Notta said. "It's so quiet and peaceful. Nothing ever happens here, does it?"

"Notta, you're naïve. Wherever there are two or more humans, troubles can spring up." Emma sighed. "Why, that Coastal Commissioner, Vanna Dee, tried to evict Ben, next door, from his place. She wound up losing the argument, but she kept that nice deputy busy for several hours." Emma looked sidelong at Notta. Notta pretended not to notice.

"You know the deputy I mean?" When Notta shook her head, Emma sighed again. "The one that took you to your junior high prom."

"DiConti? He's a deputy?" Notta stopped in her tracks and stared at her mother. "Scrawny DiConti? A cop?"

"He's filled out very nicely, my dear. Fits his uniform superbly. And he's been very nice to me." She looked out over the cove and smiled. Perhaps Notta could be made interested in DiConti. Then Emma could get her to move to Las Tumbas or maybe even Pueblo Rio to be nearer her Mother. Not that Emma would dream of interfering in Notta's life, of course.

"I suppose he could have blossomed since junior high." Notta resumed walking. Emma stood just a moment to watch her daughter. She had always mildly regretted Notta was a youthful replica of herself. None of Haakon's golden god good looks had passed on to Notta except the piercing blue of his eyes. Notta turned.

"Coming, Mother?"

"Yes." Emma hurried to catch up to Notta. For a while, they walked on the sea-packed sand without speaking. Then Notta spoke.

"Go ahead, Mother, ask it."

"Ask what?"

"The Question."

"My dear, I don't know what you mean."

"I mean, Mother, the one you always ask, one way or another. Let's get it out of the way, so I can enjoy the rest of my visit."

"I'm sure I don't know what you mean."

"I mean The Question I answer with, 'Not yet, Mother,' when you ask if there's a man in my life."

"Well, is there?"

"No. Let's go to Wong's for some ice cream." Emma smiled at the sand.

"Okay," she said. They turned and walked up the beach to the trail that went up the bluff behind San Danson Station. As they approached the Wong's store, a uniformed man came out of the Four Rosas Café. Notta looked at him and emitted a low whistle.

"Who's that?" she asked.

"DiConti Sharif," Emma answered. "I told you he'd filled out nicely."

"Fills that uniform well, too. I suppose it's only polite to say hello." She altered her direction to intercept DiConti as he made for his patrol car. Behind her Emma smiled a small and triumphant smile.

### Renewed Acquaintance

DiConti saw Notta headed for him. He knew, at once, who she was. She had occupied a secret compartment in his thoughts ever since the prom night. Bold as he could seem in pursuing his official duties, around young ladies DiConti tended toward shyness and a bound tongue. Many eligible young women dismissed him summarily as a pretty boy with an empty head. "Another dumb cop," one emailed another until the ladies of Las Tumbas were convinced there was no need to keep Mr. Sharif on their lists of potential mates.

Notta's approach tightened the ropes that bound DiConti's tongue. His delicate features demonstrated a watchful wariness. A gust of wind swept his broad brimmed hat from his head and he bent to retrieve it. This afforded Notta an excellent view of his trouser cloth straining over his shapely buttocks. Notta had an advantage over the silly girls in Las Tumbas. She had actually spent an evening with DiConti. She knew his mind and heart were worth more time.

"Why, Deputy, I do declare," she trilled in a heavy attempt at a Southern drawl. "Y'all have grown up quite nicely, indeed." DiConti straightened up. His complexion was too café au lait to show a full blush, but his neck and face darkened noticeably. Her round face twitched with suppressed merriment.

"Hello, Notta," he said. He searched for another sentence, but nothing came to mind. Notta batted her eyelids at him, coquettish as a drag queen on stage. Poor DiConti's confusion only deepened. Emma, inwardly grumbling at Notta's cruelty (as Emma saw it) came to DiConti's rescue.

"Hello, DiConti," she said. "I guess you can see my daughter has come home to torment her old mother for a couple of weeks."

"Now, Mother," Notta said. She understood the implicit warning in Emma's comment, and determined to be less the femme formidable.

"Sorry about the tease, DiConti," she said. "My manners have gotten a little wild in the City."

"'S okay," DiConti mumbled.

"It's just that you look so official in that uniform," Notta went on. "How long have you been with the Sheriff's Department?"

"Since high school, Notta." He shuffled his feet and stared at them. A bit of dust on his left shoe stared back at him.

"How did you come to join the Sheriff's posse?" Notta asked. She forced back a grin, turning it at the last moment into a small smile of interest. A wayward breeze twisted through her hair, disarranging it a little.

DiConti looked up at her. "My dad's idea, actually. He wanted me to move out, and the Sheriff's office paid better than anything he saw." The capricious breeze that had toyed with Notta's brown hair attacked DiConti's dark locks. His pomade defeated the breeze. The breeze left for lighter work among the scattered leaves across the highway.

"Do you like your work?"

"Yes." He looked straight at Notta. "Most of it. Some of the stuff is ugly, like hauling dead bodies out of car wrecks, or breaking up domestic disputes. Never a right thing to say to survivors, never a right thing to say to quarreling spouses." He waved away these ugly things with his right hand as though he were brushing away a pestiferous fly. "Helping lost people find their way, or bringing justice to a crime victim, these things I like."

"Your job sounds fascinating. I think you must be very good at your work," Notta said.

"He is," Emma joined in from the background. She wondered what she could do to nudge DiConti into asking Notta out on a date. Nothing occurred to her. Not to worry; Notta took matters into her own hands.

"DiConti," she said, "do you have time for a cup of coffee, or are you on duty?"

He smiled shyly at her. "I'm on duty again, Notta. I just had my coffee break."

"How about dinner? My treat? I'd really like to talk with you, about old times, and new ones."

"Well, I don't have anything planned, but I'll be up in Las Tumbas. I've got to work the evening shift because we're short handed. One of our deputies is away on compassionate leave."

"When do you break for supper?"

"Usually at six thirty."

"Shall I meet you at the Sheriff's office?"

"Yes. That'll be fine." He put his wide-brimmed hat on his dark pomaded hair. "I know a place that serves good spaghetti for a reasonable price. That sound okay?"

"Yes," Notta said enthusiastically. "I love good spaghetti."

"Until tonight, then." He tipped his hat to Emma. "Good day, Ms. Freed, Notta" he said. Then he walked swiftly to his car.

Emma and Notta watched him get in and carefully enter the highway. "Yes, Mother, he has filled out very well," Notta observed. "Still as shy as fawn in the mountains, though." She shook her head. "I hope I wasn't too bold for him."

"I doubt it," Emma said. "If you'd scared him too much, he'd have been busy tonight." She looked at the sun and frowned a little. "I do hope you brought something appropriate to wear."

"If you mean did I bring a skirt, the answer is yes. A touch more of the feminine will be in order tonight, I think. Now, since we're here in the Station, let's do a bit of shopping. I might find one or two small accessories for tonight." Notta took Emma by the elbow and steered her into the Wong Brothers' Emporium. The Wong Brothers knew Notta well, and had to hear all her recent history. She obliged, almost flirtatiously, with tales of her life and work in the City. Shu got so enthralled with her narrative that he gave her a ten percent discount twice on the earrings she selected to wear to dinner with DiConti.

Emma insisted Notta return to the cottage and rest before her outing. Notta felt no need of rest, but understood her mother was weary. They returned to the cottage, saw to Prime Pussy's meal, and then freed Ermentrude from her durance vile for her meal. When both cats had eaten, Notta and Emma retired to their respective chambers for sleep. Prime Pussy and Ermentrude commenced a grumbled conversation wherein each impugned the ancestry and bathing habits of the other.

### Factor in the Spaghetti

Notta arrived at the police station promptly at six-thirty. She had dressed with more than her usual care; she wore a lavender blouse, a simple gold chain and heart-shaped locket around her throat, and cream skirt that had just a little flare at the hem. Of course, she wore nylon panty hose and gray pumps, as well as the requisite undergarments for a young lady of refinement. DiConti had managed, somehow, to find time in the day to change to a clean uniform. This one fit him more loosely. His delicate features, that would have been effeminate on some men, but on his face looked as though a Michelangelo had sculpted them, softened in the light of his large smile. He was genuinely delighted to see Notta.

"That's a good color for you," he said, gesturing vaguely at her breasts, which filled her blouse very well. Her rounded face lit up when she smiled. DiConti thought her nose was utterly delightful the way it turned up just the least bit at the end. Her full mouth, red with Tropical Passion lipstick, promised a seduction he didn't want to resist.

"You're looking pretty handsome yourself, Deputy," she said. DiConti's face darkened with his equivalent of a blush. He suddenly turned bashful.

Notta saw at once she had activated DiConti's embarrassment syndrome. "My car or yours?" Notta asked, hoping to put him at ease.

"I'm sorry, but we'll have to take yours," he said. "My patrol car is strictly for business. And I don't own a car of my own, not right now."

"You walk to work?" she asked.

"No, I ride the bus. I've never needed a car in my off-hours."

"Bothersome things, cars," Notta said. "Mine is no great limo, but it gets me around." She pointed to a gray Datsun across the street. "That's my chariot, sir!"

She went to the passenger's side, unlocked the door, and held it for DiConti. He got in and buckled his seat belt. Notta went round to the driver's side and let herself in. She buckled up, and started the engine. "Where to?" she asked.

"Spaghetti still sound good?" DiConti asked.

"It sure does," Notta said.

"Go right on Fourth Street," DiConti directed, "then turn left on MacDougal Way. The restaurant's on the right. There's a parking lot on the far side of it."

"What's the name of it?"

"The Twisted Noodle. It's got a picture painted on its sign of spaghetti twirled around a fork resting in a spoon."

"That wasn't here when I was in school."

"No, it's only been open about a year." Notta continued to make small talk as she drove to the restaurant. DiConti, since he didn't have to look directly at her, found it easy to respond with irrelevant bits of this and that. He began to relax and enjoy himself with Notta. She began to hope this date wouldn't be too much work to get through.

The hostess at the Twisted Noodle seated them at a quiet table in one corner. The waitress, a woman in her middle years with iron-gray streaks in her black hair, took their orders. DiConti declined the wine, because he had to return to duty. He offered Notta the opportunity for wine. She declined, as she had to drive home.

The table had the expected red and white checkered cloth on it. Notta wondered if some factory in Italy turned the things out by the gross to supply Italian restaurants in the United States. She mentioned her thought to DiConti.

"No," he said in all seriousness, turning up a corner of the cloth with a label on it. "They're all made in China."

"Perhaps the Italians make the turntables in the center of Chinese restaurant banquet tables," Notta suggested.

"Perhaps," DiConti said. He had a twinkle in his eye. "I think, though, the Italians make samovars for Russian tea rooms. The Germans make the turntables. The Russians make skillets for cooking German sausages."

Notta laughed. DiConti actually made a joke. His thin face glowed with enjoyment. "I like your laughter," he said. The waiter brought their large plates of spaghetti with marinara sauce. Notta twisted her spaghetti on her fork. She didn't use the large spoon provided her. She never mastered using the spoon as well as the fork. DiConti used both with a masterful control. Notta managed, before she was through, to drop a few tiny red spots on her blouse. DiConti got nothing whatsoever on his uniform, not even the vanilla ice cream sundae with wine sauce.

As they ate their spaghetti, DiConti said, "Notta, do you remember our night at the prom?"

"Yes," she said softly. She smiled a warm smile at him. "It was a very good night for me." DiConti's face flushed with pleasure.

"It was the best night I had in school," DiConti said. "One of the best nights I ever had. I don't know if I ever said thank you."

"I don't think I ever gave you a chance," Notta said. "Even that far back, I was hell-bent on getting away from Las Tumbas and Mother to be on my own."

"Do you want always to be on your own?" he asked, a bit tremulously.

"No, not always. Sometimes, yes. I need my space. But I hope someday to find a Mr. Right to spend my life with."

"Maybe someday you will," DiConti said, and fell silent. Notta took up the conversation again, commenting on such thrilling topics as the weather, the rising price of gasoline, and the like. Their conversation on the way back to the station was also about unimportant things. On San Danson Mountain, the unicorn with the unique horn sighed, shed its llama skin, screwed in its horn, and began to dance. It was not as lissome as once it was. Instead of a natural grace, it danced with a studied formality. Even unicorns encounter arthritis. Nonetheless, it danced in the fog-filtered starlight. In Las Tumbas Notta pulled her Datsun to the curb in front of the police station. DiConti looked at his watch. He had five minutes left. Through a tight throat he spoke.

"I've got to go back to work," he said. "Can we get together again, soon?"

"Very soon," Notta said. Notta leaned over and kissed DiConti full on the mouth. He responded, and soon his arms were around her and her arms were around him. At last he broke off the kiss, his brown eyes fastened on Notta's blue ones.

"We'll make arrangements," DiConti said. He opened the car door. The unicorn with the unique horn danced faster, despite its aching joints. His captain had stuck his head out the door. DiConti waved at him. "I've got to go now."

"Bye," Notta said as DiConti shut the door. She watched him walk in, tears and joy glittering in her blue eyes. On San Danson Mountain, the unicorn with the unique horn brought its last pirouette to a full close, and sank to its knees. She panted heavily. Only after some time did she muster energy to unscrew her horn and get back in her llama suit.

### Someone's Knocking at the Door

Ben knocked on the Swami's door. From inside the cottage he heard a rasping voice cry, "Someone's knocking at the door! Someone's knocking at the door!" Then he heard footsteps and the Swami opened the door. He wore his customary overalls and blue chambray shirt. His starched white apron, incongruously trimmed with pink rickrack, stretched over his ovoid body. The sash it sported was also pink.

"Hello there," he said to Ben. "I'm so glad you could come." He stood aside so Ben could enter the cottage. The rasping voice cried out again, "Someone's knocking at the door!" It was a large green parrot who spoke.

"Don't mind Charles Algernon Burnswine," Malcolm said. "I'm just parrot sitting him for a friend. It's a damned nuisance, but somebody's got to take care of it."

"See how the mainsail flops," Charles Algernon said, apropos of nothing. Ben handed Malcolm the bottle of White Merlot he had brought as a host gift.

"Thank you," the Swami said. "This is good stuff. You're the first to get here. The others should be here soon." Ben hoped Dickon was one of the other guests.

Ben looked around the room while the Swami took the wine to the kitchen. Several beanbag chairs sat against the walls. At one end, a simple table, made from a door laid across two sawhorses, sported five place settings defined by blue mats set against the polished wood. Six pieces of silver flatware flanked each simple white eight-sided plate. A water goblet and three wine glasses stood at attention at the top of each place setting.

Ben wondered what use one would make of three forks of three different sizes. Then he noticed a very small fork next to a knife and soupspoon combination. This fork further awed him. Graceful blue napkins, folded to represent birds, rested on each plate.

As he was contemplating this formal setting, someone else rapped on the door. Charles Algernon cried out "Someone's knocking at the door!" several times. The Swami hastened to the door to admit Mae Ling. When he spied her, Charles Algernon screeched "Pretty boy! Pretty boy!" and peered around the room, perhaps to see how many people present recognized his cleverness.

"Ah, Swami," Mae said. "Still got the noisy guest, I see."

The Swami sighed. "Yes," he said. He closed the door. A chill breeze had begun blowing off the cove. "As you heard, he still can't tell the girls from the boys."

"Hello, Mr. Soul," Mae Ling said. "Your note about my book was most kind."

"It was an interesting book," Ben said. "I learned from it."

"One day I shall have to lend you more of my books," she said. "So few adults can truly appreciate children's literature."

Ben blushed. "I'm a child at heart," he said.

"Most of us are," the Swami chimed in, "but we're afraid to admit it, even to ourselves."

Charles Algernon screeched again, "Someone's knocking at the door!" The knock followed his screech. The Swami opened the door and greeted Malcolm Drye, dapper as always, and Dr. Chester Field.

"Juan is indisposed tonight," Dr. Field said as he shed his coat.

"Yes," the Swami said. "Willy told me when he came in. We didn't set a place for him. We'll send a 'care package' back with you."

"Thank you," Dr. Field said.

"Delightful smells from the kitchen," Malcolm Drye said. His eyes twinkled. "Good evening, Mae," he said, and bowed a slight bow. She returned a nod that implied a curtsy.

"And good evening to you, also, Mr. Soul," he said.

"Please call me Ben," Ben said.

The Swami rubbed his hands together. "Would anyone like an apéritif? I have cream sherry, and an apricot liqueur." Ben accepted an apricot liqueur. The others selected a cream sherry. The Swami put in their requests, and soon Willy Waugh, clad, as usual, in only white briefs, brought their drinks.

"Dinner will commence in fifteen minutes," Willy said. They all sipped at their drinks. For a moment, everyone stared at the floor, uncertain how to begin the conversation.

Mae Ling broke the silence. "Mr. Soul, Ben, what was your work before you retired?"

"I was a software analyst," Ben said.

"What is a software analyst?" Malcolm asked.

"Charley wants a cracker," the parrot interjected. The five people in the room turned as one to regard the green bird. Its glittering eye fixed on them.

Ben was glad of the brief distraction. He'd always had trouble describing his work in terms that non-computer people understood easily. "I reviewed programs for efficiency of design," he said, "and for other qualities, such as ease of maintenance. I also developed test plans to verify they did what they were supposed to do."

Mae Ling nodded, as if she understood. Malcolm, the Swami, and Dr. Field looked vacant. Ben wondered whether to elaborate, and decided against it. In his experience, most his own age considered computers some sort of dark magic. He changed the subject. "Mae," he said, "how did you come to write children's books?"

"I needed money. A friend of mine suggested I talk with her agent. The agent urged me to try writing for children as a place to start. I've been rather successful at it." Mae smiled; her eyes sparkled. The light in the room danced along the gray threads in her black hair.

Willy Waugh appeared at the kitchen door. "Dinner's ready," he announced. The Swami indicated the place cards at each sitting. Ben found his place, next to Mae Ling and across from Dr. Field. Malcolm sat opposite to Mae, and the Swami sat at the head of the table.

The Swami said, "Those who want to pray, or meditate, go ahead." He bowed his head. Ben had no prayer to say, and simply kept silent for the sake of the others.

When the Swami raised his head, Willy carried a steaming tureen and five soup plates into the room. A savory smell of onion and beef rose from the tureen. Willy swiftly ladled soup into the soup plates and served them, beginning with Mae. A hearty merlot accompanied the soup. The fish course was halibut grilled and served on a light curry sauce. A gewürztraminer nicely completed it. A lime sorbet came next, to clear their palates. It was cool and delicious. Ben wondered why the feast was so elaborate. The Village seemed rather far removed from the City gourmets.

The main course was medallions of pork with shiitake mushrooms in a white sauce lightly seasoned with roasted garlic and coriander. For this course, Willy poured a white zinfandel. Ben was feeling very full.

A salad followed; it was a simple sampling of lettuces caressed by wine vinegar and lemon vinaigrette suffused with marjoram. A single cherry tomato, very sweet, garnished the plate.

Dessert was a cheese and fruit plate. Willy had combined thin slices of cheddar with well-marbled Stilton on tart apple rings. To accompany it, he served a rich Australian ruby port in small glasses with a stem molded in. The Swami called the glasses port pipes.

Ben listened quietly to the dinner conversation. Much of it discussed topics about which he knew little, or had little opinion. Malcolm went on at some length about his African violets. He ended an extended monologue with "The wee plants have been the saving of my sanity." Ben thought to himself that the violets might be a symptom of mental imbalance.

Mae recapitulated her tour in Europe. "I was only in Northern Europe, this time. Denmark, Sweden, and Finland, primarily. Denmark sparkles, of course, just like the Tivoli Gardens. And the amber jewelry is truly lovely. Sweden is less inclined to cater to the tourist. I so often find it true, that Socialist societies have a poor notion of personal services. Finland is an exception. It's so much like being in one large neighborhood."

Ben opened his mouth to comment on his travels with Len in Communist and Capitalist Asia, but Dr. Field spoke up first. "Personal service is poorly understood in much of the world. Where it is still honored as a fine tradition, as in Britain, among the butlers, it is a glorious thing. We, in America, are too well-schooled in 'serve-yourself' customs to rightly appreciate personal service."

The Swami suggested they repair to the cluster of beanbag chairs after their port and cheese. Conversation stilled as they let their meals digest. Willy served them coffee in informal mugs. For Ben he had made tea. Ben wished again that Dickon had come. Time enough later, he consoled himself, to get better acquainted with him. Malcolm and Dr. Field left first, followed quickly by Mae Ling. Ben prepared to go, but the Swami stayed him.

"Ben," the Swami said, "I've got something to show you." He smiled, and took Ben's elbow. "Come with me," the Swami said, and drew him toward a room that corresponded to the smaller bedroom in Ben's cottage. Ben was reviewing polite refusals to sexual advances as the Swami led him into the room. It proved to be a shrine instead. Squat candles burned with small, soft flames before three clay statues.

"These are the Boddhisattvas," the Swami said. "Please, touch them, and tell me what you feel." Ben went to the altar and touched the statues, each in turn, from the right to the left. He only felt the warmth of the candles.

"I only feel the candle flames," he said. The Swami sighed.

"I had hoped for something else," the Swami said. There is a power in these artifacts, but none of us can tap it, not even La Señora. Since you saw the unicorn so easily at Midsummer's Night, I had hoped..." He fell silent. He shrugged his shoulders.

"Ah, well," he said. "Thank you for trying." He led Ben toward the living room. Willy had cleared away all the dishes, stowed the door and sawhorses somewhere, and appeared in the doorway to the kitchen with a dishtowel in his hands.

"Will there be anything else, Swami?" Willy asked.

"No, that's all. You found your money?"

"Yes, thank you. You are most generous."

"Good night, Willy." Willy went into the kitchen. Ben heard the door close.

"I must be going, too," Ben said. "Thank you for a superb dinner, and a most interesting evening."

"You're most welcome, Ben. We're all glad you've joined the Village.

Charles Algernon Burnswine squawked under the cover. "Sayonara, Sucker!" he said.

"Good night, bird," Ben called over his shoulder, and walked home through the gathering fog. The evening had convinced him that the people of San Danson knew how to eat well. That they also had some tie-in to another plane of existence confused him, but their general conviviality pleased him.

### Violet Incident

Ben and Butter went out walking in the August sun. The fog that usually came ashore in the late afternoon had stayed out to sea for several days under the brute force of an offshore wind from the desert interior. It was hot, and Ben and Butter both walked sedately along the path. Most of the Villagers were inside their cottages, where it was cooler. Only Malcolm Drye was out, pouring some liquid on his dahlias. Ben stopped to admire the flowers.

"Beautiful flowers," he called out to Malcolm, who was facing the house.

"Oh, hello dear boy," Malcolm said. He stood upright, a bright red plastic watering can in his hand. He wore a great apron, made of what Ben took to be white canvas, over his customary dapper suit. A few smudges of dirt told Ben Malcolm had been at his gardening for some time. Clear plastic covers protected Malcolm's patent leather shoes from the damp and dirt.

"What kind are they?" Ben asked, gesturing at the flowers.

"Dahlias," Malcolm said. "This climate is a bit cool for the best blooms, but they do flourish modestly here." Malcolm set the watering can on the ground next to the dahlia bed. "Next month they will be at their peak. Do pass by then, dear boy, and look them over."

"We will," Ben said.

"I had bigger dahlias, and many more of them, when I lived in the City," Malcolm said. He came toward the fence; Ben surmised they were in for a bit of a chat. "When I came here, I gave up dahlia breeding for African Violets." He waved toward his window. "I've quite a collection of those, now." Ben was amazed that Malcolm's brow displayed a certain moistness; perspiration didn't seem to be Malcolm's style.

" _Saintpaulia ionantha_ is a most satisfactory houseplant," Malcolm said. "Its propagation is simple, its colors vibrant and varied, and its care not too burdensome. Do you raise plants, Ben?"

"No, not indoors. I used to raise a lot of vegetables, but that was a long time ago."

"Vegetables have their place. It's difficult to grow most edibles this close to the sea. The exceptions, of course, are the cruciferous vegetables."

"I haven't tried growing anything here," Ben said. "I've been busy with a lot of other things."

Malcolm extracted a white handkerchief from a pocket of his apron. It was plain linen, not monogrammed or trimmed with lace. Very obviously, this was Malcolm's working handkerchief, because he dabbed with it at the moisture on his brow.

"Warm today," Ben said. "Don't know how long it will be before this weather breaks."

"Not long, I hope," Malcolm said. "We ordinarily get this kind of heat only in September and October, perhaps one or two days in May. We aren't acclimated to it as well as the people inland are."

"If you go far enough inland, it's too hot in this kind of weather for anybody to acclimate to, except the occasional lizard."

"Too true. I avoid the inland areas in all weathers. I am a coastal creature, I fear."

Butter whined. She had been circling around, sniffing nearby bushes, fence posts, and rocks. She was ready to move on.

"Would you care to take a tisane with me?" Malcolm asked. Ben sensed the man's loneliness.

"What about Butter?" Ben said. "She's on her daily walk."

"Will you be through with her walk in a half hour?"

"Probably, give or take a few minutes."

"When you're through with her walk, stop by, and I'll make a tisane for us. That will allow me to finish fertilizing my dahlias against the heat."

"I will," Ben said. "I'll be by in about thirty minutes." He glanced at his watch to mark the time.

"Until then," Malcolm said, and turned back to his watering can. Ben whistled Butter up and they had a nice, though subdued, stroll along the surf line. Butter wasn't quite ready to go home when Ben called to her, but she obeyed. When he left her at home alone, she barked her frustration after him. He had learned to ignore her. According to Emma's report, Butter usually stopped barking as soon as Ben was out of earshot, and didn't start again until he was almost home.

Ben opened the little gate to Malcolm's yard and walked up the white gravel path, neatly lined with rounded river stones, to Malcolm's front door. He knocked, and Malcolm came to welcome him.

"Come in, come in," Malcolm said. He beamed a bright smile at Ben. He had shed his great apron, and was again in full dress with his coat, vest, ruffled shirt, bow tie, dapper trousers creased to perfection, and brilliantly polished shoes. Ben wondered how he kept himself so neat in a place like San Danson Village that lacked sidewalks and other amenities for easing the preservation of one's appearance.

Ben looked around curiously at the cottage. Its furnishings were very like what Ben imagined he'd find in a London gentlemen's gentleman's club. Two large wingback chairs, upholstered in black leather dominated the room. Each had its individual lamp, shaded with a pleated shade adorned with a fringe of tiny beads. A deep red rug, spotlessly free of lint, covered the living room floor. Books and display cases lined the walls. It was too dark for Ben to see what they contained. Every window was blocked with shelves crowded with African violets. Malcolm indicated a chair and bade Ben sit. Ben sat, and Malcolm pranced off to the kitchen.

Very soon, Ben heard the kettle whistle, and the pouring of water into a pot. Real tea, Ben thought, properly made. When Malcolm brought the two cups in on a tray, Ben hid his disappointment on discovering the "tisane" was an infusion of rose hip and chamomile. "A sort of té manaznilla con el sabor de limón," he later described it to Dickon, who laughed. He knew Ben's fastidious preferences in teas. Ben accepted the delicate lavender china cup, fashioned to resemble a tulip in bloom, and silently thanked whatever gods might be present that the cup was a small one.

"Swami Fendabenda tells me," Malcolm began, "that he had you try to find the power he believes resides in his Boddhisattvas."

"Are those his statues that he keeps on a shrine?"

"Yes. He's very attached to them. They are, somehow, a major part of his religious and philosophical beliefs." Malcolm sipped at his tisane. "I do not hold his belief that they contain some sort of transcendental power. I am most skeptical of such things."

"I'm no ready believer in such magic, either," Ben said, "yet I have seen a unicorn here in the Village."

"As have we all," Malcolm said. "I remain skeptical, though, for I once owned one of the set, and Mae Ling the two others." Malcolm got up and took a photograph from one of the bookcases. "We found manuscripts in them. This is a picture of us with the Chinese Consul when we handed the manuscripts over to their government."

"How did they come to be in this country?"

"That is a lengthy story," Malcolm said.

### Get Me to the Chapel

Butter woke Ben. She lavished doggy kisses on him. She had learned early on that Ben woke in a happier mood if she licked his face; he woke irritable if she barked in his ear. Butter knew which side of her boss to soften with a higher priced spread.

Ben yawned, and Butter went on kissing him. After a few pleasurable minutes of this byplay, Butter lost patience. She jumped to the floor, went to the bedroom door, and barked. Ben sighed.

"Yes, Butter. She who must be obeyed has woofed." Ben threw back the covers and pulled on his jeans. Then he put on his shoes and a shirt, and went to the back door and let Butter out. The morning sky was clear, for a change, and the bright sun persuaded Ben to go with Butter.

Ben and Butter walked seaward toward Dickon's cottage. Ben hoped to encounter Dickon. On this far side of his anger with Dickon, he experienced a great desire to know more about the man. He wanted to see Dickon's cottage from the inside. He wanted to know what the contents might reveal about Dickon that Dickon hadn't thought to share before. When Ben and Butter got to the end of the Village Lane, they saw Dickon staring at the Chapel door, which was ajar. Butter raced up to Dickon.

"Hello, old girl," Dickon said to Butter. He nodded to Ben. "Something's screwy," he said. "I know I locked the Chapel yesterday after I swept it out. Someone's been inside." He started for it at a run. Ben followed as quickly as he could. Butter, of course, outpaced them both, and waited at the narrow opening by the slightly opened door, whining. Dickon, puffing a little, caught up with her. Ben, puffing a lot, slowed and walked toward Dickon.

Dickon opened the door slowly. It creaked on its hinges. Ben thought of the Inner Sanctum radio shows of his early boyhood. A shiver traveled up and down his spine. Dickon stepped inside, alert for trouble, and switched on the lights. Ben blinked in the glittering reflections from dozens of mirrors that made up a series of mosaics on the walls. Each mosaic was surrounded by a frame made of broken bits of sea shells. The Chapel had no stained glass windows, but, with the lights, the mosaics made the light in the building dance.

A man lay on the floor, before the dais, face up. He was clad in a very thin T-shirt and worn jeans. He was very thin, and his complexion was very pasty under blushing sunburn. His breath whistled in and out of his lungs like an asthmatic teakettle. Dickon went to him and knelt over him.

"He's got a fever," he said to Ben. "See if you can rouse Dr. Field." Ben and Butter turned and hurried toward Dr. Field's cottage. When they got there, Beau, in his full Kentucky Colonel regalia, answered the door. Ben hoped he could make the man understand his need for the doctor's services.

### Stranger on a Floor

Beau answered the door in his full chicken colonel regalia. Ben could see, standing this close to him, age lines around Beau's eyes and mouth. "Is Dr. Field available?" Ben asked. Beau stared at Butter wagging her tail tentatively behind Ben. She barked sharply, once, and wagged her tail harder. Ben hushed her.

"Is that a dog of war?" Beau responded. Ben looked for a good response.

"Yes," he said. "The General has often used her to carry secret messages."

Beau drew himself up to stand at attention and saluted Butter. "Enter the doctor's quarters, sir," he drawled to Ben. "The doctor will be with you soon." Beau disappeared without opening the screen. Ben opened it and stepped inside. The cottage living room was similar to his own in size. A bright orange couch occupied the left wall under a window. A bright blue recliner and a dull beige one sat on the opposite side of the room. Both recliners looked well worn, but clean. A thin layer of dust lay on the coffee table in front of the couch. There was no dust on the small triangular tables beside each recliner. A floor lamp, not lit, stood between the recliners. Bookshelves crammed with books line the wall facing the door. Ben itched to cross and read the titles, but forbore. The floor was plain pine, scrubbed clean many times over. A few nicks and gouges marred its surface in a charmingly rustic way.

The room reeked of mentholated liniment. The scent was so strong Ben's eyes soon began to water. He was very glad Dr. Field, clad in a short robe, appeared.

"Oh! Beau didn't tell me anyone was here." Dr. Field tightened the sash on his robe.

"I'm sorry to bother you, Dr. Field..." Ben began.

"Chester, please."

"Chester then. There's a man lying in the chapel with a bad fever. At least Dickon thinks he's got a fever. He sent me for you."

"Let me get my clothes on, and I'll be right with you." Dr. Field darted into the back of the cottage. Dickon heard drawers opening and closing. Dr. Field re-appeared very soon, dressed in neat khaki trousers and a soft yellow shirt. He carried a black Gladstone bag in his right hand.

"Let's go," he said. "Beau will be all right," he said, looking over his shoulder. He's lecturing the sparrows on the dangers of Yankee imperialism. That usually keeps him occupied for an hour or so." Dr. Field held the screen for Ben, and followed him out and down the porch steps. Dr. Field walked rapidly; Ben found himself pressed to keep up, and vowed to exercise more strenuously.

When they got to the chapel, Dickon was sitting on his haunches thumbing through the man's wallet. The man was still breathing noisily, and Dr. Field went to him and began a swift examination. Dickon stood without bracing himself against the floor; Ben admired his limber movements.

"He has a high fever," Dr. Field said. "We need to get him to a hospital, so he can have an IV to re-hydrate him."

"How can we get him to the hospital?" Ben asked. "Carry him to the highway, and drive him in?"

"No, I've got a radio," Dr. Field said. "I'll radio the sheriff's department to send a med-evac helicopter. Stay with him, in case he comes to, and needs reassurance." Dr. Field moved quickly out of the chapel.

Dickon smiled at Ben. "Romantic breakfast this isn't," he said.

"I hope whatever this man has isn't contagious," Ben said. "I'm not ready to be sick. I've got other things to do." Dickon grinned outright.

"Yes, we both do. I am hungry, though."

"So am I. We'll survive, I'm sure." Ben looked around the chapel. "This is quite a place. It really glitters. Not what I expect in a chapel."

"It hasn't always been a chapel," Dickon said. "Go look at the mosaics more closely."

Ben got up and went to the nearest mosaic. As he got closer, the glitter blinded him until he was very close, and most of the glare was striking the empty air behind him. Then he could see that the mirrored tiles were subtly shaded different colors. He could just make out the scene the tesserae outlined. A nude lady, rather abstractly rendered, aroused a nude man, also abstractly rendered. The effect was almost comic.

"I call that one Adam and Eve in the Garden," Dickon said, coming up behind Ben. Dickon turned and glanced sideways into Dickon's green eyes that were sparkling with mischief. "You can see Eve is trying to turn Adam on."

"Without much success," Ben said, tracing Adam's organ with his finger. "Needs Steve, I reckon."

"Probably so," Dickon responded. "The next one along," he murmured, "I call The Nativity." He caressed Ben's chest. Ben held his hands and led him along to the next mosaic. It showed a cat with a litter of kittens, surrounded by three children. Ben thought the children were rather ugly. Then he noticed a fourth kitten emerging from the mother cat.

"What on earth did they use this room for in the old days?" he asked Dickon.

"This was originally the recreation room and cafeteria for the resort La Señora's grandfather built. He had an artist friend who designed these mosaics. Not quite family fare, but it really wasn't a family resort."

The man on the floor groaned and coughed. Dickon let go of Ben and they turned and went to him. The man smelled of sickness, a sort of sour and musty smell. Ben breathed carefully through his mouth.

"Let's lift him up," Dickon said, "I think he needs to cough up some phlegm." Ben helped Dickon support the stranger, who by now was semi-conscious. Dickon offered him a handkerchief. The man coughed, cleared his throat, and coughed again.

"Thanks," he said, "down, lie down." They eased him back to the floor.

"Medical help is coming," Dickon said. The man seemed unconscious again. Ben glanced up at Dickon. Dickon had his head cocked, listening. "I think I hear the helicopter now." Ben listened, but it was two or three minutes before he heard the aircraft. Butter cowered next to Ben and whimpered as the noise grew louder. Something in its beat terrified her.

Chester Field came in. "The 'copter's almost here," he said. "I'll ride with this man to the hospital. If I'm not back by lunch, could you see to it Beau gets something to eat?"

"Yes, no problem," Dickon said. Two paramedics waved Dickon and Ben aside as they came through the door with a stretcher. One inserted a needle and started an IV right away. The other checked the man's blood pressure and other vital signs. Then they carefully loaded the man on the stretcher, and carried him to the helicopter. Dr. Field climbed aboard with them, and the ambulance rose into the sky. Ben and Dickon watched it disappear. Butter growled at it until it was out of earshot. Ben rubbed her ears. She barked and wagged her tail, and broke from Ben's petting to race around the flat area in front of the chapel.

"Had your breakfast yet?" Dickon asked.

"No," Ben said. "We haven't."

"You and Butter are invited," Dickon said. "Will you have breakfast with me?"

"Yes," Ben said. "I'm more than ready to eat. Can I bring anything?"

"No," Dickon said. "You and Butter are enough."

### Breakfast at Dickon's

Dickon opened the door of his cottage and held it for Ben. The interior was dim after the bright light outside reflecting off the high clouds and cove waters. Ben blinked two or three times, willing his eyes to adjust quickly. Butter went immediately to the hearthrug and claimed it for her own.

"Welcome to my humble abode," Dickon said. "Make yourself comfortable, and I'll rummage up breakfast." Bookshelves onto which books crowded in layers and heaps lined Dickon's living room. Ben began perusing titles. Children's stories stood cover to cover with dense looking theological tomes and sword and sorcery trilogies. Along with the Narnia Chronicles and the Harry Potter books, the stacks contained _The Joy of Gay Sex_ , Tillich's _Systematic Theology_ , _The Annotated Mother Goose,_ _Iguana with the Wind, a Tale of a Bean-Eating Lizard_ , and _The Complete Poems of Alfred, Lord Tennyson._

"Browsing my bookshelves, eh?" Dickon called from the kitchen.

"How did you know?"

"I saw your eyes light up when you saw my library. I've poked through your titles. It's the natural thing for book lovers to do."

"Guilty as charged, your honor."

Dickon stuck his head around the kitchen door. "Come on out. You can watch me cook."

"Sounds like fun."

Ben went into the kitchen. Butter followed him and sat beside him. Ben observed the appliances in the kitchen were twins of the ones in his own kitchen. Modest cost models, serviceable, but not elegant, in basic white. The linoleum on the floor was alternating red and yellow squares, the colors rather muted. Ben's floor was alternating black and white squares. Ben's table was a square one, but Dickon's table was round, with only two chairs.

He watched Dickon move around the kitchen, marveling again at how trim his body was for a man in his fifties. He drank in Dickon's smooth, almost too-young face and thick red hair speckled with gray. From time to time Dickon glanced at Ben with his green eyes sparkling with mischief. Ben suspected Dickon knew he was admiring him. Dickon seemed to enjoy it.

"Bacon or ham?"

"Bacon, I think."

"Good. Fries quick." Dickon laid out the bacon in the pan. Then he took out a carton of eggs from the refrigerator. He broke six eggs into a measuring cup he took from the cupboard by the sink. He got a whisk from a drawer. He took several spice bottles from a rack next to the stove and, measuring by eye, seasoned the eggs. Then he began whisking the eggs, gyrating his hips in synch with the strokes of the whisk. Ben wondered if this was a special performance, or an unconscious habit. He was about to ask when Butter raced, barking, to the front door. Ben got up to quiet her.

"See who it is," Dickon said.

When Ben opened the door, his fingers hooked in Butter's collar, Willy Waugh stood on the porch.

"Dickon here?" he asked.

"Yes, of course. Come in." Ben stood back and opened the door, trying not to stare at Willy's briefs. Willy seemed oblivious to Ben's sidelong glances.

"No. La Señora wants to see Dickon, and you too, Mr. Soul. Come up the trail when you're through eating." Willy turned and went down the steps. Ben admired the view openly. Willy turned and said, "Don't lollygag. She's waiting." Then he marched off toward the chapel and disappeared toward its back. Dickon closed the door and released Butter's collar. She whined after Willy a moment. Then she trotted to the kitchen to see what Dickon was cooking.

"Who was it?" Dickon called from the kitchen.

"Willy Waugh. He says La Señora wants to see us as soon as we've eaten. He said something about using the trail?" Ben went toward the kitchen.

"Oh, the funicular must be down. There's a trail goes up the mountain behind the chapel. We can go that way." Dickon turned the heat up under the bacon pan and the omelet pan. "Let me concentrate," he said, "so I don't burn the eggs. Can you make the toast? The bread's in the refrigerator. Make a couple of extra slices for Beau."

"Sure." Ben took out the bread and butter, popped four slices into the double toaster, and waited. When the bread popped up, Ben buttered the toast. Dickon declared the omelet ready and the bacon cooked. They ate swiftly; if La Señora wanted them, something must be up. He put half of each on a plate for Ben and the rest on another plate for himself.

While he ate, he scrambled three more eggs. He put these on a plate with the extra toast Ben had made. Ben wished for ketchup for his omelet, to complement the delicate balance of herbs and spices Dickon had included in it, but he hadn't seen any in the refrigerator, and suspected Dickon was one of those rare souls who didn't keep the condiment around.

"We'll let the dishes soak," Dickon said, and plunged them into the sink, running water to fill it half way. "Don't suppose La Señora will mind our informal clothes. This summons sounds like don't wait for the tux and cummerbund. Need a comb?"

"Do I?"

"You're a bit windblown. I'll lend you a clean one; I keep a supply on hand." Dickon went to the bathroom and got a purple comb for Ben. He tucked a green one in his own pocket. Then he wrapped plastic wrap around the eggs and toast he had put on a plate for Beau. They would drop these off on the way.

"By the way," Ben said, "how many people live with Dr. Field? I thought Juan Loosa, the man I met at the beach party, lived with him."

"He does. So does Beau." Dickon stared down at the plate he had wrapped. "Also Luis."

"Luis?"

"A young boy." Dickon looked up at Ben. "You might as well know. You're definitely a Villager by now."

"Know what?"

"Three people, Juan, Beau, and Luis, all live in the same body. Dr. Field takes care of them."

"Oh. I've heard about such things." Ben smiled at Dickon. "I reckon one plate of eggs will feed all three of them, then."

"Yes."

"What do you suppose La Señora wants with us?"

"Probably a first-hand account of the man in the Chapel," Dickon said, as he put a light jacket on. Ben had a heavier shirt, and needed no cloak to warm him.

"Butter should stay here," Dickon said.

"You sure you don't mind?"

"She's a good dog," Dickon said. "I'm sure she'll be okay."

Ben bid Butter stay and guard the house. Butter objected, but to no avail. When they closed the door on her, she lay on the hearthrug, dejected, and slept.

After they had delivered Beau's breakfast, Dickon led Ben behind the Chapel, and pointed out the trail. It was a worn track between the sagebrush and wild grasses on the mountain. It wound back and forth with many switchbacks, make the ascent not steep, but rather longer than the distance between the house and the chapel seemed to be. Dickon stopped several times to look at the ocean and catch his breath. Once they sighted the llamas in the shade of some small trees chewing their cuds. By the time they got to the top of the mountain, the sun had lanced through the shield of the clouds and wrapped the manor house in a noose of gold. Ben wished he had a camera to capture the moment.

### Conference

Dickon led Ben around one end of the great house to the front door. He pressed a small button on the doorframe. In a moment, Elke Hall came to let them in.

"It's good you have come," she said. "La Señora is waiting. She is troubled, I think." Elke motioned them in. "La Señora has just taken breakfast on the patio," she said. "Have you eaten?" She looked from Dickon to Ben, and then back to Dickon.

"Yes, we have eaten," Dickon said.

"Shall I bring you hot cocoa?"

"That would be nice," Dickon said. Ben nodded his agreement.

"Come, then." Elke led them down the hall, past the dining room and the library all the way to the end. A small door opened out on a semi-enclosed patio. The sun at this hour had warmed one corner of it. La Señora sat at a small table there. She looked frailer than Ben remembered her. Dickon went to her.

"Good morning," he said. "I trust you are well?"

"As well as can be expected, Dickon, for an old woman like me." Her voice was strong and steady, and the force of her personality had not faded. Ben smiled at her.

"Welcome, Mr. Soul," she said. "I'm glad you are both here. I've need of every ally."

Dickon and Ben took seats on the brick benches built into the patio walls.

"What's happened?" Dickon asked.

"You know part of it," she said. "You found that man on the Chapel floor. Do you have any idea who he is?"

"The name on his identification said 'Haven Fitz'," Dickon said. "He didn't have an address."

"I think he might have been in prison until recently," Ben added. "He was awfully pale."

"Willy says he has been scrambling up and down the mountain for a couple of days. Willy thought at first he was just a stray camper from the Coastal Commission Park, but we found out early this morning the park is closed to campers temporarily. He hasn't bothered the llamas, as far as we can tell. Nothing in his gear or his behavior suggests he is a naturalist, or bird specialist."

"Why do you think he was here?" Dickon asked.

"I think he's a spy," La Señora said. "Not a very effective one, perhaps, but I definitely think he was looking us over."

Elke brought the hot cocoa just then. Tiny pink marshmallows floated in the rich dark liquid. A subtle touch of cloves rose with the steam. Ben sipped the hot fluid with care and great appreciation.

Within the house, the telephone rang. Ben and Dickon could hear Elke answering it. La Señora did not appear to hear the telephone. She looked out over the small garden just beyond the patio. The marigolds and zinnias were overblown and ragged. It meant to her the melancholy of autumn was upon them, that last full ripeness that comes before the persistent wet of gray winter. She sighed. More than most years, it oppressed her. She said nothing to her guests about her mood. One did not discourage one's allies with news of one's own uncertainty.

Elke came out. "I've just talked with Dr. Field," she said. "There's some confusion about identifying the man in the Chapel. His papers say his name is Haven Fitz. He came out of his stupor long enough to name himself Haakon Spitz. He made Dr. Field promise that would be the name on his tombstone, if he didn't make it."

"Here's another mystery, then," La Señora said. "Too many mysteries piling on mysteries."

Willy Waugh joined them, coming in from the garden. His jockey shorts were dusty, the first time Ben had ever seen them in anything but pristine condition.

"What to do about mysteries?" Willy asked.

"Do we need more eyes and ears on the mountain at night?" La Señora asked.

"Might help. Might not. This one was a daylight stalker." Willy appraised Ben and Dickon. "Not much good at it," he added.

"He was sick," Dickon said. "Probably has been for several days. Maybe he was just confused. Strong illnesses can do that."

"Spy." Willy put his opinion into one spat out word.

Elke said, "Dr. Field told me Deputy Sharif is looking into the official records to clarify the confusion. Meanwhile, the man is responding as well as can be expected to antibiotics."

"If it should become necessary to patrol the Village and the mountain, may I recruit you, Ben and Dickon, for such duty."

"Certainly," Ben said.

"Sure thing," Dickon said.

"Who would want to spy on us?" Elke inquired.

"Vanna Dee." Willy was emphatic. Dickon nodded vigorously.

"She'd try anything to get her way," Dickon said. The cold note in his voice chilled Ben's soul.

"Perhaps," La Señora said.

"Probably," Elke said.

La Señora stared a long moment at the ragged marigolds. She nodded once, as though she had decided a point. After a further short silence she spoke.

"For now we do not know enough to be certain this Fitz-Spitz man was a spy. We must be on guard, however, against the possibility. Please keep alert, all of you." She looked at each of them in turn. Each responded to her stare with a solemn nod.

"Now, if you will excuse me, I must go lie down for a bit. I have not slept well this last while, and need a nap to recoup." She got unsteadily to her feet. Before Ben or Dickon could move, Willy and Elke were on either side of La Señora, ready to support her. Their movement had the grace of long practice.

"Old ladies are bothered with old bodies. What a nuisance!" La Señora said, and went in.

"We'll see ourselves down the hill," Dickon called after her and her two attendants. Elke waved goodbye at them. They made their way through the house and down the hill to the Chapel.

### Irate Butter

When Ben and Dickon reached the Chapel, Dickon stopped Ben and kissed him. Ben resisted at first, and then yielded. Mischievous smiling lights danced in Dickon's green eyes and over his cheeks dusted with the palest possible freckles. Ben wanted to lick those freckles, to see if they'd wash off. He restrained himself. Dickon backed off, frowning.

"Sorry," he said. He went to his cottage and let Butter out. "I'm going to have to go to Wong Brothers," Dickon said. "I've got to do the shopping. Do you want to come?"

Ben smiled shyly at him. His gray eyes pleaded for understanding. "Yes, I want to come, but I'd better go home and feed Butter," he said. She's probably feeling neglected about now."

"You're probably right. See you later?"

"Yes," Ben said.

"When? If you stop by my place later," Dickon said, "I'll get us something for a late lunch. Probably salami; that's all Wong Brothers has had lately." Dickon shrugged. "Bologna would be nice for a change, or even souse."

"Anything but liverwurst. I don't do liverwurst." Ben twisted his nose and scrunched up his cheeks to indicate his dislike.

Dickon laughed. "I don't like that stuff, either." Ben and Dickon started walking toward the Station. A playful finger of wind tousled his red hair, and went on to disarrange Ben's thinning brown strands. Ben stopped at his gate. Butter raced to the door, barking furiously that she wanted to go inside. "I'd better get in there," he said. "She's going crazy. Doesn't like her routine upset, I guess."

"See you later," Dickon said. He started toward the Station, but turned and blew Ben a kiss, before he went on. Ben waved at his back and went in to face an irate Butter.

Butter was not at the door to greet Ben. She was barking furiously in the kitchen. Ben went warily; any out-of-character behavior on Butter's part could spell trouble. He crept toward the kitchen.

Butter was at the table, with her paws on its edge, a most grievous breach of etiquette on her part. Ben was shocked. Butter knew her few rules, and obeyed them without question. Then he saw the object of her furious barking. A small gray and white cat sat, unconcernedly licking the butter, in the center of the table. It pretended not to notice the ferocious dog aching to get at it, although, Ben noticed, it kept a wary eye corner aimed in Butter's direction. Someone knocked at the kitchen door.

Ben shouted at Butter to be quiet, with no result. Butter went on angrily advising the cat in no-nonsense canine language that it had transgressed exceedingly much. Sighing, Ben went to the door and opened it.

A younger version of Emma stood on the porch. Her hair was soft brown, and her figure shapely, for a woman. She wore aesthetically tight blue jeans, and a gray sweater that supported and displayed her breasts and flat abdomen to good advantage. Her eyes were blue, and twinkled like birthday candles. Ben thought to himself that she'd have been a beautiful boy.

"Yes?" he shouted over Butter's tirade.

"I think I can stop that," she shouted back, "if there's a gray and white cat in your house."

"There is. Come in, please, and get the cat." He held the door for her. She went to the table to pick up the cat that was still licking the butter. Ben grabbed Butter by the collar and pulled her back. The woman picked up the cat and cradled it against her sweater.

"Sorry," she said, and took the cat out. Butter's furious barking followed it all the way to the door. Then she looked up at Ben and wagged her tail slowly and tentatively.

"You were ferocious," Ben said. "You terrified that poor cat." He rubbed her behind the ears. Her tail moved more confidently. "Yes, she intruded. How she got in I don't know." Ben began to look around the kitchen for gaps between the walls and the floor, holes in the screen, or other signs of forced feline entry. He was still looking when another knock came on the kitchen door.

The young woman was back, sans cat, this time with a plate of cookies in hand. Oatmeal and date cookies this time.

"I'm so sorry about Ermentrude's intrusion," she said. Ermentrude, Ben guessed, was the small cat. "She doesn't get on too well with Prime Pussy, you see. Will cookies help me apologize?"

"Yes, to me," Ben said. "I'm an easy pushover. I won't speak for Butter, though." Butter spoke for herself with a low growl. "No, Butter," Ben said authoritatively. Butter slunk off into a corner. "Would you like some tea?" Ben asked.

"Yes, that would be nice," the woman said. "Let me introduce myself," she went on as Ben took the cookies from her and put the plate on the table. Not too close to the cat-licked butter, however.

"You're Notta Freed, Emma's daughter," Ben said. "You can't deny it. You look too much like her."

"Guilty as charged."

Ben put the kettle on, got down two cups, and put a teabag in each. "I hope plain tea is okay," he said. "I don't much go for the varietals."

"Plain tea is fine," Notta said.

"Have you come for a visit?"

"Yes. I've got three weeks off, so I toddled up from the City to see Mother."

"Will you be here the full three weeks?"

"That depends on how tired Mother and I get of each other."

The kettle whistled. Ben made the tea and brought a cup to Notta. "Sugar? Cream? I don't have lemon."

"Plain is fine. Have a cookie."

Ben took one, bit into it, closed his eyes, and sighed in ecstasy. "Superb!" he pronounced.

"They should be," Notta said. "Mother made them." She took her teacup and swallowed deeply. Ben wondered that she didn't burn her throat.

"Good tea," Notta said. "Mother says you've been here since late spring."

"Yes. I saw the cabin was for rent one day, quite by chance, and applied to La Señora for residency." The afternoon was growing middle-aged when Dickon returned. Notta was just leaving; she and Ben had exchanged idle chatter for almost an hour.

"Oh, hello, Notta," Dickon said as he came in. "Up for your annual visit?"

"Yes, Dickon. I've just been getting acquainted with Ben here," she said. "Thanks to Ermentrude's interference. Ben can tell you all about it," she went on. "I promised Mother we'd go to dinner tonight in Las Tumbas, and I've still got to wash my hair. I'll see you later, guys." She went out the door.

"Only crumbs left, I see," Dickon said. "Now I don't feel guilty about being late with the salami."

"We'll have it for supper," Ben said. Butter thumped her tail, got up, and brushed against Dickon's legs. When he didn't respond to her, she whined.

"Sorry, Butter," Dickon said and bent to rub her ears and scratch her rump just above her tail. "I saw Chester in the Station. He looked very tired. I guess he had to work pretty hard to keep our intruder alive until they got to Las Tumbas. He felt he should stay for several hours to see the man through the crisis. I need a cup of tea, and I can tell you all about it."

"Okay, then I'll take Butter for her afternoon run."

"I'll come with you, if that's all right."

"Okay." Ben put the kettle on.

### Such a Nun

No hospital ever sleeps; indeed, the patients are either blessed or comatose if they can sleep. Beeping machines and calls for Doctors and nurses penetrate the night with persistent urgency. Add to this the groans and cries of those whose pain has driven them beyond caring, and a brass band could practice unheard in the halls.

Sister Beatified patrolled this universe of cacophony bringing silent comfort to the ill and distressed. Sister Beatified had taken her vows as a teenaged nun, and never regretted her marriage with God. God probably never regretted it, either. After stints in school with unruly students scarcely controlled by sturdy rulers and bruised knuckles, a wise Mother Superior had assigned Sister Beatified to hospital work.

Sister, who had never been prone to idle chatter, took up the practice of silent prayer and silent comforting of the ill. She could, with a touch, bring calm to a restless patient, relief to a painful limb, hope to a despairing heart, and releasing tears to a grieving widow. Sister Beatified was a prized institution at Las Tumbas General Hospital.

Now in her seventies, she was stooped with osteoporosis and the burdens of age. Very traditional in her habit, she typified the black robed white wimpled nun cruel boys had labeled penguins in the old days. Most of Sister's order wore modern dresses, sober in color and decent in hem length. Sister Beatified had special dispensation to keep her traditional garb.

Once she had glided up and down the corridors of the hospital. Now she shuffled, determined as ever to bring what relief she could to any and all patients. She smiled as she left a young mother's room. The woman, severely ill with post-partum depression, was at last beginning to see a positive side to life with a baby in tow. Sister Beatified had done her bit, without a word.

Sister nodded to the person in gray-green hospital garb who was striding along the hall with purpose. The person did not acknowledge Sister. Sister whispered a prayer for the person's benefit and passed by. A great chill assaulted Sister Beatified's spirit. Darkness pounded at her very soul. She stopped short, nearly falling over her own feet, so sudden was her halting. Something was wrong.

Sister Beatified had met evil before, of course. No one could live fifty plus years in a religious institution without meeting many faces of darkness. Never before, however, had the passing of a stranger so battered at her soul. Sister Beatified turned, and watched the person in hospital scrubs striding along the corridor. Something compelled her to follow. She shuffled after the figure as rapidly as her trembling legs and aching feet allowed her.

The person she followed did nothing unusual. Now that Sister looked closely, she determined the figure was a woman from her stride. Sister Beatified followed her through the maternity ward, past the pediatrics department (Sister breathed a sigh of relief when the evil didn't stop to pollute the innocent babes), and to the elevator. Sister caught up with the woman just as the elevator doors opened. They entered the elevator together.

The woman pressed the button for the next floor. "What floor?" the woman asked. Her voice was hard.

"The same," Sister Beatified said. The dark cold miasma of wrongness was filling the cubicle as it rose. Sister wondered that the weight of evil did not depress the car so much it could not rise.

It seemed an eternity before the doors opened on the next floor. The woman in the scrubs marched out and went to the nurse's station for Intensive Care. Sister Beatified followed as unobtrusively as she could.

Sister's hearing wasn't quite what it had been when she was young, so she couldn't make out what the woman asked the nurse on duty. Evidently, she wanted a certain patient, as she turned and went directly down the hall to a specific room. Sister Beatified nodded to the nurse on duty and followed the mysterious woman. The duty nurse paid no particular attention to the familiar nun. The staff accepted her goings and comings as part of the background of the hospital.

Sister Beatified followed the woman into a room. She noted the room number. Ah, yes, the man found on San Danson Mountain nearly dead from pneumonia. The struggle had been great, and Sister had visited him several times, until he began to turn around. Then she had moved on to more critical cases. What could this woman in scrubs want with the man?

The light in the room was dim after the bright corridor. Sister Beatified could just make out the shape of the woman in scrubs leaning over the patient. Sister waited a moment for her eyes to adjust. Then she shuffled toward the bed. It was like running uphill against a stream of icy wind. Sister Beatified persevered. Slowly the woman in scrubs straightened and turned toward Sister. The woman held a syringe, the plunger extended, with a sinister looking yellow fluid in it. Then Sister saw the woman's foot was on the oxygen tube, pinching it shut. The man in the bed began breathing raggedly.

"In God's Name," Sister said. "Move your foot!" A long moment of struggle ensued. To Sister Beatified it seemed an eternity. Then the cold evil retreated, and the woman in scrubs fled the room. Sister hurried to the bed; the patient was beginning to breathe more easily.

Sister put her hand on his arm. He opened his eyes and smiled at her. His face was gaunt, but his eyes were clear.

"Thank you, Sister," he said, and closed his eyes. Sister Beatified sent silent prayers Godward. She left the room long enough to go to the nurse's station. She took the phone and dialed for an outside line. Then she dialed the sheriff's office.

DiConti Sharif answered. Sister Beatified knew him well.

"Deputy," she said, "this is Sister Beatified at Las Tumbas General. I think a woman just tried to murder one of our patients. Perhaps you should come over, and I can tell you all about it."

"I'll be by within the half hour," DiConti said. "Where shall I meet you?"

"In Intensive Care. You know where that is?"

"All too well. Be careful, Sister."

"I'm just going to sit and pray with this patient. I will be well."

"Be with you soon," DiConti said, and hung up the phone. Sister Beatified put the receiver on the hook on her end and shuffled back to the threatened patient to keep vigil.

### The Patient

When DiConti got to the Hospital, Sister Beatified was waiting for him in Haakon's room.

"Deputy," she greeted him, "thank you for coming." Haakon slept uneasily. His breathing was much clearer than it had been, but he still breathed raspingly.

"Can you give me a full description of the person you found in here?" DiConti asked.

Sister Beatified described the intruder's aura of evil. It was only after her narrative that DiConti remembered Sister Beatified's worldly eyesight was very dim, while her spiritual or psychic insight was magnificent. He quickly realized she could not give him an adequate description for a police all points bulletin.

"Do you think this patient is in continued danger?" he asked the Sister.

"Yes," she said. "Get him out of here, if you have any place to take him."

"I'll call his doctor," DiConti said. He went into the corridor and found the nurses' station. He had the Sheriff's office patch him through to the radio room, and then asked the operator to call Dr. Field's frequency. It took a little time to arouse the doctor, but he had left the radio on to be available in case Haakon's condition worsened significantly.

"Dr. Field here," he said when all the electronic connections had been made. Tonight his voice sounded as clearly as a telephone in the next room might have.

"Dr. Field," DiConti said, "DiConti Sharif here. The hospital called me in because someone has tried to harm your patient. Sister Beatified...do you know her? Of course, everyone does...found a woman, not one of the nurses, about to inject something into your patient's IV hookup."

"Did she succeed?"

"No, Sister frightened her off before she accomplished any harm."

"How's Mr. Spitz?"

"Sleeping, although his breath rattles a little."

"Sounds like normal recovery is progressing. Can you stand guard over him until I can get there?"

"Should I send a helicopter?"

"No, I'll borrow a car from La Señora."

"Can you suggest a place where Mr. Spitz will be safe while he continues to recuperate?"

"Let me check. I may have a place he can stay in the Village, or at the Station."

"It's pretty late; will anybody be up?"

"For this I'll wake somebody."

"I'll wait for you," DiConti said. He went back to Haakon's room. He tried to send Sister Beatified to rest, but she refused.

"I'll watch with you," she said. "You guard his body. I'll pray for him." She took a worn rosary from her habit pocket, and began to whisper her beads. The rhythm and peace of the sound relaxed DiConti. He nearly fell asleep thinking of Notta Freed.

Sister Beatified knew the Doctor had come in before DiConti quite realized it. She rose, stiffly, from the hard chair by Haakon's bed and spoke softly to the Doctor.

"The man sleeps comfortably," she said. "I believe he suffered no harm tonight. He needs to be with people who will love him." Then she left the room, bent on other hearts to comfort and other hurts to ease.

Dr. Field went to Haakon's quiet form. "He's breathing fairly easily," he said to DiConti, who stood now by his side.

"Sister prayed for him," DiConti said. "While she watched over him."

"She's enough to make an agnostic a believer." Dr. Field listened to Haakon's lungs with his stethoscope. "He's well enough, I think, that we can move him. I'll take him to the Village. We'll take care of him there."

Dr. Field woke Haakon and swiftly explained to him that he'd be safer at an undisclosed location. DiConti supported Haakon in an upright position, while Dr. Field helped him dress. Then Dr. Field went to the nurses' station, commandeered a wheel chair, and settled Haakon in it. Dr. Field checked his patient's vital signs again, and nodded.

"We can take him out now," he said. They wheeled him to the elevator, and, on the main floor, made for the service entrance. DiConti brought the police car around, and put Haakon in the passenger's seat and buckled him in. He put the wheel chair in the trunk.

"You can follow me," DiConti said to Dr. Field. "I'll help you get him settled...where? At the motel?"

"No, I've arranged for Emma Freed, and her daughter Notta, to take him in. He'll be less visible in the Village."

A thrill went through DiConti. He concealed it from Dr. Field; it had more to do with seeing Notta again than with anything Haakon's condition could prompt. "How will we get him up into the Village?" he asked.

"Notta can help. She said she will meet us there," Dr. Field said.

"Okay," DiConti said. "Follow me down the River. I'll wait for you when I get to the Station."

"See you there, then."

Dr. Field turned and walked across the lot to the physicians' parking. He did not see a dark figure pass briefly through the bright cone shed from a parking lot light. He got in the touring car he had borrowed from La Señora and left the lot. Vanna watched the cars go from her shadows.

Dr. Field drove carefully along the River Road to the Station. DiConti's taillights, ahead of him, disappeared around the first curve. Dr. Field, who drove infrequently, took his time. DiConti, of course, made top speed on the road he drove once a day or more often in his patrols.

The Station was dark, except for a dim light burning in front of the garages. DiConti guessed this was where Juan, and maybe Notta, waited for them.

Beside him, Haakon slept in the passenger seat, not even waking when DiConti turned off the engine and lights. The garage door slid open, revealing a brighter light inside. A figure leaned against a car in the garage. DiConti's heart sped up; it was surely Notta.

### Dickon Dreams of a Crone

Dickon was in a forest of dark, forbidding trees. Moonlight scattered the ghastly white of bleached bones wherever a few breaks in the canopy allowed. The moonlight only made the shadows deeper. He was seeking something, some warm, bright, happy thing that had been spirited away by an evil force to purposes nefarious. The world depended on Dickon. Dickon had no sword, neither armor nor spear nor hope. Yet he plodded forward under the dripping trees. Behind him moon-pierced darkness. Before him moon-pierced darkness. On every side clumps of vile-smelling parasitic vegetation dangled from the trees, swaying ghostly gray in the breeze whose breath carried the dead stench of swamps stagnant with rot.

On his left, a clearing opened. Hard-packed earth shook under the tramping feet of dancing kangaroos. Two frenzied circles faced each other. The outer one stamped a rhythm counter-clockwise; the other made a syncopated counterpoint stamping clockwise. Each beast's eyes glowed red with an infernal fire. Beams shot from their fiery eyes and died in the bone white moonlight. Frost glittered in the air; steam rose from the stamping kangaroos.

Slowly Dickon became aware of a straggle-haired crone, gowned in tattered black, beating a stick on a hollow log to set the rhythm. She fixed her blind eyes on the moon, reflecting that orb's light from their blank white. As she whacked her primitive drum, she cackled a song that had no tune. Dickon shuddered. He felt the drumming and her singing drawing him into the mad thumping frenzy of the kangaroos.

"No!" he groaned. "Stop!" he commanded. The drumming paused in mid-beat. The crone turned her unseeing eyes in his direction. Dickon took up a branch that lay near him. It became a sword. The crone raised her stick to begin the dance again, once more fixing her eyes on the uncaring moon.

Dickon moaned a prayer to gods he did not know. His branch became a sword, black with old bloodstains. He swung it in a great whistling arc that swept the crone's head from her shoulders. Black ichor erupted from her neck. Slowly the upraised arm fell with one last thunk upon the dead log, shattering it. The body toppled over. The head, its eyes still fixed on the blank moon, rolled into the shadows.

A great stillness came over the kangaroos. Then, with one mighty shout and upraised arms they sank into the earth. The early sun rose, frightening the moon from the sky, and touching the clearing with rose and peach light. A merry music of pipes and viols echoed through the clearing, and a white horse came, caparisoned with gems and gold, and bowed a foreleg before Dickon, inviting him to mount. A suit of armor, chased in gold and silver appeared. Dickon donned it, and mounted the charger. They rode away into the sunrise.

### The Rising Past

Dr. Field's knock wakened Notta and Emma. Notta, ever the braver, answered the door. Emma had stood behind her, ready to render assistance should it be some intruder bent on evil who thus roused them in the night's middle. When they saw it was Dr. Field, they invited him in as soon as he said he had an emergency and needed their help.

He swiftly explained to them the threat to his patient. Notta and Emma agreed to take the poor man in and give him shelter. While Dr. Field drove to Las Tumbas to retrieve the man, Emma and Notta made up the bed Notta had been using with clean sheets and blankets and moved her belongings into Emma's room. Then Emma made them a cup of strong coffee. Notta drank hers quickly, and left for the garage to wait for Dr. Field, and, he had mentioned in passing, DiConti. The stricken patient was of less importance in Notta's mind. Emma stayed in the cottage. She paced in her living room where she had laid and started a fire.

Emma, on the other hand, fixated on the patient. Dr. Field had referred to him twice as "Mr. Spitz" and once as "Haakon." The name aroused old feelings she had long forgotten, of the golden day of the Great Temblor and the conception of Notta. What if it were he? How should she handle it? Would he even remember her? Where had he been for all these years?

Emma could provide herself no answers to these questions, of course. She could only ask them, over and over, as she crossed and re-crossed her living room, now and again darting into the spare bedroom to be sure everything was done up properly. Several times she mocked herself for being so dithered and doddering. Then she returned to the litany of questions, wheeling through them like Tibetan prayer wheels in a Himalayan wind.

Down at the garage, DiConti helped the now conscious Haakon to shift into the wheelchair next to the car. The path to the Village was rough, but, with Notta's help, and Dr. Field guiding, DiConti hoped to make the transit without undue harm to Haakon. It might not have worked, of course, if Haakon had had broken bones. He was simply too weak to walk very far, though he could manage a few steps. Dr. Field checked his vital signs, gave him a further pain shot, and motioned to Notta and DiConti. Haakon looked up as Notta stepped into the light pool where his wheelchair sat.

"Emma?" he said. "I thought your eyes were black." Delivered of this cryptic comment, he lapsed again into drowsing sleep. Notta shook her head and put the comment aside in her mind. DiConti began pushing the wheelchair up the path toward the Village. When they encountered rough patches, where the path was too uneven to maneuver the wheelchair successfully, they locked the wheels, and DiConti on one wheel, Notta on the other, and Dr. Field in back, lifted it over the rough patch. Haakon weighed less than most full-grown adults. That made it easier for the three of them to handle Haakon in his chair. They only had to lift it four times to get it up onto the Village ledge, where the flatter land made smoother going.

Emma opened the door as they lifted Haakon and the wheelchair up the three steps onto her cottage porch. A faint gray light glimmered in the east; dawn was not far off. Emma searched the man's face as they wheeled him into her home. She nodded, once, as though half-convinced of something. None of the others noticed her nod. Prime Pussy retreated to the kitchen. This late invasion was far more disturbance than she wanted. Ermentrude, ever the adventurous one, dashed out the front door in the midst of the mélange of wheels and feet. No one noticed her going. Ermentrude flashed her tail in triumph at her heedless audience, and began prowling the weeds and grasses for night prey.

Notta and DiConti settled Haakon in the spare bed. Emma bent over him to look closely at him. Notta and DiConti left the room. They needed to connect, and, though they used few words, they communicated much. In her dreams on the mountain, the unicorn with the unique horn smiled as she slept in her llama suit. Her evening's main effort was fruitful.

Dr. Field checked Haakon's vitals again. "He's doing well," he said to Emma. "He's stronger than he looks." Emma brushed a lock of Haakon's hair, more gray than blonde, from his forehead. The body on the bed was not the sculpture of muscle she remembered. She was unsure of her identification.

"What did you say his name is?" she asked Dr. Field.

"His papers say 'Haven Fitz,'" the Doctor replied, "but he claims 'Haakon Spitz' is his name."

Tension rose in Emma. "What color are his eyes?" she asked. Dr. Field noted the taut wire note in her voice.

"Blue," he said. "Why?"

"Because," Emma said, drawing in a deep breath, "I may have known this man many years ago."

"From his pallor, I'd guess he's been in prison until very recently." Dr. Field frowned. "He's very weak, or I wouldn't have brought him here."

"Notta's with me," Emma said. "She's stronger than you'd guess. And wilier. We'll be all right." Emma studied the man's face again. "I think I know him, anyway. What should I offer him when he wakes up?"

"Broth or gruel," Dr. Field said. "And plenty of water. I'll hook up an IV before I go, of course. I've just got to bring the stand from the garage."

"Broth or gruel it is," Emma said. "Sounds awfully dull for a sick man."

"He's through the crisis. He'll be wanting more substantial food soon enough. I'd avoid chili peppers and the like for a while, though. Stomach's often delicate after heavy pneumonia."

"How about tapioca pudding?"

"Tomorrow afternoon, maybe. If he wants it." Dr. Field sighed. "I'll go get the IV stand and saline solution now. Then I'm off to bed. I've had a long time without uninterrupted sleep."

"Go," Emma said. "I'll watch over him, until you come back." As soon as Dr. Field had gone, taking DiConti with him, Notta came into the room. Frustration gnawed at Emma. She had hoped to examine the full man to see if she recognized anything, although she couldn't remember birthmarks or scars.

"Strange," Notta said. "He looked at me like he knew me." She smoothed her brown hair into some semblance of order. "He called me by your name."

Her round face, with its slightly broader than prescribed nose, full mouth, and chin that ended in a small, dimpled, point echoed Emma's face. Only the gray hair framing Emma's face and her black eyes were markedly different. Age had not wrinkled Emma yet, and the City's harsh smogs had erased the dewy youth from Notta's complexion.

"He said a strange thing, too," she went on. "He said something about he thought my eyes were black."

Emma nodded. Surety grew in her that this was the Haakon she had known. It was too early to tell Notta. She had to sound out Haakon first, to find out whether he remembered her and that afternoon in a falling hotel bouncing on the heaving earth. "We'll ask him about it when he wakes up. Now, get some sleep. I'll take the first watch."

"Yes, Mother," Notta yawned. She smiled sleepily. "By the way, I had a nice evening with DiConti."

"I'm glad, dear," her mother said, fixing her attention on the patient in the bed. Notta wryly observed to herself that her mother had a new project, this patient, and was already lost in executing some plan she had in mind. Emma was asking herself where Haakon could have been, and why had he come back to her.

### Morning Shadows

Ben woke from his dreams irritable and un-rested. He struggled out of bed to let Butter out for her morning yard patrol. Sand gritted in his eyes. His head was thick, as though yesterday's hangover had hung on. He drank three glasses of cold water, shivering when the water dribbled on his bare stomach.

Butter barked at the back door. It was her "Let me in" bark, a short woof designed to disturb the neighbors very little. Ben let Butter in and gave her a morning treat. She went back to bed. Ben sat in a kitchen chair, letting the cold wood impress its chill on his body. Misery welled in him.

He contemplated himself. So folded and flabby, he thought. His bloated belly, covered with goose pimples and fine gray hairs offended him. He felt old and unlovable. He sat in the cold chair deepening his gloom while morning cajoled the shadows into the corners of the kitchen. One by one, he noted the ache in each of his joints, committing the catalog of pain to memory. He thought about making tea, and he thought about going back to bed. Neither thought moved him to action.

A small scrabbling noise distracted him. Some rodent rooting in the walls, perhaps. He listened. A loud meow shattered the mother-of-pearl morning light. Ermentrude intruded from behind the stove. Butter raced from the bedroom, barking furiously. Butter frightened Ermentrude, who leaped from the floor to Ben's bare lap and then to a clawing perch on his right shoulder. All Ben's morning misery rose like bile in his throat.

"Bad dog!" he yelled at Butter. "Bad, Bad, Bad!" Butter kept barking; Ermentrude sunk her claws deeper into Ben's now-bleeding shoulder. Ben reached with his left hand and took Ermentrude by the nape of her neck. He was sorely tempted to shake the cat with an eye to breaking her neck, but he forbore. He took her to the front door, pursued by the furiously barking Butter, opened the door and its screen a crack, and dumped the indignant cat on the porch. It spat at him as he closed the door. Butter continued to advise the cat of its proper place in the scheme of things.

"Damn it, Butter," Ben yelled, "shut the hell up!" He stamped his feet at her, and grabbed a newspaper, rolled it up, and swatted her. "Shut up!" he screamed at her. Butter slunk off to the bedroom, her final refuge. This furious Ben was a creature she had never seen, and did not want to know.

Ben went to the bathroom and put some antiseptic on his cat scratches. Then he went to the kitchen and made his tea. It did not mellow him. He was tired. He hurt. His mind went round and round the "if-only Dickon had..." track, until his thoughts jangled in his mind like an out-of-tune calliope on an un-greased carousel. His mind was bitter; his tea was more so. He poured out half the second cup.

The cold came through to him at last. He went into the bedroom to dress. He put on his jeans and a warm shirt. He sat on the edge of the bed to put on his shoes and socks. Usually Butter came, at this point in their morning ritual, and put her head under one or the other of his arms to nuzzle him so he would rub her. This morning she lay on the floor on the other side of the bed, nose between her paws, her eyes filled with reproach. Ben ignored her. When he left the bedroom, she did not follow him as she ordinarily did. Ben did not notice.

Ben pulled out the stove a little way to look for Ermentrude's entry point. He soon found it. A patched board over a hole where pipes had once passed through the floor had come loose. The cat had shoved it aside to obtain entry. Ben put it back in place, and nailed it down. Mice still might slip through the crack; mice were able, Ben believed, to flatten their bodies to a single molecule thickness to get through a tight place. Cats were clever, but could not flatten themselves as much as the mice could.

When he had patched the hole and pushed the stove back, Ben tried to read, but his grinding mind could not stop wheeling long enough to concentrate on the words on the page. Eventually he dozed as the morning turned warmer. Butter came to bark an announcement that someone was knocking on the door at half past ten. When Ben opened it, Dickon stood on the porch. Ben invited him in. Dickon took a chair. Butter came to him and put her chin on his thigh. Dickon fussed over her; it was a way to delay whatever confrontation he was about to have with Ben.

Ben broke the uneasy silence first. "Want some tea?" he asked.

"No," Dickon said. The silence returned and fermented between them. Dickon went on rubbing Butter's ears.

"I'm sorry," he said at last. "I was a prick at Pueblo Rio."

"A prick is what I missed out on," Ben said acidly. Dickon swallowed hard, and looked at the floor with great intensity.

"I'm trying to apologize."

"I don't know if I'm ready to hear an apology." Ben glared at Dickon. Then he shrugged. "Sorry. I'm in a foul mood. Ermentrude intruded, again." Ben coughed. "Clawed my shoulder."

"What?"

"Ermentrude clawed my shoulder." Ben almost snarled the sentence. "She jumped up on me when Butter started barking at her. I hadn't dressed yet." Ben scowled at Butter, who studiously ignored him. Dickon kept rubbing her head behind her ears. "I had to yell at Butter several times to shut her up."

"No wonder Butter's so friendly with me," Dickon said. He leaned forward, to talk directly to Butter. "Grumpy boss this morning?" She gazed at him adoringly. "That's my fault, I'm afraid. I wasn't very nice to your boss."

Ben got up and went toward the kitchen. "Sure you don't want some tea?" he said. "I know I need some."

"None for me," Dickon said, getting up to follow him. "I'll sit with you while you have it, though, if you don't mind."

"Suit yourself." In the kitchen, Ben busied himself making tea. Butter sat by her food dish, and gazed at Dickon. She hadn't forgiven Ben yet.

"Does Butter need her meal?" Dickon asked.

"It's a little early. You can feed her, though, if you want. She likes you best this morning." Ben's jealousy curdled his voice.

"Hey, Ben, Butter's not done anything wrong. She only tried to save you from a wild pussycat. Lighten up on her."

"Don't be lecturing me on how to live with my dog."

"You're pissed off with me. You get Butter's meal, while I fix your tea. You make up to her." Dickon spoke in a quiet voice, with all the authority he had learned to exercise years ago in the pulpit. "Furthermore," he went on, "when you've finished your tea, you take Butter out for a run on the beach. You run with her. Get rid of the nasty things between you. If you're lucky, she'll forgive you."

"Yes, master," Ben said, sarcastically.

"You and I will talk later. I'm going home now. You make nice with Butter. When you've got that settled, and then we can maybe sort some things out. Butter, be patient with him. He's only human at his best, and a little less than that today, I think."

Dickon turned and left the kitchen. Butter followed him. Ben heard the door shut and the clink of Butter's chain as she came back to the kitchen. Silently he fed her, and sat to drink his tea. When he finished his tea, he got her leash, and Butter began to forgive him.

### Ben Redemptus

Ben took Butter to the beach, and released her from her leash. Unlike her usual cheerful self, Butter, still smarting from Ben's rebuke, strolled sedately along the sand, ignoring the gulls and killdeer that she ordinarily chased with glee. The birds eyed her warily, but did not leap into flight. Ben was no longer so lost in his own misery that he failed to notice the downcast dog. Near the ocean end of the beach Ben found a rock to sit on and called Butter to him.

"Hey, dog," he said, gently. "I'm sorry I was so mean this morning." He rubbed her behind her ears. She accepted his caress with minimal grace, and turned to watch the gulls wheeling over the cove. Ben sighed. He understood better how seriously he had offended his friend and dog. He gently stroked her head. She suffered him to pet her. Her tail did not move.

"Butter," he said, "I'm very sorry. I was mean to you when you were trying to guard me from that evil pussycat." Butter continued to study the gulls. She growled low in her throat at them.

"You see, I had expected something from Dickon, and I didn't get it." Ben sighed. "I think I expected Dickon to be another Len." Ben scooted slightly, so Butter could lean against his knee if she so chose. She stiffened into an even more upright sitting position.

"You didn't know Len," Ben said. "He'd have loved you. Probably have fed you too much. He was too generous, sometimes." Butter flicked her ears back, and raised them forward again. She turned her head away from Ben to follow a flock of killdeer dancing on the sand.

"I miss him, Butter," Ben said. To his surprise, he felt tears on his cheeks. "I miss having somebody who cares where I am." He started stroking Butter's back. She relaxed her spine ever so slightly under his touch. "If you weren't with me, Butter, I'd go crazy, I think, from loneliness."

Ben sighed. Butter suddenly raced away from him to scatter the killdeer flock. She scampered through the cuneiform their feet had written on the sand, erasing whatever epic they had written. Ben let her go. Butter did the killdeer no harm. She wouldn't stray far. He wiped his eyes and watched Butter race around. She soon came back to him and lay down near him, panting. She was, however, just out of his reach. "Good show," he said to her. She softly thumped her tail a couple of times on the sand. "Still not happy with me?" He hoped she wouldn't punish him much longer. He felt so alone.

"Why did Dickon do that, though? I don't understand him, Butter. I thought we really had something started." Ben bowed over his knees and looked at the sand between his feet. He thought again of Len and his sadness welled in him. He had come to the Village to get a new grip on what was left of his life. He hadn't expected that to include falling in love, and yet he almost had.

"I'm a fool, Butter," he said. "A simpleton. An innocent abroad in a sea of sharks." Butter yawned. Ben turned his head and looked at her without straightening up. "You don't agree, I see." He scratched his ankle. "Or you don't care." Butter half closed her eyes. "Maybe I shouldn't care, either, but I don't know how to stop." Ben sat up and looked over the cove. The sun was sloping westward; it looked like it was almost sitting on top of Obaheah Rock.

"Come, Butter," Ben said. Butter ignored him. "Come, Butter," he repeated. She decided he indeed meant the command, and got to her feet. She came up to him and stood before him, waiting for his next move. He reached out and stroked the hair on her head. She stood still. "Oh, Butter," Ben said, "are you still mad at me?" He felt his tears begin again. Butter reached out with her tongue and gently licked them away. Ben put his arms around her and hugged her. She licked his face again.

"Thank you, Butter," Ben said. "Thank you." Ben snapped the leash on Butter's collar and together they started back toward their cottage. The sun dipped lower over Obaheah, catching its head in a ring of fire.

When they got to the cottage, Dickon was waiting for them on the porch. Butter ran eagerly toward him when Ben released her.

"Hi," Ben said.

"'Lo," Dickon said. Butter bounded up on the porch and whined to go inside.

"Come on in," Ben said. "Have some tea."

"No thanks. Can't stay. Just wanted to remind you of the hearing tomorrow."

"Do you need a ride?" Ben hoped the drive to Las Tumbas might provide a chance to break through the wall he sensed between them.

Dickon shook his head. "La Señora has asked me to go with her and Elke. Maybe you can offer a ride to Emma and Notta."

"Okay." Ben noted his own relief and disappointment at Dickon's answer, and promised himself to explore his reaction later. He went around Dickon and opened the door and screen to let Butter in. He knew she was thirsty, and hoped there was sufficient water in her dish. Behind him Dickon stood up. Ben turned around. A slanting ray of the setting sun settled in Dickon's hair, reddening it. Dickon's face was more shadowed, and hard to read.

"We'll have to talk some time," Dickon said. "When it's right for both of us."

"Yes," Ben said. "Soon, maybe."

"Well, I've got to go," Dickon said. He hurried down the steps and along the walk toward the gate. "Good night, Ben."

"Good night, Dickon. See you at the hearing tomorrow."

"Right." Dickon opened the gate, turned left, and went toward his own cottage without looking back.

### Emma Takes a Leap

Haakon sat in Emma's kitchen drinking coffee and stroking Prime Pussy. Unaccountably, the curmudgeonly cat had determined Haakon was an acceptable human. That Ermentrude had tried to take over Haakon had nothing to do with it, of course. At all adventures, Prime Pussy had asserted the primacy of her prerogatives; it was she who sat on Haakon's lap, while Ermentrude circled his feet, mewling.

