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InterText Vol 13 No 2
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InterText Vol. 13, No. 2 / December 5, 2004
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Contents
Father Christmas Must Die!!!..................Patrick Whittaker
Evening Tide........................................Neal Gordan
The Legion of Lost Gnomes.........................T.G. Browning
LastText............................................Jason Snell
....................................................................
Editor
Jason Snell
<jsnell@intertext.com>
....................................................................
InterText Vol. 13, No. 2. (#57) ISSN 1071-7676. Reproduction of
this magazine is permitted as long as the magazine is not sold
(either by itself or as part of a collection) and the entire
text of the issue remains unchanged. Copyright 2004 Jason
Snell. All stories Copyright 2004 by their respective authors.
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Father Christmas Must Die!!! by Patrick Whittaker
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....................................................................
The next time you hear "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus,"
you won't think of it the same way.
....................................................................
None of you knew Erickson in life, so why believe you know him
in death? You've seen his picture on television. You've read
the lies in the newspapers. You've devoured every rumor and
held it up as the absolute truth. And on the basis of these
lies and half-truths you revile his name.
Even those who were acquainted with Erickson have but an
inkling of his inner self. You can only guess at the torments
that drove him on.
Yes, he was brash. But at heart he was a kindly, goodly soul
who wanted nothing more than to rid the world of evil. And
still you condemn him.
A pox on the lot of you.
I met Erickson at University, where his star shone bright
and my own was a moonlet by comparison. I did little to
distinguish myself. Shy and no great shakes at anything,
I saw myself as one of those people put on Earth to make
up the numbers.
I had no friends, but what else should I expect? Shy people
are the invisible pariahs of this world. On the rare occasions
we intrude upon the consciousness of others, we are dismissed
as aloof. Because we can't reach out, it is assumed we have no
wish to.
Let all who once lauded Erickson and now vilify his name,
remember this: none of you ever thought to rescue me from my
loneliness. Each time you walked past without so much as a nod
of recognition, each time you threw a party without me, each
time you excluded me from your conversation, your walks in the
country, your trips into town -- each time you did that, you
did me an injury.
Not so Erickson.
We were barely aware of each other for the first months of
my tenure. I knew there was some chap called Erickson who
was looked up to by his fellows as he cut a rakish swath
through the female Halls of Residence, but I scarce gave
him a thought. He, for his own part, would have had no
dealings with me but for Lovejoy's Guide to the Occult,
Volume 7.
The evening we met, an awful storm, which had been threatening
for days, finally broke. I found myself unable to study for
the drumming of the rain and the unearthly lament of the wind.
I had just decided on an early night when Erickson knocked on
my door. He had come for the Lovejoy.
As he walked in to the tiny room that served as my bedroom and
study, I was impressed by his aristocratic bearing.
"Now, look here, Simpson," he said crisply. "I understand you
have the 7th Volume of Lovejoy. You should have returned it
weeks ago."
What a wretch I felt. Caught red-handed without an ounce of
mitigation.
Meekly, I lifted the book from my desk and handed it over.
Tucking it under his arm, Erickson fixed me with eyes as
blue as the seas on which his Viking ancestors had sailed.
"Properly speaking, you should return this to the library,
but then some fool will only get to it before me. You can
have it back in a couple of days."
Without asking if he might, he sat on my bed and leafed
through the book. He stopped at my bookmark.
"Santa Claus?" He looked up. "Funnily enough, Simpson, it's
the section on Santa that I'm after. Have you ever thought
what lies behind this Kris Kringle business?"
"A tale to encourage children to be good."
Erickson snorted. "Do you know what a cargo cult is?"
"Well, yes, but--"
"Once a year, offerings of mince pies and warm milk are
rendered to a being possessed of powers beyond our
comprehension in return for a few baubles and a sense of
well-being. What then is Santa if not a cargo cult?"
Slamming the book shut, Erickson got up and studied my CD
collection. "Led Zeppelin? I had you marked as a Bach man."
"I hate Bach."
"There's hope for you yet." Erickson smacked his lips. "Get
your coat. We've still time to hit the pub."
What sealed our friendship was a mutual love of bitter. Not
for us the bland, gassy concoction called lager much beloved
by the rest of the campus. We wanted real ale -- cask
conditioned, rampant with flavor and drawn from pumps.
Once he'd established my taste in beer, Erickson was forever
badgering me to accompany him on weekend jaunts to breweries
and pubs. More often than not, I acquiesced.
We remained friends until graduation day when we said farewell
and promised to keep in touch. We both knew we wouldn't.
It was never my ambition to go to Antarctica but that's
where I found myself. I landed a job with a bio-tech company
searching for novel sources of DNA. They assembled a team
to probe the ice pack for remnants of extinct bacteria.
The chances of success were remote; the potential rewards
were great.
I was the junior member. To me fell the task of coaxing
ancient spores back to life in petri dishes. Others got
to play with electron microscopes, centrifuges and arcane
machines which I was forbidden to go near.
My fellow team members -- bearded, pipe-smoking, fanatical
about chess -- resented my presence and made sure I knew it.
My BA meant nothing to these men of science with their
doctorates and years of field experience. In their eyes
I was little better than a lab rat.
And then there was the boredom. Six weeks in a plastic dome
with no television, no opportunities for a casual stroll, no
pub in which to seek refuge. Little wonder I went berserk.
I must have been at breaking point when Byrd strolled into
the recreation room and asked me to sit elsewhere. There were
chairs aplenty, most of them empty, but I had chosen the chair
he considered his own.
I gave vent to a scream like all the furies in Hell, and then
I was on the floor, my hands around Byrd's throat, squeezing,
tightening. Why Colins had a tranquilizer gun on him, I'll
never know. It saved Byrd's life.
The company was understanding. I was not the first employee
to crack beneath the tedium of life in their plastic bubble.
After flying me back to London, they told me to take
a three-month sabbatical and then see how I felt about
returning to work.
Still on full pay, I rented a flat in London and divided my
waking hours between studying and frequenting various pubs.
Many an hour was spent gazing into a glass, perhaps in the
hope of discerning my life's purpose. I was not sure I wanted
a career in the bio-tech industry. But what else was there
for me?
I never considered suicide as a serious option -- but I did
consider it.
Lurking at the back of my mind is the memory of a pub, of too
many beers and a painful encounter with a wet pavement. Strong
hands pulled me to my feet, threw me in a car and put me to
bed. I awoke in an unfamiliar flat with a hangover and the
bleak acceptance of more grim awakenings to come.
The smell of bacon and fresh coffee lured me to the kitchen
where I found Erickson frying a breakfast of epic proportions.
I sat down and wordlessly accepted a mug of coffee.
We exchanged only pleasantries until we had both eaten.
"Well, Simpson," said Erickson, popping the last of his toast
in his mouth, "this is a fine pass you've come to."
And indeed it was, but Erickson was not being critical. He
immediately added, "We make a right pair, you and me. In case
you hadn't heard, I had a nervous breakdown in Peru."
I swished coffee around my mouth, savoring its bitter,
no-nonsense flavor. "I can't imagine you cracking up. You were
always so self-assured."
"It was the mosquitoes. That and a dozen patronizing,
know-it-all geophysicists."
"Sounds like you and I had much the same experience. Did you
come looking for me?"
"You bet. Somehow I knew I'd find you face down in the
gutter."
"Thanks a bundle."
"I'm not having a dig, Simpson. God knows, I've seen enough
of the pavement myself since I got back from the jungle."
Erickson poured himself a cup of coffee. "Do you still
dismiss Father Christmas as a childish myth?"
I thought he was making small talk. There was nothing to warn
me I was about to answer one of the most crucial questions of
my life. "I don't think I ever believed in him."
"Not ever?"
"Maybe once. I wrote him a letter saying what a good boy I was
and please could I have any of the following. I don't recall
what I asked for but I'm sure I didn't get it."
"So he let you down? It's a common occurrence."
"What is this fixation you have with Santa? It's like a
private vendetta. What's he ever done to you?"
"A good question, Simpson." Erickson settled back in his
chair. "When I was a boy, a remarkable thing happened to me.
I was eight, I think -- maybe nine. Anyway, it was Christmas
Eve and I'd bought into the Father Christmas gag hook, line
and sinker. Can you believe my naivete?"
