by Norsebard
Contact: norsebarddk@gmail.com
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DISCLAIMERS:
This slice-of-life dramedy is to be categorized as an Uber. All characters are created by me, though some of them may remind you of someone.
The story contains some profanity. Readers who are easily offended by bad language may wish to read something other than this story.
All characters depicted, names used, and incidents portrayed in this story are fictitious. No identification with actual persons is intended nor should be inferred. Any resemblance of the characters portrayed to actual persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.
The registered trademarks mentioned in this story are © of their respective owners. No infringement of their rights is intended, and no profit is gained.
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NOTES FROM THE AUTHOR:
Written: November 13th - 26th 2023 as part of my 2023 NaNoWriMo project, plus January 26th - February 2nd, 2024.
This is yet another entry (the twenty-first!) into the long-running series featuring Wynne Donohue and Mandy Jalinski - all stories are available at the website of the Royal Academy of Bards.
Thank you for your help, Phineas Redux! *Flower*
As usual, I'd like to say a great, big THANK YOU to my mates at AUSXIP Talking Xena, especially to the gals and guys in Subtext Central. I really appreciate your support - Thanks, everybody! :D
Description: Over in Goldsboro, Nevada, Blackie and Goldie finally get their moment in the spotlight as they're entered in several contests at a large-scale dog show out at Thunder Park Raceway. Wynne 'The Last Original Cowpoke' Donohue and Sheriff Mandy Jalinski are present on the sidelines providing valuable support so the dogs can achieve the top form required to battle their fierce competitors…
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CHAPTER 1
Tuesday, April 9th - 10:15am
The small trailer park some eight miles south of Goldsboro, Nevada, had witnessed a great deal of strange things over the years. The surprise invasion of a pack of green goblins had entered local lore as had the visit by the 50-foot-tall, gorilla-like desert dweller that had mistaken the rear porch of former resident Ernie Bradberry for a public toilet.
That none of Reverend Raymond Light's horde of cannibal zombies had taken an interest in the trailers could only be called a near-miracle, but nobody could forget the dimension-warping lightning bolts, the flying vampyre ghoul, the oversized lizard or even the hunter UFO that had blown up the truck belonging to the first resident who had set up her trailer there: Wynne 'The Last Original Cowpoke' Donohue.
It was in fact Wynne Donohue who was at the heart of the latest oddity. The 52-year-old, ex-pat Texan - whose heart of gold, ice-blue eyes, long, dark hair and propensity for wearing rugged denim had all become legendary - knelt on a blanket that had been spread out on the lawn in front of her trailer.
Rather than being engaged in lofty activities such as praying, doing yoga or simply looking for a lost set of keys, her unusual position had been chosen as it was the best for the task at hand: to take high-quality portrait photographs of Goldie, her Golden Retriever, for the beauty pageant of the upcoming large-scale dog show that was to take place out at Thunder Park Raceway the following weekend.
Goldie and her canine companion, the black German Shepherd Blackie, were both entered into several events at the show, so Wynne's notion had been to snap a few pictures of the dogs separate and together to use as promotional material.
The notion had been sound, but the grim face of reality had - as always - tripped Wynne up at the worst possible moment. The red blotches that covered large parts of her cheeks, forehead and down her neck proved she had run out of patience with Goldie, herself and indeed the whole thing altogether.
For the seventh time in seven attempts, something had caught Goldie's attention just as Wynne had had the perfect shot lined up. The split second she had tapped the Take Picture! icon on the telephone's display, Goldie had jumped up and taken off after something wild and wonderful. Seven times in a row, all she had been able to photograph was a golden-brown, blurry something-or-other that exited screen-left in an almighty hurry.
Goldie yapped merrily as she chased after a butterfly. Wynne just sat there, staring at the vacant spot where the dog had been when she had tapped the icon. Though the image on the telephone's display could undoubtedly win an award at a contest for psychedelic imagery, she deleted it and shoved the phone into her pocket.
Her face was set in stone as she shuffled around to sit on the blanket. A long sigh escaped her as she propped up her head on an arm. "Wynne Donnah-hew," she mumbled to herself in her regular, inch-thick Texan accent, "tha next time y'all get an ideah like that… nip it inda buhhh-d an' chug down anothah beer instead."
The trailers owned by Diego Benitez and the Tooley family offered little respite from her misery as Diego was away visiting his sister, and little Renee and her mother Estelle Tooley were at school and at work, respectively. A bare foundation was all that was left of the trailer where the old fellow Zoltan Petrusco had spent the last good years of his life, so that couldn't inject any positive energy into the dreary morning either. Ernie Bradberry's empty trailer had been for sale for months without attracting much attention from anyone - that peculiar fact caused Wynne much head-scratching.
At least the final residents of the trailer park did their best to add some life to the proceedings. The sublimely fit late-thirty-something Brenda Travers had finally convinced her husband Vaughn to join her for her morning yoga and Tai Chi exercises, but it was obvious from his clumsy body language that he had some ways to go to be able to match his agile wife.
Wynne chuckled several times as she got up and dusted off the seat of her jeans. April had started with a bang, temperature-wise, but it had cooled off over the past few days - it meant she had no problem wearing a long-sleeved sweatshirt sporting the likeness and logos of double-Daytona 500 winner Michael Waltrip and his #15 NAPA D-E-I Chevrolet Monte Carlo. Down below the sweatshirt, she wore a pair of pale-blue jeans. White sports socks in purple flip-flops completed the ensemble.
She offered Brenda and Vaughn a brief wave before she moved around the corner of her trailer and up onto her back porch. The deck was as crooked as ever, but she had poured far too much blood, sweat, tears and cussing into it to listen to the detractors - that she had needed to add blocks of wood underneath the legs of the deck chairs and the table to keep them level was another story.
A rumbling WOOF! from somewhere out in the desert proved that Diego's Rottweiler Freddie had joined Goldie in yet another game of Chase Your Tail.
Though Diego was away, Freddie remained at the trailer park since he had yet to rebuild enough trust in Humans after his previous owner had beaten him within an inch of his life and left him to die alone in the desert. Goldie and Blackie had convinced him that Wynne and Sheriff Mandy Jalinski were all right, but he was still skeptical about nearly everyone else.
The dog house that had been set up behind Diego's trailer was perhaps basic in design, but it provided all the creature comforts Freddie needed: his favorite basket, his beloved sleeping blanket, his collection of soft toys and finally a pile of gnawing bones. Water, feed and the occasional treat would be brought to him by Wynne and Mandy while his owner was away, so all in all, he was perfectly happy with staying put.
Further woofs and yaps proved that the dogs had a good time out in the desert, so Wynne turned around and opened the screen door. "I reckon I need a li'l refreshment ta clear mah mind an' all," she said to herself as she moved into the kitchenette.
She returned a moment later holding a can of H.E. Fenwyck Double-Zero non-alcoholic beer that was cracked open at once with the now-familiar Pssshhhht! "To all y'all's health!" she cried before she chugged it down.
---
A short fifteen minutes later, the sound of a car door closing out on the central lawn reached Wynne's ears. The first such noise was soon followed by the sound of a sliding door being opened and then shut. The unexpected event made her let out a grunt, get up from the deck chair and shuffle into the living area of her trailer.
She swiftly sidestepped the vacuum cleaner - that she had put in the middle of the floor on purpose to convince herself to get on with the boring household chore - to go over to the window overlooking the lawn. A charcoal-gray minivan had been parked in front of the vacant trailer, but nobody seemed to be around.
A moment later, two mid-twenty-something women wearing stylish skirt-suits came into view. They had their heads together at first as if they were going through some kind of battle plan. One of them made a sweeping gesture at the trailers that made the other nod. The women were soon joined by a pair of well-dressed young men of a similar age who seemed to listen to what was being said.
Wynne scratched her neck at the sight. "Shoot, whaddahell-izzat now? Them folks be lookin' a li'l like them there Eff Bee Eye agents an' whutnot… but I don't reckon they be. Naw… mebbe it be that there IRS? Or some kind o' bordah patrol or som'tin… but whaddahell they be doin' he', I ain't got no clue."
The horrible truth was suddenly revealed when Wynne took a closer look at the woman she had noticed first - it was none other than Tiffany Worth who just happened to be Wynne's personal nemesis among the Holier-Than-Thou crowd known as the Virgin Tower Organization. Soon, a further, three-strong batch of well-dressed young people joined Worth and her strike team.
"Holy shittt, they be them Virgin Towah mis-shun-nairies!" Wynne croaked, clutching her head. "An' Diegoh an' them Tooleys ain't he' so them there folks be comin' straight fer me… awwwww-shoot! Where mah phoah-ne at? Gotta call an' warn Brendah…"
The telephone was soon located and put to its intended use. As soon as the number had been found in the registry, Wynne slammed the telephone to her ear while inching back to the window to observe their opponents without risking being seen by them. As she did so, she made an estimated countdown to when the doorbell would ring.
'Hello-'
"Brendah, y'all need-a lissen!" Wynne said in a hushed, secretive voice although there was no chance it would ever carry out to the central lawn. "This he' be Wynne Donnah-hew with an im-pahr-tant public suhhhr-vice announcement an' all! We got them Virgin Towah folks out he', so dontcha be openin' that there do'ah o' yers… ya hear?"
'Oh- what? The who?'
"Them Virgin Towah-"
'Oh… okay. Those people.'
"Yuh, those people! They be right outside Ernie's ol' trailah drawin' up them plans fer pesterin' us. They gonn' be ringin' them doorbells perdy dog-gone soon, mark mah words."
'Okay, we'll head for the bedroom… aaaand… we're there. Thanks for the warning, Wynne!'
Wynne inched to her left so she could keep an eye on the well-dressed people outside without exposing herself too much. "Haw, y'all sure is welcome an' all. Lawrdie, I bettah do tha same… yes, Ma'am. Tawk ta y'all latah. This he' be Wynne Donnah-hew signin' off… I be gohh-ne. Bah-bah!"
Tip-toeing away from the window, Wynne soon entered the bedroom where she pulled the sliding door shut to go completely undercover. "Haw," she said as she kicked off her flip-flops and got herself comfortable on the bed. "Whadda great op-pahr-tunity ta take a nap. Yuh. An' when them folks ring tha bell, ain't nobodda hoah-me or nuttin'!"
Chuckling at her unrivaled cleverness, Wynne crossed her legs at the ankles and put her arms behind her head. A yawn came out of nowhere, and she snuggled down to get the most out of the unexpected respite from her vacuuming and the madness surrounding the photography.
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Wynne's shoulders cried enough twenty minutes later. Hissing from the annoying pain that threatened to creep upward and give her a crimp in the neck as well, she lowered her arms and put them on her stomach where they would be less prone to aches.
Sleep had eluded her, but she had kept her eyes closed to paint a few wonderful pictures of the coming summer where she, Mandy and the dogs would cruise along the State Routes in her brand-new, thirty-five-year-old Pontiac TransAm.
The look of the old car had been transformed by the set of spotless aluminum wheels that the Bang 'n Beatin' Body Shop's foreman and expert mechanic Bengt 'Fat-Butt' Swenson had sourced from a friend-of-a-friend at a fair price - the TransAm's fire-engine-red paint job had also been given a professional waxing and buffing that had made it shine in a way it hadn't done since rolling out of the show room back in 1989.
The brake pads and rotors had been the first to be replaced as the original parts had no life left in them. The fuel and brake lines had all been upgraded, and fresh fluids had been added to every reservoir. The Tremec S700-R4 Turbo Hydramatic automatic transmission had been given fresh oil, the shock absorbers had been upgraded to modern units and the tired, old catalytic converter had been replaced with a factory-built one to make sure it worked properly.
In short, they had already made a great deal of progress since she'd bought it back in February, but there was still a long way to go before the TransAm could hit the road for real.
Distant yapping and nearby thumping on the front door interrupted the pretty pictures playing in her mind's cinema. The noises made her crack open an eyelid to search for an answer - it wasn't long before the thumping was repeated. It sounded strange, as if it was done by a paw rather than by a human hand.
"Haw? Whaddahell-izzat now? That ain't Goldie 'cos she be yappin'… gotta be Freddie…" Wynne said as she swung her legs over the side of the bed to sit up. There was time for a wide yawn before she got up, donned her flip-flops and shuffled out to the inner door.
Just as Wynne had expected, Freddie waited outside. It was obvious from the body language of the hefty, black-and-brown Rottweiler that he was upset about something. He let out several guttural WOOFs! that made the trailer rattle before he spun around twice and nodded toward the desert.
Wynne cocked her head to listen for Goldie's distant yapping. Standing in the doorway offered a clear path to the edge of the desert, and it soon became clear the yaps had a pained undertone to them. "Aw-shittt, mah darlin' Goldie done hurt herself! Much obliged, Freddie! Remind me ta nuke y'all a frankfurtah or som'tin, yuh?"
WOOF!
"Okeh… okeh… boots… need mah boots…" Wynne said and hurried back into the bedroom to shed the flip-flops and jump into footwear that was better suited for trekking through the desert.
Freddie only wore bootlets when he was at the veterinarian, so he couldn't quite understand what the tall Human was up to. He let his impatience be known by a series of window-rattling WOOOOOOFs! that said as much as 'Will you hurry up?'
'Yuh, yuh! I be there… ain't gonn' be long… almost there… yuh… almost there,' Wynne's disembodied voice said from the bedroom. Half a minute later, she appeared in the doorway wearing a pair of sand-colored Desert Campaign boots similar to those worn by the military - she had bought them through Freddie's owner Diego Benitez who had a good contact at the US Marine Corps surplus center up in Barton City where he bought all his hunting fatigues.
Another WOOOF! followed before Freddie spun around and ran back into the desert.
"Jus' lead me to'er, big boy!" Wynne said as she moved across the sandy dunes and rocky outcrops at a steady, but safe, pace. "Yuh! I be right behindcha an' all… sorta… Lawrdie, that dawggie sure can run… haw!"
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200 yards out from the trailer, Wynne found Goldie sitting on the sandy desert floor nursing her left-hind paw. The Golden Retriever let out a yap of relief as she spotted her owner approaching.
"Haw! Goldie, mah ba-yu-ta-ful dawggie… where ya hurtin'?"
Yap!
"Yer paw? Y'all done hurt yer paw an' all, didcha?"
Yap…
"Okeh… lemme see," Wynne said and knelt next to the sitting dog. Before she focused on Goldie's problem, she glanced around just to make sure they weren't about to be surprised by any of the large or small critters who had made the desert their home. When everything seemed quiet, she reached down to pick up the limb in question. "Lemme see… Goldie, y'all need-a roll ovah onta yer side an' all or I ain't gonn' be able ta look at that there paw there… okeh?"
Yap…
"Okeh. Clevah dawg," Wynne said as Goldie did as asked - to offer a little doggy support, Freddie snuggled down very close to the Golden Retriever.
Noticing the interaction, Wynne let out a brief chuckle. "Whah, I do reckon there be luv' bolts in da air or som'tin… mah-mah, I wondah whut ol' Blackie gonn' say ta that. Okeh, girl, I'mma-gonn'… lookie… at that… there… haw?"
Yap?
"I ain't seein' nuttin' he', girl," Wynne said before she leaned down to give the paw an extra-extra close look. "I still ain't be seein' nuttin'. Nuttin' like in nuttin' with a li'l nuttin' sprinkled on top, yuh? Girl, there ain't nuttin' wrong with that there paw there… did ya purr-haps twist it or som'tin?"
Yap…
"Naw?"