Emma was at the stove, stirring oatmeal porridge for Haakon. Privately Emma thought oatmeal an abomination, but Dr. Field insisted it was recuperative for Haakon, and he didn't seem to mind swallowing the gluey stuff. Judging the mess properly cooked, she spooned it into a bowl, set the pan to soak in the sink, and brought it to Haakon.

"Down, Prime Pussy," she said. Prime Pussy developed sudden feline deafness syndrome. She had never cared for the silly rule that cats shouldn't sit in the laps of people who were eating.

"Let her be," Haakon said. "She feels good on my lap this morning. Soft and warm and cuddly." The raspy echo of pneumonia still haunted his voice. He had nearly recuperated, though weak. "I haven't had much cuddling, these last few years." Emma poured herself a cup of tea and sat down.

"I don't imagine so," Emma said. "You've been in prison, haven't you?"

Haakon shrank back in his chair. "Does it show?"

"Yes, to someone who has been around as long as I have." She smiled at him

"Besides," she went on, "anyone who can enjoy my oatmeal has been on restricted rations. That usually means the army or prison, and you're probably too old for the army." She swirled the tea in her cup, staring at it.

"You don't remember me, do you?" she continued.

"Ma'am?"

"We've met before." She looked into his blue eyes and saw only puzzlement there.

Haakon shrugged. "I knew a lot of women before I went into prison. Please don't be offended if I don't remember you. It's been a long time since I lived that part of my life."

"I don't expect I'd stand out in your recollection," she said. "We only spent one afternoon together. It was earthshaking for me." She waited a moment, to give him a chance to guess. He didn't.

"It was the day of the Great Temblor." Slowly the light of understanding washed over Haakon's features.

"You're that Emma," he said. He coughed, took a sip of the coffee to clear his throat. "I used to wonder if you got home okay," he said. "That was the day I was arrested for looting. Oh, it was my own stuff I was getting, but I could never prove that in court. So I wound up at La Lechuga." He stroked Prime Pussy's head. She purred her approval.

"I tried to find you after the temblor," Emma said. "I scanned the newspapers for your obituary, or any other news I could get of you. Mae Ling couldn't tell me, nor could the Wong brothers, where you'd gone."

"My case was in all the papers," Haakon said, "but under the name Haven Fitz. Some bureaucrat who couldn't hear got my name wrong, and so I was re-christened. I served my time at La Lechuga as Haven Fitz." Prime Pussy began kneading her claws on Haakon's knee. He gently pushed her off. She stalked away in a snit. Ermentrude leaped into her place on Haakon's lap. Haakon rubbed her under her chin. She purred a more reedy sound than Prime Pussy had made. "I sort of fell off the earth."

"Indeed you did." Emma got up and turned the heat on under the kettle. "More coffee?"

"No, I'm fine, thanks." Haakon drained his cup and set it to one side of the table. A stray sunbeam, dressed in gray wintry garb, came through the window and sat in the empty cup. "Why did you try to find me?"

"I discovered I was pregnant." Emma looked down at the kettle, not quite ready to look at Haakon.

"And you thought it was mine?" Haakon said, after a moment, in a quiet voice. Ermentrude went on purring her reedy purr. Her purring filled the silence in the kitchen until the steam gathered strongly enough to make the kettle whistle. Ermentrude did not like the kettle; she snarled, and launched herself from Haakon's lap. Her trajectory ended with her front paws on Prime Pussy's tail. Foul cat language followed, as the two felines exited the room, grumbling.

"You are the only man with whom I have ever had carnal relations," Emma said. She turned to look at Haakon. He was trembling. He clasped his shaking hands together to control them.

"But we were only together once," Haakon said. "You're sure it was with me? Maybe we're remembering separate incidents."

"I hired you through Mae Ling," Emma said quietly, pouring the hot water over a fresh teabag. She turned and put the kettle on the stove and turned off the burner. "It was the afternoon of the Great Temblor. You had taken me to the zoo, after we had lunch at Hung Chow's. You went on at some length, as I recall, talking about St. Sebastian paintings, and particularly about the arrows."

"That was probably me, then." Haakon's face had the trapped look of a cornered hen; his eyes darted right and left and right and left as if he hoped to find a hole in a fence he could crawl through. "Why did you try to find me? I couldn't have helped with the expense, or anything."

"I didn't want money. I just wanted you to know you had a child. I thought I owed you that." She studied the fever-refined man before her. His prison years had ground the muscles from him, leaving wiry ropes in their place. His recent illness had leached the strength from the ropes. Even tense as he was now, he seemed more fragile than tough.

"I should have worn protection," he said. "I hadn't planned anything like having sex that day. I usually just squired ladies around. You must have gotten to me some way or another." He looked into her eyes. "I'm sorry, Emma. I should have been more careful."

"I'm not sorry, Haakon," she said, and sat down at the table again. "Notta has been the best part of my adult life. I don't condemn you. I thank you for her."

"Oh," Haakon said, "Okay." He used the table to support himself as he got his trembling legs under him. "I don't know what to say. Does she know?"

"Notta? Not yet. I wanted to be sure it was you, first. I'll tell her in my own good time. She's a sensible girl, but it may shock her. It's not as if I've hidden anything from her, about her origins. I think the mystery has always bothered her, especially when she was younger, and the other kids had fathers to talk about. Then, as she got older, more and more of the kids had divorced fathers, or had lost them in some war or another. She adjusted." Emma stood, too, and went to Haakon to offer him a shoulder.

"Here, I'll help you back to bed. I've given you quite a shock, I see." She could feel his trembling. She realized she was unsteady herself. "I've shocked myself a bit, too," she said. Haakon let her help him from the room to his sickroom. His mind whirled around his skull like a berserk carousel with wonderment at his fatherhood. Emma felt a shaky, but hopeful that a long, dark, emptiness in her life could be filled.

### Dickon Goes for a Ride

Dickon met Elke and La Señora at the foot of the funicular. He helped Elke support La Señora toward the car. She wore a green velvet gown today of a very old-fashioned cut. It made her an empress. Elke wore a plain gray suit with a simple white blouse. Her ample bosom strained the cloth. Dickon wondered if she had been putting on weight. He forbore to inquire. He and Elke settled La Señora in the back seat of the touring car. Elke got in the driver's seat and backed the vehicle out when Dickon opened the garage door. Dickon closed the door and started to get in the front seat with Elke.

"Ride with me, Dickon," La Señora commanded him. He got in with her at once. Elke put the car in gear and smoothly entered the highway headed toward Las Tumbas.

"The unicorn has been speaking to me," La Señora told Dickon as she leaned forward and pressed the button that elevated the privacy glass between the back seat and the front seat.

"Yes?" Dickon said, lifting an eyebrow.

"Matters are muddy between you and Ben," La Señora said.

"Yes. I offended him. He hasn't been ready to hear an apology." Dickon blushed.

"Indeed," La Señora said and pressed her lips together as if she were clamping down on more words.

"I invited him for a night in Pueblo Rio. Then I spent most of the evening getting drunk with an old friend." Dickon stared out the window at the passing trees. He did not want to look into the fierce eyes of La Señora.

"Dickon, Dickon," she murmured. "You are a fool, man."

"I suppose so," Dickon said. "I don't know how to make it up to him. He's shut himself off from me."

"The storm will break upon us before long," La Señora said. Dickon wondered what she meant.

"Ben will need a helpmate to weather that storm," she went on. "He doesn't know it yet, but he has been chosen to do a great work."

Dickon turned to stare at the old woman. "Ben? Chosen?"

"Yes. The unicorn has said it."

"Oh."

"He will need a companion who supports him and strengthens him." She sighed. "I had hoped you would be that companion."

"I really messed things up with Ben. We were supposed to have a romantic getaway. We didn't."

"Because you ran from it."

"No, I just got to talking and drinking with an old friend..."

"Who helped you run from intimacy?" Her voice was heavy with irony. Dickon looked out the window again. Everything in him resisted La Señora's statement. He knew it hit too close to the mark. Intimacy had never worked for him. They were passing through Pueblo Rio. The streets this early in the morning were empty, except for the immigrant laborers standing on the corner by the Safeway, waiting for a day's work.

"I have known you over twenty years," La Señora said. "In all that time you have avoided a close relationship with anyone, male, female, canine, or feline." She coughed. Speaking so forcefully had tired her throat. "You have let that Vanna woman destroy so much about you. You are getting to an age where you won't have much more opportunity for intimacy. Though I have not been there, I presume the grave offers little in the way of loving comfort." She coughed again.

"La Señora, should I ask Elke to stop? Would you like some water?" Dickon hoped to deflect La Señora's criticism.

"No. Hand me my reticule. I have a cough suppressant in it." Dickon reached down and got the string bag near La Señora's feet. She unknotted the string tie and extracted a small bottle. She unscrewed the cap and swallowed a modicum of the contents. Slowly her rasping breath calmed.

"Dickon," she said, "I have spent my life without a loving companion. Oh, I have many around me who support me and help me, including you, but I let a broken love affair in my youth prevent me from forming any further intimate attachments. I erred in this, grievously." She put a shaking hand to her chest and breathed slowly. "Reach down into yourself, Dickon," she said. "Find the fear that sabotages your love life, and uproot it."

"Señora," Dickon said, "I'm afraid to reach down into myself. I might not make it back up and out. I'm afraid I'll drown in my own muck."

"You're drowning now. How much worse can it get?" La Señora held up her hand as Dickon was about to say more. "Think about it, Dickon. It will keep your mind off this hearing."

They had arrived at the Las Tumbas courthouse, and Elke drove up in front of the door. She and Dickon helped La Señora out. Elke left La Señora in Dickon's care while she parked the car. When Elke returned she and Dickon helped La Señora into the hearing room. Ben, Emma, and Notta were already in the room. They took seats right behind them. Dickon looked around for Vanna. She hadn't come yet. He kept a keen eye on the doors, fearing her entry.

### Day in Court

Ben looked around. Everyone in the Village had come. La Senora and Elke Hall were present, too. Only Willy Waugh was missing. Ben presumed he had stayed behind to guard the llamas.

The bailiff proclaimed, "Hear ye! Hear ye! All rise! The Administrative Session of the Las Tumbas Court is now in session, the Honorable Dina Sauer presiding."

The judge, a diminutive woman in black robes, with carefully coiffed silver hair framing her heart-shaped face entered the courtroom and took her place at the bench. She sat.

"Be seated," the bailiff intoned. When the rustle of seating bodies ceased, the bailiff continued. "This Administrative Session of the Las Tumbas Court is convened to hear a complaint from the Coastal Commission, represented by the Honorable Vanna Dee, against the Village of San Danson, a cluster of cottages and a large house owned by one, Salvación Mandor, represented here by counsel, the Honorable John Diss. Let the proceedings begin.

The judge spoke. Her voice was reedy, yet carried its authority to every corner of the room. "Commissioner Dee," she said, "take the oath from the bailiff."

The bailiff intoned, "Raise your right hand. Put your left hand on the Book. Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth as you know it?"

"I do," Vanna said. She stood straight and tall and stared the bailiff in the eye. He dropped his eyes first. Today Vanna wore simple gray, with a strand of black pearls around her throat. No lace softened the severe cut of her dress.

"Be seated," he said.

"State your name and your business," Judge Sauer said.

"I am Vanna Dee, Commissioner of the Coastal Commission, and I am here today to show cause why the Village of San Danson should be closed, and all its inhabitants evicted."

"Proceed," the Judge said.

"The San Danson marbled murrelet is an endangered sub-species of an endangered species. Its only known nesting ground is on the seaward cliffs of San Danson Mountain." Vanna paused, took out her handkerchief and dabbed at her right eye as though she were about to shed a tear. The Judge shifted on her seat; the rustle of her robes sounded very like a lady's reprimanding a reprehensible remark. Vanna quickly put her handkerchief in her lap and continued.

"Human habitation is disruptive of nesting patterns," she said. "The murrelets are a shy species, easily dissuaded from their nesting habits by intrusive hikers, and their dogs and cats that attack both the adult birds and the nests themselves."

"Explain, please," Judge Sauer interrupted. "Are these nests on the ground, or in the cliffs?"

``Both places. The dogs disturb the nests on the top of the cliffs, and the cats, of course, often climb down to the cliff nests."

"I see," the Judge said. "Continue."

"Worse yet than the human intrusion, Senora Mandor keeps a herd of llamas. Their unnatural dung pollutes the watershed and pastures of San Danson Mountain with South American toxins. They also damage the grasses, which leads to erosion of the nesting grounds and choking of the rivulets the murrelets rely on for water during their winter mating season." Judge Sauer held her hand up. Vanna ceased talking. Judge Sauer asked, "What information source are you using for these facts?"

"My personal observation and the observation of Coastal Commission staff."

"Are any of them present to testify today?"

Vanna nervously fingered her pearls. "No, your honor, I didn't know their testimony might be required."

"Do you have anything to add?"

"Only that the Coastal Commission was founded to preserve the natural environment for the appreciation and enjoyment of all future generations. We acknowledge the difficulties for people who uprooted from their homes, but humans, dogs, cats, and even llamas, are not endangered species. The San Danson variety of marbled murrelets is trembling in the footsteps of the dodo and the passenger pigeon. We at the Commission take it as our sacred duty to provide these poor birds with every protection we can muster." Tears stood in Vanna's eyes. She dabbed at them again with her handkerchief. Her mascara stained a corner of the handkerchief with black.

Behind him Ben heard Dickon grunt with disgust. Judge Sauer glared at the assembled people. Ben grimaced; Vanna's performance was over the top in his opinion.

"You may step down," Judge Sauer said to Vanna. "Do the Villagers of San Danson have a rebuttal?"

"We do, your honor," John Diss said. Ben marveled at the attorney's mellifluous tones. John was square-jawed, ruddy-cheeked, and had hair and brows of black shot through with just the right amount of gray to be most distinguished in appearance. His expensive suit didn't hurt, either.

"We wish to call one witness, your honor, Dr. Mary Hajji."

``Dr. Mary Hajji to the stand," the bailiff called out. When she came forward, he swore her in. She wore soft blue blouse and a pink skirt. Her eyes were soft blue, and smile lines danced at the corners of her mouth and eyes. Ben thought her age indeterminate, which to him meant somewhere between twenty-five and seventy. Ben had no skill at judging women's ages accurately.

"Dr. Hajji," John Diss said, "please state your name and occupation for the Court."

"I am Dr. Mary Hajji, primary avian specialist for the Province of British Columbia. My doctoral thesis was a study of murrelet nesting habits. My work since has been devoted largely to research into the habits of the marbled murrelet."

"You have heard Commissioner Dee's testimony here today regarding the marbled murrelets of San Danson. What is your opinion of her statement?"

"That she is woefully misinformed. Her only accurate statement was that the murrelets are an endangered sub-species of the murrelet species, itself an endangered species."

"Can you give us specifics?"

"Yes. Science has known about the Marbled Murrelet, _Brachyramphus marmoratus_ , for two hundred years. In that time, observers have found only a dozen occupied nests in Canada, Japan, the United States, and Russia. It is not a colorful bird. The summer feathers are marbled in shades of brown, mostly dark shades. In winter the feathering is black and white. Except, of course, for the San Danson variety, where the white is replaced by a cream feathering." Dr. Hajji shifted in her chair, looked at the Judge, who nodded to her, and went on.

"Marbled Murrelets come ashore only during the breeding season, to lay and incubate the egg and to feed the nestling. Their brown plumage makes them hard to spot in the forests. They also come ashore only during the darkness, which makes land sightings particularly difficult. They are rather more frequently observed at sea, for they are substantially pelagic in nature."

"Perhaps you can explain to the Court what `pelagic' means," John Diss suggested diplomatically.

"'Pelagic' birds live most or all of their life cycle on the open ocean. The murrelet seldom goes farther inland than about seventy kilometers. They subsist on small fish. The murrelet is a superb fisher bird. The bill is well designed to seize slippery fish with a firm grip."

"Do these birds also nest at sea?"

"No, they nest on land. No one is entirely sure how far inland, but there is no evidence they build nests at sea."

"They nest, then, in cliffs or on the bluffs above the sea."

"Not at all. Though there is much we need to learn about murrelet nesting habits, all current knowledge shows they nest in moss cups high in old growth Douglas fir, Sitka Spruce, and even Hemlocks."

"In trees? In the heavy rains of winter?"

"In trees, certainly. Not in winter. Nesting doesn't begin until April or after, when the winter rains have abated."

"Are there no exceptions?"

"A few nests have been observed, unoccupied, in the treeless areas of Alaska, on scree slopes and in the tundra. Most North American murrelets live along the inlets and estuaries of the British Columbian coast, where the fish are plentiful and the trees they need for nesting are also plentiful."

"And their nesting season is in April?"

"Actually, most eggs are laid in early May. By June, they have hatched, and the parents fly, under cover of darkness, to the coast to catch fish for the nestling. The hen lays only one egg per season, you see. Both parents care for the nestling. They carry small fish crosswise in their bills. Larger fish they carry with the heads down their throats and the tails sticking out."

"Interesting." John Diss turned to peer at Vanna for a moment. She sat silent and furious in the back of the courtroom. She glared at John Diss and Mary Hajji.

"Are llamas a threat to the survival of the marbled murrelet species?"

"Llamas pose no known threat to the species. Neither do dogs and cats; housecats rarely climb forty or fifty meters into trees."

"What about humans?"

"Humans are the primary threat to marbled murrelets. Not because they hunt them, but because the old growth forests that provide nesting trees to murrelets are being logged off too rapidly. New growth timber will take several generations to be tall enough and large enough to provide for murrelet nesting. A secondary threat is pollution of their food source. Power plants, industries, and city sewer systems are far more threat than a few cottages on septic systems. A tertiary threat comes from using gill nets in the murrelets' fishing waters. The birds can become entangled there in their pursuit of juvenile herring and other small fish."

"Thank you, Dr. Hajji," John Diss said. "Do you have any further comment to make?"

"No."

"Judge Sauer, do you have questions?"

"One. Dr. Hajji, in your opinion does the continued existence of San Danson Village, with its llama herd, represent a serious threat to the continued thriving of the marbled murrelet, San Danson variety?"

"Not at all, your honor."

"Thank you. You may step down. Whereas this is an administrative hearing, and my decision is solely mine to make, I may forestall any cross-examination. In this case, I have heard what I need to hear. Ordinarily," Judge Sauer said, "I need to take a ruling under advisement for one or more days to weigh the testimony. In this case, I do not. The Coastal Commission petition is denied." She banged her gavel, stood, and stalked out of the room before the bailiff could get "All rise!" out of his mouth. Vanna stared after Judge Sauer. Vanna's face was a study in consternation.

### Dickon at Sea

Down to the sea Dickon went, along the seaweed littered beach to the rocks opposite Obadiah, where he perched on a boulder just above the splash of the surf. The wind tore at him from the South. Westward the ocean churned with an offshore storm, lashing the waves to unseen fury. In came the waves to break into foamy bits against the rocky shore. Out beyond the cove mouth and the shallows, waves leaped and struck at the great Obadiah rock, spending a storm's fury on the unyielding black rock.

Dickon let his thoughts slide into the waves. He needed to ponder and wrestle with himself. La Señora's comments troubled him, stirring his resentment and stubbornness. He could feel a dark resistance like a hot black wall across his spirit, blocking a fire he feared. Certain of his solitude, he voiced his anguish in a long groan. Only the killdeer heard this bass counterpoint to their peeping chatter as they scattered their claw prints on the wet sand. The killdeer took no notice.

Dickon spoke. "What does she mean?" he flung at an unknown listener, perhaps the waves, perhaps the rock Obadiah, perhaps God. "Root out my fear?" He shook himself. "What fear?"

He shook a fist at the sky. "Fury, that's more like it," he said. "I want to pound and slash and hurl stones at the universe. I've never had an answer, you know, to my question."

He listened a moment to the thunder of the foaming waters at the sand's edge. "You know the question I mean," he shouted. He flipped his fingers backhanded under his chin in a gesture of contempt he'd learned long ago from an old Sicilian janitor. "I've asked it often enough." He felt his throat fill with phlegm. He coughed it up and spat away from the wind.

"Why me?" he said. "That question you never answer." He shook his fist at the unnaturally brassy sky. "Job asked you, centuries ago, and you never gave him much of an answer, either." Dickon shifted his weight on the rock. The damp was beginning to seep through his heavy jeans. He slumped forward.

"Don't know yourself, do you?" he said, calming. "Some omniscient being you are, don't know even a little thing like this." He smiled grimly. "I don't have a Bildad the Shuhite to pose the questions and propose the answers. I've only got my question. Why me?"

Dickon cocked his head into the wind to listen for a response. He heard only the wind, the surf, and the chirping killdeer. He shouted at the birds. "Why me?" The killdeer continued their mad dance, scribbling the meaningless cuneiform of their claw marks on the wet sand.

"Yes, I consider this, that it is not I who has stretched the canvas of the stars across the heavens, nor is it I who has wrinkled the sea into its waves, but I am I, and I have the right to my question, and to an answer to it. Why have I suffered?"

Again Dickon paused to listen. Only the killdeer, the wind, and the sea made sounds, empty as ever of meaning.

"I know my imperfections," Dickon went on in a lowered voice. "I run from things that might hurt me, from people who might hurt me. I trusted once, trusted with all my being, was betrayed and trusted again, and betrayed again. Excuse me if I'm not dumb enough to trust a third time."

"For every action," Dickon went on, "there should be an equal reward. Justice demands it. For every good deed or pure thought, a good thing should happen. And so I loved that woman, Vanna, and she betrayed me and pursued me with hatred. She still pursues me to punish me. I put it to you, Deity of the Universe, this is not fair.

"And your church, your pious bunch of slavish servants, prattling of goodness and rectitude, they persecute me and cast me out for being the human being you seemed to mean me to be." Dickon performed an elaborate shrug. "For being the gay man you made me, I should be an outcast? This is your justice?"

And the wind blew, and the surf foamed, and the killdeer danced. Dickon slumped, staring moodily at his hands. He idly noticed the damp sand on them.

"Tell me what I have done so wrong," he said. "I loved Vanna and the church with all the honesty I could find. I dealt faithfully with them. They dumped me. Put me out with the molding orange peels and cold coffee grounds to go to the landfill. I'm more than trash, I know that. Why have you let them do me this way?" Dickon looked up at the brass and blue sky. A lone gull wheeled above the surf and sand. It screeched once, plunged to the waves, and rose with some small scrap of food.

"Is there any purpose under the sun?" Dickon said. "Is all we are allowed, to submit to the great 'what's so is what's so' of things?" Dickon shook his head and stood. "Excuse me if I'm disappointed in your answer." He brushed the wet sand and grit from the seat of his jeans.

The gull flew up coast and out of sight. The wind sang and the surf whispered across the sand. The killdeer danced up the beach toward the cliffs and back down the wet sand chasing the surf.

### After the Flood

The winter rains fell without letup for ten days. The rivers and creeks along the Coast swelled, escaped their banks, and swelled again. Pueblo Rio was underwater for a week. The River Road to Las Tumbas disappeared, washed in asphalt chunks down the river to the sea. Even Martyr's Creek was a raging torrent. From some long-forgotten homestead upstream, the creek dislodged an old icebox and pushed it onto the beach at the cove. Just back from the beach, two propane tanks, washed up from somewhere, and leaked their old and rusty residue into the cove. The sea life avoided the upper end of the cove for the rest of the winter.

DiConti Sharif and the rest of the sheriff's department worked double shifts rescuing the stranded, and keeping the traffic moving on detours around ravaged bridges. Notta had become accustomed to seeing him two or three times a week, and missed his company more than she had thought possible. She took to walking long hours on the rain washed beach, watching the waves whirl and dance in the storm winds. On the morning of the eleventh day, as Notta was about to slip into her plastic poncho to prowl the beach, Emma stopped her.

"Notta," she said, "Please don't go out for a little while. I have something to talk with you about."

"What is it?" Notta asked, hanging her poncho back on its hook.

"Do you want a cup of tea, or coffee?"

"No, Mama, I'm already sloshing. I had three cups at breakfast." Notta sat down across from Emma.

"I've told you, ever since you were old enough to understand, that I got pregnant with you from a one-night stand."

"Yes, on the afternoon of the big temblor." Notta gestured with her hand, as if she were brushing crumbs away.

"And I told you that I had tried to find your father, and couldn't?" Emma searched her daughter's face for reaction.

"Yes, Mama. What are you leading up to?"

"I've found your father." Emma's throat suddenly thickened, so she had to force out the words.

"You've what?" Notta asked. Emma coughed to clear her throat.

"I've found your father," she said. Notta stared at her for a moment.

"Where?"

"Right here, under our noses." Emma sat back, savoring the surprise she had sprung.

"Here? In the Village?"

"Here, in this house. Our convalescent guest is your father." Notta stared at her mother for a long moment.

"Have you been downing the cooking sherry?" Notta asked her mother.

"Nothing like that, child." Emma took a deep breath. "When he came here to recuperate, I thought I recognized him from somewhere. You'll remember, I'm sure, that he mistook you for me, called you by my name."

"Yes, he did. I wondered at the time how he knew your name."

"When he knew me, I was only a little older than you are now."

"So, why do you think this man's the one you slept with over a quarter century ago?" Ermentrude came in and leaped into Notta's lap.

"Because he remembers the afternoon, too."

"Convenient. I suppose he's looking for free room and board."

"I don't know whether he is or not." Emma looked at the window for a long moment. Prime Pussy leaped into Emma's lap.

"Where's he been all these years?"

"At La Lechuga."

"Some recommendation for fatherhood," Notta said wryly. She grimaced. "I suppose you'll expect me to love him, anyway."

"Whether you love him or don't love him is up to you," Emma snapped at her. "He was wrongly imprisoned."

"Most convicts are, at least if you listen to them. That's what DiConti says."

"He knows you are his daughter. I told him that some weeks ago."

"And you're just now telling me about him?" Notta's face was stony.

"I kept waiting for a good moment. This is the best one that's come along."

Notta struggled to keep her voice even Her anger put an edge on her words anyway. "Mother, I've gotten along all my life without a father. I don't want one now."

"I'm afraid you've got one, will you nill you."

Notta pushed back her chair and stood up. Ermentrude snarled as she dropped to the floor. Notta ignored her, so Ermentrude snarled again, and stalked off toward the hearthrug in the living room. By terms of the truce between Prime Pussy and Ermentrude, this was Prime Pussy's turf. Prime Pussy leapt down from Emma's lap and raced to the front room to re-establish her claim. Notta took her poncho from the hook.

"I'm going out, Mother," she said. "I have a lot to think about."

"Wear your rain boots, dear. I don't want you to take a chill."

"Yes, Mother," Notta said, with all the sarcasm an angry daughter could load into two little words. She stopped on the porch to put on her rain boots, and stomped off into the light rain.

The storm winds had blown quantities of kelp onto the beach. The usually pristine sand, marked by no more than the feet of killdeer, looked like a giant's weed patch. Notta walked along, her head down, pondering her anger, and discovering a melancholy under it. Two or three times she nearly tripped over the kelp.

DiConti found her in a brown study. She did not look up, and so did not see him approach. He stopped to admire her trim waist and hips, remembering the full breasts that he could not see because her back was to him. He noticed next the slump of her shoulders, and her bowed head as she plodded along. His heart went out to her, and he suddenly realized he loved her. He quickened his pace to catch up to her.

"Notta," he called, when he was in earshot. She looked up, her face almost lost in the hood of her poncho. "What's wrong?"

"DiConti," she said. Her smile warmed DiConti's world. She stopped and waited for him to close the distance between them. He came to her and kissed her, long and hard. After her first surprise at the shy man's sudden passion, she responded in kind. Above them the clouds swirled. On the mountain the unicorn with the unique horn stopped her grazing to sense the joy on the wind. Had she been able to, she'd have grinned in triumph.

### What Belongs to Daddy?

The fine mist the winds whipped from the clouds and the cove went unnoticed. DiConti and Notta were seeing no one but each other. It was that wondrous moment in time when two people who had grown to love each other suddenly knew it. Arms around each other's waist they walked the wet sand and did not see the wheeling gulls and dancing killdeer. The surf foamed and broke upon Obaheah and Obadiah. Notta let her head lean down on DiConti's shoulder. She told him all Emma had told her about Haakon. DiConti murmured comforting words and listened.

They might well have walked this way all afternoon up and down the beach, but the weather chose to pour down more rain. It was a small squall that the creek scarcely noticed, so swollen it was. It was, however, enough to break the lovers' mood and bring them back into that reality we all must function in most of our time.

"Shall we run for it?" Notta asked.

"Yes," DiConti said. He started at a slow lope. Notta soon outpaced him, and he raced to catch up with her. They both stopped at the point where the trail went up the hill to San Danson Station. They were laughing too hard to run any more. The rain had let up, as well.

"Coffee?" DiConti said.

"Lunch?" Notta countered.

"Yes," DiConti said. They walked up the hill to the Café of the Four Rosas. Rosa waved at them from the kitchen. Harry Pitts gave them menus and escorted them to a quiet booth.

"I recommend the mushroom burgers," he said, and left them to peruse their menus. In the end, they took his advice, and ordered mushroom burgers.

DiConti looked at Notta. The emotion blazing from his eyes momentarily startled her, until she realized her eyes were answering in kind. He took her hand. "I should have a ring to offer you," he said. She shook her head gently. "That will have to come later, the next time you're in Las Tumbas," he went on. "Formal words now," he grinned, "Notta, will you marry me?"

"Why, Mr. Sharif, you do take a girl by surprise! Of course, I'll marry you. Rings and things can come later." DiConti was about to stand and lean across the table between them to kiss her but Harry brought their mushroom burgers just then.

"Sorry to interrupt," Harry said. Notta and DiConti blushed. Harry chuckled, a sound like a rasp scraping rust from old iron.

When Harry had turned his back and shuffled toward his station, DiConti leaned over the table to kiss Notta. She met him halfway.

The burgers required attention. Rosa had smothered savory beef patties in shiitake mushroom slices flavored with a delicate touch of thyme. Over this she had spread a gravy of thickened beef broth and gently grilled bits of red onion. All this she served on a whole-wheat bun. Sliced tomatoes and a quarter dill pickle lay jauntily on a lettuce leaf beside the top bun. Succulent zucchini, battered with a coating tasting of garlic and ginger and deep-fried, took the place most restaurants left to French Fries.

When they had finished their burgers, Harry brought them dishes of green tea ice cream. "On the house," he said. He left them tiny spoons to eat it.

"Notta," DiConti said, staring at his ice cream spoon with its wee dollop of pale green ice cream, "when should I talk to your father?"

"Talk to my father? Why? What's he got to do with anything?"

"He is your father. I should ask him for your hand, or his blessing, or something like that." He glanced at her puzzled frown. "That's the way my folks taught me these things should be done. If my father were alive, I could send him to your father. Since he isn't, I'll have to go myself." He pled with his eyes for her understanding.

"What old-fashioned nonsense!" Notta sputtered. "He didn't even know I existed until a few days ago. I don't need his permission, or anyone else's, to marry whomever I please."

"Please, Notta," DiConti said, "I'm only trying to do the right thing here."

"I've never had a father who mattered," Notta went on angrily. "I don't want one now, clogging up the works." She stood up. "I'm going, now. Are you coming?"

DiConti hastily swallowed the last of his ice cream. He ate it so fast he got a small headache. Dismally he wondered where the euphoria had gone as he stood up. "I'm coming," he said. He stopped to pay for their meal, and followed her out.

Outside he found Notta dabbing tears from her eyes with a large handkerchief. "DiConti," she said, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have blown up at you." He put his arm around her shoulder. She leaned her head on his shoulder.

"It's just that I don't know what to do with a father that suddenly pops up out of nowhere. I'd presumed he'd been dead all these years, or married to another family. I never expected to meet him."

DiConti gave her a little squeeze of comfort. She took a deep breath, and straightened up. She dabbed away the last of her tears. "I guess I'd better go face the music," she said. "Mother wants me to know this sperm donor, so I suppose I must make a try."

"Do you want me to come with you?"

"No, better I think to do this on my own."

"Consider," DiConti said, "this Haakon Spitz may not be ready to have a daughter, any more than you want a father. Be gentle with him." Notta stepped back from DiConti.

"Gentle with him? How could I hurt him?"

"You never know. My mother used to say, 'Don't burn any bridges before you've built them.'" DiConti put his hands on Notta's shoulders, kissed her gently, and said, "I'll drop by this evening, if it's all right with you, and check in on you."

"Okay," Notta said, and left him at the café door as she turned toward her encounter with the ancient truth. He watched her walk past the motel and turn onto the path to the Village. Then he went to his car and drove to Las Tumbas in a daze.

On the mountain She-Who-Shuns-Males, a young female llama remarkable among her herd for her celibacy, made a low bleating entreaty to He-Who-Drools-in-His-Mash, an elder among the llama studs. One last burst of sexual energy enlivened the old llama, and he mounted She-Who-Shuns-Males, with her consent. He-Who-Drools-in-His-Mash expelled his seed into the waiting womb of She-Who-Shuns-Males, and fell away from her, exhausted. In the morning, Willy Waugh found his corpse, and arranged to have it hauled to the knackers at the charnel house. She-Who-Shuns-Males felt an embryo take root in her, and grow. The unicorn with the unique horn grazed on fog-wet grass with renewed satisfaction.

### Father and the Bride

Notta fumed as she walked back to her mother's cottage. She continued to argue with DiConti in her mind, attributing various chauvinistic attitudes to her mental image of him. When she got to her mother's front porch, she hesitated, her hand on the doorknob. Was she ready to confront Haakon? What would he want of her?

She looked at her face reflected in the door's window. The frown on her round face deepened. Her soft brown hair seemed almost bristling. She took a deep breath, shrugged her shoulders, and let her arms relax. She felt some of her tension drain out her fingertips. She wished she could shed more. She turned the knob and opened the door. Ermentrude greeted her with a loud meow of complaint. Notta idly scratched the cat's ears. She heard her mother and Haakon talking in low voices. When she entered the kitchen, they stopped talking.

"Would you like some lunch, dear?" her mother asked, starting to rise. Her tone was carefully neutral.

Notta noticed her mother was getting a little plumper. She moved more slowly, too. It angered her, unaccountably. "No thanks," Notta said. "I ate with DiConti, at the Four Rosas."

"How about some tea, then?"

Notta responded with some asperity. "No, Mama, no tea." Emma glanced quickly at Haakon as she settled back in her chair. Silence welled up in the room like a great darkness. Ermentrude's piercing yowl of frustration shattered it.

"Oh, do shut up, you stupid cat!" Emma snapped. Notta stared at her mother. Emma's patience with cats was legendary.

"Come here, Ermentrude," Notta coaxed. "Where's Prime Pussy?"

"Outside," Haakon said his voice reedy and thin. Notta noticed how very frail Haakon was. His arms and legs were sticklike, and his face was drawn and gray. Notta let go of a little of her anger.

"We should talk," Haakon said to Notta. "Emma tells me she has told you I am your father." He stared at her, his blue eyes struggling to say something Notta could not read.

"What's to talk about?" Notta said. Her anger burst from her. "Knowing you are my mother's sperm donor doesn't make a lot of difference." She deliberately ignored Haakon's wince, and her mother's pursed lips. "A father is a man who is part of his daughter's life, not a quick roll in a rented bed, and then twenty-five years of non-existence, only to show up sick and broken and needing everything."

"Notta!" Emma shouted. "Keep civil! You are worse than your cat!"

Haakon got to his feet, and leaned on the table. "This sperm donor only wants to apologize for being wrongfully arrested and convicted, and therefore absent from his daughter's life at all the important occasions. I'm damned if I could say I'd have been any good at fathering you, but I would at least have tried, if I'd known you existed. Emma, I'll go to Las Tumbas tomorrow and get a place to stay. Thanks for all the care you've lavished on me, Emma, and you, too, Notta. I'd be dead without you two." He turned and marched out of the room with as much dignity as his wavering gait allowed him.

Emma stared at the floor for a long moment. "What a fury you have in you," she said in low voice. "I have never known you to be so unkind to anyone." Her brown eyes blazed with fury. Notta could see a muscle in her mother's jaw twitching. From childhood this had indicated great anger.

Remorse flooded Notta. She thought to herself, no one breeds guilt faster than a mother does. Emma gathered the flatware and dishes from the table where she and Haakon had eaten lunch. Notta felt a wall rise up between them, colder and stonier than any that their conflicts had ever built. Notta's voice sounded small and weak as she spoke.

"I just wanted to tell you," she started, and then cleared her throat, "I just wanted to tell you, DiConti asked me to marry him, and I said yes."

"That's nice, dear," Emma said. "I hope you'll be happy." She carried the dishes and cutlery to the sink. She ran water on them, and set them to soak. "I believe I'll have a nap, now. Enjoy your demons, daughter." She walked out of the kitchen without looking at Notta. Notta could not remember another time her mother had been so distant. Notta sank into a chair by the table. Tears stung her eyes.

Ermentrude intruded into her lap. She sat, thinking, wondering where her burning anger came from. Ermentrude purred as Notta compulsively rubbed her everywhere the cat most liked, under her chin, behind her ears, and smooth soothing strokes along her back. Notta's tears spilled over, and splashed Ermentrude. The cat stopped purring, and leaped from Notta's arms. She hit the floor with a thunk. Notta buried her face in her hands, and let her torrential tears flow. In her mind, she repeated over and over how angry she was never to have had a father, and how ashamed she was at how she had treated Haakon.

Prime Pussy howled at the door. The rain had begun again. Notta let the old cat in. Ermentrude snarled at Prime Pussy by way of greeting. Prime Pussy snarled back. Then each cat went to a distant corner of the living room.

Notta went out on the cottage porch to watch the rain fling silver knives at the sodden ground. The sudden squall soon ended. A ray of sun pierced the cloud cover and illuminated the yard. Notta sighed, and let her shoulders slump. She let the darkness drain from her body into the light in the yard. The yard darkened as the sun went down below the break in the clouds.

Notta went into the afternoon shadows spreading across the living room. She sat down in a recliner and began to compose an apology. She fell asleep.

Haakon found her there when he woke up. He walked as quietly as he could, but his movement eventually woke Notta. Emma came out and went into the kitchen without speaking to either of them. Notta looked at the door and longed for DiConti's knock.

## Seasoning the Witch

### A Letter from a Stranger

The mail came to San Danson Station about the same time every morning. The Villagers often gathered to visit while Rosa distributed the incoming post to individual boxes. This morning Ben and Dickon were the earliest patrons to show.

"Morning," Dickon said as he came in.

"Morning, yourself," Ben replied.

"Expecting anything special in the mail?"

"No, not really. I just happened to be up and about, so I came on over to check the mail."

"Where's Butter?"

"I left her home. I promised her a walk, later."

Rosa called out from behind the boxes. "Mail's all out," she said. She always ended her delivery with this phrase, just in case folks were waiting in the lobby.

Dickon took his mail; he had three catalogs and four mortgage offers. He trashed all of them without hesitation.

Ben had a couple of mortgage offers, too. It was a rare day that didn't bring at least one offer of "lowest interest rates" or "easy qualification" to every postal patron. He also got an envelope that promised to be a real letter. Ben did not recognize the return addressee or address. "Cori Ander, 1217 Free Radical Lane, The City" it read. He looked at the stamp. It was a full-cost first class stamp. He opened the envelope and withdrew a sheet of notepaper embossed with calla lilies, folded in half. He unfolded it.

_Cori Ander  
1217 Free Radical Lane  
The City  
November 10, 2004_

_Mr. Ben Soul  
The Village  
San Danson_

_Dear Mr. Soul:_

_I am writing you on behalf of my client, Ms. Minnie Vann, who is too ill to write for herself. She requests you come visit her at the address on this envelope as soon as you can arrange to do so._

_From me: Ms. Vann is terminally ill. Regrettably, she has contracted a cancer of the brain, which has interfered with her motor functions, though she is yet lucid. I urge you to come soon; her prognosis is short._

_Sincerely,_

_Cori Ander, Registered Nurse_

Ben's hands trembled. He hadn't thought about Minnie Vann for several years. Now she lay dying. Specters of Len struggling for breath on a hospital bed, linked to life only by tubes and wires, rose before his mind's eye. A great heaviness fell on him, one he had shed, and forgotten. The weariness of loss slumped his shoulders and drooped the corners of his mouth. Dickon came in just in time to see Ben's slumping moment.

"Bad news, Ben?" he asked.

"Yes," Ben said. "An old friend is dying. She wants me to come visit her." He sighed, and leaned against the wall. "I don't know if I can do it."

"Why not? Do you need someone to look after Butter? I can do that; she gets along with me pretty well." Dickon studied Ben's face. Whoever this friend was, her imminent death dragged his face into a mask twenty years older than usual. Dickon started to reach for him to comfort him with a hug, but stopped. They had too much to work out for such an intimate comfort to be appropriate.

Ben looked up at Dickon and saw the concern on Dickon's face. Ben attempted a smile. "Thanks, Dickon. I've got to go to the City to see Minnie. If you can take care of Butter for tonight, and maybe tomorrow, I'll appreciate it. I think I should go by my house, too." Ben straightened. "Len's cousin moved out a month ago, and I should check on the place. Make sure everything's okay. Can you take Butter that long?"

"Sure," Dickon said. "It gives me a chance to spoil her a little. I haven't seen her for several days."

"I know," Ben said. He looked at Dickon. "We'll have to talk, some time, Dickon."

"Yeah, we've both got things to say and to hear." Dickon smiled a rueful smile. "La Señora told me some things, too, and I've got to figure those out."

"Oh, that reminds me. I'm due to go to lunch at the big house day after tomorrow. I'll have to be sure to be back."

"Drive friendly, Ben."

"I will. I'll bring Butter by in a little while."

"I'll be waiting."

Ben went out the door, leaving the pile of unsaid words between himself and Dickon. Dickon carried their weight home with him.

Ben explained to Butter about Minnie Vann while he put a few clothes and his grooming essentials in a small bag. Butter whined. She wasn't sure this Minnie was worth so much of Ben's time. Ben gathered her leash, food, and a couple of toys she especially liked, and took her over to Dickon's. Dickon assured him Butter would be fine, and reminded him again to drive carefully. "You're not used to driving in the City traffic any more," he said. Ben promised to be cautious.

The Coast Road was damp with drizzle for several miles before Ben's car broke into the sun just before the bridge into the City. The low western sun lit the towers in the City with rose and gold, beautifying them beyond any ordinary works of humans. Ben stopped in the view area to watch the light slowly crawl up the walls and leap from the tops of the buildings. As the lights began to come on he drove to the motel where he had made reservations for the night.

The room was a clean, nondescript motel room like a million others in the world. It had a bed, a lamp, a generic television, a telephone, and bathroom facilities in a small separate room. Ben felt swallowed up by the anonymity. There was something restful in it. Beige and brown rooms had their spiritual uses.

Ben took the telephone book and looked up a number for Minnie Vann. The address matched the one on the envelope he'd gotten. He dialed. The young-sounding woman who answered gave him directions, and suggested he come in the late morning.

"I'm so glad you came so quickly," she said. "We don't know how long Minnie can last."

Ben hung up the phone, the heaviness of loss on him. He turned on the television and lost himself in its flickering unreality.

### A Last Visit to Minnie

When Ben found it, 1217 Free Radical Lane proved to be one of those neo-Victorian houses so many City architects had designed near the end of the last century. It's "gingerbread" was simplified as to angle and curve in what the designers thought of as "modernized" gingerbread. Ben thought this three-story edifice, painted a gentle cream yellow with white trim, was a better-than-average specimen of the style. Ben parked his car on the steep slope, carefully angling the wheels against the curb to prevent a rollaway, got out, and locked the car. He was slow and deliberate in his movements. He recognized in himself his reluctance to confront another terminally ill friend.

He squared his shoulders, took a deep breath, and walked up the stairs to the front door with the bouquet of mixed flowers in his hand. Three names showed under three mailboxes. Evidently, each floor belonged to a different tenant. He rang the bell under Minnie's name. An unrecognizable voice scratched out "Identify yourself, please," from the tinny speaker next to the door.

"Ben Soul here to see Minnie Vann," he said, vaguely aiming at the speaker.

"Come in," the scratchy voice said. Somewhere inside a buzzer rasped, and Ben heard the bolt on the door click. He thumbed the lever down and pushed on the handle. The door opened into a small foyer with faded blue carpeting. A staircase led up on the left into the darkness above. Minnie's apartment was on the first floor. There was only one door beside the stairway. Ben walked the two steps across to it and knocked. It opened to reveal a tall woman with iron-gray hair and an angular body incongruously endowed with a large and either firm or firmly constrained bosom.

"Mr. Soul?" the woman inquired in a melodious voice that Ben recognized from the telephone contact he had had.

"Yes," he said. "Are you Ms. Ander?"

"Cori, please," the woman said, and drew the door wide open to allow Ben to enter. "Come in," she went on. Ms. Vann is looking forward to your visit." Ben walked into a living room that looked like no one had lived in it for a long time. The furniture was severe in its line, the couch, chair, and tables carefully matched to the lamps. There were no knickknacks on any surface, and though the room was dust-free, reeking of lemon furniture polish, it reminded Ben of an abandoned stage set from which the prop manager had removed all the props.

"I brought Minnie some flowers," he said, and offered them to Cori Ander.

"How thoughtful," she said. She took the bouquet from Ben. "I'll take you in to Minnie, and then I'll get a vase for them." She led Ben through a dining room as sterile as the living room to a bedroom. The door was closed. Before she went in, she turned to Ben and said, "Minnie is much changed. Please, show as little shock as possible. She's grown very fragile in the last few weeks." The care and concern in Cori's voice moved Ben. Cori turned and knocked on Minnie's door, and entered without waiting for a response.

The bedroom had none of the sterility of the rest of the house. Shelves lined two walls, with books and figurines crowded onto them. Ben recognized a plastic hen he had given Minnie years ago as a joke between friends. Its colors were bright as ever, and smote the eye, even in the soft light of the sickroom.

Minnie lay on white sheets, several layers of blankets on top of her. Only her face and her arms showed. What remained of her hair straggled across her head, wisps of distressed straw on a skin-covered skull. The blankets were pulled up only to her waist. She wore a white bed jacket with tiny forget-me-nots embroidered in blue on it. Ben thought it was too feminine for Minnie. She should have had something like a football jacket. The pungent smell of liniment almost overpowered the musty odor foretelling the grave that dying people give off.

Ben was struck at how much Minnie had shrunk. He couldn't reasonably apply any other term. The Minnie he knew had always been an ample person, not particularly tall, but large of bosom and bottom, and a bigger than life spirit. The figure on the bed had shriveled, wrinkled like a prune left in the sun too long, and nearly as dark of complexion. Minnie had always had fair skin. The inevitable tubes and wires ran from her matchstick arms to batteries of beeping monitors and bags of fluids around her. She was sleeping.

Cori watched Ben's face closely, and when she gauged he had gotten beyond his initial shock, she went to Minnie and leaned over her.

"Ms. Vann," she said softly, and then repeated herself a little louder. Minnie opened her eyes and looked at Cori. "Mr. Soul is here," she said. She motioned to Ben to come nearer.

"Hello, Minnie," he said. She turned her black eyes to him. Minnie looked out of her wasted shell at him.

"Hello," she rasped. She coughed.

Ben waited for her to finish. When she had, she pulled feebly at him to bring him closer. "Found a man, yet, kid?" she asked, and smiled. Ben was surprised to see she had lost all her teeth.

"Maybe," he said.

"Tell me about him," Minnie said. "That way I won't have to talk so much."

Ben told her about Dickon, and about Butter, and, though he hadn't meant to burden her, he told her about the disastrous night at Pueblo Rio, and how Dickon had ignored him to get drunk with Harry. "I was humiliated, Minnie. I thought we'd gone there for a romantic weekend, not a hangover. The nerve of the man! I don't think I want to risk getting hurt like that again."

She nodded feebly when he was through. Some of her old fire sparked from her eyes. "Young Ben," she said, "forgive this Dickon of yours." Her words came slowly, with pauses between their syllables. She coughed again. "Remember, if I hadn't told you to go out one weekend, you'd never have found Len. Live while you can, Ben, live while you can. Stop looking for Mr. Perfect or Mr. Right, and make whoopee with the man that's in front of you. Listen to a dying lady." Ben protested, "Don't talk like that, Minnie."

Minnie smiled at him. Her smile was a little other-worldly. "I'm going fast. Won't last out the month," she said. "Don't pretend it ain't so, young Ben," she said. "I'm an old lady, and I'm dying." She coughed again. "Hurts too much to stay alive. I've had a good run, my share of women and booze, spaghetti, morning sun and moonlit nights, all the things that make life good. Time to go. Time to see the other side." She coughed again, and her breathing grew ragged. Cori approached.

"Mr. Soul?" she said, "perhaps it's enough visiting?"

"No!" Minnie rasped out. "One more thing to do. Cori, bring me that bamboo Buddha."

Cori went to a shelf at the side of the room and brought a small Buddha carved from bamboo. Minnie took it in one trembling hand. "Take it from me, Ben," she said. "I've had it for a long time, ever since my grandmother gave it to me. She said it was a charm against harm. I've lived pretty well with it. Now, take it, and when you're time comes, pass it on." Ben took the statue from Minnie. She smiled at him, and closed her eyes. Then she opened them. "More about the Buddha in its belly."

"Go now, Ben," she said. "I'm going to sleep. I'll see you again on the other side, if there is one."

Ben leaned over and kissed her.

"Sleep well, Minnie," he said. Tears formed in his eyes. Minnie smiled and closed her eyes. Cori took his elbow, more as a show of compassion than as a way to steer him out of the room. In the sterile living room, she promised to let him know when Minnie's end had come.

"Don't bother about a funeral or memorial service," Cori said. "Minnie has requested that there be none." Cori showed Ben to the door. "Thanks for coming," she said. "Ms. Vann started out just being my patient. She's become like family to me in the end."

"I'm glad you're with her," Ben said, and went down the steps toward his car. He did not look back. He felt a backward look would betray Minnie's insistence that life go on.

### Provenance of a Buddha

Tran Di Poh idly wove bamboo strips while he waited. He intended to make a basket to hold the red lychees his wife so loved to eat. Their season would come soon. Poh knew his wife grieved; she had lost their child in the womb. The Buddhist monk declared the child's soul was so pure it did not need to be born again, but instead had gone on to Nirvana. The French priest declared the child had been lost to the wrath of God because Poh would not convert to the Jesus way. The local shaman was certain demons that lived like parasites on the French soldiers' souls bore responsibility for the unborn child's demise. Poh shrugged his shoulders at what each of the holy men said, and quietly tried to comfort his wife.

The sun was hot. Autumn should come soon, but the summer heat still clung to the mountain south of Poh's village. Poh wiped the perspiration from his brow, and settled his back against a lingam the ancient Cham people had carved. His fingers continued weaving bamboo strips. Poh fell into a trance, induced by the sun and the residual creative power in the lingam. He did not hear the tramping boots of the French soldier or the soldier's command to stand.

Private Jean D'Arme did not like being a soldier, but there had been the girl, and then the girl was pregnant, with an angry father. Jean determined it wise to leave France for a brief time. He joined the army. The army, with its usual folly, sent Jean to the Indochine, where he proceeded to serve in Purgatory. On good days, at least, it was purgatory. On bad days, it was a little worse than hell. And the priests didn't help. They kept the soldiers and the local girls thoroughly separated. Not from the officers, of course, just from the grunts. The priests, no doubt, made use of the boys, who looked a lot like girls, anyway.

In this afternoon, with his sweat trickling down his ribs, Jean decided Poh was the source of all his troubles. Jean yelled at Poh, and kicked Poh's bare foot. Poh did not react. Only Poh's fingers moved, weaving with a rapidity that would have astonished him, had he been aware of it. Poh's impassivity intrigued Jean. He sat in the shade to watch Poh. How long, he wondered to himself, could this crazy peasant keep this up?

Jean dozed intermittently. Poh went on shaping his bamboo creation. Jean recognized it as a copy of the idols that lurked in the dark corners of the incense-clouded heathen temples. Jean preferred watching Poh and dozing to marching back and forth on his sentry line. His dozing soon outdid his watching.

Poh wove the last strips into place on the Buddha's bottom, and slowly swam up out of his trance. In the afternoon ruins cluttered with jungle, only the insects buzzed. It was too hot for birds, and most jungle inhabitants are nocturnal by nature. Poh closed his eyes without glancing toward the recumbent form of Jean D'Arme. With a great smile on his face, he leaned back against the lingam. He drifted to sleep, the Buddha in his lap. Jean woke suddenly when he heard his sergeant whistling as he walked up the trail. He looked at the long shadows, and realized he needed an excuse to be in this particular place. He leaped to his feet and aimed his rifle.

Poh was still smiling when Jean D'Arme's bullet passed through his brain, spattering it across the avudaiyar, the circular stone pedestal that held the lingam. His blood followed, and drained out through the groove the ancient Cham people had carved in the avudaiyar to carry off the offerings of water worshippers gave to the lingam. Jean invented a convoluted tale about a threatening Poh's approaching him, waving a knife. That Poh had no knife was not a fact the sergeant observed, or cared about. Poh was just one more dead native, and, since they weren't French, unimportant in the universal scheme of things.

Poh's chi flowed from his dying body to mingle with the lingam's chi in the bamboo Buddha he had woven in his trance. So much power concentrated in a simple artifact gave it a life of its own. Jean D'Arme immediately succumbed to its magic, picked it up as he got up to salute his sergeant, and tucked it in his pack.

Private Jean D'Arme shipped out, several months later, for France. On the way, the vessel carrying him home docked at the City to re-provision. Jean, granted shore leave, took advantage of a naïve local girl, Carrie Vann, and got her with child. He then got very drunk. His outfit's military police found him, and took him aboard his ship in chains. They left the bamboo Buddha behind. Jean's returned to France, where an unscrupulous Marsellais pimp accused him of unseemly advances (Jean was drunk, again, and mistook the pimp for one of the working girls). The judge sentenced Jean to life on Devil's Island, where he died of dysentery induced by a parasite in his gruel. The bamboo Buddha remained in the Vann family for several generations, until Minnie gave it to Benjamin Dover Soul.

### Ben Goes Back

It took an hour for Ben to drive to the modest suburban home he had shared with Len. The neighborhood had not changed noticeably in the several months Ben had lived in the Village, but his perspective on it had. It looked far drabber to him now than it formerly had. It lacked the touch of a unicorn with a unique horn, there were no llamas on the horizon, and the neighbors, as far as Ben knew them, had very ordinary lives. Ben parked in the drive, got out of the car, and walked to the door. He hesitated there, pretending to search for the key. He did not want to enter. Something waited behind the door to confront him.

"I've been dealing with strange things too long," he muttered to himself. "Now I'm imagining monsters behind closed doors. Open it up, Ben." He put the key in the lock, took a deep breath, and turned it. He turned the knob and the door opened easily. No monster greeted him in the foyer.

A hush lay over the house, the hush of a home left vacant. Dust filmed everything, of course, from the grandfather clock in the entrance to what Ben could see of the tables and chairs beyond. The clock was silent, its pendulum still. Nothing ticked or creaked in the house. Ben shut the front door. He went into the living room. The cousin who had stayed there had re-arranged the Chinese chairs (Len had insisted they get rid of all the couches and overstuffed chairs because they were too hard to get out of). Ben felt the room was alien, a showplace for someone else's life. He did not recognize this room as a place where he had meandered through the mornings and afternoons of his life.

The kitchen, of course, had changed little. The spare bedroom where Len had spent those last suffering weeks was a neutral space now. Visiting nurses had cleared away the hospital bed and its attendant machinery for the dying. A simple twin bed, made up with a white on white chenille spread and two fat pillows stood in the center. A plain pine bureau, only three drawers tall, with no mirror, stood on the left side of the bed. A generic maple rocker sat near the head of the bed on the left hand side. Even the curtains at the window were new, a white cotton ensemble that Ben did not recognize.

The bedroom Ben had shared with Len had changed little; the cousin had moved the entire ensemble of bed, bureau, and vanity counterclockwise ninety degrees, but this did not change the room's character. Ben and Len had moved the furniture around the room several times in the years they had lived here. Still, Ben did not sense Len in the room. It was a sterile memory, antisepticised of feeling.

Ben walked back into the living room and sat in one of the Chinese chairs, the one whose back was a carved rosewood dragon. He had forgotten how uncomfortable it could be. He slid forward and braced himself against the arms to avoid the dragon's snout puncturing his vertebrae. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine Len sitting next to him. He couldn't conjure Len's image. The vague outlines were there, Len's mane of brown hair threaded lightly with silver, and the warmth of Len's presence, these he could remember. He couldn't call Len's face to mind in any detail.

Ben opened his eyes and looked around the room. He understood with a sudden flash of self-awareness that he didn't belong here anymore. This space was the cocoon of a Ben who had also passed on, Len's Ben. Ben smiled ruefully and shook his head slightly as he stared at the blue-gray carpet between his feet. It had been a great life while it went on, but now it was over, over inside himself. Len, his protector and mentor, Len his man and his lover, had gone, gone painfully, into that twilit nether region of what used to be. His living presence had become a memory, and now Ben must pack all the joys and hurts tied to the memory away in boxes in his heart. He might take them out and fondle them occasionally, but they were storage items now.

Ben thought about what practical steps he must take next. He went to the roll-top desk and opened a drawer on the right side. He took a stack of business cards bound in a rubber band from it, thumbed through them, and nodded. In the next few days he would arrange to sell the furniture and put the house on the market. Most of the treasures he might want to keep were already boxed and in the attic or the garage. He would arrange storage for those.

He went to the car, locking the house behind him, and drove to a nearby mall where he knew there was still a pay phone. He made the several calls he needed to make to set matters in motion, and got in his car again, pointed it north, and drove home to the Village with a lightened heart.

### What Does the Egret Regret

Ben had reached the marshes north of the City and its suburbs before he realized how tightly he had been gripping the steering wheel on his car. An internal dialogue he preferred to proceed without his overhearing it had tightened his muscles. His fingers ached, and pains shot up from them through his elbows into his shoulders and his neck. He took several deep breaths, trying to relax, before he decided he needed to stop and walk off some of his tension. The time had come to face something he had been thrusting away for months.

There was a vista point at the side of the marsh highway. Ben pulled in and stopped the car. He forced his fingers from the wheel and flexed them several times. Some of the ache disappeared in the tingle of blood flowing more freely through his hands. He sighed, and took the keys from the ignition and got out of the car to stand in the cold breeze blowing off the Bay over the marshes. Len had often said that a cold wind could clear cobwebs from a cluttered mind.

The salt-tolerant grasses and shrubs, all low growing, colored the marsh subtle shades of red, olive, brown, and yellow. Patches of dark water glittered under the cold gray skies. A white wading bird, that Ben guessed was an egret, stood still as stone not far from him. Its neck curved in a graceful "s" shape over its body.

A quote from something he had read or heard in the past came to mind: "What does the egret regret?" He could not recall the source of it. He repeated the phrase in his mind, turning it into a kind of mantra that slowly drew the tension from his system. In its place, Ben sensed a great emptiness.

"What does the egret regret?" became "What do I regret?" Ben mentally muttered the question several times before he noticed what he was asking himself.

"I regret nothing," he said aloud. The egret ignored him.

"Are you sure you have nothing to regret?" the voice prodded him.

"Yes, I am," he responded.

"Don't you regret selling off the things you shared with Len?" The voice accused Ben with its tone; Ben reacted with anger.

"No, I do not." He almost snarled the words. He listened to the tick of the cooling engine for a moment, hoping to silence the voice within. More calmly he went on, "Len and I had our run. It's over now. All I have of him is a collection of memories, mostly happy ones, but memories."

The voice went on. "Len took care of you, kept watch over you when you were a new kid on the block. You owe him for that." The voice sounded very much like Ben's father talking.

"And when he got old," Ben snapped back, "and was too sick to take care of himself, I took care of him."

"Len was like a father to you." The voice sighed. "You were with him most of your adult life."

"Yes, and now I don't have him, because it was his time to go." Sadness welled in Ben. He flashed on Minnie, surrounded by the paraphernalia of death, and losing her. She had taken care of him, too, when he was naïve and inexperienced. "Just as I don't have Minnie, not for much longer," he said. "Most of the people who surrounded me when I was young are gone, some to Heaven, some to Hell, some to the Southland."

Ben felt moisture on his cheek, and wiped it away with the back of his hand. He realized, suddenly, he had been crying with his eyes open. Usually he cried with his eyes shut. He wrapped his arms around his stocky torso and held himself while his tears washed the grief from his eyes.

"They're gone," he said to the oblivious egret. "I've lost Len and Minnie, Dill Doe so long ago. Hy Ewall, too. I'm alone." He hugged himself tighter; the wind chilled him. He shivered. "I'm alone," he said, "talking to an egret, who probably regrets nothing." He shook his head ruefully.

"Worse than a superstitious old Roman, looking for answers from a bird," he said. He turned toward the car. A musical noise rose over the wind. Ben looked up. A flock of geese flew in an arrow pointed northwest, toward San Danson Village. "Another omen?" he asked them. They did not answer him. Behind him the egret rose from the water and, with a great whirring of its wings, flew off in the general direction the geese had taken. "Enough, already," Ben said. "I get the message."

He got in his car. When he closed the door he could not hear the wind sing. He emptied his sorrow into the soft silence. Again his tears flowed, washing the grit of grief from his eyes. He stared out at the marsh, watching the colors fade from the grasses and sedges as clouds covered the sun. "Be like the egret," he told himself, "regret nothing and go on." He wiped his eyes and his face on his sleeve, started the ignition, and drove on toward San Danson Village.

### The Pachyderm in the Parlor

Butter sighed, thumped her tail twice on the rug. She had been dreaming she was running on the beach, chasing gulls. She was in mid-leap when Ben's footsteps on Dickon's walk woke her. She scrambled to her feet and ran, barking, to the front door. Dickon came in from the kitchen where he had just put the kettle on to boil. His green eyes sparkled and he smiled to see Butter's excitement.

"Someone coming, girl?" he asked. Butter glanced at him, put her nose to the bottom of the door, sniffed, and whined. Dickon could hear someone on the porch. He guessed it to be Ben, and went to the door. He opened the door just as Ben raised his fist to knock. Ben almost knocked Dickon on the forehead, but Butter prevented any such happening by racing around the porch in ecstasy, barking and wagging her tail. Ben and Dickon both laughed.

"Come in," Dickon said over Butter's voice. "I've just put the kettle on."

"Okay," Ben said. "Come, Butter," he commanded. She came to him and jumped up on him, trying to reach his face to lick his cheek. "Down, girl," he said, scratching her behind her ears and gently pushing on her head at the same time. She dropped to all four feet and followed him through the door Dickon held for them.

"Give me your coat, Ben. I'll hang it for you."

"Thanks," Ben said, removing his brown jacket and handing it to Dickon.

"Sit on the couch," Dickon said, "then Butter can sit beside you."

"You let her up there?"

"Yes. Dogs get priority treatment here." Dickon went toward the kitchen, where the kettle was whistling.

Ben sat down. Butter immediately jumped up on the couch beside him, and laid her head on his thigh. She stared up at him with that devotion only a dog or a forgiving god can offer a person.

Ben stroked her back. "I missed you, too," he said to her. "It's been a rough time for old Boss Ben." He leaned over sideways, so he could scratch her rump just above her tail, a form of love she most appreciated. She scooted a little closer, laying first one front paw, and then the other, on Ben's thigh. She closed her eyes in contentment. Had she been a cat she'd have purred.

Dickon came from the kitchen with a cup of tea for each of them. "Here," he said, setting Ben's tea on the table beside him. "You look like you could use this," he said. "Have you had anything to eat this evening?"

"No," Ben said. Fatigue dragged his cheeks down, making jowls of them. Dickon thought Ben looked older, more drained, than he had ever seen him.

"I can stir something up here," Dickon said, mentally inventorying the contents of his cupboard and refrigerator. "I've got eggs, and some sausage. Some canned corn, too, I think."

"Don't bother," Ben said. "Have you had supper?"

"No. I was just thinking about an egg sandwich when you came."

"We could go to the Café of the Four Rosas," Ben said. "My treat."

"You don't have to buy me dinner," Dickon said.

"My way of saying thanks for taking care of Butter," Ben said. He drank some of his tea.

"Well, I suppose so," Dickon said. "I haven't been anywhere since the court hearing about the murrelets." He took a large swallow of his tea. He frowned. "Do we need to talk first?"

"Talk?"

"About the elephant in the room between us."

"Perhaps," Ben said. "Maybe we should eat, first, though. It's going to take a while, I think, to discuss this elephant."

"It is a large subject," Dickon said. He put his half-empty teacup down. Ben did the same. He rubbed Butter behind her ears, and lifted her head and front paws from his thigh.

"We've got to go, girl," he said to Butter. "Maybe, if Rosa Krushan is feeling kindly, I can bring you a little something from her kitchen." Butter whined. It was too soon for Ben to go again. He relented, a little. "We can drop her off at my place," he said to Dickon. Dickon nodded.

"I'll get our coats," he said. He went into the coat closet and got the coats. He handed Ben the brown jacket, and put on his own denim jacket.

"Come, Butter," Ben said. She stood eagerly at the door. When Ben opened it, she raced down Dickon's walk. All the way home she ran back and forth across the path, sometimes running up to Ben, and sometimes running up to Dickon, barking occasionally for the sheer joy of life. Ben was back; life was good. At Ben's cottage, she followed him through the door. He turned on a light for her, and bade her stay. She groveled before him, begging to go with him. "Stay!" he commanded her again, and shut the door on her. She moaned grievously at the closed door. She kept moaning till Ben and Dickon were out of earshot.

"Truce?" Dickon said.

"Truce?" Ben inquired.

"Let's not talk about the elephant until after supper."

"Agreed."

Harry Pitts greeted them with a smile, and a simple hello. Typical of his laconic style. "Coupla specials tonight, lads," he said. He handed them menus and led them to a table at the back.

Dickon and Ben took seats at the table and accepted the menus. "I'd like a cup of tea," Ben said.

"Me, too," Dickon added.

"Coming up," Harry said.

The Café was quiet. A tourist couple, a man and a woman, both gray of hair, he dressed in bright pink and she in electric blue, were the only other customers. They were oblivious of the world. Dickon nudged Ben's knee and nodded in the couple's direction.

"Young love, you suppose?" he said in a low voice.

"The love is young, the lovers aren't," Ben responded in kind. "Bless them. At least it beats dying in a rocking chair on the porch of the old folks' home."

"Probably." Dickon turned back to his menu. "This pork special looks good."

Ben looked at the menu. "Hmm. Pork tenderloin marinated in orange liqueur and soy sauce, delicately spiced with ginger, and served over a bed of bean sprouts, with a side of onion-buttered carrots and garlic-dressed green beans." He nodded. "Sounds delicious. So does the beef."

Dickon picked up his menu again. "Beef medallions rubbed in Santa Fé chili powder and garlic powder, deep fried in corn meal and beer batter, and served over rice with cumin-infused gravy." Tell you what, you order one, I'll order the other, and we'll split the two meals. That way we get to try both of them."

"Sounds good to me."

They signaled Harry they were ready, and he took their order. When he served them their meals, he brought two small plates on the side. "Easier to share without mixing the flavors," he told them. "Rosa said."

A group of six young people, obviously teens on a date, came in. Harry went to seat them. Their noisy chatter filled the dining room.

"Youth," Ben remarked to Dickon.

"Yeah. Ain't it wonderful? While it lasts."

They divided their meals, using the plates Rosa had sent them. They concentrated on eating and listening to the teens discuss the monster movie they'd just seen. The older tourist couple got up, paid their bill, and left, glaring all the while at the rowdy youths who had interrupted their tryst. Dickon and Ben went on eavesdropping. It gave them an excuse not to talk before they were ready.

When Ben went to pay their bill, Harry gave him a Styrofoam clamshell.

"For Butter," Harry said. "It'd go to waste, otherwise."

"Butter thanks you, Harry," Ben said. Harry nodded, and rang up the bill. He made change for Ben. Dickon waited by the door, shrugging into his denim jacket. Ben put his wallet away and put his brown jacket on.

"I need to stop by the car," he said to Dickon. "I left an item in there that Minnie gave me."

"Okay," Dickon said. He held the door for Ben, and followed him out. "Goodnight, Harry," Dickon called over his shoulder. Harry waved, and turned toward the teenagers at their table.

### After Dinner Stint

The night chill rode on the fog's breath. It wasn't a thick fog, just enough to blur the lights at the gas station and make a pink glow around the inn's "Vacancy" sign. Neither Dickon nor Ben spoke as they walked to the garage. Neither knew quite how to start the conversation. Ben went into the garage, unlocked his car, retrieved the bamboo Buddha, locked the car, and went back to Dickon.

"It's a bamboo Buddha," he said to Dickon. "Minnie, my friend who is dying, insisted I take it."

"Who's Minnie?"

"Minnie Vann. She was my boss when I started in the mailroom at Indigent Aborigine." He smiled. "If she hadn't ordered me around, I might never have hooked up with Len, or gone into computer work. She's pushed me a lot of times when I was too slow to move." Tears stood in Ben's eyes. "She's the one who came and helped me through things when Len died. I'm going to miss her, Dickon."

"Oh." Dickon stared down at his feet as he walked the path up to the Village. He carried the clamshell Harry had put together for Butter. Ben carried the bamboo Buddha. They passed Emma's cottage. Faintly they could hear two cats arguing, and the low laughter of women. Then Butter knew they were coming, and commenced barking. She'd had enough of time alone.

"You will come in," Ben said, "won't you, Dickon?" Ben put his hand on Dickon's shoulder to encourage him.

Dickon looked at Ben's hand and smiled a tight little smile. "Yes. I don't want to go on much longer without sorting some things through."

Ben held the door for Dickon to enter. Butter greeted Dickon with a wagging tail and a great attention to the clamshell he carried. "Hello, Butter," Ben said, grinning. Butter spared him a look and a brief whipping of her tail, and returned to her adoration of the clamshell.

Dickon grinned a broad grin. "Shall I feed her?" he asked.

"Go ahead," Ben said. He put the bamboo Buddha on a shelf in front of some philosophy books. "She can't wait. Never can."

"Dogs do people food," Dickon said, still grinning. He went to the kitchen and put the contents of the clamshell in Butter's bowl. She immediately began feasting on leftover hamburger and medallions of beef.

Ben came into the kitchen. "Give me your jacket," he said to Dickon. "Then I'll put on some water for tea." Dickon handed him his denim jacket.

"I can start the tea water," Dickon said. "I know where you keep your teabags and mugs, too." Dickon's eyes followed Ben as he left the kitchen.

"Okay," Ben said. He took hung Dickon's jacket his own in the coat closet. When he returned to the kitchen, Dickon had set the mugs out with a teabag in each. He and Ben sat down at the kitchen table to wait on the kettle. The only sounds in the room came from Butter licking her bowl and the water growling in the kettle. When the water came to a boil, Ben got up and poured water in the mugs. He brought the full mugs to the table.

"Would you like to sit in the living room?" Ben asked.

"Yes," Dickon said, and got up. He took a chair where his face was in shadow. Ben sat in the other chair, his face in the full light of the lamp beside it that he turned on.

After a silence, Ben said, "Where do we start, Dickon?"

"Where do you want to start?"

Ben sipped at his hot tea and frowned at the cup. When he spoke, the words exploded out of him. "You left me out in the cold," he said, "at Pueblo Rio." Anger and hurt roughened Ben's voice. The ultimate question blasted out of his throat. "Why?"

Dickon let the fury of Ben's emotions wash over him without flinching. "Stupidity," he answered. "I shouldn't drink so much. I don't handle it very well."

"I shouldn't either. Took me a couple of days to feel good again." Ben was quieter, but the anger still rode his vocal chords.

"I was a rude, silly, ass, Ben," Dickon said contritely. "I apologize."

"Accepted," Ben said after a long moment.

"I don't often drink, and almost never that much, not anymore," Dickon said. "I had my wild time, after Vin Decatur died. I spent most of a year drinking with Harry Kerry, and others like him." Dickon leaned forward into the light. Ben could see the earnest pleading in his green eyes.

"It was a dark time for me. If it hadn't been for La Señora, I might be dead of liver disease by now, or worse." Ben wondered what to say to this revelation, but Dickon went on before Ben could think of anything. "I'm not proud of that time. There was a kind of wild freedom in it for me, a looseness I'd never had in my life. I almost got addicted to it."

Dickon smiled ruefully at Ben. "I'm sorry I lost it with you in Pueblo Rio. La Señora thinks I was getting too close to you, and got scared off." Dickon sighed, and sank back into the shadows. "She's probably right, as usual," he added.

Ben waited a moment. Perhaps Dickon had more to say. Dickon didn't say anything more. Butter unexpectedly began chasing her tail, as if she wanted to break the tension in the room. Round and round she whirled, growling and biting at the air just inches from her caudal appendage.

"Sit, Butter," Ben said to her, finally. He had to repeat the command before she stopped, looked at him as if to be sure he really meant it, and then sat next to Dickon's feet.

"What do you want now, Dickon," Ben asked. "Do you know?"

"I'm not sure." Dickon took a big swallow of his tea. "I've never had a long-term connection with anybody, except Vanna." Dickon swallowed more tea, draining his mug. "I don't know how to go about one, you see."

"The short answer is day by day." Ben sipped tea from his mug, and set it beside him again. Dickon put down his empty mug. "At least, that's how I did it with Len." Ben wrinkled his forehead. "Len did a lot of the work," he went on, "especially at the first. I'm not so sure how to start something off, myself."

Dickon waited for Ben to go on. The silence between them was less like strained.

"Len sort of took me under his wing," Ben said. "Come to think of it, so had Dill, my professor at college. And there was Minnie Vann, too." Ben looked up at Dickon's shadowed face. "I've usually had someone leading me into love. I've never tried being the leader before."

"I don't lead easy, and I don't think you do, either," Dickon said. "Why does one or the other of us have to be the leader?" Dickon raised a puzzled eyebrow. He was rubbing his earlobe in an agitated way.

"Maybe we don't," Ben said.

"Then how do we get together, if we're going to?" Dickon spread his hands as if he were holding a large bowl. Butter licked the hand nearest her. He used it to rub her head.

After a long pause, Ben said, "Well, maybe we talk about it, first."

"Talk first, sex second? That doesn't sound very gay," Dickon said with a smile.

"Or third, or fourth," Ben said. "Gay or not isn't important. The two of us are." Ben shifted in his chair to get to his handkerchief. He took it out and blew his nose.

"Do you want a long-term relationship with me," Dickon asked.

"I think so," Ben said. "Do you want a long-term relationship with anybody?"

"I don't know." Dickon studied his hands, rubbing them together. "I think sometimes yes, and sometimes no."

"What do you suggest we do?" Ben leaned forward in his chair.

"Try it out, for a while." Dickon looked away into the room's corner. He was reluctant to see Ben's face.

"Perhaps," Ben said. "Sort of 'live together' before we 'marry' kind of thing."

"At least find out if the sex is right between us," Dickon said, turning back to Ben.

"When?"

"Now's a good time to start," Dickon said, grinning. "Except the blasted condoms are at my place."

"I've got a few around here, too," Ben said.

"Hoping?" Dickon leaned toward Ben.

"Doesn't every girl have a hope chest?"

Neither of them moved. Finally Ben said, "Do you want more tea?"

"No," Dickon said. "Do I come to you or do you come to me?"

"We meet in the middle," Ben said. "That's best, I think." He stood, and waited for Dickon to stand. Dickon took a deep breath and came together with Ben. They kissed, tentatively.

"That's a start," Ben said, and kissed Dickon again, with more confidence. Dickon put his arms around Ben and kissed back. This time they held the kiss, exploring each other, for several seconds. Butter whined at their feet, unnoticed.

On the hill, the unicorn with the unique horn stirred in her dreams. She reached out to Butter, to quiet her. "Now is their time," she counseled the dog. "Let them be to fumble their way toward each other."

Ben and Dickon broke their embrace, and moved to put an arm each around the other's waist. They headed for the bedroom. Butter whimpered once, and lay down beside Ben's chair, though every fiber in her yearned to be part of the process.

In the bedroom, Ben and Dickon explored each other, speaking in the languages of touch, not words, until they joined to fill each the other's emptiness for that time.

### Respecting Morning

Butter woke first. Her sleep on the hearthrug had been tumultuous with dreams she did not remember, except that they involved convoluted chases. She had not slept well, by herself. Dogs belonged with their people, not in another room. But, the unicorn with the unique horn had spoken, and she had obeyed. She stood, stretched forelegs and aft legs, and went to the kitchen to lap up some water. Her water dish was only partly full, but it sufficed for the moment. Her other pressing needs required she waken Ben to open a door for her.

In the bedroom, she sniffed at Dickon's hand, which was outside the blanket. He was snoring softly. Then she licked Dickon's hand. He murmured in his sleep, and rolled over to huddle completely under the covers, except for his forehead and nose. Butter would have shrugged, had her anatomy permitted such an expression of resignation. She went around to Ben's side of the bed. He was half-uncovered and snoring rather more loudly than Dickon. Butter whined. Ben snored more loudly yet. Butter yipped, softly. Ben snored on. Butter gathered her strength and leaped onto the bed, staggering over Ben's body to lie between him and Dickon.

She crawled forward, until her head was even with the pillows. Then she licked Ben's ear. He mumbled, grumpily, but did not waken. Then she licked Dickon's nose, her tongue as liquid as she could make it. He did not waken. She licked Ben's ear again, and, just as she was ready to bark in his ear, he rubbed her head.

"Got to go out, girl?" he said. She whined again. Ben threw back the covers, sat up on the edge of the bed, and rubbed his eyes. Then he stood slowly, for he had come to an age where a quick jumping up from sitting often induced dizziness. Without bothering to clothe himself in any way, he went to the kitchen, Butter racing ahead of him, and opened the door for her to go into the yard. Then he checked her water dish, and filled it. He was bending over, putting it on the floor, when Dickon emitted a low wolf whistle from the doorway. Ben straightened up, blushing.

"Good morning," Dickon said. "How are you this morning?"

"A little sore, from the unaccustomed exercise," Ben said, turning to Dickon. Dickon had not dressed either. "Tea? And maybe some breakfast?"

"Tea, yes, breakfast, no. I remember, if you don't, that you've got to go to lunch today with La Señora, and it's already almost ten o'clock." Dickon grinned, his green eyes sparkling mischievously. "Probably better dress for lunch. Even Willy Waugh wears his briefs to La Señora's house."

"Right," Ben said. Butter barked at the door just then. Ben let her in.

"I'll get dressed, and run along," Dickon said. "Want to have dinner with me, tonight?"

"Yes," Ben answered. "Can I bring something?"

"Just yourself. I'll make something simple, probably out of a box or a can."

"Okay. And I can tell you all about lunch with La Señora."

"Right," Dickon said, and went toward the bedroom. He dressed quickly, and had nearly finished when Ben came in for his clothes.

"I'll see you tonight," he said, and gave Ben an awkward kiss on the cheek. Ben responded with a peck on Dickon's stubbly cheek.

"Maybe we should talk some more," Dickon said.

"Perhaps," Ben said. "Until tonight."

### La Señora's Request

Elke met Ben at the garage to escort him to La Señora's in the funicular. She motioned him silently into the funicular, engaged its controls, and the car began its slow crawl up the mountain. The fog hung low, painting a hazy film over the vegetation on the hill.

"What's wrong?" Ben asked Elke about half way up. Her worn face and shadowed eyes suggested to Ben she had been stressed for some time. Her silence loomed larger as she frowned, apparently contemplating her answer. Ben let his concern show from his gray eyes. He waited.

"Much," Elke finally said. "I'm not at liberty to tell you what. That's for La Señora to do." Elke's voice was thick in her throat. Ben guessed sadness thickened it, and maybe a little fear mixed with the sadness. Ben did not pry. He doubted Elke had a chink that any man could open.

"I'm sure she'll talk to you," Elke said. "That's why she invited you to lunch today." Elke turned away and stared at the gray landscape. The fog was thicker as they neared the top of the mountain. Only the plants just along the funicular showed. They were bejeweled with drops of fog, but the drops did not glitter in the half-gloom of the mist. For Ben the rest of the funicular ride went forward in a world he could not see, could not touch, and could hear only in muffled sounds.

"La Señora is feebler than she was when you last saw her," Elke said as they exited the funicular. "Please do not let your shock show on your face. She needs all the encouragement she can get." She touched Ben's arm with her fingertips, as if to guide him to the carved door. It was just visible through the fog. She opened it, and ushered him in.

"I will take your jacket," she said. "La Señora is in the library. I will bring tea, unless you'd rather have something stronger?"

"Tea will be fine," Ben said, shedding his jacket and handing it to her. He made his way along the hall to the library. The door was open. He coughed quietly, to let La Señora know he was coming, and entered the room. La Señora occupied a wheelchair. She was indeed frailer looking; she seemed like a bit of dandelion fluff about to blow away. Then she spoke, and her feebleness disappeared like an illusion in the presence of truth.

"Thank you, Mr. Soul," she said, "for coming. We'll go in to lunch in a little while." She gestured toward the chair he had sat in the last time he'd been in the library. "Do be seated." La Señora looked at her hands, rubbing the back of the left with the fingers of the right.

"You're looking well," Ben said, in an effort to start conversation.

"Nonsense. I'm an old lady. I'll be dead one of these days not too far along. I'm over ninety, you know." She stared at him with her fierce eyes; her smile softened their ferocity. "As any old lady will tell you, I like to hear that sort of nonsense now and again," she went on. Ben opened his mouth; she raised a hand to forestall his speaking. He saw the hand tremble.

"I need to ask you for a favor," she said. "It is a favor that may be very burdensome, so don't leap to assure me you'll do it until you hear me out." She coughed then, a great rattling sound that began in her chest and rose to whistle out her throat. Ben half rose from his chair to help her. She waved him off with her trembling hand. She cleared her throat and began again.

"The favor I want of you is to be my estate's executor." She gathered her breath for another cough, but it did not come. As she had bid him, Ben stayed silent. She looked at him with a wry smile. Her black eyes sparked fire. "Despite the sound of my lungs, I'm not ready to die just yet. I have things I must accomplish first." She coughed again, a gentler sound than her earlier cough.

"The job of executor of my estate will include godparent duties for an infant not yet conceived." Ben looked at her, and read determination on her face. "You have discovered I am not an ordinary woman."

Ben nodded. La Señora went on. "I am a Keeper of the Balance." She stopped again to cough, gently this time, into her handkerchief. "My successor will be born soon before or soon after I die. She, for balancing is a feminine obligation, will be born to someone who is of the Village." La Señora paused to study Ben. She nodded, after a moment, as though she read something agreeable in his expression.

"You will have a companion godparent. I intend to ask Dickon Shayne to stand for this child, as well." She stopped to gather her breath. "There is another child to oversee, as well. One day very near to the new balancer's birth a llama will drop, not a cría, but a unicorn. You see, when I die, my unicorn will die also, within days, if not hours, of my death. I think you may rely entirely on Willy Waugh's judgment for the foal's physical needs. Willy must rely on you to provision his work."

La Señora paused, stared at her hands. "I don't think I fear death," she said. "It seems to me more and more a promise of rest." She looked up at Ben. "I do not wish to hasten it, though. I still like living." She rang a small bell on the table beside her. "Also, preparing to die is its own journey, not to be hastened." Elke came in very soon, as though she had been listening in the hall. "It's time for tea," La Señora said. "English Breakfast, I presume, Elke?"

"As you requested, Señora."

"Please pour for us, Elke."

"Certainly, La Señora." Elke filled two cups, presenting the first to La Señora, and the second to Ben. La Señora set hers aside on the little table near her. Ben cupped his hands around the warm china, glad of its heat. The library seemed cold to him.