"Children that age believe anything their parents tell them."
Erickson's fist came down on the table like a hammer blow.
"And that's just it, isn't it? That's how the vile bastard
gets away with it. Catch them while they're young and they're
yours forever. What insanity leads normally rational adults
to tell their children that a creature of the night can be
anything but evil?
"Good people walk by day. They don't sneak into people's homes
through their chimneys, do they?"
I had to concede they didn't. Maybe Erickson was on to
something.
"Like I say," he continued, "it was Christmas Eve. I was a
rich, spoiled kid and that's something I make no apologies
for. I sat in my bedroom thinking about all the wondrous
goodies dear old Santa was going to leave in my stocking.
I'd asked for a pony, a train set, something made of gold,
enough chocolate to fill a pantry and many other things.
And I knew I was going to get them, but it wasn't enough.
"I'd recently heard from a cousin in Canada who'd bagged
a miniature sports car for his birthday. It was a replica
Ferrari complete with two-stroke engine. And I wanted one.
God, how I wanted one!
"But the silly sod didn't tell me about it until after I'd
sent my Christmas wish list. The only chance I had of gaining
my heart's new desire was to meet Santa face to face -- and
that's exactly what I intended to do.
"I sucked ice cubes to keep awake. At eleven o'clock, I heard
the servants say their goodnights before retiring. Shortly
after, footsteps in the corridor told me my parents were on
their way to bed.
"I was by now one tired little boy. My eyelids felt like
they had monkeys hanging on them. Just one more hour, I told
myself. That's all that stood between me and happiness. I was
buggered if I was going to wait another year to play catch-up
with my Canadian cousin.
"It must have been close to midnight when I fell asleep. Damn
it! If only I'd been stronger. My father always said I lacked
discipline and he was right!
"I was woken by a groan. It was like nothing I had heard
before. There was another groan and then someone cried out.
The words were muffled, but I recognised my mother's voice.
"A chill went through me as she screamed and screamed again.
Without a thought for my own safety, I raced down the corridor
and burst into my parents bedroom and there... there..."
Erickson jabbed an accusing finger at something in his mind's
eye. "Damn it! Damn it to Hell!"
He fixed me with a look that raised the hairs on my neck.
"Listen, Simpson," he hissed. "I've never told anybody this
before, and the Devil knows why I'm telling you. If you
breathe one word to anyone, I will kill you! Understood?"
I nodded. "You have my word, Erickson. This stays between
you and me."
Placated, Erickson took a deep breath and continued. "My
mother was no longer screaming. She was gripping the headboard
and sobbing. Her nightdress was -- Well, I don't have to spell
it out, do I, Simpson? She was being violated by Father
Christmas!"
I nearly fell off my chair. "Father Christmas! Are you sure?"
"I saw him with my own eyes - the beard, the red suit, his
trousers around his ankles, his face pressed against my
mother's. It was him, all right."
"Where was your father?"
"Dead. But I didn't yet know it."
"I took my father's shotgun from the wardrobe," Erickson said
in an all-too-calm voice. "I loaded it and took aim. That's
when my mother opened her eyes and saw me. The look of horror
and shame on her face will stay with me forever. It left me
no choice.
"She took the first round, straight between the eyes. I was
knocked to the floor by the recoil but leapt straight to my
feet.
"The monster pleaded for his life. He spouted some nonsense
about being my father, but my father didn't have a beard. He
didn't wear red! And he certainly would not have defiled my
mother.
"I rammed the gun into his mouth and let him have it. I killed
Santa Claus. Or so I thought."
I was shaking like a leaf, barely able to take in the full
horror of Erickson's tragedy. "You said your father was
already dead?"
"Killed by Father Christmas. I don't know all the details."
"How ghastly!"
"They say it was the nanny who found me. Apparently I was
sitting on the bed with the gun pressed to my throat. I really
don't remember.
"The police came and then some social workers and the next
thing I recall was sitting in a cell wondering where my
presents were. They told me I was insane. Well, is it any
wonder, after what I'd been through?
"I spent the next four years being shunted from one
institution to another. Finally, I learned what it was the men
in white coats wanted me to say and I said it. They let me out
and I was taken care of by a maiden aunt in Winchester."
This amazing story explained much that had puzzled me about
Erickson. For as long as I'd known him, he'd carried some
inner hurt, a mixture of bewilderment and anger. And here
was the cause of it all: Father Christmas.
There was one thing that bothered me. "Surely if they had
found Father Christmas dead, it would be common knowledge?"
Erickson laughed. "You don't get it, do you, Simpson? It takes
more than a shotgun to kill his kind. By the time the police
arrived, he was on his way back to Lapland, or wherever the
hell it is he lurks 364 days of the year. Think it through,
Simpson. What kind of semi-human creature comes out at night
and can only enter someone's house if invited?"
The answer was obvious but I could not bring myself to
voice it.
Although Erickson made no attempt to contact me after our
conversation, I went out of my way to avoid him. I changed my
daily routine, drank in different pubs, stopped going to the
supermarket.
It wasn't that I was afraid of Erickson, or even that I had
taken a dislike to him. What bothered me was the possibility
that he had more dark secrets to unveil -- secrets I couldn't
handle. I guess you'd call it cowardice.
The morning I received the letter seemed like any other until
I noticed snow falling past my window. It must have been
coming down all night because the streets and rooftops were
inches thick in it.
The snow was an unwelcome reminder that Christmas was
approaching, and I sat on my bed in gloomy introspection
before remembering the envelope. Somehow I knew it was going
to be bad news.
The company was dispensing with my services. There was a check
in lieu of notice. It was enough to keep me in drink for
another month. And then, like it or not, I was going to have
to find a job.
By opening time, the snow had eased up but not enough to
tempt me further than the Ace of Spades, a small pub with
oak beams and a menagerie of stuffed animals. Until my recent
encounter with Erickson, I had treated it as a second living
room, a place where I could lose myself in books and beer.
The landlord was taking the towels off the pumps as I walked
in. I shook the snow off my shoes and warmed myself by the
fire. Most days I was the first customer, but today there was
somebody sitting in the snug by the window. I paid him no heed
until he turned round.
Erickson looked pleased to see me.
It would have been ill-mannered to follow my impulse and
head back into the snow. So I got two pints of bitter and
joined him.
"I was wondering when you'd show," he said as I sat down.
"I've been here every day for the past week."
"You should have called round."
"Don't flatter yourself, Simpson. As stimulating as I find
your company, you're not the reason I'm here." He pointed
across the road. "You see over there?"
"The department store?"
"Galloway's. One of the oldest shops in London."
"What of it?"
"At this time of year, it stays open till ten."
Erickson seemed to expect me to work out the rest for myself.
I had no idea what his point was and indicated my ignorance
with a shrug.
He let out an exasperated sigh. "Think, man. Think! What do
these big stores do at this time of year?"
"Stay open late?"
"Don't be obtuse. They all play host to Father Christmas."
"Now hang on, Erickson. You do realize they're not real
Santas?"
"Do you take me for an idiot?" Scowling, he pulled out a
distressed photograph and threw it on the table. "I've had
this since I was a boy. I think it was my father's."
I picked up the faded photograph. A sepia Father Christmas
looked out at me from across the years. He was standing beside
a cardboard reindeer. Just another out of work actor making
a seasonal buck -- or so I thought.
"If you shift your thumb," said Erickson, "you'll see a date."
I moved my thumb. The date was faint but I could make it out.
1938.
Erickson took the snapshot and stuffed it back in his pocket.
"The man in that photo must be very old -- quite probably
dead. Wouldn't you say?"
"Obviously."
"What if I told you he was neither of those?"
"You've lost me."
"He goes into that store every evening at ten minutes to
eight."
"All Santas look the same."
"Not this one. This is the genuine article -- Kris Kringle
himself."
"Why would the real Father Christmas be working in a
department store?"
"What better disguise than to pretend to be someone pretending
to be you? Don't forget, Simpson, I've met the real Santa.
I know what he looks like. If you want to see for yourself,
come here at half past seven." Erickson knocked back his pint.
"And for goodness sakes, be sober for once."
And with that, he got up and swept out into the cold and snow.