Yap…
"Okeh, then I ain't got no clue whaddahell be goin' on he'…"
Wynne narrowed her eyes as she took in the picture of Freddie and Goldie snuggling up tight and very much at ease with each other. "Wait a minnit… wait a dang-blasted minnit! I be sensin' som'tin funny goin' on he'. All y'all be awfully close all offa sudden. Not that it be any o' mah bizz or nuttin', but… did all y'all jus'… ya know… haw… ya know… mebbe… do tha lovely, or som'tin?"
Yap…
"Haw. Wus that a yes-Ma'am or a no-Ma'am? Okeh. Haw. Shoot. Ain't none o' mah bizzness, anyhows. I sure reckon som'tin funny went on between all y'all… an' now y'all be too dang tired to walk hoah-me on yer own!" Chuckling, Wynne got to her feet and soon dusted off her jeans. "Dang, girl! I sure ain't carryin' ya hoah-me. An' that deffa-nete-ly is a no, Ma'am!"
When Goldie understood the ploy had failed, she got up and shook her back to get rid of the sand that had snuck in between the golden hairs. A few happy yaps escaped her before she and Freddie shuffled back toward the trailer at a more sedate pace than the one they had employed while playing Catch Your Tail.
Wynne put her hands on her hips as she looked at the wildly different dogs leaving her behind. Another chuckle escaped her as she set off for home as well. "Haw… don't mind me, y'all! Naw, I sure luv trekkin' through this he' desert he' fer no good reason whut-so-dag-nabbit-evah! Dang, an' now we prolly gonn' run inta them there Virgin Towah folks, too!"
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Wynne's ears were spared a religious lecture as nobody was around once she and the dogs reached the back porch of her trailer. While Goldie and Freddie went inside to get some water - and a huge pile of Lafayette's Quality Dry Feed in Goldie's case - Wynne tip-toed up to the corner of the trailer to see what the missionaries were up to.
A grunt escaped her when she realized the central lawn was devoid of life. Another car had joined the minivan belonging to the religious organization, but the second vehicle didn't appear to be one of the Tower's regular rides.
She was about to head back to the kitchenette to grab a beer when she happened to clap eyes on a logo that had been attached to the side of the new car - it said Horne-Roberts Real Estate. "Haw… it be one o' them there estate agents," she mumbled, scratching her neck. "Wheredahell do I know that there comp'ny from? I mean- ohhh-shittt! Them be tha folks who done man-itch Ernie's ol' trailah! Lawwwwwr-die!"
Moving away from the corner, she hurried over to the car from the real estate company to take a closer look. A young man sat behind the wheel with a newspaper spread out in front of him while a smartphone hooked up to the car's stereo took care of the music. The driver paused the playing when it became obvious he was about to have a visitor.
"Son, I need-a wohhhhhh-rd witcha!" Wynne said the second the driver's side window was rolled down. "Lissen, I sure be sorry fer disturbin' y'all readin' that there Cavva-naw Creek newspapah there, but are all y'all he' fe Ernie Bradberry's trailah?"
The young man needed a moment to parse Wynne's rapid-fire question - not to mention her Texan accent - but he soon broke out in a nod. "That's right, Ma'am."
"An' them folks y'all be meetin' he'… them there well-dressed folks… they be from that there Virgin Towah, yuh? Ya know, them there reli-juss folks?"
"Correct again, Ma'am."
"D'awwwww-shittt!" Wynne cried, throwing her hands in the air in a gesture of pre-emptive despair. "Ain't no way that gonn' happen! No way, no how, nosirree! Or mah name ain't Wynne Donnah-hew!"
The driver of the car from the real estate agency furrowed his brow at the odd display of histrionics, but he soon offered Wynne a supportive smile. "It's an open house arrangement so you can just join them if you'd like…"
"Join 'em?! Son, I be runnin' away from 'em if I didden need-a tend ta mah dawg an' her big, ol' pal… wait-a-minnit… wait-a-dang-blasted-minnit… yuh… mebbe that ain't no bad ideah, that… yuh… yuh!"
Standing up straight, Wynne smacked her palms together in a resounding, celebratory clap. "Whah, much obliged, son! I owe y'all a beer or som'tin!"
"That's nice, but I don't drink beer, Ma'am."
Coming to an abrupt halt, Wynne could do nothing but stare wide-eyed at the young man behind the steering wheel. "Haw… whaddahell's the world comin' to? Nevah mind, I be off. Yuh? I got some Virgin Towah folks ta spy on. Stand clear… Wynne Donnah-hew comin' thru'!"
---
Hurrying through the front door of Ernie's old trailer, Wynne involuntarily found herself playing the old party game of Irresistible Force Meets Immovable Object - she being the irresistible force. Her desert boot had only just made contact with the bare floorboards in the living area when she thumped nearly face-first into someone coming the other way.
Identical "Oouffffs!" were uttered from both parties as they staggered back from each other. Wynne's beloved cowboy hat would have gone flying had she worn it, but she hadn't had time to put it on when Freddie had alerted her to a potential problem in the desert. Instead, her long hair went for a whirlwind-like flight that obscured her view for several moments.
A cry of "You?!" suddenly cut through the air inside the trailer.
"Yuh, it sure be me awright… an' whodahell wants ta know, anyhows?" Wynne said, digging through her hair to get it out of her face. When the parting of the dark curtain finally revealed the identity of the other person, she let out a grunt that was as dark as her hair - a moment later, she broke out in a wide, toothy and certainly wicked grin. "Lawwwwwwr-die, if it ain't Tif'ny Worth! How tha hell y'all been, Tiff? Doin' fihhhh-ne, I hope?"
"I'm not talking to you! Brute! And don't take Our Heavenly Father's name in vain!" Tiffany said, spinning around on her heel to get back to the other members of her group.
Wynne let out a chuckle as she looked around. "Haw, I sure done heard someone yakkin'. Ain't nobodda he' but all y'all folks so I reckon y'all wus doin' it… or mebbe it be tha wind or som'tin?"
Across the empty living area, the well-dressed, clean-cut, straight-laced Tiffany Worth sent an entire week's worth of scathing glares in Wynne's direction, but it seemed none of them were strong enough to make much of an impact on the Last Original Cowpoke.
Not unattractive on a physical level, Tiffany had delicate features with mahogany-colored eyes and prominent cheekbones. Unfortunately, the strong Holier-Than-Thou personality she had perfected over the years since being introduced to the Virgin Tower had left a permanent mark of undiluted uppity-ness on her expression.
She had moved up in the Virgin Tower hierarchy since the last time she and Wynne had butted heads - her business card now read Mission Chief of MacLean County - but she had chosen to remain an active part of the missionary teams as she loved nothing more than persuading those of the wrong faith to come to the light and join the one, true Church of the Righteous.
While the scathing glares were still flying across the room, the real estate agent returned from the pantry in the back. The fifty-something woman, who wore sensible shoes, a tan skirt-suit and roundish spectacles that weren't a good fit with the shape of her face, briefly looked at the enraged Tiffany before she turned to Wynne. "Hello… I'm Caroline Roberts. And you are?" she said, putting out her hand for the traditional greeting.
"Wynne Donna-hew, howdy," Wynne said as she shook the agent's hand. "Haw, I be one o' them there residents. Yuh, that be mah trailah ovah yondah. When I done heard all y'all wus havin' one o' them there open how-se thing-a-ma-ding-dongs, I done tole mahself, Wynne, whydontcha join 'em fer a tour?"
Caroline nodded several times while she tried to parse Wynne's thick accent. She eventually let out a "Well, that's nice," before she gestured at the bedroom. "I've already shown Miss Worth's party a few of the rooms, but it won't take long for you to catch up. Let's start in the bedroom, shall we?"
"Aw, I been in there a-buncha times when dear ol' Ernie wus still he' 'cos he done kept some o' his hawt saw-ces there, but y'all-"
A loud Snort! followed by an even louder huff blasted across the living area. Slamming her arms over her chest, Tiffany let out a venomous: "Well, of course you had to be a loose woman!"
"Jus' fer da record, naw. Lawrdie, I reckon all y'all's world view would be challenged bah tha truth, so I bettah-"
"I told you not to take Our Heavenly Father's name in vain!"
"Yuh-haw?" Wynne said in the driest voice possible - then she turned to the real estate agent. "Lead on, Ma'am. I be all ears an' eyes," she continued before she shuffled over to the inner door to the bedroom.
While Caroline Roberts rattled off her well-rehearsed sales pitch, Wynne studied the empty room - a wistful smile creased her lips when she thought back to the state of the bedroom before and after the point where the Reverend Bernadine Russell of the Church of the Holy Crusader had come into Ernie's life.
The entire trailer had been one, large man-cave when Ernest Bradberry had first moved in. Every room had been a mess of DVDs and video tapes, magazines, dirty socks, filthy dishes and beer cans. His experiments with home-made hot sauces of all kinds had turned the kitchen and the pantry into laboratories where every shelf and table had been heavily laden with earthenware jars, pouches of spices, bottles of vinegar and strange-looking instruments used to measure the required ingredients.
The bedroom had pulled double-duty as the box room - and that was to be taken literally as cardboard packing cases had been stacked up to the ceiling in most spots. Ernie had slept in an olive-green Army-surplus bunk bed that had been put up in the middle of the mess, and his only closet space had been an old foot locker he had kept from his days in the National Guard back home in Georgia.
Once Bernadine moved in, the bedroom instantly turned white, pink and frilly. The window gained lacy curtains, the lamp in the ceiling suddenly had a proper shade rather than a naked bulb, and the utilitarian Army bunk was replaced by a double-wide bed featuring satin sheets and a white-and-pink bedspread decorated with a biblical scene.
Caroline continued her spiel without having noticed that Wynne had zoned out: "And that's pretty much the bedroom, Miss Donovan. Would you care to-"
"Haw? That be Donnah-hew."
"Pardon. Next up, we have the kitchen and the pantry," Caroline said with a smile. She held out her hand to guide Wynne back out of the bedroom.
"Naw, there ain't no need fer me ta see them rooms. I been he' a buncha times befo', an' I done helped ol' Ernie clear out when he done moved the othah year. Y'all jus' keep tawkin' ta them there Virgin Towah folks, yuh? Mebbe I'mma-gonn' jump in an' add a ques-chun now an' then, yuh? But anyhows, much obliged fer tha li'l tour an' all."
Like before, Caroline did nothing but nod and smile for several long seconds while she parsed the long comment. "Oh, it was my pleasure, Miss Donovan."
"Donnah-hew."
"Pardon," Caroline said before she moved over to Tiffany Worth and her team of missionaries. "Let me show you the pantry. As you can see, the previous owner installed a large system of shelves that can be used for all sorts of exciting…"
While the group shuffled out to see the room in question, Wynne kept standing in the middle of the living area. It was obvious from the furrow that tainted her brow - and the fact that she chewed on her cheeks and lips - that she tried to rack her occasionally lazy brain to recall the particulars of the sale.
The last time she and Mandy had visited Ernie, the Reverend Bernadine and their young daughter Christine Frances down south in Cavanaugh Creek, Ernie had mentioned the sum he was looking for, or at least hoping for, but the figure had completely slipped her mind. She pinched the bridge of her nose in the hope it would give the neurons a kick up their collective backsides, but it didn't work. Instead, she reached for her telephone and accessed the registry.
She had already found the entry for Ernie B. when she paused to look at the time - it was five past eleven, AM, which meant that Ernie would still be at work. "Shoot… that ain't gonn' work, neithah… dang. Whadda Cowpoah-k ta do? Dag-nabbit…"
Wynne knew that Ernie always had an extended lunch break at noon, but that extra hour before she could call him just might be the difference between a peaceful life and having the Virgin Tower as their next-door neighbors.
Caroline Roberts's voice filtered through from the pantry where she explained the intricate details of the special air-conditioning system Ernie had installed to maintain a steady storage temperature for his hot sauces.
Wynne rubbed her brow several times before a thought finally came to her: whipping up her telephone once more, she had soon found another entry in the registry. What she was about to say wasn't meant to be heard by the real estate agent, Tiffany Worth or any of the faithful missionaries, so she quickly spun around and headed for a secluded spot on the central lawn.
'Hi, hon,' Sheriff Mandy Jalinski's typically warm voice said a brief moment later. 'I can't see your truck over at Moira's… are you still at home? I thought you'd be in town by now. Our lunch date is still on, right?'
"Yuh-yuh, it sure is, but lissen… we got usselves a li'l trubbel down he'-"
Groan!
Wynne broke out in an embarrassed chuckle at the pitiful noise that came through the connection. "Yuh, I know… it be Goldsborah, yuh? But rest assured it ain't no monstahs or crittahs or nuttin'… an' it ain't even no explodin' crappah this time. Naw… it be wohhh-rse!"
'Should I alert the Air Force Base and get them to scramble the bombers?'
"Jus' 'bout… 'cos ou'ah trubbel be them Virgin Towah folks. I reckon they got them sights o' theirs set on Ernie's ol' trailah-"
Groan!
"Yuh, that sure be 'xactly what I done said, darlin'… but anyhows, I done trah'd recallin' whut Ernie wants fer it, but I ain't recallin' nuttin'. I wus kinda-sorta hopin' y'all could 'membah?"
A long pause of thought broke out over the airwaves. Wynne used the lull in the conversation to keep an observant eye on the trailer she had just left. She could see through the windows that Caroline Roberts and the missionaries were still speaking - they had moved back into the living area.
'I'm sorry, hon,' Mandy said at the other end of the connection. 'I remember talking about it after dinner, but not what- wait, I'll bet it's listed on the realtor's website. It must be. Have you tried there?'
"Naw! Naw, I sure ain't! Haw, that be good thinkin', darlin'! Yuh… okeh… I'mma-gonn' check an' then I'mma-gonn' get back ta y'all in a flash, okeh? Bah-bah fer now!"
Mandy barely had time to say 'Goodbye,' before Wynne closed the connection and accessed the Internet instead. After much tapping, swiping and swearing, she found the real estate agent's website. From there, it was only a matter of more tapping, swiping and swearing before she found the entry describing Ernie's old trailer.
Her face scrunched up into half its regular size when she read the asking price. "Ernie, ol' buddy… haw… that sure be way-tha-hell optimistic on yer part an' all… good shittt almighty, if folks be willin' ta pay that, we be sittin' on a dang-blasted gold mine he'," she mumbled as she moved away from the website and back to the actual telephone part - Mandy's number was soon re-selected.
"Howdy, darlin', it be li'l ol' me ag'in-"
'Hi, hon. Any luck?'
"Yuh, I done looked at that there website an' all. Ernie wants seven'y-five grand fer it. Ya reckon them Virgin Towah folks be willin' ta fork out that kinda greenery?"
'I can't say. What's the down payment?'
"Ah-shoot! Didden check… be right back!"
Even more taps, swipes and inventive swearwords followed before she had found the sums involved. "Haw, darlin', that there down payment there be five percent. Lemme see… that be… shoot… okeh… som'tin… som'tin… som'tin…"
'Just shy of four thousand dollars.'
"Yuh, sounds 'bout right an' all. Dad-gummit, I reckon that woudden be no trubbel or nuttin' fer them Towah folks. I mean, they got all them there wotchamacall'ems… uh… when folks give that there church their money. Shoot, I plum fergot whaddahell dat be called-"
'Contributions?'
"Yuh, them things," Wynne said as she cast another glance at the well-dressed people inside the trailer. "Lawrdie, tha Virgin Towah rolls in dough from whut I done heard. Say, y'all got ol' Quick Draw close bah or som'tin? Mebbe she done arranged som'tin with her bank or credit comp'ny or whutevah so she can act quickly if need be?"
'Deputy Reilly is on foot patrol-'
"Dang…"
'Wait, I'll call her on the radio. It's a breach of regulations, but I suppose it could be called an emergency, so… stand by.'