"Thank you, Elke. Please tell Willy we shall be ready for luncheon in three quarters of an hour."

"Certainly, Señora."

"That is all, Elke, for now."

"Yes, La Señora." Elke left in a rustle of skirts.

"Elke and Willy have been faithful companions for long years," La Señora said. "I shall, of course, provide for them and for others in the Village. I trust you will be able to carry out these sorts of provisions of my will without undue difficulty. Now, do you have questions?"

"I'm not sure where to begin," Ben said, slowly. He looked at her. "Why me?" he said. "I mean, I'm the newest kid in the Village. Why not Elke, or Emma, or Dickon, even?"

"They are valuable members of my community," La Señora said. "They are not the executor the unicorn suggested."

"The unicorn suggested me?"

"Yes."

"Again, why?"

"I have investigated your history, and I have read your aura," La Señora went on, "and these inquiries validate the unicorn's reasoning." She smiled. "Your old friend, Minnie Vann, was the final advocate for your stewardship."

"I didn't know you and Minnie were acquainted."

"We have a long professional history. We both served, each in our own way, to keep the balance. We considered ourselves colleagues."

Ben looked out the window at the fog. "I know nothing about auras, or the care and feeding of children, and only myths and legends about unicorns." He looked at La Señora again. "Do _you_ think I'm the right person for the job?"

"I think you are the only person for the job. You have a wisdom forged in the fires of grief, and this has made you strong. Everyone else has a long history with me, and that breeds expectations and perceptions that can interfere with a just distribution of property, let alone the spiritual oversight of a child with a unicorn companion."

"I'm not trained in psychic or spiritual things."

"That is a benefit, as well. You are honestly yourself, without doctrinal contamination." She sighed, and leaned back in her chair. "Your gentleness and quiet strength will balance Dickon's passion and impulses." She looked into Ben's gray eyes. He saw pleading in her black eyes. "Do you wish to think it over, Mr. Soul?" She reached for her cooling cup of tea and swallowed a quarter of the cup.

Ben swirled the tea in his cup. He sipped at it. "No, Señora, I do not feel qualified, but I trust your judgment, and Minnie's. If the two of you think I can do it, I'll find a way." La Señora smiled and closed her eyes. Her weariness lay on her like a gray blanket.

"Thank you, Mr. Soul," she said. She coughed again, opened her eyes, and swallowed more of her tea. She consulted her watch. "I believe Willy will have lunch ready for us soon."

She rang her bell. "I must ask you, Mr. Soul, to say nothing about being a godparent to Dickon until I have had opportunity to sound him out. He should be free to agree to serve without undue pressure."

"Certainly, Señora. Shall I say nothing to him about being your executor?"

"There is no reason not to tell him that. It will explain your visit today." She put her empty cup and saucer beside her.

"Willy promised me a treat for luncheon," she said. "I think he is making Veal Marsala, with haricorts vert in a butter sauce. Wickedly fattening, but so delicious."

Elke entered the room.

"We are ready, Elke. Please wheel me to the table, now."

"Certainly, Señora. If you will follow us, Mr. Soul?"

Ben finished his tea and put the cup gently on the tray that held the pot. Then he followed Elke and La Señora to lunch.

### The Grand Ball

Ben elected to walk down the Chapel trail rather than ride back in the funicular. The fog had lifted enough he could see Obaheah and the white waves pirouetting around its black feet. Westward the leaden sky merged into the leaden ocean. The grasses and flowers, just coming to life for their winter dance, sparkled with cold droplets the fog had left on them. Ben's shoes were soon wet, and so were his trouser cuffs, but the walk alone gave him time to ponder what La Señora had asked of him.

He was passing Dickon's cottage when Butter raced up from the beach trail to greet him. Dickon had taken her for a walk as he had promised Ben he would. She had evidently been playing in the wavelets in the cove, because her feet were wet and left sandy wet paw marks on Ben's trousers.

Dickon came briskly along the trail behind Butter. His red hair was tumbled about his skull, and his green eyes sparkled with highlights like the sun left on the sea's green wavelets. He waved to Ben. "Hi," Dickon said, as he came up to Ben. "How did lunch go with La Señora?"

"It was a good lunch," Ben said. "Veal Marsala with haricorts vert in a butter sauce. Some nice little potatoes, too, pared in round balls and bathed in olive oil and basil."

"Fancier than I'll have for you tonight. What did La Señora want with you?" Dickon tweaked his right earlobe.

Ben looked out over the cove, leaden as the sea was leaden. "I'll go into that later. La Señora has asked me to wait before I say anything." He looked back at Dickon. "I agreed."

"Bummer for the curious." Dickon smiled wryly. He searched Ben's round face and saw his determination to remain quiet. He didn't push. "Do you want to come over now, watch me open cans and boxes?"

"No, I need to rest and think. What time should I come for supper?"

"At six. It won't be anything as fancy as your lunch was." Dickon spread his hands apologetically.

"That's fine. Fancy food only goes down easy once in a while," Ben said. "Butter and I are going to take a nap. If we're late getting up, come wake us."

"Will do." Dickon quickly pecked a kiss on Ben's cheek and turned toward his own cottage. "Be sure to bring Butter," he called over his shoulder. Ben smiled at Dickon's back, whistled for Butter (who was investigating an interesting clump of grass) and turned toward home.

Once inside his cottage, Ben yawned, contemplated a cup of tea, and decided to delay making it. He sat in his recliner, leaned back, closed his eyes, and started to think about his commitment to La Señora. The weight of his commitment overwhelmed him. He wondered at his easy agreement to godfather a child yet unborn. Ben knew very little about children.

Butter jumped into his lap. He rubbed her behind her ears. She reached around and licked his hand. He smiled, and began rubbing her back. His hands gradually slowed and stopped. He drifted into sleep.

Ben was at the Grand Ball. In the musicians' gallery, slender men with powdered perukes and velvet coats sawed a minuet from violins and flutes. A harpsichord played continuo for the melody. Ben was sitting on a low love seat, his coattails spread out beside him, his tight-encased legs crossed right over left, and the silver buckle on his dancing pump winking in the candle blaze that lit the room. He had gossiped with My Lady This and chatted cattily with My Lord That on the usual level of inanity common to ballroom small talk. Everyone knew, of course, that serious conversations at a ball only occurred while one was dancing.

The musicians altered their rhythms and broke into a gavotte. Ben frowned at his twitching foot that wanted to dance. A shapely leg in green knit interrupted his reverie. His gaze ravished the well-turned calf past the knee and up the manly thigh to the crotch he devoutly hoped was not just an over-sized codpiece. On past that point of great interest his gaze traveled to the shapely waist in its green and gold velvet waistcoat, past the frilled shirt obscuring, yet still suggesting, the manly pectorals under broad shoulders. On he lifted his gaze to fall at last into the deep green pools of Dickon's eyes.

"Shall we dance?" Dickon said, and held a hand out to Ben.

Ben took it, and rose as gracefully as he could. "Why, yes," he said. The musicians abruptly stopped playing, laid aside their instruments, and headed for the punch bowl.

"Perhaps later," Dickon said. "Shall we, instead, refresh ourselves at the punch bowl as well?"

"I do discover a certain thirst," Ben said. Dickon still held his hand. Ben tingled with excitement. Dickon took a punch cup from the server and passed it to Ben. Then Dickon took one for himself. Ben sipped the punch. It was terribly sweet, and strongly alcoholic. Dickon drank his off in four swallows, and set aside his cup.

"Come," he said. "I am told the jasmine is lovely tonight on the terrace."

"Yes," Ben said. "So My Lady Wishfort said to Sir Fopling Flutter."

"There's a moon, as well," Dickon said. His green eyes glittered with fun. Ben set aside his punch, let Dickon take his hand, and walked out with him into the night, the moonlight, and the scent of jasmine.

"Oh, see," Dickon said, "there's a bench there, just in the shadow of the maze. Shall we sit a moment to look at the moon?" Ben went unresisting as Dickon drew him toward the bench. It was cool to sit on, and scarcely large enough to hold the two men. Dickon put his hand on Ben's trembling knee, and slowly caressed Ben's thigh. Ben turned to Dickon and kissed him full on the lips. Len's ghost appeared above the jasmine over Dickon's shoulder. It smiled at Ben, and nodded, as though approving his new romantic interest. Ben kissed Dickon again.

And woke up when Butter barked at the door. She needed to go out. Groggily, and half-aroused, Ben got up, and let Butter out into the twilight, a smile teasing the corners of his mouth. He went into the bedroom and dressed for dinner with Dickon.

### Spamming the Gap

It was dark when Ben set out for Dickon's place. The wind was off the sea, and its edge was cold and wet. Ben shuddered inside his warm jacket as a cold wet finger of wind scratched at his neck. Butter kept close to Ben's path, unlike her usual free-ranging self. Something threatened in the shadows, though no monsters appeared with gnashing teeth or slavering jaws. Ben and Butter both were glad to reach Dickon's cottage, and go into the light and warmth redolent with intriguing smells.

"Hi, guys," Dickon said. He kissed Ben a long moment, before he stooped and scratched behind Butter's ears. She wagged her tail furiously. Ben would have wagged his tail, if he'd had one. Dickon took his coat and waved him toward a chair.

"Supper will be ready soon," he said. "It's just simple stuff." He went to the kitchen, calling over his shoulder to Ben, "Tea? Wine?"

"Wine," Ben said, taking a chair. Butter leaped into his lap and settled herself. Dickon brought Ben a glass with a pale red wine.

"White Merlot," he said, handing it to Dickon. "It's a blush wine. Enjoy. I'll just tend to a couple of things in the kitchen, and then we can eat."

Dickon was gone several minutes. Ben sipped at the wine, closed his eyes, and let the flavor warm his tongue and throat. Butter thumped her tail on the chair arm; Ben's fingers had stopped rubbing her. He immediately set to rubbing her again. He put the wine glass, still more than half-full, on the table by the chair and put both hands to work on Butter. He set his mind adrift. Dickon's call to supper interrupted Ben's unfocused reverie.

"It's ready," Dickon said. Ben ordered Butter to get down. She looked at him in disbelief. He had to push her off.

"I've got a little plate for you, Butter, with people food," Dickon said. She forgot Ben's dumping her and raced ahead of Dickon to the kitchen. Ben looked at the table with surprise. Dickon had set it formally, with candles, napkins, and copious flatware. He turned out the overhead light in the kitchen, and the drab little room turned into a cavern of romance.

"Beautiful," Ben said. Dickon held the chair for him. Ben sat down, a large smile on his face.

"First course is the soup," Dickon said, "from a can, as I promised." It was chicken noodle, but Dickon had garnished it with bits of parsley and a very thin slice of lemon. He put a small amount in Butter's bowl. She lapped it up eagerly.

When they had finished the soup, Dickon brought the fish course. It was tuna salad on toast points. Again, Dickon had surpassed the ordinary with a touch of chili pepper in the sweet relish and mayonnaise. Butter had her own toast point, as well.

The meat course followed. It was Spam Tropicale, grilled slices of the canned meat sauced with pineapple and candied ginger. Butter ate a generous portion of this delicacy. The salad was a slaw of shredded cabbage and carrot in a dilled mayonnaise. Dessert was vanilla ice cream with a cherry sauce. Butter, of course, had her small share of these treats as well.

Dickon cleared away the dishes and set them to soak in the sink. Then he and Ben went into the living room. They sat on the sofa together. Butter lay at their feet.

"Where did you learn to do such things with canned foods?" Ben asked Dickon.

"Church potlucks," Dickon said. "I used to organize them as often as I could. Church cooks can be very creative, when they're competing with each other."

"Do you miss that? The church and all the potlucks?"

"The potlucks, yes, I miss those. Some of the church work—I miss that too. The ugly politics, no, I don't miss that." Dickon smiled a rueful smile. "Everything has its dirty politics, of course, but most jobs don't require you to forgive the politicians."

The two men were quiet for a while. Dickon leaned his head against Ben's shoulder. Ben extricated his arm to put it around Dickon. After a while Dickon said, "I like to listen to your breath go in and out. It's so comforting."

"It's nice to sit with you this way," Ben said. "I've missed this closeness since Len died."

"Did you and Len sit like this often?"

"Frequently, at first. Less so as we lived together longer. Cuddling is like sex, I guess. A couple needs it more before they have a history of other ways to be together."

Dickon sat upright, still cradled in Ben's arm. "Do you think a couple outgrows a need for sex?"

"No, but they do slow down." Ben rubbed his knee against Dickon's.

"Did you and Len slow down?" Dickon rubbed back with his knee.

"Yes, from hot and heavy and often to warm and glowing and less frequent."

"Right up till he died?"

"Right up till he got too sick. Several months before he died, his heart was too wonky to take a chance on sex." Ben slid his arm from around Dickon. "Sorry," he said. "My arm's going to sleep."

"Sometimes the spirit is more willing than the flesh's weakness can support," Dickon said. "Would you like some tea?"

"Sounds good. Can I help you with the dishes?"

"Sure," Dickon said. "I'll wash, if you'll dry. We can do them while the kettle is heating." He stood, bent over, and kissed Ben. "Can you stay tonight?"

"Yes," Ben said. "I was hoping you'd ask."

"Still early days for us, I guess," Dickon said, taking Ben's hand and drawing him upright.

"Yes, early days," Ben said. "We can still make out over a dishpan." They went hand in hand to the kitchen.

Dickon washed while Ben dried. "The only long-term relationship I've had was with Vanna," Dickon said as he drained the soapy water from the sink and rinsed the last of the suds down the drain. "When I think back about it, sex, or any kind of affection, physical or otherwise, was more of a weapon than anything else with her." Dickon dried his hands on a towel. "I guess I'll have to learn new ways of being with somebody."

"I think every new person we meet gives us something new to learn about being in the world with other people," Ben said. The kettle whistled. Dickon made them each a cup of tea. They sat at the kitchen table to drink it. Butter came in and lay at their feet.

### Hooters

Dickon heard the "hu-hu-hoo-hoot" of a screech owl in the night. He drifted up from sleep into drowsy wakefulness. The owl called again, and another answered it. Owls didn't visit the Village often, preferring to keep to the forests east of the highway. When they did come, the Villagers considered it a stroke of good luck to hear them in the night. Rodents were less inclined to restrict themselves to the woods than the owls were. The small beasts proliferated more rapidly than Prime Pussy could control, even with Ermentrude's visiting help.

"Welcome, owls," Dickon whispered. He didn't want to wake Ben sleeping beside him. Softly he laid back the covers on his side and slipped from the bed to the window. The moon was filtering through the thin fog, casting a gilding of gray silver over the foliage's blackness. The owls spoke to each other again. Dickon angled his head to look upward toward the top of the tree outside his bedroom window. He fancied he saw a flutter of movement in the moon's shadow. He shivered. The chill sea wind had cooled the cottage. Behind him he heard the click of Butter's toenails on the bare floor. He heard the soft thump she made as she jumped on the bed. He smiled. The bed would be warm for sure when he returned.

Dickon opened the window, somehow balanced on the sill, and then soared into the tree to perch on a branch. The branch swayed as the Great Owl swooped to a landing beside him.

:"Hello," he said to the Great Owl. It did not respond. He could smell the musty dust odor of its feathers. He heard the surf sigh over the rocks at the foot of the cliffs, and the lament of the wind in the leaves. Heaviness fell on him, the heaviness of judgment that found him wanting. He trembled, anticipating a severe sentence.

"You are found wanting," the Great Owl intoned. Its voice was very like a church bell tolling for the dead. "You have lost the capacity to trust."

There came a chorus of "Hear! Hear!" from an attendant audience of tree frogs. A sudden shift in the moonlight had illuminated a broad branch across from the one Dickon and the Great Owl perched on. Hordes of small green and blue bodies lined the branch. Dickon shuddered before their collective accusation.

"I have no reason to trust," Dickon said to the assembled ranids. "Everyone I have trusted, except La Señora, has betrayed me."

"An advocate, he needs an advocate," one frog piped in its ragged voice. The others took up the cry, "An advocate! An advocate!"

The Great Owl nodded, and carefully raised one claw, foot outward, to quell the outcry. As though all on the same switch, the frogs went silent.

"Is there one among you who will argue this wingless one's cause?"

Silence fell over the tree. Dickon heard the sighing surf and the winds, but no one raised a voice for him.

"Who will be this one's advocate?" the Great Owl intoned again, almost as if it asked a rhetorical question that could have no answer.

"I will," a rasping voice raked across the symphony of breeze and sea sounds.

A weasel came slithering up the tree. The frogs all huddled closer together; weasels sometimes prey on frogs. Owls sometimes prey on weasels. Dickon had never heard of weasels up a tree, but here one was.

"Identify yourself to the Court," a frog called out.

"Willis Wallace Weasel, for the defense," the advocate replied. "Who speaks for the prosecution?"

"I, Victor Victorinus, do," a vole said, appearing suddenly out of the darkness. Great round glasses framed its tiny beady eyes. Dickon giggled at the sight.

"Order in my court!" the Great Owl intoned. Dickon hushed. The owl glared at him, and then turned to the vole.

"How say you, prosecutor?"

"If it please the Court," the vole said in a shrill voice, "the Accused no longer trusts anyone or anything, including the Creator."

"If it please the Court," the weasel spoke up in an oily voice, "the Accused has been thrice betrayed, first by Vanna the vicious, secondly by Vin Decatur, and thirdly, by his church. Surely the Court can be lenient."

"What say you, the Jurors?" the Owl inquired of the assembled frogs. As one, each frog put on a mask, a mask of Vanna's face. The vole cackled with glee.

"Sorry, old chum," the weasel said to Dickon. The frogs exchanged the Vanna mask for Vin Decatur's face. The vole laughed shrilly. The weasel shook its downcast head.

The frogs took off Vin's face and put on a Ray Sincaine face. The weasel groaned. The vole chortled. The Great Owl turned sad, wise eyes on Dickon.

"Condemned," it said. "It is the judgment of this Court that you be sentenced to the outer cold."

"Can this court show no mercy?" a booming voice came from above.

"None," the Owl replied.

"Then I must do it," the voice boomed, and a great eagle swept in to knock the owl from the branch. The weasel and the vole hastened into the darkness where the weasel ate the vole, and choked to death on the rodent's glasses. The frogs leaped as one into the nighttime abyss and croaked away.

The eagle put a sheltering wing around the shivering Dickon. Dickon looked up at the eagle. The eagle had Ben's round face and slightly crooked smile. Dickon snuggled closer to the warm feathers and listened to the strong beating of the eagle's heart.

In the morning, Dickon did not remember returning to bed or moving Butter over so he had room to lie beside Ben. He did remember the owl's coming to him, to judge him, and the eagle's rescuing him, and took this dream as an omen. He thought about telling Ben about his dream, but pulled back. He didn't want to seem as dependent on Ben as the dream suggested he was.

Ben wasn't in bed. Butter, too, was gone. Dickon got up, put on his robe, and went to the kitchen. Two notes stood on the table propped against the saltshaker. The first, from Ben, was short:

Dickon—I've gone to Wong's for dog biscuits for Butter. This note for you was on the door. I'll get my mail while I'm there. Be back some time this morning.—Ben.

The second note was in Elke Hall's formal handwriting. It read:

Mr. Shayne:

La Señora requests you come to tea today at 3:00 o'clock. She has matters of business to discuss with you. She also regrets her health is sufficiently poor today that she cannot offer you a more substantial meal than tea.

Elke Hall

Dickon frowned. Ben had put him off when he inquired what had transpired when Ben went to La Señora's for lunch. Maybe La Señora would explain it all this afternoon. She had been conspiratorial before when she thought it necessary.

Dickon made himself some toast and took down a jar of apricot preserves. He had just finished his breakfast and was dressing when Ben and Butter came back.

### A Note from Home

Ben's eyes were red-rimmed when Dickon let him in. Butter was subdued.

"Good morning," Dickon said. Ben nodded. His round face was drawn and gray. "What's the matter?" Dickon asked.

Ben held out a letter. "This," he said. "Go ahead, read it."

_Uncle Ben,_

_I'm sorry to write this news to you. I can't get hold of you by telephone, so paper and ink will have to do. Mama is too stressed out to write you about Dad. He's in a bad way. Last Thursday he passed out driving the tractor in the east forty, and ran into the trees at the Coleman Corner piece. He got pretty banged up._

_Worse news, when the docs got through poking and prying at him, they discovered he has the big C, in his lungs and several other vital organs. Mama needs some support right now. Can you come?_

_Your nephew,_

_Lawson Soul_

"Oh, Ben," Dickon said, "I didn't know you had a brother."

"Hardin and I don't communicate much. Too different. We were close as boys, but our lives have gone separate ways." Ben rubbed his temples with both hands. "He never really understood why I didn't want to settle down, get married, do something like farm the land."

"Do you know his wife very well?"

"Enna was my senior prom date." Ben tried to grin, and gave up. Tears started to pool in his eyes. "Enna Pinch, she was then. Hardin always seemed a little guilty that he wound up marrying her after I had dated her."

"Did he cut you off because you're gay?"

"Pretty much. We exchange Christmas cards. That's about all."

"Are you going to go back?"

"Yes. One thing I learned from Len's passing. It's important to say goodbye to people and events from the past. I'll drive into the City today, and get a plane for Denver. I can rent a car there and drive to Berthoud."

"Do you need someone to go with you?"

"No, but I do need someone to take care of Butter. Can you do that?"

"Of course." They were silent together for several minutes. Butter lay between them, quiet as well.

"Come," Dickon said, and pulled Ben to him. "Let it out, Ben. I'm here, for now, to share your trouble." Ben wept against Dickon's shoulder. He drank in the warm male smell of Dickon and his flannel shirt.

Ben carried the memory Dickon's smell with him to the airport. He was able to get a flight from the City to Denver without difficulty, though a snowstorm over the Rockies delayed the plane's arrival. It was not snowing, then, in Denver, for which Ben was glad. He hadn't driven on icy roads for many years, and didn't want to re-learn those skills with an unfamiliar rental car.

He found his way through the maze of freeways Denver had added since his college days and took Interstate 25 north toward Berthoud. He took the Colorado 44 exit west toward Berthoud, and just east of town turned off toward Bacon Lake. The Soul family farm lay on the west side of the road. In Ben's childhood, it had been well out of town. Now subdivision homes stood just to the west of the boundary line. Ben turned in at the lane, and drove toward the old house he'd grown up in. It was two stories, still white, though it needed a coat of paint. A newer looking barn and other outbuildings stood behind it. A very bright night light lit the yard brighter than day.

Ben pulled to a stop before the front door and cut the engine. Now that he was here, he was strangely reluctant to go up the wooden steps onto the porch. Memories flashed through his mind in a wild kaleidoscope. The time he fell off the porch as a toddler, sitting with his mother snapping string beans, sitting with his father of an evening as his father lectured him about honesty. Dark things and light things, jumbled together, memories Ben didn't want to encounter. He considered starting the engine and retreating to the Denver airport.

Before he could do it, a light went on behind the lace curtains at the window on the right side of the house. Then the porch light went on. A man, too young to be Hardin, but very like him, opened the front door and rolled out in his wheelchair. Ben sighed, and got out of the car.

"Hi," Ben said. "Sorry to come at such an awkward hour. Are you Laws?"

"Uncle Ben?" the young man asked.

"Yes," Ben said. "When did you get the wheelchair?"

"A couple of years ago. I argued with a tractor. The tractor won. Come on in. I'd help with your luggage, but, as you can see, I'm in no shape to carry bags."

"I can carry my own." Ben went to the trunk and got his suitcase, a small black, soft-sided bag, closed the trunk, and walked up the steps. They creaked under his feet, just as they had the last time he'd walked up them.

Laws opened the door for him, and rolled the wheelchair back in a smooth curve.

"Fancy footwork with that," Ben said. He went through the door. Laws followed him.

"First door on the left," Laws said.

"The guest room?"

"You're a guest. Officially." Laws spoke in low tones. "I'd offer you something to drink, but Mama doesn't allow liquor here."

"That's fine. I don't drink very often, anyway."

"Uncle Ben?"

Ben put the suitcases on the guest bedroom bed and turned to his nephew in the doorway. "Yes?"

"Mama doesn't know I wrote to you. Dad was the one who wanted me to write. Sleep in tomorrow morning, will you, until some time after nine? Give me a chance to tell her you're here."

"Is she going to be upset that I'm here? I never quarreled with her, or your Dad, you know."

"I don't think so. For his own reasons, which he won't share with me, Dad didn't want her to know, until you got here." Laws shrugged. "Who can figure? It's all about something that happened before my time. It'll mean a lot to Dad that you've come. He's not got much time left." Laws brushed tears from his eyes. "He's suffered enough, I guess. It's time for him to go." He started to back out the door. "Thanks for coming, Uncle Ben."

"Goodnight, Laws."

"Goodnight." The wheelchair turned down the hall toward the back of the house.

### Snow Falls on Berthoud

Ben turned on the light beside the bed, and shut off the overhead fixture. A midnight quiet wrapped the house in tiny noises. Toward the back of the house, he heard an electric motor whine briefly, and then he heard the upstairs hall boards creak as something, presumably Laws's wheelchair, crossed them. He took off his clothes, carefully hanging them over the back of a rocking chair. The old house had no closets, and over the years since he had lived here the wardrobe had disappeared.

The old guest bed, high off the floor, with a too-soft mattress and great pillows remained. He hadn't slept in it since his childhood, but it still gave off the smell of lavender his mother had used to keep it "fresh" decades earlier. Nostalgia stirred him for a moment, but the cold room hastened him into bed. He switched off the lamp, and lay a little while in the dark, wondering why his brother had summoned him. He drifted into sleep, and, if he dreamed, he remembered none of it.

Wind rattling the windows woke him. He sneezed; overnight the lavender and omnipresent dust had clogged his nose. He sneezed a second time, and got out of bed to fumble a handkerchief from his pockets. An eerie white light lit the room. It took several blinks of his eyes before Ben recognized the light as clouded sunlight reflecting off snow. Shivering, he drew on his cold clothes. The old furnace had never quite heated this room. That was one reason it was a guest room; winter guests had been few in Ben's childhood.

Dressed, Ben tried to tell himself he was warmer. He checked the clock—not quite nine. A few minutes to go. He went to the window and stared out at the unbroken expanse of white. No line marked the joining of earth and sky. The snow was still falling heavily. Ben shook his head as his breath frosted the window. This obliterating white made him long for the gray fog and steel waters of San Danson, with the wet heather on the hill. He thought of Butter and Dickon, and the warm space between them. He sighed, and extracted his toothbrush, toothpaste, and shaving gear from his luggage. It was almost nine. Time for morning cleanup and breakfast.

Ben heard voices as he approached the kitchen. He coughed outside the kitchen door, closed, as always in winter, to keep the warmth in the kitchen itself. Then he opened the door and went in.

Enna was at the stove. Age had thickened her waist and grayed her hair. Ben was not certain he would have recognized her if he had passed her on the street. Worry or years of hardship and the harsh climate of Berthoud had engraved lines in her face and caused her mouth to droop.

Laws sat at the kitchen table. "Good morning, Uncle Ben," he said.

"Good morning, Laws, Enna," Ben said.

"So," Enna said, "you're here." Her tone did not welcome him. Her glance raked him from head to toe and back to head.

"Yes, Enna," Ben said.

"Now, Mama," Laws began. She turned her stare on her son. He withered into silence. Enna turned to the stove, her back to the two men.

"Coffee's in the pot on the counter. Cup's in the cupboard above it," she said, gesturing with a spatula. "Butter and jam on the table. Toast in the toaster, bacon and eggs in the pan will be ready in a minute."

"Lot of snow," Ben said. Enna ignored him. Ben poured himself a cup of coffee. Enna had never been one to keep tea on hand, and he hesitated to ask for any now. The coffee had the color of tea, and less flavor than the water might have had to begin with. Typical farm coffee, Ben thought to himself.

"Yes, lots of snow," Laws said. He glanced again at his mother's unyielding back. "Low over Amarillo's throwing the white stuff up against the mountains." He took a bite out of his toast. "Gonna be a cold one, today." Enna scooped eggs and bacon onto two plates, turned, and set one in front of each man. The blue-rimmed white plates stood out against the bright cherries printed on the oilcloth covering the table.

"Eat," she said, and turned to her own coffee cup. She stared out the window at the falling snow. Ben and Laws ate swiftly, lest the food go cold and unappetizingly greasy.

When he had wiped up the last of the egg yolk with his second piece of toast and last bit of bacon, Ben looked around the room. There were no traces left of the old kitchen his mother had kept. This room with modern appliances and white walls trimmed with touches of red was all Enna's room. That was as it should be, he supposed. His mother had preferred softer colors, colors that neither shouted defiance at the snow in the winter nor blazed with reflected light in the hot summertime.

Enna finished her coffee, and put her cup in the sink. "Set your plates to soak," she commanded them. "I'll do up the dishes later." The two men nodded. Enna went out of the kitchen and they heard her clicking footsteps on the stairs as she went up to her room.

"Sorry, Uncle Ben," Laws said. "Mama's not in a good mood, today." He sipped at his coffee. "It's been rough on her, Dad being sick and all. She acts mad most of the time."

"She probably is mad about your Dad's illness. It's not fair."

"It's more than that," Laws said, staring into the swirl of coffee in the half-filled cup he rotated. "She's been unhappy for some time, now, even before Dad got sick." He looked up at Ben. "I don't know just when it started, or why." He finished his coffee. "More?" he asked Ben. Ben declined; the unaccustomed beverage had set his stomach on edge. Ben heard water running in the upstairs bathroom.

"Excuse me," Laws said. "I've got a couple of things to do upstairs before we go to the hospital."

"Sure, go ahead." Laws put his plate in the sink and ran water to soak it. Lawson seemed very much at home in the wheelchair. He smiled and waved as he wheeled out of the kitchen toward the back stairs. Ben heard the electrical whine again, and surmised there was an elevator to get Laws to the second floor. Ben took his own plate and cup to the sink. He emptied the coffee in his cup on one side of the sink, and set the plate and cup to soak with Laws's dinnerware.

He was about to leave the kitchen when he heard Enna's shoes on the stairs. He waited for her to come in. She said nothing as she walked through the door.

"I was just wondering whether to unplug the coffee pot," he said.

"I'll take care of it," she said, not looking at him. "Best get your coat and a hat if you brought one. We'll be leaving for the hospital soon."

"Is Hardin in a real bad way?"

"You'll see for yourself when we get there." Ben thought he saw tears in Enna's eyes. He nodded to himself. Must be bad.

"Go on," Enna said. "In this weather, in case you've forgotten, it takes a while to get anywhere." He left the kitchen to get his coat.

### Hardin Bares His Soul

Ben held the door while Laws swung himself into the car seat. Then Ben folded the wheelchair and put it in the trunk. He took a back seat. Enna got in behind the wheel. The car was warm; in true snow-country fashion, Enna had started it a quarter hour before they got in to go. The wipers scraped at the thick snowfall, barely keeping the windshield clear. Enna carefully backed the car out of the driveway by the house and turned to go face forward down the drive to the highway. The rear wheels only slipped a little when she first started out. Ben was grateful he was not driving. It had been too many years since he had maneuvered a car over snow and ice.

The snowplows had cleared the highway, and, because most of the snow was gone, the residual snow was packed and, in places, frozen. Enna kept the car moving in a straight line. She said nothing, concentrating on the road. Laws, too, was quiet, as if he didn't want to distract his mother. The weather intimidated Ben; decades of west coast sun and rain had wiped away any affinity he might have had with snow. He looked through the thickening fall of flakes at the fences and fields they passed, and failed to find any beauty in them. Only the cruel cold and utter desolation presented itself to him.

The hospital was on the eastern end of town, not far from the farm. In Ben's youth, the site had been a combination of alfalfa and cornfields. Now a great gray concrete building rose out of the snow. Yellow light brightened the windows lining the walls. Enna parked as near the building as she could. It was still a long trek through the snow for Ben, whose low shoes allowed the snow to soak his socks. His feet were numb by the time they reached the cleared walkway before the entrance.

"Hardin doesn't look much like himself," Enna said. "Don't show how shocked you'll be." Ben nodded. As if I'd never seen a sick person before, he thought. I wonder what has Enna so irritated.

"He's on the third floor," Enna said. "We'll have to take the elevator." She held the door for Laws and Ben. Inside the hospital the lights created a realm of brightness. An admissions desk and an elevator bank dominated the cheerful lobby, garlanded with Christmas greens.

"Morning, Ms. Soul," the woman behind the admissions desk said.

"Good morning, Ruth," Enna replied. "This is Hardin's brother, just got in from the west coast," she said.

"Welcome," Ruth said. "I'm Ruth Loess. I hope you find Hardin doing well."

"Too late for that," Enna said.

Ruth nodded, gravely. Enna led Ben and Laws to the elevators. She pushed the Up button with a hard stab. Then she stood back and stared up at the panel above the elevators that showed which one was on which floor. Ben noted the hospital had four floors and a basement. The left elevator slowly dropped from three to two. The right elevator dropped from four to three to two to the basement without stopping at one. Then the left elevator rose from two to three. The right elevator seemed to have taken up permanent residence in the basement. Ben could hear the clatter of mop buckets and other gear janitors were off-loading from the elevator in the basement. Just as he was wondering if they'd ever move, both elevators suddenly came to the first floor and opened their doors. Enna took the right elevator. Ben and Laws took the left.

"We'll catch up to Mama on the third floor," Laws said. Silently their elevator took Ben and Laws directly to the third floor. When they exited the elevator onto the third floor, the unmistakable hospital odor, part disinfectant, part death, smote them. Enna's elevator stopped on each floor before it brought her to them. She wrinkled her nose against the smell.

"Hospitals all stink," she said. "Never been in one that didn't."

"The old hospital smelled worse," Laws said.

"Had longer to build up its stink supply," Enna replied. "Hardin is in the third room on the left. Brace yourself, Ben."

Enna marched toward Hardin's room with her head lowered almost like a battering ram. Ben guessed despair bowed her shoulders. Whatever bothered her had to do with Hardin, and his dying, he presumed.

"Wait here," Enna said, just outside the door. I'll tell him we're all here." Enna went in. Ben heard the whirs and beeps of hospital machinery.

"Hardin," Enna said. She raised her voice. "Hardin," she called.

"What?" Hardin responded petulantly. "That you, Enna?"

"Yes," Enna said. "I've brought someone with me."

"Laws?"

"Laws, and someone else. Ben."

"Ben? Ben who?"

"Ben your brother, Hardin."

"He came, then, did he?"

"Yes."

"Well don't keep him outside, in the snow," Hardin said.

"No snow in the corridor," Enna said. "Don't excite yourself. I'll bring him in."

She came to the door. "All right, both of you, come on in." She went back in the room and stood by Hardin's bed.

Laws rolled in, Ben followed him. Hardin lay on his side, tangled in the sheets and tubes of typical hospital décor. His back was toward Enna. He closed his eyes again. He breathed noisily and heavily through his open mouth.

"Dad," Laws said. Then again, louder. "Dad, I've brought Uncle Ben, like you asked me to."

Hardin woke with a start. "Laws?" he said. His voice was hoarse. "Dreamed your Mama was here a little while ago."

"Mama is still here, Dad, behind you."

"Oh. Can't see her there." Hardin didn't try to turn his head to look behind him.

Ben moved closer to the bed. "Hello, little brother," he said.

A smile lit Hardin's skeletal face. For a moment, Laws could see the father he remembered. Hardin had a coughing fit. Blood and phlegm stained the tissue he put to his lips with a bony hand. When he could speak, he said, "Long time no see, Ben." As if the speech exhausted him, he closed his eyes and began to snore. Fluid, perhaps tears, seeped out of his eyes and wet his pillow. Ben opened his mouth to say something. Laws put his hand on Ben's arm to stop him.

"Give him a few moments, and he'll be back," Laws whispered. They waited for Hardin to return. Hardin's eyes fluttered open. He looked up at Ben. His eyes were wet and glistened in the fluorescent lights over his bed.

"Glad you came," Hardin said. He coughed again. He took in deep rasping breaths. "Got something to say to you." He coughed again, and drifted to sleep. Ben and Laws waited. Hardin's breath rasped in and out of his open mouth. He woke himself with a sharp cry. "Hurts," he said. "Hurts damn bad."

"Hardin," Ben said, his feelings choking in his throat, "I'm so sorry."

"Bad way to end," Hardin said, and closed his eyes again. This time he did not drift off to sleep. "Go find your mother, Laws. I need to talk to Ben, alone." His long speech set him to coughing again.

"Going, Dad," Laws said, and wheeled out of the room.

"Draw the curtain around," Hardin said. "Too many busybodies in the hall." Ben pulled the curtain around Hardin's bed. He went back to the side Hardin faced.

Ben took Hardin's hand in his. His brother's skin was feverish, but the hand was cold. It was like grasping ice cloaked in a thin layer of fire. "What did you want to say to me?" he asked.

Hardin had another coughing spell. "I'm sorry," he said. Ben waited for him to get his breath. "I made a big mistake," Hardin said. He stopped to gather his breath again. He pulled his hand from Ben's grasp, and reached for another tissue. Ben handed one to him.

"I stole your girl," Hardin said. "Wasn't fair."

"You mean Enna?"

"Yes." Enna came back to Hardin's room. She stood just out of sight behind the curtains

"Enna was never my girl. I just took her to the prom, once." Ben shook his head. "Besides, Enna's not the kind of woman anybody could steal. She's too much in charge of her own mind for that."

"She's still in love with you," Hardin said. Enna coughed to let the men know she was present. Hardin didn't hear her. Ben guessed who stood outside the curtain, but Hardin had taken his hand again, and was clinging to it.

"Done you both wrong," Hardin said, and closed his eyes. A deep moan welled up in him. "Damn, I hurt."

"Should I call the nurse?" Ben asked.

"No," Hardin said. "It'll pass." His body arched under the thin sheet with another spasm of pain.

"Maybe I should let you rest," Ben said.

"One more thing," Hardin said. Another series of coughs interrupted him. Ben waited. Hardin continued, when he had recovered his breath.

"When Mom and Dad died, I took their bank account and put it my account. Half should have been yours."

"I haven't missed it, all these years."

"It wasn't much, a couple hundred dollars."

"Don't worry about it."

"Worst of all, Ben, I ignored you. You're family. I shouldn't have done that. Can you forgive me?"

"Yes, Hardin, I forgive you. I haven't been much of a brother to you, either."

"Too bad we wasted all those years." Hardin grimaced with a lesser pain. "Get the nurse, will you?"

"Sure." Ben searched for the button and rang it. Enna opened the curtain enough to get in to see Hardin.

"Hi," Hardin said to her. The nurse came, and chased them both out. Enna looked into the distance at the far end of the corridor. She was silent, but tears streaked her face. Ben put an arm around her shoulders to comfort her.

"No, not now," she said, and shook him off. "We'll have to talk when we get home, you, me, and Laws. Not here, though. Too many ears twitching in the wind to catch everything they can."

### Dickon Takes Tea

Elke Hall met Dickon at the door. She had been waiting for him, because she opened the door just as he began to knock.

"Come in, Dickon," she said. "La Señora is in the library. She is weaker today than she has been for some time. Please do not tax her strength."

"I will be careful," Dickon said. His green eyes searched Elke's round face. She shook her head gently in a helpless motion. "She's that much worse?" Dickon asked.

"Yes," Elke said. "Follow me," she added, "to the library. Do keep a cheerful face on you, but not a phony one, if you take my meaning."

"I do," Dickon said. "No one can flummox La Señora with phoniness."

The library was cheerfully bright with yellow lamplight shutting out the gray day. La Señora sat in a wheeled chair, very elegantly upholstered in red velvet, and an obvious antique, since most of its parts were dark mahogany or rosewood.

"Good afternoon, Dickon," she said, and extended her hand to shake his. Dickon noticed her hand trembled a little. When he took it, it was cool, almost cold, and the skin was papery to his touch. "I am not able to rise," she went on, "please, have a seat." She indicated the great chair opposite her wheelchair. Dickon sat.

"Elke tells me Ben has gone to Colorado for his brother's funeral," she said. "Please, when he returns, extend my condolences."

"I will," Dickon said.

"Do help yourself to tea and cookies," La Señora said.

"Do you want me to pour you some?"

"No, not just now." La Señora coughed delicately. "I am using medication that doesn't mix well with tea."

"What kind of medicine is that? I didn't know there were any that wouldn't mix with tea." Dickon thought he sounded almost belligerent. He reminded himself to keep his cool.

La Señora smiled at him. "Spoken like a true tea-drinker," she said. "I take theophylline, a substance that comes from tea leaves. Concentrated, it's a bronchial dilator." She coughed. "I am enduring a respiratory infection, and the medicine helps me breathe. I avoid tea, lest I get too much of the drug in my system."

"Interesting," Dickon said. "New things to learn pop up almost every day."

"Yes," La Señora said. She held a handkerchief to her lips and coughed again. "Excuse me," she said.

"I don't want to wear you out," Dickon said. "Let me know if I should leave."

"In good time, Dickon, all in good time." La Señora took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. Dickon heard a faint whistling in her lungs.

"I invited you here, Dickon, to ask a favor of you," she said.

"What's that?"

"I will need a second godfather for a young child, not yet conceived, who will be my eventual heir."

"A godfather?"

"I have already asked Ben, and he has agreed. You and he seem to be forging a bond. I think it would be beneficial to have both of you overseeing the child's upbringing. So does the unicorn."

"I'm flattered. Whose child is this?"

"I'm hoping it will be DiConti Sharif's and Notta Freed's child."

"I had no idea they were interested in each other."

"I'm not sure they know it, yet, either." She smiled. A hint of her former strength sparkled in her eyes. "They are still finding it out, I imagine." She sighed, gulped for breath, held up her hand as Dickon rose to go to her, coughed into her handkerchief, and cleared her throat. "Medicine's working," she said.

"Perhaps I should go," Dickon said, preparing to rise.

"Please, not yet," La Señora rasped. "I have a little more to say to you." She took a deep breath, coughed again, and went on with a clearer voice. "I will not live forever, Dickon," she said. He nodded. He was wondering if she had entered the first stages of some terminal illness. As if she read his mind, she responded to his thought.

"This that I have now is only a severe cold. I am old, and the old have less stamina to ward off disease." She swallowed, hard. "I yet have deeds to accomplish, before I yield to the inevitable." She looked at him with an almost pleading look. "I have chosen an executor for my estate when the time comes. I have asked Ben to do it," she said.

Dickon's eyes widened in surprise. La Señora noted Dickon's surprise. "He is the least involved member of our community," she continued. "Everyone else who is competent, you, Elke, Mae Ling, even Dr. Field, has too long a history with the group. Ben hasn't had time to cast so many feelings and impressions in concrete as the rest of you have had." She looked at Dickon. In her eyes he could see her willing him to understand.

And, suddenly, Dickon did understand. Ben had none of the squabbles, shifting alliances, hurts, or intimacies that had built, layer on layer over the years, the mosaic of relationships in the Village. He was new, and more likely to be neutral, than any of the rest of them. Dickon disappointed that he himself would not have the power and recognition being executor would bring. He also felt relieved someone else would have all the responsibility and all the possible flak.

Dickon smiled ruefully at La Señora. "Señora," he said, "I think you've picked the right man. I'll help Ben in whatever way he asks me." He frowned at his hands holding the teacup. "I admit I'm a little disappointed you didn't choose me." He looked up at her. "Your reasons are right on target, and I'll survive any disappointment, I'm sure."

"Thank you, Dickon. You are most comforting when you are reasonable. Please, now, ask Elke to let you out. I must rest." Dickon stood up, went to La Señora, took her thin cold hand in his, bent over, and kissed it.

"Blessings on you, Señora," he said. "Good health and speedy healing."

"Go with truth in your heart. When Ben comes home, give him my regards."

"I will. Goodbye for now, Señora."

"Goodbye, Dickon."

He went out and down the hall to the front door. Elke stood there, as though she had been waiting for him.

"She will be okay," Elke said, "this time. We'll bring her out of this episode. But every one takes more from her. One day she will not bounce back."

"And then she will rest," Dickon said, and opened the door to the outside. "I must go now. Butter needs feeding, and probably a run." He looked out at the trail. Fog was climbing up the mountain on a light wind. He walked into it, down the trail toward the Chapel.

### Morphine Metamorphosis

When the nurse had finished with Hardin, she opened the door and invited Enna and Ben back into the room. Hardin was drowsing again. Enna went to him and stroked his cheek with one finger. Hardin smiled, and for a moment Ben saw on the drawn remains of Hardin's face the map of the boy he had known as his younger brother.

"We might as well go home for a while," Enna said. "He'll sleep, now, for several hours. The nurse gave him more morphine." She leaned over Hardin and kissed him. "Goodbye, for now, husband," she said.

"Goodbye, brother," Ben said, waving from the foot of the bed. Hardin slept on, at least temporarily anesthetized enough to blank out his pain.

"We'll collect Laws from the coffee shop," Enna said. She walked briskly to the elevator and pushed the down call button. The doors opened immediately. "Here for a change," she said and went in. Ben followed her.

The lobby's holiday decorations struck Ben as tawdry tinsel as the elevator doors opened. All their cheer was gone for him in the memory of Hardin's worn and drawn face and body crumpled by pain. Laws was at the elevator when the doors opened. He waited for them to come out.

"Dad doped up?" he asked.

"Yes," Enna said. "I thought we should go home, get some lunch." She led them to the doorway. "Looks like the snow let up a little," she said. It was falling, still, but smaller flakes with bigger spaces between them. They got in the car, and Enna drove carefully home. She did not talk; the driving had become more difficult with the snow now packed on the pavement, and she needed to concentrate on her driving.

Hardin lay quiet in his hospital bed. The morphine the nurse had given him ran with his blood, singing a siren song of painlessness.

He was in a summer pasture, naked, and butterflies covered him, bright yellow butterflies with black-edged wings. Meadowlarks called to one another around him, some near, some farther. The grass beside his ears was waving in the breeze raised by the fluttering butterflies. It tickled his earlobes. He laughed. How long he lay there he did not notice, but there came a time when he was on his feet, running barefoot over the soft young grasses. Along the way he had got into his overalls. The much-washed denim rubbed his knees and buttocks with a rough caress. Almost he flew over the ground, like a dragonfly or a meadowlark. The butterflies followed him in a cloud of yellow and black.

At the house Enna directed Laws and Ben to put their coats and caps on hooks by the back door. "You'll need them for later," she said. She hung up her own coat and cap next to theirs. Then she went into the kitchen. "Simple lunch," she said. "Soup and make-your-own sandwiches. Laws, see to the fire in the parlor."

Laws wheeled toward the parlor. Ben said, "Anything I can do to help?"

"No," Enna said. She turned to him from the soup can she was opening. A half smile hovered at the corners of her mouth. Her brown eyes, for the first time since Ben had seen her, looked soft and friendly. "Don't mean to sound so harsh. This is my kingdom, this kitchen. I do best by myself. Go freshen up, if you want, or sit in a chair, out of my way."

"I'll freshen up, then," Ben said, glad of a few moments to himself without the tension that had Enna strung tight as a fiddle bow about to snap in two. He went to the bathroom to wash his face. He could hear Laws striking a match in the parlor, which was across from his guest room. Enna must want him to feel like a guest, not like someone who had come home. The parlor had always been for formal guests, like the preacher or the Bible salesman. Family and neighbors were entertained in the kitchen.

On his bed Hardin's arm began thrashing out of his control. His blanket and sheet slewed toward the bed rail, exposing his bare arm and backside to the ambient room temperature.

And then it was over, this summer of his dreaming. Without an intervening autumn to prepare him, cold descended, and an unbroken field of snow. He saw a coyote on a ridge, nose toward the fat moon riding in silver glory through the dimly starred night sky. He heard the coyote sing his heart's despair to the uncaring orb, and a great loneliness came over him. Far in the distance a steam locomotive sounded its wailing whistle. He fell to his knees in the snow, letting the cold seep into his overalls.

The soup Enna put together filled the kitchen with a savory smell. She had combined a can of chicken noodle soup with a can of vegetarian vegetable. She had sliced cheese and a light rye bread for sandwiches. Condiments were on the table, with pickles, for each to make a sandwich to his or her liking. When they sat, Enna bowed her head and spoke a silent grace. Ben and Laws watched her. When she took up her spoon, they did likewise, and began to dip their soup. Ben tried to make conversation, but after one or two comments elicited one or two word replies, he went silent. Laws had a hearty appetite, and ate three sandwiches. Ben ate only one.

"Go on in the parlor," Enna said when they had finished. "Some things I need to ask and say, Ben. Laws, you come, too. These things concern you."

A nurse's aide came, and pulled the sheet and blanket over the shivering man in the bed. Slowly his body began to warm the space again.

He was at the fireplace. Ben had come to get him. Ben had put on snowshoes and searched for him over the snowdrifts and ridges of the plains. Ben had picked him up, half frozen, and carried him home, to this warm place. Ben made cocoa, and chafed his numb fingers and toes. Ben held him close, warming him with his own body heat while the fire struggled to warm the room. He was safe.

Soon he was soaring with the red-winged blackbirds over the summer stubble, swooping and diving with the swallows at evening, and flitting with the bees from bloom to bloom. And something called to him, raking through his dreams.

Ben followed Laws out of the kitchen and along the hall to the parlor. This room had not changed since his grandmother's day. She had furnished it with heavy wood furniture from her mother's house and her mother-in-law's house. Each piece had been a treasure, for her, fraught with history and family reminiscence.

A large upright piano, mahogany, dominated the wall opposite the fireplace. Small round tables, mahogany wood, with marble tops, flanked a camel back couch, upholstered in wine velvet. This arrangement dominated one of the side walls. Two matching chairs stood, one either side of the door into the hall. The fire screen was cast iron, very heavy, in the shape of a peacock with tail on full display. The fire leaped and danced behind it.

The room was redolent with lemon oil and a faint tinge of smoke from the fire. Ben remembered oppressive afternoons enduring the preacher's visit, sitting on a hard chair trying not to wiggle while the grownups droned in pious tones.

"Take a seat on the couch," Laws said. "Mama always sits in one of the chairs."

Ben sat, noticing the ecru antimacassars on the couch. "Still got Grandmother Soul's crochet work, I see."

"Yes, mummified like everything else in this room." Laws chuckled.

"Your dad and I used to think of this as a torture chamber," Ben said. "We only came in here to listen to long-winded preachers or boring old people. Couldn't move, couldn't scratch an itch."

"Yeah, I know. Something about this room brings on the itches, too. Same thing when I was a kid. I don't think Dad ever liked it in here. After a while, we even entertained the preacher in the kitchen. Only when Mama insisted would he visit with anybody in here."

Enna came into the room and sat in one of the upholstered chairs. She placed her hands on her knees, elbows toward the front. Her full cheeks puffed out as she blew a breath through pursed lips. She looked piercingly at Ben.

"What brings you here, Ben?" she asked.

"Laws wrote me a note, said Hardin was dying, and wanted to see me." Ben's forehead wrinkled with concern. "I take it you'd rather I hadn't come."

"I'm sorry, Ben, if I've given you that impression. It's probably easier to talk business with you here. Better than writing letters back and forth, anyway." She took a deep breath, and let it out, slowly, as if to release her nervous tension. "Business and family don't mix well."

"No, I don't suppose they do very often," Ben said. "What's on your mind, Enna?" He grasped the arm of the couch with his left hand. Enna's tension had communicated itself to him. Lawson had sat back in his wheelchair, hands folded across his stomach. His gray eyes, so like his father's and uncle's eyes, stared into the yellow flames dancing behind the peacock screen.

"This farm's about to become a part of Berthoud. That means a fair amount of money. I know you and Hardin hold it half-and-half. I'm asking if you'll consider it divided in three parts, one for you, one for each of us." She stared intently at Ben, as if to will him to grant her wish.

He stared back at her for a long moment, dumbfounded. Maybe Hardin had never told her. "I don't own any piece of this farm," he said. "I signed a quit claim deed over to Hardin when Lawson was born."

Enna's tension flowed out of her like air out of a balloon. She slumped in the chair, stunned. "Oh," she said in a quiet voice, "I wonder why Hardin never mentioned it to me. I don't suppose he registered it, either."

"Quit claim deeds take effect the minute they're signed."

"I wonder where Dad put it," Lawson asked the fire.

"If you can't find it, I'll sign another one," Ben said. "A gift given is a gift given." He leaned back in the corner of the couch. "I don't suppose Hardin has made a will, has he?"

"I don't know," Enna said.

"He has," Lawson said. "It's in the desk drawer, the one he always keeps locked."

"Do you know what it says?" Enna asked.

"Yes," Lawson said. "It leaves everything he has to you and me in equal shares."

"No mention of Ben?"

"No. I'm sorry," Lawson said to Ben.

"Hardin and I weren't close, ever since I moved to the Coast."

"And told him about your way of living," Enna snapped.

"What way of living?" Lawson asked.

"With another man!" Enna said. Disgust scrunched her round cheeks into two angry red puckers.

"Oh," Lawson said.

"Your father," Enna went on, "even on his death bed is worried that he turned Ben queer because he married me, stole me away from Ben."

"Because we dated once?" Ben said. "I never thought you were my woman." He looked at Enna. "I guess Hardin doesn't understand what I am, and always have been."

"I've heard that homosexual party line. Believe it if you want to." Enna glared at Ben. "I guess I had something to do with Hardin's pulling back, too. I never encouraged him to count you family. To be blunt, I didn't want you around Laws, influencing him."

"Mama, were you in love with Uncle Ben? Before Dad, I mean?" Laws wheeled his chair around to face his mother.

"No. Never. One date and I never heard from him again."

"Why," Ben asked, "did Hardin think you were still in love with me?"

"Because he was too blind to see how much I loved him." Enna sighed. The anger that had twisted her face disappeared. She smiled a smile that made her look almost young. "I never loved any man more than I loved him."

"Hardin was always trying to measure up, as a kid. I thought he'd outgrown that," Ben said. He shook his head. "Too bad he missed the miracle in his own house."

"Miracle?" Enna asked.

"Miracle. Having somebody who loves you is a miracle."

In the hall, the loudspeaker broadcast a call for a Dr. Harmon.

For a time Hardin slept, without dreaming, in a darkness warm and comfortable. Then it began the stirring of the serpent in his bowels. It had been quiescent too long. He could feel it uncoiling in his stomach's pit, lashing its tail, and grinding against his abdomen as it unwound and unwound and unwound. He tried to cry out, but his throat would not open. Still the serpent grew in his gut. Its fangs flickered in and out as it forced its head into his esophagus. It searched for his heart.

He shouted a mental shout to Ben. Ben did not hear. Ben did not come. He despaired, and the serpent slid past his guard to sink its fangs in his heart. Death rattled in his throat, and he let go, let himself fly toward the light, leaving the husk of himself behind.

At the nurses' station, alarms sounded. Nurses came, and doctors, but Hardin had fled the serpent in his bowels.

The telephone rang in the hall. Laws looked at his mother. "I'll get it," he said. Enna nodded. She and Ben waited for Laws to return. They heard him say "Hello," then there was a long silence. Then he said, "I see. I'll tell Mama. Thanks for calling." He rolled slowly into the room. Tears streaked his face.

"Dad's gone," he said. He choked back a sob.

"We've got to make arrangements," Enna said. Her tears started. Ben went to her and held her hand. Outside the snow had thickened, and a cold north wind blew it sideways.

### Cold, Cold Ground

Ben's feet were ice lumps in his shoes. The minister droned his way through a lugubrious series of prayers and scriptures. Overhead the hard blue sky pressed down like a helmet that fit the earth too tightly. The Astroturf under the feet of the mourners lay incongruously green atop the trampled snow. As the people breathed, clouds rose from their mouths and noses to dissipate among the barren branches of the winter trees. The casket lay on canvas straps, ready to lower it into the ground when the ceremony ended. Idly Ben wondered how the gravediggers had managed to cut the frozen soil in such a neatly defined cut.

It had not been easy to stay in Enna's house. She had been distantly polite, no more. By ones and twos neighbors and friends came, always with some kind of food. Ben had forgotten the old custom of funeral meats. Enna apportioned the various cakes, pies, and occasional casseroles among the visitors.

Ben and Laws had gone through Hardin's desk, Enna professing she was not up to the task. They found Ben's quit claim deed in one drawer. In another, Laws discovered a stack of Christmas cards in a box. Hardin had kept every one Ben had ever sent him. Ben felt a twinge of guilt and regret that he had thrown away the ones Hardin had sent him over the years.

Just yesterday, with the funeral arrangements made, and the visitations tapering off, Enna had asked Ben to go to the attic and sort through the things he had left there long years ago. It was only two small boxes of papers, including pictures Ben had drawn for his mother's refrigerator, old report cards, old magazines, and the newspapers announcing his graduation from high school and university. None of this stirred any deep feeling for Ben. It all belonged to so distant a part of his life that it was unreal for him. In the end, he kept only a battered teddy bear that had kept him company through his childhood nights. Laws helped him burn the rest in the parlor fireplace.

Ben tried to wriggle his toes in his shoes. Even with two pair of socks he was unable to feel his feet. He felt the cold creeping in under his coat. The minister was lost in prayer, addressing the deity at length about human failings, and imploring the deity's mercy on the fallen-from-grace. Ben wondered if God was as bored as he was. The funeral service in the bare white church with uncomfortable oak pews had seemed to stretch forever. The church had been too warm. Ben had struggled to stay awake. Now, in the cemetery's cold air, Ben slid into a trance. He thought of Dickon, and Dickon's body heat, and wished Dickon were here to wrap him up against the cold. So intriguing did he find the idea, he almost missed the minister's final "Amen" and the disbanding of the mourners.

The mourners, of course, would return to the church, this time to the basement, to share a feast of casseroles and gelatin salads. On the way back to the church, Enna and Laws were silent, each staring out the window of the family car at memories and thoughts only he or she could see. Ben concentrated on sending blood to his feet to warm his toes.

The church basement was very warm. Ben wryly remembered his childhood winters had been alternations between frigid cold and over-active heat, depending on whether he was indoors or out. He hadn't noticed the great contrast until he had lived on the Coast for some time. The winter temperature difference there was far smaller than it was in the snow country.

Enna introduced Ben to the minister, Pastor Priam Peabody, and mentioned Ben lived on the Coast. The earnest young man in the black suit immediately began a long monologue on what vicissitudes must assail the Christian who had to live among the heathens on the Coast. He dwelt at length on the evils of divorce, moved on to the destructive horrors of pornography, and spent considerable energy on the seductive and sinful nature of the soft climate. Ben looked around for an escape route. No one came to rescue him. He attempted to interrupt Pastor Priam's tirade two or three times without success. He wondered how rude it would be just to walk away while the preacher was in mid-sentence.

Ben's anger with the clergyman almost broke through his cloak of civility, but rescue came at last. Just as Pastor Priam was starting to rehearse the atrocities of the homosexuals who infested the Coastal cities, a stolid and stocky lady in a black dress, covered with a pink apron, and topped with a blue hairdo interrupted the minister to ask him to "return thanks." Pastor Priam closed his eyes, bowed his head, clasped his hands, and bellowed a grace. During the prayer Ben quietly found a place at some distance from the clergy.

When Enna, later asked his opinion of her pastor, Ben said, "Such a pious young man," and let it go at that.

Ben ate heartily of the childhood comfort food provided in the potluck. Macaroni and cheese, a tuna casserole, corn pudding (this made savory by the inclusion of mild chilies), and, wonder of wonders, a new kind of item, a spinach quiche. The ladies setting forth the feast had thoughtfully included a separate plate for the gelatin salads, lest the hot food melt them. There was also a three-bean salad, which Ben liked, and a carrot and raisin salad that he did not like. Several choices of cake and pie rounded out the dessert offerings.

During the meal various middle-aged and older people, some balding and wrinkled, most gray-haired, and all paunchier than they had been forty years ago, came to where Ben sat with Enna and Laws. A flurry of names he had long ago put out of his mind fluttered down on him. He pretended to remember each one who claimed to have grown up with him, but most of the faces were far too ravaged by time to recall the youths and maidens who had schooled with him. From time to time Ben saw Laws let a small grin pass over his face, usually after an especially awkward performance of recognition on Ben's part.

When the meal was over, Enna did not linger. Her exhaustion showed. Laws and Ben went home with her. The house was so silent that the three of them spoke in hushed tones. That great emptiness that comes after the funeral settled in. For long minutes the three of them sat without comment. When one or another of them began a conversation, it sputtered out after two or three sentences, like a candle that would not stay lit. Laws finally excused himself and went to bed. Enna and Ben sat a while in silence.

Enna spoke. "Thank you, Ben," she said, "for keeping a low profile today."

"I don't know what you mean, Enna."

"For not talking about your life in the City." She frowned at the fire, now more a glow than a flame. "Folks around here wouldn't approve." She rubbed her sinuses with her thumb. "I don't approve."

"I'd guessed you didn't," Ben said. "Neither you nor Hardin. When I wrote you that Len had died, you never responded."

"Maybe we seem callous to you, Ben," Enna looked directly at him, "but we didn't know what to say."

"I suppose a simple condolence was too complicated."

"We didn't want to seem to approve, Ben. We didn't know what else to say." She looked away at the frosted window again. Night was settling in.

Evening filled the room with cotton silence. Ben stirred the fire once, added a log. He spoke, after long wordlessness. "I'll be going in the morning," he said.

"That's best," Enna said. "There's not much more to do here but go on without Hardin. That I'll have to do by myself." She wouldn't look at Ben.

Ben rose. "I'm going to bed now, Enna. Good luck with your going on." Ben realized he, too, had to go on, and that he had gone on long ago from this chapter of his life. A kind of relief swept through him when he realized it.

"Thank you, Ben, for coming. It meant a lot to Hardin. Good luck to you, too."

In the morning, Ben got on the road to Denver without breakfast. He left Enna and Laws a brief note, thanking them for their hospitality. As he drove south to the airport he left a dried husk of life behind him. He pictured it fluttering in the High Plains winds.

### Homeward Bound

Ben drove the interstate back to Denver. Traffic was light, and moved smoothly; the recent snows had been plowed into piles along the highway. Brown earth speckled with gray wheat stubble showed wherever the winds had pushed the field snow into drifts. The sky was brittle white at daybreak, turning rose for a brief moment, before the hard blue of a winter sky took over. The mountains to the west glittered like shards of blue willowware pottery.

Near Denver and the suburbs tangled in its skirts, the snow's whiteness diminished into sooty gray, and the clear air turned saffron with trapped pollutants. Ben's eyes began to water, and his nose began to clog. Gratefully he followed the interstate's swing east to the airport, because the road took him up from the Denver basin onto the high plains near the airport.

His flight left on time, despite an icing problem on the wings. The plane swung north parallel to the Front Range, and then turned west north of Long's Peak. Far off to the right of the plane, Ben could see long unbroken slopes of white trending down into Wyoming. To the left, peaks prodded the blue sky with ice-covered points. Ben drifted to sleep somewhere before the deserts of the Great Basin.

Ben flew a long slow spiral toward the ground. Layered yellow and dark red rock over a layer of pale green shale topped the mesa. On its canyon-scored surface, Ben could follow the lines of the watercourses by following the paler green of willows and alders through the piñon forests scattered on the higher ground. Downward his spiral flight took him, until individual trees and the sparse grass between them became visible. Ben landed. He looked down at his body, unfamiliarly slender and muscled, more like it had been when he was young.

He took a deep breath of the piñon-laden air. He began to walk with long and easy strides along a narrow trail that led to the mesa's rim above an interior canyon. As he rounded the turn at the top that led to the stairway carved in the dark red rimrock, voices drifted up to him, the voices of children and women going about household tasks.

Softly he crept down the trail. These were not the people of his tribe. He wished only to pass their dwelling quietly and peacefully to get to the water he could see in a silver ribbon between the alders and willows below. He was a being of power, and had the ability to blend into the scenery so that people did not know he was passing by. He softly sang the spell to himself and his totems, and proceeded on his way past the village.

It was a sturdy town built in an open place in the green shale. The people had built walls of crudely cut yellow rock. Then, with iron-like red adobe clay, they mortared the rocks in place. Since the cliff's overhang kept most rain and snow from the walls, the mortar held through many generations.

One villager was not deceived. Ben's magic could not blind a young dog only recently weaned. It was a curious pup. Yellow, almost the color of the walls, with one blue eye and one brown one, and a black streak that ran from a point between its ears down to its nose, it was an unlovely sight. At least the people there did not care for it. They preferred their dogs to be brindle or black, distrusting the spirits infused into an odd yellow animal. No one noticed the pup's going to follow Ben down the trail. No one missed it, not even at the evening meal, when the village dogs waited whining and pleading, for scraps to fill their stomachs. Even the dog's dam did not miss it.

Ben managed to reach the creek un-noticed by even the farmers hoeing weeds among their corn, squashes, and beans. They bent to their tasks under the morning sun, for their labor provided most of the food that would feed the people through the winter. Ben reached the stream and knelt in the cool wet sand at its bank. He reached in with cupped hands, let the clear water flow over them for a moment, and then took a double handful and splashed it on his face.

The pup that followed him came up beside him and licked his ear. Ben dipped water again, and held as much in his hands as he could to let the pup drink. It lapped thirstily at the water. When Ben's hands were empty, the pup went on licking his hands. Ben laughed quietly. He had found a companion.

Over many years Ben and the pup wandered the mountains and mesas and deserts, sometimes dwelling with a people for several months, other times skirting villages that promised to be hostile. In the northern forests they met the people of Rabbit. In the deserts they met the people tricked by Coyote. On the coast they met a multitude of peoples who spoke different tongues and ignored their neighbors.

The pup grew into a great dog, fierce to enemies and kind to children. He guarded Ben, the first to have shown him kindness. He came to the end of his days when a fearful woman threw a large rock at him, caught him unawares, and knocked him from the narrow trail he was walking over the side of a steep cliff. Ben heard him thump on the rocks below, howl one long howl, and woke up to find the plane taxiing to the gate. His face was wet. He felt a lightness of being, as though he had discarded an old familiar weight.

Rain drummed on the covered walking chute that led into the airport proper. When Ben looked out the windows, he saw it sluicing down the windows. Errant gusts of wind blew the stream sideways from time to time. Ben sighed. He hated driving in the rain. He briefly contemplated staying in the City for the night, but he was anxious to get back to Butter and Dickon, so he struggled to his car, dumped his luggage in, and started the engine.

Slow, writhing snakes of traffic clogged the freeways. Ben reminded himself to be patient as he negotiated the bridges and lane changes that took him north, north to Butter and Dickon.

A blockade closed the road from Las Tumbas to San Danson for all except local traffic. The patrolman on duty recognized Ben as a San Danson Villager, and waved him through, after explaining that downed trees and high water made the road dangerous. "Go slow," the trooper said, "but keep going. If you have to, stay in Pueblo Rio for the night."

Ben thanked him and proceeded forward. At two different places he had to drive on the shoulder to avoid fallen forest. At Pueblo Rio, the river was trickling into the main street, but it was still passable. The road from Pueblo Rio to San Danson climbed a little way higher, and the river did not yet threaten it. Ben sighed with relief, and allowed himself to drive a little faster.

He was grateful to reach the garage at San Danson Station. He had not included an umbrella in his travel kit, but he had an old poncho without too many holes. He started the walk through the Village toward Dickon's cottage, not even stopping at his own. He didn't quite know who he wanted to see more, Butter or Dickon. Several yards from Dickon's cottage an explosion of brindle fur and ecstatic barking greeted him, and showered muddy water all over him as Butter welcomed him home.

### Good Grief

One of those rare days came when the coast was clear of fog, though a storm whipped the ocean far to the west. The surf performed spectacular ballets along the shore. Ben went out with Butter to walk along the beach near the mouth of the cove. They found a large pine tree stump either washed down by the floods or pushed up on shore by the waves. It was not very damp. Ben sat down. Butter sat by his side. He scratched the dog's head, hitting the places behind her ears that never tired of his touch.

Dickon found them like this. Butter stood long enough to wag her tail to greet Dickon then sat back down. Butter knew the wisdom of silent companionship was what Ben needed. For once, Dickon knew it as well. He stood near Ben, looking out at the surf's choreography.

Ben's voice was ragged when he spoke. "I know I haven't wanted to talk. You've been patient with me, Dickon," he said. "Thanks for that." He fell silent again. Dickon turned his head to look at Ben. Ben's gaze was far out to sea beyond the surf, riding the storm waves. Dickon wondered what to say. Before he thought of anything, Ben spoke again.

"Do you have any family living, Dickon?"

"No." Dickon stared out at the gray and black waves. Under the surf, the water changed to green, almost the same shade as Dickon's eyes.

"I don't think I do, either," Ben said. Dickon waited for Ben to explain. He was aware Ben's nephew and sister-in-law still lived in Colorado. Ben went on, "Maybe my nephew might keep in touch, if he can do it without angering his mother."

"What's her problem?"

"She thinks I'm bound for Hell on a fast train."

"Because you're gay?"

"Yes." Ben stood and stretched. Butter stood as well, shaking the sand from her tail.

"I can't speak for anybody else," Dickon said, "but I don't think I'd need a family that hated me."

"Did your family know you are gay?"

"Yes. I told them soon after Vin Decatur died. Mom was angry with me at first. Dad was just sad. They were a lot older than average parents were. I came into their lives as an unexpected accident. They never planned on having a child to raise."

"Did you reconcile with them before they died?"

"Oh, yes. They never cut me off." Ben put his hand on Dickon's shoulder and squeezed him gently.

"I take it you had no siblings," he said.

"I did," Dickon said, "a twin sister. She died three months after we were born. I didn't know that until my father was dying, and Mom told me." Dickon sighed. "I think they found it too painful to mention."

"My folks never knew I was gay," Ben said. "They died in a car wreck before I came out. Sometimes I wished I could tell them, and introduce them to Len. My brother and his wife never wanted to meet Len." Ben's gray eyes clouded with pain. Dickon stared out toward the waves.

"At least they went quickly," Dickon said, after a silent space. "I watched my father get old, and then his body started giving out on him, part by part. First his legs got too weak to hold him up without a walker. Then his back went, and he couldn't even use the walker. Mom and I pushed him around in a wheel chair." Dickon coughed.

"The worst was when his mind went. He was always a scholar, reading obscure books, looking for the odd fact that would unlock some puzzle. When the senile dementia hit, he lost all that. His wits wandered through fragments of his childhood, and through the fire and brimstone theology he'd grown up with. It was a blessing when he went." Ben heard the unvoiced sadness under Dickon's matter-of-fact recitation. He put his arm across Dickon's shoulders.

"I should be comforting you," Dickon said. Ben nuzzled Dickon's ear. He noticed the touch of gray in Dickon's red sideburns.

"Not necessarily," Ben said. "Just being together is a comfort." He took his arm from Dickon's shoulders. Butter rubbed against his leg. He bent down to stroke her head.

"Your Mom outlived your father, then?"

"Yes," Dickon said. "But not by much. I brought her here, so I could take care of her. She didn't like living in this world without my father. They were married over fifty years. She died within a year, from loneliness, I think." Dickon bent down and rubbed Butter's ears. "That's when I found out what the word 'family' means when you don't have kin."

"How do you mean?"

"When your blood kin is dead, or cuts you off, your family becomes the people around you who care about you and take you for who you are."

"Then you and Butter are my family," Ben said.

Dickon kissed Ben. "You and Butter are my family," he said. Butter exploded in a frenzy of joyous racing in circles around her people. That was her way of saying they were her family.

"It's a new day," Ben said, "and a new beginning. Who'd have thought it possible at our age?"

The sun kissed the heads of Obadiah and Obaheah, and dribbled gold on the dark waves. Dickon and Ben turned toward the Village. Butter raced ahead, ready for supper.

### Vanna in the Wilderness

Vanna left the court in a fury. She looked the fool. John Diss would pay, she vowed to herself, for this legal pyrotechnic display. She, Vanna, had been the accepted murrelet specialist in this area, until he imported this foreigner from Canada. She'd make him pay.

But worse, the San Danson Villagers had won the round. After this the courts would have little sympathy for getting rid of this pestiferous community, this blight of cottages on the cove Vanna had vowed should be pristine, unpolluted by the dark hand of man or the vagaries of the Mandors, who had stolen it from her ancestors.

Vanna marched from the courthouse to her office. She snarled a greeting at Bertha Van Nation as she entered the office. Bertha guessed at once that the hearing had not gone Vanna's way. She sighed. Vanna's vitriol could vitiate the office venue for days, until she had concocted another scheme to achieve her objectives. Bertha wondered again if she should quit. The money was good, and the job got her out of the house. Not yet, but soon, she'd quit.

Bertha typed busily, not on Commission business, for there was none to type, but on a short story she hoped to sell to a magazine that catered to readers who throve on ripped bodices and heaving manly bosoms. These magazines paid a small stipend, and allowed Bertha to play out her fantasies safely on paper.

In her office, behind the closed door, Vanna paced furiously along the front edge of her desk. Her ire contorted her face into a furious kabuki mask; the blood had drained from her skin and only her eyes were alive with angry light. She stared at the walls as if she'd stare through them. Thwarted Vanna was not a pretty sight, despite her trim gray suit.

Her face came alive as an idea occurred to her. Had there been an observer, he or she might have gazed in wonderment at the sudden sense of life that animated the white mask framed by black hair. Even the red of Vanna's lipstick went from a dried blood color to a vibrant crimson reminiscent of the blooming rose. Vanna had determined her next course of action. She would take direct vengeance, not on La Señora, nor yet even on her lawyer. They could wait. First to suffer would be the damned llamas, those foul intruders from a southern clime that be-slimed the slopes of San Danson Mountain. Vanna smiled with eager bloodlust as she imagined slashing at the white and gray hides of the smelly beasts until the blood ran down their pelts in red rivulets of escaping life. All she needed was a knife, and a proper hiking costume.

She opened her door, told Bertha she was taking the rest of the afternoon off because her head ached, and left for her apartment. Once home, Vanna retrieved from the recesses of her wardrobe an old pair of jeans and a heavy flannel shirt. These she drew on in place of the gray dress. She found, at the back of her closet, a pair of hiking boots, left over from an ill-fated backpacking trip with a forgotten amour. She laced them up. In the kitchen she selected a pair of butcher knives, sharpened them, and sheathed them in a towel she tucked in her waistband. Her hair she bound in a net, lest it fly into her eyes at an inappropriate time.

Then she went to her red sports car, laid the sheathed knives beside her on the passenger seat, and drove toward San Danson Station and the Coastal Commission Park. DiConti Sharif saw her speed by, checked her speed against the radar, and shrugged. She was just within the limit. He had no cause to stop her. When she was out of his sight, she increased her speed, often crossing the center line to better make the curves. Luckily for the other motorists on the road, she had an instinct that seemed to know when they were coming at her, and she'd slow enough to avoid head-on collision with any of them.

At the Coastal Commission Park she stopped long enough to unlock the gates, open them, and drive through. She stopped, closed them behind her, and drove to the tool shed at the top of the Park. Here she parked her car, took up her knives, and set out for La Señora's San Danson Mountain property. A brief hike brought her to the fence line. She crawled through the barbed wire and into the llama pasture.

Once through the fence she stood to reconnoiter the slope in front of her. To the west, over the sea, the sun was setting in an orange fog. Vanna knew little about llamas; she presumed they were, like most grazing creatures, prone to lie up at night on high ground. She began her search at the highest point of San Danson Mountain enclosed by La Señora's fence. It was some little while into the glimmering evening before she found the pile of rocks half down the mountain where the llamas sheltered.

The llamas had chosen this natural enclosure for its security. There were three possible passages between great blocks of gray stone. At any of them, an angry llama could fend off wolves, dogs, and other predators. The herd, though never harassed, was alert to any intrusion. At first they did not realize Vanna was an intruder, since no human had before preyed upon them.

When Vanna found the llamas, they had settled for the evening. Not yet ready to sleep, they muttered soft cries to one another, and to the young llamas in their midst. One cría, not yet weaned, noticed Vanna first. This llama was always hungry; its poor mother needed daily applications of bag balm from Willy Waugh's hand, so fierce was the young one's suckling. When Vanna entered the far end of the passageway to the llamas, the young one immediately began nuzzling her. In no time it discovered Vanna's breast through the flannel and clamped on to it. Vanna shrieked, for the young llama's sucking action was painful indeed. Vanna forgot the towel-wrapped knives in her hands; she dropped them on the ground. In the dark she did not find them again (to be fair, one must recognize Vanna feared putting her hands into llama dung were she to drop to her knees to search for them by feel).

Vanna's shriek shocked the cría loose, and aroused the anger of the adults in the group. The cría's mother charged Vanna, spitting at her that vile smelling mixture of chewed grass female llamas ordinarily reserve for discouraging the unwelcome advances of a male. Vanna was soon awash in stench. She fled. Several llamas pursued her. Blindly Vanna ran toward the cliffs, forgetting the fence was uphill from her current location.

The unicorn with the unique horn was grazing by starlight near the cliffs. Vanna, blinded as she was by half-digested grasses, sensed the goodness of the unicorn as a bright and blinding light. Vanna feared that light, turned right, and fled up the mountain. By the time she got to the barbed wire fence she had cleared her eyes and most of her face of the foulness that still stank on her clothes. She did not linger to crawl safely through the fence. Its prickles caught on her shirt and jeans, ripping three-cornered tears in them. Vanna's skin barely escaped a similar fate. Once on the Coastal Commission land, she made for the tool shed and the hydrant, where she washed and scrubbed in the cold water, until the stink was bearable at last. Then she abandoned her flannel shirt and jeans, and drove home in her lingerie, carefully, lest a patrolman stop her in her undress.

### What's a Poor Girl to Do?

Vanna Dee managed to drive home in her lingerie without being caught. She drove into her garage thankful she had one rather than a carport. When the door was down she got out of the car and went into her house. A long shower got the last of the llama slobber out of her hair and off her body. Vanna toweled dry, put on a long robe, poured herself a gin and tonic, and went into her living room to drink it.

Vanna's living room had a large recliner, black, with a red oval rug in front of it. The carpet on the floor was a gray that swallowed the light. The walls were a pale yellow-green color, reminiscent of bile. A small table provided a place to put her glass. A large television squatted on the opposite wall like a bloated toad. Vanna seldom turned it on. The room had little other furniture. Vanna did not entertain in her home, and disliked spending money on things she didn't use. A starkly modern floor lamp made of cones and rods, shed light on her chair. Her chair was where she preferred to lair up to plot the downfall of her enemies. At present, that plotting focused on the San Danson Villagers and La Señora.

Several ideas came and went in Vanna's mind, but none of them promised revenge of the kind she needed. After three gins and tonic, she went to bed, her head still spinning. Neither her night dreams nor her morning work preparations brought her any enlightenment. She spent several frustrated days and nights devising and abandoning revenge plots.

One morning she left for work in a foul mood. On her way from her parking slot to the building, Noah Count accosted her, trying to sell her one of his drawings. The abstract drawing looked very like a llama to Vanna. She turned her fury on Noah; he slunk away, cowed. On most mornings, his crushing would have sweetened her day. Today it only whetted her appetite for further victimization.

Bertha was, as usual, already in place. Vanna swept in like a hailstorm, rattling the bracelets she wore and rumbling with irritation. Bertha detected a faint odor of rotten grass and leftover gin emanating from her boss. She had a delicate sense of smell, indeed. A grimace of distaste formed under her skin. Wisely, she did not let it show in her face.

"Ms. Dee," she said, "have you had an upset this morning?" she asked.

"Yes," Vanna said. "That fool that peddles pictures on the streets tried to sell me a picture. It looked like a llama. I detest llamas. He was more persistent than I like."

"Oh, you mean Noah Count?"

"Is that his name?"

"Yes. He's an ex-con. Sold drugs for a living in the City, he tells me."

"You do scrape acquaintance with some strange characters," Vanna said. She started toward her office. "I suppose he has relapsed, and still sells them."

"I wouldn't know. I'm not a user." The edge in Bertha's voice held a warning for Vanna. Long ago she had learned that when Bertha used that tone it was not wise to pursue a subject. Bertha Van Nation was the only secretary who had stayed with Vanna for more than a few months. Other Commissioners had warned her that she had run through the entire secretarial pool when Bertha came to work for her. Her position, of course, demanded a secretary.

Vanna changed the subject. "I will need the San Danson files this morning. Please pull them for me." Bertha got up and went to the file room immediately. She opened the top drawer and took out a fat file case. She closed the drawer and took the case to Vanna.

"I do not wish to be disturbed," Vanna said. She went into her own office and shut the door. She began reading through the mass of material she had accumulated on the Village and the Villagers. No inspiration leaped out at her. If only she had some way to get to those damned llamas! She needed an agent.

Lunchtime came. Bertha knocked on Vanna's closed door, and then poked her head in. Her bouffant blue hair looked like a cloud rising over the mountain of her face. Vanna growled "Yes?" at her.

"It's lunch time, Ms. Dee," Bertha said. "Do you want me to order in for you, or will you be going out?" Vanna glared at the clock on her wall. She put a post-it note on the page she had been reading to hold her place.

"I'll be going out," she said. "I need a change of scene and some fresh air. Are you eating in?"

"No, I have a lunchtime appointment with my doctor," Bertha said. She didn't mention that it was only to eat lunch. The less Vanna knew about Bertha's private affairs the safer Bertha felt.

"Very well, then," Vanna said. She picked up her purse and stood. "Lock the office; I have my key in case I get back before you do."

"All right then. I'll be back as soon as I can."

"Please do," Vanna said, and stalked out. She wore a thundercloud on her brow. Behind her, Bertha shrugged, as if to throw off the weight of Vanna's presence, got her own purse, and locked the office as she left.

Vanna had already caught an elevator and was gone. Bertha smiled. Working with the woman was bad enough. Having to make small talk riding down in an elevator with her was above and beyond.

On the street Vanna marched to the local delicatessen and got a salad and a bowl of watery soup. The meal was as unsatisfactory as her plotting. Vanna had contacts in many places, but the kind of man she needed now must have special abilities in slinking, skullduggery, and nefarious behavior. In short, she needed an ex-con, most probably a convicted drug user or dealer. Deceit, she believed, was essential to the drug culture. Her contacts with the underbelly of Las Tumbas were limited.

Noah Count approached her again, displaying another of his pastel drawings. This was an abstract presentation of an earth-mother goddess. It didn't look like a llama. Vanna was about to send him packing with a scathing rebuke when she remembered Bertha's chatter about Noah's past.

She pretended to study the picture. "Are you Noah Count?" she asked.

"Who's asking?" he said, warily.

"I'm looking for someone who can do a bit of work for me," Vanna said, "work that would be 'off the record' so to speak."

"Something the sheriff shouldn't know about?" Noah put his earth-mother goddess drawing on top of the stack of drawings he had leaning against the storefront where he stood. He thumbed through the stack, as though looking for a specific drawing.

"You might put it that way." Vanna watched him sift through his drawings.

"Does this work pay well?" He paused in his search through his drawings and looked up at Vanna.

"Yes. Five thousand."

Noah pulled the drawing that had so irritated Vanna that morning from the pile as if to show it to her. "I know somebody who can be bought," he said. He pointed to his chest. "Me."

"Do you mind killing animals?"

"No. Don't have a gun, though."

"Couldn't use a gun in this place," she said. "Too much noise. You'd have to use a knife."

"How about a bow and arrows?"

"Those would work. Can you use a bow and arrows?"

"Like a master," Noah said. "Learned on the range at La Lechuga. It was part of my rehabilitation, don't you know."

"I need some llamas killed," Vanna said. "Out on the coast."

"Oh yeah, in San Danson, I presume. I read about the hearing." Noah grinned at her. Vanna observed several of Noah's teeth were missing, or represented only by stumps. She glanced away from Noah's face. Her eyes landed on the infuriating drawing. She grimaced. Noah noted the twist of her face. He nodded very slightly.