After Erickson left, the Ace of Spades remained charged with
his presence. Some near-tangible residue of his anger and
despair hung in the air. It made the fire cold and the beer
flat.
The bar filled with shop workers and people taking a break
from Christmas shopping. Strange faces everywhere. Normal
people doing normal things.
As always, I was excluded. I was the dishevelled,
slightly-unwashed loner sitting in the corner. The one to be
ignored. The one everyone expected would still be there at
closing time.
I was reminded that Erickson was the only friend I had in
the world.
Squeezed out by the lunchtime rush, I left the Ace of Spades
and wandered around Galloway's.
Morbid curiousity drew me to the Toy Department where harassed
parents sought to buy their offspring's love with expensive
toys that would be forgotten within weeks. The line for
Santa's grotto snaked around shelves loaded with
shrink-wrapped joy.
Children waited to declare their virtue and claim their
reward. Mothers and fathers clinging to tiny hands did their
best to dampen expectations. Already they were calculating
their monthly repayments.
Erickson was right. Santa Claus was evil.
I returned to the Ace of Spades at the appointed time but
didn't go in. Instead, I hid in a narrow passage cluttered
with barrels and crates. It was snowing again.
The clock over the entrance to Galloway's showed a quarter
to eight when I spotted my quarry in his red costume. If he
wasn't Father Christmas, he was certainly equipped for the
part. He had the right build and his beard looked real enough.
With snow and shoppers spoiling my view, I couldn't be certain
that this was the man in the photograph, but the resemblance
was definitely there.
The thing that struck me most was the way his head tilted
to one side as if he had an injury to his neck.
Shuffling into the pub, I found Erickson by the window.
Although the bar was far from empty, he had a table to
himself.
"I saw him," I said, handing Erickson a whisky and sitting
down.
"So what do you think?"
"There was something about him."
"His neck?"
"Possibly."
"Even the Undead can't walk away unscathed from a shotgun
blast." Erickson looked me in the eye. "What does your gut
tell you?"
I savored a sip of whisky before answering. My gut had known
from the start.
"He's our man, all right."
"It makes me sick to think of him walking amongst us,
unnoticed, unmolested. All those children..." He broke off and
downed his whisky. "I need your help, Simpson. Are you with
me?"
My heart turned to lead. Whatever Erickson had in mind was
sure to add to my woes. "Count me in."
"Remember we're doing this for all those children who once
a year are told a big fat lie. Is it any wonder they grow
up unable to tell good from evil? Finish your drink and
come with me."
Erickson's car was parked around the corner. He opened the
boot and stepped back to allow me to view its contents --
two mallets and a clutch of wooden stakes.
"Tonight," he said. "Let's rid the world of this filth for
once and for all."
Kris Kringle left Galloway's shortly after ten o'clock. We
traced his footsteps in the snow.
Halfway down an alley, he sensed our presence and turned.
I should have waited for Erickson's order, but fear got the
better of me. I swung the mallet blindly. Chance guided it
to the side of Kringle's head. His neck straightened with
a sound like damp kindling on a fire.
Santa staggered, went down.
Erickson was immediately upon him. I stood helpless as they
thrashed in the snow. For a moment it seemed that two had
become one. Erickson and Santa -- an amalgam of limbs and
heads.
Father Christmas got hold of Erickson's hair and lunged at
his neck.
And then Erickson was on top. He gouged Kringle's eyes and
took him by the throat.
"Now, Simpson! In the name of God!"
I threw myself at Father Christmas and drove my stake through
his heart. Blood fountained. It spread across the snow like
the shadow of an eclipse.
Red and white. The colors of Father Christmas.
I was shaking as we walked away.
Somehow the police tracked us down. I know we left footprints
in the snow but once on the main street we walked in the
gutter. No snow there. No footprints.
And yet the police were outside the Ace of Spades before we'd
finished our pints.
Erickson saw them first. He pointed to the panda cars outside
the window. Then he pointed to the gents.
By the time the police entered the bar, we were in the
alleyway and headed in opposite directions.
My severance check remained uncashed. I lived on my wits and
the kindness of strangers. The shyness which made me all but
invisible proved a boon.
I walked to Manchester, surviving on scraps and sleeping in
fields. By the time I got there, I was just another bum.
Nobody gave me a second look. I was a scrap of sub-humanity,
unworthy of attention.
After six months, I decided it was safe to associate with
other hobos, to share their makeshift homes in underground car
parks and empty shops. Soup and bread from the Salvation Army
kept me alive. The indefatigable humor of my fellow vagrants
kept me sane.
There were nights when I welcomed the cold because it took my
mind off the hunger, and there were nights when I welcomed the
hunger because it took my mind off the cold.
Once in a while, I'd find myself being kicked and pummelled
by inebriated youths. And I didn't mind so long as they left
me unconscious.
Every meal was eaten with the thought that it might be my
last. When I lay down to sleep, I wondered if I would see
another dawn.
I suppose I could have given myself up. Freedom is a base
currency when it's the freedom to starve, to shiver in the
dark, to be the plaything of lager louts. And yet it never
occurred to me to do so.
I just got on with my semblance of life.
It was December again, days short of the anniversary of
the night I'd become a fugitive. I was standing outside the
Manchester branch of Galloway's, daring myself to go in just
long enough to drive the cold from my bones.
That was when Father Christmas came shuffling along with the
gait of an old man. It was dark. He had his head down. A white
beard obscured his face.
He walked beneath a streetlight. I saw something familiar
in his eyes - a mix of ice and fire. Just a momentary glimpse
before he disappeared through the staff entrance.
My mind reeled. Could it really have been Erickson? I tried
to dismiss the thought as idle fancy, a longing to once again
share his company.
The next two and a half hours were a torment. I stood outside
the staff entrance, taking a stroll now and then to avoid
being arrested.
At ten o'clock, the store shut its doors. By a quarter past,
the last customers had been persuaded to leave. The exodus of
staff began minutes later.
Father Christmas, still in his costume, came out at about half
past and this time there could be no doubt. It was Erickson.
I followed him along the High Street. He hesitated outside a
pub then walked on. Wary of attracting attention, I waited
until he turned down a small road before coming up alongside.
"Erickson," I whispered. "It's me. Simpson."
He glanced at me without breaking his stride. "Bugger off,
Simpson. You'll blow my cover."
I continued to dog him, matching him step for urgent step,
until he turned and grabbed my lapels.
"Damn it, Simpson! Just how stupid can you get?" He caught
my odor and pushed me away. His beard could not disguise his
disgust. "I thought we'd agreed we could never meet again!"
It was true, but then I hadn't expected him to be in
Manchester, dressed as Father Christmas of all people.
"I'm sorry, Erickson. It's just that..." My voice trailed off.
He shook his head and smiled. "I've often wondered what became
of you. I had this notion of you going to South America to
fleece gullible tourists. I suppose I should have known
better."
"Not one of life's success stories, am I?"
Erickson pointed down the road. "I have a room. We'll stick
you under the shower, burn those rags you're wearing and
tog you out in something vaguely decent. It won't be Saville
Row -- but then, I am a fugitive."
Erickson's room was in the attic of a large Victorian house.
While he went through a suitcase pulling out crumpled clothes,
I wondered if there was any way back to normality. Other
people had assumed false identities and started new lives
in foreign countries. Why couldn't I?
Erickson handed me some cricket whites. As he closed his case
I caught sight of a cricket set -- bat, ball, stumps and
bails. It was, I suppose, Erickson's way of maintaining
contact with his previous life.
The room across the hallway was unoccupied, so I was able to
take my shower with little danger of discovery. Erickson's
clothes were a poor fit, but at least I was clean.
When I returned to Erickson, he was in his pajamas, sitting on
the bed, nursing a glass of whisky. The Father Christmas suit
lay folded on the dressing table, but the beard remained. It
was not, as I'd assumed, fake.
"I take it you'll be happy with the couch," he said, pouring
me a drink. "It's a bit lumpy, but it must be better than what
you're used to."
Nodding meekly, I sat on the couch. The thought of a good
night's sleep in warmth and safety brought home to me how
tired I was. A couple of sips of whisky and I was unable
to stifle a yawn.
Erickson chuckled. "I'm as bushed as you are. Let's get our
heads down. We can catch up with each other in the morning."
I was asleep before he'd put out the light.