"Wynne Donnah-hew standin' bah, Sheriff Mandy!" Wynne said with a grin. While she waited for an update, she shuffled back to the vacant trailer where she caught up with the others who were still in the living area.
Caroline Roberts, Tiffany Worth and the others studied the wooden rafters in the ceiling, the panels down at the floor, and even the floorboards themselves that had all been replaced or at the very least refurbished by an expert carpenter.
'Hon?'
"Yuh, I be he'," Wynne said, moving into the kitchen so she could talk in private.
'Deputy Reilly would be able to meet the down payment, but nothing beyond that. She doesn't yet have the financial means required for the monthly rates. She's still negotiating the terms with the bank's credit department… you know how slow that process can be.'
"Aw-sombitch… yuh, don't I evah. Haw. Okeh… okeh, no panic. No panic… haw. Shoot," Wynne said in a mumble as she took a peek at the estate agent and her potential customers.
Moving back into the kitchen, she leaned her rear-end against the counter. Drawing a deep breath, she held it for a short while before it left her as a sigh. "Okeh, I reckon I'mma-gonn' hafta put in a bid on tha trailah, then. 'Cos, frankly, gettin' them Virgin Towah folks that close woudden be good fer mah blood pressure, nosirree."
'Hon, I agree, but-'
"Lawrdie, can y'all imagine whut gonn' happen ta ou'ah awesome community barbecues in da summah or that there Criss-mas get-togethah an' all them things? An' ou'ah New Year's celebra-shun? Naw. Naw-naw-naw an' a li'l mo' naw. It be a ton o' money, but if it means I'mma-gonn' hafta buy Ernie's dang-blasted trailah ta stay sane, then I reckon I'mma-gonn' hafta buy Ernie's dang-blasted trailah! Shoot…"
'Honey, listen to me… please!'
"Always, darlin'."
'Think it through before you commit to anything… okay? Please think it through. And don't sign anything what-so-ever before we can get a lawyer to look at it.'
"I deffa-nete-ly hear whut y'all be sayin', darlin', but I been burned befo' 'cos I coudden think fast enuff. Yuh, I sure been burned an' all," Wynne said, rubbing her brow furiously. "I reckon we need-a act fast or else we gonn' lose ou'ah li'l haven down he'. Woudden be fuhhhh-n, no Ma'am. But I sure hear wotcha sayin'. Aw-shittt… I reckon I'mma-gonn' hafta improvise."
'All right, but please be careful. Best of luck with it… I love you. And keep me posted!'
"Haw, I sure will, darlin'. Luv' y'all like ca-razy. Bah-Bah."
Once the telephone was back in Wynne's pocket, she assumed a neutral expression and walked back into the living area to check out the competition. Tiffany Worth was busy speaking into her own telephone - the real estate agent Caroline Roberts wore a broad smile that reached from ear to ear.
The sight made Wynne furrow her brow. She eyed the two women for another few seconds until her neural pathways had made enough of a connection to signal that a deal might have been struck between the two. "Dad-gummit… that ain't gonn' happen. Nosirree, that jus' ain't gonn' happen," she mumbled under her breath. "Wynne Donnah-hew… it be haaah time fer some improvisa-shun."
Screwing a steely and sublimely confident smile on her face, Wynne stepped forward and hooked her thumbs into her belt loops. "Tell y'all whut, Miss Roberts. I jus' been on da horn with mah finan-shual backahs, an' we be willin' ta close this he' deal he' an' now. Yes Ma'am, I'mma-gonn' put in a bid fer this he' trailah."
Tiffany Worth shot Wynne another pointed look, but it wasn't an Evil Eye for a change - it was one of pure, unadulterated gloating.
"I'm sorry, Miss Donovan-" Caroline Roberts said.
"Donnah-hew!"
The real estate agent offered Wynne an apologetic smile. "Pardon. I'm terribly sorry, but Miss Worth has just signed a letter of intent-"
Wynne's heart nearly performed a loop-di-loop in her chest at the news, but she steeled her backbone to carry on with the semi-charade: "Izzat a fact? Well, my finan-shual backahs be willin' ta add another twentah percent to whutevah sum Miss Worth offah'd fer this' he' trailah. Goin' bah the ohh-ree-gee-nal askin' price, I reckon that be… ah… ah… ah… ninety grand."
The bold statement made everyone clam up. As a result, the trailer soon grew so silent that the proverbial dropped pin would have rattled the window panes. The members of the Virgin Tower missionary team cleared their throats, shuffled back and forth or found something very, very interesting to look at down on the bare floorboards.
Tiffany Worth glared at Caroline Roberts before she turned to Wynne and took a threatening step forward. A hissed "That's preposterous!" featuring a strong undertone of venom was soon sent in Wynne's direction.
Standing firm, Wynne simply shook her head. Her cause was helped by the fact she was seven inches taller than the angry Mission Chief - it gave her an almost insurmountable edge in their negotiations. "Naw. It be bizzness. Nuttin' mo'. Nuttin' less," she said in a put-upon steely voice before she turned to the real estate agent. "Well, Miss Roberts? Wotcha reckon? Whut it gonn' be?"
Looking greatly concerned over the completely random curveball that had just been thrown at her, Caroline Roberts rubbed her brow repeatedly. "I… well… I can't make that decision on my own. The letter of intent has been signed, but I'm also obligated to get the largest sum I can for the property owner. I need to call Mr. Bradberry to… to… well, to ask what he wants. Please don't kill each other while I do so."
"Okie-dokie," Wynne said with a grin. Turning her back to the flushed, spit-flying-furious Tiffany Worth, she shuffled over to the window that offered a good view of the central lawn. Freddie was nowhere in sight so Goldie had run over to Estelle and Renee Tooley's trailer to have someone to play with. Unfortunately, nobody was home so it quickly turned into a fruitless endeavor for the Golden Retriever.
Steam continued to pour from Tiffany Worth's ears. She remained in the trailer at first, but soon stomped out of the trailer to head back to their minivan. There, she yanked a can of diet soda out of a cooler box and tore it open with excessive force. The contents were chugged down in a few gulps.
"Haw, that be tha only good no-shun she done had while I been he'. Yuh, one o' them Dubbel-Zerahs sure woudden hurt or nuttin' right this he' minnit," Wynne said under her breath.
She cast a quick glance over her shoulder to gauge whether or not she had time to make it back to her refrigerator to get a can of H.E. Fenwyck's finest, but the look upon Caroline Roberts's face told her the beer would have to wait. A moment later, the real estate agent waved her over.
"Here she is now, Mr. Bradberry," Caroline said into her telephone. "Yes… yes, I will. Thank you."
Once Wynne was close enough, the telephone changed hands - it was soon put to her ear. She broke out in a broad grin when she could hear Ernie's familiar tones speaking at the other end of the connection:
'Ah… is this Miss Wendy Donovan?'
Wynne briefly narrowed her eyes to shoot Caroline Roberts a dark look for mangling her name for the umpteenth time, but a thought soon flashed through her mind: perhaps she could turn the confusion into a secret weapon as the real estate agent and the missionaries only knew that she had known Ernie - not that they had been, and still were, best buddies. "Whah, it sure is, Mista Bradberry! Lawrdie, I be mi'ty pleased ta hear ya voice an' all!"
'What the hell-'
"Yuh, we got plenty ta discuss, that sure ain't no lie. Lissen, Mista, I been lookin' at that there Fer Sale sign fer a good, long while now, yuh?"
'Uh… yeah? Wynne, what's-'
"But now since them friendly folks from that there Vir-gin To-wah Orga-niza-shun" - Wynne made sure to pronounce each syllable with a clarity of speech she rarely achieved - "done took an int'rest innit, I reckoned I needed ta-"
'They what?!'
"Yuh-yuh, cross mah heart, hope ta choke on a peanit!" Wynne said, looking at Tiffany Worth through the window. "They sure have. Okeh, then I thunk, whydontcha mebbe put in a bid or som'tin fer that there trailah there. So, Mista Bradberry, wotcha ack-chew-ly be lookin' fer?"
'Seventy-five grand, Wyn- I mean, Wendy. I can maybe, maybe, maybe go as low as sixty grand, but… dammit, I really need the full sum 'cos it's just dead money tied up in real estate, you know?'
Wynne's eyes flew wide open before they narrowed down into ice-blue slits. She took several deep breaths while she cast sneaky glances at the missionaries and Caroline Roberts. "Yuh-huh? That sure be a buncha cash. Yuh. An' I kinda overbid 'em bah twentah percent an' all, so that gonn' be… aw… aw… ninety grand. Yuh. Like I done said ta that there realtah an' all. Okeh…"
'Holy shit, Wynne! Do you even have that kind of money?!'
"Naw."
'Shit!'
"A-yup."
Wynne began rubbing her brow. Mandy's pleading message of needing to think it through and to understand the potential consequences before leaping into the proverbial unknown came to her unprompted - she had indeed leapt without thinking about anything, and had landed face-first in yet another smelly mess of her own doing. "Okeh. I done took tha green flag so I reckon I need-a head off inta turn one. Yuh-"
'No, back 'er on down, Wynne. The start's been waved off. Are you sayin' the Virgin Tower wants to buy my trailer?'
"Yuh, I sure do. An' not only wanna buy it… I reckon one o' them there big-wigs done writ her signa-chure onna lettah o' intent or some such-"
'I'm not sellin' my old home to those narrow-minded fanatics. End of discussion.'
"Okeh…"
'Put the realtor back on, Wynne. I need to have a serious conversation with her.'
Wynne soon waved Roberts over. "He' she be now, Mista Bradberry. Aw… it sure wus nice tawkin' ta y'all… yuh. Bah-bah."
'Don't go too far, Wynne. We need to talk once this mess has been sorted out.'
"I hear ya. Yuh," Wynne said, nodding hard. "Okeh, bah-bah fer now, then."
While Caroline Roberts spoke to Ernie, Wynne made a beeline for the kitchen in the hope she could persuade the faucet to produce a few drops of water so she could wet her whistle. She let out a long groan when nothing happened regardless of how much she turned the knob - then she groaned even harder when she remembered that she had turned off the water mains herself after the carpenter had left so no accidents of the seeping or leaking kind would occur.
A mumbled "Aw-shoot… Wynne Donnah-hew, y'all be dumbah than a door post," escaped her before her presence was required in the living area:
'Miss Donovan?'
"Donnah-hew, fer cryin' out loud! How many dog-gone times I gotta tell y'all mah name is Wynne dang-blasted Donnah-hew!" Wynne roared as she stomped back out of the kitchen.
"Pardon," the real estate agent said without actually showing much remorse over her faux pas. "Well, it seems there's been a misunderstanding. Mister Bradberry has just informed me he no longer needs my services. The trailer is off the market."
The corners of Wynne's mouth twitched hard at the grim thought of needing to scrounge up $90.000 somewhere - not to mention needing to face Mandy to explain another mess. Her good mood had already gone due south when Caroline Roberts continued:
"It appears Mister Bradberry isn't looking to sell after all, so… well, I'm terribly sorry, Miss Donohue. Your bid would have been successful, but that's the way it goes sometimes."
Wynne heard the words but not their meaning. As a direct result of the disastrous, calamitous and just plain mind-numbingly brainless screw-up she had just leapt into, she balled up her fists and stuck them into her rear pockets.
When her depressed mind finally finished parsing the realtor's message, she let out a surprised grunt. "Haw? So… whaddahell y'all trah'in' ta tell me, anyhows?"
"That Mister Bradberry's trailer isn't for sale after all. The letter of intent is null and void… and I'm afraid your bid is off the table," Caroline said with a smile.
As the ton of brick-shaped guilt slipped off Wynne's shoulders and fell onto the floorboards with a resounding bang, she let out a deep sigh of relief. She needed several deep breaths before she could let out a croaked "Mercy Sakes… that there minnit there done took ten years offa mah life… Lawrdie."
Caroline Roberts nodded a couple of times before she made for the door. "If you will excuse me. I need to inform Miss Worth of the development."
"Aw… sure. Sure. Y'all bettah be reddy ta duck 'cos that woman sure knows a thing or two 'bout them angry glares an' all," Wynne said in a state of mind that still hadn't fully caught up with the latest development.
The brief meeting between Caroline Roberts and Tiffany Worth out on the central lawn did in fact turn explosive: an endless, fiery, venomous tirade rolled across the trailer park like a late-summer thunderstorm until the entire Virgin Tower team got into their minivan and drove off at full speed - the rapid exit producing a choking cloud of dust and a rattling shower of pebbles.
Wynne observed it all from the front porch of Ernie's trailer. It wasn't long before her own telephone rang, and it came as no surprise to her when the caller-ID said Ernie B. "Howdy, Ernie! Lawwwwwwwr-die, y'all jus' done saved mah bacon from bein' honey-roasted ovah a pit o' hellfi'ah! I ain't nevah gonn' be able ta repay y'all or nuttin'…"
'We're buddies, Wynne. You owe me nothin'. Honestly… I can't tell you how confused I am right now!' Ernie said before he let out a long series of chuckles.
"Yuh, I hear ya. It sure been one o' theeeee weirdest days so far… an' that really be sayin' som'tin considerin' tha messes we done been in around these he' parts an' all!"
'Yeah, no shit. I'm relieved nothin' came of it. Imagine if the Virgin Tower had moved in?! I wouldn't have been able to show my face in Goldsboro ever again!'
"Aw, it prolly woudden ha' been that bad… haw… yuh, it woudda! Ya woudda been dunked in tar an' rolled in feathahs fer sure!" Wynne broke out in a snicker at her joke. "But anyhows, I reckon y'all gonn' need yerself a new realtah. I don't got one o' those lined up or nuttin', but mebbe I got somebodda y'all could sell it ta-"
'Tell you what, Wynne… I'm actually thinkin' about settin' it up as a rental instead. That way, I could keep direct control over who moves in and still get a cash flow going.'
Wynne broke out in a wide grin - she even punched the air. "Aw! Aw-yuh, that would be purr-fect in this he' situa-shun an' all, 'cos like I done tole y'all, I mebbe got somebodda lined up. 'Membah De-per-ty Quick Draw? Bea Reilly?"
'Yeah. She gave me a fine for pissin' in public a couple of years ago.'
"Yuh, that be Quick Draw, awright," Wynne said while a cheesy grin played on her lips. "Anyhows, Bea be stayin' at Missus Bizzybodda's boardin' how-se an' all, an' the ol' bat is drivin' 'er insane. She don't got them finances reddy ta buy tha trailah, but I reckon she got enuff ta rent it. That woudden be no bad deal, nosirree. Hell, it would be perdy dang smart, ack-chew-ly. I reckon y'all need-a tawk ta 'er directly an' all."
'That sounds like a good idea, Wynne. Isn't she the Junior Deputy-'
Wynne shook her head at the telephone although Ernie wouldn't be able to see it. "No mo' she ain't. She been promoted ta one o' them reg'lar de-per-ties an' all. Mah darlin' Mandy done tole me Quick Draw might not stay 'cos she got a good offah ta join Sheriff Wotshisname down in Lansin'burg, but mebbe this could persuade her ta stick around."
'All right… thanks. I'll definitely get in touch with her. Do you think I can just call the sheriff's office for her telephone number?'
"Yuh, I reckon."
'Good. I'll do that at once.'
"Haw, that sure would be fihhh-ne an' dandy, yessirree." While she spoke, Wynne happened to cast a glance in Caroline Roberts's direction. "Aw, I bettah get off tha horn. That there real estate agent y'all jus' done fiah'd be lookin' a li'l downcast. Mebbe I'mma-gonn' offah her a beer or som'tin. Then I be off fer Goldsborah fer some lunch with mah darlin', dontchaknow."