"I'll need the five thousand dollars up front," Noah said. For that I'll throw in a drawing." Noah grinned at her again. "That way you're paying me for a picture, not for killing anything."

"Clever," Vanna said. "I'll get half the money and meet you here in an hour. I'll get the rest when you've completed the job."

"Only half?" Noah read implacable decision in Vanna's face. "Done," Noah said. "I'll wrap the drawing for you and be here. In one hour, then."

"In one hour," Vanna said. When she returned with the cash, she exchanged the roll of bills for a wrapped drawing. It wasn't until she got home that night that she unwrapped the drawing. It was the llama picture. She put it in a corner, turned to the wall.

### El Coronel Pasa

Beauregard LeSieupe went forth upon a blustery November afternoon. Gray rain clouds clustered over the western sea. The few gulls wheeling over the crashing surf cried mournfully into the moisture-burdened air. The killdeer danced frantically with the foamy edge of the waves on the shrinking beach. Again and again the waters wiped away the cuneiform their feet left in the packed wet sand. Into this turmoil of nature Beauregard went, his white coat tails flapping, his hat and wig jammed tightly on his head lest he lose both to the thieving fingers of the wind.

For reasons he never knew, and none other ever guessed, Beauregard, who commonly walked the beaches, elected this afternoon to climb the hill behind the Village. Despite the increasing turbulence of the pre-storm winds, he climbed up the slopes, using the twisting trail behind the chapel to make his progress. Perhaps he had some vague intent to scout the manor house's gardens for spies. Perhaps he intuited a Yankee spy lurked among the llamas. Poor Beauregard was not a part of the balance of things, and so his thoughts are not collected.

Nonetheless, slowly and steadily up the mountain he went. Occasional raindrops spattered him, but not enough to deter him with their wetness. At whiles the wind wailed with the death cries of dolphins caught in tuna nets. Beau was oblivious to the melancholy music the wind moaned. Whatever his purpose, he trudged toward it without faltering or stopping.

Within the same body, Juan slept. He had been up much of the night soothing Luis, the terrified boy who shared the body with him and Beau. Luis slept, too, an uneasy turbulence of dreams chasing their tails through his mind.

Near the top of the mountain, where the trail to the manor house went up a knoll, a less traveled track went north, toward the Coastal Commission lands. Beau took this road less traveled by. This high above the sea the crash of the surf was more a sigh than a roar. Beau walked the narrow trail near the crumbling cliff edge. Now and again a small stone his foot dislodged tumbled down the cliff face toward the sighing sea. Bits of shattered path followed the tumbling stones. Beauregard pressed on as though he carried the message General Lee needed most to take back Petersburg.

The path turned at its northern end to wind along near the fence that marked the Coastal Commission area apart from La Señora's San Danson Mountain. Beauregard followed it up the still rising slope, winding among the drizzle shrouded sage bushes. Far enough inland from the sea that he could no longer hear the surf he encountered a ghost from his past.

Noah Count stood, leaning against a wooden fence post, carefully avoiding the barbed wire that stretched in both directions from it along the steel posts of the fence line. Beau's sense of time was fragile; though he had not encountered Noah for more than twenty years, it seemed to him but yesterday they had talked and shared a smoke.

"Hello, Colonel," Noah said, saluting Beau in a mocking way. A cigarette dangled from a corner of Noah's mouth. His eyes were red-rimmed. Deeper marks than Beau remembered lined his face. Beau presumed war did that to a man, wore him old in a short time. He returned Noah's salute.

"Where is your uniform, sir?" Beau asked.

"I'm working undercover, don't you know," Noah said. "Can't let the Yankees guess me out."

"Yankees active in this area?" Beau asked, looking around him in startlement.

"Yankees all around us, Colonel," Noah said. He leaned further toward Beau. "Can't be too careful, don't you know."

"Yes sir," Beau said.

"Come up hill a few feet, Colonel," Noah said. "We can sit and talk. Share a smoke like we used to do."

Juan stirred in his sleep, but weariness was too heavy upon him to wake him. Beau said, "Sounds good. You can tell me about the Yankee positions."

"Sure," Noah said. He walked with Beau on the other side of the fence to a log that had fallen before the fence's construction. The fence builders, on government contract, had built the fence over the middle of the log rather than move it.

"Sit here, Colonel," Noah said, and took out a homemade cigarette. Not tobacco, this cigarette, but marijuana heavily laced with angel dust. To Noah a mild buzz-maker. To Beau, it would be rather more. Noah lit the white torpedo and took a deep inhalation. Then he passed it to Beau, who, remembering the old wild days, took the smoke deep into his lungs. From this first hit, Beau was lost in a world of wandering mists and fluttering dreams.

Beau did not notice when Noah got up and left him with the tag end of the cigarette. Neither did he notice the burn on his finger and thumb when the fire came to the end he was holding. He did not know he dropped it into a damp grass patch where it sizzled and went out.

Some time later, Beau got up on his feet, very unsteadily, and began to retrace his steps. Headquarters must know the Yankees were in the vicinity. Walking was more trouble than usual. The mountain seemed to be a breathing entity; the ground rose and fell in rhythm with the rise and fall of Beau's chest as he sucked in air. Nonetheless, he persevered. Headquarters must know.

When he came to the cliff top, he stopped to watch the surf spread white sparkles across the sand so far below him and catch his breath. An iron band seemed to be squeezing his ribs just below his nipples. He could not get enough breath to continue for several minutes. At last he synchronized the sea's sighing with his own incoming and outgoing breath. One foot went in front of another, somehow miraculously finding the narrow path. Beau swayed along across the cliff top, about to topple now into the sage on the landward side, now into the void above the surf. Almost he danced at certain perilous points where the edge of the trail threatened to fall away into the sea.

When he came to the steep slope behind the Chapel, he made his way, still swaying, down the trail toward the ledge that held the Village. Near the place where the land leveled, Beau caught his toe on a stone, tottered in place, and fell full length on his face. He was still for a long while, contemplating the pain in his head.

Juan came to. Fear nibbled like a school of piranhas at his mind. He thrust the fear away. Then a great hot fire built in his heart, spreading up through his shoulder and down his left arm. Juan evaporated in that pain. Beau, likewise, dissolved in the fire.

Little Luis Cruz, beset with hurt and terror, cried "Señor Jesus, por favor!" Three souls intertwined and went into the mysterious great beyond. The body twitched violently, and was still. The rain came down and soaked the linen suit. The hat and its attached wig rolled before the storm winds into a pyracantha shrub someone had planted by the Chapel's back door long ago.

### The Wig in the Bush

Butter found Beau stretched out in death behind the Chapel. She was walking with Dickon and Ben for her evening stroll. As she often did, she had ranged ahead, zigging and zagging from side to side as one scent or another took her attention for a moment. The rain had stopped, for the time being, and Dickon and Ben were moving slowly, talking.

Butter discovered Beau's body. She sniffed at it, curious and uneasy at the same time. She had not encountered a dead person before. Then she noticed his hat and wig bobbing in the wind on the pyracantha bush. She approached it warily, growling at this strange apparition. Suddenly she wheeled and raced back to Dickon and Ben, circling them and alternately barking and whining.

"What's up, girl?" Ben said. She started toward the back of the Chapel, and then stopped to look back to see if he and Dickon were following. Dickon rubbed his right earlobe.

"I think she wants us to follow her, Ben," he said. When they turned to go in her direction she trotted forward, stopping again only once to make sure they were following. When they got near the pyracantha, Butter stopped, pointed with her nose, and began barking.

Dickon spotted the wig and hat bobbing on the bush. "It's Beau's hat," he said.

"What on earth?" Ben said as he toward a man stretched on the ground. Dickon followed him.

"It's Beau," Dickon said. Swiftly he knelt beside the body to feel at the neck for a pulse. "No heartbeat I can detect," he said. "I'll stay here. You go get Dr. Field." The worry and fear in Dickon's voice prompted Ben to his feet. His own heart was thudding in his chest.

"Right," Ben said, wheeling around and breaking into a lumbering run. Butter raced along with him, barking. He tried to hush her as he ran, with little success. He soon slowed to a fast walk because exercise easily winded him. Years of indolence had left their mark. When he got to Dr. Field's cottage, he knocked on the door. Dr. Field grumbled from inside, "Damn it, Beau, did you forget how to turn the knob?" He flung open the door. He was disheveled, clad only in drooping boxer shorts that had leering yellow faces imprinted over red hearts on a white background.

"Oh," he said when he saw Ben. "I thought it was Beau coming home. I don't know where he is. I'm just about to get dressed and go look for him." Butter whined from her place beside Ben. She knew something was very wrong.

"Beau's behind the Chapel," Ben said. He was still breathing heavily from his attempt to run. "Something's wrong with him, I think. He's lying on the ground, not moving."

"Face up or face down?" Fear wore grooves in the doctor's face.

"Face down." Ben's face was a mask of worry.

"Let me get my pants and a jacket. This doesn't sound good. Beau never lies on his stomach, if he can help it." Ben waited while Dr. Field dressed. Dr. Field set out loping at a pace Ben's longer legs and weaker lungs could not match. Butter danced ahead of Ben, urging him on. When Ben caught up to the doctor, he was on his knees feeling Beau's throat for a pulse.

He looked up at Ben and Dickon. Dickon was still rubbing his right earlobe. Ben tried to catch his breath. Dr. Field's eyes were bright with tears about to spill. "He's dead," he said, "and has been for some hours." He stroked Beau's head. "He had a heart condition. My guess is he died from a heart attack. The autopsy will tell us more." Ben reached for Dickon's hand. Dickon pulled Ben to him, his arm around Ben's shoulders.

Dr. Field stood. "Call the sheriff," he said. "I'll get a blanket, something to cover him. It's not right he should lie exposed like this." Dr. Field started to turn, and swayed. Ben caught him and steadied him.

"I've got a blanket closer," Dickon said. "Ben, you go with Chester. Help him call through on the radio. I'll get a blanket, and stay with Beau until somebody official gets here." Ben nodded.

"Okay, Dickon," Ben said, still supporting Dr. Field. "Butter, stay with Dickon. Come on, Doc, let's get the necessary things done, and then we can rest a little." Ben started out for Dr. Field's cottage. Butter started to follow him, but Dickon grabbed her collar and held her back. Dr. Field insisted on standing on his own, and despite his shakiness, managed to walk to his cottage. Once there, he steadied to the needful tasks. He radioed the sheriff's office, explained in careful detail what he had observed, and his estimate, as the deceased's physician of record, that he had died of a heart attack, induced by cause or causes unknown. Then he poured himself and Ben each a generous shot of sour mash bourbon.

"Sit, Ben," he said, and took a chair for himself. He stared at the whiskey in his tumbler. Ben sat. He waited while Dr. Field took a sip of his bourbon. Dr. Field began to talk while he gently swirled the amber fluid in his glass.

"I first met Beau when I came to the City for a convention years ago. A so-called friend of his, Noah Count, made the two of us the butt of a practical joke. Noah conned me into waking him up by telling me he, Noah, was sick, and could I get his friend?" He sipped again at his bourbon. Ben took a small swallow from his own tumbler. He was confused, and the whiskey didn't help him to clarity. He was unused to taking whiskey neat, and almost choked. The fire burned its way down his throat and into his belly. He blinked as his eyes watered. The fumes rose to his brain. He waited for Dr. Field to go on.

Dr. Field did not look up. "Beau was the one I was closest to." He sipped again at his bourbon. "He was totally the invention of a scared little Hispanic boy, and one of the most southern of all southern gentlemen anyone could meet." Dr. Field took a larger swallow of his whiskey, and coughed. "Strongest defense mechanism I ever encountered." Ben waited for Dr. Field to enlighten his confusion.

He looked up at Ben. "I was in love with him, you know. It wasn't right, and I never let anything come of it, because he was my patient. But the counter-transference was strong." Ben took a second, more cautious, sip of his bourbon. It warmed his throat more than it burned. Dr. Field swallowed another large mouthful, and this time he didn't cough.

"It was only after Beau came to me for therapy that I met the other two." Dr. Field emptied his tumbler. He stood, a little unsteadily, and went to the bottle for a refill. He turned and offered a refresher to Ben, who declined.

"Juan was the protector, the guardian for the group. When he was out I never worried. Luis, of course, the original boy, was helpless and hopeless. And I never knew, with Beau, from one minute to the next what would happen." Dr. Field made his shaky way to his chair. He fell into it. He raised his glass. "To the trio," he said, slurring his words. He swallowed some of the liquor.

"It's not right to say Luis was helpless and hopeless," he went on. "He created the Louisiana colonel out of snatches of old movies and the conversations of the ruling classes in his little corner of Texas." He looked at Ben, pleading for some kind of understanding in that hurt puppy way the unaccustomedly drunk sometimes display. Ben smiled. It was the only comfort he could think of offering just them.

"You see," he said, "while I was in love with Beau, Juan was in love with me. It was all so awkward, since they were in the same body. Aside from being Beau's therapist, there was Luis to consider, too." Dr. Field took another long swallow of his drink. He slurred his words more than ever. Ben shook the whiskey cobwebs from his brain. He hadn't understood that multiple personalities inhabited the one body.

"How would I ever forgive myself if I'd been having sex with Juan, or even Beau, and Luis suddenly popped out? His emotional age probably never exceeded twelve or fourteen." Ben stared at his drink. He'd heard more than he wanted to know about the doctor's internal life. He interrupted the doctor's reminiscence.

"Do you need to be present when the sheriff comes?" Ben asked.

"No, they know what I saw, and they know where to find me. I'll wait for their report." He drained his glass. He looked at the bottle, drowsily, but did not get up to fill his glass again. His head dropped, chin to his chest, and he began to snore softly. Ben took the empty glass from his nerveless fingers and put it on the sideboard next to the bottle. He put his own partially empty glass there, as well. Then he went into the bedroom, even though he felt rather like a prowler, and got a quilt from the bed. This he tucked around the sleeping doctor and quietly went out the front door. He joined Dickon and Butter to wait for the sheriff. When the sheriff came to take Beau's shell away, Ben got the wig and hat from the bush and laid it on the body bag as it went into the helicopter.

### Strayed Arrow

Noah left Beau dreaming by the fence. The wind was rising, rain on its breath. Noah headed toward the tool shed Vanna had said would shelter him. He had left his bow and arrows there, to keep them dry, while he reconnoitered the llama pastures. Instead of beasts, he had found an old acquaintance, Beau. How odd that Beau was out here in this wild place. He hadn't said much, unlike his old self, but it had been good to share a joint with him. Like old times, when they were both younger.

Nice to have smoke to share. Noah's rations had been short for a very long time. This assignment from the woman with the frozen eyes and her ridiculous payment for that stupid drawing had let Noah buy this wonderful stuff. His head buzzed with a pleasant hum, almost a melody.

Noah had been the star of the La Lechuga archery class. He had hit the target at least one time out of three, far better than the drooling companions in his class. Noah had not been the crack shot he'd let Vanna believe he was. Noah had never let the truth interfere with a good sale.

Still, he felt obliged to provide some effort toward Vanna's goal of killing off the llamas. If he could find them. He got to the shed just as the rain began to drench the land. He went in, lay on the cot, and listened to the rain dance on the shingles as he drifted off into a drugged state between dreaming and sleeping.

Morning came, inevitably, and with it the evaporation of narcotic effects. Noah opened his eyes and squinted at the dim light invading the shed. Food did not interest him. His full bladder alone stirred him to rise, go outdoors, and relieve himself. He only realized the bathrooms were close by after he had watered the weeds in the tool-shed dooryard.

His hands shook as he zipped up his fly. He held one out in front of him to watch it dance. Had the morning been warmer, he might have stood until noon watching his hand tremble in the gray sunlight. The need for warmth drove him into the shed to retrieve his denim jacket and put it on over his worn shirt. His faded jeans and ragged sneakers provided less than optimum warmth, so Noah lit another joint, which he consumed entirely before he remembered his promise to kill llamas.

Noah wasn't sure just what a llama looked like. He'd seen pictures, a long time ago, but years of substances had dimmed the picture in his mind. He vaguely remembered they were larger than rabbits and smaller than horses. "Time to find the beasties, don't you know," he said aloud to the uncaring room and took up his bow. He went forth to be a Nimrod in the morning air. He had proceeded several yards toward the fence dividing the Coastal Commission Park from La Señora's property when he realized he hadn't brought the arrows with him. He smiled, shrugged his shoulders, and returned to the shed to pick up his quiver.

The arrows were steel tipped, but, for safety's sake, had large round rubber balls on their heads. The balls were a fluorescent orange. Noah stood a moment, mesmerized by the color, before he slung the quiver over his shoulder, took up his bow again, and stalked toward the llama pastures.

The stud llamas had their own pastures. It is an unfortunate truth that stud llamas tend to mate with female crías as early as they could possibly mate. In this they are little different from other herd beasts. Unlike bulls, and often rams, they get very lonely very fast, and need company. Willy Waugh, therefore, kept three studs together in a pasture near the Commission fence.

Noah found these studs. It was probably fortunate for him he did not find the mothers and their crías. The studs were mellower, for they had no young to protect. When he came upon them, Noah's head was singing with the dope's symphony. Pearly streaks of lavender, silver, and gray suffused the midday light. The brown and white llamas moved like dreams cast loose on the ether of the mind over the green pastures.

Noah lifted his bow, nocked an arrow, pulled back the string, aimed at a floating llama, and let fly the missile. It sped true toward where the target had been, and missed the llama entirely, for the beast had taken two or three steps forward. The arrow struck a flake of hay and fell to the ground. Noah had not removed the rubber protector on the tip.

Again and again, so long as he had arrows, Noah nocked, aimed, released, and missed. The llamas went on unconcerned, until the last arrow of all, driven by a vagary of the wind, veered off course and struck a stud's rump. By then it had spent its force, and it did little more than sting the beast. Noah approached the studs to count his kills. All three beasts "dry spat" at him in warning.

Noah knew no better, and came on toward them. The nearest of the three sprayed Noah with half-digested grasses. Noah abandoned his bow, and fled the scene. In his drugged state, the stench begot visual hallucinations, slimy snakes slithered and twined about his person, lizards belched great clouds of poison gas into his nostrils, and poison toads spat wads of burning bile on his skin. Even after he reached the tool shed, and had washed under the frigid hydrant, reptilian beasts bedeviled him. They clustered around him to torment him and jeer at him, until he fell, senseless, upon the tool shed cot and slept off his intoxication.

Willy Waugh came to the stud pasture with the evening hay. He found the curiously dulled arrows, and the bow broken under a llama's foot. He puzzled over these things, determined to discuss them with La Señora.

### Farewell to a Fallen Warrior

Beau's autopsy revealed he had died of a heart attack. It also revealed he had ingested a large amount of cannabis before his death. Dr. Field expressed his puzzlement to the sheriff as to how Beau had gotten hold of the substance.

Dr. Field arranged a private viewing and burial for people from the Village, with a more public memorial later in the week. The recent notoriety of the Village and La Señora in the affair of the murrelet hearing brought many of the curious public to the service. As it happened, the Las Tumbas Loyal Order of Mongooses Lodge was available. There was even an organ, rented for a wedding the day before, which the musical instrument shop allowed to stay in place one more day for free.

Dr. Field had determined, after consulting with Dickon and La Señora, that they should only honor Beau in the service. "Let the others rest in anonymity," he said. "We'll do no good broadcasting to the world that three people lived in this one body."

Two large sprays of stock and calla lilies, white and purple, flanked a large portrait photograph of Beau in full white regalia on the stage. Beau had sat for it several years before. The organist played a prelude composed of _Softly and Tenderly Jesus is Calling, Blessed Assurance,_ and _Out of the Ivory Palaces,_ repeated as long as needed, until Dickon, garbed in clerical robes, rose. He went to the podium, itself sheathed in white lilies, and led the assembled company in prayer (carefully worded to be non-religion specific), and allowed a time for silent prayer. The organist, a pious evangelical named Sara Moníz, softly played _Whispering Hope_ through three times at full vibrato and a lugubrious pace.

Dickon had expressed his despair to Ben at learning the mousy Sara's repertoire. He had suggested several hymns, none of which the lady knew, or cared to learn. She knew certain gospel songs and Fanny Crosby hymns, and that was it. She had no need to clutter her mind with any high-church highfalutin' music. She was a small woman whose entire appearance suggested the downtrodden and hopeless in a female package. She had set her shoulders in a perpetual slump somewhere in her childhood, and they would not straighten. Her wan face was pinched and narrow, with a point to her nose and a lack of presence to her chin. She dressed in a shapeless black dress with very tiny white polka dots. When Dickon had discussed Sara's repertoire with Chester Field, the good doctor was delighted. Pastors in the cornfield and hog pen pulpits of rural Iowa, of course, had formed his taste in funeral music.

Dickon rose again, and opened the great Bible that was there, and read two Psalms, numbers 23 and 121. He followed this with the first three verses from the third chapter of John's First Epistle. The organist keyed _Beyond the Sunset_ underneath his words. Then he introduced Dr. Field, to speak the eulogy. The organist backed this up with _In the Garden._

"I've known Colonel Beauregard LeSieupe for over thirty years," Dr. Field began in a strong voice. His short stature meant that, from the congregation, his head appeared to be resting on the podium, talking as a disembodied entity. No one in the congregation thought that particularly odd; they were accustomed to experimental television advertisements and other media playing games with talking heads. Dr. Field cleared his throat and went on.

"Beau was born in Texas. He could not remember the year, but it was quite some time ago, now. He grew up in Texas, and left it as a boy becoming a man. His peregrinations took him all over the South, before he came to the City in its wilder days." Dr. Field coughed.

"That's where I first got to know him. Then his life was less than exemplary, as he would tell you himself if he were here today, and he eventually fell afoul of the authorities." Dr. Field took out his handkerchief and mopped his eyes. Sara Moníz allowed the music to swell while Dr. Field composed himself. Dr. Field went on in a hoarse voice.

"The probation court assigned Beau to my care as a therapist. Unfortunately, his treatment was only partially successful." Dr. Field coughed, nearly strangling, as though a fish bone had lodged in his throat. Sara skillfully increased the organ's volume until Dr. Field had recovered himself.

"That was why I took him into my household, to watch over him. It was I who benefited most." Here Dr. Field took a deep breath, and raised his voice as Sara began to increase the volume again. "Beauregard LeSieupe gave me joy to rise in the morning, and joy to lie down at night, hope to greet the rising day, and a purpose to rest in the evening. He was my friend, my companion, and my frequent care for nearly thirty years. He has blessed me. May he sleep through eternity in the blessed arms of the Lord!" Abruptly Dr. Field returned to his pew and sat down with a thud that even the rousing climax of _In the Garden_ could not stifle.

Sara, leaning over her keyboard, peered around to be sure Dr. Field was through, before she launched into _What a Friend We Have in Jesus,_ in her reedy soprano. She sang all four known verses, and closed with a quiet organ reprise with the melody in the tenor line. Dickon managed to keep his face straightforwardly stiff, and stared at the floor. As the last notes died away, Dickon rose for the homily. He re-read I John 3:1-3, stood looking quietly at the crowd for a moment, before inviting them to pray with him.

His words were simple, a prayer for Beau's peace and his being enabled to receive God's forgiveness, followed by sentences of thanksgiving for Beau's life. All this to the accompaniment of _Jesus I Come_. Dickon segued into the benediction, and announced to the assembled company that a reception had been prepared for their refreshment in the dining room next door. Then he walked down the center aisle while Sara began her postlude medley of triumph, complete with trumpet and horn stops on the organ opened wide. She began with _There is Power in the Blood,_ followed that with _Throw Out the Life-Line,_ and ended with a crashing version of _When the Roll is Called up Yonder._ Her pedal work on this last in the chorus was truly inspired.

Dickon fled with the crowd, many of whom had never been in a religious funeral before, to the coffee, sticky sweet cake, and salted peanuts of the reception. Dr. Field had luckily arranged the event with a caterer who had a bargain sale on leftovers from a wedding that had not quite happened. Judiciously, the caterer had left the tiered wedding cake, with its plastic bride and groom in her shop. She did bring, however, the little paper cups of mints, which she scattered everywhere among the tables. No one commented, if anyone noticed, the embossed phrase on the white napkins, "Blessed be your journey through life together."

### Night Swats

Noah Count fingered the mist on his beer mug in Roger's Gin Jar, a beverage dispensary of ill repute in the tumbledown section of Las Tumbas' old downtown. Outside the rain fell in soft misty drops on the scarred concrete and broken asphalt of the street. Winter was wearing thin as spring trembled on the horizon.

Noah wore a black leotard with a black tee shirt. The garments clung to his bony frame like a mummy's dried skin. He wore a black beret on his head. He looked like a cynical poet in a dark French movie.

Noah was not happy. His patroness, Vanna Dee, was angry with him. He had not harmed the llamas, nor had he obtained any information that Vanna could use to move La Señora and her brood out. Vanna's anger had moved her to cut off all funds to Noah, until "you can return me something valuable," as she had put it. Noah's disability pittance did not stretch to cover the drugs that he thought it his right to have. He sighed at the unfairness of life, and sipped at his beer. It was a watery American brew, not the hearty Chinese or German labels Noah preferred.

Noah ate a peanut from the dish on the table. Hastily he washed it down with more beer. "Older than Methuselah," he muttered. The taste the peanut left in his mouth soured the low-hops concoction the bartender had drawn for him. Noah sighed again, and got up, leaving the half-full mug on the table. He wound his way through the maze of dark and greasy tables to the men's room in the back.

He held his breath against the stench of the place as he added his waters to the swirling pool in the rusty urinal. As he stood there warding off the miasmic atmosphere, a sudden idea occurred to him. He would dispatch the old lady herself. If she were gone, none of the others would have the heart to stay. When he came out of the men's room, the smoke and dust of the barroom's air seemed almost clean.

He walked out of the bar into the warm spring drizzle. Tonight he would satisfy the Dee woman, and reinstate himself in her good graces. He whistled a monotonous series of notes as he went toward the bus station. The company had recently initiated a coastal route that would bring him within two miles of San Danson station. It was time to try it out.

The bus was an old and noisy relic pressed into the new coastal service to minimize costs until the company could build loyalty on the route. Despite the noise it made, and the hard discomfort of the worn seats, Noah slept soundly during the ride from Las Tumbas to Pueblo Rio. When the bus stopped he woke. Realizing where he was, he forced himself to stay awake, so he didn't miss his stop. The afternoon was old when the bus left him off at the coastal stop. The drizzle had quit. In the late afternoon light Noah could have observed spring flowers blooming in the woods on the landward side of the road had he looked. He didn't bother. At the road to the Coastal Commission lands, he turned seaward and climbed the hill. When he got to the gate, he clambered over it, and angled his way to the fence between Commission lands and La Señora's holdings. He found a comfortably dry spot under a cypress tree and sat down to wait. While he waited, he smoked the last of his weed, drawing the smoke deep into his lungs and holding it there. Noah's world mellowed.

It was well into the night before he left the cover of the cypress tree. In the meantime, the clouds associated with the spring drizzle had run away before a western breeze, revealing stars uncommon to the coastal sky. Noah blessed them. Their light made it possible for him to cover the distance to the manor house without losing his way.

At the manor house he loitered in the shrubbery to reconnoiter the building. He watched the one remaining light go out, guessing that to be the old lady's bedroom. This should be a cinch. She was tiny and frail. A pillow over her face in the night, and she was gone.

Noah crept from window to window, trying each, until he found one that he could open. He raised the sash. It protested with a noise that grated on Noah's ears. He held his breath and waited. No one came to investigate. He climbed up on the sill and crouched like a vulture on a barren tree branch, listening. No sound came from inside. He sat on the sill and let his right leg gently down toward the floor. There was no furniture in the way. He put his other leg down on the floor and slithered into the room.

He stood for a moment. All he could hear was his own beating heart. Smiling grimly, he let his eyes adjust to the dim starlight entering the room, and went forward to the door. He took a tiny flashlight from his pocket and snapped it on. He played its pencil-thin beam around the room. He had entered a pantry, it seemed, with cans and boxes stored on shelves. He opened the door, and found himself in the kitchen. Correctly guessing the general location of the bedrooms, he crept along the hall and opened the first door he came to. It was empty, evidently a spare.

The second door opened onto a sleeping woman. Noah could hear her gentle snoring. He went as silently as he could, hoping no floorboards creaked under his weight, toward the sleeping figure on the bed.

One pillow held the woman's head; the other was under her out-flung arm. Noah took minutes to ease it out of her bed, and then raised it to smash it down on her. She cursed him, sat bolt upright, and knocked him off balance. She rolled out of bed with surprising agility and felled him to the floor with a body blow to his knees. Noah fell with a thump on his tailbone, and the breath whooshed from him as the woman leaned on her elbow placed in the pit of his stomach.

The light came on suddenly. A young man, well muscled, stood laughing over the prostrate Noah and the recumbent Elke. Noah had picked the wrong room.

"Got a live one, I see," Willy Waugh said to Elke.

"I smelled the weed stink on him," she said. "I think he probably got in through the pantry. He tried to smother me, the silly twit."

Noah groaned, and tried to say something. Elke leaned on his stomach with her other elbow. Noah nearly passed out from lack of air.

"Get something to tie him up with, and we'll call the sheriff's office," Elke instructed. "And quit laughing. You're not the one keeping his stinking body on this cold floor."

"Yes, Ma'am," Willy said. He went to get some duct tape. He used it to bind Noah's hands and feet together. Willy bound them rather tightly. Willy and Elke left Noah stretched out on the floor. Willy wasn't laughing when he called DiConti Sharif. Then he went in to explain to La Señora what was going on.

"Elke must have given him quite a startlement," she said. "Well done, both of you. When DiConti comes, give him my thanks as well." She closed her eyes, and went back to sleep, secure in the care of her guardians.

### A Modest Proposal

Emma snapped a leash on Prime Pussy. The orange tabby snarled; leashes went on cats only as a prelude to veterinary visits. Prime Pussy was not fond of veterinarians. Emma held the door for the grumbling cat. Prime Pussy sat on the sill, neither going out nor remaining in. Her tail, still in the living room, lashed back and forth.

"Move, Prime Pussy," Emma snapped. Prime Pussy didn't even deign to look at her. Ermentrude watched this play of wills from a safe place on Notta's lap on the couch. Notta suppressed her amused smile. She had so often tussled wills the same way with Ermentrude. Cats do not readily yield to anything.

"Prime Pussy," Emma said in her most commanding voice, "move out. We're going for a walk." Prime Pussy ignored Emma pointedly turning her head to the right to stare at an empty birdbath. "You asked for it," Emma said, and put her sneaker toe under Prime Pussy's tail and shoved the cat to her feet. Prime Pussy meowed her outrage, to no purpose. She was on her feet and walking across the porch. Emma quickly followed her. As Emma went down the stairs to the ground level, Notta permitted herself a low chuckle.

"I heard that, Missy!" Emma called back to her. "Sometimes you're as stubborn as a cat, yourself."

"Yes, Mother," Notta said through the screen. Emma waved goodbye, and walked with Prime Pussy toward the gate. Much to the tabby's surprise, Emma turned left, toward the Chapel, and not toward the garage. Prime Pussy immediately felt less put upon. Emma had engaged her curiosity. Emma's good temper returned in the soft spring afternoon. A warm breeze, by coastal standards, blew from the landward, making the daffodils in the Swami Fendabenda's yard prance on their stems. No roses, yet, but anemones and grape hyacinth flanked the dancing daffodils. Emma let Prime Pussy explore a little, stopping when the cat stopped to watch a lizard scurry up a fence picket, walking fast so the cat could chase a white moth passing by.

Emma had more in mind than a spring stroll with Prime Pussy. Her target today was to visit with Haakon. She wished to thank him for his gracious acceptance of Notta's invitation after the mistreatment he had suffered at her hands. She had brought Prime Pussy because she needed an excuse to go walking without asking Notta. She did not know why, but she didn't want Notta to know she was visiting Haakon.

Emma went up the porch steps and knocked gently on the door. Haakon came around from the side of the house. He had shed his shirt to work in the side garden, where he was planting cucumbers, spinach, lettuce, and one experimental jalapeño pepper plant. His wiry chest, with its nearly invisible gray and blonde hairs, had begun to fill out a little. His ribs still announced their pronounced presence to the eye.

"Hello," he said. "Sorry I'm not dressed for company." He crouched down to pet Prime Pussy. She accepted his touch with grace. Emma smiled briefly. Emma thought Prime Pussy an excellent judge of character.

"Hello to you," Emma said. She smiled at Haakon. "I wondered how you've been getting along."

"Tolerably well, Emma," he said, standing up. "I'm eating, I'm breathing, and I can sleep at night if I leave the window open to hear the surf sing." His blue eyes seemed less faded than they had when he had first come to Emma's cottage.

"Notta told me she'd asked you to give her away," Emma said. "She told me you said you would. Thank you for that, and for not holding her bad temper against her." Haakon smiled. The smile transformed his lined face from a roadmap of sorrows to a clown's face of laughter.

"She had a real shock to get me for a living father," he said. "Who knows what romantic nonsense she'd invented about me when she was a child? And now, she gets this wreck of a man," Haakon waved his hands from his shoulders to his knees, "who in no way measures up to anybody's fantasy of a romantic father."

"Perhaps," Emma said, unconvinced. "Although I don't think 'wreck of a man' is a proper description for you to use."

"I am not what I was under dear Cynara's reign," Haakon quoted. Emma recognized it as a translation from one of Horace's _Odes_. She had helped a graduate student class in the Classics when she was a librarian.

"None of us is, Haakon. We've all faded with the snows of yesteryear."

"Villon, is it? One of the Ballades?"

"Yes. I don't remember which one, offhand."

"Forgive my manners," Haakon said. "We don't have to stand here in the yard. We can at least sit on the porch, or inside, if you don't mind the liniment smell." He grimaced. "I suppose I smell like it, myself."

"Not that I've noticed, Haakon, but the porch will be fine. It's a lovely afternoon." Emma led Prime Pussy up the stairs and took a seat on the porch, resting her feet on the top step. Haakon sat beside her, and leaned against the porch rail. Prime Pussy meowed emphatically, until Emma allowed her leash room enough to crawl into Haakon's lap. There she sat and purred.

"You still look the same to me, Emma," Haakon said as he rubbed Prime Pussy's ears softly.

"Now that, Haakon, is downright flattery, and might buy you a cup of tea sometime."

"Tea with you is payment enough." He smiled shyly at her. "I do have tea, if you'd care for a cup."

"Not right now," she said. "Haakon, what are you going to do with yourself? Have you thought about that?"

"Some. I don't have any answers, though. I didn't learn a lot, growing up the way I did, about earning a living, except by selling myself. One glance in the mirror tells me I'm beyond that." He shrugged. "I don't know what I could learn at my age, either."

"You can learn whatever you set your mind to. Didn't you pick up any skills in prison?"

"Just some domestic duties. And gardening."

"And a little bit about poetry."

"Yes, there's that. Not a saleable skill, though."

"And you do know a lot about selling, I'd say. At least about how to deal with customers. You could bring in a little income."

Haakon studied the idea for a long moment, staring at his hands he had laid across his thighs.

"I've got another hurdle, Emma," he said. "I'm an ex-con. Who's going to hire an unskilled ex-con?"

"Rosa Krushan, maybe. She needs someone to pump gas for her. You should talk to her." Haakon stared out at the cove without answering. Emma guessed he was rolling the idea around in his head. She kept quiet. Haakon needed time to build his confidence.

"Maybe she'd have me," Haakon said. "I should talk to her sometime."

"Try tomorrow," Emma said, "about one in the afternoon. Rosa's usually between food preparation stints at that time." Emma folded her hands across her breasts. "It never hurts to try," she said, "and now I'm going to try another suggestion on you."

"What's that?"

"I suggest you move in with me when Notta moves out." Emma took a deep breath. "That's a modest proposal," she said.

Haakon stared at her for a long moment. Then he began to stroke Prime Pussy's chin with one hand. He looked away from Emma and smiled. "Notta's right about one thing, for sure," he said. Emma raised a quizzical eyebrow. "You are a take-charge kind of person."

"Notta said that about me?" A scowl shaped Emma's round face into a blunt instrument.

"She said it admiringly," Haakon hastened to assure her. He took a deep breath. "Why would you want me to move in with you?"

"I have my reasons. One is you're easy company. Another is DiConti and Notta will need a place to live, and this cottage should suit them very well. A third is Prime Pussy misses you." She studied his face intently.

"Emma, you said this moving in with you is a modest proposal. Did you mean proposal of the romantic kind?" He glanced quickly at her, and then looked back out at the cove, as if he feared her scrutiny.

Emma looked out at the cove for a long time. When she answered Haakon, her voice echoed a surprised tone. "I suppose I did," she said, "though I hadn't quite thought of things that way." She looked back at Haakon. "I hope that doesn't offend you."

He turned to her and smiled a tight smile. "Offend me? Not at all. Astonish me? Absolutely." He shifted his position so he faced her more than the cove. "Emma, I'm not good romance material. If you'd been around more men, you'd know that."

"I'm not the world's greatest catch, either, Haakon. True, I've never been with any man but you, not in a carnal way, and I've never lived in a household with a man in it." She turned her gaze on him. "I might not like it at all, and I might be too miserably set in my ways for anyone to endure. I can cook, keep house, and carry on a decent conversation, and those things should count for something."

"They count for a lot, especially the conversation. Before you push this any further, though, there's something you should know about me." Pain marched across Haakon's face, aging him twenty years." He cleared his throat a couple of times. Emma waited for him to go on. It didn't seem like a good time to interrupt.

"You should know, Emma, I wasn't celibate in prison." He cleared his throat again. He felt like he was speaking through a thick cloth stretched across his tonsils. Emma waited her concern showing on her face. "I was the kept man, the 'bitch' as prison lingo calls it, of another prisoner. It's how I survived." He looked directly at Emma, pleading for something, perhaps understanding? Perhaps forgiveness?

"I presume your status meant you were his wife in prison." Haakon nodded. "You did what you had to do," Emma said. "That was then. We have to live in now."

"It's nothing I'm proud of," Haakon said. He looked away, toward the sea. "Some of it I enjoyed, and some of it I hated."

"Are you trying to tell me you prefer men?" Emma studied the wooden step her feet rested on.

"No, though I sometimes found pleasure in the sex, it's not my preference. I'm not sure, now, that I have any urges toward any kind of sex. I'm sort of worn out with the whole thing." He coughed, and stared at the bit of sky he could see over the ocean.

"Haakon," Emma said, "please look at me." Her quiet request was as much bidding as it was asking. Haakon tilted his head until he was almost leaning it on his own shoulder, and looked warily at her.

"Whether we ever have sex again or not is not important. If it happens, it happens, and if it doesn't, it doesn't. I need a companion, a friend, to be with me on a steady basis. What I mean by romance is sharing life's great extravaganzas and tiny moments with one important other person. I haven't had much of that with anybody."

"Do you think we could make a go of such a thing?"

"Yes, or I wouldn't invite you."

"I'll try it out, Emma," Haakon said. "We'll have to agree to be honest with each other about whether it's working or not. Okay?"

"Okay," Emma said. She slid closer to him so she could take his hand. He took her other hand and looked into her eyes. Prime Pussy rumbled a purr, and extended one paw to pat Emma on the knee.

## Trials and Revelations

### Paige's Peephole

Paige Turner often accepted the Sheriff's hospitality and spent a night in Cell 7. It was isolated from other cells, and quiet, even when the drunk tank was full of howling boozers. Paige had lived on the streets of Las Tumbas most of her adult life. Most of the deputies knew her by sight, and all knew she was the half-sister of the sheriff, Daniel Druff.

Paige's face, body, and wardrobe reflected the vicissitudes of twenty-plus years on the streets. Deep grooves surrounded her mouth and nose. Her costume was a stained sweatshirt above a pair of threadbare jeans. Her pale brown hair tangled in ringlets on her head, down her neck, and spilled over her shoulders in an untidy mass. Her perfume pleased no one except the occasional cockroach. Her blue eyes were her best feature. A love of all she saw sparkled and danced in them.

Paige had a different perception of the Universe than most. She saw the world through what she called "a peephole in God's muumuu." This often meant she saw into other people's subconscious mentation.

The Las Tumbas _Epitaph_ , the local newspaper, forecast a cold night. Paige, whose middle-aged skeleton had begun to grate on itself with arthritic buildup, chose to use her jailhouse privileges for the night. On this same night, Noah Count began his second twenty-four hours in the Las Tumbas jail.

Noah was in severe withdrawal. He could not keep water on his stomach, let alone the heavy baked beans that had been the jailhouse supper. His limbs trembled, and perspiration drew rivers from his body. Perhaps he should have been in hospital, but the guards on duty that night had not schooled themselves in the medical aspects of withdrawal. Toward midnight he fell into a sleep nearer coma than restfulness.

Paige woke to peer through her private peephole in God's muumuu. She recognized several of the prisoners as either regular repeat offenders or those waiting for trial dates. A terrible clawed creature was feeding on one prisoner's brain, siphoning the little gray cells through its aardvark-like snout. Paige gagged mentally and shifted her focus. She knew that unconscious mind belonged to an alcoholic homeless man with Alzheimer's disease. He was a frequent guest at the jailhouse, too.

One cell held only a great black hole. Paige probed tentatively at it. She got no response to her first few touches. Then, suddenly, she was swirling in a great maelstrom of evil. She spiraled down, terrified, drowning, toward a bottom that she never quite reached.

Paige screamed, both in her peephole and in the world of deputies and jail cells. The night guards came running. They could do nothing except hold her down as she writhed and wriggled on the cot in the cell so she didn't fall and hurt herself.

In the darkness, Paige came at last to a small room with a tiny door. She compressed herself and squeezed into the room. A small boy huddled in a corner, with tears in his eyes and terror on his face. Paige rushed to him, to comfort him. He snarled at her, and tried to move away from her. She slowed her approach, giving him time to understand her benign intentions.

It seemed to Paige to take hours of gentle murmuring and slow approach to connect with the tear-stained boy. The guards were grateful that, after several minutes of contorted movement, Paige had calmed and seemed to be sleeping quietly. They were ready to leave her to her slumbers, when she cried out gibberish in a great voice, and began writhing again. Again they held her down.

Paige brought the boy up through the spiraling darkness, struggling against the current all the way. When she at last reached the light at the top of the black hole, a terrible witch confronted her. The hag stood with arms akimbo athwart the exit from the black hole. She raised her left arm to cast something at them. Paige raised her right hand, and alongside her, the boy, now nearly full grown, raised his right hand as well. The witch flinched, screamed, and shriveled away. Paige brought the boy forth.

The guards relaxed their grip on Paige as she quieted again. Her breathing remained rasping and heavy, but she did not twist and turn on the soaked sheets. After several minutes, they decided she would be okay if they left her. In the harsh cell light, her face looked older and the grooves in it deeper. The same light turned her hair white.

On his way back to his guard post, one of the guards looked in through the cell door peephole at Noah Count. Noah appeared to be sleeping normally, although the sheets he lay on twisted around his legs and torso. Several times that night the guard checked on Paige, and occasionally, on Noah.

Noah woke feeling newly born. He felt free in a way he never had. He asked the day guard to send DiConti to him. When DiConti arrived, Noah told him about Vanna's hiring him to make mischief at San Danson Manor and among the llamas. He offered to testify at her trial, and to plead guilty at his own. DiConti taped their conversation, and advised Noah to consult a lawyer before making a final decision.

Paige woke exhausted. She sniffed herself, got up, and went to the sheriff's office. She asked a woman deputy on duty for permission to take a shower. The woman readily agreed, and promised to find Paige clean clothes. When she had cleaned up, Paige went back on the street to the Missing Man Mission and volunteered her services in exchange for a cot to sleep on and a corner to call her own. Her hair never recovered its brown, and the lines in her face only deepened. Paige was content, at last. She shuttered the peephole in God's muumuu and took up her life.

### Arrested Development

DiConti took the tape he had made of Noah's account to Barry Cooda, the Assistant District Attorney. Barry listened carefully, and then asked DiConti discreetly to investigate Vanna's background and Noah's background.

DiConti began with Bertha Van Nation. She had just put in her retirement papers, and was glad to spill all she knew to DiConti. She told him about Vanna hiring Haakon, about her frequent references to getting rid of La Señora and the llamas, and about the llama painting Vanna had hidden in her work closet. She thought the signature might be "Noah Count," and promised to check for DiConti. Later that day she telephoned him and assured him the picture was from Noah's brush.

DiConti presented his further evidence to Barry, who decided he had enough evidence to warrant an indictment. While the bureaucrats were preparing the paperwork, Vanna somehow got wind of what was in the wind, and disappeared. For several weeks no clues hinted at Vanna's whereabouts, and most law officers forgot about her in the ongoing crush of Amber alerts, drive-by shootings, bank robberies, and other ordinary crimes that made up their work world.

DiConti did not forget. In his travels up and down River Road (he often went to San Danson to visit with Notta Freed), whether on patrol or not, he kept a sharp lookout for the missing Vanna. After two and a half months of quiet observation and contacts with informants, DiConti got a call one afternoon from an anonymous tipster. When he answered his phone, a gravelly voice said, "DiConti Sharif? The Deputy?"

"Yes," DiConti responded.

"The witch you want is working the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon in Pueblo Rio. Ask for Mistress Whippy."

"Mistress Whippy?" DiConti repeated, not sure he'd heard correctly. A click followed by a dial tone answered him. DiConti checked his online county map and discovered the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon was on an obscure cul-de-sac in Pueblo Rio. He drove to Pueblo Rio. On the way he radioed the local police chief, who promised to send backup to the bar.

When he found the cul-de-sac, the sign marking the saloon was so small that he almost left without entering. Few establishments in Pueblo Rio were discreet; the town particularly catered to a gay and lesbian clientele, and let anything and everything hang out. Then he spotted the cowgirl logo on the door, painted in faded black and blue colors. When he reached the door, he saw a small sign that said "Women Only." He twisted the knob and went in.

A miasma of cigar smoke (despite the law's ban on smoking in bars), stale beer, something unwashed, and hatred for men washed over him. A long bar ran down the left side of the room. Scars, perhaps made by big feet in steel-toed boots, marred its walnut stained pine. A half dozen bar stool occupants fell silent as if on a single cue. They all turned to stare at him with menace flaring from their eyes. The women were all weighty specimens. Every one of them wore faded and stressed denim jeans and sloppy gray and black sweatshirts. DiConti's imagination flashed him a picture of beached killer whales waiting for prey. Beyond the bar a swinging lamp slowly played shadows over a massive pool table. One lone white ball lay off center on the green.

A very tall and muscular woman with a flat bosom came from behind the bar and approached him. DiConti guessed she was the bouncer and bartender.

"Not able to read, dude?" she growled at him.

"I can read," DiConti said. "Can you?" He presented his credentials to her. She squinted at them.

"What do you want here?" she said. "Nobody here called a damned cop." She put her hands on her hips and stared down at DiConti. DiConti wondered if she were a transgendered basketball player.

"I'm here for Mistress Whippy," he said, hoping he had heard the name correctly.

"She don't do men, dude."

"I have another kind of business with her. Is she here?"

"Yeah, dude. That way," the bouncer said, and jerked a thumb toward a side door. She stood aside for DiConti to pass. He walked to the door she had indicated, and knocked. The door swung outward with enough force to knock DiConti to his knees, if he hadn't been prudently standing just out of its way. A cowgirl came out, naked except for leather chaps, her ample breasts flopping as she hurried past. Furious curses followed her through the door. DiConti saw at once that the cowgirl was not the perpetrator he wanted. He ignored her as she ran into the shadows behind the pool table. He looked through the door.

Vanna strode out, her face contorted by rage. She had a riding crop that she snapped against the high-heeled knee-high leather boots she wore. She had piled her black hair in a high bun on top of her head, and a long switch of hair, not quite the same shade, swayed from its anchor at the top of the bun. Fluorescent pink lipstick made her mouth a slash in her heart-shaped face. She wore a leather brassiere that showed more breast tissue than it covered. Incongruously, she wore a short pink skirt, flared at the hem, with white and rose chiffon ruffles. DiConti nearly laughed.

"Mistress Whippy?" he said, and shook his head. "Couldn't find anything cleverer?"

"What's it to you, little deputy," she snarled.

DiConti removed his handcuffs from his belt. "Vanna Dee, you are under arrest for the harassment of La Señora and her llamas," he intoned formally. "You have the right to remain silent," he continued. Before he could go on to the attorney provision, Vanna lashed her whip at him, aiming for his eyes. He saw it coming and ducked. The whip struck a beer sign on the far wall and fell harmlessly to the floor. Part of the handle remained in Vanna's hand, a glittering triangular knife blade pointed at him. As he straightened up again Vanna lunged at him. He sidestepped her. The bar patrons cheered Vanna, and groaned when she missed DiConti.

Vanna recovered her balance as DiConti started to draw his gun. She lunged at the deputy again, seeking to pin him to the wall with her poniard. She missed the deputy, but not the wall. The poniard, driven by her fury, buried itself in a stud behind the paneling. She tugged at it, seeking to loosen it. DiConti grasped his opportunity and clamped the open handcuff on Vanna's free arm. Foregoing gentleness, he jerked her other arm free of the poniard. Vanna broke his grip and pounded her fist toward his temple. The blow would have knocked him out if he hadn't jerked Vanna off balance by her one cuffed arm. When she lurched, he grabbed her other arm and locked it in the other half of the handcuffs.

Vanna tried to turn her head and bite DiConti, but the high heels on her boots made her unsteady. She almost fell to her knees. As she was falling, she tried to kick DiConti in the groin. He jerked her upright.

"Now march," he ordered. "You're bound for jail." Vanna refused to move. DiConti pushed her. She stumbled. The bar patrons rumbled and angry murmur. They began to advance on DiConti and Vanna, as if to stop the arrest. Several brandished bottles broken against the bar. One of the largest women crunched broken glass under her boots. DiConti drew his pistol. He aimed it at the foremost woman.

"Stand back," he said. "Don't interfere." Several of the women muttered, but let DiConti push Vanna toward the door. One of Vanna's heels broke off. DiConti kicked it toward the women who still advanced on him, though at a wary distance. He wondered where the Pueblo Rio backup was. From the back of the room the white cue ball flew past his ear and through the door. It crashed into a car window outside. DiConti hoped it wasn't a window on his patrol car.

Wary of the women, DiConti turned to back through the door. He wrapped one arm tight around Vanna's waist and dragged her toward the door. He stopped backing when he ran into a solid wall of hard flesh. The bouncer/bartender filled the door.

"Going somewhere, dude?" she said. He looked up and backwards at her. She was grinning cruelly. She put her arm around DiConti's neck and slowly tightened her grip.

"Yes, he is, Jen Derr," a heavy voice said just outside the bar. "It's a righteous collar, so let him go; get out of his way, or I'll put a bullet in your kidney. Maybe I'll drill the other one, just for the hell of it."

"All right, Anne Drozheny." Jen let go of the doorframe and stood aside. DiConti dragged the still-struggling Vanna to his patrol car and opened the rear door. He shoved Vanna in and locked the door.

Once he had her locked in the rear seat of his patrol car, he finished reciting her rights to her. He turned to Sergeant Drozheny.

"Ma'am," he said, "I thank you for your timely intervention."

"Don't mention it. The gals get overheated sometimes. A threat of ventilation usually cools them down. They're not as bad as they might be. Just protective of any woman who has trouble with a man. I'll talk to them. You're the first man they've seen in that bar in several years." She grinned. "Not a man friendly place," Anne chuckled. DiConti smiled.

"Right you are about that," he said, and got in the car. He heard Anne, at the door, threaten prison and other vile things for the woman who had chucked the cue ball through the bar door. He thought about offering to back up Sergeant Drozheny, but decided his continued presence would only pour oil on a very hot fire. He locked all the doors with a mechanism that no one in the back seat could override, and drove as fast as conditions allowed to Las Tumbas.

He radioed ahead for assistance, and when he got to the jail, four other deputies helped him subdue Vanna and drag her into a cell. They left her there spitting vitriolic verbal abuse at all and sundry. Even the lice and mice that ordinarily frequented that particular cell departed for quieter places. DiConti politely declined several offers of celebratory drinks, went home, freshened up, and drove to San Danson to share his successful capture with Notta and the Villagers.

### The Accused Accuses

Vanna Dee raved for nearly twenty-four hours. She ran from side to side in her cell at first, shaking the bars on the small window in the door and pounding on the cinderblock walls with her shoes. She broke the heel on the second shoe. She sat in the center of her cell, drew invisible pentagrams on the floor and invoked demons (who did not appear). She howled like a coyote bereft of prey, the moon, and its privates. She swore in several foreign languages and arcane dialects she created on the spot. She wearied, and eventually fell asleep on the hard, thin, mattress that lay on the concrete ledge as a bed.

When she awoke, hours later, she was calm as a frozen lake. Her black eyes pierced the gloom left in the corners by the single small bulb that lit the space where she was confined. She admitted the reality of her physical situation. She could not escape this confinement by breaking things or shaking them to pieces. She'd have to break the system that chained her here.

"Guard!" she called. No one answered. All shifts of guards had heard her tantrums. None wanted to be near her. "Guard! Are you there, nitwit?" she called again. No one responded. "Guard!" Vanna screamed at the top of her voice. Other inmates in the cell block began banging on their doors, hoping to drown Vanna's screams.

More time passed before a small woman in a khaki uniform came in pushing a large cart. She stopped at each cell along the row and slid a tray into a slot on the cage door. When she came to Vanna's cell, she slipped the tray in. Vanna looked at the crushed beans and chopped corn embedded in thick gray gravy. She shuddered. She could not bring herself to eat it with her eyes open. She was surprised at how reasonably good it tasted, and ate the full tray. A small paper cup held a tablespoon of green gelatin for dessert. For drink, she had water drawn from the basin and fountain located above the toilet tank.

She put the tray back on the ledge by the slot through the door. The small guard with the big cart came back and methodically picked up the trays from each cell. "Tell whoever is in charge that I want to speak to my lawyer," Vanna said, as calmly as she could. The little guard paid no attention. Vanna growled her frustration into one last word. "Please!" The guard left the corridor.

The dim light prevented Vanna from forming any reasonable opinion as to the passage of time. She did not know what interval transpired before she heard a key in the lock on her door. She stopped her pacing back and forth and waited to see who would enter. Sheriff Druff came in. He motioned to her bed. "Sit down," he said.

Vanna looked at his burly form. She saw an authority in his bearing that cautioned her against any overt rebellion. She sat. He loomed over her.

"Man outside says he's here to be your lawyer. Some dude up from the City. Says his name is Dayton Mann." Vanna let her relief show.

"He was my lawyer in the City," she said. "I'd like to see him now, if I can."

"You can. Got that right. Want to clean up first? You could stand a hosing down." Vanna looked at Dan Druff's craggy face. She read no unkind intent in it.

"A shower would be nice," she said.

"Good. Keep calm, and I'll have a couple of guards walk you to the showers. They'll find you a uniform to fit, too." He went out of her cell. Before he locked the door he said, "I'll tell your attorney to wait until you get presentable." The sheriff shut the door and locked it. Vanna waited only a little while before two very burly women in khaki uniforms came to escort her to the showers. Vanna stripped her tawdry costume off, showered, and dressed herself in the prison issue orange. Even the bra and panties were orange. The particular orange shade the prison preferred looked vile on Vanna. It imbued the pallor of her face with sallow highlights that gave her an appearance of jaundice. Grimacing at her mirror image, Vanna swiftly combed her hair and bound it in a pony tail. Then she went to meet Attorney Mann.

Dayton Mann rose when the guards brought her into the bare interview room. He had been sitting on one side of a table empty of everything except his briefcase. He still dressed in fashions he hoped would capture the attentions of women. He wore a gray flannel jacket cut in the latest fashion, with soft suede patches at the elbows. Instead of slacks, he wore denim jeans carefully faded to highlight his crotch. On his feet he had bright yellow tennis shoes. His gray hair topped his sartorial splendor with a celebration of the ludicrous.

Vanna guessed women still ignored Dayton as they had always done. He had developed his legal skills, however, to a fine point, and had a strong reputation as a defense attorney. Although his advances and plays for her had disgusted Vanna when she first came to know him, his later legal skills made him a useful acquaintance to keep in her arsenal. Now this weapon must be unleashed.

They exchanged brief greetings, before Vanna told Dayton the circumstances of her arrest by DiConti. Dayton made several notes on his yellow legal pad. Then he told her about the charges pending against her, and the determination of the judicial system to try her for harassing La Señora and the San Danson Villagers. He warned the fight might be difficult to win.

"We do have a weapon," he said to her. "Your arrest sounds violent. We will file against this DiConti Sharif for police brutality. Do you think the patrons at the Black and Blue Cowgirl will back up your story?"

"Yes," Vanna said, and smiled. Her smile chilled Dayton, and he struggled to keep his cool demeanor with her. "The women of the Black and Blue Cowgirl will do whatever it takes to stop a man, especially a lawman, from abusing a woman."

"Give me a list, then, of those who were there, if you know their names."

"I only know one, Holly Wudenfein. She'll know who the rest are, or the barkeeper, Jen Derr, will."

"I'll go to Pueblo Rio and interview these women tomorrow." Dayton made a further note on his yellow legal pad.

"Give me a piece of that paper," Vanna said. "I've got to identify you, or they'll make mincemeat out of you."

He gave her a sheet of the paper and a pen. She wrote on it, "Dayton Mann is my lawyer. Please help him help me. In a man's world you've got to use every weapon, even a man, to win. Mistress Whippy." She gave him his pen and her note.

"You ever been to Pueblo Rio?" she asked.

"No, I haven't," he said. "I presume there's a nice place to stay."

"Yes, several. Try the Straight Arrow Motel. That should suit you."

"And entertainment, a place to meet women?"

"Pueblo Rio has several bars. You can try with the women. Just be careful which ones you hit on. I need a whole lawyer to fight my fight." He patted her hand. Its coldness startled him.

"Be cheerful," he said. "Dayton's here. We'll beat this thing." He folded the note she had written and put it in the natty jacket he wore. "I'll be in touch." He stood. "Guard!" he called out. A guard came to the door.

"We're through here," he said. "Please escort Ms. Dee to her cell. In two days I should know a lot more, Vanna," he said. He left for the greater world.

Vanna glared at the guards who came to escort her back to her confinement. They glared back. Vanna marched ahead of them at full speed, head erect, and eyes fiercely fixed directly forward, as if she were leading an army in a battle charge, not returning to a cell.

### Arrangements

La Señora's strength returned with the summer sun. She was able to walk with the aid of her cane, and to sit several hours a day sorting through old papers and memorabilia that she had gathered over her long life. She also had stamina enough to provide for those who had served her long and faithfully.

On this sunny June afternoon she sat at luncheon with Rosa Krushan, Elke Hall, and Willy Waugh. Willy had prepared the meal, and Rosa had praised it. Willy had begun with a clear chicken broth wherein floated tiny wontons stuffed with shrimp and ginger root. A salad of romaine hearts and radicchio dressed in balsamic vinaigrette had followed. The main course had been heated potato salad and ham in a dilled mustard and mayonnaise sauce. For dessert Willy served slices of chilled fresh nectarine lightly dusted with nutmeg and cinnamon. After dessert he poured a Ceylon black tea, quite strong, softened a little with a quarter teaspoon of fireweed honey.

La Señora addressed them over tea. "You have been faithful friends for many years," she said. "I must thank you for your continual kindness and attention to both my comfort and my well-being. I have come to an age when it is logical to assume I shall not live much longer. Moreover, I know a great battle on a spiritual plane looms before me. It will, I think, exhaust me utterly."

Rosa, in a rare display of feeling, let the tears stream down her cheeks. "Señora, don't say such things. I cannot bear to hear them." Her gray hair framed her teary face with waves that echoed a surfer's dream beach. Her dark brown eyes pooled with sorrow. Elke took her hand and squeezed it.

"I only say what is so, Rosa. One cannot avoid the inevitable."

"We just don't like to hear it, Señora," Willy said. His voice was roughened with the strength of his feelings. He could not allow himself to weep, not for a person. For a llama, perhaps.

"Please," La Señora said. "Let me go on without interruptions for sentiment." Her black eyes sparkled in the sunlight. Perhaps they had tears in them, too. Her three guests chose not to know La Señora could weep.

She continued. "I have made disposition in my will for all of you. In your care, Willy, I will leave the llama pens and sheds and the llamas. Also, I will set aside a cottage for you. The creatures would not be happy with any other keeper. There will be one exception, a llama that will belong to a child not yet born. You will know that llama when the time comes. I give you a solemn duty. When that llama is born, give it the horn of the unicorn. Do you accept this obligation?"

"Yes, Señora," he said. "How will I know the llama to give it to?"

"That llama, while still a cría, will make itself known to you."

"Rosa, I have provided that you will own the Café of the Four Rosas. I do not think the west end of this County could imagine anyone else cooking in that kitchen." La Señora smiled at her. "I expect, of course, you will maintain your current culinary excellence."

Rosa's tears flowed freely, now. She took a blushing pink handkerchief, embroidered with white roses on dark green stems from her purse and dabbed at her eyes. Her mascara had run, and left dark stains on the bright pink. "You are too kind, Señora," she blubbered. Elke squeezed her hand again.

"You have served me well, as liaison to the neighborhood. Because of you, Rosa, we are accepted here in all our non-traditional oddity." La Señora waited for Rosa to compose herself. A few more mascara stains soiled the pink handkerchief before Rosa's sobs subsided. "I appreciate the sacrifice you have made, Rosa, in living separately from Elke. Even though you have been nearby, you have not had a joint home of your own."

She turned to Elke. "Elke, my dear companion and friend, you have done so much to keep me going, and to keep my work flowing. Without you, my affairs would be chaos and disturbance. These past years since the Great Temblor you have lifted from my shoulders the grievous burden of organizing my household affairs. I appreciate, too, your sacrifice in living apart from Rosa most of every week." She reached out a hand to each of them across the luncheon table. "That is why I have written into my will that Dr. Field's cottage will be your joint home for so long as you want to live in it."

"I thought," Elke said through an unaccustomed thickness in her throat, "that Haakon Spitz might remain there. Or, that Notta might move into it with her young man."

"Haakon will have another refuge," La Señora said. "You will hear more about that later. Notta and DiConti I have also provided for." La Señora took an envelope from her pocket. "One other matter," she said, "that I should take up with you." She opened the envelope and withdrew a sheet of notepaper. Bold writing in green ink covered the white sheet. "Let me read this," she said. "It's from the Reverend Carrie Oakey."

Señora,

_I have received four separate requests for marriage and commitment ceremonies from San Danson. Are you turning into Gretna Green, or Reno? Just joking._

_I'm happy to perform all four services, but I do want to know if I can do all four on the same day. My schedule is busy, and I'm flying frequently to the East Coast. Each service takes fifteen to thirty minutes. Can you contact all the interested couples and get back to me?_

_Thanks, Señora. Carrie Oakey out._

"I have talked with the other three couples involved," La Señora continued. "They are agreeable to a joint series of ceremonies, with a grand feast to follow after. Rosa and Elke, you are the last for me to ask. Will June seventeenth be acceptable for you to have your commitment ceremony? Will you be comfortable celebrating this event with three other couples? They are, DiConti and Notta, Dickon and Ben, and Emma and Haakon."

"Emma and Haakon? I wouldn't have guessed it," Rosa said. "I'm glad to celebrate with them. How do you feel, Elke?"

"What happens in the Village is all for one and one for all. I think it's a grand idea."

"That's decided, then," La Señora said. "Willy, you and I will consider the menu tomorrow. If you will all excuse me, for now, I must go in to my nap. Elke, Willy can help me to bed. You take the afternoon to be with Rosa. You can think about how you want to celebrate your union."

Willy helped La Señora rise, and they went in. Rosa and Elke lingered on the sun-washed patio, talking of ribbons, laces, and who would be the groom and who would be the bride?

### Trial by Panel

The Bailiff spoke in a loud voice. "All rise for Las Tumbas County Disciplinary Hearing number 407. Be advised that the Complainant is one Vanna Dee, and that the Respondent is Deputy DiConti Sharif of this County. The Charge is Excessive Force Exerted in an Arrest.

"This hearing is called to order," Sheriff Ottami proclaimed in booming voice that startled people in the hearing room who had never encountered him before. He was a small man, neatly put together, with the trim figure of a boy, despite his thick shock of white hair. His voice invariably startled people who heard him in person for the first time. "Let the records show this review panel is duly constituted with the requisite number of law enforcement officers, represented by myself, Drake E. Ottami, Sheriff of Greenhill County, and Daniel Druff, Sheriff of Las Tumbas County, and the requisite number of citizens, Mr. Arthur I. Diss of Las Tumbas, Ms. Mira Kell of Pueblo Rio, and Ms. Anna Mull of Los Albaricoques. Bailiff, read the complaint."

The Bailiff rose and read from the paper before him in a reedy voice: "Vanna Dee, incarcerated in the Las Tumbas County Jail, prays the panel to hear her complaint against one DiConti Sharif, Deputy Sheriff of Las Tumbas County, that on August seventh of this year the said Deputy Sharif did use excessive force in his arrest of the said Vanna Dee at the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon in Pueblo Rio, Las Tumbas County. Ms. Dee further alleges and affirms that the said Deputy Sharif did restrain her roughly in close embrace and did drag her at gunpoint from the establishment aforementioned. Furthermore, Ms. Dee alleges that the said Deputy Sharif violated her person with his touch in sensitive portions of her anatomy. Sworn to this fourteenth day of September, this year."

"Call Vanna Dee to the witness chair and swear her in." The Bailiff called out, "Vanna Dee, you are now summoned to the witness chair for this hearing," and, when she had been escorted by the deputies and carefully seated in the chair, the Bailiff said, "Do you, Vanna, swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, on your most sacred honor?"

"I do." Prison had added pallor to Vanna's face. Her attorney had encouraged her to dress in a simple black sheathe dress, a natural garment for her, and the specific garment he chose heightened her apparent vulnerability. She spoke in a small voice, yet one that carried throughout the hearing room.

"On the date in question," Dayton Mann asked her, "where were you, at about two in the afternoon?" She raised her eyes to her attorney. Throughout her responses to his questions, she fixed her gaze on him, as if no hope existed in the world but his work on her behalf.

"I was at the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon, in Pueblo Rio."

"And what was your purpose in being there?"

"I had an appointment with Holly Wudenfein, an appointment Deputy Sharif interrupted."

"How did Deputy Sharif interrupt you?"

"He knocked on the door of a private room Holly and I were using. His knock terrified Holly. She ran from the room in an unclothed state."

"Why was she unclothed?"

"The nature of our conversation was intimate, and led to her general disrobing."

"What transpired next?"

"I followed Holly out of the room. I was concerned about her. As soon as I came into the saloon's main room, Deputy Sharif slammed me, face first, against the wall, and handcuffed me."

"What did you do then?"

"I cried out, because the cuffs hurt me. I didn't hear Deputy Sharif identify himself as an officer of the law."

"What happened next?"

"I tried, feebly, to defend myself, without success. Sheriff DiConti forcibly dragged me across the room, in the process breaking the heels off my boots and bruising my stomach. When other patrons of the Black and Blue Cowgirl tried to intervene on my behalf, he brandished his weapon at them. When I examined myself later, I discovered he had bruised my breasts and raised welts on my stomach. I also sprained my left ankle when he broke the heel off my boot."

"Thank you, my dear," Dayton Mann said, "for reliving your ordeal in your statement. I'm sure we all can acknowledge your bravery in confronting your abuser in this manner." Vanna demurely lowered her head and looked at her folded hands. One who had never seen her rages might be dazzled into thinking she was a pious churchgoer. Dayton Mann returned to his chair. Sheriff Ottami began the panel's inquiries.

"Ms. Dee," he said, "you say you didn't hear Deputy Sharif announce himself as a police official, nor did you hear him warn you of your rights?"

"He did not warn me of my rights until I was in his patrol car, handcuffed."

"Did you resist the Deputy in any physical way?" Mira Kell asked. Her gray hair was coiffed in extravagant waves across her skull. Under her hair her face was wrinkled and sharp. Her eyes glittered with intelligence.

"I did resist the Deputy by trying to break his hold on me. I would have acquiesced if I had known he was an officer of the law." Vanna managed to extract a tear from her left eye. She let it trickle dramatically down her pallid cheek.

"Anyone else have questions?" Sheriff Ottami asked. The other panel members murmured "No," or shook their heads. "Call DiConti Sharif to the witness chair and swear him in." The Bailiff dutifully carried out Sheriff Ottami's commands.

Sheriff Ottami said, when DiConti was duly sworn, "You have heard the charge, and Ms. Dee's testimony. What do you have to say in your defense?"

"Sir," DiConti said, "Ms. Dee has mis-stated the situation. With the first words she addressed to me, she called me 'little deputy,' so I presumed she understood my police role." Mira Kell and Anna Mull nodded their heads. DiConti's straightforward manner impressed them. His youth and dark good looks, and the way his uniform molded to his body, also helped support the veracity of his statement in their eyes.

"Go on," Sheriff Ottami said. "Tell us in your own words what happened."

"I advised Ms. Dee, who was calling herself 'Mistress Whippy' at the time, that she was under arrest, and began to recite her Miranda rights to her."

"How did Ms. Dee react to your arresting her?" Mira Kell asked.

"She lashed at me with a whip she was carrying. I was trying to handcuff her at the time." He took a deep breath. "The whip missed me, struck a beer sign on the opposite wall, and fell to the floor. I had, by this time, cuffed one of Ms. Dee's arms. When she lashed the whip at me, part of the handle remained in her hand. It served, also, as the handle for a poniard. Ms. Dee struck at me with the poniard. I dodged the blow. She struck out again with the weapon, I sidestepped her strike, and the blade lodged deeply in the wall."

"What is a poniard?" Anna Mull inquired.

"A poniard is a square or triangular bladed dagger," Sheriff Druff answered. "It was particularly popular in Renaissance Italy."

"What occurred next?" Sheriff Ottami asked.

"While Ms. Dee was trying to extricate the dagger from the wall, I handcuffed her other arm. Then I began to escort her from the saloon. She attempted to bite me and to kick me in my groin. I had to almost drag her out of the saloon."

Arthur I. Diss was a dried up shell of a man, with a few wisps of gray hair wandering over his polished skull. He spoke in a compelling baritone that filled the room. "Did you, in the process of taking Ms. Dee out of the saloon, touch her body in any inappropriate places?"

"I had my left hand on her handcuffed wrists. I held my weapon at the ready in my right. My hands were too busy to touch her in any inappropriate part of her anatomy."

"Why had you drawn your weapon?" Sheriff Druff inquired.

"There were other bar patrons in the room. They advanced on me and Ms. Dee in a threatening manner. I drew the weapon to warn them off."

"When, if at all, did you wrap your arm around Ms. Dee?" Sheriff Ottami asked.

"As we got to the door, I wrapped my left arm around Ms. Dee's waist, so I could back out the door, thus keeping an eye on the other bar patrons. While I was backing up, someone among the bar patrons threw a billiard ball at me. It broke a window in a Pueblo Rio patrol car. Sergeant Anne Drozheny of the Pueblo Rio police had arrived; she calmed the crowd. I conducted Ms. Dee to my patrol car and finished explaining her rights to her. Then I brought her directly to Las Tumbas without further incident."

Arthur I. Diss asked, "Did you at any time, intentionally or accidentally, touch Ms. Dee in a sexual or other inappropriate manner?"

"I did not."

Sheriff Ottami addressed the panel. "Any other questions for Deputy Sharif?" The panelists indicated they had no more questions.

"The panel calls Sergeant Anne Drozheny to the witness chair."

Sergeant Drozheny took the oath, and sat in the chair. Sheriff Ottami asked the first question. "Sergeant Drozheny, do you have anything to add to Deputy Sheriff's account?"

"I wasn't inside the saloon when Deputy Sharif was there. I cannot add to his account of what happened. I got to the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon as quickly as I could. Deputy Sharif was at the door, his arm restraining Ms. Dee. The barkeeper, Jen Derr, had her arm around the Deputy's neck, in what I took to be a threatening manner. I advised her that the Deputy was executing a just warrant, and Ms. Derr released him. Deputy Sharif then conducted Ms. Dee to his patrol car, and advised her of her rights."

"Did Ms. Dee demonstrate any signs of physical abuse, such as bruises, or scratches?" Sheriff Druff asked.

"No. The Deputy had a couple of scratches. Ms. Dee had none."

"Do you have any evidence Deputy Sharif abused his authority in making this arrest?"

"No. His only folly was entering the saloon alone. We could have made it easier if he'd been advised to wait for a Pueblo Rio officer. We had a temp doing dispatch that day, and she didn't know how dangerous it could be for a male officer to enter the Black and Blue Cowgirl alone."

"The bar is not friendly toward men?" Ana Mull asked.

"Not at all," Sergeant Drozheny said. Sheriff Ottami dismissed the Sergeant when the panel indicated they had no more questions. He then called for witnesses who were inside the bar during the arrest. The Bailiff went to him and whispered in his ear. He nodded. Then he said, "The panel calls Holly Wudenfein to testify." There was a rustling noise in the back, and a young woman came forward. She was demurely dressed in dove-gray. The cloth cloaked her ample bosom in dignity, and the skirt fell just below her knees. Her calves set several male hearts and one or two female hearts fluttering as she came forward to take the oath. She wore her hair in a severe bun on top of her head. Her soft brown eyes looked upon the world with all the pathos one would expect of Bambi.

"Please state your name and occupation," Sheriff Ottami said when she had been sworn.

"I am Holly Wudenfein," she said. "I live in Pueblo Rio. I am currently unemployed."

"Were you in the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon when Deputy Sharif arrested Ms. Vanna Dee?"

"I was there when he arrested Mistress Whippy," she said. "Is that the same person as Vanna Dee?"

"Yes," Sheriff Ottami said. "Please, tell us what you saw."

"Well," she said, settling herself into the witness chair, "I had gone to the Saloon for instruction from Mistress Whippy, that is, Ms. Dee, in lovemaking techniques. I was involved in an affair, at the time, and thought I needed instruction."

"Yes," Sheriff Ottami said. "Do tell us about the arrest."

"Well, I found Ms. Dee's instruction violent and distasteful," she said. "I fled the room. Mistress Whippy followed me, shouting curses at me. That was when Deputy Sharif told her she was under arrest."

"Did Deputy Sharif identify himself as a police officer?" Attorney Diss asked.

"He didn't need to," she said. "She addressed him right off as Deputy. That was just before she tried to slash his eyes with the whip. When that didn't work, she tried to stab him with this weird little knife she had in her whip handle. When the Deputy handcuffed her other hand, she tried to gore him in the groin with the toe of her boot."

"Did the Deputy at any time you could see him inappropriately touch Ms. Dee in a private part of her anatomy?" Mira Kell asked.

"No. I thought he was real patient with her, her being such a spitfire and all."

"Did you think other patrons in the bar represented a threat sufficient to cause the Deputy to draw his weapon?" Sheriff Druff asked.

"Oh, of course, that bunch, they all hate men. I'm surprised they're none of them here to crucify him."

"Did Deputy Sharif recite for Ms. Dee her rights to silence, an attorney, etc.?" Attorney Diss asked.

"He started to, but she was fighting him so hard he had to concentrate on subduing her."

"Did someone throw a billiard ball at the Deputy?" Anna Mull inquired.

"No, not at the Deputy. I threw it at Mistress Whippy."

"Are there further questions for this witness?" Sheriff Ottami asked. Again the panel indicated it was through with a witness.

"Does anyone else wish to come forward to speak?" Sheriff Ottami asked. No one came forward.

"This panel will retire to consider the testimony," he said. The five panelists got up and walked, single file, through a door at the side of the room. The Bailiff closed the door behind them. Ten minutes passed in murmurs among the people gathered together. Vanna Dee whispered continuously with Dayton Mann. She must not have liked what he was saying; she scowled at him several times. Once she scowled at the clock. It almost stopped under her gaze.

The side door opened. The panel, led by Sheriff Ottami, returned in single file to the table at the front of the room.

"It is the judgment of this panel, that Deputy Sharif, on August seventh of this year, did arrest Ms. Vanna Dee on a valid warrant in the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon, where Ms. Dee was conducting a private class in intimacy. Further, this panel finds that Deputy Sharif acted with reasonable restraint and appropriate courtesy in carrying out said arrest, despite the resistance offered by the plaintiff. We, therefore, unanimously recommend that the plea of the plaintiff be denied, and that Deputy Sharif continue in full duty to function as a deputy of this county's sheriff's office. So ordered. Bailiff, bring us the paperwork, so we can sign everything. This hearing is dismissed."

### Ermentrude's Intervention

When Dr. Field decided to return to Iowa, La Señora suggested Haakon move into Dr. Field's cottage. The move in no way lessened the tension between Notta and Emma. Notta had sublet her apartment in the City to a co-worker, and arranged with her employer to perform her duties by remote contact from Las Tumbas. She went to Las Tumbas once or twice a week to transmit work to her company and to receive further instructions from them. That also gave her time to see DiConti away from the Village.

Notta had apologized to her mother for her outbursts, and had tried to let go of her anger toward Haakon. This she found peculiarly hard to do. She talked with DiConti about it several times, but she couldn't quite bring herself to let go.

A late spring rain squall had escalated into a full-blown winter-type storm. The rain and wind had lashed the Cove for three days before moving inland to bury the mountain ski areas in a late wet snow. After three days cooped in the cottage with Prime Pussy, Notta, and Emma, Ermentrude's restless spirit drove her outdoors by one of her secret egresses in a closet. Notta, busy with her work, and Emma, busy in the kitchen, did not miss the younger cat. Prime Pussy, of course, counted her absence a brief blessing from an unknown god.

Ermentrude, wary of Ben's cottage and Butter, prowled farther afield than she customarily did. Her wanderings included several explorations of rodent dens, chittering observations on various birds in the bushes, and the curious pursuit of a lizard, a species new to Ermentrude. She came at last to Dr. Field's old cottage. Haakon sat in a rocking chair on the porch, to enjoy the rain-cleansed air. The cottage still smelled like a liniment tube; the very walls and floorboards emitted a pungent essence of menthol.

Ermentrude recognized Haakon's scent before she saw him. She experienced cat pleasure; Haakon's lap had frequently been her refuge from Prime Pussy's unkindly attentions while he stayed at Emma's cottage. He had formed a habit of stroking her in just the right, gentle, way that a cat needs. She bounded up the porch, and into his lap.

"Hello, Ermentrude," he said. She purred, and settled down. Haakon began stroking her back. She stretched in ecstasy, coiled up again, and closed her eyes. For some time her rumbling purr and the distant sigh of the surf were all Haakon listened to. Peace entered him, a peace that passed all his understanding.

At lunchtime, Notta missed Ermentrude. The little cat seldom missed a chance to beg tidbits from Notta's lunch, despite Emma's expressed disapproval of feeding pets people food from the table. Ermentrude did not appear, even though Notta and Emma had tuna salad for lunch. Prime Pussy prowled back and forth on a narrow track across the kitchen door, her way of requesting a bit of tuna. Emma said little, and did not take up Notta's attempts at conversation.

"Do you want some tea?" Emma asked as Notta finished her tuna salad.

"No, thank you, Mother," Notta said. "Do you know where Ermentrude has got to?"

"No. I haven't seen her all morning." Emma got up, took their dishes to the sink, and put the kettle on for her cup of tea.

"I'll just go and look for her," Notta said. "Perhaps she slipped out when neither of us noticed."

"Perhaps," Emma said. She took up the morning newspaper and began to re-read it. Notta took this as a dismissal. She got a light jacket, gray with white piping on the lapels, and went out the door. She first went to Ben's place. Ermentrude had invaded Ben's cottage more than once, despite Butter's loud objections. Ben did not answer her knock, and from the quality of Butter's barking, Notta guessed Ben was not at home.

She tried the Swami's cottage next. He hadn't seen any cats, and Malcolm Drye reported a similar lack of feline sightings. Mae Ling did remember seeing a cat, at a distance. She had glanced up from her tablet (she was writing another children's book, this one about the rice planters of Hoi Anh) and seen a cat stalking through the grass. She had not paid attention to the cat's color, or other characteristics.

Notta thanked her and trudged on toward the cabin where Haakon was staying. She debated passing by without stopping, but Haakon, who was still in the rocking chair called to her. "Notta," he said, "If you're looking for Ermentrude, she's here. She came by to see me this morning."

"Oh, thank you!" Notta said. "I've been worried about her." Notta came toward Haakon on the porch. She was very surprised to see Ermentrude curled up in Haakon's lap, purring her most contented purr.

"She's been here quite a while," Haakon said. His fingers were slowly rubbing Ermentrude under the chin. The cat's eyes were shut and Notta detected a grin on her face. "I suppose," Haakon said, "you'll be taking her home now." He continued rubbing Ermentrude's chin. The thinness of Haakon's fingers struck Notta anew. Haakon's whole frame was thin, drawn, as if he had been stretched almost beyond endurance. Notta couldn't quite reconcile this attenuated man with the gloriously muscled god her mother had described as her lover.

"I suppose so," Notta said.

"Don't suppose you have time for a cup of tea, do you?" Notta heard a desperate loneliness in Haakon's voice.

"I don't..." she began, and stopped herself. "I don't have anything I have to do right away," she said. "If you'll put up with me, a cup of tea will be a treat."

Haakon's smile momentarily erased the weary lines in his face. "Then come in," he said. "I've even got a bit of milk for you, Ermentrude." He picked the cat up out of his lap, cradled her in his left arm, and opened the door to invite Notta in. The reek of liniment made Ermentrude sneeze; only that could interrupt her purring.

Over the couch Haakon had hung a picture of St. Sebastian, bleeding profusely from many golden arrows. The painting was a little stylized, and reminded Notta of El Greco's figures. She wondered where Haakon had got the gruesome thing. It radiated pain like a fire radiates heat.

"Do you prefer to sit in here," he said, "or in the kitchen?"

"Mother has me trained to drink tea in the kitchen," Notta said. The kitchen was away from the bloody saint on the living room wall.

"This way, then," Haakon said. He handed Ermentrude to Notta. He took a small bowl from his cupboard. He went to the refrigerator, poured milk into the bowl and put it on the floor. Ermentrude opened her eyes and stared at Notta until Notta became aware of her. Notta looked deep into the cat's green eyes with their yellow rings, and felt herself slip down into a psychic space she had never touched before. It was like plunging into a deep pool, shaped like a funnel. At the bottom of this pool she shot through the narrow end into a place of calm. Some dark thing she had carried so long she didn't know she bore it stayed behind, scraped off by her passage through the narrow opening.

When she returned to her everyday self, Haakon was putting the kettle on. Ermentrude was leaping from Notta's lap to get the milk in the bowl Haakon had poured for her. "Earl Grey or Thai Jasmine?" Haakon said to Notta.

"Thai Jasmine," she replied. "That will be a nice break from mother's Lipton and English Breakfast."

Haakon took two heavy plastic mugs from the cupboard. He put a Thai Jasmine bag in one cup, and an Earl Grey bag in the other. Bergamot struggled with the jasmine and liniment air and lost. "I'm afraid my crockery isn't as elegant as your mother's," he said. "This is all the Wong brothers had."

"They serve," Notta said. Haakon and Notta both fell silent. Only the grumble of water heating in the kettle, the hiss of the gas in the burner, and Ermentrude's steady lapping at the milk made any life in the room. Notta broke the silence when the kettle whistled and Haakon got up to pour the water. She took a deep breath and plunged into her apology. "I am sorry for the way I've acted," Notta said. "I've been vicious and nasty to you, and I don't know why."