Heartburn woke me just before dawn.
Sometimes a man can only find himself in the dark. I was Eric
Simpson, fugitive, Santa Slayer. Whether the Universe liked
it or not, I existed -- a fact I chewed over for some time.
If there was truly a God in Heaven, then he had let me down
badly. I had risked my life to rid the world of a great evil.
Where, then, was my reward?
Too angry to sleep, I got up and huddled against the radiator.
Erickson slept on. I listened to his gentle snoring and told
myself that here was a man I would truly give my life for.
But the beard bothered me. It was white and bushy. I saw now
as my eyes adjusted to the dark that he was wearing a cravat.
And I thought back to events immediately after we'd sent Kris
Kringle's soul to Hell.
As we fled the scene, Erickson clutched his neck. In the Ace
of Spades, he sat with his collar turned up. Climbing out
of the toilet window, I'd caught a flash of crimson.
I went to the suitcase and took out the cricket bat and a
stump.
Erickson awoke as I pressed the metal tip to his chest and
raised the bat. His lips moved the slightest amount. I think
he was trying to say, "Thank you."
"Goodbye, old friend," I said, delivering the blow which laid
his soul to rest.
And that's the whole story. I phoned the police and went
quietly. Of course, they thought me mad. You all think me mad.
You point and whisper behind my back: "See how he quickly he
has become accustomed to his cell? He is happy here. Surely
there can be no greater proof of insanity."
A pox on the lot of you.
Patrick Whittaker (trashman97@hotmail.com)
---------------------------------------------
Patrick Whittaker is an independent filmmaker with two short
films to his name ("The Red Car" and "Nevermore"). To keep the
wolf from his door, he works as a freelance software analyst
in the airline industry. He is planning on having a midlife
crisis as soon as he can find the time.
===============================
Evening Tide by Neal Gordon
===============================
Dodge is working at the kitchen table, going over the figures
from the big telescope on Cerro Tolelo. The numbers, in
precise columns and rows, speak to him of an exactness that
he finds reassuring. He thinks that the numbers depend on
him to give them meaning, and for this dependency, he is
grateful. There was a time when his family needed him.
A time when a new bride, a new job, a child and then another
demanded his strength. But those times are gone and now
only the numbers need him, and Dodge needs to be needed.
He concentrates on the numbers, seeing the slow trends and
wave-like patterns that they represent, and for a moment
he feels how insignificant his life is in comparison.
Annie removes the lid from the kettle and steam rises from
the hot shells. Using tongs, she lifts the open shells from
the pot and places them in a clear glass bowl. She covers
the pan and leaves the shells that are not open to sit above
the hot liquid. "They're perfect," she says, as she carries
the brimming bowl to the table, "Just perfect."
Dodge eyes the clams for a moment. They need to be cooked
exactly, he thinks. Because he has shown her how to do this
many times in the past twenty-three years, he knows that they
will be overdone. He says, "Yes, they look wonderful," as he
moves several onto his paper plate.
Annie sits down opposite him and takes a half dozen of the
clams onto her plate. "You're going fishing with Charlie in
the morning?" she asks.
"Yes. He's got Will for the weekend," he says, and uses his
fork to pull one of the clams free from its shell. When he
begins to chew the clam, he feels that it is nearly right,
and knows that he should have cooked them.
"Ok?" Annie asks, brushing back the long strands of her hair
from the sides of her mouth.
She tucks the hair behind her ear smoothly and Dodge sees the
precision in this gesture, the automaticness of it, how her
middle finger catches the strands and tucks them away. He
smiles, mumbles a yes, picks up his pencil and crosses out
a line of calculations.
"I heard that there might be a storm," she says.
"It's supposed to stall inland. The high pressure will stop
it," he says without looking up.
In a while, Dodge realizes that Annie is crying. The sound
of her breathing, so shallow, tells him clearer than words.
"I need to talk to you," she says.
"I'm listening," he says, adding a number to one of the
columns.
"No, Dodge," she says, putting a hand on his writing hand.
"With you. I need to talk with you."
Although he dislikes the distraction, he sets the pencil down
and removes his glasses saying, "You know I trust you, just
get whatever it is you think we need."
"It's not that kind of thing," she says.
He can see now that her eyes are brimming. A slow fear comes
to him like the paw of an enormous bear, pressing him into his
chair. "You don't need to ask my permission," he says, trying
to comfort her by patting her hand.
"You don't listen," she says and feels the words on her
dry lips.
"Yes. I'm listening. Go ahead. Tell me."
"I'm going," she says, flatly, and laughs.
"Where to? Maybe I'll tag along."
"No. I'm going away from you."
"I don't understand," Dodge hears himself say.
"Divorce. I'm going to get a divorce from you," she says and
uses the heels of her palms to wipe the tears from her cheeks.
"But you're my wife."
"Not for long," she says and pushes back from the table.
A glass topples over and spills water across the page of
calculations. Annie stands and goes out the back door to
the beach.
Dodge sits in silence because he does not know how to act,
does not know how to solve the problem that is suddenly
before him. When he stands, he begins to clear the dishes
from the table.
He does not understand his wife; cannot get a bearing on her,
he thinks as he folds the paper plates into the garbage. What
he understands is numbers. Raw data, clean and comprehendible.
The numbers that come from the Vax computer, long strings that
indicate the locations of the stars. Numbers that predict,
indicate, and display the stars that he knows by number
and name.
He remembers when the house settled. It happened in the fall
of sixty-two, with Dodge in his new teaching position at Penn.
An early autumn storm hammered the island. The wind and water
rose up and pulled almost fifteen feet of sand from under the
foundation. He and Anne drove down from the city. Their first
son, David, was due in a few weeks, but Dodge had wanted to
check on the house. When they got to the island, the bridges
were washed out. Dodge hired a small whaler that drove them
from the bay to the beach side. The pilot identified the
wrecked homes that stood sideways in streets, upended on the
beach, or half buried in the water. So many had simply been
washed away.
Dodge's father, John, was standing where the half basement
of their beach house should have been. Dodge clambered out
of the boat and was halfway to the bulkhead that separated
their backyard from the long public beach when he saw the
old man's stern look. Obediently, Dodge turned around, came
back, and helped her out of the small boat.
"You shouldn't have come down," John said as they walked up
the beach.
"I was worried about the house," Dodge said.
His father kissed her on the cheek and put an arm around her,
helping her on the soft sand. "You have some other things to
worry about," he said, putting a hand on her swollen stomach
as Dodge followed behind the two of them. "You can repair
architecture, but you can't replace family, Dodge," the old
man said without looking at his son.
They had been lucky during the storm; the water took several
yards of sand behind the bulkhead. Washed it away: reminded
everyone that the island was nothing more than a big sandbar.
The old house sat on forty foot pilings. It was one of the
only houses on the island that had been built that way. John
was from the mid-west, and although he loved the ocean, he
had always been wary of it; insisting on what the contractors
considered needless safety standards. He liked to err on the
side of caution.
They were one of five houses at this end of the island that
were still standing. They had the foundation rebuilt that
fall, after the baby came. While the contractors waited for
other home owners to collect relief and insurance from the
federal government, they were happy to have the work, and
unwilling to look John in the eye.
Inside the house, Dodge finishes the dishes, collects his
work from the table, and closes the numbers into his briefcase.
He opens the back door and steps down the stairs to the cool
sand, hoping to find Annie. He knows that he must find the
thing to say to her now, must find the key to the equation
that will produce the correct solution.
The moon shine on the sand sparkles like diamonds. Dodge
sees a figure walking ahead of him and knows that it must
be her by the way she walks. He smiles at the pleasure of the
recognition. I know how she walks. He begins to hurry towards
her. I must have seen her walk a thousand miles, he thinks.
When he reaches her, he catches her elbow and she stops.
"What can I do?" he asks.
"There is nothing to do," she says. She does not pull away
from him. She stands as if her elbow as detached from her
body.
"Tell me how to make this okay."
"You can't."
"We've been married twenty-two years. There's got to be an
answer in twenty-two years," he says, feeling the edge that
comes with the unsolvable, the unexplainable.
"There's no answer." she asks, pulling clear of the tightening
hand.
"Let me try to find an answer." He reaches out a hand to her,
but she doesn't take it.