'Business as usual, then? Say hi to the Sheriff for me.'
"Y'all bettah bah-lieve I'mma-gonn' do jus' that, friend! An' it gonn' be with a sloppy, ol' kiss jus' the way we like 'em. Yuh. Lissen, I need-a thank y'all a gigantoh bunch fer savin' mah bee-hind. I wus headin' fer hawt watah but y'all done threw me one o' them there swimmin'-donut-things there-"
'A lifebuoy?'
"Yuh! A big-ass one that done kept me afloat fer anothah mess on anothah day."
'Oh, you're very welcome,' Ernie said before he let out a chuckle that reached through the connection and tickled Wynne's ear - it made her grin. 'All right. There's no time like the present… I better call the Deputy now.'
"Okeh! Tawk ta ya latah, buddy! This he' be tha one an' only Wynne Donnah-hew signin' off, yuh?"
'Bye, Wynne. I'll call you again once I've spoken to the Deputy.'
"Okie-dokie. Bah-bah fer now!"
Grinning at the unexpected - not to mention rare - success of one of her improvised adventures, Wynne stuffed the telephone into her rear pocket before she strolled out to explain the latest development to the visibly disappointed Caroline Roberts.
*
*
CHAPTER 2
Eight miles north of the trailer park and the conversation that went on down there, the compact, athletic presence of Sheriff Mandy Jalinski leaned back on her swivel-chair to take in the goings-on in the sheriff's office - everything looked much the same as it had for the past decade or more.
Just about the only things that worked flawlessly were the newly installed strip lights that had caused so much grief back in December just prior to the exhausting business involving the Grand Western Parade that marked the theatrical premiere of Wynne's horror Western.
Their coffee machine also kept soldiering on with nary a murmur save for those it was meant to make as it processed the ground beans and water into the life-saving, dark-brown liquid known as coffee. It was perhaps getting a little long in the tooth, not to mention slower in arriving at the desired results, but it hadn't suffered a malfunction or complete breakdown yet.
Beyond those highlights, the rest could only be described as the pits: the brown linoleum floor resembled a 2000-piece jigsaw puzzle that someone had thrown up in the air simply to watch the pieces land at random. The felt tiles in the ceiling were drooping, the wooden door to Main Street was sticking, the inner door to the adjacent jailhouse was rusted shut, and the maps on the walls were from the mid-1960s and thus half a century out of date.
The state of affairs wasn't much better in the restroom out back: both hot-water faucets had begun to act up despite the plumber's best efforts. One of the cisterns continued to leak like a sieve, and the ventilator in one of the stalls had literally been reduced to its component parts one day when Beatrice Reilly had turned it on.
And yet, something was different - the office air was clean and breathable with nary a trace of the Clouds Of Stinky Doom that would usually pollute their indoor climate. Mandy toyed with a ball point pen as she looked across the office to take in the sight of the temp Deputy Sheriff sitting at the watch desk.
The old pro Don Woodward had once more come over from Jarrod City to fill in for Barry Simms while the latter's special, and unusual, case was being dealt with at the highest level. A career deputy in his mid-fifties with a fatherly face and a calm demeanor, Don's somewhat plump figure meant he wasn't a natural when it came to hot pursuits - instead, his skills were of a clerical nature as witnessed by the wonders he had already worked sorting the old case files.
Better still, he was able to dig up any kind of information at a moment's notice, be it recent DUI records, old duty rosters, older arrest warrants or even near-ancient, handwritten personnel files from when the world had still been in black-and-white.
Barry's request to resign from the MacLean County Sheriff's Department yet remain at the Goldsboro office as a civilian employee shouldn't have been more than a formality, but the case had hit a snag when one of the big-wigs had insisted that their Drive 4 Diversity program needed to be upheld: with the sheriff and the deputies at the Goldsboro Office being 75% Caucasian, the civilian position needed to be filled by someone from a minority group or the Sheriff's Department would undoubtedly become a target of media scrutiny. When Barry's claims to indeed be in a minority group on the basis of being a smoker had fallen on deaf ears, the entire transfer had come to a grinding, bureaucratic halt.
It had been a quiet morning. The old Bakelite landline telephone on the watch desk had only sent out its shrill noises once, and that had been local resident Albert Rossmann who had reported yet another imaginary prowler.
Though everyone knew it was a mirage brought on by what had to be developing dementia for the retired gentleman, the regular procedures needed to be followed, so the incident log had been updated with the date, time, specifics and the initials of the responding Deputy Sheriff. Once the Deputy in question had returned from yet another wild goose chase, the paperwork needed to be typed, approved by the Sheriff, signed by the Deputy assigned to the case, stored in a folder and finally put into the filing cabinet used for open-ended cases.
Mandy's train of thought was interrupted when the portable radio on the watch desk began squawking. The white noise was soon followed by Beatrice Reilly's disembodied voice saying: 'Mobile Unit Two to Base. Mobile Unit Two to Base. Base, do you copy? Over.'
Down on the floor, Blackie rested in a doggy-basket that had been placed just inside the door. She had a full bowl of water, a stick of chicken jerky and a gnawing bone within easy reach, but the morning had been so slow and uneventful that the all-black German Shepherd had chosen to take a nap instead.
The potential for imminent action of the best kind saw her jump to her paws and practice her most feral sneer. Once she had the sneer and the accompanying guttural growl down pat, she shook her back to get the sleepies out.
Don Woodward reached for the radio while he picked up the pencil he used for the incident log. "This is Base, Mobile Unit Two. We copy. Go ahead, over."
Beatrice Reilly continued: 'I'm up at the used car lots at the Bang 'n Beatin' Body Shop. I was just contacted by a furious Mr. Browne who reported cases of vandalism on two of the used trucks they have for sale.'
Mandy let out an annoyed grunt as she got up from the biggest of the three desks in the office. Moving into the middle of the floor, she put her hands on her hips as she listened to Beatrice's ongoing report:
'The trucks affected by the vandalism are parked next to each other at the far end of the second lot. The first has two slashed tires. The other has been keyed pretty badly. Over.'
"Ten-four, Mobile Unit Two. I'm updating the incident log as I speak. Over," Don said as the pencil flew across the form to update all the appropriate fields.
Blackie let out a resounding Woof! that was doggy-shorthand for 'Ready to champ on bad people whenever you need me!'
Mandy let out a mumbled "Vandalism…. great. That's all we needed," before she moved over to the watch desk to take over the portable radio from Don Woodward. "Mobile Unit Two, this is the Sheriff. Knowing Mr. Browne as we do, he'll want the damaged vehicles off his lots as soon as possible, but I need you to take photographic evidence of the vandalism before they're moved. Over."
'Will do, Sheriff. Over.'
"Are there any footprints near the vehicles, over?"
'Yes and no, Sheriff. The lot they're on is covered by deep, loose gravel and is literally pockmarked by hundreds of little dips and hollows. Also, dusting for fingerprints would be a waste of resources as the vehicles haven't been broken into. Over.'
A grunt escaped Mandy as she strode over to the office windows overlooking Main Street. Though lunch hour and the recurring invasion of hungry workers and independent contractors would cause plenty of vehicular chaos at the stroke of noon, the tranquil nature of the day meant the traffic remained sparse for the time being: a lone, white GMC truck rumbled north. A brief while later, a farm tractor went in the opposite direction.
"Acknowledged, Mobile Unit Two," she said as she turned away from the windows to return to her desk. "It could be a local teen on a bender or an out-of-towner who felt like wanting to create a little mayhem. Did you happen to see anyone who might fit either of those descriptions while on patrol, over?"
'That's a negatory, Sheriff. Everything's been quiet so far. I'm on a full patrol so I checked nearly every alley off Main Street on my way up here. I never saw anyone who wasn't supposed to be here. Over.'
Down on the floor, Blackie studied the unfolding events intently. Since the Humans did nothing but talk-talk-talk, she let out an annoyed Wooooof… before shuffling back to her doggy-basket. Two seconds later, the old-fashioned Bakelite telephone suddenly breaking out into shrill ringing caused the experienced K9 officer to jump to her paws all over again and let out a hopeful Woof!
Don Woodward picked up the receiver at once and pinned it between his cheek and shoulder while he held the pencil ready at the incident log. "You've reached the MacLean County Sheriff's Department, the Goldsboro office. How may we help you?" he said in a smooth, all-professional voice.
Mandy cast a brief glance at the temp Deputy's actions before she returned to the conversation she had with Beatrice Reilly on the portable radio: "Very well, Mobile Unit Two. Get all the photos you can, then return here so we can get them moved over to the laptop. Base out."
"Sheriff?" Don said, holding up the telephone's receiver. "It's Mrs. Peabody. She wants to report a case of vandalism at her boarding-"
"Goddammit!" Mandy barked as she stomped around the corner of the watch desk to grab the old-fashioned receiver. "Mrs. Peabody, this is Sheriff Jalinski," she said, digging into her breast pocket to find a ball point pen as well as her indispensable notepad.
Woof! Woof-woof-woof-woof-woof!
Mandy tried to signal Blackie to wait with the woofing until after the telephone call, but the German Shepherd was so excited that it took three increasingly annoyed gestures before she understood the commands. Embarrassed, Blackie quickly piped down and shuffled back to her basket where she got busy with her gnawing bone instead.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Peabody- pardon? No… no, that wasn't Barry Simms coughing. It was my dog. You were- no, it wasn't coughing, either. It was barking. Yes."
Mandy's face gained another grim shade of annoyance at the weird direction the conversation had taken. Her eyes went on a rolling tour of the ceiling before she decided to cut to the chase with a curt: "You were saying, Ma'am?"
While the owner of the boarding house spoke at the other end of the line, Mandy jotted down every bit of information relayed to her. "I see," she said as she flipped the page and moved the pen to the top of the next one. "To recap, two windows were smashed at some point during the late night or early morning hours. Both were at the rear of the boarding house. The kitchen and a storage room. Very well. Was anything taken from the rooms- all right. You found a brick on the floor? Please don't touch it. It might have- oh. All right. You touched it."
The thoroughly fed-up tone in Mandy's voice made Don Woodward grin as he added the various information required for the latest case to hit the Goldsboro office.
"Well," Mandy continued, "the brick might've had useable fingerprints on it- pardon?"
A deep furrow developed on Mandy's forehead as she listened to Mrs. Peabody continuing to speak in her ear. The first such feature was soon joined by another one to show that it was getting from bad to worse - then an angry glare flashed across her eyes. "No, Mrs. Peabody, it wasn't- look, I can guarantee it wasn't the so-called colored fellow across the street. No. No. And it wasn't his children, either. No!"
Don Woodward and Blackie both stared wide-eyed at the sheriff as her hitherto modulated voice grew increasingly fierce as the telephone conversation went on.
"No, Mrs. Peabody! Your accusations are baseless. As an officer of the law, I must inform you they're borderline defamatory! I'll be at the boarding house in three minutes' time to inspect the damage so we can get this over and done with. Yes! Goodbye!"
The receiver was replaced on the telephone stand with surprising gentleness, but it was only because of its fragile nature. The second Mandy's hand had left the receiver, she broke out in a resounding: "Goddamn that old bat!" while she smacked a clenched fist against her hip. "Get this, Don, she had the Goddamned audacity to accuse Keshawn Williams and his children of the vandalism! It's not even preposterous, it's grotesque!"
"Yes, Sheriff," Don said, knowing full well to stay out of such affairs.
Mandy took a deep breath and held it in the hope the added oxygen would calm her down. The first attempt yielded nothing in the way of results, so she stomped back to her desk to slam her palms onto the desktop. She stood like that for a few moments until her complexion returned to its regular pinkish hue from the tomato-red it had been at.
"All right. We need to nip this in the bud ASAP. Deputy, is the Senior Deputy still on speed trap duty down south at Haddersfield Pass?"
"I believe so, Sheriff. That was the site of his latest report."
"Get him back on the double," Mandy said as she strode over to the rack that kept the rest of their portable radios.
"Yes, Sheriff. I'm on it," Don said as he reached for the old Bakelite telephone - Rodolfo Gonzalez would be out of range of the portable radios, so a traditional telephone call would be necessary.
After choosing the first of the radios, Mandy tested the transmit key to hear if the other units squawked or if it needed a change of batteries. The other units responded to her test, so she clipped it onto her belt and yanked the sticking door open. "Once the Senior Deputy is back, tell him to contact me on the radio. We need to increase the frequency of our foot patrols. We have to catch the S.O.B. who's doing this before he gets another destructive urge."
"Will do, Sheriff."
Down on the floor, Blackie took the opening of the door as her cue to join the fun. She shook her back again before she zipped out onto the sidewalk. She glanced up and down Main Street a couple of times while waiting for directions. When her owner whistled, patted her thigh and pointed north on the street, she took off at a moderate pace to seek out some much-needed action.
-*-*-*-
A handful of minutes later, an unrelenting and certainly entrenched battle of opinions had broken out on Main Street between two equally strong-willed combatants. Mrs. Peabody and Mandy both gave as good as they got, and as a result, their voices grew louder and more frustrated as the verbal sparring went on.
Several people driving past slowed down their trucks or field tractors to gawk at the unusual scene. The buddies Kenny Tobin and Richard 'Ritchie' Lee - who were on their way home to the Tobin residence north of Goldsboro after buying two mystery boxes at the Chicky Kingz takeout parlor - took several pictures of the strange scene before they sped off once more. The farmers Geoffrey Wilburr Senior and Junior rumbled past pulling a load of fresh hay bales. Sitting in the back of the trailer, Geoffrey Junior couldn't help but chuckle at the strange sight.
Over at the epicenter of the row, Blackie's black eyes moved from one Human to the other. Both seemed greatly peeved about something, best reflected in the fact that their voices rarely held less than annoyed tones. As the heated discussion continued among the two-legged creatures, Blackie lost interest and wandered off to find a more peaceful spot that wouldn't tax her sensitive ears.
Ten paces into her journey, she stopped and turned around to see if her owner needed assistance after all, but it seemed that it wouldn't go beyond the current level of arguing. Shrugging, she continued her own exploration of Main Street's distinctly un-exciting sidewalk.
"Mrs. Peabody," Mandy said in a voice that proved she had reached her limit, "I'm telling you for the last time… the Williams family has nothing to do with the vandalism. Nothing!"
The features of the late-sixty-something Mrs. Peabody - nobody had ever used, or even heard, her first name - soured almost as if she had bitten into a lemon. She wore ankle boots and an old-fashioned, dark-blue frontierwoman's dress that had been buttoned all the way up to the upper hem. The bun in her gray hair had been wound as tight as ever, and that and the pair of square reading glasses that were perched on her nose gave her a harsh, humorless and utterly narrow-minded look. "You don't know that!" she said in an insulted tone.
"And you don't know that they are! You're simply guessing. Accusing someone of a crime with zero evidence to back it up is a serious matter, Mrs. Peabody," Mandy said, stressing most of the words to hammer the point home.
When the owner of the boarding house finally fell quiet and seemed to need time to compose her next reply, Mandy continued with a message she knew the perennial penny-pincher would understand: "At the very least, you'll be looking at a costly lawsuit for slander."
Mrs. Peabody's sour looks briefly turned concerned before a more neutral expression fell over her. "Well… but Mr. Rains told me to be cautious of them-"
"Mr. Rains has no say in the matter," Mandy said as her eyes narrowed down into hazel-green slits. "Mrs. Peabody, you ought to know better than to listen to him and his associates. They aren't the best people to take advice from."