Haakon carefully picked up the cups with the hot fluid in them. He didn't respond right away. He didn't know what to say to this woman who was the fruit of his loins. He set the cups down. Then he sat. "I don't care why, if you don't," he finally said.

Notta stared at the window. "I'll be nicer from now on," she said. She rubbed her right hand with the fingers of her left.

"Only if you feel it," Haakon said. "I know I've no right to intrude on your life."

"Except the right of genetic inheritance," Notta said. She sipped at her tea. She looked for another conversational gambit. She was coming to understand Haakon was no surer of himself than she was. "Tell me," she said, "something about your mother and father. What were they like?"

Haakon frowned. "There's not too much to tell. I never knew my father, or even, for sure, who he was." He sighed, and smiled painfully at Notta. "Absent fathers probably run in my family."

"Mine, too," Notta said, and grinned. "My mother's father was one of seven sailors, all of whom died at Pearl Harbor. Grandmother never knew which one was mother's father. What about your mother?" Ermentrude began to purr softly.

"My mother was a professional. She was always kind to me, and tried to bring me up to be honest and decent as she saw honesty and decency." His eyes looked inward. "She died when I was twelve. She got pneumonia on top of a venereal disease. The only thing she left me was a small gold cross." A shadow crossed Haakon's lean, lined face. "The police confiscated it when they arrested me for looting my own stuff. It never appeared on the list of things I was supposed to have looted. Only the beans and part of the cash showed up on my indictment."

"I seem to have unusual grandparents on both sides," Notta said. She drank deeply of her cooling tea.

"Most people's ancestors are an odd bunch, one way or another," Haakon said. "I never knew anything about my mother's people. She left them or they tossed her out long before I came into the picture."

"How did you survive, at twelve?"

"By my wits and by selling my body. Where I lived, that's what a person had a body for. I was lucky. The Madam sheltered me from anybody who might have hurt me, until I was old enough to take care of myself. She never sold my services to men, for example. Only to women who wanted a young man. Of course, that ended when I grew up. Madam told me one day to strike out on my own. I did, and eventually I met your mother."

"And out of that I came."

"Yes." They sat comfortably silent. It was Notta who spoke first, impulsively. "I don't know if Mother has told you, but I'm to marry DiConti Sharif soon," she said. "I'd like you to walk me down the aisle."

Haakon stared at her in consternation. "That's something I never expected to do," he said, "I don't know how. I can learn, I guess."

Notta grinned. "Dickon says most fathers survive the act."

"Well, I'll do it, if you want me to."

"Thanks, Haakon." She reached out to touch his hand. She wanted to make their connection concrete, but Ermentrude intervened.

Haakon drew his hand from the table as Ermentrude leaped into his lap. Notta started to reprimand her. Cats weren't supposed to occupy laps without an invitation. Notta left her reprimand unspoken when Haakon crooned, "Hello, little kitty, I'm so glad you came to see me today." Ermentrude and Haakon had obviously formed their own set of rules, and it was Haakon's home, after all. Notta and Haakon made small talk as they finished their tea. Then Notta excused herself; she did need to do some more work before she went to Las Tumbas to send it in to the City.

"I'm glad you came, Ermentrude," Haakon repeated, "and I'm glad you brought Notta." To Notta he said, "Give my best to Emma." He stood in the door and watched Notta walk down the path toward Emma's cottage. The afternoon sun gilded the mountain as if to promise good things.

### Old Letters

La Señora sat at her Papá's desk. It was an old roll top desk, made from oak, and carved and engraved with multiple representations of grapevines. Decades of waxes and oils had collected in the engravings, darkening them against the golden wood. La Señora seldom used the desk; it was, after all, Papá's, and therefore a shrine to his memory. Many of the ornate pigeonholes still held the same contents Papá had put in them many years ago.

Now La Señora determined to go through the old bills, estate notes, and other trivia of that bygone era and discard what was of no historic or familial importance. She had already filled the small mahogany wastebasket once with debris. Elke had emptied it for her and brought it back, along with a pot of oolong.

La Señora emptied a pigeonhole she did not recall emptying before. After she had sorted through and discarded the stack of old grocery bills, she probed the seemingly empty space to be sure she had removed everything. She touched the back, and bumped against the left side. A small door, engraved with grapevines, opened on the left, where the pigeonhole cabinet joined the wall of the desk. When she peered in, La Señora saw envelopes. She carefully withdrew them. There were four of them, thin, and all addressed to her, but never opened.

Her breath caught in her throat. The hand was not familiar, but the return addressee was. It was Lt. O. Reginald Shinn. He had been the love of her young life so long ago in Lima. Trembling, she laid the letters before her on the desk. She sipped her tea. The cup rattled against the saucer as she put it down. The envelopes bore Ecuadorian stamps. She read the postal marks. The letters had been written over a period of several months, in 1938. All were postmarked in Lima, Peru. La Señora arranged them in date order.

She took up a rapier-shaped letter opener that had belonged to Papá. The thin blade trembled in her hand. She inserted it carefully into one corner and slit the yellowed envelope. Bits of paper flaked off the cut. She lay the letter opener aside, inserted two fingers into the envelope, and drew out a folded sheet of paper. The lavender ink traced a bold hand on the sheet. She adjusted her reading spectacles on her nose and read the letter.

_British Embassy  
Lima, Peru  
February 7, 1938_

_My Dearest Lima Rose,_

_Lima is forlorn, that her favorite rose has fled for a northern clime. The city's society is dull, her balls unmusical, her suppers tasteless. When will you return?_

_I sit in my rooms and read the shipping news. My hope rises with every ship sailing in under American registry, and sinks again when the vessel simply unloads some dull cargo._

_I grieve that I let you get away without receiving your gracious agreement to be my wife. In lieu, this "lieutenant," as you would say it, begs the grace of a note from you. Any topic will do, your daily observations on the weather perhaps?_

_Yours, in all tenderness,_

_Lt. O. Reginald Shinn_

La Señora stared at the note for a short time, not quite seeing it to re-read it. She had long ago decided that her Reggie had forgotten her before her ship sailed from Lima's harbor. Had Papá intercepted this letter? She restored the sheet to its envelope, and took up the next. This she also opened with the letter opener.

_British Embassy  
Lima, Peru  
March 12, 1938_

_My Dearest Lima Rose,_

_The post between the City and Lima is most empty of letters from you. I trust my first letter reached you? You've been in good health, I pray, and just too busy to write? Perhaps you've been away at a cousin's distant farm, or on that small cove your father speaks of so fondly._

_Lima misses you, and now the autumn has come, and, though the gray skies of Lima seldom show blue, if your letter arrives, I'm convinced azure will drown the clouds in heaven._

_I trouble for this darkening mess in Europe. The little Hun frightens me, with his ranting and his moustache. Mussolini, too, seems too large a price to pay for timely railroad travel. Let me hear from you._

_Your loving Reggie_

La Señora's face darkened with anger. Papá had definitely intercepted Reggie's letters. How else would they come to be, unopened, in a secret compartment of this desk? How hypocritical it had been of him to comfort her when she lamented never hearing from Reggie. She took up the third letter.

_British Embassy  
Lima, Peru  
May 2, 1938_

_My dear Lima Rose,_

_I have been ill. Some tropical fever that, no doubt, the natives shrug off, but we British take in full measure of distress. I have been bed-bound for nearly a month, and too weak to hold a pen for several weeks after that. I contracted this whatever it is somewhere along the Urubamba's jungly banks._

_I am now well on my way to recovery, and about to take up my duties again. Rumor has it that I won't be here much longer. I'm due to be rotated home to stand by for a more active assignment. Despite Lord Halifax and Neville Chamberlain, I do think war is imminent._

_Winter is on us, in Lima. We suffered a rare rainstorm two days ago. Some of the poorest sections of the city flooded. Small loss of life, but great loss of livelihood to those who least can afford it. Pray for them, if you will, my darling. Pray for me, as well._

_Your loving Reggie_

La Señora laid aside the third letter. She removed her spectacles and pinched her nose to relieve its tension. She rotated her shoulders to strike the stress from them. She felt a compassionate touch from the unicorn grazing on the hill. Sighing, she took up the fourth, and last, letter.

_Aboard the HMS Flying Fish  
Somewhere off the coast of Colombía  
June 17, 1938_

_Dear Miss Mandor,_

_I have been posted back to Britain. Your father's letter was therefore delayed a few days in reaching me. Please forgive my importunate previous missives. I had no idea you were considering taking holy orders. May you be blessed in your new life. Do not trouble for me. I shall recover, knowing you have set yourself aside to a noble cause. As your father put it, "No British Lieutenant can compete with Almighty God for a lady's hand."_

_Yours in Christ,_

_Lt. O. Reginald Shinn_

"Papá," La Señora said "I do not regret I have never paid any priest to pray for the repose of your soul. Whatever the Evil One hands you in Hell, you've got double coming." Elke entered the room without knocking. The fury in La Señora's voice had penetrated into the hall where Elke was passing.

"Señora," she said. La Señora turned. The anger in her eyes shocked Elke, who had seldom seen La Señora show anger. Then La Señora burst into tears. This frightened Elke, but she rushed to La Señora to comfort her. She knelt by La Señora's chair and took the old woman in her arms. Bit by bit La Señora told the whole sorry tale to Elke's large and comforting shoulder. Had Papá been present, Elke would have gleefully pummeled him into something resembling library paste.

"Oh, Señora," she said, over and over, soothing the old woman, until her sobs quieted, and her tears dried.

"You must think me an old fool," La Señora said, "to be so overwrought about something that happened almost seventy years ago." She pushed back, gently, from Elke's shoulder and reached for a handkerchief in her pocket. She could not find one. Elke handed her a packet of tissues.

"Señora," Elke said, "old hurts can be sharper than new ones."

"Perhaps so," La Señora answered. "I must ask you not to talk of this. May I, as usual, rely on your discretion? It wouldn't do for the world to know the iron maiden can break."

"Certainly, Señora." Elke stood. "Do you need more tea?"

La Señora laid her finger against the outside of her teacup. It was cold. "Yes, nice fresh tea would be very pleasant. You may pour this cold stuff on a geranium, if you will."

"Certainly, Señora. Shall we take tea in here, or somewhere more comfortable?"

"In the lunchroom, I think, my dear. It's cozy there, and I need cozy for a little while." Elke helped her stand, and supported her as they walked out of the room.

"Thank you, Elke," La Señora said. Elke nodded.

### The Virtual Cockroach

Vanna lay on her prison pallet and let her mind ramble through the netherworld. In her ramble, she came upon a chink in the wards surrounding La Señora and the unicorn. She tried to wriggle a finger of her mind into the weakness without success. It was too narrow. Then she bethought her of a cockroach, and its ability to scrabble into crevices. She shaped the dark shadows of the netherworld with the currents of her mind to create a virtual cockroach. She placed a cursed disease of the spirit on it for it to carry into La Señora's psyche.

La Señora lay sleeping in her bed. Her rest was uneasy, and she began to dream. Her Papá was in her dream, pale of face, his moustaches ragged, and in need of wax. Black hollows took the place of his eyes. His wounded mouth pled with her for some gift she could not discern. Fury twitched at the end of the whip she held, raised to slash at him.

The unicorn, too, was uneasy, shifting and stomping its feet in its niche in the circle of rocks where the llamas had come for the night. The llamas nearest the unicorn muttered in their drowse; its disturbances stirred them to restlessness as well.

La Señora, in her dream, slashed the whip at Papá, not to strike him, but to drive him back. Papá wailed, and slid into the darkness. La Señora fell out of her dream, only to dream again a little later. Reggie occupied this dream, resplendent in his dress uniform and the vigor of his youth.

The virtual cockroach crept into the crevice in La Señora's psychic wards. In her dream, La Señora watched in horror as war wounds sprouted on Reggie. A flesh wound to his face marred his youthful beauty. Then a mortar shell tore away his left leg and left him incongruously standing on the right, staring down at the bleeding stump. Then a whistling bullet tore a great gaping hole in his chest. Reggie crumpled and fell. Out of the gore poured on the floor of the netherworld a fiendishly laughing Papá arose. La Señora woke from this dream, sobbing. Her sobbing turned to muttered curses. Elke heard her, and came to her, to hold her and murmur soothingly over her until La Señora went to sleep again.

For a time her sleep was placid and free of dreams. The virtual cockroach had slithered on to the unicorn's rest, seeking to unsettle the beast's mind with darkness. The unicorn dreamed a host of creeping and crawling things attacked it, seeking to bite at its hooves or to crawl up its fetlocks to suck at its blood. The unicorn stamped its feet to crush the creeping and crawling things. In its stamping, it missed the virtual cockroach, which scurried into a crack in the netherworld.

When La Señora woke in the morning, Elke sat drowsing by her bedside. Elke heard her stir under the covers, and woke. She smiled at La Señora. "Ready for breakfast or do you want to sleep a little longer?"

La Señora found it difficult to force words through the thickness in her throat. She did manage to croak, "Water, please." Elke poured from a pitcher on the nightstand beside La Señora's bed. La Señora slowly sipped and swallowed nearly a full glass before she gestured to Elke to take the vessel away.

Still hoarse, but better able to speak, La Señora said, "Have you been here all night, Elke?"

"Much of it. You had troubled dreams last night. It seemed best I stay near, to be sure you were all right." Elke leaned over and patted La Señora's hand. "Is there anything I can do?" she asked. "Or is it just the upset that business of the letters gave you yesterday?"

"It is much ado about something long past," La Señora said. "My will and understanding know that, but my heart and unconscious mind haven't accepted it yet." She cleared her throat again. "Is it late?"

"Just coming on to seven, Señora," Elke said. "Do you want me to help you dress?"

"No, I can manage. It would be nice, though, if you were to lay out my print frock, the one with the cabbage roses. It buttons up the front."

"That I will."

"Just tea and toast, this morning, perhaps with a little rose hip jam."

"Of course, Señora." Elke rose, extracted the gown from the armoire at one side of the room, added the small clothes to it, and left to give Willy his instructions. La Señora pushed back her bedding, slowly swung her feet over the side of the mattress, and pushed herself upright. Then she stood and went into the bathroom to perform her morning ablutions. She rang a small bell she kept at her bedside when she had dressed. Elke returned to brush La Señora's hair, and coil it into a bun. Then she wheeled her out to breakfast.

After breakfast, La Señora said, "I must get back to cleaning out Papá's desk."

"Señora, do you really want to continue that work today?" Elke asked.

"Yes. I gain nothing by putting it off." Elke read the determination on La Señora's face. She nodded.

"I will be close by, should you need any assistance," Elke said. She pushed La Señora's wheeled chair into the office and raised the shades on the windows. The morning light sent the night shadows scurrying into the corners or under the furniture. La Señora re-read Reggie's letters. Her suitor's devotion struck her in this reading. "I missed this kindness," she said, "by drowning myself in my fury with Papá." Tenderly she folded the letters, put each in its respective envelope, and put the envelopes in their secret slot in the desk. As she closed the panel, she thought to try the matching pigeonhole on the right side of the desk. It, too, had a catch that opened a small door. Behind the door, La Señora found a faded blue velvet pouch. As she withdrew it, she felt papers in it. A stained satin ribbon was knotted about the opening.

She picked carefully at the knotted ribbon. When she had undone it, she opened the pouch. A puff of dust settled on the polished desktop. La Señora withdrew several sheets of old paper. The top one had a brief scrawled note on what appeared to be butcher paper. "Miss Sally, may you find this when you most need to. He bade me burn it, but these sheets you should see. Elly." La Señora had to search her memory for some time before she remembered Elly Ganz, the nurse who had attended Papá in his final illness. She laid the note aside.

She recognized her Papá's hand had written the remaining sheets. The first several sheets were dated in the 1920s. They recorded Papá's affair with a woman named Tara Bull. The left hand edge of the pages was ragged, probably because they had been ripped from a bound notebook. Two other sheets were dated 1935 and 1939.

_My Journal, October 14, 1935:_

_We laid my Fancy Danza to rest today. Brave heart that she was, in the end the consumption took her far too soon from this world. I have laid her to rest in San Danson Mountain, in a plot that overlooks the sea. It comforts me to think her spirit may rise up to look over her beloved ocean._

_Now all my concern must be my darling daughters, especially to guard them from the dangers of worldly men. I must trust Tara to oversee Neva, which I believe with all my heart she will. My Salvación I shall take away to the stricter society of Lima, her mother's home. Perhaps one day there will be a man pure enough for her._

_Poor motherless waif that she is, I must get a good woman to care for her. I asked Tara, but she declined, fearing the wagging tongues of the world. No doubt she is right. Women usually are about such things. God help me be the parent my little girl needs!_

"So," La Señora said to the page in front of her, "that's why we rushed off to Lima. Oh, Papá! Could you not see I needed to be among familiar things to mourn Mamá?" She laid aside the journal page and took up the other.

_My Journal, September 2, 1939_

_War has come, begun on a Polish bridge. I am a gloomy old man, perhaps, but I foresee no good coming of this, only death and destruction. Please, whatever gods may rule the weary world, let this conflict burn in Europe, and not spread across the globe as the Great War did! We were wise, I think, to return from Lima when we did. Shipping lanes will not be safe, not with ships that glide like great sharks under the sea to prey on innocent vessels. Dark times, these!_

_After almost a year and a half, my Salvación has taken up her life again. I know it struck her most cruelly that her British beau didn't contact her. I haven't told her my part in interrupting her foolish infatuation. She might be a long time forgiving me._

_I could not let her marry a Brit, especially one schooled at a Public School, as they call their boarding academies for corrupting the young with sodomy and cricket. Any man worth his salt knows the lads who learn buggery by force in those places never after loses the taste for it. It's a wonder the Empire hasn't collapsed._

_At least I was a lusty man for my women, wed and unwed. Salvación is too good a soul to lavish on any ordinary man, let alone one given to buggery. One day, perhaps, I'll find the right man for her._

"Papá," La Señora said, "you're as much a fool as any man ever was. Damn your prejudices, and damn your arrogance!" She drummed her feet on the floor in frustration. At the same time she slapped the desk with a ruler that she kept on the desk top.

Elke heard, and put her head in the office. "I've just put the kettle on, Señora. Would you care to take some tea?"

"Yes," La Señora said, pushing her wheeled chair back from the desk. "I need Earl Grey, I think, to wash this betrayal from my throat." Elke recoiled. She had seldom heard La Señora express anger, though she knew well the stony glare displeasure brought to La Señora's eyes.

"Señora," Elke said, rushing to her, "is something wrong?" She put the back of her hand on La Señora's forehead. La Señora slapped it away.

"Leave it, Elke." La Señora's voice was savage.

"Earl Grey it is," Elke said, retreating, and went to put the kettle on.

La Señora put the sheets concerning Papá's affair with Tara back in the velvet bag and re-tied the ribbon. The other sheets, and Elly's note, she put in the hidden slot with Reggie's letters. "Later," she said to herself, "I'll sort out how I feel about all that mess later." La Señora struggled with herself until she took control again. For a moment she slumped in her wheeled chair. Then she wheeled out of the office and down the hall to the library, where a worried Elke found her when the tea was ready.

### The Velvet Pouch

La Señora welcomed Emma and Notta to her library. The afternoon spring sun danced and sparkled in La Señora's library. She sat in one of the great armchairs Ben had described as "thrones for a cattle queen," because they were very large, brown leather, and commanding presences in their own right. La Señora seated Emma in the other large leather chair. She gestured toward a smaller recliner of a more modern fashion, covered with dark green fabric and adorned with golden oak arms and platform. The comforting smell of old books mated with the rich aroma of brewed tea.

"I have Darjeeling today," she said. "It is from a gift packet Dijee Tully has mailed me from Australia. She assures me it is pure Darjeeling, from Darjeeling itself. I do hope you find it flavorful."

"I'm sure we will, Señora," Emma said. "I remember Dijee. She was a diamond in the rough."

"Was she that sailor that worked with Captain Locke?" Notta asked.

"Yes," Emma said. "I remembered you were frightened by her rough voice when you were a child."

Notta smiled. "Yes, I was."

"Tea?" La Señora asked. When they said yes, she took up the pot and poured the rich red and brown fluid into three white bone-china cups set in matching saucers. Tiny blue periwinkles and twining green leaves wreathed themselves about the cups' rims and saucers' edges. As La Señora handed around the tea, Emma noted her hands did not tremble this spring as they had during the winter. Emma presumed it demonstrated an improvement in La Señora's health.

"It's a lovely spring day," Notta said, accepting her teacup from La Señora.

"Yes," La Señora said. "It is. Spring days can be delightful. Do have some seed cake," she went on, offering them thin slices of the rich confection with a gesture. Emma demurred.

Notta said, "Please, a single slice. It smells delicious." La Señora took a silver server from the tray on the teacart and carefully lifted a slice of the cake onto a small plate from the same set as the cups and saucers. She put a silver fork on the plate and handed it to Notta.

Notta murmured her thanks, took a polite amount on the fork, and lifted it to her mouth. "Delicious!" Notta declared. "Caraway and poppy seeds both, with, I think, lemon and orange?"

"Yes," La Señora said. "It's based on a favorite recipe Rosa shared with Willy Waugh many years ago. I think Willy added the orange liqueur to the batter." Notta continued taking dainty bites while Emma inquired after La Señora's health, and received assurances it had much improved since the prior winter.

A brief silence came, and rested easily among them. La Señora spoke, sending the silence softly toward the room's corners. "I've asked you here today," she said, to reveal a secret I have only recently discovered. It affects the two of you most closely, and concerns a history you should know about your ancestress." La Señora folded her hands in her lap and looked down at their worn knuckles for a moment. Emma and Notta waited. When La Señora looked up again, tears stood in her eyes. Neither of the other women recalled ever seeing La Señora come even this close to crying before. La Señora took out an antique lace handkerchief and dabbed at her eyes.

"Please forgive me," La Señora said. "This is very hard for me to tell, because it reflects on my dear Papá in an unsavory manner."

Notta felt a little thrill. She had always known La Señora was a distant relative of some degree, and had guessed long ago that she knew family history even Emma had not heard. Emma composed her round face in blank neutrality.

"I have always acknowledged you as kinswomen," La Señora went on. "I have always thought you to be my cousins." She clasped her hands together in her lap again, as if to hold herself, or her universe, together. "You are, in fact, not my cousins, but my niece and grandniece."

"We are?" Notta asked.

"Yes," La Señora said. "Your mother, Emma, was my half-sister." La Señora cleared her throat. "We shared Papá, but we had different mothers." Emma stared at La Señora. None of the women knew what to say next.

Notta finally broke the silence. "Who was Grandma Neva's mother?" La Señora looked gratefully at her.

"A young woman orphaned by the influenza epidemic of 1918," La Señora said. "Her name was Tara, Tara Bull, and she came from Kansas or Nebraska. Of her mother and father, I only know the names, because I saw them one time on a faded photograph. They were Fuller and Amy Bull."

La Señora paused to freshen her tea. She silently offered the pot to Emma and Notta. Notta held her cup out for a refill. The Darjeeling was very good.

"Papá met Tara when he went to pay his respects to the ashes of a long-time business associate at the Las Tumbas Columbarium of Everlasting Repose. Papá was late arriving; some matter of business had taken longer than he expected. Tara was employed by the Columbarium as a receptionist and guard. She was just closing up when he arrived and sought admittance. She was of a kindly nature, and allowed him to enter, despite the late hour. I suspect, from knowing Papá's ardent nature, and Tara's exuberance for life, that they charmed each other from the first. The denouements of their stories are best told by the papers."

"Papers?" Notta said.

"Yes," La Señora said, "a few pages of Papá's diary, and a note from Tara." She withdrew a small pouch of faded blue velvet tied with a stained satin ribbon from her apron pocket. She handed the pouch to Emma. "I discovered these just days ago in Papá's old desk. I don't know where the rest of the diary is. Mother had already passed when Papá died. Someone unknown, perhaps Papá himself, saved these few pages, and not the rest." La Señora looked at Emma and Notta with eyes that almost pled with them for understanding.

"It took me some pondering to identify Tara Bull with Tara Freed, the mother of my sometimes playmate, and presumed cousin, Neva. Later on, when Neva came to me for help because she was expecting you, Emma, and her mother had disowned her, I never knew 'Aunt' Tara's hypocrisy. They most rightly belong to you two. It now seems right to me to give them to you." La Señora offered the pouch to Emma.

"Señora," Emma said, "thank you. I have often wondered about my mother and her mother. I am grateful, and I am sure Notta is as well, to have these mementos from the past." She took the pouch. "Notta and I will keep these carefully for the next generation."

"I am also grateful," Notta said, "and flattered and humbled, to be so near a kinswoman to you as grand niece." She got up from her platform rocker and kissed La Señora gently on her age-whitened cheek. La Señora took Notta's hand and patted it with her two hands. La Señora's black eyes were bright, but whether with tears or joy neither Emma nor Notta could say.

La Señora rang her bell to summon Elke. "And now, my dears," she said, "please forgive me, but I must ask you to leave an old woman to her napping." She looked weary indeed, so Emma and Notta excused themselves and walked down the Chapel trail to Emma's cottage.

For a while each was silent with her own thoughts and expectations. Over half way down, Emma said, "We'll read the papers when we get to the cottage, over a whiskey, maybe."

"Sounds like a plan to me, Mother," Notta said. The mustard danced around them in yellow pirouettes on the mountain. As they neared the Chapel, the ocean sang a sibilant song on the sand and rock. The spring had come.

### Urns and Ashes

When Emma and Notta got back to Emma's cottage, and had each greeted her own cat, Emma got a bottle of bourbon from the cupboard and two small glasses. She poured a delicate finger of whiskey in each glass, and she and Notta sat down to read the contents of the velvet pouch. Prime Pussy and Ermentrude, of course, disdained the whole proceeding and each other to curl up at opposite ends of the couch.

"Shall I read to you or you to me, or each for ourselves?" Emma asked.

"You read a page, and pass it to me. I think you should have the right of seniority." Notta said. With trembling fingers Emma loosened the knot on the satin ribbon that kept the pouch closed. It was not too tight, for which Emma was grateful. Old satin ribbon could be mighty stubborn stuff to untangle. She drew out a small packet of papers, held together by two strings, one near the top, the other near the bottom. She gently pulled the strings over the ends and laid them on the side table next to her. She picked up the first page. The paper was yellowed, and felt brittle in her hands. It was good rag paper, though, and still tough. Commander Mandor had written on it in a careful Copperplate hand. She read.

_My Journal, June 16, 1920_

_My beloved Fancy has this day made me most glad, for she is with child, and by me. She and the Doctor estimate a December birth._

_My Journal, June 21, 1920:_

_I went to Las Tumbas yesterday. The business with the hardware people went well. I completed my other errands (my dear Fancy wanted spools of ribbon and embroidery thread for the garments she is making for the babe who is coming), and determined the hour still sufficiently early to allow me to pay my respects to poor Endeavor's ashes. I at once hastened my steps toward the Columbarium of Everlasting Repose, which is built, appropriately enough, next to the ancient aboriginal tombs that give Las Tumbas its name._

_The young woman attending the reception area was just closing as I arrived. When I explained I was from out of town, she took pity on me, and escorted me in to see Endeavor's niche. It is simple and elegant, clad in pink granite, with his Endeavor More carved in a graceful script above his marble urn. The urn itself I thought a little vulgar, with an excess of cherubs crawling around on the handles, and rather more leaves and vines twining about than good taste requires. I suspect Endeavor chose the niche before his passing, and that vulgar mother of his chose the urn afterward._

_The young lady, whose name, I have discovered, is Miss Tara Bull, is a lovely young thing. Her hair is long and flowing, and carefully frames a face otherwise perhaps too round. Her eyes are blue as cornflowers in her native Kansas, and her smile is quick and lively. Her form is firm and nicely proportioned. Her manner is modest, yet she does not cringe or simper as so many young ladies do these days. She quite charmed me._

Emma handed the first sheet to Notta, and took up the next and continued reading.

_My Journal, July 6, 1920_

_I have been to Las Tumbas again. This hardware matter continues to vex me. Shingle Brothers cannot seem to find sufficient crystal doorknobs in the octagon pattern I have chosen. Each time they give me excuses, they urge me to take instead a supply of white ceramic ovals such as one might find in the lesser halls of a public institution._

_After my business, I went again to the Columbarium. I told myself it was to calm my thoughts with reflections on immortality, and the relative value of doorknobs in the schemes of the Almighty. When I got there, only to discover Miss Bull was not there, I had to admit my inner purpose had been to see her. A scrawny youth, with a straggling mustache, in an army uniform, advised me Miss Bull would return at one o'clock, should I wish to return._

_With all due respect to Endeavor, his ashes are a great deal less company than he was, so I repaired to a nearby tavern for a sandwich and a bit of spirits. I drank rather more than is my custom, for the sandwich was very dry. When I returned to the columbarium, I impulsively asked Miss Bull if I might call on her there the following week. A man has needs that needs must be met, and Fancy's condition prevents my joining with her for conjugal release. Miss Bull agreed, and smiled winsomely at me._

_I have only just returned, and that to a household in uproar. My dearest Fancy is out of sorts at the constrictions of her confinement. Her doctor has forbidden her to go out walking on the beach. I have given her over into the care of her nurses, and have fled here into my study. I promised to bring her some trifle or other when I go next to Las Tumbas._

Emma passed the second entry to Notta, who was still puzzling her way through the antique script. Emma took up another sheet and began to read.

_My Journal, July 14, 1920_

_Bastille Day, and I am returned from Las Tumbas. As it happened, I was quite late returning. Dearest Fancy was most disquieted for my being out so late in the motor car. She profoundly distrusts the machine, and even more, my piloting of it on the River Road. My present of three romantic novels went ignored for a full half hour while Fancy lectured me on the vagaries and dangers of motoring after sunset. How far sharper her tongue had been had she known the true cause of my delay!_

_Were I of the Roman faith, I should be on my knees saying "Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned." Since I am of no faith, I can only admit I have erred grievously. After a sumptuous late luncheon with Miss Bull, including a full two bottles of the best local wines, we returned to the columbarium. It was then I discovered Miss Bull was temporarily lodging in the facility as a substitute night caretaker, the scrawny young veteran to whom that duty ordinarily fell having been called away to the East for a family crisis. I took advantage of her inebriation and the propinquity of her quarters to ravish her. She seemed to enjoy the illicit act as much as I did. Only after we had consummated our liaison did I become aware we had coupled in the presence of several urns on a shelf above the bed. When I mentioned these jars, she assured me the ashes in them no longer involved themselves in mortal concerns. I fear I shall see her again, with a like result in my behavior. If only motherhood had not put my beloved Fancy Danza off limits!_

Emma handed these sheets to Notta, and took up the next, which was written in a different hand, one less-schooled, and more modern. It was short and showed stress where it had been crumpled, and smoothed again, perhaps more than once.

_The Columbarium of Everlasting Repose  
Las Tumbas  
September 7, 1920_

_My Dearest,_

_I am certain, now, that I carry your child. I have confirmed this with a doctor in Los Albaricoques. I shall need assistance, for I must move from Las Tumbas to some place I can pass as a widow who has just lost her husband, for the sake of my honor, and to avoid the stain of dishonor on our child. I shall need money, and perhaps other assistance._

_Your Tarara-Boom-Deay,_

_Tara Bull_

Emma passed this letter to Notta, who was frowning over the sheets Commander Mandor had written of his tryst among the urns. She took up the last of the sheets and continued reading.

_My Journal, September 7, 1920_

_The piper's come to be paid! A servant brought the post to Fancy Danza while I was busy in the Village settling a dispute between two workers. I'm in for it now, for Fancy opened a short letter from Tara, Miss Bull, who not only disclosed our affair, but also advised me she is expectant with my child. Fancy is furious, even though she herself had many men before I married her. It is that this affair comes after our marriage, at a time of great physical discomfort for her, that she considers my worst betrayal._

_My Journal, September 12, 1920_

_Fancy has insisted my honor requires me discreetly to settle Tara and her babe to come in a modest lodging in Corona Espinosa. Tara has determined to take on the surname "Freed" and live there as a quiet widow. I am to continue to care for the mother and child, visiting the child as its uncle on a regular basis. On no account am I ever to stay the night, or have carnal relations with Tara. Tara agrees to these terms; indeed, she and Fancy have formed a liaison against me. I am forbidden Fancy's bed as well._

_My Journal, December 17, 1920_

_Today I am a father. Fancy has borne me a daughter, Salvación. Fancy is weak, but will recover her former vigor, according to her doctors. I fear her affection for me will not recover._

_My Journal, April 27, 1921_

_A letter from Tara today. She has brought forth a girl-child, whom she has named Neva, for the snows of the high mountains, saying, "may she be pure as those snows are pure, unlike her errant mother." So now I am father to two girls._

_My Journal, June 16, 1922_

_My children are my darlings. Their mothers treat me coldly, keeping me distant from their beds and even more distant from their hearts. My sins weigh heavily on me. When I am with my daughters I forget their icy mothers, and my heart soars._

Emma waited, sipping at her whiskey, while Notta finished the last entries in the Journal. Notta looked up at her mother. "I feel I'm the odd one out," she said, "since I plan to be married before I get pregnant."

"Don't judge, daughter," Emma said. "From what my mother told me of this Tara, she was sternly puritanical. I believe it; Mother raised me very strictly."

"Mother, you were stricter than my friends' mothers."

"And you've turned out quite well for it," Emma snapped. Notta grinned.

"I'm not complaining," she said. She swallowed the whiskey remaining in her glass. "We've survived, all of us. Maybe someday, when I'm old and married and stuck in the house, I'll get on the internet and see what I can find out about this Amy and Fuller Bull."

"If you do, it will probably just be more ancestral dirt," Emma said. "Although, it is nice to know something of one's family history." Emma frowned. "Perhaps, it's better. What a scoundrel!"

"Yeah, he's a cad, for sure. Yet, he loved his daughters."

"And it's greatly to his credit, I suppose," Emma said. "Still, I don't think I'll forgive him very readily.

"No reason we should either forgive him or hate him. He's dead and gone, what, forty or fifty years? Forget him. Shall we have some more whiskey, Mother?"

"I think it's reasonable to have a bit more." Emma smiled at Notta. "While we sip, we can talk about wedding plans." Emma gently gathered the old papers together and put them in the velvet pouch. She tied a soft knot in the satin ribbon, and put it away in the drawer she reserved for special keepsakes.

### Letter from Iowa

La Señora received a letter from Iowa. Dr. Field sent it. When she had read it, La Señora shared it with the Village.

_Dr. Chester Field  
1067 Parsley Place  
Parlor House, IA  
December 2, 200X_

_Señora Salvación Mandor_

_Greetings from the snowy cornfields of Iowa. We've got a foot of snow on the level, and some drifts up to two and a half feet. So far, it has been a mild winter._

_As you can see, I have an established address. It's an old Victorian home, and would be worth a fortune if I could move it to the City. Here it's a modest house, with four bedrooms upstairs and a kitchen, parlor, sitting room, and office downstairs. You can tell Dickon that it has indoor plumbing._

_I have a small practice in psychiatry, dealing mostly with depression. Winter farm life is rife with sadness and unspoken anger. Farm wives, mostly, have to struggle with it. The men are too busy fighting the elements and feeding the livestock to have time for fighting depression._

_I have a spouse. After all these years, I have finally found my man. His name is Winston Baygeaux. I call him Winnie, for short. He was at Iowa State when I was, but we didn't take the same courses, and never got acquainted. In those days students in psychology didn't meet students in religion. Winnie's a retired Methodist clergyman. He has been married and widowed._

_Winnie is taller than I am, by about a foot. His hair is dark brown, with light touches of gray at the temples. He smiles easily, and makes jokes readily. We met at a gay bar in Des Moines; I think it is the only gay bar in Iowa. We had a drink together, and then each of us went home. A pleasant encounter, quickly forgotten, until we met the next week at the butcher's counter in the local supermarket. It didn't take long for us to get to know each other Biblically._

_May the winter solstice find you, and all the Villagers, two-legged and four-legged, in good health and spirits._

_Your friend,_

_Dr. Chester Field_

The Villagers were pleased to hear their former neighbor was doing so well. Several wrote to invite him and Winston to visit. In the dread and frozen snows of Iowa, the letters warmed the cockles of Dr. Field's heart.

### High Noon Nuptials

Guests started arriving a good half-hour before the ceremony. The parking area at the motel and café in San Danson Station filled as the guests came. The funicular, operated today by Harry Pitts, kept very busy transporting guests up the hill. Once they arrived, La Señora, seated in a great chair, brought out for the occasion, directed them to the terrace, where Malcolm Drye and Mae Ling ushered them to their seats. The llamas gathered at the side of their pens to observe the humans. The unicorn stood, front feet on a bale of hay, to better see the event. Her eyesight was not what it once was.

Willy and La Señora had decided to stage the ceremonies on the mansion's terrace. The Reverend Carrie Oakey stood at the center of the terrace's wall, the cove glittering in the sun behind her. She beamed as the four couples processed out of the house into the warm June sun. Reverend Oakey wore her white pulpit gown and stole for the celebration. DiConti and Notta came first. DiConti wore his deputy's dress uniform, his khaki jacket glittering with various brass ornaments and gold threaded epaulets. DiConti's face wore intense concentration like a coat of armor. Notta had selected a traditional white satin and lace gown with a seed-pearl tiara and a filmy veil. Her face was serene as a nun's certain of heavenly bliss. Ermentrude processed with them on a glittering rhinestone leash, her tail ramrod straight, except the very tip, which curved delicately above her back.

Haakon wore a dark blue suit, newly tailored for him, with a very pale pink tuxedo shirt and black wingtip shoes. Haakon looked worried. His lips moved silently, as though he were reciting a part. Emma had selected a simple rose sheathe with a filmy rose and periwinkle print overdress. Her pumps were tinted rose to match her sheathe. She walked with matronly dignity, a slight smile twinkling occasionally on her lips. Prime Pussy strode ahead of Haakon and Emma at the end of another rhinestone leash. Her tail lashed from side to side.

Rosa and Elke had had both chosen to be the bride. Elke wore a floor-length gown of robin's egg blue that matched her eyes and set off her blonde hair with a flourish. She looked every inch the incarnation of a Valkyrie. Rosa wore a deep rose-colored gown, also floor-length, and a gold necklace with a large oval onyx pendant. Rosa was round and plump, like a peach ready for the plucking. Each woman wore matching pumps. Willy Waugh, for once in trousers and shirt, though still barefoot, walked between them. He carried the rings, tied to a small white satin pillow with blue and rose ribbons.

Dickon and Ben dressed in matching denim tuxedos, especially made for them, with blue chambray shirts and black shoes. Dickon's movements were nervous, and his hands seemed to tremble at times. Ben walked stolidly, with neither hesitation nor hurry. Butter walked between them, a small pouch containing the men's rings strapped to her back. Her tail wagged gently; she was with her beloved people.

Notta and DiConti stood on the left, Ermentrude sat between them. Emma and Haakon, with Prime Pussy between them, stood to the right of DiConti and Notta. Then going to the right, Rosa and Elke took their place. Ben and Dickon positioned themselves on the far right of a semi-circle, Butter between them. When they had arranged themselves, Reverend Oakey began. She signaled the assembled guests to be seated. Then she spoke.

"Dearly beloved," she began, "we have gathered here in your presence and in the presence of the Divine One, to celebrate the joining of these four couples in their commitment to each other. Under our current laws, two of these couples will be wedded and two will not, yet all four couples are alike in the solemnity and joy of their joining. We invite you to pray with us, if your beliefs allow, addressing your prayers to whichever form of the Divine One you have discovered to be God."

Reverend Oakey let the congregation quiet itself before she began the prayer. "Divine One, whom we severally know by many names, we invite you to make holy these who join together in your presence. Bear them up in their weak times, and dance with them in their strong times. Give them guidance when they need it, and hear their expressions of thanksgiving when they make them. Amen."

She stood before DiConti and Notta. She quickly stooped to take a pouch from Ermentrude's collar. When she stood she said, "DiConti, what do you say to Notta?" DiConti and Notta turned to face each other.

"Notta," he said in a choked voice. He cleared his throat and began again, clear and firm. "Notta, you complete me. Now, when I work in dark places, I have the light of you to carry with me. When I am weary, I have you to come home to. You bless me. For these and other reasons, I, DiConti, take you, Notta, to be my lawful spouse, and I promise to love you and cherish you, in good times and bad, day by day, as Love gives me strength. I give you this ring to show the world my commitment," he added, as he put a simple gold band on her finger. Ermentrude rubbed against his left leg, leaving her cat hair signature of approval on his uniform.

Carrie Oakey turned to Notta. "Notta, what do you say to DiConti?"

Notta's voice was low pitched, but clear as she said, "DiConti, you came into an empty place I didn't know I had, and you filled it. I will never fear that emptiness again. For this, and other reasons, I, Notta, take you, DiConti, to be my lawful spouse, and I promise to love you and cherish you, in good times and bad, day by day, as Love gives me strength. I give you this ring to show the world my commitment," Notta said, and put a white gold band on DiConti's finger. She had had the jeweler engrave two entwined hearts on the top of it. Ermentrude purred.

The Reverend moved on to Haakon and Emma. She stooped to remove a pouch from Prime Pussy's collar. Prime Pussy growled at her. Carrie stood up quickly. "Haakon," she said, "What do you say to Emma?"

Haakon's declaration was low and indistinct. Only those very near heard him clearly. "My life has been dark, with few people who cared about me. When I ended up a broken shell on your doorstep, you took me into your house and your heart. Now you give me yourself in marriage. Oh, Emma, what a gift! I take you to be my lawful spouse, and I promise to love you and cherish you, through dark days and bright days, as Love gives me strength. I give you this ring to let the whole world know I love you." He froze, and stared at Emma, as if to beg her to tell him what to do next.

"Put the ring on her finger," Carrie whispered. Haakon shook himself, and pushed the silver band set with a tiny emerald on Emma's finger. She smiled at him.

"Emma, what do you say to Haakon?"

Emma's voice was strong, even though a little bit husky. "Haakon, you gave me a great gift when you brought Notta into my life. She's off on her own, and you have come to me to be with me. I thank whatever gods may be for you. I take you, Haakon, to be my lawful spouse, and I promise to love you and cherish you, through dark days and bright days, as Love gives me strength. I give you this ring to tell the whole world we love each other," she said, and put it on Haakon's finger. It was also a silver band, set with a tiny ruby. Carrie smiled at them, and moved on to Elke and Rosa.

Reverend Oakey untied the rings from the pillow Willy Waugh carried. He grinned at Elke and Rosa, and walked to a seat reserved for him next to La Señora. "Rosa," Carrie said, "what do you say to Elke?"

Rosa's speech was low, and intimate, meant for Elke before all others. "When you came to me that first day through the dust and ruin of my life and possessions, I began to love you. Before all these people, Elke, I commit myself to be your life's partner, and I promise to love you and cherish you, with faith and tenderness, for as long as I live. I give you this partnership ring I had made for you, to tell the world I love you" and she gold band studded with an onyx copy of the astrological symbol for two women on Elke's finger.

"Elke, what do you say to Rosa?"

Elke proclaimed her words to all the assembled company. "Rosa, you have been my faithful companion for many years. I commit myself to be your life's partner, and I promise to love you and cherish you, with faith and tenderness, all the days we have together. I give you this partnership ring to proclaim our union to the world," she said, as she slid the mate to the ring Rosa had given her onto Rosa's finger. Carrie Oakey smiled at the pair, and moved on to Ben and Dickon.

Carrie bent down again, and took the pouch from Butter's back. Butter licked her face, and sneezed. Reverend Oakey wore face powder, an annoying substance hitherto outside Butter's experience.

"Dickon," Carrie said, turning to him, "what do you say to Ben?"

"Ben, you have taught me to trust again. You have sweetened my bitter spirit with your generous one. You have turned this cynic into a man of hope. I commit myself to be your life's partner, and I promise to love you and cherish you, in plenty and in want, in sickness and in health, day by day, as Love gives me strength. I give you this ring," Dickon said, and slid the ring onto Ben's finger. "I have our names engraved on it, joined by an equal sign, to declare our union to all who have eyes."

"Ben," Carrie said, "what do you say to Dickon?"

Ben's voice was steady. "Dickon, I had given up on love, believing it was only for my past. Then you walked up to me on the beach, and set in motion my revival in loving. Beloved friend, I commit myself to be your life's partner. I promise to love you and cherish you, in plenty and in want, in sickness and in health, day by day, as Love gives me strength. I give you this ring, engraved with an infinity sign," he said, "and let the world understand, we are a pair." He bent over Dickon's hand to slide the silver band onto Dickon's finger. Butter wagged her tail, stirring a bit of dust on the terrace.

Carrie returned to her central position. She addressed the assembled congregation. "I invite you to pray with us again," she said, and bowed her head. "O Divine One, approve these who come together. Grant them the strength and grace to fulfill their promises made to each other with steadfast affection and faithfulness. Teach them righteousness and peace and love ever expanding. We, who are your creatures, ask it of you. Amen."

In a ringing voice Carrie Oakey declared, "By the authority committed to me as a minister of the Church, I declare that DiConti and Notta are husband and wife, that Emma and Haakon are husband and wife, that Rosa and Elke are committed partners in life, and that Ben and Dickon are committed partners in life. These who have joined together in the Divine Presence, let no one put asunder!" The congregation applauded, and Butter woofed happily.

Carrie grinned at the couples and said, "It is customary to close this ceremony with a kiss." Each couple did. Carrie finished the service with a loud proclamation. "And now, folks, let's party!"

### Reception

Harry Pitts took the cats and Butter by the leash and led them away to their respective cottages. He carried a large brown paper bag in one hand. The smells coming from it intrigued all three pets, so they neither spat at one another nor did they entangle their leashes. Willy Waugh disappeared into the kitchen. The llamas returned to grazing.

The four couples formed a receiving line at the terrace door into La Señora's mansion. Mae Ling brought each of them iced tea or lemonade, depending on individual preferences. She assured them plates had been filled and set aside for them according to their pre-ceremony requests.

The guests lined up to shake hands, some to kiss brides, and, when they had done so, went into the long hall of La Señora's mansion. Tables lined one wall. They bore heavy loads of food. La Señora sat in her wheelchair at the beginning of the food line. She wore a long formal gown, moss green, trimmed with rose piping on the neckline, hemline, and side seams. As she greeted each guest, she bade him or her to take up a plate and select from the offerings.

Willy had written out small tags to warn guests that various items contained shellfish, hot spices, or nuts, for those guests who had aversions or allergies to such ingredients. On the seafood table, the first, he offered crab puffs, ceviche on water crackers, sea scallops wrapped in bacon, squares of sole Florentine on toast points, tuna tartar on sesame wonton crisps, shrimp puffs, Cajun shrimp balls, crab and cucumber rolls, and shrimp with jalapeños and mayonnaise served in cups made of lettuce leaves.

The guests had dressed according to their own notions of formality. Carrie Oakey wore a simple black dress with classic pearls. Rev. Bobbo Link wore his clerical collar, and a white clergy shirt, with black jacket and trousers. Sheriff Druff and other police personnel, including Anna Drozheny, wore their dress uniforms. They entered the buffet line in a clump, and clung together, as if a little ill-at-ease with all the civilians surrounding them.

The next table held chips and dips. Tortilla chips (both yellow and white corn), potato chips, sweet potato chips, fried wontons, taro chips, crudités, banana chips, dried carrots, and dried zucchini all tempted the palates of the guests. Dips included clam dip, red, black, and pinto bean dips, mild, medium, and piquant salsas, aioli, onion dip, dill dip, cheddar dip, spinach and sour cream dip, and guacamole. Bite-size biscotti occupied a plate between two mascarpone dips, one flavored with amaretto, and the other with Kahlua.

The neighbors, most of whom had come either to satisfy their curiosity or to acknowledge Rosa, whom they counted one of their own, wore their Sunday clothes, usually a coat, shirt with tie, trousers, and polished shoes for the men, and dressily simple frocks and high heels for the women. The neighbors chatted easily among themselves about livestock, the weather, and the fools in the state capitol.

A third table held chafing dishes with Swedish meatballs, Italian meatballs in basil and tomato sauce, German cabbage rolls with caraway seasoning, three kinds of beans, and Buffalo chicken wings. Cold dishes held three different pasta salads, one with tuna, one with ham, and one with green peas and carrots. A large bowl of three-bean salad sat next to the pasta salads. Dilled potato salad and a creamy potato salad were also on offer.

A group of Dickon's Pueblo Rio and Las Tumbas acquaintances mingled at the end of the reception line. They were a colorful lot. Their hair was died various colors that no hair had ever naturally had. Their garb ranged from retrograde chic from consignment stores to skin tight leather, and one, Harry Kerry, in cast-off scuba gear. Most of the men in this group kissed the grooms rather than the brides. DiConti and Haakon bore these tokens with grace, though DiConti's unease was greater until he realized his fellow officers had progressed through the buffet line and out to the eating area.

At the fourth table three large urns dispensed coffee, decaffeinated coffee, and hot water for teas and tisanes. Napkins and flatware lay just past the urns. Then an array of cool pitchers, moist with condensation, offered iced tea, iced water, lemonade, and a choice of pineapple, mango, and tomato juices. Mae Ling handed each guest a small cup of variously colored mints as she graciously directed guests out onto the front terrace where Harry and Willy had set up tables. Malcolm Drye and Swami Fendabenda had quickly shuttled the folding chairs from the rear terrace to the tables on the front terrace while the guests had been in the reception and buffet lines.

When everyone had passed through the reception line, the four couples breathed a sigh of relief, and made their own way, following La Señora, past the buffet and out the door to where their filled plates waited for them. By then, some guests had gone round for a second helping.

When everyone had eaten as much as he or she could, Reverend Oakey called for the crowd's silence. Then she invited the couples to a side table that held four small wedding cakes. Each couple joined hands on a cake cutter, and, at Carrie's signal, cut through the cake. By joint agreement, they forewent the gross tradition of shoving cake in each other's mouth. By now the band had arrived, and set up its stand on the terrace where the wedding ceremonies had taken place. Everyone lined up in four lines to get a piece of cake.

When the crowd had seated itself again, Carrie Oakey called for quiet. Willy, Harry (who had returned from his pet care duties), Swami Fendabenda, and Malcolm Drye circulated through the tables giving each person a plastic glass filled with sparkling water. "It's customary to toast newly joined couples," she said. "Take up your glasses and salute these eight brave people, who set forth on the grand journey of lives together with another person. No other human relationship requires so much courage, or promises so much reward. Brave friends, we salute you!" Carrie drained her glass. The crowd did the same. One or two anonymous guests choked on the water; for them it was a most unaccustomed beverage.

A band began tuning up on the terrace where the ceremony had taken place. The band was formed by a group of West County teenagers who had skills to play a wide variety of music. They called themselves Hermit and the Crabs. They began with a rock and roll version of Vivaldi's Spring Sonata, and then segued into a medley of show tunes from the forties and fifties. The guests drifted in and stood, waiting for the couples to come in to start the dancing.

Notta and DiConti began it. Hermit and the Crabs played the "Beautiful Blue Danube Waltz" for them. Haakon and Emma joined the young pair on the dance floor. Elke and Rosa followed, and then Dickon whirled Ben into motion. As the waltz ended, DiConti and Haakon exchanged partners. Dickon invited Carrie Oakey to dance, and Ben selected Mae Ling for a partner. Elke took Malcolm Drye and Rosa selected Swami Fendabenda. Hermit and the Crabs struck up a lively polka, and soon the entire guest list was whirling around the terrace.

The dancing went on until the first tendrils of summer fog twined their way into the cove between Obaheah and Obadiah. The party broke up then. Willy and Harry, with help from Mae Ling and the Wong brothers, gathered up the orts of the feast and put them away for leftovers. They folded the chairs and took down the tables. The four couples went each to their respective dwellings, and over their further activities we draw a discreet veil. Only the unicorn with the unique horn dared intrude, and that only long enough to ensure issue of Notta and DiConti's consummation from their nuptials.

### The Thirteenth Juror

Chester Dross had spent his life as an invisible member of society. Both his appearance and his personality were prone to blend into the background of wherever he was. His face, stature, body type, and voice were all "average," so average that those who noticed him immediately slid on to the next more interesting topic. Yet even society's non-entities shall have their minutes in the sun. So it was that Chester Dross became the thirteenth juror, an alternate in the Vanna Dee trial.

After the first day's business, when he had been appointed to the jury, Chester went to the Las Tumbas Last Resting Place Cemetery to tell his beloved Unda, his late wife, of his extraordinary elevation into the public eye. "Let me read you the online paper, dearest," he said to the small gray granite slab that marked Unda's grave. "The neighbor's boy, Billy something, prints it on his computer." He took a folded sheet of paper from his pocket. "I didn't know, until he told me, that the newspaper's on a computer these days."

_"August 6, 2003—The trial of former Coastal Commissioner Vanna Dee, on charges of hiring a vagrant drug dealer to harm well-known coastal citizen Señora Salvación Mandor in a dispute over grazing for llamas and nesting ground for marbled murrelets, got underway today when presiding Judge Dinah Sauer began impaneling a jury. Jury selection had been expected to take several days, but neither Barry Cooda, the prosecutor, nor Dayton Mann, the defense attorney, issued any peremptory challenges, and very few challenges for cause. Opening arguments are to begin tomorrow."_

Chester put the snapdragons he had brought from home into the metal vase at the tombstone's base and settled himself on the warm grass. "This court business is strange," he went on. "Somebody says something, like this Judge Sauer, loud enough for all the room to hear. Then people start whispering to each other, or running back and forth with papers and things. The whispering and paper running go on for half an hour. Then somebody says something out loud again. By then most of us have forgotten what was said the last time somebody spoke."

Chester gazed across the cemetery. It was a warm day, and even the trees drooped in the sun. Chester adjusted the brim of his hat to better shade his eyes, and went on. "The attorneys and the judge asked people questions before they either put them on the jury, or sent them home. Some of the people had good reasons for not serving; a lot of them had phony-sounding excuses. The judge seemed to believe most of them, no matter how far out their reasons were for not serving. The attorneys got rid of some of the ones the judges liked, for various reasons, I guess. Each of them dismissed several people without explaining why."

Chester listened to the breeze rattle the eucalyptus leaves. "Sea breeze, Unda," he said. "Be cooler tonight. I hope the courthouse will be cooler tomorrow. It got kind of stuffy in there this afternoon." He leaned back on his hands. "I was surprised when they called my name. They'd already picked twelve people. It seems they need an extra, just in case somebody gets sick, or dies, or something else goes wrong. Judge Sauer asked me my name and address, and then asked me if I thought I could give a fair and impartial judgment based on the evidence. I said yes, I could. She put me on the jury as an alternate, and it was all over for today. We start up again, tomorrow, at nine sharp."

Chester pushed himself to his feet. "Unda, sleep well. It's a warm summer night, and I know you're safe here, with all these stone angels around you. I'll let you know what happens tomorrow when I come." He put his fingers to his lips and kissed them, then transferred the kiss to Unda's gravestone. "Sleep well, old girl," he said, and left the cemetery.

The following evening Chester came, as was his daily habit, to Unda's grave. He had brought a whiskbroom today to brush away the accumulation of dust and dried bits of vegetation the summer breezes had scattered across his wife's grave marker.

"There we are," he said as he finished his sweeping and put the whiskbroom in his pocket. "All neat and tidy for now." He sat down and took a folded sheet from his pocket. "Let me read today's news for you," he said. Unda waited. Chester read.

_"August 7, 2003—Prosecutor Barry Cooda today outlined the case against former Commissioner Vanna Dee. The prosecution alleges that Ms. Dee hired one, Noah Count, of no fixed abode, to damage the property of Ms. Salvación Mandor, of San Danson Station, for five thousand dollars. The threatened property was llamas. Ms. Mandor keeps a herd on her coastal property. Further, the prosecution alleges, Ms. Dee hired Mr. Count to enter the home of Ms. Mandor with the intent to cause her grave bodily injury."_

_"Defense attorney Dayton Mann rebutted the prosecution's accusations, saying that the supposed transaction to hire Mr. Count was, instead, a payment for a painting of llamas. Attorney Mann further stated that any improper or illegal behavior on the part of Mr. Count was solely his own responsibility. Attorney Mann further characterized the prosecution's charges against Ms. Dee as 'pure persecution of a public servant.' The jurors were attentive throughout the proceedings. At the end of the session, Judge Sauer recessed the proceedings until next Monday _morning."__

"Lots more excitement today," Chester said. "Not so much whispering in the background. The article sums up what the attorneys said pretty well. Of course, they had to put a lot more words into it."

"These attorneys are pretty good speech makers. The prosecutor, Barry Cooda, is probably about thirty to thirty-five. He's got dark brown hair, slicked back, but not greasy looking. He looks like a boy you'd want your daughter to date, if you had one. His voice fills up the room, and he talks to the jury just like he was sitting in their living rooms. That other one, that Dayton Mann, he's a different kettle of fish. Wavy gray hair, looks like he goes to a beauty parlor to have it fixed up. Dresses flashy, too. Didn't wear a dark blue suit like Mr. Cooda, that's not good enough for this City slicker. He had on a beige coat (camel's hair, I think they call it) and butternut colored trousers. His shirt today was yellow, and he wore a bright blue tie." Chester leaned back and looked at the variegated blue sky.

"When this Dayton Mann opens his mouth, oil oozes out like grease from a cheap hamburger. After an hour of listening to him, I wanted to scrape myself clean. The defendant, this Vanna Dee, should get somebody else to represent her." Chester rolled over on his side and stared at his shoes.

"Ms. Dee, that is, the defendant, is an elegant woman. She wore a gray dress today, kind of tight, but very proper. She looked tired, like she hasn't slept well for a while. No wonder I guess if she's been in jail. That'd make anybody sleep restless, I suppose. Her eyes are strange. It's like there's no life in them, or like she was looking inside all the time. I think she'd be hard to get close to. Maybe she's just got a shell built up around her, to protect her. Anyway, I guess the real show gets underway on Monday." He stood, and performed his ritual fingertip kiss. "I'll see you tomorrow, Love. No trial news, though, until Monday." Chester left the cemetery.

Monday afternoon was cooler than the previous week had been. Chester had brought a dandelion digger today. The grave next to Unda's was only occasionally attended by the family, as they lived at some distance. Once in a while Chester tidied away the weeds, or swept the flat grave marker with a whiskbroom. Today he had decided to uproot several sheep weeds that had thrived despite the regular mowings that leveled them. The sheep weed's long taproot rivaled the dandelion's, and so the digger was most helpful. Wouldn't do, he muttered to himself, to let Unda's neighborhood go messy.

"There," he said to L. Bow, whoever he or she was, "that'll do till your family can come by." Then he went to Unda's grave. The snapdragons had withered over the weekend, and he had thrown them out on Sunday. Today he had cornflowers from his neighbor's yard. Their bright blue blossoms echoed the deep summer sky overhead.

"Quite a day today," he told her. "That young prosecutor laid out quite a case against somebody named Noah Count. He hasn't shown how this Vanna Dee connects with it, though." Chester knelt to unwrap the cornflower stems from the wet paper towel that kept them fresh. He'd put fresh water in a clean replacement vase, which he put at the foot of Unda's stone. He'd drop the dirty vase off at the office on his way out.

"I got a bit stiff today," he said. "It's a long time to sit on a hard chair and listen to people. This is what the computer paper had to say." He lowered himself to the grass.

_"August 11, 2003—Prosecutor Mann called his first witness today in the Vanna Dee trial. Elke Hall, secretary and companion to Ms. Salvación Mandor, testified that a man, later identified as Noah Count, had entered her boudoir with the intent to harm her. She, not being asleep, was able to resist his attack long enough for Ms. Mandor's resident handyman, William Waugh, to enter and subdue Mr. Count."_

_"Defense Attorney Mann waived cross-examination of Ms. Hall."_

_"Prosecutor Cooda then called William Waugh to the stand to corroborate Ms. Hall's testimony. The prosecutor further elicited from Mr. Waugh that earlier in the month someone had shot several arrows at Ms. Mandor's llama herd, greatly upsetting the creatures. Mr. Waugh's voice broke when he spoke of the stress this incident caused those llamas who were with cria."_

_"Defense Attorney Mann also waived cross-examination of Mr. Waugh. Prosecutor Cooda then entered into evidence a forensic specialist's affidavit regarding fingerprint evidence that demonstrated Noah Count had been responsible for both the intrusion into Ms. Hall's bedroom and the attack on the llamas. Defense Attorney Mann agreed to the admission of the affidavit. Then Judge Sauer recessed the court until tomorrow."_

"This Elke Hall is quite a woman," he went on. "I wouldn't want to take her on in a show of strength. She's tall, and looks like she has a lot of muscle. Not a bad looker, either, if you like big women." He chuckled. "Not my type, Unda, as you know. I just observed. She sure had a strong voice. The bailiff turned down the microphones, so she didn't blast us all out of the courtroom."

"The handyman looked real uncomfortable. Somebody had got him into a coat and tie. He kept running a finger around his neck all the while he was testifying, so I don't think he wears a tie very often. He spoke kind of soft, and twice the Judge had to ask him to repeat himself. He sure must love those llamas, though. He got all teary-eyed when he talked about them."

"Time for me to go, Unda," Chester said. He stood and performed his finger kiss ritual. "I've got to turn in early tonight. Thank goodness, I've got a partial casserole in the freezer. I can microwave that. Did I tell you I'm turning into something of a cook, now? I use the recipes on the boxes and cans. Sleep softly, Unda, safe as you are from all harm." Chester walked toward the cemetery gates, mournfully whistling _Beneath the Cross of Jesus_ off-key.

Chester knelt before Unda's tombstone the next day. "Quite a day in court," he said. "The prosecution brought in this fellow, Noah Count. Even scrubbed up like he was, and dressed in a quiet gray suit and white shirt, no tie, you could tell he'd been around a hard block or two. Lots of lines in his face, and a stringy body that he must have used up by living fast. He looked like the survivor of some bad disease. Clear-eyed, though, and gave straightforward answers to the prosecutor's questions. This is what the computer said about his testimony." Chester sat on the grass over Unda's coffin. He opened the sheet and read.

_"August 12, 2003—Fireworks today in the Vanna Dee trial. Prosecutor Mann called Noah Count as his star witness. Mr. Count readily admitted to felonious assaults on Ms. Mandor's llama herd and on Ms. Hall. He admitted he was currently sentenced to La Lechuga for those crimes. Prosecutor Mann asked him what motivated him to attack the llamas and Ms. Hall. He testified former Commissioner Dee had hired him to damage or destroy the llamas, and to disrupt Ms. Mandor's household. He cited his dependence on drugs and Ms. Dee's offer of five thousand dollars as inciters for his actions. When Prosecutor Mann asked Mr. Count why he had come forward to witness for the prosecution, Mr. Count stated he had undergone a profound spiritual awakening in prison, and intended henceforth to perform only good works to ameliorate the harm had done in his earlier life. At Attorney Mann's request, Judge Sauer recessed the trial until tomorrow, when Mr. Mann is expected to cross-examine Mr. Count."_

"Be interesting to see what the City slicker has in store for this fellow. He's the one connecting Ms. Dee to the crimes. I looked over at her several times. She was dressed in a pale green dress today. It kind of tones down how dead white her skin is. Lot of fury in her eyes. I think she'd have killed this Noah Count, if she could have." Chester brushed a sparrow feather from Unda's marker.

"I don't rightly know, and I should wait 'til I've heard her side of things, but I don't trust this Vanna. She's hiding something in her past. Did I tell you that neighbor lady, the one whose name I can never remember, invited me to supper? I declined. I never liked her much. She talks a mile a minute, and doesn't say anything worth hearing. Anyway, tomorrow's Wednesday. We'll see what happens." He pushed himself to his feet and touched his kissed fingers to the stone. "Sleep well, Unda," he said, as he headed for the cemetery gates.

"More against Ms. Dee," Chester told Unda when he had seated himself on her grave. He had first replaced the spent cornflowers with two red roses. "That slick Dayton Mann was in full cry today. Raising and lowering his voice like a TV preacher, striding back and forth, as he grilled that poor Noah Count about his whole life. Looked like a silly ass, too, in his white linen suit and red tie. Got his comeuppance in the end, though. This is what Billy's computer had to say:"

_"August 13, 2003—Defense Attorney Mann cross-examined Mr. Noah Count today. He forcefully pressured Mr. Count into admitting a life of drug dealing and use, as well as involvement in several confidence schemes. He extracted from Mr. Count an admission that Mr. Count had yielded a painting of llamas in return for Ms. Dee's five thousand dollars. He questioned Mr. Count's spiritual awakening, particularly since this event occurred without benefit of clergy from any known religious group. Mr. Count repeatedly answered Mr. Mann's jabbing questions in a simple and clear voice. No matter how Mr. Mann attempted to provoke Mr. Count to an outburst, Mr. Count remained calm."_

_"In mid-afternoon, Mr. Mann rested his cross-examination, and the prosecution called its last witness, Ms. Bertha Van Nation, Ms. Dee's Commission secretary. Ms. Van Nation affirmed that Ms. Dee had received a painting of llamas, but testified to Ms. Dee's disdain for the object. Ms. Van Nation further testified that Ms. Dee had frequently expressed her desire to be rid of Ms. Mandor and the Villagers of San Danson. When Mr. Mann pressed her on cross-examination, she surprised the court by saying she had overheard Ms. Dee wish Ms. Mandor and the Villagers dead on several occasions. When Mr. Mann tried to object to the testimony as hearsay, Judge Sauer pointed out he had "opened this can of worms yourself." The trial recessed until tomorrow at nine in the morning."_

"Tomorrow, I expect this Dayton Mann will try to put on a defense. We'll see what happens with that. I bought me a pork chop to fry up tonight, and a couple of potatoes, and a little onion. I hope I can make them come out something like what you used to fix for me. I'm going a little early, tonight, my dear. I'm rather tired from this trial business. Sleep well, Unda," he said, as he folded the article to fit in his pocket and pushed himself up. His shoulders drooped as he walked toward the cemetery gates.

Chester walked slowly to Unda's grave. His chest hurt, and the fierce sun beat at him. "I've got the latest news, Unda," he said. He flopped heavily on the ground. "This is what the computer said today."

_"August 14, 2003—The prosecution rested today. Defense Attorney Dayton Mann called Ms. Vanna Dee to the stand to testify in her own defense. She testified she had never hired Noah Count to attack either Ms. Mandor or her llamas. She admitted she and Ms. Mandor had been adversarial, in the past, concerning the murrelet habitat in San Danson Village. She pointed out that issue had been settled in administrative hearing before Judge Sauer some time ago. Mr. Mann asked her again, had she hired Noah Count to harm Ms. Mandor or her llamas? She categorically denied she had."_

_"On cross-examination, Prosecutor Cooda elicited from Ms. Dee that she had been at odds for several years with Ms. Mandor. He asked her to testify about several incidents over the years where Ms. Dee had used her office to pressure Ms. Mandor and her Village tenants. When he pressed these issues with Ms. Dee, she suddenly exploded with anger, and accused Ms. Mandor and the San Danson Villagers of a persistent and long-term campaign to destroy her, Ms. Dee's, employment and personal life. When Prosecutor Cooda asked her to name instances, she was unable to provide him with a coherent answer. After this testimony, Defense Attorney Mann rested the defense. Closing arguments will be heard tomorrow, in an unusual Friday session."_

"Ms. Dee really lost it on the stand today, Unda. She was doing fine answering Mr. Cooda's questions when something snapped in her. She started screaming about the old lady and the people in the Village being out to destroy her. She completely lost it. I think she'd have confessed if Judge Sauer hadn't interrupted and told the bailiff to bring her a glass of water. When Mr. Cooda started his questions again, she answered him in a dull voice. Sometimes she didn't make sense at all. When Mr. Cooda was through, Mr. Mann rested for the defense. The jury should get the case tomorrow." For a long time, Chester lay on his back staring up at the sky.

"It's awful lonesome here, without you, Unda," he said. "Even after three years I still go home hoping you'll be waiting for me. Do you ever get lonesome, over there on the other side?"

He pushed himself up into a sitting position. Grass clippings clung to his shirt. He brushed them off. "Guess I'm some kind of fool," he said. "Of course you don't get lonesome. You've got God's holy angels to sing with. Sing, Unda, sing loud and strong." He turned to go, then turned back to leave his finger kiss on the marker. "Good night, Unda. Sleep safe." He left the cemetery.

Chester trudged over wearily to Unda's grave. He leaned against the marker with one hand and wiped the sweat away from his forehead with the other. "Seems extra hot today," he said. "Courthouse was a furnace, Unda. I can rest now, though; it's over, my big time on the jury. We started out the day listening to the attorneys again. Mr. Cooda made a strong case out of the evidence for Ms. Dee's guilt. Mr. Mann got up then, and tried to make Ms. Dee out to be the victim, but after everybody saw the twisted hate on her face, I don't think it washed much with anybody. This is what the computer said:"

_"August 14, 2003—The Vanna Dee trial ended today. Ms. Dee has been found guilty. Both the prosecution and the defense kept their closing arguments brief. The jury deliberated for twenty minutes, before returning their verdict. Ms. Dee growled as the bailiff led her from the courtroom. Her attorney, Dayton Mann, said afterward that he would take the possibility of an appeal under advisement. Ms. Dee will be sentenced on September 22 of this year._

_The Coastal Commission will meet next Tuesday with the Governor to determine a replacement for Ms. Dee on the panel_ _that has oversight of the coastal beaches and wildlife habitat."_

"I won't stay today, Unda. I'm so tired, for some reason. Maybe I ought to see the doctor next week. Can't get my breath, sometimes. Now, don't worry about me. I'll be back to see you tomorrow. Sleep safe, love, sleep safe, here among the stone angels." His arm shaking for no reason he could guess, Chester left his fingertip kiss on the marker and went home.

As August dwindled into September, he faithfully continued to visit Unda. "Got one more story from the trial, Unda," he said one September afternoon. "It's a little one. I cut this one out of the paper myself." He drew in a deep breath and sat on the little camp stool he carried to the cemetery with him now.

_"_ _Las Tumbas Epitaph_ _, September 22, 2003—Ms. Vanna Dee returned to Judge Sauer's courtroom today to hear her sentence. The session was brief. Judge Sauer read the defendant's list of convictions, and then asked her if she chose to appeal. She shook her head no. "I sentence you to five years, to be served at the El Serrucho Oxidado institution for hardened criminals."_

"What do you think of that, Unda? And I was part of it." He closed his eyes, and dozed. Evening came on a warm breeze heavy with the scent of ripening apples. Chester murmured unheard words to the emerging stars and sighed. Unda waited for him.

"Las Tumbas Epitaph _,_ _September 23, 2003—Las Tumbas Last Resting Place Cemetery gardeners discovered the body of long-time Las Tumbas resident Chester Dross on his wife's grave. Mr. Dross was known to visit his late wife's grave on a daily basis. He apparently died of a heart attack last evening while visiting the cemetery. Police say no foul play is suspected. Arrangements are pending."_

### Psyche to Psyche Combat

"Conflicts waged on the psychic planes are not spectator sports," La Señora told Elke, Rosa, Willy, Dickon, and Ben when she briefed them on what she would need for protection when Vanna attacked. "Forces ethereal do not make good video," she continued. "When one describes them, one uses metaphors. Indeed, one who struggles on the psychic plane does so in metaphors. The metaphor each combatant uses is particular to him or her. Thus one combatant may attack with a flock of gulls the other combatant perceives as a herd of buffalo." La Señora smiled. "It can be quite confusing, if the combatants later try to describe events to the same third party."

"I'm sorry," Ben said. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," La Señora stared at her lap, looking for words, "that psychic battles can be described as a series of pictures, but the combatant doesn't _form_ pictures in her mind. It is the idea of the idea, or the form behind the idea, that one hurls at one's foe." La Señora looked humbly up at Ben. "It's most difficult to explain this to a novice, or to one who has no conscious experience of psychic events."

"It sounds a little like an idea Plato talked about that my philosophy professor, John Dilbert Doe went on about. I didn't understand Plato, or Professor Doe, either."

"Then let it pass," La Señora said. "Just be prepared for me to become very still, almost as if I were dead. Then watch that nothing, not an insect, not an elephant, not a whirling cloud of dust, can get to me. Okay?"

"We'll do our best," Ben said. The others murmured consent.

"Thank you," La Señora said.

After her sentencing, Vanna returned, under guard, to the Las Tumbas Incarceration Facility. Her escorts pushed her into her cell and locked the door. She rattled the bars a few experimental times, then, suddenly exhausted, lay down on her cot, wrinkling her black sheath. She stared at the speckled ceiling until she drifted into a trance.

La Señora retired to the library for an afternoon cup of tea. She expected an attack in the night, and had arranged for Elke and Rosa to sit with her. As she sipped her Darjeeling, she instructed them on their responsibility to guard her body against any physical intrusion. One never knew how many minions Vanna might field. It was quite possible to win a struggle on the psychic plane, only to lose it all because the one who fought the battle in a trance was unprotected from the dagger in the dark wielded by a cutthroat. Rosa armed herself with two rolling pins from the kitchen. Elke trusted her right arm to coordinate with her left arm. Each woman took up a chair on either side of La Señora. They sipped their tea and waited. As the sun slowly sank into the western sea, La Señora entered a watchful trance state.

When the night's dark was complete, and the last pink shreds of sunlight had passed into the shadow of the turning globe, Willy, Dickon, and Ben stood watch with the llamas. The adults formed a ring around the unicorn with the unique horn and the crías. Each adult faced outward, ready to repel invasion. At equal one-third distances around the circle, Willy, Dickon, and Ben stationed themselves. They waited, alert, as the stars twinkled into being overhead. Tonight the moon slept, uncaring.

Vanna slipped further into her trance. She began to conjure destructive forces. To her mind's eye, they appeared as beetles and slugs, foul creeping things fetid with diseases of the spirit. When she had amassed a sufficient number to form an insect phalanx, she sent them against La Señora and the unicorn. She hoped to catch them with their defenses unemployed.

La Señora and the unicorn perceived the oncoming disease bearers as mice. La Señora conjured five virtual cats to consume the horde of rodents. In her trance, Vanna perceived a large spray can labeled with the name of a popular insecticide. Round one to La Señora. La Señora and the unicorn waited; it was not yet time to launch an attack of their own.

Vanna drew on dark energies that suffering jail inmates had oozed, over decades, into the concrete prison walls. She gathered these as a mighty force to send against La Señora. She shaped it in her mind into a huge rolling pin that could flatten the lump of pallid dough she perceived La Señora to be.

La Señora perceived the dark energies as a giant black swan. She swiftly created a gaucho avatar for herself, and, fashioning a noose from a stream of light particles, she flung a lariat over the swan's head and around its neck. The swan took ponderous flight into the bowels of nothing. Hand over hand La Señora pulled herself along the lariat toward the swan's back. Over the tail she clambered, and then made her way, barb by barb, up the swan's back feathers, to the joint between its neck and body. The swan's body trembled with the mighty beat of the wings as La Señora extracted a small silver knife from her belt and plunged it into the swan's neck. With a great rush of air, the black swan tumbled from the bowels of nowhere like a broken balloon. La Señora woke from her trance, thirstily drank the tepid Darjeeling in her cup, and went back under.

The collapsing swan sucked energy from Vanna's psyche. She needed to rest. She raised minimal defenses to alert her to any attack from La Señora and the unicorn, and fell into a shallow sleep. La Señora and the unicorn rested as well.

Vanna, renewed in strength after a short rest, conjured a great, slavering beast, with dripping jaws and blood stained claws. She sent it rampaging after the feeble damsel on a spavined donkey, for so she saw La Señora and the unicorn in this essay of psychic force. The beast snatched up the damsel and her steed, caging them in its claws. Roaring foul breath, it lifted them to its fetid maw, where its fouled fangs waited. From her pocket the damsel produced a thorn, a tiny thing that swelled and grew as she neared the beast's mouth. As the beast prepared to crunch her bones, the damsel thrust the thorn into its upper gum. With a scream, the beast dropped the damsel and the donkey, and shrank away into the bowels of nothing.

La Señora experienced the attack as a horde of stinging wasps descending on her. She snatched up a smoldering torch that lay conveniently to hand and singed the wasps' stingers, rendering them powerless to hurt her. When she had smoked the wasps away, she determined to go on the offensive. She began speaking a low three note chant. It echoed in the emptiness around her. Bit by bit she gathered scattered bits of the cosmos together, and began to weave a net around Vanna's seething spirit. She thought of it as encasing a black onyx stone in a glittering silver chain.

Vanna felt fiery ropes wrapping around her flesh. The more she struggled, the more the ropes wrapped around her and burned her. Great stinking smells of burnt flesh assailed her nostrils. Vanna shrank, and the ropes shrank to bind her. Vanna panicked, and called on the virtual cockroach she had hidden earlier in La Señora's psyche. She summoned it to attack La Señora's greatest vulnerability.

La Señora concentrated on her chanting. She had her eyes closed, until a mocking laugh forced her off the rhythm of her chant. She saw, not the cockroach of Vanna's perception, but a leering and bullying face, a man, her own father, laughing at his cleverness in foiling Reggie's courtship. Rage she thought she had stilled and sublimated roared through La Señora's psychic nerves. Flame, dark and searing at the same time, surged along the connection she and Vanna and the unicorn had forged during their conflict. Pure hate that yearned to burn and kill flooded from La Señora into the web, and fried Vanna's psychic abilities. In a brief instant she lost, for that time, her power to harm anyone.

Regrettably, as La Señora later made clear to her supporters, the rage also ran backward, and damaged the unicorn and La Señora beyond healing.

### Spent

"I should have maintained control," La Señora said. "It was not for me to destroy Vanna; I am a Keeper of the Balance. It is for me to bind that which unsettles the Balance to stabilize the cosmos." La Señora spoke this the next day, when she had recovered a little. "How is my unicorn, Willy?" she asked.

"Very tired, Señora, and resting. I've got water and feed nearby for her. When I go back, I'll give her another rubdown, to comfort her, like. She's fond of a rubdown, you see."

"We shall be slow recovering," La Señora said. "Presuming we recover. I do not think, though, Ms. Dee will trouble us for some time." L Señora coughed. When the spasm ended she said, "I will think about this situation, and what you may do about it. I do think my doing is nearly done." She closed her eyes and slept. Ben, Dickon, and Willy left quietly. Elke set herself to stand guard over the sleeping woman. Rosa went to the kitchen to make chicken soup, for whatever healing that could bring.

Vanna's guards woke her. She was listless. She cooperated with all their commands, but showed no initiative and no spark of rebellion. Silently, they thanked whatever prison-guard gods there might be for this change. A young guard opined that Vanna had finally understood her plight, and given up. An older guard warned that the shock was probably temporary. Another guard, neither old nor young, remarked that other guards would have to deal with the aftermath. Las Tumbas was getting rid of Vanna. They all smiled at that thought, and loaded Vanna, with other chained prisoners, into the van for El Serrucho Oxidado.

La Señora's recovery was slow and incomplete. Her arms and hands were given to sudden and unexpected tremors. She began taking her tea from a half-filled mug; a full porcelain cup tended to slosh all over her if the tremors struck while she held the cup. Elke had a cot moved into La Señora's bedroom, and she slept there, should La Señora need anything in the night. Occasionally La Señora would cry out in her sleep, and wake only when Elke came to cradle her in her arms. Then La Señora would start to recount the dream that had terrified her, but she could seldom repeat the whole of it. The fragments she remembered were enough to trouble Elke's rest. Elke lost weight, slowly, over the autumn months. La Señora, also, grew thin and drawn.

The unicorn with the unique horn moved with all the pain of an arthritic body. Where once she had proudly led the llama herd, now they led her, bringing her into the pastures with the sweetest grazing, and deferring to her in choosing sheltered locations for rest. She was grateful for all their care, and frequently blessed them.

La Señora, when she had a little gathered her strength, called a conference. Ben and Dickon, Emma and Haakon, Elke, Notta and DiConti, the Swami, and Malcolm Drye were there. Rosa was at her café. Mae Ling was in Europe again, promoting her latest children's book, _The Tormented Tortoise of Toulouse._ The Wong Brothers and the Pitts siblings were busy with the store, café, and gas station.

They met in the library. Willy and Elke had brought dining room chairs in to supplement the overstuffed seating. The wonderful smell of old books surrounded them all, cosseting them. Elke brought La Señora in her wheeled chair and placed her at a vantage point. She set the brakes, and then poured La Señora a half-mug of tea.

La Señora spoke haltingly, and with pauses to collect her breath in the middle of her sentences. Those who saw her only at intervals were shocked with her decline. She briefly greeted them each by name, and offered them a choice of tea, cocoa, and coffee. When Willy had served them all, she began.

"Beloved Villagers, I draw to a close." At their murmurs of dismay, she held up a trembling hand. Her commanding presence won over the trembling. They all hushed. "This," she said, "is the proper course of things. I am an old woman, and I've done my bit of living." She paused for several breaths. They rasped in her throat.

"I must pass my responsibility on," she said. "It is more than one person should bear." She smiled. "One will come, indeed, she is on the way," here she looked at Notta directly and sketched a blessing with trembling fingers in the air, "who will one day take over. For now, all of you must work together to guard the Balance, until she comes into her full power." La Señora lay back, and stared a moment at the ceiling. A rising wind sang in the shrubbery outside the window.

"Be aware," La Señora said, "that Vanna is not vanquished, only restrained for a time. She may yet return to do much harm. Be on guard." La Señora coughed. Elke crouched by her side.

"Don't overtire yourself, Señora," Elke said.

"I must finish," La Señora said. She sat up straight again. "My friends, I have failed you. In my struggle with Vanna on the psychic plane, I let my own dark nature interfere." She coughed again, but waved Elke's hovering presence back. "I let a great anger in me pollute my binding of Vanna's evil. For a time, it has burned out her psychic synapses. Mine it has burned out forever." She took a sip of tea from her mug.

"I must leave you this burden. Where one who intends good may fail, the many who stand against evil shall, in the end, prevail. Stand together, my friends." She bowed her head on her chest. Several present wondered if she had fallen asleep. She looked up at them and spoke.

"I must rest, now, rest up for my eternal rest. Go in peace, dear Villagers, and live. Elke, please?" Elke released the brakes on La Señora's wheeled chair and pushed her away. The gathered villagers murmured among themselves, and one by one or two by two, left for their own cottages. The night's fog began to gather on the hill, where the unicorn with the unique horn lay, breathing heavily, surrounded by the guarding llama herd.

### Passages

When Elke ushered Dickon into the room, La Señora smiled weakly at him from her bed. Elke had established a hospital bed in the library, one of La Señora's favorite rooms. On bright days, La Señora could look out the windows over the cove to watch the gulls wheeling in the sky above the wavelets.

"Come, sit beside me," La Señora said to Dickon. "Elke," she went on, "give us a little time, say a half hour, and then bring us some tea. Green jasmine will do very nicely, I think."

"Yes, Señora," Elke said. "We've a few almond macaroons. Shall I bring those, as well?"

"Yes. That will be nice." La Señora coughed into a handkerchief she held. Her breath rasped in her throat several times before she could breathe easily again. Dickon waited; she had summoned him.

"Dickon," she said, when she had recovered, "I wish to make a confession. It is a custom of my childhood religion. Will you hear my confession?"

"I will listen, Señora, but remember I'm an ex-clergyman of the Protestant variety."

"I was taught, as a girl, that any good person may hear another's dying confession, if no priest is available. I have not followed my childhood religion since I was a schoolgirl, anyway. It was always more burdened with ritual and tradition than my spirit could manage." She had to stop to catch her breath again. Dickon took her free hand and held it loosely in his.

"May whatever God there is forgive me," she began in a formal voice, "for I have sinned. I have often been short of temper when I should have been patient. I have neglected formal religion all my adult life. I acknowledge I still see no point to bowing and scraping on hard pews and floors to flatter any god into doing things my way." She stopped, gathered her breath, and rested. Dickon waited; he guessed she had more to say.