"You don't even understand what I'm talking about," she says
touching her forehead.
"I understand that you're upset." He puts a hand on her
shoulder.
"Obviously I'm upset," she says and leaves his hand where it
is. He feels how warm she is through the thin shirt. It is as
if she is burning up. As if the speed with which she is moving
away from her is creating friction.
"And I want to help," Dodge says.
"You don't even know what's wrong and you expect to help?"
"If you tell me the problem, I'll try to find a solution."
Dodge feels the cold wind through his sweater, and he moves
closer to her, trying to shield her from the wind.
"I don't want that."
"Then let me give you what you want," he says looking down
into her long blonde hair.
"I want you to understand this, not solve it. I don't want
to be a damn problem for you to solve," she pleads to him.
"Then what do you want?"
"I want you to understand. Just try to understand."
"That you want a divorce?" he asks, squeezing her shoulder.
"No, that there's a problem." She nods her head to him.
"I don't understand," he says and reaches his other hand
towards her.
"I know," she says as she pulls free from him and runs towards
the house as if pushed away.
Dodge watches her run away from him. He watches closely as
she steps up the back stairs and goes in. A chill stirs him
to walk and he goes toward the house where he grew up, not
knowing where else he should go.
His father left him the house, along with everything the old
man owned when he died. Dodge kept the house exactly as it
was. With the money left him, Dodge bought a large fishing
boat like his Dad had always wanted. It seemed a concrete
way to spend the money that the old man had worked so hard
to make and never enjoyed.
The boat came fully equipped; a beautiful teak deck,
snorkeling and scuba equipment, a little bathroom, a weather
radio for emergencies. Dodge's one major addition was an
antique bronze mariner's compass. The compass sits high in
the center of the of the rear deck, its clear glass like a
jewel. It weighs almost forty pounds and came out of a luxury
liner from the twenties. It is exactly what a compass should
be, accurate and reliable. Dodge thinks of the compass now,
and wishes the compass was attached to Annie.
When he gets back into the house, Dodge sits in the kitchen,
listening to his wife in the rooms above him. He looks at the
worn plank flooring of the kitchen and sees the way the house
leans from front to back. How it always has, even before the
hurricane when Dad died. If you drop a marble down in the
living room, it'll roll towards the beach, just as it did when
he was a child and when his children were children. He thinks,
I know each of these rooms, know which get the sun in the
morning, know which windows get the cool breezes from the salt
marshes, know which mattresses are lumpier than others. I have
slept in all of the bedrooms, gradually moving up to the third
floor as I grew away from my parents, just as my children grew
away from me. And as my wife now has.
Because he does not know what to say to her, does not know how
to solve her problem, he goes upstairs to their bedroom that
overlooks the beach, pulls the curtains, and undresses. After
he puts on his pajama bottoms, he stops and listens to his
wife on the third floor, in the boys' rooms. Dodge opens the
curtains and climbs into bed between the covers. The bed is
very cold, and he turns up the electric blanket to compensate
for his wife whom he knows is not coming to join him.
As he falls asleep, images of Annie's white skin pass through
his mind. Her skin so white that it glows pink, as if it
thinly veils the blood below. The image of her body, across
shoulder blade, under arm, to curve of breast comes to him.
Her skin is smooth and clean and even though he is on the edge
of sleep, he knows that the image is an old one, from when
they were both young. He sees her breast, smooth and white,
it's light pink areola like the color of her lips. He sees
how her breast pulls away from the body when she lies on her
side, how its weight pulls the skin taught from the side of
her rib cage.
Before sunrise, Dodge wakes to the sound of his boys in the
rooms above him. He smiles a turns to Annie, smelling the
sweet smell of her long blonde hair on the pillow. It is a
long mournful moment when he realizes that Annie is not next
to him. She is upstairs in one of the spare bedrooms.
He gets up and goes to the bathroom. He starts a hot shower,
undresses, and steps in. The water runs over the back of his
neck and down over his shoulders. The water falls across him
like warm rain and he stays under it as it begins to grow
cold. Because he cannot face what is outside the bathroom,
the water is cold before he reaches to turn it off.
When he gets out of the shower, he hears Charlie Stevens
yelling downstairs.
"Let's go, Dodge old man," he calls.
Dodge wants to yell down to him, but the stillness of
the room, the tired calmness he feels, would be shattered.
Instead, he wraps a towel around himself and goes to the
steps. "Give me a minute to get some clothes on," he calls
from halfway down the stairs.
"Where's Annie?" Charlie asks.
"I don't know," Dodge croaks, feeling the words tighten in
his throat.
"She won't care if I make some coffee, will she?" Charlie asks
and steps toward the kitchen. Charlie's boy, Will, is standing
by the front door. He is a bored thirteen year old, with stiff
short hair.
"No, she won't," Dodge says and turns to go back upstairs.
Annie is standing at the top of the stairs, holding her
suitcase. "You're going fishing?" she asks him.
"I have to. They can't go without me," Dodge says.
"Fine," she says gritting her teeth and not wanting to look
at him, "I'm taking the sedan."
"Can we talk about this for a moment?"
Feeling that she shouldn't, she sets the case down next to
the banister, turns and walks to the master bedroom. Dodge
follows, trying to think of what to say.
The curtains are open, Dodge notices, and he pulls the bedroom
door closed.
"What do you want to talk about," she says, and Dodge hears
a harshness in her voice.
"Can I get dressed?"
"No. I won't be here that long."
"You can't leave me, Anne," Dodge says, sitting on the made-up
bed.
"And why not?" Annie steps to the window, watching the arc of
the sun break the horizon.
"Where will you go?"
"That's not your concern."
"Do you have any money?" Dodge asks.
"Our combined account balance was seventy-three thousand
dollars. I took half and put it into an account at another
bank."
"Thirty-six five," Dodge says, running a hand through his wet
hair. He feels strange sitting in a towel with the curtain
open.
"I'm taking the sedan, but I won't bother you about the house.
I'll come by in a few days and get the rest of my things,"
Annie laughs.
"The furniture?"
"Only those items which I found, bought, or refinished. They
have no value without my effort," she says and dismisses the
question with a wave.
"So you're taking whatever you feel you have a right to,"
Dodge says, leaning back on his hands. He feels the towel
slip and reaches forward, rewrapping it at his waist.
She turns to him then, feeling strong. "Complain and I'll ask
for half equity in the house."
Dodge stands. "Please don't do this. You have no where to go,"
he says, opening his arms.
"It's already done. I took an apartment."
"Anne, please, be reasonable."
"Like you?"
"Yes, reasonable," he says. As he steps toward her, the towel
slips from his waist and he catches it in one hand, holding it
in front of him.
"Drop the towel," she says.
He can't. He tells himself to do it. To do what she says, but
he can't quite manage it. "I can't," he says.
"You're a cold fish, Dodge," she says, hurrying past him to
the hallway, wanting to run.
Dodge stands still for a moment. When he hears her shoes on
the stairs, he drops the towel. "I dropped it," he yells. He
hears voices below him. A door close. For the first time,
Dodge recognizes what is happening. That his wife is leaving,
now. He feels his testicles tighten against his naked body. In
a spasm of movement he runs after her.
"You about ready to go?" Charlie calls from the kitchen.
"Nearly," he says as he stops halfway down the steps. Will is
standing next to the front door looking at him as if he is
seeing something that he understands too well.
Dodge turns and goes back to the bedroom. He picks up the
clammy towel, finishes drying off, and gets dressed, not
knowing what else to do.
Dodge steers out beyond the point and then turns east into the
ocean, letting the boat carry itself. He runs the engine way
up, skimming the boat over the waves as the smell of the water
and gas combine with the bright sun to clear his head. His
mind wanders over the green grey water. The boat skips off the
surface and he drives forward, hearing the engines rap up and
up. The wind whips the tears from his eyes and he realizes
that he is crying, but can't put words to the reason why. As
the engine screams, and the boat slices ahead, he is
overwhelmed.
Charlie steps up onto the bow and pats Dodge on the shoulder.
Dodge doesn't turn and Charlie points past him to the sonar
screen that shows the ghost of a large school of fish. Dodge
eases off the throttle, realizing that he does not know how
long he has been driving.