"In your opinion, perhaps, but Mr. Rains was sheriff for a very long while-"
Mandy broke out in a nod that was perhaps just slightly exaggerated. "True. And then he disgraced himself and the uniform he wore by uttering a racist diatribe while being filmed. Look where that got him. No, this discussion is over, Mrs. Peabody. The Sheriff's Department will find the person responsible for the vandalism and bring him, or her, to justice. Thank you. Goodbye."
Spinning around on her heel, Mandy stomped along the sidewalk with an even fiercer stride than usual. A few seconds later, she was joined by Blackie whose puzzled doggy-eyes proved she really didn't understand the strange Humans.
---
They had almost made it back to the office when the portable radio on Mandy's belt crackled to life with a 'Base to Mobile Unit One. Base to Mobile Unit One. Sheriff, are you on this frequency, over?'
Sighing, she came to a halt and pulled the radio off her belt. "Mobile Unit One receiving, Deputy. Over."
Don Woodward's voice came from no more than eighty yards further down Main Street as he relayed his message: 'I've just come off the phone with Mr. Rossmann. He's reporting a prowler lurking on Josiah Street in the vicinity of number seventeen, eighteen and nineteen. Over.'
Mandy's sigh grew deeper and more resigned. Her thumb was already resting on the transmit key, but she simply couldn't work up the energy to respond.
A few seconds went by filled with nothing but sighs - then Don tried again: 'Sheriff? Did you copy? Over.'
"I'm here, Deputy. All right. I'll head over there to talk to Mr. Rossmann in person," Mandy said, crossing over Main Street to begin the short journey over to Josiah Street - the newest neighborhood in Goldsboro. "Once I get back, we need to contact his family to let them know this cannot be allowed to go on. We must have their contact information somewhere… please find it in the meantime."
'Will do, Sheriff. Over.'
"Very well. Mobile Unit One out," Mandy said before she attached the radio to her belt.
Blackie let out another puzzled Woof? but soon fell into step next to her owner's striding legs.
---
Mandy had only just made the turn from Second Street and onto Josiah Street when the radio came alive again: 'Base to Mobile Unit One. Base to Mobile Unit One. Sheriff, there's been a further call. I have the caller on hold at present.'
Groaning out loud, Mandy whipped up the radio at once. "Deputy, please tell Mr. Rossmann to calm the hell down! I'm almost there! Over!"
'Sheriff, it's not Mr. Rossmann but Mrs. O'Sullivan. The report is the same, however. She and her husband have also spotted a suspicious-looking man walking through the gardens of several houses, over.'
The fact that Esther O'Sullivan, a far more reliable witness than Albert Rossmann, had seen the supposed prowler as well upped the urgency and made Mandy pick up the pace.
Down below, Blackie let out a cheerful, celebratory Wooooof! before she assumed her favorite feral sneer and took off at a fair clip.
"Copy that. Responding at once. Mobile Unit One out," Mandy said before the radio was shoved back onto the belt. Her right hand moved a few inches ahead to open the small button on her holster that kept her service firearm in place.
---
Mandy spotted Eamonn and Esther O'Sullivan standing on their porch as she and Blackie jogged past their house. The retired couple waved at her before they pointed across the street at the spot where they had last seen the stranger - she acknowledged it by giving them a thumbs-up.
Blackie ran ahead and soon arrived at number seventeen. When Mandy caught up to the fierce German Shepherd, they plotted their potential manhunt. As with most of the bungalows and two-story houses on Josiah Street, the building was pulled back a good fifty feet from the sidewalk to allow room for an open garden. The curtains were drawn and the driveway was empty, indicating nobody was home.
Mandy jogged up the garden path to get to the front door. When she reached it, she briefly checked the woodwork and the doorjamb for signs of a burglary without finding anything untoward. She turned to her right and ran along the front of the house until she reached the corner. Peeking past it, she took in the sight of a garden that only had the expected items: flowerbeds, a vegetable patch, a few young trees and a bush or two.
Returning along the front of the house, she peeked past the other corner without seeing anyone or anything suspicious. Grunting, she and Blackie left number seventeen behind to head onto the next house. A niggling thought began to take form at the back of her mind as she ran up the driveway of number eighteen, but she pushed it aside to remain focused on the task at hand.
---
Three fruitless minutes later, Mandy arrived at the front lawn of number nineteen. She came to a brief halt close to the hideous marble fountain while she began analyzing the thought that had remained at the back of her mind.
The house was owned by the Jensen family, and one of the people living there had been at the center of the investigation involving the series of infuriating prank calls the previous summer. Torsten 'Tor' Jensen had eventually confessed to being behind the slew of A.I.-generated calls. Later in the summer, Circuit Judge Cornelius Etherington had sentenced him to carry out community service that the young man had completed without trouble.
Tor had behaved himself since then save for the inevitable bouts of mischief and loud behavior that most teenaged boys stumbled into from time to time, but his older brother was a different story. Apparently the black sheep of the family, the brother had taken to marihuana like a duck to water which had caused him to fall in with the wrong crowd up north in Richmond Falls where the Jensens had lived before moving to Goldsboro. To fund his growing habit, he had become involved in low-level criminal activities that had seen him arrested a few times but never put behind bars as such.
Before she went any further, Mandy took the radio off her belt. "Mobile Unit One to Base. Mobile Unit One to Base," she said before releasing the key.
'Base receiving, Sheriff,' Don Woodward said.
"Base, I need the name of the oldest son of the Jensen family. They live at number nineteen Josiah Street. At once, please. Over."
'I'm on it, Sheriff. Stand by,' Don said - as he spoke, the sounds of the chair at the watch deck being pushed back could be heard loud and clearly.
"Mobile Unit One standing by."
Mandy let her eyes roam over Josiah Street while she and Blackie waited for Don Woodward to find the records in the crew room. Nothing moved anywhere. The newish asphalt already smelled warm though the sun had yet to really hit its stride after the bleakness of the winter months. Someone mowed their lawn somewhere.
Old-fashioned swing music wafted across the street from a radio on someone's front porch - a moment or two later, a honey-voiced disk jockey announced the next band, Johnny Dalton's Swingin' Sensation. Soon, a warm, rich clarinet played the opening bars of the traditional tune Don't Sit Under The Apple Tree.
Blackie used the lull to sit down on the sidewalk. Like her owner, she kept a watchful eye on the street, the houses and the hideous marble fountain. When the radio crackled to life once more, she jumped to her paws to be ready to gnaw on some bad people.
'Base to Mobile Unit One. Base to Mobile Unit One. The names of the sons are Torsten and Lukas. The parents are Matthew and Carole… that's Carole with an E at the end. Over.'
"Lukas… right," Mandy mumbled before she pressed the transmit key. "Thank you. Do we have anything on Lukas Jensen? Over."
'Nothing recent, Sheriff. There's an entry from last summer. He's wanted for questioning regarding an alleged theft of money from his mother during a stay at the family home. Over.'
As the particulars of the old case came back to her, Mandy broke out in a nod. "Good work, Deputy. It may end up as a wrong assumption on my part, but there's a chance that Lukas Jensen may be our prowler. By the way, hasn't the Senior Deputy returned yet? Over."
'That's a negatory, Sheriff. He had only just pulled over a speeding vehicle when I called him. He wanted to complete that task before returning. Over.'
"Very well. Mobile Unit One out." Stepping forward, Mandy kept the radio ready as she began scouting out the house at nineteen Josiah Street. A few moments later, she depressed the transmit key once more: "Mobile Unit One to Mobile Unit Two. Deputy Reilly, do you copy, over?"
Reams of howls, crackles and static followed before Beatrice's voice tried to poke through the wall of noise. 'Barely… Sheriff… coming in… real… broken and… garbled-'
Mandy rolled her eyes and shoved the old radio back onto her belt. In its stead, she took her private telephone and selected Beatrice's number - the connection had soon been established with a perfect sound quality. "Deputy Reilly, let's try this again. What's your status on the vandalism call up at Mr. Browne's?"
'I'm almost done here, Sheriff. Mr. Browne has assessed the damage to the vehicles and has written a claims form to their insurance company. At present, he's working on a written statement for our case file-'
"He'll have to drop off the document at the office later on," Mandy said while keeping a keen eye on the nearby houses so she wouldn't miss anything. "I need you over at nineteen Josiah Street on the double. We have a confirmed sighting of a prowler."
'I'm on my way. I'll take the short cut through the back gardens. ETA three minutes,' Beatrice said before she terminated the call.
Mandy soon put the telephone away so she could concentrate on her surroundings. A silver-gray Honda turned off Second Street and drove onto Josiah, but it was soon parked in front of one of the homes at the first part of the street. The unseen radio continued to play old-fashioned swing and big-band hits which made listening for strange sounds difficult.
Blackie spun around and let out a growl at someone approaching them from the rear, but her guttural noises became a welcoming Woof! when the person in question turned out to be Beatrice Reilly.
"Present and accounted for, Sheriff!" the Deputy said, saluting her superior. Out of breath after running across two of the used car lots, through one garden, bypassing a second one that had a covered swimming pool, through a third back garden where she had almost tripped over a woman sunbathing topless, and finally appearing at the bend in Josiah Street that led to the cul-de-sac, Beatrice unbuttoned her holster and drew the service firearm at once.
"Good," Mandy said and mirrored her Deputy's actions by drawing her pistol. "The prowler was initially reported by Mr. Rossmann and later confirmed by the O'Sullivans. I've checked number seventeen and eighteen without finding anyone. If my suspicions are correct, the prowler could be Lukas Jensen who in fact lives here."
"Oh… all right. That's Torsten's older brother, isn't it?"
"Yes. Go right, I'll go left. Look inside as well as-"
"Sheriff! Contact!" Beatrice suddenly said, pointing the firearm at the house next to where they stood.
A pudgy young man with long, greasy hair and a pasty hue shuffled along the side of the building wearing old basketball boots, filthy blue-jeans, a hoodie and an olive-green winter jacket. He obviously thought he hadn't been spotted yet as he stood up on tip-toes to gain enough altitude to look through a window.
Blackie drew a deep breath to let out one of her thunderous barks, but she held off for as long as it took her to cast a glance at her owner. When both Humans took off at a sprint, the German Shepherd decided to join them on the hunt instead of wasting precious moments barking about it.
Moving swiftly with their firearms pointed down at the ground, Mandy and Beatrice fanned out to surround the suspect. This left the center lane open for the ferocious fighting machine known as Blackie who finally let rip with a bark that threatened to blow the leaves off the nearby bushes - it did in fact make a flock of birds take off in a wild mess of annoyed tweeting and dropped feathers.
The young man jerked back as if bitten by a snake. After spinning around to take in the triple threat that approached him, he stupidly tried to make a run for it. A mere three steps on from his starting point, he threw his arms in the air as he was intercepted by a barking Blackie. Mandy and Beatrice caught up with them at once to corner the suspect.
"On your knees! Hands behind your back!" Mandy roared at a volume that wasn't much below that of Blackie's barking. After she had slapped a pair of metal handcuffs around his wrists, she took several steps back to cover herself in case of a counterattack. "I'm Sheriff Mandy Jalinski. This is Deputy Sheriff Beatrice Reilly. You are not yet under arrest, but you are being held under suspicion of prowling and-or other yet-to-be-determined criminal activities. State your name and address."
The pudgy, wild-haired youngling in the filthy clothes tried to pull the disinterested act at first, but the undeniable presence of the barking K9 officer and the two armed members of the Sheriff's Department broke down his defenses within moments.
His eyes darted around the scene as if he was only just understanding what was going on. As he shook his head in defeat, tufts of greasy hair fell into his eyes while his ungainly double-chins wobbled hard - all in all, he presented a pitiful image. "All right, all right! Get that frickin' dog away from me, man! I'm Lukas Jensen, okay? This is frickin' police harassment 'cos I frickin' live here, man!"
Mandy let out a grunt and let Blackie stay exactly where she was. "Deputy Reilly and I caught you peeping through a window of a house neither owned nor inhabited by the Jensen family. Let's try again. State your name and address."
"I'm not lying! Check my frickin' wallet! Liner pocket of my jacket, man!" the youngling said in a voice that veered into the screechy.
While Beatrice opened the filthy winter jacket to search for the wallet, Mandy moved to the side to keep the young man in her firing line in case it was a trick - Blackie did the same except that her weapon of choice was her set of sharp teeth that she made sure to show the prisoner.
A clear Clunk! was heard when the open jacket bumped against the wall of the house they were standing up against. Beatrice furrowed her brow and patted down both side pockets - the left one was soon revealed to contain a hard object. "What's that? A bottle? A small revolver? Like a Saturday Night Special?" she said before she stuck her hand down there to retrieve the mysterious object.
Lukas shot the Deputy Sheriff a dark look before he shook his head. Similar to the earlier situation, his long, greasy hair whisked back and forth as he did so. "No, man! It's one of those multi-function tools. You know… a screwdriver, a can opener, a cork screw and… yeah, okay, a pocket knife."
Beatrice nodded before she retrieved the tool that turned out to be old, filthy and rusty. Unfolding the blade to give it a closer look, she quickly established that it hadn't been properly maintained for a number of years.
The surface was dotted with rust and was decidedly unfit for coming into contact with any type of food that needed to be sliced into smaller pieces - it was, however, perfect for slicing tires. A quick sniff of the blade made her crinkle her nose in disgust. She had hoped to find traces of the typical scent of rubber, but only discovered traces of filth, grime and an undefinable, vile stench that she didn't want to know the origins of.
Once the multi-function tool had been put into an evidence bag that she had dug out of a pouch on her utility belt, she continued her search for the wallet. It was soon retrieved from the liner pocket. "Twenty dollars… a ticket stub… three condoms…" - Beatrice shot the pudgy, slovenly youngling a look that said 'not that he would ever get an opportunity to use any of them' - "and… well, well, well. Two small bags of weed."
"That's for personal use, man," Lukas Jensen said in a surly tone.
Beatrice nodded in a somewhat exaggerated fashion. "But of course. All right, here it is. Lukas Jensen, twenty-four years of age. Josiah Street nineteen, Goldsboro, MacLean County, Nevada."
"Like I frickin' told you, man!"
Mandy let out a grunt. "Like you told us, yeah. So why were you peeking through the window of your neighbors? Don't tell me it was an accident."
"I'm not saying another word, man."
Beatrice and Mandy shared a brief look before the latter holstered her sidearm so she had her hands free to yank the heavy-set prisoner to his feet. "That's probably a wise choice, Mr. Jensen," she said in a no-nonsense voice. "All right, we're hereby placing you under arrest. Deputy Reilly will inform you of your rights on our way over to the office. We have plenty of paperwork ahead of us."
Lukas shot his captors a grim look before he shuffled off in silence with his hands cuffed behind his back - Blackie followed at a few paces' distance to make sure that everything remained calm.
Mandy brought up the rear at first, but when they reached the O'Sullivan residence, she said: "I better get Esther and Eamonn up to speed so no half-baked theories can muddy the waters even further."
"Yes, Sheriff," Beatrice said over her shoulder while keeping a firm grip on Lukas' arm. "Once Mr. Jensen has been processed, I'll introduce him to our nice, comfy holding cell."
Mandy was already halfway up the garden path, but she had time to let out a: "Very well, Deputy Reilly."
Down on the sidewalk, Blackie let out a cheerful Woof-woof-wooooof! that proved she was in her element. Though she watched her owner head up the garden path to one of the homes, she remained steadfast and tracked the prisoner's steps all the way back to the jailhouse on Main Street.
*
*
CHAPTER 3
At the same time eight miles south of Goldsboro, Wynne let out a howl of despair that ended in her smacking both hands against her forehead in a clear display of getting just a teeny-tiny bit disgruntled with how things were progressing. She had finally found the perfect setup for the photo of Goldie she had tried to take all morning when everything had come crashing down - again.