"I have carried bitterness in my soul against an innocent man. I have poisoned my spirit in this, making my work less effective. I have carried adulation for an unworthy man in my heart, and, when I discovered his betrayal after decades, converted my adulation to bitter hatred, of which I did not divest myself." She began coughing again. She took her hand from Dickon's and gestured toward a glass of water with a bent straw in it. Dickon held the glass so she could sip from the straw. When she had taken a little, she pushed the glass away and lay back with her eyes closed.

Dickon was about to get up and tiptoe from the room when she opened her eyes again.

"I have more," she said. "I confess to whatever powers may be that I have tyrannized my associates, bidding them do this or do that as though I owned them. I have expected perfection from them, and I have ignored the flaws in my own character and performance. I have avoided the usual sins of gluttony, fornication, theft, and murder mostly because I've had so few opportunities to commit them. That's all, Dickon, except for one thing more. I bound Vanna Dee in a hell of unknowing. It will not last forever. Any clever hedge witch might remove it. I ought to have bound her with restraint, and instead I let my inner fury scorch her spiritual channels. I have left her to be a potential problem for you all."

"May this God, whatever that is, forgive you what you repent," Dickon said as solemnly as he could. He wondered what further trouble Vanna could bring, then set the thought aside. Some tomorrow would be better for considering threats. Elke coughed discreetly from the library door. Dickon looked at La Señora. "Have you more to say?" he asked her.

"No," she said, "I have no more to confess. Come in, Elke."

Elke arranged the tea things on a teacart near La Señora's bed. "Will you take tea, Señora?"

"No, not just now. A bit more water will do for me." Elke held the glass with the straw to La Señora's lips.

"One thing more to say," La Señora said to Dickon. "Please tell Ben that strength lies in joining bamboo with clay." She wheezed a moment, and went on. "I don't know what it means. It is the message that was in my mind for him when I woke this morning."

"I'll tell him, Señora," Dickon said. For a time they were all three silent. Elke and Dickon sipped their tea and nibbled macaroons. La Señora watched the golden afternoon light waltz on the waves. She closed her eyes and slept. Dickon murmured goodbyes to Elke and left. Elke closed the drapes against the encroaching night, gathered the tea things, and left the room.

She-Who-Shuns-Males woke in the night mist with a sense someone had called to her. Not sure quite why, she left her comfortable straw bed in the corner of the shelter and went to the unicorn with the unique horn, who lay on her side, not with her legs under her. She-Who-Shuns-Males, even now a little awkward with carrying her cría, lay down beside the unicorn. The unicorn was shivering with the cold. In her llama way, She-Who-Shuns-Males generated as much body heat as she could to warm the old one she so admired. The unicorn's shivering lessened. She-Who-Shuns-Males felt the old one link mind to mind with her.

"My time is upon me," the unicorn said. "I have had long days, and now they are over. That you bear in you will be my heir."

She-Who-Shuns-Males emitted psychic puzzlement.

"You may have observed, I am not wholly like other llamas," the unicorn said. "I have been able to shed my llama nature to take on another form. Your cría will be similarly gifted."

"How shall I rear such a wonder?"

"With love and discipline, just as you would any cría." The mind-link broke when they heard footsteps sliding through the grass. Willy Waugh came into the shelter. He saw at once that the unicorn's hours were numbered. He hastened to her, and lay down beside her along with She-Who-Shuns-Males. He stroked the unicorn's mane, slowly and steadily.

The night wore on to its middle. The mists hid the stars, and the windless sea was hushed. No sound came louder than the labored breathing of the unicorn. Then, with a jerk of its legs, the unicorn expelled a long sigh of breath, and was still. Willy bowed his head and wept.

She-Who-Shuns-Males felt a power enter her cría. Notta Freed Sharif felt her child move in her womb. In the library, a cry, neither joyous nor sad, awoke Elke. "Reggie, wait for me," La Señora croaked out. Then Elke heard La Señora's breath rattle in her throat as she died. Weeping, Elke lit a candle, and closed La Señora's eyes.

### The Funeral under the Sun

A soft wind blew in from the sea. The Villagers and other mourners stood around the two graves, one large, the other normal in size. They made great brown scars on the green hill. Over each, a simple pine casket was suspended. On the smaller casket lay a spray of yellow roses. On the larger casket lay a great sheaf of green cornstalks.

Today the winter rains had relinquished their claim on the coast. Ben was glad of it; funerals had been all too frequent in the past few years for him. He knew, in his heart, that frequency was a side effect of his age. So many had happened in the rain, or in snow covered cemeteries. A funeral under the sun was a pleasant change. Ben decided to read it as a tribute to those who had died.

When they all had gathered, a quiet hush fell over them. No one murmured or whispered, except the wind. It sang a sad little hymn among the grass blades. Dickon, garbed in a white pleated pulpit gown with black velvet bands on the front spoke to them.

"Salvación Mandor, or La Señora, as most of us knew her, has come to the end of her journey in this life. We who are left behind grieve her going. We grieve for ourselves, for the hole in our circle of important people. We are normal, to grieve, for we endure a great loss." Dickon surveyed the crowd. Ben guessed he was momentarily overcome, himself, with his grieving.

"La Señora," Dickon went on, after clearing his throat, "was a woman of great presence, and many gifts. She saw farther into things of the spirit than anyone else I knew. She guided so many of us away from our personal disasters and toward our personal triumphs. Her guidance was often very firm, and only the greatly foolish dared oppose it." Several in the crowd smiled, and one or two chuckled softly. La Señora had indeed been an iron fist, when she felt the need. Many of them knew it first-hand.

"La Señora never had the comfort of spouse and family to sustain her. In her dark times, and she had them, as we all do, she turned to those of us who were privileged to live in her inner circle. We were her adopted family, and she was our fearless leader, our mother, and our goad to right action." Dickon paused again, and looked down at a little book he had in his left hand. He had a finger stuck in it between two pages. Ben expected him to read from it. Dickon didn't. He looked out over the gathered mourners.

"La Señora was born on this mountain, in a bedroom of the manor house. She never told us which one. I suspect she didn't know. She grew up here, and in Lima, Peru, her mother's native city. Early in World War Two, she discovered wounded veterans needed ongoing comfort and counsel. She learned how to soothe their spiritual hurts while nursing their bodily wounds. Her work with those who came home broken in spirit from the war led her into another kind of mission work, that among the derelict on the streets of the City. When her mission was razed to build a high-rise complex, she retreated to her childhood home, bringing a few of us with her." Dickon coughed, and shifted his weight. Ben wondered if Dickon's sciatica was troubling him.

"Here La Señora practiced her spiritual exercises, and oversaw the affairs of the Village. She contributed time and money to several charities in the County, especially concentrating on those that benefited children." Dickon paused again.

"La Señora was never alone," he said. "She had a friend, a special llama, from her native Peru. She said she was in frequent mental contact with this llama. It died the night she died, at about the same time. We have provided it a grave next to hers, as she asked us to do."

"La Señora confessed no one religion among the multitudes humans offer. She respected all of them insofar as they set the spirit free. She disliked all of them insofar as they imprisoned the spirit. When she left instructions for her last rites, she requested this prayer be read:

_"Out of the nothing I have come, and perhaps to nothing I return. I came in fear, and I found love. I go in fear, and hope to find something even greater than love. Whatever you are, that have sustained me thus far, hold me up still through all things that may come. You have been my blessing, and the ground of my being. Be with me still. Amen."_

Several people, including Ben murmured "Amen" at the end of the prayer.

"And now," Dickon said, "we commend La Señora's body, and the body of her beloved llama, to the earth, to go in the fullness of time back into the earth. Her spirit we commend to the Lord of the Universe, the Maker, and Redeemer of all. So be it." Dickon nodded to the pallbearer to lower the coffins. When they had done so, he stooped to take a clump of soil from the pile beside the grave. He scattered some on the llama's coffin and the rest on La Señora's coffin. Then he stepped back for the mourners to do the same, if they chose. Elke led the way, and the rest of the Villagers followed.

One by one they each took a handful of dirt and dropped it in the grave. Dickon, in his robes, stood staring at his feet as they passed. When all had had the opportunity to pass the caskets, they huddled together in a small group. They stood silently, some hand in hand, while Dickon spoke the benediction. Ben looked at him. Tears stood in Dickon's eyes as well as in his. They would miss La Señora.

By ones and twos, the mourners left. Each of them carried the weight of loss on bowed shoulders. The sure of foot plunged down the hillside directly toward the highway. Those less sure of foot picked their way down the trail toward the Village and its trail leading to Rosa's Café. Rosa had laid out a simple buffet of cold meats, bread, condiments, and hot tea and coffee. Dickon and Ben were the last to go. Willy Waugh watched them until they were out of sight. Then he took off the shirt and trousers he had worn for the ceremony, folded them neatly, and put them on the low iron fence that surrounded the Mandor family cemetery. Then he lowered the coffins. Judging all were out of earshot, he started the backhoe and began filling the graves.

The wind went on whispering a song in the grass, and the westering sun danced on the waves of the cove.

### Remembering

When the last of the neighbors had left, and only the Villagers, the Wong brothers, and the Pitts siblings were left, Rosa put the closed sign on the door and locked it. Emma sighed heavily. Notta wiped at her eyes. Haakon and DiConti looked at each other, and waited for their womenfolk to recover. Willy came out of the kitchen. He brought fresh coffee and tea and put them on the warming plate. Ben got up and got fresh tea for himself and Dickon. The Swami set his cup aside. Mae Ling and Malcolm, in turn, refreshed their supply of olives. Everyone was silent, lost in thoughts and remembrances. Harry Pitts got up once, to get another slice of salami and a hard roll. He made enough noise that everyone else looked up to watch him spread mustard on the roll, lay the circle of salami across it, and fold it over.

Olive Pitts spoke up first. "La Señora was a righteous woman," she said. Her voice rasped on Ben's ears. He tried to remember whether he had ever heard her speak before or not.

"She was," Dickon said. "She knew how to be gentle and strong at the same time, but she never swerved from what she thought was right."

"She was what goodness is all about," Willy said. All eyes turned to him. He blushed, but went on. "She took me away from the place where they hurt me all the time. She took me to her house, to live. I was a wild thing, frightened like a cornered llama. She tamed me." He smiled at them all. "She wasn't easy on me, when she thought I was wrong. She insisted I wear clothes all the time. We disagreed a lot about that. That was in the City." His face grew sober. "I don't know what life will be, without her. She always pointed me in the direction I should go, and she always pointed me right." He heaved a great sigh. Tears, unshed, stood in his eyes. Elke went to him, put a hand on his shoulder, and squeezed. He looked up at her and mouthed "Thank you" at her. Elke looked around the room. She could see the others were as surprised as she was to hear Willy say so much all at one time.

"She was our kinswoman," Notta said. Emma nodded. "We didn't know how close, until recently."

"She never considered the degree of kinship when she offered to help me," Emma said. "I was a young mother, with a shaky job, when she invited me to join with you and move to the Village. I'm not sure I'd have survived, without her help." Several murmurs around the room acknowledged Emma's comment.

After a little silence, Dickon said, "La Señora pulled me back from a pit I was digging for myself. She wasn't gentle, that time, and that was a good thing. I needed someone made of iron."

"She could be iron, that's for sure," Mae Ling said. She had come back from her European book tour just in time for the funeral. "I remember her standing up to those developers. They had a tough time bringing her down."

"Yes," Dickon said. "Those were rough times for La Señora." He got up and went to the table. He took a bun, split it, and layered it with ham and onion slices. Then he spread mustard over the onion, and put the bun together. Ben sighed. He'd have to eat a bit of onion, now, in self-defense. He liked onion well enough, but it sometimes disturbed his digestion.

Malcolm Drye refreshed his tea. Rosa Krushan opened her mouth to say something, but Malcolm started speaking first. His back was toward Rosa, and he didn't know she was about to talk.

"La Señora understood, as no one else ever did, how I loved and hated my family, especially my brother, Quig." Everyone held their breath; Malcolm seldom mentioned his family or his inner feelings. "La Señora helped me understand that hating and loving the same person can be part of keeping the Balance."

"Keeping the Balance was a favorite idea of La Señora's," Elke said. "She mentioned it often." Elke uncrossed her ankles and leaned a little forward. "She was a balanced person, herself."

"She honored whatever set people free to be themselves," Rosa said. "That's what I remember most about her. She did that for me, anyway. She taught me to let go and follow my heart wherever love takes me." Rosa smiled at Elke, and reached out to her to take her hand. "She helped me accept myself as someone who could love you, Elke. She gave me a great gift."

"And me," Elke added. Malcolm returned to his seat.

Harry Pitts spoke up. "She was a good woman. I never understood her Balance philosophy or her Cosmic this and whatnot. She said she didn't accept Jesus as her lord and savior, not in any way I could understand, but she was good woman, who did good things for a lot of people. I hope she's right, that God reads the human heart to approve or disapprove human deeds." Harry blushed. He seldom made such long speeches. "She took me in when I was broken in spirit and mind, and gave me a place to heal. She did the Lord's work, whatever she called it." Tears spilled down his cheeks. "She loved the way God loves, without condemnation."

The Swami had been picking at his teeth with a toothpick. He cupped it in his hand and said, "Keeping the Balance was La Señora's way of acknowledging the good and the bad in the universe, and of understanding you can't let one overcome the other."

"I don't understand," Ben said. "Isn't the good to be desired, and the evil avoided?"

"No," Olive Pitts said. "It doesn't work like that. Consider the light, the light that goes on shining in the darkness, as John's Gospel describes it." She looked around the room. Everyone waited for her to continue her exposition. "The light shines on in the darkness, and the darkness has never overcome it," she paraphrased. "But the darkness doesn't go away, either." Olive furrowed her brow with her thoughts.

"Someone, someplace, describes God as 'ineffable effulgence,' that is, a radiance beyond description. Human life would burn up in such brilliance. We need the shadows, too. We can identify the light because the darkness defines it. We can identify the dark, because the light marks its boundaries." Olive shook her head. "I don't know if that makes sense, in words. The idea I'm trying to say makes sense to me, but words don't capture it all."

The Swami joined in again. "Consider destruction and creation. This is an idea I picked up reading excerpts from the Hindu Upanishads. To create something, we must destroy something. For example, to make flour we must destroy wheat grains. Is this destruction and creation good or bad? One can argue either side of the question." He patted his stomach, encased, today, in a white shirt under a vest he had unbuttoned before the threads holding the buttons broke.

"It's yin and yang," Shu Wong said. "Hot balances cold, earth balances water, wood balances fire, and so on. Too much one way, too much hot, for example, is disharmonious. One must add cold to restore the balance. It's basic Taoist belief." Way Wong went to the teapot and poured himself another cup.

Willy looked out the window. "Dark is coming on," he said. "It's time I went to the llamas. They grieve, too." He stood and untied his apron. He wore his customary briefs under it, and nothing else. "Do you want me to come back and help clear up, Rosa?"

"I'll help," Elke said. "I'm not quite ready to go back to the manor house. It's so empty."

"We've all got an empty place," Ben said. "Even me. I still haven't wrapped my mind around it, you know, that La Señora is gone."

"Something that big takes time to get used to," Emma said. She stood, gathered up her crockery and flatware, and took them to the kitchen. One by one, they all helped in clearing their dishes away, before they went to their homes. Rosa and Elke loaded the dishwasher, started it, and settled into a booth, Elke's head on Rosa's shoulder. It was much later that night that they woke up and went upstairs to Rosa's room.

### Faces in the Waves

Dickon found Ben on the beach staring out at Obaheah Rock. A storm to the west had the seas running high. Butter stood beside Ben, her tail wagging gently. Ben's hands hung at his sides. The gray in his hair shone silver in the sea mist. Dickon called out Ben's name. Ben started, surprised. His gray eyes re-focused from some far distant place. He smiled vaguely at Dickon. Butter turned to Dickon, her tail wagging more vigorously. As Dickon drew close, Ben raised his hand, and brushed at his eyes with the back of it.

"I thought you might be here," Dickon said. He came up even with Ben and put an arm around Ben's broad shoulders. He nuzzled Ben's ears. Puzzlement creased Dickon's face. Ben was so distant. He scratched Butter behind her ears. Ben and Dickon stood, looking out over the sea. Dickon's green eyes teared in the wind; they were pools of green mystery. The waves whirled and twisted at the base of Obaheah.

Then Ben slipped awkwardly from Dickon's embracing shoulder. "I was just looking," Ben said, "at the waves when I started seeing faces in them."

"Pretty boy faces?"

"No," Ben said, smiling briefly at Dickon's jest. "Faces of my dead." He fell silent, staring out at the waves. "So many people I know have died," he continued. "My grandparents and parents, to begin with. That's so long ago I remember their general presence more than I remember what they looked like. I've got photos, of course. Someplace. I can't quite call them up, not as sharp images." Dickon raised his hand to comfort Ben with a touch on his shoulder, but some distance in Ben's attitude stopped Dickon's gesture.

Ben went on, still staring at the waves dancing like Cossacks against the rock. "I remember other faces more clearly. Minnie Vann, for example, or Hardin. When I think of them, I can see the pain they were in written across their faces. It's much easier, though, to see them younger, alive, and whole. I see Hardin, as he was in high school, so young, so naïve, so full of hope. I remember Minnie as the robust woman who never let a pretty girl pass unnoticed." He turned to Dickon.

"I've seen so many dying people," he said. "Sometimes I wake up from a nap and see Len's face as it was the night before he died. He was asleep, and the weariness and struggle to breathe had carved deep lines into his cheeks and around his eyes. Funny thing, when he was laid out in his coffin, all that stress was wiped away, or padded with makeup, or something. Death robbed his face of the character he'd built up over his life."

Butter sat next to Ben and leaned her head against his knee. He stooped sideways to pat her head and straightened up again. "Someone told me, years ago," he said, "that a person spends the first half of their lives gathering things and people, and the second half letting go of the things and people they've gathered." He frowned and stared down at his feet. Then he smiled, and looked up at Dickon. "Nobody warned me that I'd collect a new important somebody in the middle of letting so many go."

Dickon smiled back, and reached out to fold Ben into his arms. Butter thrust her head between their legs, lest she be forgotten.

"Why did all this come up today?" Dickon asked.

"I woke up from my after-lunch nap dreaming of La Señora," Ben said. "She looked just like the last time I saw her, frail as crystal and strong as steel. It just went on from there. I'm glad the coffin was closed for her funeral."

"That's becoming more common. I prefer it, myself." Dickon chuckled. "It's easier to gloss over the deceased's flaws if his face isn't right in front of you."

"Secrets of the profession, I suppose," Ben said. "Better you do those things, like funerals, than me. I've had a bellyful of funerals. By the way, did I tell you that you did a nice job for La Señora?"

"Yes, thanks again. It was hard for me to do."

"My hard part comes tomorrow, when John Diss reads the will. I suppose we should all gather in the library at the manor. It was a favorite room of hers."

"Sounds like the plot for an old British murder mystery."

"Do you see faces, Dickon?"

"Every time I look at some one."

"I mean, do you see faces in your dreams? Or," he gestured toward Obaheah Rock, "in the waves, or the clouds?"

Dickon considered. "No, or not very often. Most of the time I dream about houses, or running away from something. When I do dream about people, they are too far away for me to see their faces." He looked at the waves. "Sometimes I see wild horses in the waves, prancing and galloping around the rocks. I don't look at the clouds much. They're usually a solid mass of gray."

"Well, here, maybe. Where I grew up, they floated white or gray or black across the dark blue sky. They changed shapes as they wandered overhead. In the summers, anyway, Hardin and I used to lie on our backs in the fields and tell each other stories about the shapes the clouds made." A bold gull landed on a bit of cliff not far away. Butter raced over, barking, to warn off the intruder. The gull ignored her.

"I will miss La Señora," Ben said. "I'd guess you all will miss her more. You knew her longer." A weary sadness pulled Dickon's cheeks toward his jaw. Had Ben been looking then, he'd have seen Dickon looking older than his years.

"Maybe. I don't think there's much percentage in second-guessing who might be sadder than someone else. La Señora made a big difference for a lot of us."

"For me, too," Ben said.

"That reminds me," Dickon said. "La Señora had a message for you. She said that strength lies in joining bamboo with clay."

"Did she say what that meant?"

"She didn't know."

"We'll find out when we need to know, I guess." Ben turned to look out on the sea again. "I think the storm's not too far away," he said.

"The paper said it's about eight hours off shore," Dickon told him. "My place, or yours, for supper?" The gull left the cliff; Butter came back toward Dickon and Ben.

"Mine. Dickon, we should choose one place to be ours. This 'yours-and-mine' routine feels too distant since we so publicly committed ourselves."

"I guess so. Besides, everybody in the Village knows when we visit each other. The big question is, my place out by the ocean, your place near the Station, or some third alternative?"

"What do you think, Butter?" Ben knelt to stroke the dog's head. She wagged her tail, making a fan in the sand. "No comment, eh? Just be sure the food and water dishes go where you go. And the treat cupboard. All right, I've got it." He looked up at Dickon and grinned. "Butter's easy. We're the problem children."

### The Way of the Will

John Diss studied the papers in front of him on the table while the Villagers gathered. Rosa had closed the Café for the afternoon, Harry and Olive had closed the motel, and the Wong brothers had closed their emporium and gas station. They had come up in the funicular, two at a time, with Rosa by herself at the last. Everyone else had come up from the Village by way of the Chapel trail. They had come in a group, talking softly among themselves. Ben and Dickon had stopped by the llama shed to collect Willy Waugh, and then gone on to the Manor House. When everyone was seated in the dining room, the only room with enough chairs readily available, John spoke.

"The 'Reading of the Will' is a device for fiction. I will not read the will today. I will acquaint you with its terms. I'm doing this at the request of the executor, Mr. Benjamin Dover Soul, whom you all know, I'm sure." The Villagers sat silent, waiting for John Diss to go on.

"Señora Mandor has provided for each of you in one fashion or another. She has provided that the entire San Danson Village and San Danson Station properties remain in a trust, to be administered by her executor, and two villagers chosen by a vote among you." John took a swallow of water from the glass set beside him.

"To Notta and DiConti Sharif she assigns the right to live in the Manor House, together with any of their issue. In the event of their passing, the Manor House will revert to their heir or heirs." Notta and DiConti beamed. Emma smiled with satisfaction.

"To Willy Waugh, in recognition of his longtime devotion to the llamas and their care, he is to be provided a stipend sufficient to feed and medicate the herd, and is to be provided a cottage in the Village."

Willy looked baffled. "I always sleep out of doors," he said.

"You're getting old enough, now, Willy, you should learn to sleep inside," Rosa said. "You're not too young for arthritis to start."

"Oh," Willy said, and shrank back into his chair to ponder arthritis. Rosa's opinion carried almost as much weight with him as La Señora's opinion had.

"Further, Señora Mandor's will provides Village cottages for Mae Ling, Malcolm Drye, Emma and Haakon, Elke and Rosa, the Swami Rirenda Fendabenda, and Benjamin Soul and Dickon Shayne." John looked up from his papers. "How you divide the housing among you is for the parties involved to decide." He sipped at his water again.

"We'll have to get together," Ben said, "and work out what's best for everybody. I think that's what La Señora would want us to do."

"We can do that when John's through, maybe," the Swami said.

"We'll see if everybody's ready," Ben said. The Swami nodded.

John Diss continued. "To Shubert Wong and Waylon Wong the will leaves right to operate the gas station and emporium for as long as either man shall be willing to work them. They are guaranteed the use of the rooms they currently occupy over the emporium so long as either of them lives."

"Harry and Olive Pitts are granted the motel business to operate for as long as they are able and willing to work at it. They are granted, for as long as either of them lives, the right to reside in the rooms they currently occupy." John reviewed the paper in front of him. "There are further provisions, for the investment of the monies attached to the estate, but those are primarily instructions for Ben, as executor. Do any of you have questions?"

The Swami raised his hand. John nodded at him. "If Ben's managing the investments, who will review what Ben does? Does the will say anything about that?"

"No."

"Do you know much about investing, Ben?" the Swami asked.

"Not as much as I'll need to learn, I'm sure. John, isn't one of the requirements La Señora laid out that I'll have to make annual reports to the Villagers about where the trust money is and how it's earning?"

"Yes. Remember, the trust is intended to provide shelter for you Villagers while you're alive. The property eventually reverts to Notta Sharif and her children."

"Then Notta should have a say in the investment program."

"I'll consult with her on a regular basis," Ben promised.

"Good," the Swami said.

"Any further questions?" John asked. When there were none, he turned to Ben. "Ben, it's your meeting now." Ben came forward.

"Two things we should take care of today," he said. "One is choosing the two Villagers to help me administer the trust. How do you want to go about it?" The Villagers looked at each other. Malcolm Drye spoke up.

"I think we should each write two names on a piece of paper and hand it in. If two people get more votes than anybody else, they should be Ben's helpers."

"What if it's three with the same, or almost the same, votes?" Haakon said.

"Narrow the next vote to just those three," DiConti suggested. Ben looked around the room.

"Does anybody object to doing the choosing this way?" No one did. "Okay, then. I suggest we have John Diss count the votes. He's as neutral as anybody can be."

"Sounds good," Mae Ling said. The others murmured assent.

When the papers had been distributed, and everyone had a chance to write two names on his or her paper, fold it, and hand it to John Diss, John began the count. A few Villagers commented on the weather while they waited for the count. John was thorough; he counted once, and then recounted, to be sure he had done it accurately. When he was through, he leaned over and said so to Ben.

"Okay, John," Ben said loudly enough to quiet the conversations in the room, "what results did we get?"

"Two people got more votes than anybody else. Congratulations, I think, Elke and Malcolm." A few Villagers applauded. "Do you want me to read the numbers?"

"Not necessary," the Swami said. "We've applied our communal judgment. Let's go with it."

"Right on," Willy said. "Good luck to both of you."

"Thanks," Malcolm and Elke said in unison.

"Now, about distributing the cottages. Shall we try to do that today, or later?"

Emma spoke up. "I think four cottages should keep the tenants they've got. Haakon and I are thoroughly satisfied with the place we have. The Swami, Malcolm, and Mae all have been settled in for years. So has Dickon." She looked back at Dickon who sat against the wall. "Are you and Ben ever going to move in together?" she asked.

Dickon blushed, and Ben grinned.

"We have talked about it," Dickon said, "but we haven't decided whether it's to be his place or mine."

"Well, I have an idea," Emma said. "Ben, move in with Dickon. You're a great neighbor, and so is Butter, but I think Rosa and Elke should take over your cottage. It's closer to Rosa's Café, where she goes every day. You two men are in good health, and should get all the exercise you can. Chester's old place should suit Willy. It's closer to the llama pens than any of the others."

"I'm willing, if Dickon will have me," Ben said, "and Butter."

"Butter's more than welcome," Dickon said, "and I'll take you to get her," he teased.

"I'm satisfied with Dr. Field's old place," Willy said. "I'll air it out some more, maybe, before I move in."

"That settles that, if nobody has any objections," Ben said. He waited for objections to rise. None did. "Okay, then," told the Villagers. "Willy has hot water for tea, if you want some. Otherwise, we might as well go home and start packing to move." The Villagers stood. Some took chairs they knew belonged in other rooms with them. Ben thanked John Diss, and walked him to the funicular. Notta and DiConti stayed behind to talk a little while with Elke about preparations for moving into the Manor House. The llamas gathered in their shed as the winter darkness spread over the mountain and Village.

### Prime Claws

When the underwater landslide buried the Codfather, a vacuum in undersea power came into being. It persisted only a short while before petty fiefdoms arose to fill it. Such transient power networks as the Starfish Hegemony and the Sea Urchin Autocracy commanded the connections between pelagic hindbrains for their season, and withered away. Only the Crablord succeeded in rivaling the Codfather's reach. The Crablord lived on a patch of sand in San Danson Cove.

On a day in March, near the end of the month, the Crablord's s network thrummed with energy put forth by the Ur-Mind. Births were happening, not of crabs hatching, for it was a little early in the season for that, but land births of moment and importance. Ashore, on the mountain above the cove, a woman endured labor in a manor house. A llama endured labor in a nearby shed. The Crablord marveled at the stress land mammals suffered to bring forth young. Privately, he deemed the crab fashion of producing young by laying eggs in the sand far preferable to the land creatures' contorted ways.

Notta Freed Sharif had planned to go to the hospital in Las Tumbas. Sadly, when her babe deemed it time to sally forth into the world, no one with an automobile was in San Danson to give her a ride to the maternity ward. DiConti was on patrol somewhere in South County, Elke was in the City to conduct business, and Ben and Dickon had taken Butter to the veterinarian in Pueblo Rio for her annual vaccinations.

Desperate for help, Notta telephoned Olive Pitts. Olive had experience, from her mission years, with midwifery. Olive came trudging up the hill with Harry in tow. Few travelers meant they could close the motel for several hours without trouble. Harry was good for boiling water, and generally fetching whatever Olive sent him to get. Notta's labor was not unduly long, even for a first child, and Hyacinth Sharif came into the world in a timely fashion. Olive cut the cord, cleaned the child up, and presented a diapered Hyacinth to her mother. Notta took the infant to her chest, holding it and snuggling it, until it found a nipple and began to nurse. Bonding began. Notta, exhausted, beamed with joy, and wished earnestly for DiConti to hurry home so she could show him this wonderful expansion of their lives.

The llama, She-Who-Shuns-Males, was fortunate that Willy Waugh was at hand. Her labor was difficult, and she was terrified. None of the llama mothers in the herd had thought to explain to her what would happen when her cría came. Willy soothed the llama's fear, calming her, until the cría slid from the womb into the world. Willy caught the infant as it came out, gently lowering it to the ground covered with soft blankets. He used warm towels to dry the babe. Then he put it where She-Who-Shuns-Males could sniff at it. Bonding began. Shakily, She-Who-Shuns-Males stood still to allow the cría to nurse. When it had finished, she lay down with it in a corner of the shed. Willy put feed near her, and withdrew to let her rest.

In the cove, the Crablord returned to his ordinary sensorium. He scuttled slowly over the sandy bottom, feasting on shrimp and mussels as he went. He mused, in his crustacean way, on the balance of the Cosmos. He fed more than he mused, and grew into his new carapace.

Ten days passed, alternating suns and moons. Inland, the green hills grew rumpled looking as random clumps of grass grew taller than the general herbage. Yellow mustard bloomed across the meadows, spreading butter color on the hills. Orchards bloomed, each according to its fruit variety flooding the air with perfume from white and pink petals. Carrie Oakey came to San Danson, and before the assembled Villagers and representatives of the police powers in the County, christened Hyacinth Sharif. DiConti strutted, Notta beamed, and Hyacinth gurgled. All in all, as Ben later remarked to Dickon, a delightful naming ceremony.

In the llama shelter, Willy took the horn that made a unicorn of a llama cría from its hiding place. He unwrapped it from the blanket that protected it, and laid it alongside the cría. A calm sense of bliss warmed She-Who-Shuns-Males. Willy stroked the cría's muzzle with a gentle finger, and rubbed the budding horn socket with bag balm to soothe its itch. The sun shone through the morning mists, driving them away.

The sun light reached the shallow waters of San Danson Cove and dived deep into them to warm the Crablord's sand. He stirred the warm sand with his claws, scuttled forward to snap up a shrimp, and basked in the sun. Darkness stirred in his sense of well-being. A taint touched the psychic ether. The Crablord stood still, tasting the currents. The threat did not come from the sea. Some other part of the Cosmic Balance felt a disturbance. The curious Crablord searched for the source. Evil slumbered uneasily somewhere on the land, far away at present, but connected, somehow, to the Cove and the Crablord's domain. He set a portion of his unconscious mind to monitor the evil, and went on his way eating the shrimp and mussels he found in his cove.

### Ermentrude Finds a Purpose

Ermentrude quickly adjusted to living in the manor house. It had so many nooks and crannies for a cat to explore. One of her favorites was a room La Señora had called the old lumber-room. Old furniture seldom moved from its position over the decades had allowed a patina of dust, dead insect husks, odd bits of paper, and the like, to build up. A cat could find much to play with and investigate.

It was as well the cat had this outlet. Notta and DiConti had little time for her, now that the squalling infant had come. Like all creatures, Ermentrude's people doted on their young, and offered little to longer-term companions who had been ever faithful, in their fashion. Ermentrude no longer had the joy of twitting that stuffy Prime Pussy, who presumed to rule Emma's household.

Ermentrude had discovered the old lumber-room one day when she had probed a crack behind a seldom-used fireplace. A broken stone had tumbled out of place when she pawed at it. It left a space just large enough for her to squeeze through without flattening her whiskers. Once in the hole, she found herself in a space between the walls of two rooms. The space was quite wide enough for her to run in, although she could not have turned around had she wanted to. The wall into the next room had a large break in the plaster through which she could easily enter the lumber-room. The plaster break let her out under a low table that supported several layers of boxes.

Even though the dust made her sneeze, Ermentrude guessed at once that this room was her discovery alone. The human scents were so old as to be almost not present. They didn't connect, either, with any scents anywhere else in the house. Ermentrude was far more interested in the spicy scent of rodents. Mice teemed in this room, and with their scent she detected another kind of rodent, rats. Her experience of rats was limited to a single encounter, which she had won, because the rat ran from her.

Ermentrude prowled the lumber-room for several days, gradually decreasing the rodent population. After each foray, she had to clean quantities of dust from her fur. After one particularly dusty trip into the room, she spent so long at her toilette that Notta noticed. Little Hyacinth was asleep, and the house was very quiet, so Ermentrude's very busy tongue made enough noise to alert Notta. She watched Ermentrude for several minutes, until the cat, exhausted by her labors, lay on her side and slept. Notta laid aside her magazine, rose from her couch, and went to the sleeping cat. She picked her up and stroked her. Ermentrude purred. She had missed this human contact; she had especially missed living with Haakon, who was a persistent and gentle stroker of cats. Notta and Ermentrude spent several minutes in this precious communication. Then Hyacinth woke, crying.

Notta hurried to the nursery she and Haakon had established in a room La Señora had seldom used. She carried Ermentrude with her, and did not put her down until they were in the nursery. Ermentrude had not been in this room since Hyacinth had come. While Notta attended to the noisy infant and her noisome diaper, Ermentrude began an olfactory tour of the baseboards. She soon discovered rat scent, strong and fresh. Her ears could hear breathing in the wall. She mewed, to alert Notta, and scratched at the wall. Notta, busy with Hyacinth, paid Ermentrude no mind. Ermentrude continued along the baseboard. She found a hole large enough for a rat, but too small for her. She crouched before it and waited.

Notta took Hyacinth and left the room. Ermentrude was relieved that she also took the wastebasket with the soiled diaper as she went. Its malodorous contents had masked the subtler play of rat smell and mouse smell in the walls. Yes, mice ranged here, too, though not as many as in the lumber-room. Ermentrude had a sudden picture of rodents attacking Hyacinth. It came with great force, and impressed on her the need for a guardian for the baby. It was a sending from the young unicorn with the unique horn, itself a mere infant, but more educated and aware than a human child, because its mind matured at an animal's rate.

Ermentrude had never thought of herself as a guardian of anything, except Haakon's lap, which she had defended her primary right to against all of Prime Pussy's claims. That old rivalry was of the past. Ermentrude discovered she needed a purpose, and the unicorn advised her that guarding Hyacinth against rat intrusions was the purpose she should have.

After an hour or so of crouching, Ermentrude got the reward for her patience. The rat, a young one, scurried out to prowl the nursery. Ermentrude pounced, and broke its neck on the first bite. She dragged the carcass into the open and left it where Notta or DiConti could easily find it. Notta found it; she almost stepped on it when she brought Hyacinth back to lay her in the crib. It was well she did not step on it; her feet were bare, and the shock of a cold and furry body on her soles might have caused her to drop the baby.

She laid Hyacinth in her crib, and went to the kitchen to get a broom and dustpan. She scooped the corpse onto the dustpan with the broom and bore it to the trashcan outside. Then she called Ermentrude, for she guessed the cat had slain the intruder, and rewarded her with a tuna treat, and a rub under the chin. Ermentrude purred. DiConti heard the full adventure when he came home, and he praised Ermentrude for protecting his beloved Hyacinth.

From that time, Ermentrude became a rodent exterminator. The manor house was large, and she never did entirely rid the structure of mice and rats, let alone clearing the yard of gophers, but she pursued her purpose with due diligence. It made her, who had been a frivolous and spoiled kitten, a most mature cat of the utmost gravity. Notta and DiConti took little notice of Ermentrude's change, attributing it solely to the cat's being an adult now. Prime Pussy knew better, and wondered if she could claim any credit for providing a sobering example to the younger feline.

### Spaces in their Togetherness

Dickon and Ben took stock of Dickon's cottage. It was no larger than Ben's, with a living room, kitchen, bathroom, and two small rooms that could be bedrooms. Dickon, of course, had expanded to fill his available space long ago. Now he and Ben wondered how to put Ben's belongings into that compressed space as well.

"I just don't see it working," Ben said. "It's too much volume for this amount of living space. And, I have things in storage I'd like to bring in, some time."

"Big things, like furniture?"

"No. I got rid of all the furniture. It's books, mostly, and some china, a few figurines, that kind of stuff. Important to me, if not to anybody else." Ben sighed.

"We need a couple of rooms added on." Dickon frowned. "I don't know how, though. We'd never get building permits, not with the Coastal Commission to battle."

"It would be expensive, too," Ben said. "We'd need permission from the Villagers, first."

"I'm sure they'd go for it. As long as it doesn't cost them money."

"Let's float the idea," Ben said.

One by one they talked with the Villagers, and with DiConti and Notta. No one objected to an addition to Dickon's cottage. Ben moved most of his possessions into the garage until they could sort the matter out. Rosa and Elke moved into Ben's old cottage. DiConti talked with an acquaintance of his in the County Building and Zoning Department. They would have to get several permits, an architect, and a qualified contractor, but they were exempt from Coastal Commission authority.

Finding an architect was difficult. No one wanted to work on two rooms added to an old cottage by the sea. Most wanted to replace the existing cottage with a palatial edifice that could have housed the whole Village. Ben and Dickon were almost desperate enough to give up on the idea when Mae Ling introduced them to Wren Gell.

Wren Gell was a newly licensed architect, and planned to specialize in remodeling and additions to existing structures. "It won't be lucrative," she told Ben and Dickon, "not like designing shopping malls and office buildings, but there is a niche market for it." She came to the Village, and immediately understood its charm and remoteness. She made some preliminary sketches, went back to her office, and within a week, for a modest fee, had a design for three rooms to build across the seaward side of the cottage. Ben and Dickon approved her plans. The Villagers did as well. Ben withdrew money from his savings to pay for the construction.

Ben and Dickon had lived together about two months when they engaged Wren. Adjustment to another's regular presence was difficult for Ben, and more than difficult for Dickon.

"Ben," Dickon said one night, "I don't want to hurt your feelings, but I need some time away from you."

"I can get that," Ben said. "I need some time away from you, too. Most of the time I lived with Len, one or both of us was working. Here we don't either one work. How do you think we should arrange time away?"

Dickon rubbed his forehead. "I'd like one day a week to be by myself here at home," he began, "but I don't have any idea what you would do with your time away. And, it's only fair I should give you a day at home by yourself, but I don't have any idea where I could go or what I could do with myself." He gave Ben a pleading look.

"Do you think we could make it just by going into separate rooms, once we get the addition built on?"

"Maybe. What do we do until then?"

"I think," Ben said, "I can spend a half day at the manor house working in the office on Village matters. I'll talk with DiConti and Notta. I'll have to leave Butter here, though."

Dickon smiled. "Butter's no problem. She's easy to be with. What I don't see is how I can give you time to yourself."

"We'll think of something," Ben said. "By the way, while we're talking, what about the cooking? Do you want to cook sometimes?"

"I'd rather do laundry. You're a much better cook than I am."

"As long as you don't feel like I've pushed you out of your kitchen," Ben said, "I'm happy to cook. And I hate to do laundry."

"That's easy to settle, then."

About midsummer, Wren found a contractor for Dickon and Ben. Her brother, Dan Gell, had two workers to spare for the construction. When they came to work both Dickon and Ben were thrilled. They were muscular young men, one blonde, the other brunette, and preferred to work in very short cutoff jeans and boots, eschewing encumbering garments such as shirts. Several times a day Ben and Dickon came to oversee the work. At other times they surveyed it from a distance. The young men, Bill and Bob (Ben and Dickon never got their last names—Ben dubbed them "Bill y Bob") were very efficient, and completed the work in less than three weeks. Ben and Dickon walked the pair to their truck at San Danson Station, ostensibly to help them carry their tools, but actually to enjoy one last view of their butts.

Ben and Dickon painted the new rooms. Emma sewed curtains for the new windows. The Swami laid floor tiles (he had apprenticed to a flooring contractor in his youth). When the rooms were ready, Ben and Dickon agreed to use the center room as their bedroom. Each of them took one of the other rooms for a private study. By agreement each study was off limits to the other. Butter, of course, could go anywhere she pleased.

The two older rooms became a joint library and a sitting room. Dickon and Ben began to settle into the comfortable routines of an old married couple.

### Child's Play

Hyacinth had learned to walk. Immediately Notta's daily workload had tripled. Hyacinth was a curious child, eager to touch, see, smell, taste, and hear, everything under the sun. The child had inherited her father's darker hair and soulful brown eyes. Her short body promised, to Emma's practiced eye, to carry on the Freed family tradition. Hyacinth was just a little bit shorter than average for her age, and her stocky frame was evident even through the baby fat. Most obviously all her own was her smile. It carried, Dickon said, the light of the universe.

She-Who-Shuns-Males, on the other hand, was now able to relax a little. She-Who-Smells-Like-Flowers, her unicorn offspring, was of an age to graze safely with the llama herd. She-Who-Shuns-Males had weaned the cría at her earliest opportunity. She did not like motherhood, and vowed to shun males more fiercely in future.

One warm day Notta had the door open to let the fresh air blow stale smells out of the manor. Hyacinth found the open door almost immediately, and walked through it. The patio intrigued her for a half hour. She saw butterflies and bugs she hadn't seen before. Ermentrude woke from a nap and discovered the child was not in the playroom. The cat set out to find the babe she considered her personal responsibility. She tracked Hyacinth onto the patio, and off its edge toward the pasture fence that kept the llamas from the manor house yard.

Ermentrude caught up with Hyacinth at that fence. Hyacinth was clinging to the woven wire barrier, her face pressed tightly to it, her nose extended through one of the openings. She was crooning a low, sad sound. Far off in the distance beyond Ermentrude's vision, the llamas grazed on brown grasses. One cría broke from the herd and loped toward Hyacinth. It was She-Who-Smells-Like-Flowers, and she heard Hyacinth's call. At the fence, she touched her moist nose to Hyacinth's nose. Hyacinth sneezed, and the startled cría drew back. Alarm faded from Ermentrude's mind. She-Who-Smells-Like-Flowers was the unicorn in llama disguise, and she soothed the cat's fears for Hyacinth's safety.

The threesome stood at the fence for several minutes in wordless communication. Hyacinth reached through the fence to touch the cría. Ermentrude arched her back with pleasure. Then She-Who-Shuns-Males trotted over to scold her cría, and bring her back to the grazing herd. Ermentrude mewled loudly. Hyacinth sat down to stroke the cat. She sat on a thistle. Only the thickness of her diaper prevented her filling her buttocks with prickles. Once down, Hyacinth couldn't get up again. Although the fence was in reach, she didn't think to grasp it and haul herself up. At home she had various low tables and stools that she could lean on until she established her precarious balance.

Frustration brought her to tears. Her tears soon became wails of anger. Ermentrude wanted to cover her ears with her paws, but looked for a means to get Hyacinth to her feet instead. She did not succeed. Willy Waugh was working in the llama shelter and heard Hyacinth. He came running, and picked the child up. Hyacinth rested her bottom on Willy's arm. This promptly filled his forearm with thistle prickles. Willy was tough, and accustomed to the slings and arrows of outrageous nature, but the thistle prickles driven into his arm by Hyacinth's weight made him grimace with pain. He hurried toward the house with Hyacinth. Ermentrude made haste to follow.

At the door Willy knocked on the frame. Notta came at once. "Why are you carrying Hyacinth?" she asked.

"Kid escaped," Willy said, "with only Ermentrude to guard her. She sat on a thistle," he went on as Notta reached out for Hyacinth, "so watch out for her diaper. It stings." Notta carefully lifted Hyacinth and put her on her feet on the floor. Hyacinth grabbed Notta's trouser leg and held on.

"Thank you, Willy," Notta said. "Can I help?" she asked as he pulled thistle thorns from his arm.

"No, thanks," Willy said. "Unless you've got some scotch tape?"

"Yes, I have," Notta said. "Let me get it for you." She took her trouser leg from Hyacinth's grasp and went to the office. Hyacinth tried an end run around Willy. He put out an arm to stop her. When Notta came back with the scotch tape, Willy used several lengths of it to lift the stickers from his arm. He gave the rest of the roll to Notta.

"Thanks," he said. "Best get a gate to keep the kid in. She's a wild one." He turned and went back to his work in the llama shed. Later that afternoon, when his arm still stung from the thistle, he soothed it with cornhusker's lotion. It took several applications and a couple of days to heal the soreness. Notta rang up DiConti and had him bring home a child gate that same day.

She-Who-Smells-Like-Flowers took to standing for long periods looking over the woven-wire fence between the manor yard and the pasture. Hyacinth could no longer wander at will across the yard. Hyacinth and the unicorn in llama disguise slowly learned to communicate mentally, since they couldn't get together. She-Who-Shuns-Males tried, at first, to keep her cría from the fence, but eventually gave up. She was a llama mother, and in some measure rejoiced that her cría was growing up.

Notta hovered over Hyacinth for several days, afraid to let the child out of her sight. Emma noticed Notta's demeanor, and, of course, had heard about Hyacinth's escapade. Little by little she engaged Notta's interest in other things than her child. It was not the first time a wise grandmother prevented a mother's concern from smothering a child. When she deemed Notta sufficiently distracted, Emma took Hyacinth to see the llamas. They soon made it a daily habit, weather permitting. Ermentrude kept guard, however, even through her naps. She did not sleep soundly until well after Hyacinth's third birthday.

## The Villainous Villainess

### Pondering the Abyssal

The Swami Rirenda Fendabenda always consulted the _I Ching_ soon after breakfast. He first wrote a question across the top of his open notebook page. Today it was, "Do my dreams from last night portend good fortune or ill fortune?" Then he laid down his pen, folded his hands, and bowed three times to the joss sticks burning before the three Boddhisattvas. He put three cash, small round Chinese coins with square holes, in a cup made of ostrich leather. He shook the three coins in their leather cup. Then he cast them on the altar before the Boddhisattvas. The coins slid softly to a stop at the base of the clay statues. Each showed a side with two characters. The Swami drew a broken line on the notebook page beside him. In the break he drew a small circle.

He scooped up the coins and returned them to the cup. He shook the cup and threw them again. One of the coins showed the four characters; the other coins showed the side with two characters. The swami drew a solid line above the broken line. Again he cast the coins. This time one of the coins showed two characters, and the other two landed with the four-character face showing. The Swami drew a broken line. He frowned. The trigram K'an, which symbolized water, always disturbed him. A fortune teller had warned him in his adolescence to avoid sailing, swimming, and other water sports, because great harm lay in the water waiting for him.

The three remaining coin casts built a second K'an trigram on the first. The ideogram was K'an, the Double Water, commonly called the Abyssal. The Swami sighed, and opened his _I Ching_. The reading for the Judgment said, "The Abyssal doubled (Danger!); if you are sincere in your heart, you will succeed in your actions." The Symbol said, "Water flows unending into the deep places, this is a symbol of doubled water. The superior man maintains his virtue and continues teaching."

The Swami also consulted the saying for the first line, since all the coins had shown the same face). It read, "Bottom six: water flows again and again. One falls into the water pit. Misfortune ensues." The Swami carefully copied these comments into his notebook. He shook his head. "I hate water signs," he muttered.

The changing bottom line formed the sixtieth ideogram, "Limitation." He consulted the I Ching again. The Judgment for this ideogram read, "Limitation; success. Do not persevere in galling limitation." The Symbol section read, "Water over the Lake is the image of Limitation. The superior man creates numbers and measures, and measures correct conduct against virtue." The Swami wrote these things in his notebook.

He wrote in his notebook, "This ideogram portends darkness. Some danger waits in my forward path. With good fortune, I may recognize it in time to avert it. I do not wish to stumble into any pits. Moderation is key, I think, at this moment. I shall let my bottle of Ripper Ridge Riesling rest a while longer." He tapped his teeth with the top of his pen. He sighed and put his notebook, the _I Ching,_ the coins, and the cup in a drawer on the side of the desk that held the Boddhisattvas. Restless, he decided to go out walking.

In her cottage Mae Ling took three ordinary American dimes from her change pile. She shook them in her hand like dice, and then cast them on the cloth of her kitchen table. She did this six times and produced the ideogram K'an, the Abyssal. The third time she cast her three dimes showed tails. This meant that for her the third line changed. She read the words for the third line: "Six in the third place means: Forward and backward, abyss on abyss. In danger like this, pause at first and wait, otherwise you will fall into a pit in the abyss. Do not act in this way." A second translation she consulted, though less verbose, also advised against action. She also read the Symbol and Judgment for hexagram number forty-eight, the Well. It, too, promised misfortune, and urged cooperative action to overcome it. Mae shook her head. Some turbulence, not yet a fear, stirred in her mind. She put her _I Ching_ away and went out to walk and think in the open air.

Cooperation suggested consultation. She met the Swami on the path. She had often discussed I Ching results with him before. He understood the process, and had studied the philosophy that underlay the book.

"Good morning," she said to him. The wind tousled her black hair. The Swami watched it blow strands away from her bald spot and then cover them up again. For reasons he never explored the process fascinated him.

"Hello, Mae," he said. "Bright morning, isn't it?" The overcast glowed with a pearly fire where the sun threatened to melt it. Glints of silver sparkled on the cove's waves. Beyond the cove mouth subdued surf splashed gently against the toes of Obaheah and Obadiah. Chill air did not trouble Mae and the Swami. They had lived in the village long enough to consider such temperatures normal. It was the violent summer heat of Las Tumbas that devastated them.

Mae had her reading glasses on. The mist had cleared slowly from them. She wondered now why the world seemed fuzzy. The Swami said to her, "Been reading already this morning, Mae?"

"Oh, yes," she said, realizing suddenly her glasses were on her nose. She took them off. The world leaped into relative clarity. She let the reading glasses fall against her breast. She had them on a chain around her neck. "Sad reading," she said. She shook her head. "I cast the _I Ching_ ," she went on. "I got K'an, the Doubled Water. It is a very sad hexagram."

The Swami frowned. A hint of fear entered his eyes. "I, too, got that hexagram this morning," he said. "What do you suppose that means?" It was most uncommon for both Mae and the Swami to cast the same hexagram on the same morning.

Mae shook her head. "I would guess it means it applies to more than our individual questions," she said. "I don't know that, of course, and the commentaries don't offer much interpretation for groups instead of individuals." She rubbed her neck where the chain that held her reading glasses rubbed her skin under her collar. "Still, that we both got it the same morning, that is unusual."

"Does anybody else in the village consult the _I Ching_?" the Swami asked.

"Not that I know of."

"I don't know of anybody, either."

"For the time being, it is best we keep this to ourselves, then," Mae said. "It troubles me that it may mean something bad is going to happen to all of us."

"We can only wait and see. Did you have any changing lines?"

"Yes, the third. That led me to the Well, number forty-eight. It suggested cooperation may avert misfortune. Did you cast any changing lines?"

"Yes," the Swami said, "the first. That led me to number fifty-nine, Limitation. That speaks of limits, measuring, and comparing one's actions to virtue."

"Let us ponder on these things," Mae said. "I must go now."

"I, too, must go. I'm off to collect my mail. Can I get you anything while I'm at Wong's?"

"No, thank you. I'm well-stocked on everything. Walk carefully today."

"I will. Please do likewise."

"Okay." Mae turned toward her cottage. The Swami walked toward San Danson Station.

In the desert psychic forces gathered dark thunderclouds over a rusty outcrop above a prison. Under the cove waters the Crablord scuttled uneasily from shellfish bed to halibut fry schools, sampling a little one place and then a little in another. Some disturbance in the universe upset his feeding. Butter whined in her sleep on Ben's lap. He stroked her rump, quieting her. The young unicorn wept tears she did not understand as she tore the green grass from the ground.

### At El Serrucho Oxidado

El Serrucho Oxidado Penitentiary takes its name from the saw-toothed sandstone outcropping that dominates the eastern horizon near the prison. The formation is particularly striking in its color, as most of the Sangre Negro Mountains are dark colored basalt. Before European settlement, several tribes of the deserts accounted the sandstone formation a holy place. Seasonally, the tribes came to trade, particularly in coral from the coastal tribes for turquoise from the inland tribes.

The location is remote. The legislature selected it for the penitentiary because it has the only reliable water source for fifty miles in any direction. The water is sufficient in quantity and quality to irrigate a year-round garden. The produce raised here feeds the inmates, as well as providing them rehabilitative work and healthful exercise. El Serrucho Oxidado is a women's facility. The system sent Vanna Dee here after her conviction.

Vanna Dee was a quiet, sullen, prisoner. She performed the daily routines demanded of her by the prison staff without complaint. When she got special privileges for good behavior, she took them as things to endure rather than things to enjoy. One or two of the guards speculated Vanna was either dull-witted, or had been lobotomized. Her synapses were burnt out, and her evil nature banked like the coals of an overnight fireplace. Three years she remained in this spiritually vegetative state.

Vanna had several cellmates in her first three years. She was so uncommunicative that each of them requested transfer to some other cell. Her sullen silences bore heavily on the ordinary run of felonious females in the prison. Only one inmate, Jenny Tall, was willing to endure Vanna's black hole personality.

Jenny was a lifer. She had been committed to El Serrucho Oxidado in her early middle years for killing her three husbands. The men had discovered Jenny had married each of them, without bothering to divorce any of the others. Moreover, they discovered she had impoverished each of them by emptying their bank accounts and selling off such other assets of theirs as she could. The determined to "teach the bitch a lesson." One night they captured her, beat her, and raped her, repeatedly.

Jenny was outraged, but the police in her area were inclined to overlook a little well-deserved wife punishment (the community was not an enlightened one). When Jenny understood she'd have no justice from the system, she made her own justice. One night she waylaid her husbands, one by one, bound them, emasculated them, and left them to bleed to death. When the police accused her, she freely admitted her crimes.

A jury of local men voted for the death penalty, but the judge, a newly appointed bleeding heart liberal from north state, commuted the sentence to life in prison without the possibility of parole. And so Jenny came to El Serrucho Oxidado. The beating she received from her husbands had left its mark on her face and body. Her eyes appeared to be looking in two different directions at the same time. Her nose, always a prominent feature of her physiognomy, also seemed bound to go in two contrary directions. Age had sharpened her chin and stolen her teeth. Her left shoulder rode high, and her right shoulder sank. Some damage to her pelvic structure left her with a crab-like shuffle in place of a walk. She added to this twisted presentation of humanity by wearing strange bits of feather, dried broccoli, withered carrots, twigs, and other detritus in her tangled gray locks.

Jenny fancied herself a witch. She claimed tribal ancestry, although the tribe's name changed according to her whim. Now she was Chemehuevi, yesterday she had been Pomo and Modoc, and Thursday last she claimed kinship with the Hunkpapa Sioux. No one, not even Jenny herself, knew absolutely how true her claims were. In the prison, no one cared; everyone presumed others had some lie to tell about her past.

Many women found Jenny repulsive to look at. Vanna didn't, or, at least, didn't demonstrate any disgust at Jenny's appearance. Jenny showed no distress at Vanna's withdrawal from the world. The warden congratulated herself on a wise assignment of cellmates, and went on to other prison administration matters. It was in October, the beginning of Vanna's third year in prison, that Jenny came to be with her. Jenny was physically unable to work in the garden. Vanna was very capable, as long as some one closely supervised her work. Vanna spent a long, warm, October day planting broccoli and cauliflower plants in the winter garden. Others harvested the last of the vine-ripened tomatoes.

Jenny sat in the warm sun, watching the gardeners. She kept watch over the water bucket, doling out dippers full of water to the thirsty gardeners. A hawk rode the updrafts over El Serrucho Oxidado. Jenny let her spirit enter the hawk, just to see the world from his god's eye view. Instead, she got a vision of the Dark One, he who has no name among the People. He etched in Jenny's mind that she must perform healing rituals for the first person she saw when her trance ended. A terrified Jenny agreed she'd do her best. The Dark One faded, and the hawk swooped on a ground squirrel. Jenny's spirit returned to her broken flesh. She opened her eyes. Vanna stood before her, saying, "Water, woman, water."

Jenny dipped the dipper in her pail, and offered the water to Vanna. Jenny's hand trembled so much she spilled part of the water. Vanna didn't seem to notice. She drank what remained in the dipper and handed the empty vessel back to Jenny. She plodded back to planting broccoli and cauliflower plants.

Jenny pondered for many days how to effect a healing. When Vanna fell asleep at night, Jenny entered a trance state and began exploring Vanna's aura, probing her mind, and seeking her spirit-ghost on the ethereal plane. Time and again Jenny ran into a wall of black, opaque, glass that walled the essential Vanna off from her consciousness. Jenny recited to herself in all the Native American languages she knew, the bits of lore she had collected over her lifetime. Nothing presented a cure for this walled-off kind of mind. Jenny grew desperate. In her universe, commands from the Dark One could not be ignored or dismissed.

She decided, in the end, to consult the Dark One itself. One night, while Vanna lay as one dead on the upper bunk, Jenny lit a small fire in the drain of her cell with matches she had smuggled from the kitchen. On this fire, started with shredded racing forms, and sustained with alder twigs, she put the sacred sage and dried branches of the unholy goat-nut. She began a prayer in Chemehuevi, repeated it in Pomo, and again in Ohlone. She fell back in a trance, bruising her head on the concrete cell floor. The Dark One gave her a vision, a worm with a corkscrew proboscis that burrowed into the hard black glass that was the barrier in Vanna's mind.

In her trance, Jenny became the worm, and began burrowing into the obsidian barrier in Vanna's psyche. Round and round the corkscrew proboscis turned, and the whole worm body Jenny imagined herself to be turned with it. The tunnel Jenny-the-worm made lengthened, until it was twice as long as the worm's body. As she went forward, Jenny felt the heat build on her worm-body. Some hot dark energy seethed behind the barrier she was penetrating. The corkscrew tip broke through into the hot darkness. The pressure release blasted the worm-Jenny back into her body. Jenny's brain collapsed, and she died.

On her bunk Vanna pondered her re-awakening as she savored her fury. She must escape this prison, and return to revenge herself on La Señora and the Village. She resolved to hide her recovery until she could escape. She felt Jenny's spirit whirl up and away. In the netherworld, the Dark one chuckled.

### Maw Hawganee's Cornbread Corners Cookhouse

Vanna waited six months for an opportunity to escape El Serrucho Oxidado. When it came, escape was simple. Vanna walked away from the prison with a bucket of water to sustain her across the desert. Since Jenny Tall died, the guards had rotated the water distribution duty among various inmates. One February day the detail began planting potatoes. It fell to Vanna's lot to dispense water from the bucket. The weather was cool, with an overcast sky, a rarity in the Páramo Purpúreo desert.

Vanna watched her cohorts begin the stoop labor of digging holes, plunking cut pieces of potatoes (every one had three eyes, to increase the odds of viable plants). Then she covered them with the cool, moist earth. She suddenly realized the three guards watching the six women were all turned away from her. She stood up, took up the heavy bucket, filled with water and protected with a wooden lid, and slowly walked up the side of the gray ridge and over its top. The prison had not fenced the field; no desert creatures had developed a taste for potatoes, and the inmates had all been told repeatedly that the desert had no water for fifty miles in any direction. The mostly city-bred inmates believed it to be un-crossable.

It wasn't, Vanna proved, over the next five days. The overcast stayed with her most of the time. She carefully rationed her water supply, and even had a few mouthfuls left when she came to Cornbread Corners and Maw Hawganee's Cookhouse. She had bruised her feet on the rocks and sands of the Páramo Purpúreo desert. Prison issue shoes had cardboard soles and thin cloth uppers that did not wear well. The prison orange that covered her wiry frame was already faded when she had put it on. Now it was streaked with dirt. Her hair straggled around her ears. It had gone gray while she was in prison.

When Vanna found Cornbread Corners, very little of it was left. Sand-filled cinder-block squares and oblongs marked where several buildings had stood. A cluster of salt cedars indicated a water source, the first Vanna had seen. Several of the structures had date palm trees around them. Vanna could see a few dates hanging from one of the trees, but they were too high up for her to reach. The thought of the fruit woke her hunger pangs. On a slight rise, a stand of Joshua trees and cholla cactus made a forbidding desert postcard outlined against the sky. A graveled road that lay between the cactus stand and the buildings disappeared left and right into the horizons.

One building still stood. Two gas pumps, obviously museum quality, stood in a battered area of asphalt. A small office, padlocked, defined the rest of the gas station. It was attached to a low building marked by a faded sign that proclaimed the property to be Maw Hawganee's Cornbread Corners Cookhouse. Another faded sign in the window promised the place was open. Vanna put her bucket down beside the rickety porch and climbed the three steps to the door. She opened the screen, grimacing when its hinges squealed like dying rodents as she pulled on it. The door into the cookhouse stood ajar. Vanna pushed it open. The scent of frying meat and a low murmur from a radio greeted her. Her hunger increased.

The room was ill lit. Dark paneling, perhaps rescued from a mobile home, ran along the walls. The ceiling lamps had four bulbs, but only two were lit in each fixture. A row of booths lay along one wall. Their red plastic seats were roped off. Dust lay on them. A counter ran along the other wall, with stools upholstered in the same dark red plastic. At intervals a jar of sugar, a bottle of ketchup, and salt and peppershakers shaped like cactus huddled together. The counter top was an indeterminate gray.

A cash register, surrounded by gums, mints, and peanuts in grimy bags occupied the end of the counter opposite the door Vanna had entered through. Two yellowed plastic jars of jerky stood sentinel over the candy. A display case under the cash register was too dimly lit to show its wares. A life-size puppet sat in the shadows on a rocking chair staring into the corner. It appeared to be female.

"Hello, anybody here?" Vanna called out. She got no answer. The meat sizzled quietly on a grill she could not see.

"Hello?" she inquired in a louder voice.

"Hold your horses," someone drawled in a high-pitched voice from somewhere in the diner's back room. "I'll be there in a minute."

Vanna waited. She heard footsteps. She saw no one. The voice drawled again, nearer now. "My, my, aren't we a mess. Just come in off the desert, I'd say." Vanna looked down, since the voice seemed to come from a place near her waist.

He was only as tall as Vanna's waist, about three feet, plus or minus a few inches. Bushy white hair surrounded his round face adorned with a great walrus moustache. He reminded Vanna of the cartoon tycoon on Monopoly cards, minus the top hat and tuxedo. This little man wore jeans and a tee shirt covered by a dirty white apron, obviously cut down to fit him.

"What can I get for you?" he asked her.

"What have you got?" she said.

"Well, today's special is hamburger steak with mashed potatoes and mushroom gravy. Green beans, too."

"I'll take an order," Vanna said. "I don't have any money, so I'll have to work for it, wash dishes or something."

"I'll have to think of something," the little man said. "One special, coming up. Do you want coffee or soda with that?"

"Coffee, please. Black."

"I'll bring a cup as soon as the kettle boils," the little man said and disappeared into the back room. Vanna heard water being drawn, and the hiss of gas in a propane burner. She heard the little man whistle as he cooked her steak. When he came out with her coffee, he brought napkins and flatware with him. He set two places on the counter, one in front of Vanna, and another, on his side of the counter, for himself. "I'll just have my lunch while you have yours," he said. "I was cooking it when you came in."

He served their meals, and clambered up on a stool that had a ladder that made it easy for him to mount it. Eye to eye, Vanna could see the little man had a certain jollity about him. His brown eyes sparkled with either mischief or good will.

"What brings you to Cornbread Corners," he asked her as he cut his hamburger steak with his fork.

"Just stumbled across it," Vanna said. "I've been lost in the desert for several days. I picked up a hitchhiker, and she stole my car and clothes. Left me to die in the sand with her prison uniform."

"I see," the little man said. "You do need a good bath, and something decent to wear."

"How far is it to a highway?"

"About ten miles, by road. You'll need a ride. Once you're there, you can hitch a ride with an eighteen-wheeler." He appraised her with a long look. "I can provide you a change of clothes and a ride."

"I can't pay you. Like I said, I've lost all my money."

"Well, there is a way," he said. "I get awful lonesome out here. Not many folks stop by, these days, not since the interstate took them all over toward Barstow." He smiled at her. She quickly gauged his intent.

"I'm not somebody who just sleeps around," she said.

"Food and shelter and clothing are commodities hard to come by in the desert," he rejoined. Vanna stared at him a long moment.

"Done," she said. She went back to eating her mashed potatoes. After a few moments she said, "I'm Donna, Donna D'Schuys. And you are?"

"Zachary Eustatius Napoleon Lee. He stuck out his hand, offering to shake hers. She took it. "You can call me Zach, or Zachary, or even Lee. Just don't call me Shorty; I find that offensive."

"Understood. How did you come to Cornbread Corners, Zach Lee?"

"I was born here. Never lived anywhere else."

"Must be dull, to grow up in a quiet place like this."

"Wasn't quiet in the old days. When Maw opened the place in the late twenties, Hollywood people used to stop here. That's why I've got the booths roped off, you see. Clark Gable and Carole Lombard used to sit in the center booth there. Randolph Scott and Gary Cooper used to sit in the left hand booth. They held hands a lot. Mary Pickford, Clara Bow, Joan Crawford, lots of stars." He sighed. "That was mostly before my time, of course. My Mama, Rhea Lee, Maw's daughter, told me all about it. I do remember the soldier boys, during the war years. They kept the place hopping. Maw and Mama made a good living here."

Vanna ate the last of her green beans. Canned ones, she guessed, from the bland taste.

"More coffee?"

"No, not now," Vanna said. "I need to wash up, if you don't mind."

"Sure. The shower's this way." He beckoned her behind the counter. She followed him through the door, glancing at the small grill and the propane burner where the kettle sat. He led her out the back door and into a shower room. "We used to cater to truckers and tourists, before the new roads took them all away. Soap's in the shower, towel and washcloth are on the rack inside. I'll go get one of Maw's dresses for you. She was about your size. I'll bring you a toothbrush and a comb, too, new off the rack."

He left Vanna to her ablutions, which she performed as best she could with the meager flow of lukewarm water. When she stepped out of the shower, he had left a cotton print dress (it had blue roses in profuse bouquets) and cotton underwear for her, but no brassiere. She dressed, combed her hair, brushed her teeth, and slipped on the huaraches he had thoughtfully left for her. She went back into the diner. Zach was at the propane burner. He had lit it to heat water for another cup of coffee.

"You sure clean up pretty," Zach said, looking her up and down.

"Thank you," Vanna said. "It's been a while since a man said anything nice like that to me."

"Come meet Mama," Zach said. "She'll want to meet you. She wants to meet all my dates."

"Your mother is still alive?"

"No, she passed quite some time ago. She's still in the diner, though. Come on, Donna, come this way." He took Vanna's hand and led her toward the shadowy corner where the life-size puppet sat in the rocking chair. When she got close, Vanna discovered the "puppet" was a mummified corpse.

"Mama, this is Donna," Zach said to his mummy. "Donna, this is Rhea Lee, my Mama." He patted the body's shoulder. Dust rose up from it. "Isn't Donna pretty, Mama?"

Vanna looked around, wondering how to escape this nutty dwarf. A large jar of dill pickles sat on a shelf. Dust covered it, too. Vanna picked it up with both hands and smashed it on Zach's head. He crumpled in a puddle of brine; shriveled cucumbers and limp sprigs of dill bedecked his brow.

"Sorry, Mama," Vanna muttered. "It's too much for me." Vanna felt in the midget's pocket for his keys. She didn't find them there, but when she opened the cash register to take whatever the till had, she found them. Only twenty-three dollars and change in the till. She stuffed the cash into a pocket of her borrowed dress.

She collected her prison uniform from the bathroom where she had left it. She went into the kitchen and poured cooking oil all over it. Then she went back to Zach and his Mama. She took a lighter from the display near the cash register, thumbed it several times until it produced a flame, which she touched to the greasy uniform. It flared up at once. She dropped the burning mess in the mummy's lap.

She went out the back door where she had seen the car, an ancient Chevrolet. She got in, started it, and took off toward the west. "Goodbye, Shorty," she said as Cornbread Corners disappeared behind her. The fire within flared in Rhea's lap, leaped for the ceiling, and caught a rafter.

A she-coyote trotted toward the old townsite. Her pups swelled her belly, though she was a few weeks from her term. She was hungry now, slower to catch her prey because the extra weight in her womb retarded her speed. She nurtured a large litter. Nine embryos grew in her. Sometimes the careless human left food scraps out where she could find them. She went there now to reconnoiter.

The smoke smell distressed her. She knew of fire, and its great danger. This smelled like a campfire. She smelled the breeze for meat cooking. She tasted the air for human presence. There was none, except the stale remembrance of people past. Only the fire smell came to her. She topped the ridge with its headdress of cholla cactus and Joshua trees. Flames engulfed the last structure in Cornbread Corners.

She slunk down the hill. The fire had driven a number of rodents into the open daylight, their burrows under the old building too hot to remain in. She caught several voles and a ground squirrel. She was crunching the last of the voles when the fire ignited the residual gas in the tank under the old pumps. They blew into the sky, rockets headed for Mars. A loud explosion announced the launch. The coyote fled over the ridge, brushing a Teddy Bear cholla as she passed it. Several segments of the plant attached themselves to her fur. Days later her side festered, her throat swelled with infection, and she died, her litter unborn.

Vanna heard the distant explosion, thought it was simply an engine noise from the Chevrolet, and drove relentlessly toward the promised highway.

### Northbound

The Hawganee vehicle sputtered to a stop. Vanna sighed. The desert afternoon was hot, she was thirsty, and Maw Hawganee's castoff dress clung to her flesh. She had soaked the cotton print with her perspiration. She was too tired to curse. She abandoned the broken Chevrolet, left it in the middle of the road, and started to walk. She soon regretted that she hadn't snared one of Maw Hawganee's hats to top of the mummy's ensemble. Zach, of course, hadn't planned for Vanna to leave the cookhouse.

The road was going up a hill from the Chevrolet. Vanna bent forward, watching where she put her trudging feet. She didn't want to turn an ankle on a rut or spin to her knees because a loose patch of gravel slid out from under her feet. It seemed to her the wind was getting louder without providing any cooling. She stopped to rest at the crest of the hill, and took time to look ahead. Relief flooded her. The freeway ran along the hill's other side, about a quarter mile from where she stood. The way to it was downhill. Her vigor renewed, she walked down to the highway, went up the northbound onramp, and stood with her thumb cocked in the classic hitchhiker's pose. Many cars passed before one stopped.

It was an older car, something Japanese, with battered fenders and rusty undercoat showing through. It was running, and the passenger door was open, beckoning her. She hoped it had air conditioning. It must have, she reasoned, because all the windows were rolled up. She ran, with a lurching gait, toward the car, got in, and pulled the door closed.

"Buckle up," a male voice told her. She looked at the driver, a scrawny little man with a shock of white hair carefully coiffed in luxurious waves. She buckled up.

"My name's Ray," he said, "Ray Fermi. "What is your name, Sister?"

Ordinarily Vanna bristled when a man addressed her as Sister. Something in Ray's tone made it sound less like the usual insult. "I'm Donna," she said, "Donna D'Schuys." She was sure no one would connect Donna D'Schuys with Vanna Dee, the escapee from El Serrucho Oxidado. The old car's air conditioning had begun cooling her almost immediately.

"How did you come to be wandering around in the desert?" Ray asked.

"I was visiting some people in the back country," she said. "They were bringing me to the next town, so I could get a bus home. Their car broke down, so I walked to the freeway."

"Do they need help?"

"No, they know the country. A neighbor's coming to help them get their car home." Ray nodded, as if to himself.

"You look right beat," he said. "You need a soda, or something, to drink. I've got a thermos in the back seat with water. It's not real cold, but it is wet. Help yourself."

Vanna unbuckled her seat belt, turned around, and got the gallon thermos off the back seat. She opened the lid enough to allow air into the container as she lifted its spigot to her mouth.

"Take it slow," Ray said. "When you get real dried out, you have to be careful not to get wet too fast. Makes you sick," he said. Vanna lowered the thermos to rest between her knees.

"Have you spent a lot of time in the desert?" she asked Ray.

"I've traveled across it almost twenty years." He smiled at her, and looked back at the road. "I'm a freeway evangelist," he said. "I drive up and down the freeways, picking up hitchhikers, or sit in diners to talk with the truckers. I tell them about Jesus, and how he died for our sins. Do you know Jesus?"

"Not personally," Vanna said, and stared out her side window at the passing rocks and cacti.

"It's all in the Book, the Good Book," Ray went on. Vanna could hear his enthusiasm growing. She shuddered within. Evangelists were not her cup of tea. She shut her mind and ears, and let Ray ramble on with his scriptural quotes and sermonizing. She didn't respond, not even to murmur "Mhmm," and yet he kept going. He was self-priming. Evening came down with a gray velvet kind of light. The color dimmed and bled away from the twisted and layered rocks. Lights ahead promised food and shelter. Ray was asking her a question.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I was thinking about something. What did you ask me?"

"Do you want to stop for some supper?" He smiled. "The Dipstick Diner up ahead is pretty decent. Breakfast twenty-four hours around. It's the only place to eat for a lot of miles."

"Yes," Vanna said. "I should stop and eat. Maybe find a place to wash up a bit."

"Coming right up," Ray said. It took another ten minutes before they reached the off ramp for the Dipstick Diner. When they got to the restaurant, Ray parked under a yellow and pink neon sign. The lights colored his coiffure, making it a sickly thing to look at. Vanna looked away.

Ray held the door for her as she got out of the car. Then he shut the doors and locked them. Vanna stumbled toward the diner's entrance. Ray rushed up and supported her under her elbow. Uncharacteristically, she welcomed his support. The noise and lights dizzied Vanna when they walked in. If Ray hadn't been holding her, she might have swooned and fallen. The hostess, a brassy blonde well past her youth, led them to a booth. The red vinyl looked new. A truck driver of indeterminate gender sat at the counter nearby, alternately scooping up scrambled eggs and guzzling coffee. An elderly waitress, her gray hair styled as carefully as Ray's hair was, replenished the driver's coffee before coming to take Ray and Vanna's order. Vanna ordered breakfast. Ray ordered the fried shrimp.

Ray continued to talk about his beloved Jesus while they ate. Vanna pretended to listen to him. Now that they were in the diner, it was harder to ignore him. He gesticulated with his fork as he made his points about salvation. Vanna looked up once, caught the truck driver's eye, and shrugged very slightly. The truck driver winked, and turned back to the coffee cup on the counter.

Vanna finished her meal first. She hadn't interrupted Ray's monologue. She watched the truck driver get up, leave money to cover the check, and walk to an arch where a sign promised restrooms lay beyond it. The gray haired waitress picked up the money and rang up the sale on the cash register. Then she cleared the dirty dishes from the counter. Vanna excused herself, saying she needed to use the bathroom facilities, and left. Ray continued to preach to the shrimp and fries on his plate. Vanna guessed he hadn't heard her, or realized she had left.

### On the Road Again

In the Dipstick Diner's women's room Vanna went about her business. When she emerged from the stall, she was surprised to see the truck driver standing at one of the sinks carefully combing her very short hair while looking in the mirror. Her body was blocky, and only the closest inspection showed her breasts, which, apparently, she did not confine in a brassiere. She raked Vanna up and down with a penetrating glance.

"That your husband out there?" the truck driver asked.

"No, just somebody who picked me up on the freeway when my car broke down," Vanna said. "Talks a lot."

"I guess!" the truck driver said. "Drive me up a wall, having to listen to that Jesus crap."

"Not my favorite topic, either," Vanna said. "It's a free ride, anyway."

"Probably not," the driver said. "That kind usually uses another body part almost as much as they use their mouth. If he's anything like one freeway evangelist I've heard of, he'll want something all night to pay for the ride, then sneak out and leave you with a motel bill to pay."

"Ray says he's a freeway evangelist."

"Wouldn't be Ray Fermi, would he?"

"That's the name he claims."

"He's got a bad reputation. Preaches your ear off while he's doing the nasty, according to a couple of working girls I know up toward Dry Bone City. Get shut of him, girl."

"How am I going to do that? I don't have much money, and no way to get away from here until the bus comes by."

"No bus here, little lady. You need a plan B. Which way are you headed?"

"North."

"I'm going that way myself. I can give you a lift as far as Dry Bone City." She stuck out her hand. "My name's Ann, Ann Droyd. What's yours?"

"Donna, Donna D'Schuys."

"You got a purse, or coat, or anything back there with the loudmouth?"

"No. Everything I've got with me is here."

"Okay, then. We'll just slip out the back way. Let good old Ray pay for your eats."

"That sounds good to me."

They left the women's bathroom. Instead of turning left toward the dining room, they turned right toward a door marked Exit. Ann pushed it open. Her eighteen-wheeler sat behind the diner, idling.

"Hop in on the other side," she told Vanna. Vanna went around the truck and climbed up on the running board to open the door. The seat was rather high above the running board. Vanna had to clamber in like a small child. When she had seated herself, breathing rather heavily, Ann showed her where the seat belt was, and how to buckle it. Then Ann put the rig in gear and started up the onramp, gradually building up to freeway speed. The chatter of the diesel engine sped up and turned into a background noise, singing in harmony with tires and the evening winds blowing through the cab. The music of the travel lulled Vanna to sleep. Ann looked over at her from time to time and smiled. Vanna slept on, undisturbed.

Four hours down the road, Ann pulled into another truck stop. The change in the sounds and the brighter lights woke Vanna. "Dry Bone City?" she asked.

"Not yet, Donna," Ann said. "We're about half way, though. This hole-in-the-desert is the Valve and Gear Diner. We're at the top of the Juniper Summit. I need to get rid of some stale coffee, and take on fresh. Coming in?"

"No," Vanna said. "I'll just doze here, if that's okay."

"Fine by me. Want me to bring you anything?"

Vanna dug in her pocket and pulled out a dollar bill. "A donut, if they've got one. Chocolate frosted."

"I'll see," Ann said. She took the dollar and went in. Vanna dozed off again. Loud voices just outside the cab woke her.

Voice One said, "Heard about a prison break at El Serrucho Oxidado." This voice sounded young, like a man just past boyhood.

Voice Two said, "Oh yeah. That's a prison for broads, ain't it?" This voice was rougher and older than the other. Vanna slipped down out of sight.

Voice One: "Yeah, somewhere out beyond nowhere, in the desert. Anyway, this one broad just walked away. Didn't do her no good, though.

Voice Two: "How's that?"

Voice One: "That desert's hell on earth. They reckon she died out there. Search helicopter found a few bones, some orange scraps of cloth, and hair. Not much left. Seems the coyotes get hungry."

Voice Two: "Bad way to go. Been better she stayed in prison." Vanna heard footsteps crunch on a patch of gravel, and the two voices were gone. She almost sobbed with relief. Whoever had died in the Páramo Purpúreo had stopped her pursuers. Vanna felt no sorrow for the dead woman. If she didn't have the strength to survive, that was her problem. Vanna stretched out on the front seat, careful not to bump any of the levers and switches. She didn't know how to drive a big rig. She was wishing Ann would hurry up when she drifted off to sleep again.

Ann woke her. "Hey, Donna, wake up," she said. "I got your donut. I brought you some coffee, too." Vanna, startled, bumped her head on the steering wheel as she sat up.

"Damn!" Vanna said. Then, "Sorry, Ann. Just bumped my head."

"Okay. Here, take your donut and coffee." She took them and sat up on her side of the cab. Ann stood on the running board and swung her considerable bulk into the cab with grace and ease. She slammed the door shut, put the tractor in gear, and rolled toward the highway.

"You know anybody in Dry Bone City?" she asked Vanna.

"No. I'm going on from there to a place up north called Las Tumbas."

"I've heard of it. It's the other side of the City, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"Got family there?"

"Yes," Vanna lied. Ann stopped asking questions. The big rig wore away the miles as it rolled north.

### House in Dry Bone City

Ann brought her big rig to a stop in an empty shopping mall parking lot. She shut off the engine. The sudden quiet woke Vanna.

"Where are we?" Vanna asked.

"Dry Bone City," Ann said, "at an old mall on the south side of town."

"What's around here? Any place to eat or to stay?"

"No place to eat until morning. There is a place to stay, but you might not want to go there."

"If it's halfway clean and has a bed, I'm open to it."

Ann chuckled. A gleam of the setting moon glanced off her teeth. "It has beds aplenty," she said. "Most of them occupied."

"Is it expensive? I wouldn't think so, not in this neighborhood."

"You don't have much cash?"

"Only twenty bucks."

"Well, maybe you can work something out with the owner. She's a friend of mine, Delta Blow. You up for walking a couple of blocks?"

"Is it safe?"

"Around here? Oh, yea, it's really a quiet neighborhood this time of night."

"What time is it?"

"About three in the morning. I can leave the rig here. I can't unload until seven or so."

"Unload? What?"

"My cargo. Canned tomatoes and peaches. Might be some canned asparagus back there, too. It's groceries for the discount supermarket in this mall. They sell what other markets can't sell." Ann opened her door. Something clanged on the running board, and banged on the asphalt.

"Damn!" Ann said.

"What dropped?" Vanna asked as she opened her door too.

"Well, it wasn't my earring, honey," Ann said. She bent over, picked up an object and held it up for Vanna to see. "My iron," Ann said. "I carry it for protection. Some of the truckers on the road get a mite frisky, and this equalizes things."

"Oh, I see," Vanna said. "Are you taking it with us?"

"No," Ann said as she tossed it back in the cab. "We won't need it." She took a jacket from behind the seat. "You be warm enough in that flimsy dress?"

"I think so," Vanna said, "if we don't have far to go."

"Only a couple of blocks," Ann said. "Push the button by the armrest down. That locks the door; then shut it." Vanna shut the heavy door. Ann walked around the front of the cab. "We go up this street," Ann said, indicating a dark tunnel across the thoroughfare from the mall. The lights of Dry Bone City lit up the sky in the far distance. Vanna stayed close to Ann as they walked north. Their footsteps echoed off the silent buildings on either side. No streetlights illuminated the building facades. The moon was too low to penetrate the gloom. Vanna got the impression the structures were mainly one or two stories with flat roofs. An occasional lighter shadow suggested a few old Victorian houses remained scattered among the industrial buildings.

In the third block one building, an old Victorian house three stories high, stood out against the Dry Bone City glow. The porch light had one small red bulb and two white ones that shed a pink patina over the painted wood. Ann turned in at the neat wrought iron gate. Vanna marveled that the gate was so well oiled it whispered as it opened. She followed Ann.

Ann rapped discreetly on the door. Vanna wondered who would hear such a soft knock at this hour. A large woman opened the door. Vanna could only make out her silhouette against the soft yellow light of the interior. Only after she had entered behind Ann did she realize the woman's hourglass figure threatened to spill out of a very fitted pink and purple velvet dress topped with a mauve and white boa. A large mound of blond hair sat atop the woman's head; Vanna suspected it was a wig. Ann made the introductions.