As Charlie and Will set out the fishing lines, Dodge spreads
his work on the small table in the center of the deck. He
begins to recopy the figures from the previous night,
collecting his thoughts and focusing in on the new work,
finding comfort. The ocean is so quiet that he loses himself
among the rows of numbers, shutting out the real world.
When Will leans over the table where Dodge is working, his
shadow is cast straight down across the white pages of
numbers.
Dodge blinks a few times at the starkness of the contrast and
then looks up at the young boy. "Is it lunchtime already?"
Will shakes his head no and says, "I think we have some clouds
coming." He points towards the horizon.
"Let's have a look," Dodge says and stands. For a moment Dodge
is disoriented. How long have I been working, he thinks. The
boat must have drifted. It is getting on to afternoon, the sun
at apex. Which direction are we facing?
Will points to an angry black stripe running parallel to
the horizon.
"Good eye. We need to get back in," Dodge says and walks over
to the compass. According to the compass, the storm is coming
from the northwest, Dodge sees. Even though the direction
feels completely wrong to him, he turns the boat due west,
reasoning that he will find the harbor after he finds a
recognizable point on land. The compass is irrefutable.
As they sail diagonal towards the front, they see red and
green heat lightening, boiling in the smokey black clouds.
"Hail," Dodge says to Will. "See the lightening? That's hail."
Both Will and Charlie nod, as if they are joined together.
Father and son take in the lines, stow the tackle. Charlie
drinks a beer, quickly.
When the face of the front approaches, the air begins to cool.
Dodge feels the heat being sucked off the surface of the water
and lifted into the sky. Will begins to rub his arms with his
hands, and Charlie puts his arms around the boy.
Dodge pulls out sweatshirts from under the seats. Charlie and
Will seem glad to have them, but Dodge knows they are thinking
what he is thinking: they should be within sight of landfall
by now. The boat moves under the edge of the front.
"Are we going the right way?" Will asks Charlie in a shaky
voice, but loud enough for Dodge to hear.
"Are we?" Charlie asks. His voice has an edge to it. He pulls
out a life jacket from beneath the back seat and hands it to
his son, nodding.
"Well, unless I read wrong."
Dodge checks the compass. Tries to estimate the ocean current.
It's dragging us what? East? South? he wonders. He checks the
compass and changes course, heading more south, away from the
cloud bank. According to the compass, west, southwest.
The wind comes up, and the boat rides in and out of the waves.
Dodge tries to keep the boat between the swells. Every few
swells, a wave breaks into spray over the gunwale. The boat
takes on a bit of water and the bilge pump kicks on below
deck. Dodge watches as Charlie motions for Will, who seems
to be crying, to sit on the deck.
In ten minutes, it is apparent to Dodge that they are not
going in the right direction. "We must have drifted a long
way out," Dodge says, trying to laugh.
"You'd better get on the radio and call someone to come get
us," Charlie says.
"I only have a receiver. I don't usually go out so far that
I need a transmitter."
"Well you did this time," Charlie says. Dodge cannot miss the
anger in his voice.
Will pulls his knees up under the sweatshirt and cuddles
against his father's legs. The boy is wet. They are all wet,
Dodge thinks. He checks the compass again, seeing Charlie
rubbing his son's shoulders. The boy is crying hard now, Dodge
sees. It is then that Dodge makes eye contact with Charlie.
In Charlie's cold stare, Dodges sees that, for this moment,
Charlie hates him. It is the hate of a father who is
protecting his only child.
Rather than cringing, what Dodge feels then is connection.
What he sees in Charlie's eyes is a feeling that he knows
and understands. It is the feeling of responsibility he felt
that first few years with the new appointment, the baby, his
father's death, another baby right away. How it had seemed
that he was the only thing that stood between his family and
oblivion. The incredible strain of it.
Dodge understands why Annie has left as he recognizes that
he misses the responsibility of having so many people depend
on him. That with the loss of pressure on him, he has come
ungrounded. He has let a space between them open up rather
than letting the vacuum of the children's absence draw them
together.
In frustration, Dodge clinches his fist and punches the
compass. The dial spins wildly inside the glass ball, and
Dodge runs to the wheel, turning the boat directly into
the storm. He steers by what feels right to him, pushing
the throttle wide open.
"What the hell are you doing?" Charlie yells.
"Going home," Dodge says, not looking back.
For ten minutes the air grows darker and colder until Dodge
lets out a yell, and steers straight into the harbor. As he
hurries the boat toward the dock, he cannot help but mentally
plot the course that he must have taken, how the tide must
have carried him down the coast, how with each increment of
ease in his life he sailed further away from Annie.
As they tie up, the storm lets loose. Rain falls in thick
vertical waves. Charlie and Will run to their car without a
word. In the minute or so that it takes Dodge to get to his
car, he is soaked. The rain is grey and emerald green and so
heavy that the windshield wipers merely slosh it around. The
car crawls through the streets on the way home.
When he gets home, the house echoes with the noise of the
storm. Dodge goes to the master bedroom. Through the windows,
he watches as the waves come up ever higher, crashing against
the bulkhead between the house and the beach. The water is
covered in froth, the foam so thick that it looks like brown
shaving cream.
Shivering, he strips off his wet clothes and pulls on a heavy
sweatsuit and climbs into the bed, freezing. The bed is cold
and he turns the electric blanket up further and lays there,
listening to the storm front beat out its fury against the
house.
When he wakes, he is broiling. Everything is quiet and he
knows instantly that the storm has stopped. The digital clock
blinks midnight, and Dodge realizes that the power must have
gone out, too.
He gets up and goes to the windows. There are stars out and
he sees them reflected on the surface of the ocean. The stairs
twinkle on and off in the gentle waves. It is a new moon.
Dodge strips off his sweaty clothes and goes, naked,
downstairs and out to the sea.
He steps into the cool ocean and swims out into the stars that
he loves so much. Out in the waves, he laughs as he realizes
that the stars are actually tiny ctenafores, washed up by the
storm. As they die, their small jelly bodies luminesce sparks
of green. The water is refreshing, and he swims in and out of
the tiny glowing stars around him.
When the salt in the water begins to irritate his skin, he
walks out of the surf and back up to the house. He turns on
the outside shower and feels the warm water wash away the salt
from his body. He thinks about how long it has been since he's
been naked outside. There was a time when he had done this
kind of thing regularly. When he and Annie had enjoyed the
house rather than just lived in it.
It was when the children were young, when he felt as if he
was under such pressure. He had been able to relax then.
Everything had seemed so ridiculously impossible that he felt
at ease about it. As the children grew, as the job became
easier, as the pressures decreased, he felt less able to
relax. Instead of impossibilities ahead of him, everything
seemed possible, and less interesting. It was only his work
that pushed him on.
He snaps off the shower and walks up the back stairs to the
kitchen. Inside, he catches a glimpse of himself in the
hallway mirror. His skin is covered with quarter-sized
ctenafore stings. His flesh begins to itch as he realizes
the high price he has paid.
Neal Gordon (nealbriggs@hotmail.com)
---------------------------------------
Neal Gordon began studying writing at Iowa State University,
then transferred to the University of Iowa creative writing
program. Following completion of his degree, he left the
Midwest for the East Coast, where he completed graduate school
at Temple University. His work has appeared in magazines,
compilations and online over the past decade. Currently, he
teaches at the Episcopal Academy outside Philadelphia.
==============================================
The Legion of Lost Gnomes by T.G. Browning
==============================================
As crime waves ran, it couldn't really be called much of a
wave. A rivulet, perhaps, hardly a wave. But when faced with
the obvious, even the primally stubborn can be convinced and
that's what Doris was. _Convinced._ Now, the only problem she
saw, was that she wasn't sure if it was a good thing or a bad
thing.
Somebody was stealing lawn gnomes.
Doris shuffled the three reports a second time and laid them
out carefully, side by side. The first was from Jimmy and was
a model of quiet police efficiency. Short, concise in the way
short things should be but often aren't, and totally deadpan.
No twists. Nothing to indicate that Jimmy found any of the
incidents to be slightly on the broken side of Serious City.
The second was Marla's report and it, too, was a good example
of police work, though there were twists and slants to the
narrative that caused Doris to suspect that Marla had had a
_hard_ time keeping a straight face when she took the
information. That little tiny doodle in the lower left corner
that looked suspiciously like an inebriated squirrel hanging
upside down from a branch was only the most obvious
indication.