The Golden Retriever had been standing tall and proud up on the flatbed of the matte-black Chevrolet Silverado Trail Boss Midnight Edition with a gentle breeze rippling through her golden fur, but at the exact same split second that Wynne pressed the Take Picture! icon on her telephone, Goldie had been spooked by a noisy, fast-moving patrol jet out of Bradley Air Force Base.
The scaredy-dog had gone into a yapping frenzy that had ended in her jumping clean off the rear of the truck. After some frantic circling down on the lawn to find the nearest safe spot, she had raced in under the Silverado where she pretended to be a third muffler so the evil world at large would never find her - that her golden fur stuck out against the silvery exhaust pipes like a sore paw didn't seem to play a part in her considerations.
Upstairs, Wynne shuffled around to sit on the Silverado's opened tail-gate. She just sat there with her head propped up on her arm for several minutes, practicing her thousand-mile stare while letting out a steady stream of deep, heartfelt sighs.
To add another dose of the Unfortunates to her growing collection, the patrol jet was soon joined by a heavier, four-engined transport airplane that made twice the racket as it traversed the bright-blue skies - it meant that Goldie whimpered even louder down in her hideout.
Wynne's cup of misery finally ran over when two Air Force helicopters appeared over the desert somewhere to the east of her. The hugely noisy contraptions were clearly on a training mission as they flew so close to the ground their flapping rotors kicked up plenty of desert dust in their wake.
"Gollllly, whaddahell them flaaah-boys be doin' ovah yondah? That sure don't look safe or nuttin'," she mumbled as she tracked the helicopters going past no more than a mile or so beyond the trailer park - their characteristic noise making Goldie let out a sequence of whimpers that sounded as if she was transmitting an S.O.S. in Morse code.
"Naw, I reckon I ain't meant ta take that there dang-blasted promo-shunnal pic-chure," Wynne continued before she let out a sigh. Once the telephone was back in her jeans pocket, she got up and dusted off her rear.
As expected, her beloved cowboy hat graced her dark locks. Though battered and sweat-stained, the hat was as big a part of her image as her inch-thick Texan accent. She intended to keep using it until it would literally come apart at the seams - and when that happened, she would stitch it up and put it straight back on her head.
The weather in mid-April was already too hot to wear her lined winter denim jacket, but not yet warm enough for the single-layer summer edition - thus, she wore a gunmetal-gray, double-layered, car-coat-style windbreaker over a white-and-red retro sweatshirt commemorating the legendary Darrell Waltrip winning the NASCAR Winston Cup in the Junior Johnson-run Budweiser Chevrolet back in 1985.
Below the colorful shirt, she wore faded blue-jeans and her favorite decorated cowboy boots. The red bandanna was obviously in place in her left-rear pocket, but the sheepskin gloves had been put in the closet until cooler weather would return come fall.
"Girl? Goldie?" she said, leaning down to look under the Silverado where the Golden Retriever still pretended to be part of the hardware even though all the noise-making aircraft had left the sector. "C'mon, Goldie, fer Pete's sake… we gotta getta town! Shoot, we gonn' be late fer lunch, dontchaknow. Y'all 'membah how Moira's gonn' look if we get there late, dontcha?"
Yap… yap?
" 'S right, all them boots threatenin' ta step on yer paws an' tail. Sure ain't gonn' be fun if we get there an' tha place be packed alreddy… no, Ma'am!"
Yap…
"Yuh. Like I done said."
Goldie peeked out from underneath the Silverado's black frame. When she had assessed that the world had returned to normal, she crawled back out and gave herself a solid shaking to get rid of the dust and blades of grass picked up by her fur in the mad scramble.
Wynne rolled her eyes repeatedly before she opened the crew cab's rear door so Goldie could jump onto the back seat. "Lawrdie, y'all sure is one helluva scaredy-dawg, ya know that? Haw… she be sittin' all perdy-like. Mebbe I oughttah snap a pic-chure befo' she gonn'-"
A Yap-yap-yap! telegraphed Goldie's intentions. Two seconds later, she jumped off the seat and made herself comfortable in her preferred safe room - i.e. the footwell - so she wouldn't have to look at the scary world as they drove past it.
"-Move," Wynne continued - she had only made it as far as reaching for her telephone. "Yuh. Okeh. Whahdahell not. Yuh. Okeh. Hawwww-shoot, the day sure ain't off ta a good start or nuttin'… I done burnt mah toast an' tha coffee wus only lukewarm an' Goldie be teasin' me an'- an'- an'- shoot. I'mma prolly gonn' stub mah toe or smack mah nose or som'tin sh-toopid once we done getta town… Mercy Sakes!"
After climbing behind the steering wheel, Wynne turned on the radio as the very next thing she did. Her favorite radio station, the Down-Home Ol' Country Shack, soon took care of the entertainment by introducing Clifton Page & His California Fiddlers who would play Westward-Ho, Boys! - a lively Country & Western song from the mid-1950s celebrating the pioneer days of the Old West.
"Aw, I ain't familiar with that one… but it sure is a goodie, yessirree. Haw, love them ol' tunes," Wynne said as she twisted the ignition key and selected reverse. The matte-black truck soon left the central lawn behind to drive onto the gravel road that would take it to the State Route.
---
"I don't bah-lieeeeeve it! Wouldya lookie there!" Wynne cried as she brought the truck to a rocking halt at Goldsboro's southern city limits.
The innocuous sign that proclaimed the small desert hamlet to be the place Where Magical Things Happen! had once again suffered the wrath of someone with a hunting rifle and a deep-seated grudge against the town. "Lawrdie, some dang-blasted foo' done shot that there Welcome Ta Goldsborah sign full-a holes… ag'in! Holy shit almighty, mah sweet li'l Mandy gonn' be awf'lly, awf'lly peeved, I be tellin' y'all!"
A startled Yap? came from the footwell in the back. Goldie's tone of voice proved she had little interest in the goings-on.
The Down-Home Ol' Country Shack - that broadcast out of Lansingburg in Pacumseh County further south - continued in the traditional vein by playing The Backwoods Crew's astounding cover version of the famous Dueling Banjos tune from the 1972 movie Deliverance. The crisp and slightly eerie music formed a good soundtrack to the ruined sign.
"I ain't nevah gonn' figgah out howindawohhhhhh-rld them folks he' in town can ovahheah that there sign bein' blasted all ta hell an' all! Dad-gummit, that there triggah-happy fellah there gotta be usin' a scattah-guhhn or som'tin. I reckon it gotta sound like a thundahclap. Whadda y'all reckon?"
Yap…
"Yuh, mah words 'xactly, girl. Aw, ain't nuttin' y'all or me or nobodda can do 'bout that now," Wynne continued as she stepped on the gas once more. "Food an' beer, he we' come!"
-*-*-*-
Mandy eyed the black Silverado as it drove onto Main Street, but she had no time to greet her partner. Instead, she locked herself into the jailhouse where Beatrice had just finished taking Lukas Jensen's fingerprints.
After the ugly incident in February when they had processed Gregory 'Gory' Jones for a DUI - where the prisoner had physically assaulted Rodolfo Gonzalez and Beatrice Reilly during the procedure - Mandy had officially decreed that when it came to locals or out-of-towners who were under the influence of alcohol or illegal substances, all registrations were to be conducted by two or more deputies.
Thus, she kept the procedure under close observation while her hand rested on the hilt of her service firearm so she could step in at once if there was even the smallest risk of things spiralling out of control.
Lukas Jensen's personality was night-and-day different to Gregory Jones's, however, so the young man accepted being processed without drama. Once the handcuffs were off his wrists, he willingly took off his winter jacket and handed it to Beatrice for a further thorough search. The pungent odor of stale sweat and old filth soon spread through the jailhouse.
"You want my pants too, man?" he said as he leaned against the jailhouse's only desk.
Beatrice and Mandy both eyed the filthy jeans before they shared a brief look that said they had little interest in discovering the state of the prisoner's underwear. "Not at present, thank you, Mr. Jensen," Beatrice said before she held up the green jacket. Something metallic or glassy rattled as she shook it, so she sent the prisoner a dark look. "Do you have drug paraphernalia in here? Syringes, et cetera?"
"No, man. Just a lighter for my weed. Some coins. Keys. Buncha shit like that."
A grunt escaped Beatrice before she strode over to the desk to ready a tray and to retrieve a pair of safety gloves from one of the drawers. Once her fingers were well-protected by the coarse fabric, she dug into the pockets to see what would turn up.
The aforementioned objects soon saw the light of day along with piles of lint, old scraps of paper, $4 in petty change and several small bags of ground marihuana leaves ready to be used in a chillum or as a booster for regular, home-rolled cigarettes.
Mandy echoed Beatrice's grunt as she took in the sight of the pitiful objects that had been spread out on the tray. "How did you get here, Mr. Jensen? I don't see a bus ticket for one of the overland lines."
"I hitched a buncha rides, man," Lukas said, wiping his snotty nose now he had the chance to. "The drivers think I'm a veteran 'cos my jacket kinda looks like an old Army uniform or some shit. They often give me beers or something to eat, man."
A highly disapproving "Hmmm," left Mandy before she turned to the meager amount of currency on the tray. "Four dollars. Is this all you have?"
"Yeah, man. I had more earlier, but you know… I had to buy some weed, man."
Nodding, Mandy turned back to face the prisoner. "In that case, we'll add vagrancy to the list of charges brought against you."
It took Lukas a few seconds to process the comment, but then he stood up straight and tried to puff out his chest - unfortunately, the greasy hair and the flabby waistline lessened the dramatic pose. "Oh, man! You can't pull that shit! That's frickin' police harassment, man!"
"Pipe down! Deputy Reilly, let's introduce Mr. Jensen to Holding Cell One, shall we?" Mandy said before she strode over to the cell door and worked the lock.
Once Lukas was sitting calmly on the bunk bed, the door was closed and secured. Mandy went over to the desk to observe their latest prisoner on the black-and-white monitor that was hooked up to a CCTV camera installed in the holding cell's ceiling - it seemed Lukas Jensen was no stranger to such accommodations as he calmly pulled off his boots and made himself comfortable on the bunk.
"Good," Mandy said, crossing her arms over her chest. "Now let's see if we can connect him to the acts of vandalism. The smashed windows at Mrs. Peabody's boarding house will be almost impossible to prove unless he fesses up to it, but perhaps we can match the metal key with the markings on the truck that was scratched up at Mr. Browne's."
Beatrice took the key in question and gave it a closer look. "Well, the tip is shinier than the rest, so… on the other hand, I suppose it could have been grinding against the coins. Also, the rusty pocket knife could have been used to slash the tires of the other truck."
"Indeed. We'll need to have them examined by the Sheriff's Department's forensics experts," Mandy said and let out a sigh. "Who all reside up north in Barton City. If we're lucky, we may be able to persuade them to send a technician down here. If not, one of us will have to waste an entire day driving up there, wait endless hours for an answer that may be inconclusive, and then drive back."
"Are you going to call Mr. Jensen's parents?" Beatrice said as she pulled out the swivel-chair to prepare for her extended stay in the jailhouse.
"Not at present. He's not a minor and Mr. and Mrs. Jensen will both be at work at this time of the day. There's no need to cause them any undue worry," Mandy said on her way over to the front door. "Very well, I'll be in the office if you need me."
"Yes, Ma'am," Beatrice said before she dug into the second desk drawer to get the paperback and the bag of nuts and other trail snacks she always kept there.
-*-*-*-
Across the street, Wynne had long since reversed into the parking space reserved for her in the alley adjacent to Moira's Bar & Grill, but the tune playing on the Down-Home Ol' Country Shack was so good she just had to stay and warble along to it: Jerry Reed's immortal truck-driving anthem East Bound And Down from the original Smokey & The Bandit.
In the back of the crew cab, Goldie tried to cover her sensitive ears with her paws. After two attempts, she realized there wasn't enough room in the footwell for such an acrobatic feat, so she had to endure her owner's singing.
Once the tune ended, Wynne turned off the radio and opened the door. "Haw, that ol' tune sure ain't nevah gonn' get ol', nosirree. Lawrdie, I reckon we still gonn' be lissenin' ta it come tha next century or som'tin. Okeh, Goldie, it sure be haaaah time fer some brews an' burgahs, dontchaknow."
Happy for the reprieve from the warbling, Goldie let out a Yap! before she hopped down from the rear cab. She sniffed the air and the ground a couple of times before she jogged around the corner to get to the front door.
Wynne had already taken the first step of the same journey when her ears picked up a faint sound that had originated somewhere behind her - it had been akin to a moan of pain. Narrowing her eyes, she turned around to take a closer look at the far end of the alley.
Only the first twenty yards of the narrow path had been paved. Beyond that point, a simple grassy trail led to an old, wooden garage shed that had housed several of Goldsboro's horse-driven carriages back in the town's early years in the 1880s. Parts of the roof had collapsed so the shed's current owner, Moira MacKay, only used it as storage space for tables and chairs that were too worn to be used in the restaurant, but not worn enough to be sent to the scrapheap or even the recycling plant.
Wynne was about to shrug and carry on when the sound was repeated - this time, there was no doubt it had been a moan of pain. "Aw-shoot… somebodda or som'tin be hurt somewhere 'round he'…" she mumbled as she moved past her truck and entered the grassy trail. "Breakah one-nine, breakah one-nine! Somebodda he'? Anybodda? Nobodda? If y'all can hear me or som'tin, jus' yell, okeh!"
'Help… help me…'
The croaked message caused a massive outbreak of goosebumps to flourish all over Wynne's body. "Haw?! Shittt… there really be somebodda he'… okeh… okeh! I hear ya, son! This he' be Wynne Donnah-hew an' I sure be comin' an' all! Now all I gotta do is find'cha!"
Squirming to get rid of the little goosepimple-pests, she pressed ahead to find the person who had called out to her. Although the alley didn't offer many spots anyone could use for cover, she had little success in her endeavor - even after looking high, low and everywhere in between.
"Dad-gummit! This ain't goin' great… it sure is tha wrong dang-blasted moment fer mah rotten luck ta strike," she said in a mumble after she had kicked an empty cardboard box aside.
Standing up straight, she held her hand next to her mouth so it would act as an amplifier. "This he' is Wynne Donnah-hew ag'in! Where y'all at, anyhows?! I ain't seein' nuttin' or nobodda nowhere… haw, y'all need-a cry out ag'in, dontchaknow, 'cos this sure ain't workin', nosirree!"
'The shed… I'm over by the shed…'
"Tha shed? Okeh… okeh. Yuh, I hear y'all loud an' clear, son! Now all I gotta do is see ya as well… shoot, there ain't nuttin' he'," Wynne said as she moved further along the grassy trail. A splash of bright colors suddenly appeared amid all the green grass and the brown foliage. "Aw?! There ya be, fer cryin' out loud!"
Forging ahead at surprising speed, Wynne quickly reached the stricken individual whose clothes were as far removed from the rural norm as humanly possible: white sports shoes with neon-green laces, tiger-striped sweatpants, a shock-red T-shirt and a silver baseball cap that had come to a rest in the wearer's lap.
"Whaddahell… Tor? Whah, it sure is Tor Jensen," Wynne said as she knelt next to the whimpering teenager. "Whaddinda-wohhhhhh-rld y'all be doin' way ovah he', son? Where y'all be hurtin'? I don't see no blood or nuttin'. Y'all got some broken bones or som'tin? Didya trah ta climb up tha shed an' fell on yer ass? Tor? Say, are y'all jus' drunk or som'tin?"