"Delta, this is Donna, Donna D'Schuys. Donna, this is Delta, Delta Blow." Delta extended her hand for a shake. Vanna took it. The woman's grip power surprised Vanna. "Donna needs a place to stay, maybe earn a little money. She's on her way to see family up north. I thought you might have an opening."

"Ann, honey, I've got no more openings than any other woman." Delta tittered; the tiny laugh was all out of proportion to her size. "Come into the parlor," she said to Vanna. "Nobody else is in there right now." She led the way toward a side room, where she turned the lights to full brightness. The room was lined with red plush sofas and cushioned chairs. Red velvet drapes covered the windows. An upright piano occupied one short wall next to a staircase that ascended into the gloom upstairs. Vanna wondered what western movie the decorator had used for inspiration.

"Let me take a look at you, honey," she said to Vanna. Vanna stood still while Delta studied her face and body in detail. Delta said "Hmm..." two or three times. Vanna hadn't been so closely scrutinized since she had begun work at the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon.

"Your face is too old," Delta said, "though your figure held up pretty well. Could wrap that up in leather, give you a whip and some small chains, but you've got too many deep lines in your face to carry it off. Gray hair doesn't help, although we can change that. I don't think you'll make a working girl."

"I've had experience," Vanna said, "as a dominatrix. In a women's bar."

"Whipping men is about the same as whipping women," Delta said, "but you just look too old. That what you were in for, prostitution?"

"Yes." Delta nodded at her.

"You know anything about keeping books?"

"I worked for the government once."

"I didn't say 'cooking books,' honey. Done any housekeeping?"

"When I had to."

"I can always use a maid," Delta said, "and general kitchen helper. I'll find a bed for you for tonight, and introduce you to Hannah Bollix, our housekeeper and cook, in the morning. Need a bath?"

"Yes."

"I'll take you to the tub," Delta said. "Ann, what about you? Need a place to sleep?"

"I'll use the cab's sleeper. I've got a seven o'clock unload, and then I'm off for home. Thanks, Delta, for taking in my stray."

"I'm sure it will be mutually advantageous," Delta said. "Find your own way out?"

"Yes. See you next trip north." Ann gave Delta a quick kiss and shook Vanna's hand. "Good luck, Donna," she said. "I hope you can see your family soon." Then she walked into the hall and out the front door.

"Come this way," Delta said to Vanna as they entered the hall. She pushed a swinging door open. At once the décor changed from modified Victorian to sleek modern. "Please walk softly," Delta whispered to Vanna. "Most of the girls are sleeping. They've had a busy night." At the end of the corridor Delta turned right, opened a door, and led Vanna into a small and efficient bathroom.

"Towels on the rack," she said. "Put the one you use in the hamper by the basin. I'll get a bed made up for you."

Vanna drew a bath, eased herself into it, and luxuriated in the warm comfort until the water began to cool. She soaped herself then, and rinsed, and got out and dried off. She slipped Maw Hawganee's dress on, since she had nothing else to wear, and went into the hall. Delta Blow emerged from the door opposite, which Vanna could see opened onto a kitchen, and led her to a nearby bedroom.

"Sleep tight," Delta said, after turning down the covers for her. "I'll bring you something better to wear. I'll hang it in the closet."

"Thanks," Vanna said. She slid under the covers and was asleep before they warmed up.

### The Merry Maid

Hannah Bollix woke Vanna in midmorning. That was the normal rising time for kitchen help, she told Vanna. "Come to the kitchen in ten minutes," Hanna said. "It's time to make the canapés. You'll put the olives on."

Vanna got out of bed. She was pleased to see Delta had left a brassiere and panties that fit her and a plain striped seersucker frock in the closet. The frock had a wide white collar, and looked rather like a uniform. She put the clothes on, and slipped her feet into the huaraches. She made a mental note to get hold of other footgear. Mama Rhea Lee's feet had been smaller than Vanna's, and the huaraches were not a good fit.

Vanna stepped into Hannah's kitchen and found Hell. Hannah was a small, shriveled, woman with an acid glare and a razor tongue. She showed Vanna how to spread cream cheese on little dry crackers and how to place a stuffed olive slice in the exact center of the cracker. Vanna had little empathy and much antipathy for culinary work. Cooking reminded her of Dickon, and her sense of subservience as his wife. For this time, she knew she could not object too strongly, not until she had accumulated a little capital for going on.

Hannah was not easily pleased; she was, like many cooks, a perfectionist. Additionally, presentation was paramount with her canapés; they were to grace the parlor where the gentlemen waited for the turn at the house's services. Hannah felt she had a reputation to maintain. Vanna infuriated her, because Vanna could not seem to grasp how important it was that the olive slices should be _exactly_ centered on the cracker, and that the cream cheese should be of a _uniform thickness_ on the cracker. Hannah despaired of teaching Vanna to cover the entire cracker with cream cheese.

She set her to work, instead, cutting zucchini and carrots for the evening meal for the staff. Delta fed her ladies one meal a day as part of their compensation from the house. She also covered all work-related medical and dental expenses. She did not provide child support, however. Delta was renowned in her community for her charitable works. Hannah told Vanna these things in short bursts of angry speech. Vanna cut the vegetables poorly, but this angered Hannah less than the olive misplacements had. Hannah performed the duties that required more skill, such as frosting the sugar cookies and cutting out their shapes. When Vanna had finished crucifying the evening's vegetables, Hannah left her for a moment to consult with Delta Blow.

Delta returned with Hannah. "Donna," she said, "I've other duties for you this afternoon. The rooms where the ladies entertain their gentleman callers need refreshing. I'll show you how to do the first one, and then you can complete the others. Please come with me."

Vanna gladly escaped the kitchen. She was feeling quite peckish. She had learned early on that Hannah disapproved of the help's eating even the most mistake-laden canapé. Raw zucchini and raw carrots did not look like food to Vanna. Hungry as she was, being around food only heightened her need.

"When do we eat?" she asked Delta as she followed her up a narrow flight of stairs just outside the kitchen.

"Later, when the ladies get here," Delta said. "Doesn't do a woman's figure much good to eat too heavy, unless she's going to be doing field work." Delta's ample figure, wrapped now in a flowing yellow muumuu fringed with a bright orange trim, glided down the upstairs corridor to its far end. She opened one of the two doors in the end wall. It let into a closet with a sink, mops hanging on a rack, toilet-cleaning implements, and a cart stocked with toilet paper rolls and plastic bags for lining small wastebaskets. Next to it a little red wagon held a vacuum and mop bucket.

"Each one of my ladies is a jewel," Delta said with a grandiloquent flourish of her heavy arm. Vanna noticed that each finger of Delta's hand sported a ring set with a gaudy stone. She wondered if Delta was talking about her work staff, or her hand. "There's Amethyst, Diamond, Emerald, Jade, Onyx, Opal, Pearl, Peridot, Ruby, Sapphire, Turquoise. I name each of them as I hire them."

She rolled the cart into the corridor. Delta rolled the wagon out as well. "Each lady's room has a carpet in the bedchamber. The floor in each bathroom is tile. You will vacuum the carpet and mop the tile." Delta closed the door, and opened the other alongside it. Satin bed sheets and pillowcases filled the shelves. Each was a different color.

"Each lady has her own color of bed linens," Delta explained. "These lavender ones are for Amethyst, for example. The white set is for Diamond, the bright green for Emerald, the dark green for Jade, and so on." Delta opened a door on the side of the cart. She took a set of sheets and pillowcases in each color and stacked them in the cart. She closed the door.

"Now, honey, push the cart with one hand and drag the wagon with the other. The rooms are never locked, so always knock before you go in. We don't get much afternoon trade, but it happens sometimes. You don't want to disturb the working women. It just isn't done."

When they reached the stair head, Delta knocked on the door marked Amethyst. She got no answer, so she entered. "I suggest you start in the bathroom," Delta told Vanna. "First empty the wastebasket. It's usually full of used condoms, so use rubber gloves. There are some gloves on the cart." Delta put a pair on, picked up the plastic sack, tied a twist in the top of it, and dropped it into a heavy canvas bag attached to one end of the cart. "Then clean the basin, shower, and toilet," Delta continued. She showed Vanna how to use the various brushes and cleaners for each bathroom appliance.

"In the bedchamber," she went on, "first strip the bed. Then empty the wastebaskets, gather any glasses or bottles, and put them on the cart. I'll warn you now, don't think about drinking anything in any of the bottles. Frequently the fluid is not alcohol." Vanna nodded. She didn't care for alcohol, and doubted she'd like any other fluids even that well.

"After you wipe off the dresser and the nightstands, make the bed," Delta went on. "If you're not sure what color bed clothes to use, just match the ones on the cart to the ones on the bed. Store the dirty linens in the other side of the cart. There's a canvas bag to hold them. When you're done, turn down the bed at one corner, so it looks inviting, turn out the lights, and close the door. Then go to the next room across the hall." Delta swiftly stripped and made the bed in Amethyst's room. Vanna hoped she understood the proper folding to use on the corners.

"Now," Delta said as they crossed the hall to Turquoise's room, "I'll watch, and you do this room." Delta stood back, and Vanna began in the bathroom, cleaned it, and then cleaned the bedchamber. She almost put Sapphire's sheets on Turquoise's bed. Her sense of color was poor in the corridor's dim light. Delta helped her distinguish the two colors, and Vanna finished the room.

"You should do all right on your own," Delta said. "When you're through, take the trash bag and the laundry bag down the back stairs—that's the staircase we came up—and leave them on the back porch. The service will take them from there. On Fridays look for packages wrapped in blue paper. Those will be the sheets returned from the dry cleaners." Delta took a deep breath. "Got it? Think you can manage?"

"Yes," Vanna said, and she did. She soon came to appreciate her time cleaning the rooms. No Hanna Bollix disturbed her work. Hannah loomed over the rest of her waking hours like a miasma of misery. Payday came at the end of every month. Delta paid Vanna a modest stipend for her work. Vanna was furious to learn that ten percent of her wages was deducted automatically for a charitable fund the house supported. The fund paid for housing aging prostitutes in a convent with aging nuns. Vanna watched for months to see where Delta kept this money without success.

### The Cote of Soiled Doves

Vanna grew accustomed to the routine of peeling vegetables and cleaning toilets that her new life provided. She had not wholly recovered from the psychic binding La Señora had inflicted on her. Her drive to go north to avenge herself did not disappear, but its coals were banked in the recesses of her spirit. She found the monotony of her days soothing. She rested, recuperating some of her power as she wielded the vegetable peelers and commode brushes of her new arsenal. The lines incarceration had scarred into her face softened and smoothed, though not enough to disguise her age. The gray streaks in her hair stayed. Where her figure had once been trim and womanly, now it was gaunt, and she had developed a light stoop.

She discovered that all was not as sweet and cozy in the House as Delta Blow liked to paint it. Theoretically, Delta collected fees for all the ladies, and took a small percentage for House overhead before she disbursed the funds to each woman. She did not tell them she took ten percent off the top before she calculated the House fee. Delta considered this her moral right, as she had no other salary from the business.

The ladies were contractually obliged to turn over any gratuities especially grateful customers lavished on them to the common fund, so Delta could take the House share. Vanna discovered every one of them had a tip stash in their rooms. Vanna deemed it appropriate that she, as maid of all work to these ladies, who seldom acknowledged her existence, should get a small gratuity of her own. The ladies could not report any thefts without exposing their own duplicity.

Vanna became adept at ferreting out the tip cache locations. Amethyst had a purple teddy bear decorating her bed. It sat on the pillows, and was nearly as large as a Great Dane. Amethyst had installed a zipper in the teddy's crotch. It was functional, and she slipped all her tips into a cavity in the toy's stuffing. She collected a sizeable sum. Her waist was delicately thin, and her bosom most ample. The middle-aged men, the ones who had more money, frequented Amethyst.

Diamond was a thin stick for those who liked such stringy meat. They were commonly stingy men, grim in their demeanor, quick about their business, and disinclined to tip. Diamond did have a small cache, stored in an old cold cream jar. Vanna took little of it. Diamond counted the money every evening when she came in, and again in the morning. She knew to a penny how much should be in her jar.

Emerald was careless. She had great swaths of emerald cloth draped over every bit of furniture, and even an emerald sash framing a picture of the Virgin. The Holy Mother's gentle gaze did not deter Emerald's customers, or Emerald herself. Any gratuities Emerald received she carelessly laid on the bureau top or stuffed into a medicine chest on the wall of her apartment's bathroom. Vanna easily extracted a large share of Emerald's extra earnings without Emerald's noticing.

Jade was close with her funds. She had a small bamboo vase that held her tips. Each morning she took whatever was in the vase with her. Vanna never got a chance at Jade's money. Onyx chose to decorate her room with an African art theme. Shields and spears ranged along the walls. Her cache reposed in the helmet that perched on top of a Masai warrior statue. Onyx catered to the young men, and got only a little money on the side, compared to ladies like Emerald and Amethyst. Opal served the working classes, truck drivers, dockworkers, and the like. Her room had simple furnishings. The visible fabrics ran to chintzes and machine lace. Her tips were moderate. She kept them in a mason jar in a drawer. Vanna found her gratuities to be a modest but steady source of income.

Pearl was old for a woman in her line of work, and near retirement. Delta wanted to encourage her to retire, since she added little to the House income. If Pearl received any tips, Vanna never found where she stashed them. The furnishings in Pearl's room were minimal, just what the House provided. Peridot decorated her quarters with vague landscapes drifting in mist. The few times Vanna had observed Peridot, she seemed to be drifting in mists herself. She did keep a cache of tips, though. She had taped a heavy nine-inch by eleven-inch envelope behind one of the landscapes. She stuffed the cash she earned there. She kept strict account of how much went in, and how much she took out. Vanna did not dip into her cache.

Ruby loved sweets. Her plump figure testified to her weakness for chocolates. Her regular gentlemen callers, the clients most likely to leave a tip, commonly brought boxes of chocolates for her. Vanna had little use for chocolates, though she did, on rare occasions, help herself to a truffle or two. Sapphire and Turquoise were sisters. Ecru lace defined their decorative preference. The lace covered bureaus, accented framed pictures (mostly of dogs and horses), and fringed their bed shams. They sometimes entertained clients together. Old gentlemen, approaching senility, many of whom declined sex for conversation, were wont to leave the sisters with stock tips, or some sentimental bit of jewelry such as their grandmother's rings. The sisters took in too little cash to help Vanna's escape fund.

The kitchen, of course, provided Vanna no opportunity for theft. Hannah Bollix kept tight control of the food money. She met their suppliers at the door, and disbursed funds as needed to obtain items, mostly vegetables Vanna wound up peeling. Vanna might have got away with an extra cucumber slice or two, but so much as even one cream cheese decorated cracker missing required a full and truthful explanation as to its disappearance. Vanna was not sufficiently fond of crackers to steal very many, and, Hannah did provide her an adequate amount of food.

Vanna did not eat with the ladies at their grand meal. She served them, and laid out the plates and platters of canapés in the receiving parlor. When all was presented to Delta's satisfaction, Vanna could take a quiet plate in the kitchen. When the House activity was in full swing, Delta expected Vanna to keep discreetly to her room. Vanna complained to Hannah Bollix that she had nothing to do but sit in the room and stare at the wall. Vanna intended to extend this complaint into a request for a television set. Hannah, however, determined it best to solve Vanna's boredom by presenting her with a small library of religious texts to read. Vanna stacked them on her bureau to collect the dust of the ages.

### Irons in Vanna's Fire

Chill rain fell steadily. The sky was as dark at noon as it was at dawn and twilight. When night came the House's clientele huddled in the parlor nibbling canapés and swilling hot chocolate. Hannah Bollix pressed Vanna into service filling wontons with ginger-spiced pork and shredded cabbage to make a special winter treat for the parlor people. Vanna took a basket of the deep-fried goodies to fill a chafing dish in the parlor. It was a lulled moment. Only two brothers sat on couches waiting for one or another of the ladies to service their needs.

The brothers, Brandon and Clapton Irons, were callow fellows. Only a year apart in age, they were often mistaken for twins. They were pale, with faded blue eyes and weedy brown hair. They were altogether unprepossessing. Vanna slipped in quietly and dumped her basket of wontons into the chafing dish.

"Are you the next one?" Clapton asked her.

"Next what?"

"Next working lady?" Brandon elaborated.

"No. I work in the kitchen."

"A pretty lady like you?" Clapton said.

"I'm not pretty enough for this kind of work," Vanna said, and started to leave. Brandon grasped her arm, not roughly, and held her in the parlor.

"Clapton and I are tired of waiting," Brandon said. "We've been here a half hour."

Vanna pulled her arm from the boy-man's grasp. "I'm sure Delta will have someone to accommodate you momentarily," she said. "Now, please let me go. I am not supposed to linger in the parlor."

"How much?" Clapton said.

"Boys, boys!" Delta admonished them. "Donna is my cleaning lady and kitchen helper. She's not a professional lady. Do have some of her wontons. There's mustard sauce and soy and rice vinegar to season them." She jerked her head at Vanna, indicating she should leave. Delta's great beehive hairdo, flaming red tonight, slipped askew. Un-self-consciously Delta pushed it back into place with a touch of her hand.

Vanna left. She heard Delta advising the weedy brothers behind her that they should wait for the "really pretty" ladies. Vanna fumed at Delta's insult. Not for the first time Vanna wondered where Delta kept the fund for aging prostitutes. Hannah Bollix had mentioned that the fund's receipts would soon be turned over to the convent for the care of geriatric fallen angels. Vanna wanted the money to escape. Her psychic synapses had been slowly healing. She remembered ever more clearly her desire to revenge herself on La Señora and on Dickon (she had come to believe Dickon had led La Señora's attack).

Delta had expanded Vanna's cleaning chores. When she finished cleaning Turquoise's room, she had to clean Delta's apartment. It was larger, of course, than any of the working ladies' rooms. Delta had a bathroom, elegantly appointed with marble fixtures that required special polishing, a bedroom with a great heart-shaped bed that required special sheets that were very hard to fit to the bed, and a sitting room cluttered with plaster saints and votive candles. Several particularly vulgar and sentimental religious prints littered the walls. Each of these had votive candles, also. Once each week Vanna had to remove the candle stubs and put new ones in the little glass holders. Each glass holder had to be washed (which meant scraping off wax and soot) before it received the new candle. Vanna wondered how Delta managed to breathe when all the candles were lit. The sitting room was always low on oxygen, even with the doors open.

In the end, though, Vanna found an advantage. She had just begun on the candleholders when she knocked a particularly hideous representation of the Sacred Heart of Jesus loose. Its nail fell from the loose hole in the plaster, and only Vanna's quick reflexive response prevented the prized atrocity from plunging to the floor and an almost certain smashing. This picture had covered Delta's wall safe. It had a combination lock, of course, and Vanna knew that would stop her prying for a time. Delta, for all her business acumen, was not clever or devious enough to hide her combination very well. She had written it on a piece of paper that she had pasted to the fallen picture. Vanna quickly memorized it. Then she replaced the nail in its loose hole and carefully hung the picture on it. She swept up the plaster fragments that had fallen on the floor and completed her cleaning. She left the picture hanging on a slant. She hoped Delta would straighten the frame, thereby dislodging the nail and bringing down the picture.

Evidently Delta had tried to straighten the picture. When she went in the next day, the plaster was patched. The picture was down, disclosing the safe. Delta stayed in the room the whole time Vanna was cleaning. Vanna pretended to take no notice of the safe. The day after that Delta had re-hung the picture. Vanna guessed Delta might be holding the retired prostitute's funds in the safe, along with the receipts from the House. One day when Delta was occupied outside the House on business, Vanna opened the safe and checked its contents. It held several rings, some very old letters, and a stout envelope with the funds for the convent. Vanna shrewdly returned everything to its correct position. She deemed it wisest to take no money from the fund until she could take it all and make good her escape.

Escape was a major hurdle. How could she get away from the House without pursuit? Delta had many friends on the Dry Bone City police force, and others among the local state troopers. Vanna knew she'd not get far without help.

The Irons brothers entered her life again. Hannah Bollix, about ten days before the winter solstice celebrations, fell ill with influenza. It kept her in her bed for several days, days when Vanna had to serve in the kitchen. The canapés in the parlor were as carefully made as ever, but the ladies ate very plainly indeed. Vanna did not pretend to understand cookery, or to have any culinary talent whatsoever. She managed to fry hamburger patties and boil potatoes. She could also tear lettuce for a salad. For several days the working ladies at Delta's House suffered Vanna's uninspired dinners.

Vanna also had to take responsibility for deliveries. Among those who delivered items to the House were the Irons brothers. They delivered clean towels and bedding, the very same rainbow assortment Vanna used to refurbish the workrooms for the ladies.

When Vanna opened the door to accept the first delivery, Clapton called back to his brother, "Hey, Brandon, it's the lady that looks like Mama!" Brandon came hurrying, a load of colored towels in his arms.

"Cheese, you're right, Bro," he said. "Howdy, Ma'am. Don't remember us, I suppose."

"Yes," Vanna said. "I believe we met in the parlor." She spoke sharply.

"We need to apologize," Clapton said. He held his cap in his hands and shuffled his feet. A faint sour smell rose from him. Vanna wondered whether it was his natural body odor, or some effect of the rain's growing mold on him.

"For what?" she said.

"For thinking you were a working lady," said Brandon. He came up on the back porch. Vanna noticed the top towel on the stack he carried had been spotted with the rain that had begun to fall.

"Apology accepted," she said. "Stack the towels and bedding in the usual place," she ordered. "Let me know when you're finished."

"Yes, Ma'am," Brandon said. Clapton shuffled his feet again, and jammed his cap on his head, the bill covering his neck. They turned and went to the rear of their truck and began relaying sheets, pillowcases, and towels into the small room off the House's rear entry. Vanna went to the kitchen and brewed a small pot of coffee. Her coffee was atrocious, she knew. She suspected the Irons brothers wouldn't notice; she doubted they were latté cognoscenti.

When they had completed their unloading, Vanna invited them into the kitchen for a cup of coffee. They each drank three cups of the vilely weak brew she offered them. She made small talk with them. She discovered Clapton was the brainy one; he had completed tenth grade. Brandon hadn't quite finished the ninth grade. Then they quit school to hustle laundry for an uncle who exploited the family connection for every possible cent.

She also discovered they had lost their mother about a year before, and now lived together in a small set of rooms in a gloomy boarding house. For them, the House was a grand and glamorous place, one they could seldom afford. Even to sit in the kitchen thrilled them. Clapton complimented Vanna on her coffee several times, claiming it was just as good as the brew his mother used to make. Brandon offered an enthusiastic "Uh-Huh!" after Clapton's compliments.

Vanna let them rattle on about the wonders of laundry pickup and delivery for a while longer. She set about preparing the vegetables for the ladies' supper. She was boldly going to essay boiling carrots as well as potatoes tonight, and frying sausage patties instead of ground beef.

"Boys," she said, "how far did you say you travel on your route?"

"Mostly around Dry Bone City," Brandon said.

"Have you ever been up north?"

Clapton answered. "We went all the way to Skater Falls last winter," he said. Skater Falls was a small town about forty miles north of Dry Bone City.

"Ever been to the Keystone?" she asked, naming the state capitol. "Ever been to the City?"

"Those places are too big for the likes of us," Brandon said.

"Yeah, we'd get lost, or raped, or something," Clapton said.

"Not if you had somebody experienced with you," she said. "Somebody like me. I've been both places. I could show you the ropes."

"Cheese!" Brandon said. "Think about it, Clapton! We could have some real fun!"

"What would we do for money, Bro?"

"You said your uncle owes you a bonus, didn't you?" Vanna asked. They hadn't, but now they remembered saying it.

"Yeah, he does," Brandon said.

"Right," Clapton said, "but we'll never see it."

"You'll just have to take it," Vanna said. "Don't you collect the receipts for the route?"

"Yes," Clapton said.

"He always counts that money real close," Brandon said.

"What if you just kept it for one day, left that night for the north?" Vanna said. "Take the truck, too. You can make peace with him when you get back."

"I don't know," Clapton said. Vanna saw he was churning the idea behind his pimpled brow.

"Maybe we could, Clap," Brandon said. "Let's think about it."

"Could you go, Miss Donna?"

"I could, in about a week," she said. "It'll take some planning, though."

"Next week we collect from a lot of customers," Brandon said. "It'd be a perfect time, Clap."

"Let me think about it," Clapton said.

"Maybe you boys should get on your way," Vanna said, "while you think about it. Don't want to get your uncle mad at you. Let me know what you decide to do." The boys got up, caps in hand, and thanked Vanna for the coffee. They left the House talking conspiratorially about getting away to the north. Vanna shut the door behind them and crossed her fingers. Some seeds, she thought, get planted in very uncertain soil.

### The Tea Party

Delta brought Vanna a knit dress of a soft rose color. "This should suit you. Wear it to the church tea party next Sunday."

"What party?"

"Every year in December the local Evangelical Church of the Foursquare Bible, that church two blocks from here, throws a tea party for all the girls in the house. Their invitation includes all the staff, as well."

"Why some church want to throw a tea party for a house of whores, and why they would want to go, is beyond me," Vanna groused.

"It's for something they call their mission outreach. The food's good, the tea is drinkable, and the ladies are polite. I think some of them are curious. Once I even recruited a Jade from the group. The church ladies loved her; she tithed, and that was over half their monthly budget."

Vanna asked, with a grimace, "Attendance is mandatory?"

"An appearance is. I'm not comfortable with evangelical church stuff, myself. I'm a practicing Catholic; I go to mass every Christmas and every Easter, and I never miss the Good Friday Stations of the Cross."

"Okay." Vanna fumed after Delta had left. How was she to get away with the Irons brothers? She had been aware the House was going to some party (she had guessed it might have something to do with the convent for old nuns and whores). She had hoped to slip away unnoticed while Hannah and Delta were having their naps. So now what?

When the day came, the weather was clear and cold. The customary heavy fog that wrapped Dry Bone City in the winter mercifully shrank back against the mountains on the west side of the valley. Delta led her ladies to the small chapel the Evangelicals worshipped in. They went directly to the basement without entering the chapel.

The church ladies had decorated the basement to make it cheery. Evergreens, in honor of the advent season, looped in an arch over the Salsman's "Head of Christ" lithograph that dominated one wall. On the opposite wall, a reprint of Holman Hunt's "Jesus the Light of the World" was similarly draped with pine boughs. Vanna felt suffocation from all the religious potlucks of her past rise up to threaten her breathing. The room began to blur. Vanna sat down heavily on a nearby chair. One of the church ladies, a solicitous woman of bulky build wrapped in navy blue with tiny white polka dots scattered over it, observed Vanna's discomfort.

"Dearie," she said, leaning over Vanna, collapsed on the chair, "do you need a cup of tea?"

Vanna's view of the dotted cloth stretched to the tearing point over the woman's bulging bosom swirled her into a swoon. Perhaps the heavily rose-scented talcum the woman had daubed on her face contributed to Vanna's sense of suffocation. Vanna passed out. A gaggle of church ladies surrounded her, patting her hands or chafing her wrists. Delta saw the commotion and came over to rescue Vanna.

"Please, ladies," Delta said. "I think she just needs some air and some quiet." Seeing that the solicitous women were reluctant to let go of this opportunity to serve one of "the tainted," Delta said, "Maybe just one of you could stay with her until she has recovered."

"I will," the first lady said. "I found her first." She glared up at her evangelical cohorts. They were all accustomed to deferring to the woman's wishes, and so they drifted away to mingle with their fallen angel guests.

Vanna returned to consciousness. Her first impression was of a night sky with fuzzy stars that unaccountably trembled and danced. Enlivening awareness finally led her to realize the shivering sky was simply the church lady's breasts heaving about as she breathed. The poor lady was wheezing. Some other allergen, probably a cosmetic worn by one of the other church ladies, had initiated her asthma. She sneezed, and the heavens shook. Vanna sat up.

"Feeling better, Dearie?" the lady asked.

"Yes," Vanna said. "A little dizzy, still, but all right otherwise."

"Maybe now's the time for that cup of tea," the lady said.

"Yes," Vanna said eager to be rid of the woman's powder, "a cup of tea, very nice."

"Take anything in it, Dearie?"

"No, no thank you. Just tea." The woman got up and went for the tea. Vanna shook her head. The dress was stretched so tight over the woman's derriere that the polka dots were distorted into ovals. At first Vanna thought the dress's rump was faded, until she realized it was the lady's white girdle showing through. Vanna looked around the room.

It was easy to tell Delta's ladies from the church ladies. The church ladies all wore drab colors. On many of the scrawniest, the dresses hung like dirty bath towels draped over a shower rod. Here and there some bold lady, commonly one of the younger ones, had sought to liven her costume with a dash of color, such as a garnet pin in the shape of a cross, or, in one most bold case, a full-size silk rose pinned to a most drab gray sack dress.

Delta's ladies wore colors, bright and happy colors. Each of the girls was dressed in a basic garment that reflected her color, amethyst for Amethyst, apple green for Jade, brilliant turquoise for Turquoise, that sort of thing. Accessories included handbags in contrasting colors, elegant faux fur wraps, and glittering jewelry around arms and throats. Pearl had draped a red fox around her neck. It was a refugee from a cloth coat her great-grandmother had worn near the beginning of the twentieth century. Old as it was, its fur still shone silky red with orange and blonde highlights. Its beady black eyes glittered, even in the dismal corners of the chapel basement, and its tiny nailed paws concealed a cunning clasp that held the whole around Pearl's shoulders. The paws rested suggestively just above Pearl's cleavage.

All the women were elegantly coiffed. Some years earlier the wife of the then-presiding pastor at the chapel had admired Delta's hairdo. Delta had willingly shared her secret that she had her hair done at the Incorrigible Curl Salon, a place run by one of her former girls. That same pastor's wife had appreciated Delta's discreet provision of services that she was no longer willing to provide to her husband. She had even more approved of Delta's extending the man a clergy discount. She soon had most of the women in the congregation trooping into the Incorrigible Curl Salon for the dressing of their hair. When her husband mentioned preaching a sermon on the vanity of women's obsession with their appearance, especially their hair, she advised him that he should keep his mouth shut, lest he lose his sexual relief allowance. The man found a text in Paul's epistles that substantiated a woman's adorning her crowning glory, her hair. The sermon was among his most popular offerings.

Each of Delta's girls was taken aside by an individual church lady armed with a plate of cake and a large pot of tea. This was the Jesus time, when the church ladies witnessed to their salvation in the Lord. Vanna came close to breathing a thanksgiving prayer when the partnership process came up one church lady short, and she had no one to tell her about Jesus. She went to Delta, who was about to begin on her mound of cake.

"Delta," she said. "I'm not feeling well. I think I'll go back to the house and lie down. Can you make my excuses and thanks to the ladies?"

"Sure, Donna. Do you need anything?"

"No, Delta. I've just got a time of the month headache. I'm sure I'll be fine."

"Okay, kid. Wake Hannah up if you need anything. She stayed home today. She was sick. I hope it's nothing going around. I can't afford to have any of the girls sick during the holiday season."

"I'm sure it's nothing more than a headache. I've been getting them for years."

"Cheer up, Donna. One day soon you'll be past the curse. It's a great blessing, almost worth the hot flashes."

"I'll take your word for it," Vanna said. She didn't bother to mention she hadn't had any menstrual function since La Señora had frozen her synapses.

"Should I send one of the girls with you?"

"No, Delta. I can walk a couple of blocks without difficulty. I'm sure the fresh air will revive me."

"Okay." Delta smiled at Vanna and waved her out. Then she turned to her assigned church lady and pretended to pay attention while she set to work on the mound of cake before her.

Vanna walked as fast as she could toward the House. She was awkwardly slowed by the high heels she wore. If it had been warmer weather, she would have removed her shoes and made even better speed in her stocking feet, but the sidewalk was too cold to walk on without footgear. If luck was with her, she could make her getaway as she had planned.

### Dumping Dirty Laundry

When Vanna returned from the evangelical tea, she first checked on Hannah Bollix. Then she slipped into the kitchen and put some barbiturates in the cooking wine. She would have liked to raid the kitchen fund, if for no other reason than to spite Hannah Bollix, but Hannah kept the key to that safe close to her private parts. Vanna could see no way to root in that area for it without being discovered, even though Hannah was sound asleep. Hannah was very attached to her key. She changed out of her rose party dress into her customary drab maid's gray. Then she softly climbed the stairs.

In Amethyst's room she unzipped the purple teddy bear and took the stashed cash from it. Then she emptied Diamond's cold cream jar. The amount was small. Vanna slipped it into the purse she carried with her. Emerald's cash, as usual, lay on the bureau. Vanna checked the medicine cabinet, as well, but it was empty of cash today. She added Emerald's funds to her purse. Jade's bamboo vase was empty, as usual. She had taken her tips with her when she left. Vanna extracted Onyx's small cache from the warrior's helmet. She also emptied Opal's Mason jar. Pearl's room provided no cash. In Peridot's room Vanna broke the frame of the landscape behind which Peridot kept her money. Vanna left the broken picture on the floor. She put the envelope of money in her purse. She skipped Ruby's room, and the quarters of Sapphire and Turquoise. She knew from experience there would be little money there.

She crept downstairs again. She checked in on Hannah. Hannah snored softly. Vanna went to Delta's room and removed the picture covering the safe. She checked the combination against the one scrawled on the back, opened the safe with it, and took all the cash. The jewelry she left. She had no contacts for getting rid of it.

Vanna went to the kitchen. She had just picked up a pen and a notepad from Hannah's desk when she heard shuffling footsteps. Quickly she sat at the table with her head in her hands. Hannah shuffled in.

"Something wrong with the church shindig?" Hannah asked.

"No," Vanna said. "I just didn't feel very well. I fainted, so I came home."

"You should lie down."

"I don't really want to." Vanna sneaked a glance at the kitchen clock. The Irons brothers should be arriving at the mall parking lot in a few minutes, and Vanna still had to leave a note for Delta before she went.

"Go lie down," Hannah ordered. "I'll wake you in time to fix the evening meal. They'll be so full of cake they won't want much, anyway."

Vanna considered. "You don't feel well yourself," she said. "You should probably lie down again, too."

"I will. Don't worry about me, woman. Just do as you're told." Vanna got up and pretended to leave the room. Through a crack in the door she watched Hannah. Just as she suspected, Hannah waited long enough for Vanna to get to her room, then opened a cupboard door and took out the cooking wine. She poured a large glass, and gulped it down. Then she started for the door. Vanna quickly slipped away into her room.

She gave Hannah a half hour, and then checked on the woman. She was snoring loudly, one leg flung toward the floor. Vanna wondered again about reaching under Hannah's dress and slipping the key from her waist, but decided escape with what she had was more important than the pittance in the kitchen fund and the blow to Hannah's pride.

In the kitchen Vanna took a notepad and a pen. She wrote a short note to Delta, saying she was being abducted by two young men she caught ransacking the house. She implied the two young men had assaulted or drugged Hannah, and were stealing all the cash they could find. She was hostage to these hooligans. If she could make her escape, she would, and return to Delta. Then she slipped out of the house with her ill-gotten gain stuffed in her old purse.

The brothers were waiting for her in the parking lot of the mall. She greeted them, and got in back with the laundry. The ride north was unpleasant, since the garments were on their way in to the washing machines. After they were on the highway, Vanna surreptitiously opened the door of the van to shove the most offensive garments out. Under-drawers and stained sheets fluttered in the wind. Yellowed sheets wrapped around windshields. A browned nightshirt obscured the windows of a Mercedes, which crashed into a Ford pickup swathed in stained hospital gowns. Hard on its tail came an eighteen-wheeler. Tablecloths from a rib joint spread their greasy selves over its windshield. It crashed into the Mercedes and the Ford and jackknifed. Delicate lingerie danced with sweat-stained work shirts across the windows of multiple cars. At the final count fifty-two cars, variously adorned with dirty clothing and other laundry, steamed and smoked in a massive pileup. Vanna closed the truck doors and breathed deeply of the cleaner air.

About an hour out of Dry Bone City Vanna knocked on the rear window of the truck's cab. This was her signal to the boys to stop, let her out, and into the cab. They obeyed with alacrity. It had occurred to them that the cab was narrow enough that Vanna would have to sit very close to them both. They had spent most of their hour driving north talking about various strategies for exciting Vanna by rubbing her knees with their knees, exploring her inner thighs with a straying finger when shifting gears, and the like.

Vanna was unwilling to facilitate their games. "Keep your body parts to yourselves," she told them soon after they were underway again. "Remember, I look like your mother, and I'm certainly old enough to be your mother." The chastened boys damped their exuberance. Clapton drove on. Brandon dozed on the passenger's side. Vanna breathed in their hyper-excited teenagers exudates, and thought nostalgically of the dirty laundry she had left.

All-night restaurants were frequent. Vanna suggested they stop at one. She knew young males needed frequent re-fueling. Brandon and Clapton alit from the truck with alacrity. They were half-way to the diner's door when Vanna commanded them back to the truck.

"You'd better give me the money you brought with you," she said. "I don't want you to lose it. I'll keep it for you." Brandon and Clapton nodded at each other.

"She even sounds like Mama," Brandon said. He dug the wad of bills and coins he had liberated from the receipts box out of his jeans pocket. He dumped the lump of cash in Vanna's hands. She put it in her purse.

"I'll sort this out," she said, "when we've eaten. It's smart to keep your money neat. That way you don't give somebody a ten and think it's a five." Brandon and Clapton solemnly bobbed their heads to demonstrate they understood her lesson. She clapped them on the shoulders. "Let's eat now," she said. "Then it's on to El Embudo and a motel." The boys grinned. Brandon flipped the straggling tendrils of hair from his eyes with what he thought was a debonair hand gesture. He and Clapton turned, each taking Vanna by an arm, and went toward the diner.

Vanna requested a booth. The gum-chewing waitress, a buxom young blonde woman with a low-rise neckline and a high-rise skirt, twisted her swollen lips in disgruntlement and led them to a corner booth. Vanna ordered pancakes and coffee for all three of them, and sent the Irons brothers to the bathroom to wash their hands. She wanted to be rid of them while she counted the receipt money they had stolen from their uncle. It proved to be over two hundred dollars. Vanna smiled. She had collected close to seven hundred from the ladies' caches, and nearly double that from the convent fund for aging prostitutes. She began to plan her escape from the Irons brothers' clutches.

The brothers returned, their moldy natural smell overlaid with the pungent cleanliness of cheap soap. Vanna hoped El Embudo was near. She'd forgotten to watch for mileage signs. She urged the young men to hurry their breakfasts as she wolfed down her own. They were on the road again in short order. Soon after they entered the freeway a mileage sign declared El Embudo was less than fifty miles away. Vanna began to look for a motel.

Near daybreak they approached the capitol city's outskirts. The traffic had begun to pick up, and Clapton expressed frustration with driving among so many other vehicles.

"Time we found a place to stay," Vanna told him. "Pull off at the next exit. It says it has some motels." Clapton exited the freeway with relief. The frontage road was far less traveled. He drove the truck to a budget motel Vanna picked out from the cluster of motels and restaurants at the interchange.

"I'll go in and register us," Vanna said. "I'll tell them you're my boys, and we can get a room with two double beds."

"Yeah," Brandon said. "Who gets to sleep with you?"

"We'll figure that out after we're in," Vanna said.

"I'm oldest. I should go first," Clapton commented. Brandon got out of his side of the truck and stood by the open door until Vanna got out.

"Maybe we could draw straws," he said.

"Maybe," Vanna said. She went into the motel and got a room for them. She paid cash for one night's lodging, using some of the delivery receipts she had taken from the Irons brothers. The clerk handed her a key, never glancing at the name she had printed on the registration form. She had used Delta's name.

Vanna directed them to a room on the backside of the motel, away from the traffic noise. The three of them went in. "Hit the shower, boys," she said. "Shower together. It saves on water." Clapton and Brandon stared at her.

"We never done anything like that," Clapton said. "It sounds kind of queer."

"Nothing queer about it," Vanna said. "It's not like home here. Water's short in this area, so everybody has to conserve. Go ahead now; get in there, both of you." Reluctantly they unbuttoned their shirts, drew off their tee shirts, took off their shoes and socks, and dropped their trousers. The musk of tired excitement washed off their bodies into the stale motel disinfectant in the room. The young men headed for the bathroom. They looked at each other and giggled nervously.

When Vanna heard the shower water start, she quickly searched their clothes for spare change. She found little. She took their wallets and emptied the identification cards into a pile. The identification she burned in the wastebasket. She heard the water shut off. She quickly walked to the bathroom door and listened.

The brothers' muffled conversation told her each was accusing the other of wasting water. Then one brother, she thought it was Clapton, suggested they should each soap the other before turning on the water to rinse off. The other brother, probably Brandon, resisted, but only for a short time. Clapton's ministrations became too arousing for Brandon to resist. Vanna left them to their fraternal pleasures.

She gathered their clothes and shoes in a rough bundle, picked up the truck keys, took her purse, and left the room. In the parking lot she unlocked the van's rear doors, tossed the Irons brothers' clothing in, and shut and locked the doors. She put the keys in the truck's ignition and locked and closed the door. Then she swiftly walked to the front of the motel where there was a public telephone. She telephoned an anonymous tip to the El Embudo police about two young men who had stolen funds from a brothel and a laundry service. She left the room number and motel name before she hung up. Then she walked to the freeway onramp to hitch a ride west.

Brandon and Clapton were drying off when officers, with the motel clerk in tow, entered and arrested them. They were unable to account for the missing money, their missing clothes, or their missing mother surrogate.

### The Bus Not Missed

Vanna's walk along the frontage road toward the onramp disclosed to her a bus stop. The inter-city company advertised its routes. From where she was Vanna could ride to downtown Keystone, and from there take a bus to the City. She checked the schedule. This time of day several buses passed within minutes of each other, carrying commuters to the city center. Vanna waited less than five minutes. She got on the bus, paid her fare, and took a seat on the western, or shadowy, side of the bus. Several passengers rose out of their commute stupor long enough to notice the gaunt woman in the drab dress and quickly sank back into numbness, forgetting her. She rode to the city center. As she got off the bus, she glimpsed her face in the bus's rear view mirror. The aging woman reflected at her had a lined and bitter face under graying black hair that straggled over her skull in random disorder.

Schedules to the City were less frequent. The next would not leave for three hours. Vanna determined to freshen her wardrobe. She remarked a thrift store two blocks from the station. It was the Previously Loved Garment Boutique. A regal elderly lady greeted Vanna as she entered. Vanna didn't quite understand what the woman, whose accent was northern British had said, but took it for a standard greeting. The woman's nametag said Lynne O'Liam.

"Ms. O'Liam," Vanna said, "can you direct me to garments appropriate for a recently widowed woman? You see, I lost my husband in a traffic accident not long back, and I am only now entering a period of slightly greater social activity following my deepest mourning."

"Yes, my dear, I quite understand," Ms. O'Liam said. At least Vanna thought that was what she said. Ms. O'Liam led her to a rack near the rear of the store. It had a great variety of garments representing several degrees of formality. All were black, and quite sober in cut. Vanna rooted through them while Ms. O'Liam stood by. Vanna found two that suited her, one formal gown almost suitable for evening wear, and another, a simple frock, with a slight, soft flare to the skirt and a simple bodice. Black lace trimmed the gown's neckline. The frock's neckline was untrimmed, though narrow lapels emphasized its modest plunge toward the bosom. Vanna frugally consulted the price tags; they were not inordinate, in her estimation. She asked Ms. O'Liam about underthings.

"We have a supply of modest undergarments that have never been worn," Ms. O'Liam said. She took Vanna to that counter. Vanna selected a week's supply of sensible modesty to wear under her new garments. She also bought two pair of shoes, also black, and a battered suitcase to carry it all in. Her bill came to nearly forty dollars. Carefully shielding her bankroll from Lynne's eyes, she extracted the required bills, and accepted her change. She took a little time to pack her purchases in the suitcase. She returned, then, to the bus station, bought a ticket for the City, and waited for the call to board the bus.

The bus boarded several minutes before its scheduled departure. Vanna was the first in line, and so could select a seat anywhere she wanted. She chose the right side of the bus, which would be on the north as it traveled to the City. She deliberately left her bag on the seat and stared pointedly out the window. Her ploy worked. No one sat next to her. The bus left the Keystone station, and traveled for twenty minutes to a suburban station. More passengers boarded here. Most passed by Vanna's suitcase, though several glared at it. The only empty seats on the bus were near the restroom. That was not prime bus territory.

The last passenger to get on was a woman of color, though the color was an indeterminate brown that could have been skin tone, or ingrained dirt, or even walnut juice stain. She was of medium height, dressed in a dull brown coat and wide-brimmed brown hat decorated with small green apples. She wore thick gray socks over feet thrust into sandals devised from tire treads and strips cut from tire sidewalls. Vanna thought she looked like a mushroom. She even smelled a little earthy, as though mushrooms might be growing on her.

"Here, let me move this suitcase for you, honey," she said to Vanna, and swung it up onto the rack over the seat. "There," she said, and plopped down in the seat next to Vanna, who was preparing several cutting remarks.

"Thanks for having me, honey," the woman said. "I'm Idabet, Idabet Moore," she said. "I hail from Oklahoma originally. What's your name?"

"Donna," Vanna said. "Donna D'Schuys. I hail from the insane asylum." Idabet seemed not at all put out.

"Which one?" she asked. "Bubblebrook or Singing Springs?"

"Neither," Vanna said. "I'm from out-of-state."

"Been traveling a long time, have you, honey?"

"Several days. Please don't chatter at me. I need to sleep." Vanna closed her eyes and pretended to sleep. It worked for a while. Idabet engaged the older man across the aisle in conversation. Her prattle was so dull Vanna dozed for another half hour. Mercifully, Idabet dozed herself for a short while. Her snores were irritatingly arrhythmic, but Vanna managed to endure them. At Cebolla the bus stopped for a half-hour rest break. Idabet led the passengers off the bus. Vanna stayed. She hoped Idabet stayed in Cebolla.

No such luck. The bus took off again for the City. A refreshed and renewed Idabet nudged Vanna in her ribs. Vanna glared at Idabet. Idabet responded.

"You look like you've got a tummy upset," she said. "Here, have a ginger mint." Vanna declined, silently. "Oh, go on, honey. It settles your stomach like nothing else. Regulates the bowels, too, if you've got trouble that way." Vanna stared at the brown lozenge on offer. Her stomach churned. The brown fingers holding the lozenge looked very dirty. Some compulsion must have forced her, Vanna thought later, to take the ugly abdominal roborant. By the time she got to the City her stomach was engaged in all out civil war.

On top of this she heard all of Idabet's family history for three or four generations back. The Moores were prolific unto the ultimate generation, and Idabet talked lovingly and at length about each clan member. Vanna came away with an impression of a clan frequently bloodied by divorce, murder, and suicide. Perhaps Idabet should have written it all down for daytime drama.

In the City Vanna hoped to escape her seatmate. Regrettably she had mentioned she meant to stay for the night at the YWCA hostelry. Idabet immediately decided to stay there, too. "Maybe we can share a room," she said. Vanna waited for a narrow opening in the traffic flow. When one came she shoved Idabet ahead of her into the stream of cars. While Idabet was negotiating her way to the opposite curb, Vanna disappeared down a side street to seek alternative lodgings.

### Homecoming

Las Tumbas had changed only a little since Vanna had been sent to prison. A few more cars clogged the streets and some of the stores had changed businesses. A couple of storefronts were boarded up. Vanna met no one she knew. She had never had a wide circle of friends in Las Tumbas, though she had a vast set of acquaintances from her membership on the Coastal Commission. Few of those acquaintances would venture into the streets around the bus station. People from the State Building where Vanna had had her office avoided this area, even though it was only two or three blocks from them. The luncheonettes on the other side of their building had far more cachet than the narrow diners with fly-specked windows that catered to bus passengers.

Vanna knew her appearance had changed considerably. She had age lines creasing her face. Gray streaks shot through her hair. Her trim body had thickened with the manual labor and big calorie diet in prison. She presumed that news of her escape from El Serrucho Oxidado had been widely disseminated in Las Tumbas. What she didn't know was that she had been declared dead based on an old skeleton tagged with scraps of orange canvas. She had overheard a conversation in a parking lot that implied the authorities thought she was dead, but she had not seen a newspaper article or heard any news report that backed up that conversation. She hoped no one expected to see Vanna Dee on the streets of Las Tumbas. Maybe that would increase her chances of passing unnoticed while she was in town.

She rented a room for the night at the Folded Arms, a notorious flophouse. Her room was on the top floor at the back. She had to dispossess several fleas and cockroaches of their customary abodes, but she appreciated the quiet it offered, as well as its easy access to the alley, so she could come and go unobserved by the desk clerk. She registered as Sarah Toga. Police might be looking for Donna D'Schuys, either as a thief or a kidnap victim.

Vanna stowed her suitcase in the closet. She had looked in the bureau drawers, but too many mice had dropped offerings there. She lay on the sheets, closing her nostrils against the residual smell of other occupants. She wondered if the bedding had ever been washed. For one brief nostalgic moment, Vanna missed Delta's House and El Serrucho Oxidado both. Then she fell asleep.

Rats copulating in the walls woke Vanna near midnight. She considered getting something to eat, and decided to wait for morning. She was no longer sure enough of her ability to brazen out any confrontation. Some caution had crept into her nature, from where she didn't know. Something had happened to her that she didn't quite fathom during her confrontation with La Señora. The rats completed their coitus and Vanna went back to sleep.

Vanna dreamed she was in a parade. A loud brass band behind her played the Tit-Willow song from _The_ _Mikado_ off key behind her. She could not march in a steady cadence. Every time the chorus began with "Willow, tit-willow, tit-willow" she had to pause on one foot, the other raised in the air, while the "-low" syllable was drawn out for several measures. Her knees began to ache, and she fell, right in the middle of the street. The crowds roared their disapproval. The band wound down its music like a record dying as a phonograph lost power. Silence fell.

Vanna looked up at a blue and brass sky. The sun was burning her. A great shadow loomed over her. It was an ape, drool dripping from its yellow teeth. It bent down. Vanna closed her eyes. She feared it was about to kiss her. The ape took Vanna's knees one by one in its paws and massaged them. It hurt, but it healed. When the ape was done, he stood, one paw out to help her to her feet. She used him to stand.

A calliope had supplanted the brass band. The parade was evidently continuing, with Vanna once again at the head of it. Unaccountably she had obtained a baton, which she realized she was to twirl and hurl into the sky. As she did so, she suddenly realized the baton was a snake holding itself rigid. At least the calliope kept a sort of rhythm. Vanna did not recognize the tune at first, until she found herself muttering the words "Onward, Christian Soldiers," under her breath. The parade route turned right, marched a block, turned right again, marched two blocks, turned right again, marched a block, and turned right again to begin all over.

A tumbling acrobat snatched the baton from Vanna's grasp, and preceded her on the route marching on his hands and twirling the baton with his feet. It was a snake no more, only a simple metal tube with bright plastic ends. He tossed it to Vanna, and she caught it. It was a snake again, one that hissed at her. Then it crawled up her arm and wrapped itself three times around her neck. Its tail tickled her left ear, and its tongue flicked in and out of her right ear.

"The emperor waits for you in the throne room," the snake hissed. "Your time is upon you. You who were empress shall enter a new condition." The snake unwound from her throat and slithered down her back and onto the pavement. It disappeared in the crowd. The acrobat followed it. Vanna tried to follow the acrobat, but a sudden honor guard of giraffes ridden by baboons with scarlet rumps surrounded her. Something gripped her left big toe. She looked down. An enormous bright red lobster was clamped to her foot. She kicked and screamed at it. The lobster flew away. Something thumped against the wall. She woke herself up. Her left big toe was hurting inside her sock.

Hoping that her pain was internal, and not the side effect of rodent teeth, Vanna sat up, and turned on the feeble light overhead. She examined her toe. Blood seeped through her sock. Vanna cursed the Folded Arms and all its rats. She opened the tiny window in her room and looked out on the alley. By the gray light she judged dawn had come. She heard a scurrying noise behind her, and brought her head in and turned to see what made it. She saw a rat's tail disappearing into the wall. The overhead light began swinging in the breeze from the open window.

Vanna collected her suitcase and slipped down the rear stairs. She opened the back door and set off an alarm. The alarm shorted out and sparked a fire in the tinderbox building. As Vanna fled down the alley smoke and flame began to climb the spaces between the old walls. In places those walls had holes, the result of one or another fight or falling drunk. The flames leaped for the larger oxygen supplies in the corridors. By the time Vanna was three blocks away the entire structure was involved in the conflagration. Seventeen derelict men and one desk clerk died in the flames and smoke. The rat that bit Vanna's toe escaped through a narrow hole to a neighboring building that suffered only smoke damage. The rat lived to beget many more rats who in turn begat other rats, and so the circle of life continued among the rodents of Las Tumbas.

### Princess Valiant

Willy Waugh tried sleeping in the cottage the village had set aside for him for several nights. Each night he woke numerous times unable to breathe. Several other times he woke from horrible nightmares about assaults on the llamas. After two weeks Willy went to Ben.

"I can't sleep cooped up in a house," he said. "I need my outdoors. I'm moving back to the llama shed."

"You've given the cottage a fair try, I suppose," Ben said. "Should we keep it for you?"

"Find somebody else to live there," Willy said. He went back to the cottage and gathered his supply of briefs. He carried them up the hill to the llama shed. There he laid them carefully on a pile of clean straw, then went to the pasture to check on the llamas. They gathered round him and nuzzled his cheeks and neck. He smiled and murmured to them, "I'm home, kids. Not to worry." From then he lived among the llamas.

The cottage remained empty for several months. It was high summer before she came, seeking sanctuary.

One afternoon Ben and Dickon were at Wong's Emporium having a cola in the shade. Summer dust drifted through the air. The sun gilded patterns the breeze wove. The traffic on the highway was frequent by San Danson standards. Several cars had passed in the last hour.

She came on foot, an uncommon approach to San Danson Station. She wore a dusty ankle-length dress with heavy looking skirts. The dress was cut from an iridescent material that shimmered and shifted from floral patterns to butterfly patterns to abstract designs as she walked. It shifted colors with a speed that made its hues seem liquid poured over the cloth. She had a shawl loosely draped around her shoulders. It was crocheted from variegated wool that incorporated a multitude of colors. The sun played hopscotch on its looped threads. She wore a dusty white turban on her head. Ben wondered if it was a towel she'd stolen from a motel. Her valise was battered beige cardboard. The handle was pulling loose from the case. Her stride was strong and manly.

She came up to Ben and Dickon sitting on the Emporium steps and stopped in front of them. She towered over them, for she was a tall woman with broad shoulders. She stared at each of them for a long moment. "Is this San Danson?" she asked. Her voice was husky, either with dust or with whiskey. She exuded a heavy lilac perfume mingled with more earthy undertones of hot humanity. Weariness dragged at her dark complexioned cheeks.

"Yes," Ben said, "it is." Her shoulders relaxed. Relief flooded her lined face. Her piercing blue eyes softened. She put her valise down and tucked a stray tendril of iron gray hair under her turban.

"Thought I'd never get here," she said. "I'm Princess Valiant Crow, Val to my friends."

"Well, Ms. Crow," Dickon said, "come sit on the stairs. They're shady."

"Can you direct me to Ben Soul?" she said.

"I'm Ben Soul." Ben stood and held out his hand. Prickles ran along his backbone. What could this woman want? How did she know his name?

She ignored his outstretched hand. "We have business together," she said. Ben dropped his hand.

"What sort of business?"

"Is this one safe?" she asked, identifying Dickon with a jerk of her head.

"How do you mean, safe?"

"Does he know what ranges your pasture up yonder on the mountain, including the disguised one?"

"Yes. What disguised one?"

"Don't play coy with me. I come from fields beyond the known fields. I know who you are, I know about the disguised one, and I know what her mission is. I know of the babe, as well." Her blue eyes glittered with power. They looked as though lightnings flashed from cornea to pupil. "The holy one in the pasture has called me."

"Oh?" Ben's face showed his skepticism.

"You'll want credentials," Val said. She knelt to open her valise. A beam of light shot from it, illuminating the wrinkles on her face. She extracted a worn envelope and shut the valise. "Here," she said, handing the envelope to Ben.

Ben took the envelope carefully between two fingers. He frowned at it. He turned it face up so he could read it. It was addressed "To Whom It May Concern." It had been opened at some distant time in the past. The hand was familiar. Ben had seen it before, many times. He extracted the single sheet that reposed inside.

_To Whom It May Concern:_

_This note introduces to you Princess Valiant Crow, whom you may identify by the crow tattooed on her left shoulder. She is a bona fide Servant of the Balance. All men and women of good will may trust her._

_Signed this 7th day of March, 1994, by Minnie Vann._

Ben recognized Minnie Vann's signature. He had seen many iterations of it in his time. "Do you have a tattoo on your left shoulder?"

"Yes," Val said. She dropped her shawl into the crooks of her elbows and pushed the neck of her dress down. This bared her shoulder, and a considerable portion of her ample breast. At least the nipple remained discreetly covered. A great black bird, obviously of corvine kind, was inked on her shoulder. She flexed her shoulder, and the bird spread its wings, as if about to take flight. She flexed again, and the bird folded its wings. Dickon gaped at the woman's shoulder. He had never seen so active a tattoo before.

"What brings you here?" Ben put the note in the envelope and handed it to Dickon. Val's eyes followed the paper. She watched it while she replied to Ben.

"I'm the only one available to teach Hyacinth," she said. "There is much need of haste because the child cannot learn everything it should know on its own in time. Also, I need a refuge, for a time. There are those in the City who would hurt me."

"Hyacinth has parents," Dickon said. "They are in charge of her education."

"And you, Dickon, along with Ben, are responsible for the village, and for the mission La Señora had to lay aside."

"We're what?" Ben asked.

"We're responsible for completing La Señora's mission. Vanna won't be frozen in limbo forever."

Dickon spoke. "Don't be too quick to trust this 'lady,' Ben," he said. "Her shoulders are awfully broad for a woman, and her hips are uncommonly narrow. I don't think she's a she, at all. Who knows what else she's covering up."

Val looked Dickon up and down. "I am anatomically and emotionally female," she said, "and it cost me a pretty penny to be physically female." She advanced on Dickon. Her height became almost menacing to him. "I was male, once upon a time, until I met a surgeon with compassion, and a clever knife." She turned back to Ben. "That note's the only evidence I have of my good intentions."

"Here's a how-de-do," Ben said. Harry Pitts came from behind the café with Butter. She had been sharing a hamburger patty with the taciturn waiter. When she saw Princess Val, she approached her immediately, tail wagging. It was plain to Ben and Dickon Butter approved of this odd person on their doorstep.

"Butter likes you," Dickon said.

"Dogs usually do," Val said. She stooped to pet Butter, her skirts billowing out around her. Butter licked her cheek. The dog's tongue left a long track in the powder that liberally coated Val's face. The dog didn't repeat the licking, but she went on wagging her tail and accepting Val's petting.

"You say there are those who would hurt you," Ben said. "Who are they?"

"Members of my Native American community," Val said. "I am of mixed heritage, Chippewa, Seminole, and Chemehuevi. There are many others, like me of mixed tribes, who have gathered in the City. Some of them recently converted to a radical brand of Christianity. Their leader has urged them to kill me, because I am not the gender I was."

Ben turned to Dickon and Harry. "What do you think?" he asked them.

"I think we give her shelter for a night or two," Harry said, "and test her further."

"Yes," Dickon said. "Let's see what the folks up the hill think, and the rest of the village should have something to say, too."

Ben rubbed his chin with his hand. "Butter likes you. That's in your favor. We'll see where we go from here. About teaching Hyacinth, that's up to her parents. I won't speak for them. Same thing goes for any 'disguised one' on the hill."

In the cove, the Crablord sampled the waters. The darkness in the desert still tainted the flow. A new brightness ran alongside it, wild and free. Its flavor stirred the Crablord's interest in ways he had not encountered before. On the hill She-Who-Smells-Like-Violets lifted her head and tested the spice on the breeze.

### Approval Rating

It was the first gathering of the entire village since John Diss had explained the terms of La Señora's will. Ben and Dickon had asked the villagers to come together to interview Princess Valiant Crow, and decide if they should accept her request for sanctuary. The village met on the beach. Princess Valiant had been staying in Donna's old rooms over the Café of the Four Rosas. All the human villagers were there and, at Dickon's suggestion, Butter, Prime Pussy, and Ermentrude also attended.

Ben had put Butter on her leash because so many people around often excited the sociable dog to loud barking and dervish-like whirling among the people. Butter stayed quiet on her leash. The villagers had gathered around a table Willy and Rosa had set with simple fare, potato salad, macaroni salad, baked beans, green salad with avocado dressing, and a salmon mousse. Urns held hot and cold tea, coffee, and lemonade. Three-year-old Hyacinth sat demurely with Notta and DiConti. She yawned often in the sunshine, drowsing against her mother's shoulder. Ermentrude was on a leash, as well. She sat, self-contained, next to Hyacinth, with her tail neatly wrapped around herself. Not far away Prime Pussy, grown old with Emma and Haakon, stretched full length on the warm sand. She also wore a leash.

Harry brought Princess Val into the gathering from the Café. Val's silhouette in the summer sun was more than ever visibly masculine, despite her flowing gown of sea green edged with dark green lace. She wore low heels, and walked on the sand with a steady dignity that exuded self-assured strength. Ben marveled that she could pass herself off as female so skillfully. Her glossy black hair was braided and wound into a bun on her head. An eagle feather protruded at a jaunty angle from the right side of the bun. Harry introduced her to each villager in turn, led her to the table to select a beverage (she chose hot tea), and guided her to the only empty chair.

"Val," Ben said, "we've brought you here to meet everybody. Maybe the best way to start is for you to tell everybody your story."

Val smiled at all of them, somehow including each of them as an individual and also addressing the group as a whole. "I'm transgendered," she began. "Do you all know the word?" Everyone nodded. Harry's face twisted with distaste for a brief instance. If Val saw it, she ignored it. "That as a long and difficult road to travel, but I have made a successful journey of it."

Butter whined. Ben stroked her. He felt her tremble with an unexplained eagerness. He scratched her behind her ears.

Val continued. "My former community, a motley collection of mixed-breed Native Americans, iconoclasts all, has threatened my life. A radical fundamental Christianity has clouded their minds with hate. Or, maybe it's more accurate to say it has shaped the hate they had in them for all the perceived injustices and oppressions of the society around them." Val shrugged. "I will not judge them."

Ermentrude stood and stretched. She pulled against her leash, and pulled it from Hyacinth's hand. She ran toward Val and leaped into her lap, curled up on it, and fell to purring. The villagers took in a collective gasp of breath. It was an uncommon display of affection on the young cat's part. Val smiled down at Ermentrude and stroked her under her chin.

"I am one of many in the universe," she said, "who help to keep the balance between dark and light, male and female, strong and weak particles, and a host of other things. Ben's friend, Minnie Vann, whom I knew in the City," she looked at Ben, he nodded at her, "was another such. She told me about your La Señora, who was a grand mistress of Balance Keepers." The villagers murmured among themselves. Prime Pussy pulled herself to her feet and arched her aching back. She had encountered arthritis in the last winter, and its stiff joints and pain plagued her now, even in the sunshine. She pulled herself forward, dragging her leash, and went to Princess Val. She began rubbing slowly against Val's stocking-covered legs. Patches of her winter coat stuck to the nylon weave.

Val bent over and stroked Prime Pussy gently on the head. She looked up at the villagers. "I have come here to help," Val said. "There is much for me to teach your young Keeper of the Balance." She nodded toward Hyacinth. "Your hour of trial will come upon you before long. Vanna has escaped her prison, both the one of her mind, and the walls of El Serrucho Oxidado. She will come here when she can. She seeks vengeance."

Butter pulled her leash from Ben's loosened grip and raced to Val to sit beside her. Val caressed Butter's head. Butter leaned against her leg and closed her eyes in contentment. Shock and loss marked Ben's face. Butter had never been so quick to abandon him for anyone before, not even Dickon.

"You none of you have any reason to trust me to be who I am," Val said. "I am open to your questions."

Willy saw her first, stepping delicately down the side of the mountain. He said nothing to the others, waiting to see what she would do. The sun sparkled on her flanks and drew glints of gold, silver, and pearl from her horn. It was the first time she had used it, Willy was sure. The older llama who had borne her followed, at a distance, bleating softly. Willy guessed that She-Who-Shuns-Males did not understand what this strange cría was doing.

The young unicorn approached the winding log and sand staircase at the seaward end of the beach and, placing each foot with great care, descended to the sandy strand. Seated as they all were, only Princess Val could easily look up and see the unicorn. She had just offered to answer questions when the creature reached the group of villagers, and walked around them on the cove side to reach Princess Val. She carefully laid her chin on Val's shoulder and brushed the woman's cheek with her ear. Then she turned to the villagers and dipped her head three times.

"I think the sign is clear," Malcolm Drye said. "Val belongs among us."

Hyacinth woke up and saw the unicorn. She pushed herself up on her chubby legs and ran to it. It lowered its head and neck so she could rub its nose. The unicorn licked Hyacinth's face, turned again to the group of villagers, nodded as if to bid them farewell, and walked around them, down the beach, to the switchback stair and climbed up on the mountain again.

"Yes," Ben said, "Val belongs among us. Does anyone here see things differently?" He surveyed the villagers. No one offered a contrary opinion. "Then I suggest she move into the cottage next to Dickon and me," he said. He waited again for dissent. There was none. "If we don't need to say anything else, I suggest we eat," he said, and got up to pour himself a cup of tea.

### Roomers and Rumors

Vanna left the vicinity of the burning Folded Arms flophouse without looking back. She walked over an hour to a quiet neighborhood in Las Tumbas' low-rent district. There she took a small apartment under the name of Sara Toga. It had a sitting room with a Murphy bed, a bureau, a large, although shabby, recliner, and a tiny kitchen, with a two-burner electric hot plate and a very small refrigerator. Vanna settled in, and went looking for work.

She had some difficulty finding work, since she didn't have a valid Social Security number in Sara Toga's name. She didn't, of course, dare to use her Vanna Dee number; Vanna Dee was officially dead. She was also afraid to adopt the Donna D'Schuys identity and arrange for a Social Security Number for that name. Donna might still be a "person of interest" to the Dry Bone City police. It required some discreet inquiries on Vanna's part, and rather more cash than she wanted to let go, but at last she obtained a Social Security number and card in Sara Toga's name. She found work, then, as a cleaning woman at a small suite of offices in a nearby strip mall. Little as she liked cleaning, it offered a kind of anonymity other work didn't, and didn't require a resume that could be checked by an employer. It had other advantages, as well. It was close enough she could walk to work. The evening work was light, and she ordinarily completed it by midnight. She usually ate a small meal at her apartment, went to sleep, and got up in the late morning. That left her afternoons to pry into the progress of the San Danson Village.

The Las Tumbas _Epitaph_ offered few articles on the small cluster of cottages. Not much happened in San Danson to pique a newspaper's interest. Vanna began with editions of the _Epitaph_ from her trial days, and read forward. Eventually Vanna came across the wedding announcements for the four couples, and the obituary for La Señora. Frustration rankled in Vanna's soul that she could take no revenge on the woman who had so weakened her psyche.

Greater by far was her frustration that Dickon had apparently found a happy romance. She had never forgiven him for being less than the charming (and groveling) prince she had dreamed of marrying in her girlhood. It made not a whit of difference to her that he had never promised to be such a prince. He had, in her perception, failed her most terribly, and he should suffer forever for it. He was still alive. She could hurt him. Very little else had happened at San Danson. Vanna didn't discover the birth announcement for a certain Hyacinth Sharif to Deputy DiConti Sharif or San Danson.

Six weeks after Vanna moved into her apartment she came home one night to find the corridor on her floor musky with a mushroom scent. Something troubling and earthy about it tickled her hind-brain with unease. She had smelt it before, more dilute than this occurrence. Snorting to clear her nose, she let herself into her own apartment. She was thankful the smell had not penetrated her rooms. A week later, the scent permeated the corridor again. It aroused Vanna's primitive fear centers again. The unease it prompted disturbed her rest, and for several days she did no concrete planning about revenge on San Danson.

One afternoon she discovered the source of the distressing fungal odor. She was crossing the porch to walk down the street to work when a voice accosted her.

"I know you," the voice said. "You're from the bus." Vanna turned, her stomach churning with remembrance of the roborant and Idabet's family history. It was, indeed, she.

"Yes," Vanna said shortly. "I'm off to work. Can't stop to talk." She plunged down the stairs to the street and strode off toward her job. She pointedly ignored Idabet's promise to see her later.

Indeed, Vanna ignored Idabet for several more days, until her weekend left her at loose ends. She had gone to the communal bathroom to use the facilities, and was returning, planning to spend a little quiet time napping and sorting out her thoughts. Idabet had other plans, however. She waylaid Vanna in the corridor.

"You're not very friendly," she whined to Vanna. "I've tried to find you at home several times, but you didn't answer."

"I work a lot. I don't have much time to be social." Vanna tried to step around Idabet. Idabet moved in front of her.

"I'm lonely, lady. I need company, somebody to talk to."

Vanna scowled at Idabet. Most people would have quailed under that glare. Idabet did not. She straightened a little and stared back at Vanna.

"You don't fool me," she said to Vanna. "You can call yourself Sara Toga, but I know who you really are."

"Oh? And who do you think I am?"

"Somebody called Vanna Dee. You're supposed to be dead in the desert, but I know your face, wrinkled as it is." Idabet cackled. Fury welled in Vanna's psyche. She pushed it down. It wouldn't do to strike Idabet here and now. How could she explain a dead body in her corridor? Especially if Idabet had been inquiring about her with the apartment manager, or someone else in the building. Vanna couldn't know what connection Idabet might have claimed to her.

"I don't want money," Idabet went on. "I have plenty of money." She patted her bosom. "I want company, a girlfriend to pal around with." She patted Vanna's arm. Vanna stared at her blouse sleeve, expecting corruption to erupt on it. "How about dinner, tonight?"

"And if I don't have dinner with you?" Vanna said through clenched teeth.

"I'll call my old friend, Sheriff Dan Druff, and tell him where to find you. Dinner is better for you, I think. Your treat, of course. Someplace nice, like the Shiitake Shanty, for a steak. I fancy a steak with mushrooms."

Vanna's angry retort was on her lips, and her muscles were tightening to strike Idabet with a fierce fist when a glimmering idea occurred to her. She had many insults to avenge. Idabet was only one of many offensive people who needed a comeuppance. If Idabet, who hadn't even known her could recognize her, others who had known her well, like Bertha Van Nation and Barry Cooda, might recognize her at any time. Step one, Vanna decided, would be to change her appearance. Either mass murder or cosmetic surgery was required. That would cost. She didn't know how much money Idabet might carry in her brassiere, but any amount would help.

"You win," she said to Idabet. "Let me get dressed, and meet me in half an hour, on the porch. I'll buy you a steak at the Shiitake Shanty."

"We'll have something nice for dessert, Dearie," Idabet said. She stood aside so Vanna could pass. "Half an hour, now. I'll be waiting."

Vanna clenched her nostrils against the fungal essence emanating from Idabet and went to her apartment. She opened her door and went in. Her mind whirred furiously over possible plans to rid herself of Idabet and cash in on Idabet's assets. A half hour of whirring mind brought her no nearer a solution to Idabet's presence in her life, so she affixed a tight smile to her face and went to the porch to meet her nemesis.

### Supper at the Shiitake Shanty

The Shiitake Shanty was a quiet secret long-time Las Tumbas residents kept for themselves. It was not a large place. It only had twenty two-person tables, allowing for feeding about forty people at one time. The hour was early, and Vanna and Idabet easily found a table for two. Idabet ordered the T-bone steak smothered in sautéed shiitakes, the most expensive item on the menu. Vanna preferred the steak salad, a far more modestly priced meal. Idabet fell to with a will, plying knife and fork with speed and skill. Vanna marveled to see a woman eat with such gusto. Idabet had little to say until she had scoured all the flesh from her steak, consumed the mound of French fries accompanying it, and daintily patted her greasy lips with the provided napkin. Vanna was still working on her salad.

"Right good, Dearie," she said to Vanna. "How's your salad?"

"Quite adequate," Vanna said. "I'm not a big eater."

"Oh, I am," Idabet said. "I can eat a horse three times a day, and want a side of cow between meals. Always was a hearty eater, down home on the farm."

"I see," Vanna said. She took another mouthful of salad. It seemed to turn to dust in her mouth. She chewed valiantly, and swallowed it with the help of a mouthful of water.

"Why are you in Las Tumbas?" Vanna asked. "I'd have thought you'd have stayed in the City."

"Las Tumbas is quieter, more like home," Idabet said. "What about dessert?"

"The pecan pie here is very good," Vanna said. It was also the cheapest dessert on the menu.

"Can't do nuts," Idabet said. "The Chocolate Decadence for me. You eat the pie, if you want it."

"I'm skipping dessert," Vanna said.

"Watch me enjoy, then, Dearie," Idabet said as the waitress brought her a plate of chocolate cake, liberally frosted with chocolate icing, and accompanied with a large scoop of chocolate ice cream floating in a pool of chocolate syrup and decorated with white chocolate sprinkles. Idabet fell upon the dessert like starving hordes fall on piled rice in some third world famine, and despite having just eaten a huge meal, she demolished the heap of chocolate in short order. At the end she used her finger to wipe up the last of the syrup. Vanna's face screamed her disgust. Idabet looked at her, and grinned.

"Let's go home, now, Dearie," she said. "You pay the check, and we'll go." Vanna paid, carefully neglecting to leave any gratuity. Idabet linked her arm through Vanna's as they left. Vanna tried to pull free, but Idabet's grip was iron. Along the way Idabet chattered nonsense about the weather, flowers along the walk, the misdeeds of the Las Tumbas police, and the outrageous price of spinach (this prompted by a torn newspaper ad for that vegetable).

At the rooming house, Vanna finally disengaged her arm from Idabet's grip and started to go up to her room.

"Now, Dearie, the night's young. You're coming in for a little chat."

"I'm very weary," Vanna began.

"None of that. You spend too much time alone, that you do. You're coming in for a nightcap." Idabet took Vanna's hand, and almost literally dragged the villainess into her apartment. It was a bed-sitter arranged just like Vanna's place. Idabet had rather more clutter in her apartment. Vanna collected little in her life but grudges. Idabet collected stuffed animals, small figurines, and they collected dust. Every surface in Idabet's place had a crowded array of porcelain and plush pigs, cats, dogs, birds, dragons, and sheep. Idabet dragged Vanna past this wealth of knickknacks into the kitchen. She sat Vanna down, took two cups from the cupboard, rinsed them under the tap, and turned the water to hot and let it run.

Into each of the cups Idabet put a spoon of powdered coffee, and then added two-thirds cup warm tap water. Then she stirred in a heaping spoon of sugar and a shot of vodka. She turned then, and presented the result to Vanna with a flourish.

Vanna gagged at the thought of this cocktail, but she forced it to her lips and sipped. It wasn't quite as vile as its appearance promised, but it was not gourmet coffee. Vanna did learn where Idabet kept her cash. Idabet had taken the large bankroll wrapped in a plastic sack from her sugar canister in order to get at the sugar. Vanna began considering how to get the money from Idabet's canister into her own pocket. It was a sizeable roll, and, even if mostly ones, would nicely augment Vanna's cosmetic surgery fund.

When she had finished her vodka coffee, Vanna pleaded her need for rest, and Idabet at last let her go, promising to see her in the morning. Frantically, Vanna agreed, just to get away to her own apartment. Once there she locked the door, let down her Murphy bed, and huddled under the covers. She put her mind to work on Idabet removal. Nothing came to her. She fell into an uneasy sleep, where a leering Dickon/Idabet clone pursued her through strange and dark alleyways.

Vanna woke to morning light as uneasy and queasy as a partially cooked egg. The light seemed to slither and dribble over the room, and the sun through the window glared angry and yellow-red. Someone was knocking on Vanna's door. Vanna groaned, and got up. She struggled into a robe (another bit of thrift shop couture) she took from her closet and answered the door. As she had feared, it was Idabet who waited on the other side.

"Good morning, Dearie," Idabet said. She wrapped her arms around Vanna and gave her a big wet kiss right on the forehead. Vanna shuddered. "I thought we'd go to the park, today," Idabet said cheerily. Vanna was about to remonstrate, when she remembered the railroad ran alongside the local park. An idea tickled her brain. A picture came to Vanna, of Idabet tied to the tracks like Pauline in an old _Perils of Pauline_ serial. Swift pictures of Idabet tied down before an approaching saw blade and Idabet falling off a steep cliff chased each other through Vanna's mind. Idabet, she thought, today is a good day for you to die.

Under Idabet's command, Vanna dressed in casual clothing, grabbed a light jacket, and walked to the park with the fungal-fumed woman. Idabet chattered glibly about birds, clouds, grass, the high cost of coffee, and kittens as they went. At the park she insisted Vanna push her in the swings, even though these playthings were supposedly restricted to use by children. Idabet's wide hips did get stuck, and Vanna briefly imagined twisting the swings until the chain choked her nemesis.

They went on, Idabet flitting from tree to tree in blithe abandon, Vanna trudging after her. Several children watched them in awe as Idabet, fluttering a scarf she had taken from her brassiere, whooped and sang as though she were five, not five and fifty. At last, Idabet collapsed on a park bench and patted the seat beside her to bid Vanna sit down.

"We'll rest here for a while, Dearie," Idabet said. "Then we'll go get a little lunch someplace, and finish it off with ice cream."

"Yes," Vanna said, seething inwardly. Idabet flung her head back to stare at the clouds, her scarf carelessly draped across her lap. Gradually, her breathing slowed, her head came up, and dropped forward, as she drifted into sleep. In a little while she snored raucously. Vanna stood very carefully. She wished for a wire, and looked about her for something. She took the scarf, rolled it, wound it around Idabet's neck, pulled it tight, and tied the ends together. She took a stick she found on the ground, put it through the tied scarf, and began twisting. She twisted and twisted, hoping the scarf would hold, while Idabet thrashed, frantically tearing at the scarf around her neck. Eventually, Idabet was still. She slumped over. Vanna kept twisting the scarf for good measure, until she was sure Idabet was dead.

When she was sure the woman had died, she untwisted the scarf, threw the stick under some bushes, unwrapped the scarf from Idabet's neck and tucked it into Idabet's purse. She removed the small amount of cash from Idabet's purse and took the key to Idabet's apartment. Then she went back to the rooming house, let herself into Idabet's apartment, took the bank roll from the sugar canister, and checked the other canisters for money, as well. The sugar roll was the largest, but the flour and salt had bills, as well, though the corn meal had none. Vanna wiped the canisters clean of her finger prints, dropped the key on the bureau, and let herself out. Then she went to work.

### Oh, Doctor, Doctor!

When she returned from cleaning offices, Vanna counted the money she had stolen from Idabet's canisters. It totaled over twenty-one thousand dollars, mostly in large bills, an amazing sum for an almost-bag lady to have collected. Vanna wondered where Idabet had got it, and regretted she hadn't known about the amount so she could have wrung the source from the brown-clad woman before she killed her. Vanna might have tapped the source, too.

Newly enriched, Vanna began shopping for a cosmetic surgeon. She researched the available choices for over two weeks before she discovered Dr. Porter House. He was not as costly as most others of his profession. Drink and, some claimed, the devil, had unsteadied his hand. Vanna interviewed him, and found him steady enough. The man's black eyes were filmed with pain, as though a deep sorrow ate at his soul. His long, thin face, with its pointed chin, bore deep grooves of life's travails, and even when he smiled the sorrow danced around his lips in a funereal fandango. A great mane of white hair crowned his face and covered his ears. He was not a great advertisement for his own skills.

His baritone voice dispelled all fears of his incompetence. Rich as olive oil, decked with colorful overtones like stained glass, Dr. House could have graced a pulpit or fronted a mortuary with dignity and gravity. His long, nervous fingers shaped figures in the air as he described enhancements he could make to Vanna's frame and face. As, from time to time, the mongoose dances to charm the cobra, so Dr. House wove a tale of remade beauty to enchant the viperous Vanna. He named a figure triple what Vanna had on hand, and she returned to herself. She determined there would be a way to rid herself of Dr. House when his work was done.

"I don't have money enough for what you've described," Vanna said. "How much just to augment my breasts, give me pouting lips, and round out my cheeks a little?"

"Well," Dr. House said, poising his fingers over his calculator's keypad like vultures about to swoop on road kill, "let's see." His fingers danced frenziedly over the calculator keys and pressed the total button. "Thirty thousand," he said, "give or take a little."

"I'll have to pay in installments," Vanna said. "How much down?"

"A third, say ten thousand."

Vanna sighed heavily. She knew, intuitively, that Dr. House wouldn't yield much more. "When can you begin?"

"Tomorrow at nine."

"Here?"

"Yes, my surgery's in the back."

"I'll be here," Vanna said. She went back to her rooming house. Someone had left a copy of the Las Tumbas _Epitaph_ on the stairs. A small headline caught Vanna's eye.

_Strange Fungus in Park_

_A strange fungus has infested a park bench in Little Cowpoke Park. A group of children smelled it (it gives off a strong earthy odor) and went to investigate last week. Alarmed at its resemblance to an old woman, even to being dressed in a dress and scarf, the children alerted their parents, who called the Sheriff's office. Sheriff Dan Druff called in mycologists from the local junior college. To date, they have been unable to identify the species of the fungus._

_Experts have tested it for mycotoxins. None hazardous to human health have been identified. The fungus does not appear to have attacked the bench, which is made of wood and steel. Scientists state categorically there is no perceptible danger to the public at this time, or when (and if) the fungus spreads spores._

Vanna tossed the paper aside, and went to her apartment. At daybreak, she got up and went to Dr. House's office. When he came in, she gave him ten thousand in cash. He put it in his office safe right in front of her. She noted where he kept the combination in a locked desk drawer. Then she submitted herself to his knife. During the post-operative phase, she lay about her apartment, her nerves tingling. It was two weeks of pain before Dr. House unveiled his handiwork. Vanna stared in grim amazement at the changes he had wrought.

She had bee-stung lips, all right. They were enormous. Her cheeks, too, that had always been lean, and rather on the hollow side, puffed like pink balloons. Her augmented breasts protruded from her slim thorax like two steroidal watermelons. Her back ached holding them sufficiently upright so she wouldn't fall on her face.

"I look like Betty Boop gone mad," she said to Dr. House.

"A work of art, my dear, a work of art." He beamed at her. She smiled a tight little smile.

"I'll have the rest of your fee in a few days," she said. "I'm waiting on an inheritance."

"Not too long, my dear, I can't wait too long."

"I quite understand," she said. On her way home, Vanna stopped to harvest beans from several Castor plant she had observed growing on a fence around an abandoned lot. She took these home, dried them, and crushed them to a very fine powder outdoors. She carefully poured the powder into a small jar, and put it in her purse.

She returned to her apartment, took time to dye her hair red, took her few belongings, packed them in her battered suitcase, and left for the last time. Her rent was due in three days, so she left the key on the bureau before she went out and locked the door. She stopped a thrift shop to buy a few garments that would fit over her new bosom. She selected a moss green dress, which must have been someone's office outfit, and a beaded party dress in turquoise. Nothing else in the shop would fit her freakish new shape. Contemplating herself in the mirror, she was certain none of her old associates would recognize her.

The small matter of Dr. House's fee did not trouble her. Her ten thousand dollar down payment did. She broke into the surgeon's office, broke open the desk drawer, and took the combination to the safe. She opened the safe, extracted her ten thousand, plus another three thousand the doctor had put away some other time. Then she rigged the small jar of ricin powder to spill its fine powder when the safe was opened the next time. She closed the safe. She returned the combination to the drawer and closed it. The good doctor should be very sick, indeed. Vanna left to seek her vengeance on others who had wronged her.