Still, all the facts were there and dutifully cataloged with
direct quotes from the crime victim listed here and there as
appropriate.
They also cracked Doris up. "Well, you don't think they just
up and walked off by themselves, now do you missy?"
Doris could just see the victim, Gretchen Reinhart, canting
her head to the side and looking up at Marla as she spoke.
The last of the three was from Mort, Doris's problem child
in the office. Mort tried very hard but lacked that certain
something that gives one confidence in someone allowed to
carry a gun in public. He'd been improving steadily and this
particular report couldn't have been easy for him,
improvements or no. In a way, Doris was touched at the inner
police officer it revealed. He obviously believed everything
this latest victim of crime had to say and since that included
a few scatological references to neighbors who just _had_
to be guilty of _something,_ Doris figured that Mort could
probably keep busy with the follow-up all the way through
Christmas.
Since it was currently the month of May, Doris figured she'd
have to keep an eye on Mort. Doris looked back at the reports
one final time, mentally added up how much the stuff taken
could have been worth and then chucked them all into a basket
she kept for things not finished and not really in need of
finishing. By her reckoning, all the thefts taken together
couldn't have cost the victims more than $300 and a bit of
wounded pride.
She figured that what they had was an art teacher who'd been
working too hard and needed a break. Conjectured art teacher
probably snatched the little guys and then _offed_ them with
a small but sturdy hammer. The ex-gnomes were probably rounded
hunks of concrete in the nearest landfill.
In Doris's worldview, justice wasn't really blind, just slow
to balance.
Doris often went home for lunch since she only lived ten
blocks away. It gave her a chance to look things over as she
went, though she rarely saw anything more interesting than
someone parked too far from the curb. But, she also figured
that establishing a visible presence around town never hurt
and she got the bonus of a hot meal with no interruptions from
townspeople upset about parking or speeding tickets.
Just a block away from home, she spotted two of her neighbors,
Cissy Brown and Verla Manning, talking animatedly. Doris had
already started to give them her friendly, neighborhood cop
I-see-you-but-I'm-busy wave when the animation speed jumped
a couple of notches and the two women _both_ started yelling,
waving their arms, and moving with reckless speed in her
direction. Doris sighed, pulled over and parked. She made
a point of not getting out of the squad car.
Cissy Brown was in the lead in the race to get Doris's ear
first. She had an advantage over her competitor since she had
longer legs under a fairly trim body, kept in shape by fending
off the attacks of a set of seven-year-old triplets vaguely
rumored to be hers. She wore a bright blue t-shirt, shorts
and, oddly enough, jogging shoes -- though the progress she
was making toward the car would more properly be termed
sprinting. Verla Manning, Doris's other neighbor, was within easy
striking distance behind Cissy and her legs were shorter and
would remind one of tree trunks, had tree trunks been wearing
faded denim this year. She was one of those people who had the
misfortune to have large internal organs with shoulders to
match. She resembled an Albanian weightlifter with a perm.
Even so, Doris would have put money on Cissy over Verla but
only if Verla wasn't looking.
"Doris, I want her--" Cissy got in first from about ten
feet out.
"Damn it, Cissy, will you just--"
"--arrested. She stole--"
"--did not!"
"Did too, you--"
Both stopped abruptly when Doris started playing with the
shotgun racked on the passenger side of the squad car. Doris
had the good fortune to witness a rare phenomenon: Both
women with their mouths open and no sounds coming out.
Doris wished she had a videocam since she doubted she'd
ever be so fortunate again. She got out of the squad car
and leaned on the door.
In a mild voice, Doris asked, "Something you two need? I'm on
my lunch break if you don't mind. I'd like to have chance to
at least open the refrigerator before heading back to the
office."
This time Verla got in the first shot. "Cissy's been robbed.
She thinks I did it but I haven't touched any of her stuff."
Verla glared at her next-door neighbor. This might not be the
worst fight the two of them had had, but it was going to go
down as one of the more official ones, if Verla had anything
to say about it. Doris had the grim feeling that living six
houses away from the conflict wouldn't be far enough if Cissy
didn't apologize and damn soon.
"You always hated ..." Cissy snapped back, now glaring at
Verla.
"Maybe, but I'm no _thief._ If you want tacky little concrete
goblins--"
"Gnomes!"
"--whatever, hiding in your rose bushes, that's your look
out."
"Judas Priest!" Both of the women snapped their heads back
to stare at Doris. Her expression must have been a shade
grim because they both took a step backward. They had just
discovered what small European nations felt when bus loads
of Prussians stop for border checks. Without another word,
Doris got on the radio.
That night after supper, Doris wandered out into the front
yard, a bottle of Conceited Sonnavabitch Stout in hand,
thinking dark thoughts. The stout didn't exactly help. Once
opened, she'd committed to drinking it and frankly, as far
as she could tell, this particular stout had nothing to be
conceited about.
Milt, her husband and chief of police for the neighboring town
of Newport, ambled out after a few minutes, wiping his hands
on a dishrag and wondering why Doris had his bottle of C-SOBS.
As far as he knew, she hated stout. He stopped for a moment,
considered that, and then frowned.
The only way that would happen would be if Doris was in
conference with her subconscious and not paying attention.
He watched while she finally sat down on the grass under
the hawthorne tree and looked disgusted.
"You want me to finish that? And maybe get you something you
actually like?"
Doris blinked twice, looked at the bottle and then nodded
gravely. "That would probably help. Then I got a couple of
questions for you."
"Weird stuff?"
"Weird stuff."
Milt sighed and complied. Within a minute he plopped his wiry
frame down beside his wife and braced himself. "Okay. What's
up?"
"Gnomes."
"I beg your pardon?"
"Lawn gnomes. You have any thefts of lawn gnomes in Newport
lately?"
"Not that I know about. But I rarely have time to go over more
than half the reports these days. Too much court time. Unless
Jesse flags it for me, I generally don't see it. Why? You
missing some?"
"We are, not to put too fine a point on it, missing
battalions. Legions. Whatever the hell you'd call a bunch
of the little suckers."
"Well, they can't get far."
Doris glared at him. "Not funny."
"Sure it is. Listen to yourself. Lawn gnomes indeed."
Doris regarded him with a less than charitable expression.
"Milt, I nearly had two neighbors who aren't particularly
friendly go to war this afternoon because a couple of the
concrete goobers are missing. Cissy Brown figured Verla had
stolen them and probably dumped them in the Bay or possibly
taken a sledgehammer to them. I don't need neighbor fights
here in town, especially within six houses of where I try
to sleep."
Milt looked thoughtful. "Why would anybody want to take them?
They're not that expensive."
"Only thing I can figure is that somebody thinks they're tacky
and hates them even more than I do."
"You don't think anybody would ... ah ... just use them?"
"Milt, people who'd take and actually use at least 12 or 13 of
them are too sick to function in society. They'd never be able
to plan a getaway. And they'd give themselves a hernia, to
boot."
"That the only stuff that's been taken?" Inside the house he
heard the sound of the dishwasher abruptly end with a rattle
that meant the locking mechanism had come unlatched. Milt got
up.
Doris twisted the top off her beer and drank some. She shook
her head as she looked up at him. "No. One house was missing
a pink flamingo and two ceramic toadstools." Doris sat up and
started to drink a bit more beer and then stopped. "I'm kind
of surprised you haven't had any taken."
"Guess Toledo and Newport have different hunting seasons."
He started walking backward toward the front door, left hand
gripping his stout, the right ready to fend off any attack
from Doris.
"You're cruisin', Milt ... " she warned, standing up as she
tried to roll up one sleeve while still holding her beer. Milt
got what he figured was enough lead and then split for the
front door. Now if he could just get it locked before she got
there ...
Doris didn't enjoy holiday weekends. No police officer does,
really, since it always means a lot of extra work keeping
people from hamburgerizing themselves and near relatives
in some car crash. The Toledo PD was short handed for this
particular Memorial Day since Fred Vasquez had requested
special holiday leave to visit family in Powell Butte,
Oregon. With his accrued vacation leave, Doris couldn't
see any way to deny him the vacation. The last time he'd
taken off for more than a day had been during the first
Reagan Administration.