When the teenager remained curiously unresponsive, Wynne leaned in to get a better look at Tor's eyes. "Haw, wouldya lookie at them pupils… he ain't drunk, he be stoned outta his skull. I didden know he wus one o' them folks… haw… but dat don't mattah shit now. Tor? Tor, son, can y'all hear me?"
"Yes…"
"Haw, that sure be good an' all. Yuh. Tell me, y'all smoke some strong weed or som'tin?"
"No… a… pill…"
"Okeh… shit. That crap be way outtah mah league," Wynne said and rubbed her face. "Y'all jus' lissen he', son. I'mma-gonn' call Sheriff Mandy. Betcha bottom dollah she knows whadda do, yuh? Jus' sit tight, yuh?"
The telephone was soon retrieved from her rear pocket - Mandy's personal number was selected within seconds.
'Hi, hon. I'm sorry, but I'm really busy-'
"Darlin', this he' be an emergency an' all! I be ovah bah the ol' stor-itch shed down tha back o' tha bar an' grill… I done found Tor Jensen an' he sure is a sick, li'l fellah awright! He done tole me he popped a pill o' some kind-"
'What?! Goddammit!'
"Yuh, an' I reckon y'all need-a-"
Mandy only had time to let out a barked 'I'm on my way!' before she terminated the call.
Chuckling at her partner's efficiency, Wynne shoved the telephone back into her pocket. "Y'all heard that? Tha Sheriff gonn' be he' in a-cuppel-a seconds-"
A cry of 'Wynne? Where are you?' was soon heard at the far end of the alley up by the black truck.
Twisting around, Wynne let out a loud "We be down he' bah tha shed an' all!" before she turned back to the stricken Tor. "Didden I tell ya? Yuh, help sure be comin', son. Everythin's gonn' be jus' fihhh-ne now."
It only took Mandy another handful of seconds to arrive at the scene with Rodolfo Gonzalez in tow - the Senior Deputy had returned from his speed trap assignment at the exact same time the Sheriff had come blasting out of the office door.
"Man! He looks like death warmed over!" Rodolfo said once he clapped eyes on the sickly figure leaning against the shed.
"Yeah… give me the lowdown, Wynne," Mandy said as she knelt next to Tor Jensen. After assessing the young man's pale, sweaty face, she unzipped the first-aid bag she had grabbed from the crew room.
A dark grunt escaped her when she realized that none of the items in there would be of much use in the present situation: a pair of surgical gloves, two rolls of bandages and the clamps to hold them in place, a cold spray, a small pack of sterile cotton swabs, a pair of curved scissors, two tweezers, a roll of skin-friendly adhesive tape and a pack of band-aids - their combined effect on a potential drug overdose was a clear and undeniable zero.
Wynne pushed her cowboy hat back from her brow as she turned to the Sheriff. "Haw, there ain't much ta say, Sheriff Mandy. I got outtah mah truck an' almost left fer Moira's when I done heard ol' Tor he' moanin' in pain. I coudden find 'im at first, but… yuh, I did kinda find 'im, obvi'sly. At first, I didden reckon it was mo' than him bein' drunk or som'tin, but he done tole me that he had nabbed a pill o' some kind."
"Thank you," Mandy said before she scooted closer to the semi-unresponsive Tor to check his dilated pupils. "Torsten… can you hear me?"
"Yeah…"
"What kind of pill did you take? And where did you get it?"
The teenager shook his head as if the questions were too hard for him to understand at first. A moment later, he continued: "I d- don't know what it was… Lukas g- gave me some of his… two… two pills… I… I only took one…"
Wynne narrowed her eyes. "Whodahell that there Lukas be?"
"Torsten's older brother," Mandy said in a growl. "We just arrested him for prowling and possession of marihuana. And vagrancy, for that matter."
"Holy shittt!"
"Torsten," Mandy continued in a voice that held equal measures of compassion and the typical, no-nonsense style of talking she employed whenever she wore the uniform, "when did you take the pill?"
"D- don't know… I… I have… the other one… in my pocket," the teenager said, touching the left pocket of his tiger-striped sweatpants.
Mandy reached out at once to stick her hand into the side pocket. It only took her a second to find and retrieve a small plastic bag identical to those they had found in Lukas Jensen's wallet. His bags had contained marihuana, but the round pill that had the latest bag all to itself obviously had a far greater punch and thus a far greater risk than the weed.
"Senior Deputy?" Mandy said over her shoulder. Once Rodolfo was at her side, she gave him the plastic bag. "Get in touch with HQ on the double. Explain the situation. Tell them we need to get this analyzed ASAP."
"Will do, Sheriff," Rodolfo said before he took off for the office at a fair clip.
Wynne took in the sight of the Senior Deputy hurrying along the grassy trail - it hammered home the fact that time was of the essence. Needing to wipe her brow, she took off her beloved cowboy hat and used the back of her hand to take care of business. A long moan uttered by Torsten Jensen made her turn back to the sickly youth. "Whaddaya reckon we oughttah do, darlin'? This he' shit sure can't be treated with no rum toddy an' a tub o' strawberry ice cream. Ou'ah young pal Tor be in real trubbel he'."
"Yeah," Mandy said in a despondent voice. Leaning back on her thighs, she wiped her damp brow on her sleeve. Torsten's stark paleness, dilated pupils and glistening skin proved that no matter what they decided on doing, they had to act swiftly. "Goddammit… and the day started out so well," she continued as she reached for her telephone.
"Well, there be differin' ohh-pinions on that claim, darlin'," Wynne mumbled as she thought back to her char-broiled toast and lukewarm coffee - not to mention the frustrations that had piled up dangerously when she had tried to take the photos of Goldie. "Yuh… anyhows. Who ya callin'?"
Mandy's fingers scrolled through the registry before they landed at the entry she wanted. "The AirMedics. We're not equipped to handle this kind of incident."
"Whoa, the rescue choppah?"
The entry was tapped upon while Mandy said: "That's right."
"Lawrdie…" Wynne said, scratching her neck. She kept quiet for a few seconds before the proverbial light bulb went off over her head. "Haw, mebbe Doc Gibbs could give ol' Tor some kind o' solution that… that would make him puke it out or som'tin?"
"It's too late for that, hon. I'll bet it's already in his blood," Mandy said with an apologetic smile.
"Yuh… okeh. Y'all prolly right…"
"It was a good suggestion, though," Mandy said before a voice in her ear made everything else less important. "Good morning, this is Sheriff Jalinski from the MacLean County Sheriff's Department, the office in Goldsboro. We're dealing with an overdose of an unknown but certainly illegal substance. It's a minor. We need an urgent airlift. What's your ETA? Twenty-two minutes? Very well. We're at the southern end of town. Yes, there's ample space for landing. Yes. All right. Thank you."
Once the telephone was put away, Mandy turned to the stricken boy. "Torsten, the AirMedics will soon be here. They'll fly you to Barton City. Isn't that where your mother Carole works?"
Torsten just sat there, staring at the two women close to him. He shook his head a couple of times before he let out a croaking: "I can't remember…"
"Lawwwwwwr-die, whaddahell did that po'ah kid take?" Wynne said, smacking a clenched fist onto her thigh. "Sombitch, it gotta be some heavy shit fer that kinda reac-shun! An' ta think his own dang-blasted brothah gave 'im two o' them pills! Whah, Tor coudda… naw, he woudda been dead had he done taken 'em both…"
Mandy's jaw worked overtime as she ground her teeth. Far too wound up to reply to Wynne without barking, she patted down Tor's pockets to find a wallet or - better yet - his telephone.
"Whoa," Wynne said once Mandy had found an almost new, brand-name smartphone that was clearly equipped with all the bells and whistles. "Howdahell can a kid his age afford one o' them there wondah-things?"
"Probably a freebie from his brother," Mandy growled as she accessed the telephone - she didn't make it far before she arrived at a lock-screen. "Oh, for crap's sake… it's protected." A quick glance at Torsten proved she could forget all about penetrating the clouds in his mind to get the proper password.
"Dang… now whut we gonn' do?"
Undaunted by the latest snag to hit them, Mandy quickly pulled the radio off her belt. "Mobile Unit One to Base. Mobile Unit One to Base. Urgent!"
'Base receiving, Sheriff. Over,' Don Woodward said just across Main Street.
"Deputy, I need you to find the current telephone numbers for Mrs. Carole Jensen and Mr. Matthew Jensen. It's urgent. Contact me as soon as you have them. Mobile Unit One out."
The familiar noise of flapping rotors had yet to enter the airspace above the three people, so a somber silence fell among them. Wynne racked her brain to think of the name of the slaughterhouse where Tor's father Matthew worked, but she was unsuccessful - the company name was printed on the side of the Isuzu pickup truck that Matthew usually used for driving back and forth to his shifts, but she couldn't get a grasp on it.
A mere minute and a half went by before Don Woodward's voice could be heard saying: 'Base to Mobile Unit One. Base to Mobile Unit One. Sheriff, I have the requested telephone numbers, over.'
Mandy let out a brief, cheerful noise at the news before she reached for the radio, her notepad and her ball point pen. "Excellent work, Deputy. Let me have them, over," she said into the former while she held the latter ready.
While Mandy jotted down the information - three telephone numbers, two of which were the same indicating it was their home number - enough of Wynne's neurons had heeded the scramble-call to come up with the name of the company Matthew Jensen worked for:
"Haw! Hanson's Meat Processin' an' Packin' Comp'ny! Sure is!" she said and threw her arms in the air in victory. "Yuh-yuh, it done says so right there on tha do'ah o' that there Eye-Zoo-Zoo truck he be usin'! An' y'all know whah I even be lookin' at a foreign vee-hickel, right? 'Cos it be a daughtah comp'ny o' General Motahs!"
Mandy broke out in a tired smile at her partner's unbridled enthusiasm for all things Bow Tie - the chuckle that wafted through the airwaves proved that Don Woodward found it amusing as well. "Deputy, I take it you heard Miss Donohue's message? All right, get in touch with Hanson's central administration and ask them to have Mr. Jensen call me on my personal telephone. Here's the number…"
---
Four minutes later, Mandy's tired smile had been replaced by a somber mask of sympathy as she listened to Carole Jensen weeping over the telephone.
'Oh God… last year was bad enough… but drugs?' Tor's stepmother said in such a trembling voice that even the simple sentence was hard to understand.
The male Jensens had all been affected differently by the fact that Matthew's first wife had simply upped stakes and left with nary a word save for a Dear Matt card on the bed: Matthew's soul had received such a knock from the cold rejection that he had withdrawn from the world and everyone in it. By the time he and Carole found each other, he had neglected his sons to the point where the proverbial barn door had been standing wide open for others to influence them in all sorts of bad ways.
Torsten had grown into a stereotypical, teenaged brat who wore loud clothes and listened to even louder hip-hop while he messed around with pirated software, music and movies on his computers. Lukas, the older brother, had never been much of a thinker. Instead, he had chosen to go for short-term gains and long-term losses by throwing himself into the hazy world of smoking pot with an assortment of stoned ne'erdowells and shady people who had committed to a life of crime.
Though Carole wasn't the biological mother of either of the two boys, she had done her utmost to keep the Jensen family as a tight unit. The Jensens had moved from Richmond Falls, Nevada to Goldsboro the previous year to get away from the individuals who continued to act as bad role models for the brothers.
Torsten had hit his previous rock bottom not long after moving to Goldsboro when he had been responsible for the prank calls that had the entire Sheriff's Department up in arms, but his run-in with the law and the subsequent community service had given him the mental reboot everyone had hoped for.
Lukas, on the other hand, had been too far gone into his own, marihuana-laced reality to ever come back to the family circle. It wasn't long before he rebelled against the whole thing and simply returned to his pot-smoking, so-called friends.
A long sigh escaped Mandy as she continued to listen to Carole Jensen weeping. To offset the tangible grief at the other end of the connection, she locked eyes with Wynne in search for some support - although the look they shared was one of love, the drama surrounding them was too heavy to neutralize fully.
"Yes, I'm afraid so, Mrs. Jensen," Mandy continued. "The pill he took is yet to be analyzed so I can't tell you what kind of substance it was… not that it matters."
'Please… let me speak to him…'
Mandy furrowed her brow as she took in the state of the young patient. Torsten's condition hadn't changed at all since she had first seen him: his skin remained waxen and glistening, his breathing was shallow and his pupils were still dilated.
Although Mandy hated telling blatant lies to gravely concerned parents or other relatives, she knew from bitter experience that there were times where a white lie would be a far better option than relaying the grim truth. "He's resting at the moment, Mrs. Jensen. I obviously understand your concerns, but I feel we should allow him some space."
'Oh… all right… I suppose.'
"I've been monitoring Torsten closely since I got here, and his condition has remained stable. That's a good sign."
'God, I hope so. What's going to happen now? I… I can't come home at once because I'm car pooling… but it's the middle of the day and… and… the others can't leave already…'
While Mandy spoke into the telephone, Wynne picked up a familiar noise somewhere in the far distance. She quickly patted Mandy's shoulder and pointed skyward - Mandy responded by giving Wynne a thumbs-up.
"We've called for an AirMedic rescue helicopter, Mrs. Jensen," Mandy continued into the telephone. "I believe it's getting closer as we speak. I'm certain they'll take Torsten to a hospital in Barton City-"
'Oh! Oh, please, please, please call me again when you know which one they'll go to! I… I can take the bus… or a cab… and… promise me you'll call again!'
A steely mask of determination fell over Mandy's face. "I promise. The minute I know where they're taking Torsten, I'll call you," she said, breaking out in a decisive nod although Carole Jensen wouldn't be able to see it.
'Thank you… thank you…'
"You're welcome. I need to go, Mrs. Jensen. I'll call you as soon as I'm told. Goodbye." Once the telephone was back in Mandy's pants pocket, she let out a sigh and an emphatic "This is one of the crappiest things we've ever had to deal with…"
"Yuh, that sure ain't no exaggera-shun or nuttin'… haw, that gonn' be one helluva family suppah that. Tha kid brothah fightin' an overdose caused bah tha oldah brothah…" Wynne said and pushed her hat back from her brow. "Whodahell invented all them crap drugs, anyhows? Lawrdie, I sure know I ain't tha best Cowpoah-k ta groan an' moan 'bout folks abusin' stuff 'cos I done em'tied mah share o' beers even when I shoudden ha' done, yuh? But them drugs be a whooole 'nothah kettle o' stinky fish… they be brainkillahs. I done took enuff med'cine when I wus a li'l girl ta know… sure ain't no lie."
Mandy let out another sigh, rubbing her face several times before putting her hands on her hips in a perfect image of strength that was as dishonest as a three-dollar bill.
---
A short minute went by before the entire town could hear that the arrival of the AirMedic helicopter was imminent - Wynne and Mandy both looked up as its shadow raced across the far end of the alley they were in. The rotors created plenty of noise at first, but as soon as the sound levels dropped to a point where speaking was possible, Mandy leaned in toward Wynne's ear. "Stay with Torsten while I brief the medics. Okay?"
"Haw, sure thing, darlin'!" Wynne said and gave her partner a big thumbs-up. "Yes Ma'am, I'mma-sure-gonn' be yer Florence Nightgown or whutevah that there lady's name wus…"
The helicopter - a twin-turbine AmeriCopter 218M - hovered in mid-air for a moment or two before the pilot concluded their flight by setting up for a perfect touchdown literally in the middle of Main Street.
The downdraft kicked up such a storm of sand and desert dust that it almost looked as if a proper sandstorm had appeared out of nowhere - scraps of paper and all the other typical items littering any street were whipped around in a frenzy by the whirlwinds that didn't die down until the pilot gradually reduced the power from the whining turbines.