### Val Talks with Dickon

Princess Valiant came to see Dickon and Ben in their expanded cottage. Ben inquired how Hyacinth's lessons were progressing.

"Quite well," the Princess said. "She's a clever young miss, and already wise beyond her years. I won't be able to teach her much more."

"She's not five, yet," Dickon said.

"True," the Princess replied. "That troubles me. She will need protection for many years to come, until she can grow into her own full strength. It should take about fifteen to twenty years." The Princess shook her head. "We don't have that long," the Princess said. "An old evil nears us." The crow tattooed on her shoulder fluttered its wings in agitation. Today the Princess wore a bodice that exposed her shoulders.

"Should we be posting guards on the house on the hill?" Dickon said. "Willy's up there, and Haakon's around quite a lot. DiConti's there when his job allows."

"And don't discount Notta's ability to defend her little one," Ben said. "She's tougher than her mother, and that's saying a lot."

"Physical harm is less likely," the Princess said, "though it's wise to guard against it. It's psychic damage that's the most worrisome. We'll have to pull together as a community, join our minds, as it were, to meet the attack that's coming."

"This is Vanna, isn't it?" Dickon said. Fury washed over his face. "Will I never be done with that woman?"

"I need to talk with you about Vanna," the Princess said. "Ben, I need to talk to Dickon alone. Do you mind?" Ben looked at the Princess for a long moment.

"It's up to Dickon," he said. "It's not my place to mind." He looked at Dickon.

"I can handle myself," Dickon said. The crow on the Princess's shoulder spread its wings, as if it were drying them in the sun after a rain.

"Shall we walk?" the Princess said, wrapping a soft woolen shawl around her shoulders. Dickon wondered if the tattooed bird felt like a blanket had dropped over its cage. Then he reminded himself it was only pigment scarred into skin.

"Okay," Dickon said. "Where to?" Dickon took a light jacket out of the closet. The mist, though thin, still swirled outside the cottage.

"Let's go down to the beach, and toward the ocean," the Princess said. "I haven't been that way for a while." Butter got up to go with them, but Ben called her back. She whined. She loved Dickon, and she was quite fond of the Princess, too. Ben promised her a treat, and took her to the kitchen as the door closed behind Dickon and Val.

The fog had not left the cove yet. Dark swirls of gray-black mist twirled and twined against a lighter gray background of higher cloud. One heard the surf before the mist thinned enough to see. Val led Dickon down the cliff trail. The mist thinned as they got to the water level. Val and Dickon placed their feet with care on the rocky path that led along the base of the cliffs. Dickon judged they had about three hours before the rising tide covered the path completely. Val didn't try to carry on conversation against the surf-song of the sea. When she and Dickon had arrived at a narrow strip of sand that faced outward toward Obaheah Rock, still shrouded in mist except for a few feet at its base, she stopped, looked around, and found a small niche in the cliff-side to lean against. Dickon found a similar place to support himself.

"I haven't been here in a long time," Dickon said. "How did you know it was here?"

"I discovered it one day when I was out walking," Val said, and waved her hand to dismiss the subject as unimportant. She frowned, concentrating her gaze on her sneaker-shod feet. "I have to ask a great favor of you," she said. "I ask it only for the good of the village."

"Oh?" Dickon said, suddenly wary.

"I need to explore your connection to Vanna," Val said. "Your emotional and psychic connection, I mean."

"We've been divorced over twenty years," Dickon said. "I don't have any connections to her."

"You were married to her for how long?"

"Nine years, eight months, and eight days," Dickon said. "That's what the lawyers wrote on the divorce papers."

"You have psychic connections, then," Val said. "It's inevitable. We can't discard the people we've been intimate with, not entirely."

Dickon gripped the rock behind him. The gray hair in his sideburns pulsed with the stress of the jumping muscles in his jaw. "I'm well rid of that vicious woman," he said through clenched teeth. "I don't want connections of any kind with her."

"Do you hate her?"

"Frequently."

"Then you still have connections to her of the most basic emotional kind." Val stood upright, wrapping her arms around herself. "You're human, Dickon, and subject to frailty like any other human."

"Oh, hell!" Dickon said, and kicked at a small shell on the sand. The shell spun out over the water and sank into the surf.

"When we gather together to oppose Vanna on the psychic plane, we can't include you. Hate can't destroy hate. Hate only feeds hate." Dickon glared out to sea. Then he turned and glared at Val.

"Isn't there any way to change the situation? I feel like it's a fight I should be part of."

Val looked at him with compassion. The shawl had slipped from her shoulders. The crow tattoo had drooped its head and was dragging its wings, as though it were injured. "No, there's no way to change the situation. The time for change was before you got involved. But that wasn't meant to be."

"I loved her, for a while, you know," Dickon said. "Not at first. I married her because I needed a wife to get a church. She was a good prospect, I thought, for a preacher's wife. She seemed to be demure; she'd grown up in the church." He swiped at his eyes with the back of his hand. Val put a hand on his shoulder, to comfort him. He shrugged it off. "I learned to love her as I lived with her. I grew accustomed to her soul. I couldn't see her vicious streak. Maybe she didn't have one, then."

"That vicious streak has always been part of her," Val said. "Every one of us has the capacity to be vile. Most of us suppress it most of the time. Vanna doesn't. She operates from it continuously. Probably has since her childhood, or maybe even her birth."

"You make it sound almost like original sin."

"Original sin? Could be. I don't understand Christian doctrine." They were silent for a while, watching the sun westering low on the horizon.

"There is a place and a function for you," Val said. "It's not in the mind-meld."

"What?"

"Somebody has to keep alert in this world, to prevent physical harm. We don't know what Vanna can do, or what allies she'll bring with her."

"And you think I can do that?"

"Yes. It's a situation where your rational mind must be in control."

"You'll be in the mind-meld?" Dickon's green eyes were pleading for something. Val wasn't quite sure what.

"Yes."

"Take care of Ben," Dickon said, and rubbed his eyes with his fingers. "It's too late for me to find anybody else."

"I will take care of Ben," Val said. "We'd better go back, before the tide swallows the path."

"We should," Dickon said. They carefully walked along the surf's edge on the few stones above water. At the main beach they turned their backs on the scarlet-fingered sunset tincturing the wine dark whale road with bloody highlights.

### Vanna's Vengeance

The Reverend Eaton Hamm stumbled into death as he had stumbled through life. Ordinarily he took his evening constitutional on Hickory Bark Lane. That fateful night, he mistook his usual turn, and went along Birch Bark Court. He was walking past Barry Cooda's home when Vanna set off her psychic brain bomb. Barry was unaffected, Reverend Hamm died. Right there, on the sidewalk, he fell, his gray matter turned to pitiful putty in his skull. He left, behind him, his wife, Westphalia Hamm, a lifetime's pile of sermon manuscripts (a voluminous record of theological pap that pleased, but never nourished, a string of forgettable congregations), and a yellow stain on the sidewalk where his over-full bladder broke as he died and fell. The coroner listed his death as "by natural causes," and Reverend Hamm was duly buried in the Las Tumbas cemetery with full religious rites.

Vanna had worked over a month setting up this particular brain bomb. Barry had earned her everlasting enmity when he prosecuted her trial, the one that had sent her to El Serrucho Oxidado. Studying Barry's schedule had used up a week. When Vanna was certain she had pinpointed his habits, she began work on her weapon. Brain bombs were tricky things to make. Selection of the proper cone-shaped root (Vanna had finally chosen a fat, short, carrot) had taken several days of prowling vegetable bins and flower shops. Focusing the thrust of the psychic power required several nights of chanting and prancing widdershins, at least according to the book Vanna stole from the Las Tumbas library. Then she had to construct a prop to hold the carrot in position, its sharp point aimed at the window where Barry invariably took his evening meal. This window was on the second story, so the carrot had to aim high. Vanna used an alarm clock, powered by a potato battery, to set the time of detonation. When the brain bomb went off, its signal passed through Reverend Hamm's brain, making mush of it.

Barry, as it happens, was having dinner with Dan Druff, and so would not have been affected by the bomb. Perhaps Vanna should have lingered to ignite the bomb when she could be sure of her target, but she had other folk to fry. From Barry and the bomb she had turned her attention to Bertha Van Nation, her one time secretary, and, she had thought, confidant. Bertha's testimony had been crucial in sending Vanna to El Serrucho Oxidado.

The Las Tumbas _Epitaph_ had provided Vanna the opportunity she sought. Bertha was to appear live on the local television station as the author of her romance novels. This time Vanna elected to employ less exotic means than a brain bomb. She thought simple electrocution would quite suffice. During the night before Bertha's appearance on _The Ann Jovi Show_ , Vanna, in her cleaning lady persona, slipped into the studio and wired the guest chair. Since she was using electric power, unfortunately, she had to work in the dark. She secreted a pressure switch in the chair's cushion, and wired the chair to deliver all the station's power in a single surge. She carefully cleaned away any trace of her presence, and went home. _The Ann Jovi Show_ was an early morning offering. Vanna, in an obscure motel room, turned on the television to watch Bertha fry. Bertha was confused by the directions she got from the show's behind-the-scenes staff, and sat in the host chair. Ann Jovi, not wanting to put her guest at a disadvantage, quietly took the guest chair. Ann was a slender wisp of a woman, and inclined to perch on the edge of chairs. She didn't immediately trigger the electric current. She began her interview with Bertha.

"Ms. Van Nation," she said, "you are noted for your steamy plots and daring dialogue in the romance novels you write. Do you write from life?"

"No, Ann," Bertha said. "It's all imaginary. Nobody I know has ever lived the wild kind of lives I write about."

"How do you get your ideas? Where do they come from?"

Bertha frowned in concentration. "I'm not sure where they come from," she said. "I imagine a character in a situation, and write from there."

"For example," Ann said, smiling into the camera, "you imagined Hillary Heloise Habsburg in that ruined manor house 'somewhere in the darker parts of England' and went from there?"

"Yes."

"How did you come to create such a wonderful villainess as Vivian Valdore, who's in the same book?"

"Oh, I modeled her on a woman I worked for, who's in prison now. Then I added traits of several other unpleasant women I knew along the way."

"The hero, Almondo, is he modeled on anyone?"

"Yes. My beloved husband."

"You are very clever, indeed," Ann said. "We must break for a commercial, now. We'll see you after the break." When the director signaled she had cut to the commercial, Ann leaned over toward Bertha. "You're a very good interview," she said. "I think it's going very well."

"Thank you," Bertha said. She watched Ann adjust herself backward into the chair. Ann had pressed her hands down on the arms to lift her body into the chair, and so she dropped herself right on the pressure switch in the cushion. The station went dark, except for the ethereal blue light of the frying Ann Jovi. Ever afterward, Bertha, who had been fond of meats, ate only vegetable matter. Even mushrooms reminded her too much of the frying hostess. Investigators never determined who had rigged the chair, and were never certain whether it had been meant for Ann Jovi or Bertha Van Nation.

Vanna didn't know how badly she had missed cooking Bertha's goose. She was so determined to plunge ahead to destroy Dickon, and this little refuge La Señora had built that she didn't stay to watch the pyrotechnics on the Ann Jovi show. First she must reconnoiter the scene. Trusting her disguise, she decided to spend one or two nights at the San Danson Station Motel.

### The Girl Scouts

Harry Pitts did not recognize Vanna when she checked in. She wore her green suit, and a large hat with a floppy brim. The hat, also green, was trimmed with artificial cherries. She registered as Donna D'Schuys, guessing the name was now out of play, and she could safely use it again.

Vanna began with a stroll along the beach. The wind was high, and tangled her hair. Gulls swooped at her. She feared they might land on her head, or worse yet, leave her offerings of a semi-liquid kind. In the cove, the Crablord suffered indigestion and dark dreams, which disorders he attributed, at first, to eating mussels out of season. The killdeer scattered before her like leaves hustled along a street by an autumnal wind. Far out to sea a whale migrating south swung seaward to avoid the uncanny unease prickling in its baleen. Vanna strolled along the beach, hoping to observe the Village unseen.

Several people saw her. They knew she was from the motel. Harry had announced her signing in as soon as he could tell the first person. Everyone was on edge about strangers. Malcolm Drye watched her wander along the wavelets at the edge of the sand. The Swami peered out his window from time to time to see what she was up to. Ben and Dickon were away that day, and might not have recognized Vanna at a distance, anyway. Butter was troubled, and barked furiously while Vanna was at the seaward end of the beach. No one was at home to hear her, however, so little good it did her to make herself hoarse.

Vanna's reconnoitering told her little. The tramp to the sea and back to the motel tired her. The breast augmentation surgery Dr. Porter House had performed was leaching destructive chemicals into Vanna's system. Slowly her left breast was beginning to turn to point nipple downward at the ground as the lower half of the implant drained. Her right breast, keeping the balance, was pointing nipple upward at the sky as the upper half of that implant drained. Unbeknownst to her, Vanna's pouting lips were likewise draining unevenly, so that the left corner of her mouth had begun to turn upward as the right corner began to turn down. When she got to the motel Vanna went right to sleep. She did not wake until late morning.

Her breakfast at the Four Rosas was a simple plate of toast. She eschewed the orange marmalade, fearing it would not settle on her queasy stomach. She followed breakfast with a quick walk part way into the Village. Prime Pussy snarled at her, and then slunk arthritically under Emma's cottage. No one else appeared to be about. She did not linger long, judging night's dark cloak to better insure her concealment. A large woman came out of a cottage further along in the Village. Vanna hastily turned around and made for the motel.

At the desk she asked Harry Pitts for a copy of the morning newspaper. He, engrossed in a gloss on a verse in Habakkuk, handed it to her without looking at her, though he asked her to read it in the lobby, not her room. The headline shrieked her failure. "Talk Show Hostess Fries" led the banner on the first page. Vanna gasped with her shock. Harry looked up at her and frowned in puzzlement. She seemed twisted, physically twisted, in a way he had not noticed the day before. He stared a long moment at her while she read how an unexplained electrical hookup had killed the popular local talk show host. Vanna's contorted lips moved as she read the quotes from Bertha Van Nation and Barry Cooda, among others. She threw the paper on the counter and stormed off to her room. She hastily packed her battered suitcase with the few articles she had brought with her. Then she sat on the bed to consider what to do next. That's when the transient psychic attack struck her.

Her synapses began firing at random. Her damaged brain could no longer control and focus her anger as it once had done, and she sent out psychic pulses of destruction in random directions. One pulse passed through Malcolm Drye's cottage, searing several hundred African violets to a crisp as it passed. Another, angling more seaward, slew several individuals of _Brachyramphus marmoratus, variety Sandansoniensis_ as they swam and fished in their pelagic way. A third impulse bore eastward into the redwood forest, until it grounded itself out in an unlucky fox's den, where it skewed the brains of the vixen's kits.

Vanna herself collapsed on the unmade bed for almost an hour. When she came to consciousness, she took her packed suitcase, stopped by the motel office only long enough to check out, and went to the highway to hitch a ride. It took her most of the day to get to Pueblo Rio, half-way to Las Tumbas. When her latest ride, in a pickup loaded with manure, dropped her off in Pueblo Rio, she walked toward the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon.

### Prime Pussy Passes

Prime Pussy felt the dark forces pass over her. She mewed in fright. Haakon heard her, and let her in. "What's wrong, old cat?" he asked her. She mewed again, and rubbed against his ankles for comfort. Even this comforting contact caused her pain. She mewed again. Haakon lifted her, very gently, into his arms. She essayed a purr, though it had more of groaning than purring in its note. She settled into Haakon's lap to sleep. Her rumble drifted into silence. Haakon stroked her fur with a light touch that soothed her.

She entered into a dream of clarity. Cats, on occasion, entered into this particular dream state when She-Who-Licks-All-Furs chose to commune with them. Prime Pussy had only once before had such contact, when She-Who-Licks-All-Furs brought her to choose Emma as her guardian human. Prime Pussy, in her dream, pictured herself sitting primly upright, her tail curled around her, waiting expectantly for what was to come, like a young kitten before her Mistress.

Soundless was the voice She-Who-Licks-All-Furs used, yet Prime Pussy, who had grown deaf over the years, heard it with no effort. The voice said, "Your time is come to leave your ninth life. Do not grieve; you have lived well, even lavishly. Your guardian humans have fed you, kept your litter box clean, medicated you, stroked you, and always provided you clear water to drink. You have been blessed. It is required, now, that you give in return as you pass into my realm of blessing. As you come to me, leave with your people your strength of character and your sense of purpose. A great darkness looms upon them, threatening to overwhelm them. They will need all manner of help from loving creatures who follow the good."

Prime Pussy bowed her head, in her dream, to acknowledge She-Who-Licks-All-Furs' teaching. Her clarity dream ended. She slept a little while unaware of the pain that licked at her joints without reprieve.

The endorphins provided by communing with the divine lasted little longer than the relief of an aspirin. Prime Pussy moved uneasily in her sleep, and thus grated an arthritic joint against itself. She woke with a piteous mew. Haakon murmured, "There, there, old girl. An ache creep up on you in your sleep?" Prime Pussy mewed again, a mew of satisfaction that Haakon had noticed her discomfort. She stood, carefully, in his lap. He saved her the jolt jumping down would have given her knees by carefully setting her on the floor. She rubbed his ankles to show her appreciation, and trotted stiffly toward her water dish. She drank, lapping the water in with the underside of her tongue as all cats have done since time immemorial. Then she went in to rest beside the hearth.

How to arrange her dying so that her spirit could be available to Emma in the great need that was about to come upon the Village? Prime Pussy could not guess. She thought of Emma's interests. Cookie sheets, of course, and Haakon, but what else?

Unbeknownst to Prime Pussy Emma had a small crystal cat she prized greatly. It had been a gift from La Señora when Emma was a gawky adolescent. After much worrying, Prime Pussy determined to leave the matter in the paws of She-Who-Licks-All-Furs. Prime Pussy drifted into a deep sleep. She was so very tired.

After a long time Prime Pussy woke to a place of fascinating rodent smells, with occasional wafts of tuna and turkey aromas. She rose and stretched, suddenly whole again, and raced after butterflies and cheeky birds that tempted her to strike, yet always stayed just out of reach. Prime Pussy went racing after them into a golden afternoon that no night would terminate.

For a moment, Emma's crystal cat glowed brightly, and then returned to apparent normal. Emma and Haakon were at table, eating a leftover meatloaf and green beans with mashed potatoes.

Only as evening fell across the Village did Haakon discover Prime Pussy had passed. He gathered Emma in his arms, and together they shed tears into their prayers for Prime Pussy. Wordlessly She-Who-Licks-All-Furs soothed their sorrow with the soft lavender lights of evening.

When morning came, Haakon prepared a grave in the garden Prime Pussy had so often watched from her perch on the sill of the kitchen window. Emma laid her age ravaged cat in a shoebox on a soft bit of towel, then glued on the box's lid. "From earth you came," she said, "and to earth you shall return. You have blessed my life for many years. May the Great Spirit bless your eternity."

Then she took the box to Haakon in the garden. He took it from her and laid it tenderly in the grave he had dug. "Sleep well, old cat," he said, and wiped his eyes. Then he shoveled the dirt over the box and patted the soil into a low mound. "We should mark the grave, do you think?" he said to Emma.

"No," she said. "The Great Spirit knows where it is. That suffices." The stood silent a moment, and then turned and went in. Emma put the kettle to boil while Haakon got out tea bags and cups.

### Inspiration Strikes a Princess

Malcolm stopped Princess Valiant on her morning walk and invited her in to survey the damage to his violets. He was nearly speechless as he showed her the blackened foliage and crisped blossoms that cut a wide swathe through his violet collection.

"It's very bad," she said, "that you have lost these plants is a sorrow for you, I know. It does provide us, though, with an early warning. Vanna has been here, or not too far from the Village. The taint of her evil is on this destruction." Princess Valiant sniffed. "I smell her trace." She made a face, as if she had tasted something very foul, indeed.

Malcolm's hands fluttered. "I know you have said before that we shall have to present a united front when Vanna comes to wreak havoc amongst us. How will we know when she comes?"

The crow tattooed on Val's shoulder drew one wing across its eyes as if to brush tears or soot from them. "That is a question I have not wholly answered," Val said. "I think we need to meet as a Village to consider establishing warning systems. Can we gather here, at your cottage?'

"Well, yes," Malcolm said. "I can prepare some light refreshment. Is tomorrow evening a good time?"

"Yes. I'll alert the other Villagers and the folk at the Manor House."

"I'll prepare something light to eat, and something refreshing to drink. At seven?"

"At seven," Val said. "I'll go now. See you tomorrow. And thanks, Malcolm."

Val estimated the time to be midmorning, from the brighter glow in the gray skies that marked the sun's position behind the fog. She knew Dickon and Ben would be walking on the beach with Butter; Butter was quite regular in her habits, and kept her people on a tight schedule, as well. She went next to the Swami's cottage, and knocked on the door.

"Someone's knocking at the door," a raucous voice declared. "Someone's knocking at the door!" it repeated. Val sighed. Charles Algernon Burnswine was in residence, again. "I do believe that damn-fool parrot spends more time on holiday with the Swami than it spends at its own place," she said to herself.

"Yup," the Swami said behind her, startling Val. "And, from now on, this is old Charley's home. I've just inherited the rascal." Val turned to face the Swami.

"You poor man," she said. "How long ago?"

"A week. I'm getting used to the mouthy thing, though. It beats listening to me talk to myself. What brings you out and about today?"

"Malcolm called me in as I was passing. He's had a blight strike his violets. I think it's something Vanna caused, although I'm not sure it's intentional."

"How do you mean?"

"The taint of her evil was on the destruction, but not in a way that said she had targeted these plants. I think she has been nearby, and something happened. She lost some control over her powers, perhaps. That occurs from time to time with all psychic activity, benign or malevolent."

Charles Algernon Burnswine chose to comment. "All the world's a brothel, and we're merely the whores in it." Princess Valiant shook her head and continued.

"Malcolm has graciously invited us to meet at his place tomorrow at seven in the evening to consider our options. I'll let Emma and Haakon know, and I'll talk to Ben and Dickon. I don't want Ben to think I'm trying to take over his leadership."

"Right. I've got nothing on tomorrow night. I'm due to see Mae Ling this afternoon to discuss correcting a translation of a minor text I'm working through. She has some ideas about it. I'll tell her of the meeting."

"When I talk with Ben, we'll decide who else we need to notify, such as the Sharif family, and the rest of the Village. I'd best be off to see Emma and Haakon before they get too busy with their day. Take care, Swami, and be alert."

"Will do. By the way, did you know Emma and Haakon have lost Prime Pussy? She passed a couple of days ago."

"Yes, I had heard, but thanks for reminding me." The Princess waved a goodbye to the Swami as Charles's voice rang out.

"Go down, Moses, pleasure old Abraham," the parrot declared. Princess Val Crowe smiled and shrugged. A parrot of wide experience, she thought to herself as she passed the path into Elke and Rosa's cottage. They would be elsewhere, she knew, Elke at the Manor House, and Rosa at the Café of the Four Rosas. At Emma and Haakon's cottage, she knocked on the door. Emma answered. Sorrow had etched lines in her plump cheeks. The house, strangely to the Princess's experience, did not smell like cookies baking. A certain stale oppression hung in the air.

"Hello," Emma said. "Come on in, Princess. We're in the kitchen, about to have a cup of tea. Will you join us?"

"Certainly," Val said. She followed Emma through the neat sitting room into the cheerful kitchen. Haakon stood to greet her. He, too, slumped with the weight of his loss. Prime Pussy had become a major force in his life.

"I have heard that Prime Pussy went to be with the Great Spirit," Val said. "I'm sorry for your loss."

"Thank you," Emma murmured as she got another cup out of the cupboard. Haakon nodded, to acknowledge the Princess's comment. "Please, sit," Emma said, indicating the third kitchen chair.

"Thank you," Val said. She told them about Malcolm's violets and the get-together at his cottage on the next evening. They chatted idly for a little, discussing the weather and the appearance of the first autumn flowers on the mountain. While they talked Emma held a small crystal cat, rubbing it with her thumb almost as if she were stroking Prime Pussy's chin. Gradually their talk turned to remembrances of the lost cat, her spirit, her gentleness with those she loved, her fierce disciplining of Ermentrude, and other poignant points of importance to the people she had left. Val murmured appropriate responses; all the while her mind was worrying at how to guard the Village against Vanna's surprise attack.

She saw suddenly how they might do it. Under her blouse the crow tattoo on her shoulder flew in happy circles. "Emma," she interrupted her hostess, "will you bring your crystal cat tomorrow night? I have an idea it may be most important."

"Yes, if you think I should."

"I do," Val said, "and I apologize for interrupting you."

"Certainly," Emma said a little bewildered. She paused for a moment. "As I was asking, do you think we should invite another cat to live with us?"

Val thought deeply. "Wait a little while," she said. "Perhaps another cat is on its way to brighten your lives even as we speak." She finished her tea. "Please forgive my rushing off," she said. "I've got to find Ben and Dickon, to talk with them about tomorrow night's meeting."

"Quite so," Emma said. She smiled at Val. "Thanks for dropping by," she said. "It's a comfort to visit with friends."

"Don't mention it," Val said, and went to the door. "Tomorrow, then."

"Yes."

Val let herself out and started toward her own cottage. As she passed the Swami's cottage she heard Charles Algernon Burnswine screech in rage. She looked up. The bird banged its beak on its cage. "Follow the drunken sailor," he said. Val shook her head and went on toward Ben and Dickon's cottage.

### The Lost Cowgirl

Vanna got a ride to Pueblo Rio with a local chicken farmer. The farmer had passed her by, less than impressed with her disheveled and off-balance appearance. She had simply swung herself into the bed of his stake truck. Today the farmer was not transporting chickens. He was, instead, transporting that well-known poultry byproduct, chicken manure. Vanna plunged into the truck's bed with great vigor. She plowed into the manure pile full force. It was, sadly, quite fresh, and therefore quite wet and sticky. Vanna wiped the excess from her head and face as best she could, and determined to endure a reeking ride to Pueblo Rio.

The afternoon sun had driven the fog back from the redwood forests that lined River Road, but it was still cool, as sunlight only dapples odd bits of the forest floor among the stately trees. Pueblo Rio was a different matter, of course. Long ago the doughty pioneers had cut back the looming trees to make a clearing where they could build their town. Now, in common with most modernized towns, it had a great deal of concrete and asphalt to collect the heat and thrust it back into the faces of pedestrians. Vanna leaped from the truck when the unwitting farmer stopped for the first of Pueblo Rio's two traffic lights.

The heat smote her, and, worse, excited the feces on her face. She snorted, a most unfortunate behavior to choose, as it drove the manure up one nostril. The stench became her world. Instinctively she turned toward the only refuge in town she knew, the Black and Blue Cowgirl Saloon. No one challenged her passage. The few pedestrians on the streets avoided the noisome harridan as quickly as they whiffed her eau de cologne.

She made her way to the saloon, only to meet grave disappointment. Where the staunchly feminist institution had squatted a fern bar now flourished, a fern bar labeled the Lavender Lily. Two pretty young men minced out as she approached the door. They hurried away from her, disgust distorting their perfect faces. Vanna sat on the curb, entirely disoriented. A passing dog mistook her for a fireplug. The abuse aroused her from her funk. She considered. The woods behind the Lavender Lily could provide a refuge. When she had worked here as Mistress Whippy she had often used the area for outdoor scenes with her clients.

She went along the street to a small alley she knew of, that led behind the bar and its neighboring buildings. It joined the lower end of a trail that wound up the steep hill into the forest above the bar. Vanna toiled her way up. Near the ledge where the trail leveled out, she stopped to wipe her hands on the grass. They were not sanitary, but manure no longer clung to them. There was a campground on the level ledge, seldom used after Labor Day. She knew it had a washbasin, and an outdoor spigot. She could at least rinse the worst of her accumulated filth from her body.

When she got to the campground, it was occupied, to her dismay, by a group of men holding a picnic. She waited while they broiled wieners and ribs, consumed great quantities of beans and coleslaw, and quaffed liberal amounts of beer. When they were well-fed and quite mellow, much to her delight they went to play volleyball at the field up the hill. It was out of sight of the picnic tables.

Vanna darted into the picnic area, stole two cold wieners and a small paper bowl of beans. She forewent the coleslaw, having no great yearning for vegetable food. She'd rather have had soda, or water, to drink, but all that was available was beer and ale. Not paying much attention to which she picked up, she got away with a six pack of big ale cans. In the shadows at the edge of the campground she devoured the wieners, not even minding the faint aura of manure that tinctured their flavor. They were, after all, chicken hot dogs. The beans she scooped out with her fingers, and swallowed them without chewing them. Then she began to drink the ale.

The picnic party returned, sufficiently flush with excitement from their volleyball game that they didn't notice the missing ale and food. They stayed until dusk, laughing and joking, while Vanna finished off the ale. Vanna was not accustomed to alcohol consumption; she had always enjoyed an occasional glass of wine, but had not drunk much of that since she was incarcerated at El Serrucho Oxidado. She fell asleep, and did not wake until an owl landed on a branch above her head and expelled its little pellet of inedible rodent parts on her face.

Her head hurt. Her body hurt. She stank. And, she was disoriented, unsure of where she was. It was several minutes before she pushed her mind back to her present predicament, and realized she needed to carry through with her cleanup plans. She groaned as she got to her feet, and stumbled to the faucet. She quickly realized her garments were beyond hope. Even though she could wash the manure away, they remained stained. The gushing water brought a further problem to her attention. Six large cans of ale produced a lot of bladder pressure. She tried the door on the bathroom, but it was locked. Desperately, she went into the woods and relieved herself under the owl's watchful gaze.

She waited in the moonlight as her clothes dried. Long before the moon had reached the western horizon, the fog had moved inland and swallowed it up. Vanna put on her dress, damp as it was, and her still-wet shoes, and stumbled away from the campground. She went uphill, into the dark forest. The splotches of moonlight silvered the spaces between clumps of redwoods with a ghastly light very like the reflection of cold candles from the cheeks of the dead. It was a night sacred to the dark spirit of the redwood grove, and foul things crept toward a broken stump in a small clearing surrounded by a great circle of trees. Vanna came as well, crawling with other dark things that crawled, toward the black heart of the stump. She came to it, and laid her head upon its jagged edge.

The stump hollowed its edge to hold her head. "Sleep, my daughter," it whispered in her mind. "We shall plot together later." Vanna slept through the night, and through the next day, and through the next night, and gathered strength from the fell tree stub where she lay. While she slept, it whispered to her of the joys of evil-doings and the wonders of wickedness. Her bruised psyche sucked in the sentiments as an ointment to heal her hurts. Far away in the Nether Regions the Dark One smiled an evil smile.

### Gathering against the Storm

The autumn winds had blown from the northeast all day. The interior had heated like an oven, baking the brown grasses to tinder dryness. On the coast, the accustomed fog had fled westward toward Hawaii. In the sky the bright stars glittered. Soon, the pale moon would shine on the dark cove waters. Such a night was a rare phenomenon in San Danson, and one commonly reserved for occasional autumn nights. Princess Val Crowe took it as a sign of hope. She knocked on Ben and Dickon's door. Butter raised her usual ruckus, lest her people not know someone had come to visit.

"Hi," Ben said, as he opened the door. Weariness sat on him like a small gray imp bearing his shoulders down. "Come on in, Princess. Would you like some tea?"

"Tea would be nice, any kind."

"It's good old orange pekoe and pekoe," Ben said as he held the door for her. "Come into the kitchen. Dickon's in there. I'm guessing you want to see us both."

"Yes," Val said. "We have been invaded, recently, and we need to prepare against a future invasion."

"Vanna?"

"Who else? She's this village's personal demon, at least for this time."

Dickon looked up as they came into the kitchen. "Hi, Princess," he said. His green eyes sparkled with merriment whose source Val could not guess. Just then the kettle whistled. "I foresaw you'd be coming," he went on. "I put the kettle on just in time." He had set out three cups with three bags. Now he poured the boiling water over them and set them around the table. "Sit," he said, as he took a chair. Ben and Val sat.

"What's up?" Dickon asked.

"We've been invaded," Val said. "Vanna's been in the vicinity, probably in the Village. I think she's in disguise. Harry told me he had a strange guest at the motel night before last. Malcolm's had a scorch event cut a swathe through his African violets." Val took a deep breath, and slowed herself down.

"I've suggested we get together at Malcolm's tomorrow night for a meeting. If I've stepped on your authority, Ben, I apologize."

Ben waved his hand. "Any Villager, including you, can call a meeting for any reasonable purpose. I don't have anymore authority to do it than anyone else."

"I had no ideas when I started out, except that we needed to get together to come up with whatever we could. Then, when I stopped by to talk to Emma and Haakon, it came to me. We have power objects among our possessions, and if we bring them all together they will give us an edge in the struggle."

"Slow down, Princess," Dickon said. "I'm lost."

"What do you mean by power objects?"

"Ordinary enough statues, or books, or even kitchen implements, that have become repositories for the life force of people or creatures. These life forces may be drawn upon to strengthen psychic activities."

"I don't think we'd have anything like that around," Ben said. "We're really ordinary people, Val. Not quite in touch with the planes beyond this plane we know."

"You sell yourselves short," Val said. "You're more in tune than you know. But you don't have to be in tune with anything to possess one of these power objects. I've located four just today. The Swami has three statues, and Emma has a crystal cat."

Dickon asked, "Ben, do you suppose La Señora's words about connecting the clay and the bamboo have something to do with these power objects?"

Ben frowned with puzzlement. "I don't know quite how they would."

"Well, there's the Swami's Boddhisattvas," Dickon said, "and then there's Minnie Vann's Bamboo Buddha she gave you."

"You have Minnie Vann's Bamboo Buddha?" Val's excitement was like an electric spark flashing around the kitchen.

"Yes," Ben said. "Do you want me to get it?"

"Just bring it to Malcolm's tomorrow night, at seven," she said to him. "That's five," she counted. "We need at least two more."

Dickon said, "Well, you want to go through the kitchen drawers, or poke around our small figurine collection?"

"No," the Princess replied. "I'm guessing the best hunting ground will be the Manor. There's so much there to look through." She took a large mouthful of tea, washed it around her teeth, and swallowed it. "I should be going," she said. She lifted her teacup again and drained it, closing her teeth just in time as the wet bag pulled away from the side of the cup with a plopping sound.

"Would you like to stay for supper?" Ben asked.

"No, thanks, though. I'd best be on my way. It's time for me to do my nightly meditation," she said. "I don't eat until I've had my quiet time." She stood. Ben got up as well.

"Remember, bring your Bamboo Buddha," Val said on her way to the door. "Come to Malcolm's tomorrow night at seven. You, too, Dickon," she called over her shoulder. "Thanks for the tea."

"Good night," Ben said.

"Good night." Princess Val went to the path and turned toward her cottage. The crow tattooed on her shoulder tucked its head under its wing and pondered.

### Stump Speech

The Stump Spirit caressed Vanna with fingers that burned like fire and ice at the same time. Where it caressed her cosmetic surgery, all the blunders Dr. Porter House had provided melted away, turned into black steam by the Stump Spirit's touch. Vanna slowly re-emerged from the physical wreck her experiment at disguise had made her.

Then the Spirit touched Vanna's mind with its own. The oily darkness of its mental tendrils slid into sockets in her psyche. Vanna shuddered. The touch was at once terror and ecstasy.

"I am Shikunok," it told her. "This is my stump you have chosen for your pillow." Vanna extended a wordless apology. Shikunok replied, "You owe me nothing for this, nor for your psychic restoration. Indeed, I am pleased that you have come to me. I have been able to discharge a debt to the Dark One by curing you." Vanna sensed a chuckle rippling across the ether.

"I do not like paying debts, ordinarily," Shikunok continued. "In this case, it has been a pleasure. You are a delight to ravage, my dear."

"Ravage?"

"I speak in the spiritual sense," Shikunok said. "I am eons beyond physical ravishment, more's the pity. I doted on it, in my time." Again a chuckle rippled across the ether. "I was notorious for it."

"Who are you?" Vanna questioned again.

"I am Shikunok, as I told you."

"Shikunok is your name. That tells me nothing."

"Ah, are there no more speakers of old things among your people?"

"We have historians," Vanna said. "They mostly write long dull books about wars and politicians."

Great sadness permeated the psychic emanations from Shikunok. "Always with the warriors! The clamor of the battle tumult and the great wind of grand speeches, with so little said about those of us who use subtler means to conquer and control. Seriously, though, have you no history, nor even legends of Shikunok?"

"No, nothing. When did you die, anyway?"

"In a truly spiritual sense I'm still living."

"Yes, of course you are," Vanna responded. A certain irritation prickled under the skin of her mind. Shikunok seemed a bit dense. She thought a moment. "How many centuries have you been the Spirit of the Stump?"

"A lot. More than I can count on my fingers and toes."

"No wonder I've never heard of you, then. Our histories only go back about four centuries in this area. Before that, we know nothing of what transpired."

Great sadness welled across the psychic connection between them. Vanna hastily erected filters to dilute it. When had she learned to do that?

"I need to tell someone my story," Shikunok said. "I choose you to listen."

"Well, really," Vanna began. A strong clamp overrode her filters and her control.

"Listen!" Shikunok commanded her. Vanna listened.

Shikunok told her/showed her his story. He had been a small boy when he first discovered he could twist the minds of others in his small tribe. He began with minor mischief, such as making an arthritic elder dance wildly around the fire one night, or causing the shaman to double time his healing chants, and the like. Puberty struck Shikunok with a tidal wave of mental power. He discovered he could now control many minds at one time, enough to determine the activities of the tribe. Now he discovered, as well, the joy of ruling others absolutely. He could have sexual congress with any tribal member any time and any place he wanted. No one could stop him.

One tribe proved too small for his ambitions. He had soon led his people in a war attack to steal the women of the neighboring group. When the men of that tribe came after Shikunok's tribe to avenge themselves and retrieve their women, Shikunok took over their minds and introduced them to man on man sex. The behavior so amused him he made it permanent.

Shikunok extended his control to other tribes in his vicinity. When he chose, they all descended to the great ocean, and in great danger of their lives (many died) he sent them out to capture a great whale (they got the whale, and it died, too). Another time he amassed his men and sent them foraging up the river to raid the groves of the peoples who dwelled in the great valleys of the interior. When he lost too many men in these ventures, he simply twisted the minds of other men in other tribes to join his band.

One old shaman's mind he could not twist. This shaman was so well shielded Shikunok did not know he skulked on the edges of the village. The old shaman grieved for the peoples of the coast and the peaceful lives they had once shared. One night, Shikunok had chose to shame a couple who had kept back a choice portion of venison when he had wanted some for his supper. He forced the man to fornicate with his eldest son while the man's wife was forced to beat her husband's buttocks until the blood ran. Shikunok could have blanked the incident from his victims' minds, but that would have been less than satisfactory vengeance. He wanted them to know the full embarrassment of their punishment. While he was engaged in this powerful mind control session, the old shaman crept up on him and smashed his head with a great rock. So Shikunok died, and his spirit entered the redwood tree where he had been imprisoned ever since. "And," he concluded his tale, "thanks to the elements, my house has gotten very small indeed, until only this stump is left."

"How very interesting," Vanna said. Shikunok's grasp on her mind had loosened considerably while he told his tale. Vanna slipped his grasp and backed away from the stump. Shikunok was preening himself as she left.

Vanna walked down the mountainside toward Pueblo Rio. Unbeknownst to her, her hair had become gray as the winter skies over the water. Her breasts, cheeks, and lips, that she had Dr. Porter House augment, had shrunk to their former size, but now the skin was carved with great wrinkles. Yet there was power in her stride, and ferocity in the glitter of her hard black eyes. She planned her attack on San Danson as she made her way toward the drowsing river town. It was only as she approached an outlying cabin that she realized her green dress had evaporated while she was with Shikunok. Sudden prudence dictated she find clothing. Her luck held. The outlying cabin was unoccupied. Vanna broke a window on the door and entered. She found clothes in a closet that fit her reasonably well. She chose jeans, boots, socks, and a heavy black and yellow flannel shirt. When she had put them on, she left the cabin, with the door wide open, and went to town.

### The Awakening

The Villagers gathered at Malcolm's that evening. Outside, the gray sky darkened toward night. A full moon could not penetrate the fog. It scarcely brightened the sky. When they had all gathered together, Ben called for quiet, and turned the session over to Princess Valiant.

"We have been invaded," the Princess began. "Vanna has been near us, or among us. You've seen the gaps in Malcolm's violet garden." Several Villagers murmured sympathetically. "We can expect she will return, and probably within a few days," Val continued. "We must make ready."

"Just how do we do that?" Notta asked. She clasped Hyacinth to her. "Hyacinth is too young to stand against an old evil like Vanna." DiConti moved closer to Notta and Hyacinth. He put a protective arm around Notta.

"I quite agree," Val said. "Hyacinth is not ready to battle a witch like Vanna on the psychic plane. We will need to ready another champion."

"You're the major psychic among us," the Swami said. "Will you be our champion?"

"No," Val said. "Someone must collect the spiritual strength of the whole village. That also requires skill, and more, it requires experience. I can't gather your strength, and battle Vanna at the same time."

"La Señora never had to gather strength from other people," Emma argued. "Why not?"

"She had strength she nourished over decades," Val said. "I don't, and most Keepers of the Balance would not have so much power. La Señora was unusual that way. I hope, in her time, Hyacinth will come also into that level of power." Val sighed. "We have to deal with Vanna now," she said.

"What kind of person do you need?" Dickon asked. Worry welled in his eyes. "Can any of us qualify?"

Val smiled at him. "Yes, Dickon, one person can, for sure." She turned to look at Ben. "You, Ben, have the potential."

"I do?" Ben responded. "I'm not psychic; I don't even trust my eyes when I see these things happen." He shook his head. "I'd do whatever I can," he went on, "but I think I'm an already-broken reed, not fit for the Village to lean on."

"None the less, Ben," Val said, you are our best hope. You will have to submit to some unpleasant mental invasion to get ready, but I can help you get through that."

Haakon spoke up. "Ben, if Val's right about this, and she usually is, I think, will you do it? We'll be your backup battery, or whatever, if we can. But if you're our best hope, we need you."

Anger flared in Dickon's green eyes. "Can't we all do this together? Does it have to be laid on Ben alone?"

"We will all be doing everything we can," Princess Valiant said to Dickon. "Someone has to be the point on the dagger, as it were. Ben's the likeliest candidate."

"Yeah, but sending him up against Vanna, that's an awful request."

"You willing, Ben?" Harry Pitts asked.

Ben thought a long moment. He looked up at Dickon's worried face. "Yes," he said, more to Dickon than to the rest of the Villagers. "I'll do it. This is my home, and if vermin comes in, I need to do my best to exterminate it."

"Thank you, Ben," Princess Valiant said. "I'll do all I can to prepare you." She turned to the rest of the Villagers. "Tonight we need to meld ourselves into a single power source, one we can join almost instantly if we have to. Swami, did you bring your Boddhisattvas?"

"Yes," the Swami said. "Shall I put them on the table?"

"Please do. Ben, put your Bamboo Buddha there with them. Emma, did you bring your Crystal Cat?"

"Yes, here it is," she said. She stroked it with her thumb as she carried it to the table.

"Ermentrude brought me this," Hyacinth piped. She handed a jade pendant, shaped like a unicorn, to Princess Valiant. The Princess put it on the table with the other artifacts.

"We need one more holy thing of power," Val said. "Seven's the best number to have."

"Will my Bible do?" Harry inquired.

"Yes," the Princess said, and motioned to Harry to put it on the table.

"You'll be safe enough here," Harry said to the book. "These are good things and good people. A Bible can be among them and ally with them." He kissed the worn book and laid it on the table. Then he took his seat again.

"Please join hands," Princess Val said. "Ben, join your left hand with Malcolm. Put your right hand on the table." Ben did so. Then she joined her right hand with DiConti and put her left hand on the other side of the table. She looked around the room. Everyone had joined hands. The Princess began to chant. No one present knew the language she used, but each of them felt the power in her words and voice. Ben's right hand grew warm as power surged into him from the table. He felt it travel across his body and through his left hand into Malcolm's hand. The Princess chanted louder, and the power increased. Most of the Villagers closed their eyes to let the power flow become more real for them.

Dickon did not close his eyes. From across the room he watched the table's power items glow with some inner light beyond his ken. The room lights paled before the table's brilliant occupants. How long the chanting went on he never remembered, but at its end, Val's voice rose to a high pitch, then cascaded tone by tone to its lowest pitch, and died away. The silence in the room was profound as the light from the objects faded. Sleepily and dreamily the Villagers returned to the ordinary reality of Malcolm's living room.

"Thank you," Val said. Exhaustion dragged at her flesh. On her shoulder the crow tattoo tucked its head in its wing and slept. "When the time comes," Val said, "you each of you should sense the call to come together in spirit to support Ben in the struggle." Val sighed. "Excuse me," she said. "I need to rest."

"Would you like a cup of tea?" Malcolm asked. "I have some very fine Darjeeling."

"Yes, a cup would be nice." Malcolm got up to put the kettle on. "I'll make a big enough pot for everyone," he said.

"Here," Dickon said to Val, "sit on the sofa." He got up and went to Ben. "Are you sure about this, Ben?" he said softly.

Ben replied in a soft voice, "No."

"Oh, jeez!" Dickon said. The kettle whistled, and Malcolm made tea. Emma opened a bag she had brought, and handed round orange drop cookies. The Villagers made small talk for a while, and then made their respective ways home. The owners took their power objects with them as they left.

### Boring out the Neural Pathways

Dickon slept poorly that night. In the morning he got up early and made tea and toast for himself. He knew Ben would boil up some pasta for his breakfast. When he had eaten his toast and fed Butter her morning treat, he went out of their cottage into the gray drizzle. It wasn't heavy enough to wet him, and it matched his mood. Butter had wisely declined to accompany him. She'd rather wait for warmer hours in the morning to wander the trails.

Dickon went down the stairs to the beach. He needed to let the waves wash his mind and soul clean of worry. Princess Valiant found him on a rock near the mouth of the cove.

"Good morning, Dickon," the Princess said. "You're up early."

"Yes," he said. "I am."

"You're upset about Ben, aren't you?"

"I am," Dickon said. "Why Ben? You've told me why not me. Okay. I accept that. I don't understand it, particularly, but I accept it." He glared at her. "Why Ben?"

"Ben's an older soul than he imagines," the Princess began. "He has hidden experience to draw on that nobody else can equal, at least among the Villagers. It's experience he's acquired over several transmigrations."

"Are you telling me he has past lives? I don't believe in such stuff."

"I do, and it's the way I explain things. Be free to come up with your own explanation, whatever suits your religion. There's more to it, too. Ben doesn't have any religious axes to grind."

"Meaning?"

"Ben's not allied with any one world view shaped by a religion. You have one, I have one, Harry Pitts is locked into one, but Ben is not."

"No, he's not much on religion." Dickon shifted on his rock. Then he stood and dusted off the seat of his jeans. "How dangerous is this thing you've got Ben doing?"

"Dangerous?" Val frowned. The tattoo on her shoulder fluttered its wings. "I don't know, Dickon, how dangerous it is," she said. "It could be pretty hard on Ben, and maybe it won't. The human mind is curiously fragile and wondrously strong all at the same time."

"I don't want him to do it, but that won't stop him, I know." Dickon clenched his fists. "I've waited all my adult life for Ben to come along. I don't want to lose him now."

"You won't, not if I can help it." Val put a hand on Dickon's shoulder. "Can you keep Butter busy today for several hours? I need to help Ben get ready."

Dickon heaved a long sigh. "Yes," he said. "I'll help Butter worry."

"Good man," the Princess said. "I'll start back, now. The longer we have, the better I can prepare Ben."

"I'm coming with you," Dickon said, and turned away from the ocean to climb the bluff to the cottage he and Ben shared. Along the way he and Val didn't speak. When he looked over at her, he could see she was preoccupied.

When they were almost at the cottage, Val turned to him and asked, "Is the Chapel available?"

"Sure," Dickon said. "We have a key."

"I think Ben and I should work there," she said, "where we won't be disturbed."

"Do you want to come in for some tea?"

"No tea, thanks. I'll just collect Ben and get to work."

"What about lunch?"

"We'll eat when we're through."

"I hope he's had breakfast, then," Dickon said, and opened the door into the cottage. Ben was sitting on the couch in his bathrobe, finishing a cup of tea.

"Hi," he said. Butter came to his feet and lay on them. He wriggled his toes under her stomach. She had learned to require this bit of attention every morning.

"Dress warmly," Val said, "and come along with me, Ben. We've got a lot of work to do."

"Sure," Ben said, and stood up. He pulled his robe together where it threatened to gape, and went into the bedroom. He drew on jeans, a flannel shirt, and put on his heavy socks and boots. When he came out, Butter danced around him, certain they were going to go for a walk. He stooped and petted her.

"Not now, old girl," he said. "Dickon will take you out later. You stay, and guard the house, okay?" Butter whined, and sat, puzzled, as Ben followed Val out the door. Ben looked at the sky overhead.

"Still gray, I see," he said. "It's that time of year again, I guess."

"Stays gray here a lot," Val said. "It's a common thing, on the coast of an ocean, the fog and low cloud." She pointed. "We're going to the Chapel," she said. "Dickon gave me the key."

When they got to the Chapel, Val opened the door and said, "Take a comfortable pew, Ben. You'll be sitting for quite a while."

"Okay," Ben said. Princess Val took a small sprig of sage from her pocket and lit it. She waved it in the air, censing the Chapel with its smoke. As she waved the smoldering sprig, she chanted in a deep voice that recalled her masculine beginnings. Ben waited. He had no idea what tongue she spoke. He could not tell Cherokee from Kwakiutl; indeed, he had trouble distinguishing Spanish from German.

When Val completed her chant, she raised her arms to shoulder height and extended them as widely as she could. She began another chant. This sounded to Ben like an invocation of some spiritual being. He looked around the Chapel, half expecting a loincloth-clad apparition to rise from the floor. Nothing like that happened. Val completed this chant also, closed her eyes, and bowed her head. Ben thought he saw her lips move, as if she prayed silently. He waited.

Val opened her eyes and smiled at him. "Ready, Ben?"

"I guess," he said. He heard a tentative quaver in his voice and cleared his throat.

"This won't be easy, I don't think," Val said. "What I need to do is enter your mind and open up certain pathways. I will be as gentle as I can about this."

"What do you need me to do?"

"First, give me permission to enter your mind."

"Granted." Ben swallowed hard. "Just don't broadcast everything you find there."

"Granted," Val said. "Next, I need you to close your eyes and relax as much as you can."

"Sounds like sex for the first time," Ben tried to joke. Val remained grimly serious. She knelt on the pew over Ben, her knees to either side of his thighs. She put her hands on his temples and began to mutter. Ben smelled the closeness of her, and felt the warmth of her breasts near his face. He felt a prickling in his temples. Darkness overtook his mind, and he lost all sensation of the pew beneath him.

Val concentrated her mind on the image of a drill bit boring through blockage after blockage. Some blocks were thin, and presented themselves to Val's mind as flimsy plywood. Others were more substantial brick or stone, and yielded more slowly to Val's intrusion. She came to a final barrier that presented itself as steel shining in a dim light. She began to drill. Her bit bounced off. She tried several times without denting the barrier. Finally she conjured a diamond drill bit and that bored through.

Once into Ben's innermost mental compartment, Val discovered Ben was amazingly adept at mustering psychic energies. She quickly allied Ben's energies to her own, and began the slow and careful withdrawal she deemed necessary to preserve Ben's mind. She imaged doors built into every barrier she'd drilled through as she withdrew. These she carefully closed and locked, and saw herself handing off the key to them all to Ben. At the very end she came out of Ben's mind and removed her hands from his temples. She backed off her numb knees and tried to stand. She couldn't, quite, and had to hobble to a place on the pew near Ben. She sat, and drifted into an exhausted slumber.

Ben came back to the world slowly. First he felt the hard pew under his butt and behind his back. He was sore enough that he had trouble moving. He felt numb, until he pushed himself to his feet. His blood, returning to its usual free flow through his arteries and veins, tingled in his flesh. A wave of almost nausea came over him prompted by the sensation. He looked around for Val. She was snoring softly on the pew. He probed at her mind without thinking. A sudden mental image of Val, shaking a finger and saying "No!" came to him. Only after he disengaged did he wonder at this strange skill he suddenly seemed to have.

He called softly to Val. "Val," he said, "wake up, Val. Are we done, yet?" Val stirred, but did not waken. "Val," he called a little louder. He started to grasp Val's shoulder where the tattooed bird resided. Before his fingers had done more than touch the cloth, he felt a beak peck savagely at them. Val, startled by Ben's jerking his hand back, woke up.

"Hi," she said. "Sorry I fell asleep."

"Are we done?" Ben asked.

"Yes," Val said. "Everything went much easier than I thought. You're a natural psychic, Ben."

"Sure," he said. "I've got a bridge you'll really want to buy."

"Take it from someone who knows, Ben. You are a natural psychic." She went on to explain to him how she had perceived the barriers in his mind, and how she had left them with doors he could open or close at will. Then she had him practice several times opening and closing the doors. Ben surprised himself with how easily he manipulated what he still thought of as a kind of mumbo-jumbo. When Val was satisfied they had done all they could for the day, they left the Chapel and went to the cottage, where Dickon prepared them a simple meal of meatloaf, potatoes, and spinach.

### Into the Maelstrom She Goes

Vanna proceeded unnoticed through Pueblo Rio. Her flannel shirt and jeans and boots only marked her as a passing Lesbian, no matter of note in the small community that sometimes billed itself as the Lesbian Capital of the World. (We should note, in passing, other communities on both coasts disputed the title.) One urge moved Vanna now: to revenge herself on Dickon, and any of Dickon's friends she could find. She had come to believe he alone had caused all her troubles. Neither food nor drink distracted her.

The River, however, thwarted her. Every time she approached the water, something turned her away. One time it was a wren's song. Another time she followed a blowing plastic sack as it danced in the air. On a third try, when she unaccountably found herself paralleling the River instead of crossing it, she stopped to consider the phenomenon. It was then she heard the voice of Shikunok in her head.

"Water's no good for witches," he said. "You're a full-fledged witch, now. If you want to cross water, you'll have to get someone to carry you." Shikunok cackled. "Water dissolves witches, my dear. Always has." Vanna cursed, and kicked at a fire hydrant in front of a store called The Antique Junkyard. She bruised her toe, which brought forth yet more vile curses from her. A young man with long stringy hair handed her a pamphlet as he passed. She looked at it. "Jesus Saves!" the print shouted at her. She cast it away in disgust. It joined a group of its fellows in the muddy gutter.

Vanna stood a little while staring down River Road. Then it occurred to her that she didn't need to cross water to come to San Danson. The highway ran on the north side of the River, turning away from it near its mouth. It did cross Martyr's Creek. That presented a problem, she supposed, but maybe she could find someone to carry her across the stream. Maybe being in a car could be considered being carried. Shikunok in her mind was silent, and gave her no help. Vanna walked to the sea-bound side of River Road, stuck out her thumb, and waited for a car to stop for her.

In San Danson Village, Emma and Haakon kept watch on the small Crystal Cat. When it began to glow, they knew, it would be a warning Vanna was near. Harry Pitts frequently lay a palm on his Bible. If it grew unbearably warm, Val had assured him, it meant Vanna was in the vicinity. The Swami touched his Boddhisattvas several times a day. They, too, could sense Vanna's propinquity. On the mountain, Notta kept a lookout on the jade unicorn. It, too, would glow, should Vanna attempt an invasion over the mountain. Ben's Bamboo Buddha was expected to indicate, probably by temperature, that Vanna approached. As it happened, Harry's Bible alerted the Village first. He immediately activated the siren they had installed over the Import/Export Emporium and gas station. It was the signal for the Villagers to gather in the Chapel. Vanna had found a ride, and was about to stalk the Village.

Vanna's ride from Pueblo Rio crossed several small streams tributary to the river along the way. Each time she crossed one, agony assailed her body. The whiskey drummer (his self-description—he actually sold local wines to various bars and restaurants along the coast) chattered happily on about vintages and tannin and oak and raspberries and wine noses without noticing Vanna's momentary distress. She did not distract him. Her aim was to get to San Danson before dark, so she could lie up in the redwood grove across from the Station until daybreak.

The drummer was surprised when she urged him to let her off just before they got to the Station. Vanna didn't want to risk anyone at the Station recognizing her, now that Shikunok had reversed her disastrous cosmetic surgery. She finally slowed her driver's arguments by threatening to jump if he didn't stop. He, fearing a lawsuit, or even prison time for sexual harassment, jammed on the breaks, let Vanna exit to stand at the side of the road, and roared away as soon as he could.

Vanna waited until he was out of sight and went into the woods to camp in a spot where she could watch the Station without being seen. Food, fire, and water were no longer necessary to her. The Dark One had taught her system to subsist on dark currents drawn from the nether ether. She felt no chill, no hunger, and no thirst. Dark fog flowed in from the Cove and obscured the moon. Vanna settled on the ground, her back against a tree, and waited for her hour to strike the Village. While she waited, she drew more strength from the dark earth.

On the mountain, the young unicorn with the unique horn paced restlessly across the pasture. The disturbed llamas clustered around her to guard her.

### The Villagers Assemble

The unease that struck the unicorn, She-Who-Smells-Like-Violets, quickly transmitted to Ermentrude, Butter, Charles Algernon Burnswine, and the nameless crow tattooed on Val's shoulder. Val heeded the warning her tattoo gave her. She quietly went from cottage to cottage, asking folk to come to the Chapel. She then went to the Station to alert Harry, Olive, Rosa, and the Wong brothers. Harry rang the Manor House. Notta rang DiConti, who was just about to leave the sheriff's station in Las Tumbas, with the news. Then she gathered Hyacinth, the jade pendant, and Ermentrude, and went to find Willy Waugh. When she found him, he led Notta and Hyacinth down the trail in the thickening fog to the Chapel. The rest of the Village, including Butter and the other six objects of power were already present. Val nodded at Notta.

"Where is DiConti?" Val asked Vanna.

"He's on his way. He'll take up position with Dickon outside when he gets here."

"Good." Val looked at Dickon. "Perhaps you should begin to circle the Chapel," she said to him.

"Right," Dickon said. He hugged Ben hard and quick. "Be careful, Ben," he said. He started to say more, but his throat filled. Ben smiled at Dickon with tears in his eyes.

"I'll be careful," he said. Dickon went out, with only one lingering backward glance. He sighed as he went out the door and began his slow circling of the cottage as the fog settled down around it.

Inside the Chapel, Princess Valiant arranged the seven power objects in a circle. For those that had faces, she arranged them face out. They were to ward off evil. Inside this circle she put Hyacinth, with Ermentrude to guard her. Under her Kelly green sweater with cable-knit patterns running vertically, the crow tattoo flew in purposeful circles, clapping its beak in a silent chant.

Notta started for the circle to be with Hyacinth.

"No, Notta," Val said. "Not there. That protection is for Hyacinth. I need you and your fierce mother love by the door, with Butter on one side of you, and Charles Algernon Burnswine on the other."

Notta opened her mouth to argue, and then thought better of it. Princess Valiant knew more of these matters than any of them. Notta quietly took a position by the door. Butter and Charles joined her, Butter at her feet and Charles Algernon Burnswine perched on her shoulder.

"Let the rest of us gather in a circle around Ben," Val said. "No particular order but let each of us touch the persons on either side, whether by holding hands, or some other body-to-body contact. Once we have melded into one will, I will meld that will with Ben's will. We can pass our joint power to him through me."

The Villagers circled around Ben, who sat on a cushion on the floor. The others had brought each his or her own cushion to provide what softness down and fabric could against the cold Chapel floor. Princess Val had warned them the session could be long, and their bodies would be full weary when the struggle was over.

Across from San Danson Station Vanna waited for evenfall. She observed Rosa, Harry, and Olive leave the restaurant. The motel had a sign lit saying it had no vacancies tonight. A little later she watched the Wong brothers head up the trail into the Village. She guessed they were gathering for a party. All the better to catch them unawares, she thought to herself. Shikunok's spirit chuckled in Vanna's hindbrain.

Vanna stood and stretched. She moved stiffly out of the redwoods and crossed the highway. As much as she could, she kept to the shadows the descending night was casting across San Danson Station. Once she had passed through the Station area, she crept quietly up the trail toward Emma and Haakon's cottage. Just before she reached it, the llamas appeared on the trail, blocking her way. Vanna cursed. After her earlier brush with the beasts she had no desire to engage them again. Prudence dictated she either climb the mountain, or go down to the beach.

Vanna chose the beach. She remembered the llamas were most agile on steep slopes and precipitous cliffs. The llamas watched her go down to the packed sand and nodded. They had done their bit, and they would continue to stand guard. Now the Village was high ground, and Vanna did not occupy it.

The beach was far closer to the cove waters than Vanna liked, but she determined to endure it. She remembered the trail at the other end offered a way up into the Village. The fog that writhed and wreathed around her could not touch her. She had cast a drying spell to protect her body. It required only a little of her powers.

The crashing surf annoyed Vanna. She thrust the sound out of her consciousness, and contemplated the climb up the steps cut into the bluff toward the Chapel. She knew Dickon was up there, and she burned to destroy him. She felt great power, as well, an awesome threat of light beat against her. She climbed into it, defying it. When she reached the top of the bluff, she joined battle.

Ben, as the Village's power focus and champion, met her attack head on.

### Clashing Spirits

Ben experienced a hammering at his mind and soul. Blow fell upon blow fell upon blow. Words echoed in his brain. "Resistance is futile," a dead mechanical voice proclaimed to him. Ben walled off his mental ears. He sent out great bursts of energy to contain Vanna's attack in chains of bright light. Vanna broke those chains.

On her side, Vanna experienced sending out pulses of darkness to negate Ben's light force. When Ben counter-attacked, Vanna experienced white roses with vicious thorns binding her hands and head. She imagined hordes of earwigs, black as night, and glittering like obsidian in firelight, chewing away the petals and thorns. She felt Ben's next attack as an insecticide spray. Quickly she contrived a chemical antidote. She attacked Ben again, struggling to separate him limb from limb.

Ben blunted Vanna's attack with a shield of light. He sought again to bind Vanna, to subdue her. He was mindful that La Señora's failure to be compassionate had flawed her subduing Vanna. Ben sent out chains fashioned into metal snakes to surround Vanna and bind her.

Vanna countered with hideous mongooses, whose blackened teeth rent the snakes into shreds of drying skin and flesh that blew away on a mighty wind. Ben conjured mice, then, wee rodents of light, to nibble at Vanna's toes and ears and nose, hoping to distract her from the net he constructed of light and raised over her head. Vanna flung tiny knives at the net and rodents, shredding the net and slaying the rodents.

And they paused, each to gather strength. Dickon, making his circle of the Chapel, dimly saw Vanna's figure in the agitated mists. He yearned to rush her, push her over the edge. A tendril of thought from Princess Valiant forestalled Dickon's rushing his ex-wife. DiConti came up from the Station and joined Dickon.

"How's it going?" DiConti asked in a low voice.

"I really don't know," Dickon said. "Vanna's over there, at the head of the trail from the beach. I wanted to push her over, but Princess Val says not to."

"I guess we have to trust her instincts," DiConti said. "I'll go on back. Give me three or four minutes, and we can circle the Chapel. Clockwise direction?"

"Clockwise it is," Dickon said. He watched the trim deputy disappear into the thickening mists, counted out about four minutes, and began his circling again.

Vanna struck, hoping to catch Ben unawares. Ben, though resting, had remained alert. He could feel the approach of Vanna's psychic spear and sent out flames to burn it in mid air. Vanna began a barrage of darkness that probed every inch of Ben's defenses. Rats followed vipers, vipers followed cockroaches, cockroaches followed poison darts, and then the circle of vicious things began again. While Ben was busy repulsing these invasions, Vanna probed for weaknesses in Ben's mind. The power surging through Ben's neural pathways was so strongly communal, thanks to Val's channeling of the Village people, that Vanna was confused. She sought the spirit of Shikunok's advice.

Unbeknownst to her, this opened to Ben her justified fear of water. A plan formed in Ben's mind. Behind his shields which were still repelling vipers, rats, cockroaches, and poison darts. He twisted bright silver ropes from strands of the surf. As he twisted them, he coiled them around Vanna, until his mental picture of her looked like Laocoőn strangled by Poseidon's serpents on Troy's war-ravaged strand.

His maneuver terrified Vanna. She imaged black flames from burning coal to evaporate the chains of surf. They hissed away. The psychic recoil stunned Ben, and Vanna discovered, just before he slammed his mental doors shut, that Ben's vulnerability lay in Dickon. Vanna sought out Dickon. Yes, he was here. She could revenge herself on this man she had grown to hate so much. She waited for him to come around the Chapel on his patrol. When he came in sight, she shot a great thunderbolt of hate at him. Ben barely deflected it in time. Unthinking and unplanned, Ben raised a great waterspout from the Cove and whirled it up the beach and onto the bluff. The Crablord rode its vortex like a horseman of vengeance.

The waterspout swirled around Vanna, enveloping her in water. Her skin shriveled as it sizzled and yet the water came. Her flesh dissolved in agonizing streams of liquid that vaporized as the water dissolved her. Her last agonizing scream shrilled across the Cosmos as the water found her bones, and washed them painfully away into the nether ether. The Crablord went with her, cooked red in the steam of her dissolution. Dickon fell to his knees, stunned. Tears ran from his green eyes and mingled with the fog droplets on his face.

### As the Fog Eddies

DiConti found Dickon face down on the ground. He ran to the prone man, fearing he was dead. When he got to Dickon, the man was conscious, though still weeping.

"Dickon," DiConti said, "can you get up?"

"I think so," Dickon gasped out between sobs. "She's gone, DiConti, gone altogether."

"Vanna? Vanna's gone?"

"Dissolved," Dickon said, as he levered himself up using DiConti's outstretched hand. "We don't have to worry about her coming back."

"You sure about that?"

"Yes," Dickon said, trying to brush the damp grass stains from his clothes. "I watched the waterspout wash the life out of her." He coughed. "It was so sad to watch. I hadn't expected to feel sad about it." He stared at the fog where Vanna had been. He shook his head. "I hadn't thought I'd feel sad," he murmured.

"Come inside, then," DiConti said. "If it's all over, the others should know, too. And, I think you need a cup of tea, or something, to warm you up. You're shaking like a leaf in a windstorm."

"Yes, I suppose so," Dickon said. "Oh!" He ran for the Chapel door. "I've got to see if Ben's all right!"

DiConti ran after Dickon. The Chapel door was locked from the inside. Dickon began pounding on it. "Let me in," he cried. "Let me in!"

A muffled voice came through the door, and then Dickon heard Butter barking.

"What?" Dickon shouted.

"Someone's knocking at the door," Charles Algernon Burnswine screeched. "Someone's knocking at the door!"

"DiConti, are you out there?" Notta's voice came through the keyhole. "What's happening?"

"It's over, love," DiConti said through the keyhole. He almost shouted to be sure Notta heard him over the commotion Butter, Dickon, and the parrot were making.

"Ouch!" Notta said. "No need to break my eardrum!" She turned the lock and opened the door. "DiConti," she said, and fell into his arms. He began kissing her.

She broke away from him. "Hyacinth!" she shouted, and ran to her daughter. Hyacinth was sleeping calmly, a beatific smile on her childish face. Ermentrude, beside her, yawned, and resumed purring.

"She's okay," Notta said to DiConti. She almost sang the words. "Hyacinth's okay!"

Dickon saw Ben lying so very still on the Chapel floor. He rushed to Ben and grasped his hand. It was damp, almost feverish. "Ben," Dickon said, anguish thickening his voice. He brushed Ben's hair back from his brow, scarcely noticing how white it had gone during the psychic struggle. Butter came, whining, and licked Ben's face. Ben's slow, agonized, breathing did not change. His eyelids fluttered, as though he dreamed, and went still.

"He can't hear you," the Swami gasped out. He was just coming to consciousness. "It'll probably be a while before he can hear anyone."

"Is he all right?" Dickon anxiously asked.

"I don't know. I hope so." the Swami said. "We were all concentrating, all melded together. Then there was a big jolt. I blacked out." He pushed himself into a sitting position. "It looks like everybody else did, too." He rolled over into a kneeling posture and began to check the others on their cushions and blankets. Dickon ignored him to stroke Ben's brow. That's when Dickon noticed Ben's hair had gone white just since he'd entered the Chapel.

"Everybody's still breathing," the Swami said when he had crawled around and checked everyone in the circle. "Ben breathing too?"

"Yes," Dickon said, "barely." DiConti came over to Ben and the Swami.

"I'm going to brew some tea," DiConti said. "All these people will need a restorative."

"Tea's the best for that," the Swami agreed. "Tea and warmth. As people wake up, we need to get them into a cottage, where they can be warm."

"Use ours," Dickon said. "Can someone help me with Ben?"

"Yes," DiConti said. "I put two emergency stretchers under some pews near the door. We'll use those to move people."

"I want to start with Ben," Dickon said.

"And the Princess should be next," the Swami said. "I'm not an expert like she is, but I know enough about these psychic collapses to understand it's usually the leaders who get hit the hardest. That's Ben and the Princess, here."

"Do you think you can manage one end of a stretcher?" DiConti asked the Swami.

"I do. Might have to stop a moment to get my breath along the way."

"Good," DiConti said, and went to get the stretchers.

The Swami, Notta, DiConti, and Dickon rolled Ben onto one stretcher, and Princess Valiant onto the other. Dickon and the Swami took up Ben's stretcher and started toward the cottage. Butter trotted alongside the stretcher. At the last moment, as Dickon and the Swami were going through the door, Charles Algernon Burnswine squawked, "Warms me heart's cockles, maties," and leaped onto the Swami's shoulder. When the bird's talons sank in, the Swami muttered something. "Mind your tongue," the parrot replied.

"You game for it, Notta?" DiConti asked, nodding toward the Princess on the other stretcher.

"I am," Notta said, "but I don't want to leave Hyacinth."

"She's got Ermentrude to watch over her."

"And her grandmother," Emma said, struggling to her feet. DiConti went to help her get up. "I take it the storm's over?"

"Dickon says he saw Vanna dissolve in a waterspout," DiConti said.

"Water is supposed to harm some witches. The more usual destruction is by fire," Malcolm said. He, too, was coming around.

"How do you know that?" Emma asked.

"I'm not sure," Malcolm said. DiConti and Notta picked up Princess Valiant's stretcher and made their way to Dickon and Ben's cottage. The fog was twisting and twirling in the wind, almost as if it were dancing. As the other Villagers woke, they made their way by twos and threes to Ben and Dickon's place to take tea and gather their wits.

### Walkabout in the Dream Time

Ben wandered lonely as a cloud that's lost its storm through a landscape made fantastic by blue trees and yellow grasses. Orange mountains girded the horizon. Odd as the colors were, they felt right and fitting to him. When he hungered, pink and silver apples appeared on the blue trees. When he thirsted, fountains flowing vermilion lemonade appeared to slake his thirst. When he wearied, a rosy rock cushioned in soft black velvet appeared for him to sit on.

He was sitting on such a rock when Princess Valiant came and sat beside him. She wore no clothes. Ben looked down at himself. He, too, was nude. He smiled at that. He hadn't been nude with a woman since his mother changed his last diaper into briefs. Quickly he checked. The Princess had had the "final" operation. The Villagers had speculated about that probability ever since Val had come among them.

"Hello," he said to the Princess. The crow on her shoulder nodded to him, and put its head back under its wing.

"Hello," she said. She looked him up and down. "Not bad for an older man," she said. "Dickon must enjoy you, very much."

Ben blushed. "You'd have to ask him about that," he said.

"You blush all over, did you know?" she said.

"I do? I never thought about it."

Val put an arm around Ben's shoulders and leaned to whisper in his ear.

"I've got to tell you something," she said softly. Ben jerked his head away because Val's breath tickled his ear.

"This is my last hurrah," Val went on. She let Ben go and looked away from him. The colors were bleeding from the landscape. Already the world was noticeably pastel.

"Your last hurrah?"

"Yes."

"What do you mean?"

Val clasped her hands in her lap. "I mean, this is the end of the line for me."

"Do you mean you're dying?"

"Yes, Dense One, I'm dying. You're dying, too, but you won't complete the job for a long time yet." Ben felt tears start in his eyes. He had grown fond of this Princess.

"Don't weep for me," Val said. "Don't let the others be too sad, either." She smiled a radiant smile. "You've all given me a great gift, you know, to let me be one of you for a while. I never had that kind of belonging, before. It's good to die among friends. If the Village is willing, I'd like to be buried in the cemetery on the hill. Just a plain plywood coffin, nothing fancy. Maybe Dickon can say a few words over me. Ask them for me, will you?"

"Yes," Ben said through the phlegmatic thickness in his throat. Val kissed him.

"Thanks," she said. She reached out to a nearby juniper that had sprung up and took a beaded buckskin dress off it. She stood and slipped it over her head. She looked down at a stunned Ben.

"It's only the Universe maintaining its balance," Val said to him. "When Vanna's darkness receded into the Nether Ether, the balance requires a light counterpoint to recede as well. I'm the chosen one, this time."

"It's going to be up to you, now, Ben," she went on. "You'll have to help maintain the balance until Hyacinth can."

Ben stared at her. "I don't know anything about how to do that."

She smiled at him. "You'll have to make it up as you go along," she said. "That's the way we all learn." She held out a hand to him.

"Stand up, Ben. It's time for you to go. I'll take the high road, you take the low road. If by chance we meet again, it will be wonderful. If we don't, things just happen that way." Ben took her hand and stood. The colors of the landscape had faded to grayscale. Val touched the juniper again, and extracted a loincloth. She handed it to Ben.

"Tie this on," she said, "and go on down. Don't look back, look forward." She turned her back on him and started climbing up. He waved a forlorn goodbye to her and started to walk down. The grayscale landscape became a pencil drawing, and faded to black.

### The Long Watch

Dickon and Butter were at Ben's side through the two long nights and days of his recovery. Dickon held Ben's hand, rubbing it, and talked to the silent man. He called Ben by name at frequent intervals. Butter lay on the bed next to Ben. She shared her warmth with the chill body of her beloved person.

"Ben," Dickon said, "I don't know if you can hear me. Butter's here, I'm here, we're waiting for you to come back. Vanna's gone, whirled away in a waterspout. It's safe to come back, Ben." He repeated his words several times an hour, until they became a kind of mantra for him.

Dickon even tried to pray, a practice he had given up years before. "God, or Great Spirit, or Universal Whatever, we need to talk. I need you to bring my man back to me, if you can. I'm not complete without him." Dickon was silent for a while searching for words. "That's it, that's all I have on my mind. Bring Ben back. Amen, I guess."

Emma and Mae Ling took turns sitting at Princess Valiant's bedside. She was no less comatose than Ben, until about an hour before her death. She began moaning. It became a cadenced kind of moaning, almost a chant. A rattling rush of breath fled her lungs and rasped out of her throat ended the moan. It was Princess Valiant's end, and the end, too, of her crow tattoo. When they went to wash her body, the Villagers discovered the tattoo lay on its back, its claws in the air, and its head lolling down Val's shoulder blade.

Ben recovered consciousness soon after Princess Val died. He opened his gray eyes and smiled. Dickon dozed in the chair at his bedside. Butter lay beside him, breathing the heavy breath of sleep. Ben freed a hand from his blankets to stroke Butter's ears. She stretched, yawned, and licked Ben's arm. It was enough to waken Dickon.

"Hi," Ben said. "Have I been out long? I'm so hungry I could eat horseradish."

"Ben," Dickon said, his smile erasing the weariness that had lined his face. "Welcome home, brave warrior," he said. Tears stood in Dickon's green eyes. He stood, bent over, and embraced Ben. "I was so afraid I'd lost you," he said, his voice muffled by Ben's neck.

"I was in another place, for a while," Ben said into Dickon's ear. "A long time, I think, as hungry as I am, and as thirsty."

"It's been two nights and two days since Vanna was melted away by a waterspout," Dickon said. "It's true, Ben, Vanna's gone."

"I know," Ben said. "Princess Valiant told me, just before I came back. Can we talk about that later? I want to get up, eat, have some tea, and go to the bathroom. All those minor little necessities taken care of, I can take some time to figure out what it all means."

"Okay," Dickon said. "But there's one more bit of news you should know. Val, she didn't make it."

"I know," Ben said. "She told me she wouldn't, and asked to be buried in the cemetery on the hill."

"Where or when did you talk to her?"

"I'll tell you over food and tea, lover. Now, help me get up and get dressed so I can eat."

"Okay," Dickon said, straightening up, "but we'll have to talk sometime. I've got things to work out in my mind, and I need you to help."

"Same here, Dickon," Ben said as he sat up. He waited for the specks swirling in his vision to settle. "A full stomach and an empty bladder do wonders for sharing confidences."

Dickon helped Ben stand, and helped him walk to the bathroom. He would have held Ben up while he voided his bladder, but Ben dismissed him with the words, "Please, Daddy, I can do it all by myself." Dickon withdrew and closed the bathroom door. He waited outside, fearing every moment to hear the thud of Ben's falling body. When he heard a shocked cry, he pushed the door open.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Ben said.

"Tell you what?"

"That my hair's gone white."

"Oh, sorry. I've grown used to it. It's rather elegant, you know."

"It makes me look old."

"And wise. Dye it later, if you want to. No big deal, lover man."

Ben turned to look at Dickon. Suddenly, he laughed. "No, I suppose it's not," he said.

### Ermentrude's Interlude

Ermentrude left Hyacinth in her parents' care and went adventuring. She had seldom left the manor house while Vanna remained a threat. Now that the threat was gone, she wanted a holiday. She wandered down hill along the funicular's path, stopping to crouch, lash her tail, and pounce on a fat mouse. The mouse flesh was sweet to her taste. For a little while she dozed in the sun. The unicorn with the unique horn prompted her to wander on, and she found herself at the Café's back door.

Rosa saw her stalk a butterfly, and commented to Harry, "That sure looks like Hyacinth's cat."

Harry replied. "Yup. Could be." He went back to counting out teabags. Rosa thought no more of it, and turned to her vegetable chopping again.

Ermentrude continued to wander toward the beach. The unicorn took out its horn and screwed it in. She began to dance. Ermentrude had all the excitability of estrus, which was odd, since Notta had had her spayed as a kitten. At the far end of the motel she met the tom. A great orange rough beast he was, wise in the wild ways of feral existence. He circled Ermentrude, growling and mewling at her. She stood for him, and he pounced on her back, his teeth grasping her neck, while he had his way with her. When he had done, he streaked away, across the highway.

Scratched and bitten and sore, Ermentrude lay in the shade of the motel, panting, for a long while, before the lure of supper drew her back up the mountain to her food dish in the manor. She did not venture outside her habitual confines again. It was more than a month before Notta noticed how rapidly Ermentrude had put on weight. She mentioned it one afternoon to Willy. He took a long look at Ermentrude and said, "Kittens. That's all."

"Can't be," Notta said. "We had her fixed."

"Some tom unfixed her, by the look of it," Willy said. "Strange things can happen on the mountain."

Puzzled Notta shook her head, unwilling to believe. She was still disbelieving when Ermentrude delivered two male kittens, one gray and white, like herself, and one a bright orange, like the itinerant tom.

"Perhaps we should ask the Pueblo Rio vet for a refund," DiConti said to Willy, who had attended the birth.

"Wouldn't do it," Willy said. "These kittens are unicorn magic. Bet Ermentrude still shows up spayed on an X-ray."

Notta shook her head, and went to get a sturdy box and soft old blanket to make a bed for Ermentrude. She cut one side of the box to allow Ermentrude easy passage. When she returned with the readied box, she said to Willy, "I don't know if I'm up to mothering Hyacinth without a lot of help."

"That's why there's the Village to raise your daughter, and these kittens. Bet your Mom and Haakon would appreciate having one or both of them when they're weaned."

"Perhaps," Notta said. She lifted Ermentrude gently, stroked her head, and put her in the box. Ermentrude mewled until Willy gently lifted the kittens into the box with her. They began nursing at once. Ermentrude settled in for a rest. Only later did she leave the kittens long enough to drink and eat from the water and food Notta had left close to her box.

Ermentrude soon discovered the burdens of motherhood were almost as wearisome as her labor had been. Six weeks later, when the kittens were of an age to wean, she celebrated with a long, unbroken nap on Hyacinth's bed while Notta and Hyacinth took the kittens to Emma and Haakon. Emma and Haakon took the kittens in, and named them Megawatt and Gigabyte. They came in the fullness of time to play their own parts in balancing the Universe.

### In the Fullness of Time

Princess Valiant's funeral was a Village affair. Willy brought the backhoe and dug a grave for her not far from La Señora's grave. The Swami had displayed an unexpected skill with wood, screws, and saws, and made a simple casket for her. When they gathered on the hillside, the llamas came and stood near them. Charles Algernon Burnswine rode on the Swami's shoulder. For once Charles had nothing to say. Butter stood quietly between Dickon and Ben, just the tip of her tail wagging. Ermentrude lay in Notta's arms (Hyacinth had held her until the cat became too heavy for the girl's arms).

Dickon spoke. "Val was our friend, and a great strength to us. We shall miss her. We only had her a little time, but that time was blessed with her presence. We commit her now to the great mystery of the Universe. The Overarching Power has a place set aside for her. Go about the rest of your lives, carrying her spirit in your hearts. Let her dust return to the earth. Amen."

They all stood silent for a few moments, waiting, not sure for what. At last a crow flew over, cried out one wailing "Caw!" and dropped a black feather on Princess Valiant's coffin, and then flew away into the sun.

The Swami, Dickon, Willy, and Haakon then lowered the plywood casket into the grave. The mourners dispersed, Ben leaning on Dickon. In the cove waters, crustaceans clustered in conclave. With much clattering of their claws they selected a new leader.

When Dickon got Ben home, he put on the kettle. Ben dozed while the water heated. Dickon brought the cup to him and set it on the table beside his chair. He waited until Ben woke up.

"Tea," Dickon said.

"Thanks," Ben said. He sipped at it, and put the mug down. "I've said goodbye again," Ben went on. "Another funeral. I'm tired of them."

"The Princess was a good Villager," Dickon said. "She fit in almost as quickly as you did."

"She told me she belonged here more than she ever belonged with any other group of people she'd ever known. She thanked all of us for that."

"When did she tell you that?"

"While we were both lying in a coma. Our spirits, or souls, or consciousness, whatever you want to call them, met in a weird landscape. We talked a little bit, and then she told me how well she fit here. And then she said goodbye."

"What was it like, to fight Vanna mind to mind?"

"Strange images," Ben said, and went on to tell Dickon what he remembered of the struggle. "In the end," he wound up his tale, "I had to use the cove against her. I hadn't meant to destroy her, but I had to. She was coming for you."

"For me?"

"Yes. I couldn't let anything happen to you." Dickon streamed tears down his face.

"Oh, Ben," he said, as he got up and went to sit at Ben's feet, "I saw her die. It was so very sad, and such a great relief. A weight that had held me down ever since I met her, or maybe even from before, just went when she did." He sighed. "I was empty and light, and almost afraid I'd float away after her. Then I thought of you, and I was filled again, only you don't weigh heavy on me. Ben, I love you. There, I've said it. If I'm embarrassing you, I'm sorry."

Ben caressed Dickon's gray-shot red hair. "I'm not embarrassed, you ninny. I love you, Dickon, like I've never loved anybody else."

"Not even Len?"

"He was another man, and I loved him dearly, in another way. He's gone, his time glass filled up, and he went. You're my man, now, Dickon. For this time we have, let's celebrate being together."

"We will, Ben, we will." They sipped at their tea as the twilight softened the room. Butter sat with them, a small grin playing about her muzzle.