Back at the garage shed at the far end of the alley, Mandy dove in for a quick kiss on Wynne's lips. She shook her head and broke out in a disbelieving smile at the insanity of finding themselves in yet another weird mess. Once Wynne had replied by mirroring the smile, the Sheriff got up and ran through the alley. She made it past the Silverado within seconds and was soon out by the AirMedic helicopter.
Like all the helicopters used by the AirMedic Corps, the AmeriCopter was painted in strong, almost fluorescent colors so it would be recognizable at any accident site. Three red crosses had been painted onto the fuselage: one on each side of the air vehicle on the sliding doors as well as a large one underneath. The entire back half of the helicopter was a fully equipped pre-E.R. theater that could even be used as an on-site surgery in the cases where the patient's life depended on a quick intervention.
The rotors continued to circulate but grew ever slower as the turbines had been powered-down. Most of the dust that had been whipped up had landed in all sorts of places - creating unwelcome piles of the reddish stuff that someone had to shovel into buckets - but some of it continued its flight in large clouds that drifted down Main Street like plumes of exhaust smoke from an old truck or tractor.
Despite the completed power-down procedure, Mandy had plenty to do holding onto her hat and protecting her eyes even at a distance of thirty paces. Once the majority of the winds had died down, she ran over to the helicopter to bring the doctor up to speed.
The pilot was alone in the cockpit, but the passenger-side sliding door to the rear compartment soon opened to reveal an African-American man in his late-thirties. The carrier strap for a Rapid Response bag was quickly pulled over his shoulder before he jumped down onto the street. The back of the fluorescent jacket he wore said D-O-C-T-O-R in light-reflective lettering.
Behind the doctor, a male flight nurse jumped down onto Main Street. Spinning around, he reached into the helicopter's rear compartment to gather up another large Rapid Response kit and several smaller bags containing medical supplies.
"Doctor," Mandy said loudly to be heard over the whooshing rotors, "I'm Sheriff Jalinski. Your patient is at the far end of the alley you see over there."
The doctor turned to look at the alley adjacent to Moira's Bar & Grill. He let out a quick grunt before he turned back to face Mandy. "I'm Doctor Peyton Richards. I doubt our gurney can fit next to that black truck."
"All right. That's no problem."
Doctor Richards made a few hand gestures at the nurse to inform him to prepare the gurney in case they would need it - the nurse responded in kind before he ran back to the rear of the helicopter. There, he pressed a button that lowered a hydraulic, platform-like hatch.
The Doctor turned to Mandy as they set off for the alley: "What's the status of the patient, Sheriff?"
"We believe he's overdosed on an unknown substance. He's hazy and unresponsive, but he hasn't lost consciousness while I've been here. I can't say how long his present condition has lasted, though."
"We'll find out when we do the blood work," Doctor Richards said as they jogged past the Silverado. He nodded to himself before he turned to Mandy: "I was right… there isn't space for the gurney here."
"Very well… Wynne! Wynne!"
Down the far end of the alley, The Last Original Cowpoke looked up in a hurry. 'Yuh?'
"You need to move the truck! Their gurney won't fit!" Mandy shouted as they entered the final stretch of the alley.
'Sure thing, Sheriff Mandy! Stand clear, y'all! Wynne Donnah-hew be on da case!'
The three people met at the point of the alley where the asphalt ended and the grassy trail began - Wynne only had time to utter a quick "Howdy, Doc! Bah-bah, Doc!" as she hurried past.
Peyton Richards let out a brief chuckle at the exchange. "I suspect you know everyone in town on a first-name basis, Sheriff?"
"Pretty much… all right, here we are," Mandy said as they reached the stricken Torsten Jensen.
Doctor Richards's smile was replaced by a mask of professionalism as he put down and unzipped the Rapid Response kit. Once the top cover had been pushed aside, he knelt next to the patient to conduct a preliminary analysis.
---
At the mouth of the alley, Wynne came to a screeching halt at her Silverado that was no longer matte-black - instead, the truck had turned rust-red from the thick layer of desert dust that coated every inch of the grille, the hood and the windshield. "Holy shitttt!" she croaked as she had to do a double-take at the amount of dust that had been blown onto it.
There was no point in getting behind the wheel just yet as she would never be able to see anything, so she climbed up onto the flatbed and dove into the storage box that she and Fat-Butt Swenson had welded onto the rear wall of the crew cab below the central window. The large brush she had been looking for was soon found - then she climbed down, ran up front, lifted the wipers so they wouldn't be harmed, and began brushing all the evil dust off the windshield and every other surface she could reach.
The moment she had made enough of a peephole to drive safely, she threw the brush back into the box, got behind the wheel and raced out of the alley. 100 yards further north on Main Street, at Byron Gibbs's animal clinic, she made a U-turn that literally created a cloud of dust although she didn't go faster than 5 miles per hour. Once all that had been accomplished, she jogged back to the scene of the medical drama.
Several Goldsborians had lined up on the sidewalk to gawk at the helicopter, and Wynne made sure to wave, tip her hat and let out a constant stream of "Howdy," "Lookin' fihhhh-ne," "Nice ta see y'all," and "Whazzup?" as she jogged past them.
The group included the talented sketch artist Nancy Tranh Nguyen, Barry Simms's aunt Mildred Herzberg, Konstanin Aranowicz from the Town Council and Tabitha Hayward from the town museum - the latter took dozens of pictures of the incident to document everything and to have something to put on the walls of future visual presentations.
Someone who wasn't there to merely gawk was Rodolfo Gonzalez who had taken it upon himself to conduct the traffic while the Sheriff was busy helping the medics. Standing in the middle of Main Street looking very important, he wore one of the regulatory fluorescent vests over his regular black-and-dark-gray uniform. A bright-white baton was held aloft to warn the motorists of the road ahead being blocked.
A long chuckle escaped Wynne when she noticed that the only such traffic within miles in either direction was a farm tractor driven by Geoffrey Wilburr, Sr.
The double-wide load of hay the veteran farmer had stuffed onto his trailer could perhaps have squeaked past the helicopter with an inch to spare on either side, but the unfortunate scraping incident with the FBI command center vehicle during the large-scale exercise in February had made him decide to wait it out - in short, he had stopped his John Deere tractor in the middle of the street to grab some richly deserved shut-eye while he could.
Instead of going back to Torsten - there was a risk her typical rotten luck would cause an even worse situation than the one the young man was in already - Wynne slowed down to a regular walking pace. She noticed that Rodolfo carried an expression that said he would very much like to hear the particulars of the case, so she made a sharp left-hand turn to join the Senior Deputy.
The proud Mexican-American looked his usual dapper self: his uniform sat just right and was free of lint, desert dust or any other kind of infestation - he even managed to make the fluorescent vest look cool. His pale-brown complexion, the slicked-back hair and the pencil-thin mustache that graced his upper lip all joined forces to create an air akin to that of a classic Hollywood matinee idol.
"Howdy, Rodolfo!" Wynne said and tipped her beloved cowboy hat. "Dad-gummit, jus' when we done thunk we'd seen it all, haw? An' then this dang thing lands he' like an ovahgrown grasshoppah or dragon fly or som'tin…"
Rodolfo nodded as he cast a closer look at the brightly colored AirMedic helicopter behind him. "Yeah, no kidding. Hey, check this out, Wynne!"
Holding up the bright-white baton in the proper stance, he used his thumb to flip a small switch at the base. As the advanced feature was activated, the upper two inches of the baton started blinking red. "Eh? Eh? How about that?"
"Wa-hey! Ain't dat som'tin?" Wynne cried, whipping off her hat to swing it in the air, Texas-style. "Haw, now all y'all can open a night club ovah yondah in Vegas or… naw, one o' them there old-school discos! Yessirree… y'all sure got them lights fer it!"
"We received four of these the other day," Rodolfo said and flipped the switch again to turn off the baton. "It didn't exactly please the Sheriff. She would have preferred to get new maps, but… no. They're apparently too expensive!"
"Shoot… yuh, whah'dahell not?"
Rodolfo nodded before he turned to look at the helicopter once more. "It's been a really sucky day for the Jensen family, hasn't it? The older brother is in Holding Cell One and their youngest is about to get a helicopter ride I'm pretty damn sure he never wanted."
"Yuh, Sheriff Mandy done tole me y'all-reddy had wotshisname in tha slammah."
"Lukas Jensen, yeah. The Sheriff and Deputy Reilly caught him peeping through the windows of his parents' neighbor."
"Whah, I be a sombitch-"
"He had several pre-packed bags of marihuana on him, so that's possession. Add the vagrancy charge… yeah. And we might even be able to pin an Intent To Sell on him because the grass had been repacked into small bags."
Wynne let out a dark grunt as she watched the male nurse come back to the helicopter to prepare something that was out of her field of view. "All y'all gonn' be able ta pin som'tin mo' on'im as well," she said in a dark voice. "That a-hole done gave Tor that there pill he be trippin' on."
"Shit… really?"
"Tor tole me so… yuh. Really."
Rodolfo shook his head a couple of times before his skills as a traffic conductor were put to the test by the arrival of a delivery truck - its driver was far too impatient for the circumstances and tried to squeeze past the wide helicopter. Grunting in annoyance, Rodolfo ran over to the truck at once to give the driver a textbook Stern Talking-To.
---
At the far end of the alley, Doctor Richards concluded his initial examination of Torsten Jensen. "All right. You were right about the overdose, but I can't determine what kind of drug is responsible. It could be some kind of home-made substance. That's not uncommon these days."
"We've recovered a second pill identical to the one Torsten took," Mandy said, looking at the young patient's waxen skin. "I had my Senior Deputy contact HQ to get a substance analysis team down here… they'll probably arrive in a couple of hours or so. Unless they take a wrong turn at Collinstown, of course. That's happened before."
The doctor let out a dark grunt. "It's certainly different compared to Barton City."
"MacLean County is a world away from Barton City, Doctor. Well, from any of the larger cities, for that matter. In any case… what do you recommend we do?"
"There's only one thing we can do given the circumstances. We're going to airlift Mr. Jensen to Barton City. He needs further treatment and to be under constant observation until his present condition recedes. At this time of the day, we'll be going to Barton City Central," the doctor said as he zipped the Rapid Response kit.
Mandy reached for her telephone at once. "Very well. I promised the boy's mother I'd call her as soon as I knew more. So… please excuse me while I do so."
---
A few minutes later, a somber Wynne watched the doctor and the flight nurse push Torsten's gurney into the rear of the AirMedic helicopter. Once a few wide belts had been tightened to keep the gurney secure during the take-off and subsequent flight, the nurse pressed a button that made the platform-like rear section move back up. Wynne tipped her hat at the young patient to wish him well on his stressful journey, but the odd position he was in meant he couldn't really see her.
The pilot reached out through a small gap in the Perspex window to signal the spectators they needed to stand clear. Once everyone had moved back to a safe distance, the turbines restarted their infernal whining that in turn made the rotors move around and around - their speed soon picked up until they had been reduced to blurry lines in the air.
Wynne pre-emptively took off her beloved cowboy hat before she turned around to shield her face from the sandblasting. It seemed to take an eternity before the turbines were up to full operating speed, but once they were, the AirMedic helicopter took off and went straight up into the air to make sure it would stay well clear of the nearby houses.
Reaching an altitude of 300 feet or so, the pilot turned the craft around in mid-air and soon headed north, gaining additional altitude for each passing moment.
It wasn't long before Main Street returned to its typically quiet self. The impatient driver of the delivery truck was finally allowed to carry on, and he did so with an angry honk and an even angrier gesture out of the driver's side window.
Sand, desert dust and scraps of paper continued to flutter around high and low until everything settled down, thus creating brand new piles of trash for someone to sweep up and chuck into buckets of the public trash cans.
Wynne put her hat back on before she shuffled back to Moira's Bar & Grill. Once there, she waited for Mandy to join her - it didn't take long before the Sheriff came striding around the corner after doing a little clean-up at the incident site.
"Howdy, darlin'. Lawwwwr-die, we gotta stop meetin' like this… haw. I been livin' he' fer a buncha years now, but I ain't nevah seen no AirMedic choppah land he' befo'. Shoot, I hope young Mista Tor gonn' be awright an' all… he didden look too dang good at'tha end there."
Mandy finally let out the long, slow sigh she had been building up to for quite a while. Taking off her Mountie hat, she ran her fingers through her damp hair. "No, but at least some of the unresponsiveness was caused by a sedative that Doc Richards gave Torsten. I gather it was designed to help reduce his heart rate."
"Aw… okeh. Makes sense… yuh."
Mandy paused for a brief moment while she glanced at the spot on Main Street where the AirMedic helicopter had only just been. "I spoke to Carole Jensen again," she continued in a downcast voice. "The boys' stepmother. She's already on her way over to the Central Hospital."
"Tor gonn' need his Ma an' Pa bah his side, sure ain't no lie. Mercy Sakes, thinkin' back ta them months I done spent at that there neural hospital back hoah-me in Shallah Pond, Texas aftah mah accident… if I hadden had mah Grandma Flora Sue an' mah Auntie Martha an' mah Ma an' Pa there, I woudda been a basket case fer sure."
"Mmmm."
Wynne fell silent again, but the quiet moment wasn't wasted as she slid up next to Mandy to wrap a long arm around her athletic waist. "Haw, I reckon all this he' shit gonn' change ou'ah plans fer this he' aftahnoon, yuh?"
"Our afternoon plans?" Mandy said and shot her partner a puzzled glance. "Oh… dammit, that's right… we were supposed to go up to the body shop to work on your TransAm."
"Yuh… we wus gonn' vacuum the carpets front an' rear an' apply some KwikClean ta tha dashboard an' all. No trubbel, darlin'… it ain't goin' nowheah. Lawrd knows I ain't feelin' like workin' onnit taday, anyhows. I'mma-gonn' call Fat-Buhhh-tt an' explain in a li'l while."
Another long, slow sigh escaped Mandy as she looked across the street at the sheriff's office and the adjacent jailhouse. "If I go over there now, I'll probably end up thumping Lukas Jensen. So… how about we pay A.J. Lane a visit and treat ourselves to a quality lunch and some of his fine coffee instead?"
"Haw! That sure be tha best dog-gone ideah I done heard the entiah day, darlin'!" Wynne said before she waved her cowboy hat high in the air to mark her appreciation of the suggestion. "Yessirree, ol' Slow Lane gonn' have a-cuppel-a visitahs needin' some foodie pick-me-ups. Yuh, an' I know fer a fact that spicy beef meatballs in tomatah saw-se an' white pah-tah-tahs on tha side be purr-fect fer that! An' mebbe a Dubbel-Zerah or two… yuh."
Nodding decisively, Mandy spun around on her heel and led Wynne over to the front door to Moira's Bar & Grill, the restaurant everyone considered the best eatery in all of MacLean County.
They had barely entered the establishment before they were greeted by a long series of ecstatic yaps by Goldie - the scaredy-dog had obviously been hiding in the doggy-cave underneath the pool table during the terrifying experience with the flapping noise-maker out on the street.
"Mercy Sakes! Goldie, y'all nearly done threw me on mah buhhh-tt!" Wynne cried as she had to take several fast steps backward to stop herself from being bowled over by a golden tornado that came at them at full speed.
Plenty of doggy-loving was soon dished out which gave the moods of both parties a much-needed boost. "Haw! Darlin', I reckon I'mma-gonn' be bizzy he' fer a li'l while longah!" Wynne said around an armful of golden fur. "Mebbe y'all could-"
"I'll place the orders," Mandy said with a chuckle as she enjoyed the soothing sight of the playful wrestling.