Friday and Saturday nights went down smoothly enough. Doris
issued several tickets for speeding, one DUI and one warning
ticket for following too close. Considering the driver was
tailgating a Southern Pacific Railroad train as it moseyed
into the pulp mill, Doris couldn't talk herself into a full
ticket.
Sunday night, Doris made several long, elliptical loops that
meandered across the Yaquina River a couple of times and took
in the Kauri Street Annex, Alder Lane -- which doubled for
Toledo's Nob Hill -- the High School, and finally finished
up with a brisk cruise down the US 20 bypass of Toledo. Every
other time she'd park, get out the radar and clock a few cars
as they bypassed the town.
It was nearly midnight and one of the rare, fine evenings
just behind the Pacific Coast when the sky was clear as a
bell and one could count meteors were one inclined and upwind
of the Georgia-Pacific pulp mill. Milt, Doris figured, was
undoubtedly enjoying the rustic moodiness one finds in coast
towns with a surfeit of fog. Throw in that there was quite
a lot of Newport stretched out along the coast and Doris
figured he'd not only be home late but be in need of a cheery
face once he got home.
Doris noticed lights behind her and readied the radar gun.
Before squinting through the sight, it occurred to her that
the car lights had come on, rather than appeared. Since the
vehicle had come out of Cemetery Loop Road, the driver must
have been rolling with the lights off before he hit the
intersection.
The vehicle passed by her without any tell-tale red flashes
from the brake lights but Doris figured the driver to have
taken his foot off the gas -- the radar gave out two readings,
one after the other: 58 mph followed by 54.
Doris dumped the radar and pulled out after the car -- a red
SUV that vaguely looked familiar -- and quickly discovered
that their speed had dropped even further--the SUV was now
doing under 50. After another 30 seconds, the car's right
turn signal came on as it slowed and the driver turned onto
the Siletz Highway, leaving Doris with a choice of following
or not.
Not. No matter how suspicious Doris felt, she had no real
reason to pull them over and the random hassling of motorists
didn't happen to be one of her faults.
Still, she did take one final, quick glance as she passed
the Siletz Highway turn-off and slowed to turn left onto Old
Highway 20. The lighting wasn't great but she could see enough
to recognize a back seat packed with three or four kids, each
seat-belted into immobility. She even thought she saw one of
the little buggers flip her off. She certainly saw one arm
up in the air, though she couldn't tell how many fingers
the rugrat had extended.
Doris had just turned onto Main Street when the radio
crackled. Meg, the Toledo Dispatcher, keyed in.
"...units--" Doris laughed. Toledo had five squad cars and
only had two on patrol at any one time. Even on Memorial Day
Weekend. "--we have a robbery at 233 East Ridgemont."
Doris grabbed the mike. "Base, this is Doris--how long ago did
it happen?" Doris's subconscious had started yammering in the
corner.
"About ten minutes ago. That's the Cutter house -- Maude Cutter
phoned it in."
"Did she see anything -- anybody?"
"Not really. Just caught a glimpse of a car headed down
the road."
"Eastbound?"
"Affirmative." Meg sounded miffed. She hated it when Doris
second-guessed her so effortlessly.
"Base, this is Jimmy. I'm west of Butler Bridge -- it'll take
me a while to get there."
None of the three of them took advantage of the clear airwaves
for several seconds and then Doris keyed in and off, paused
and keyed in. "I'll take it, Jimmy. Meg, get in touch with the
State Police. I think I saw the vehicle. It was a red SUV and
they turned onto the Siletz Highway about five minutes ago.
I didn't have any real reason to stop them then." Doris could
have kicked herself but refrained. That could come later.
"Base, what was taken?"
There was a pause before Meg answered. "Three or four lawn
gnomes and a urinating cherub birdbath."
Doris pulled over and ground her teeth a couple of times. It
figured. What else could it have been?
Cops don't really have a special way of thinking. And of
course, every cop is different and uses what mental equipment
they have in the most expeditious way. Jimmy, for example, was
a great linear thinker. He could leap-frog two or three steps
if they happened to be in a straight line but throw a slow
curve left into the mix and you'd see brake lights. Milt was
better than Jimmy with any sort of randomized, slow to medium
curve and he could second-guess the average person three times
out of four.
Doris had a marvelously skewed set of brains. When events ran
in twisted curves, she barreled along overtaking and even,
occasionally, jumped the track to get in front. Like now.
Item: Three or four concrete goobers strapped in the back
of a SUV.
Item: One of them flipping her off.
Conclusion: Since concrete doesn't bend very well, the
upraised arm would have to have been a permanent gesture.
After a little thought, Doris did recall having encountered
at one time or another a couple of the tackier lawn eyesores
posed to be waving bye-bye or its mercantile equivalent,
_check please,_ depending upon one's penchant for gruesome
detail.
Item: Memorial Day. Doris shelved it for the moment. It was
important, but at this point she wasn't sure how or why.
Possibly related item: Subject SUV last seen headed
north-by-northeast along the Siletz Highway. Which, by
happenstance and bad roadway was connected in two spots with
the old Pioneer Mountain Road, which fed back in before the
by-pass, about a mile east of it.
Before you could say Pioneer Mountain, Doris had the squad car
turned and was making speed heading eastbound on Old Hwy. 20,
all lights flashing, but no siren.
There was one cemetery Doris could think of in that direction
and it got damn few visitors, ever. Doris was headed for it,
all the while thinking how peculiar a concrete gnome looked,
asking for a dinner check. That may not be what she seen but
the image kind of fit somehow.
The clincher was that Memorial Day had already arrived, since
it was already past midnight and that _particular_ holiday was
one of only two holidays carefully and religiously observed by
the owner of that one rather private cemetery.
When Doris had taken US History from him in high school, he'd
always made an effort to remind the kids of the point behind
Veteran's Day and Memorial Day. He also owned a red SUV, now
that Doris thought about it, but he hadn't been driving it
much this last year or so because of poor health.
Judas Priest, she thought. Now why in hell did Tom have to
steal them? He couldn't have just borrowed a few from friends
or neighbors if he didn't have enough. Now I'll have to take
steps.
A moment later, another circuit cut in and Doris nodded even
more grimly. Mick's got to be handling it for him; Tom
wouldn't have lifted the buggers. Besides, it's much too
slick an operation for anybody else but Mick.
Long ago Doris had learned an interesting secret of life:
Codgers get to _be_ codgers, by devious, sneaky means. Some
more sneaky than others.
Doris knew enough about Mick's history to piece together part
of the puzzle. She just wondered what pieces Tom Smythe had in
_his_ past.
Doris killed the flashers as she turned onto Pioneer Mountain
Road and went to sub-light speed. The road was tricky and had,
back before 1960, been the original route of the Corvallis-
Newport Highway -- code name US 20 by the uninitiated.
It sported all of the trappings of coast road building from
that era, including steeply banked, back to back, narrow
curves that were a blast to take on a motorcycle if you
weren't subject to motion sickness. Doris didn't figure she
needed any more thrills for the evening so she took them at
the granny speed indicated by the mph riders of the curve
signs. After a mile, she slowed even further, figuring she
wanted to make damn sure she didn't get to the house first.
She wanted to give them enough time to get the little guys
unloaded -- hopefully getting a strained back in the process.
These two needed some sort of lingering aftereffect to mark
this particular idiot notion.
One set of ugly curves back from Doris's intended destination,
she slowed to a stop and considered her next move. She briefly
considered turning off her own headlights but then sighed.
What would be the point?
Just as surely as she could figure out what was going on, Mick
could figure out just how long it would take Doris to figure
it out. She had no doubt that he was currently sitting on
either the front porch bench glide or was leaning against
a tree in front of the house.
She shrugged, put the car in gear and moseyed around the curve
to turn into 14480 Old Pioneer Mountain Road and possibly into
an ugly situation.
As she had figured, Mick Reeves was sitting on the front
porch. Had to be. Only Mick could have pulled any of this off.
Mick was closing in on 90 years old and had that wiry
gauntness you see in old people who have been straight-arming
the grim reaper for years, successfully. He had never been a
big man, which was almost a given, considering his former line
of work: Espionage -- first for the old OSS during WWII and then
later on, for the CIA up through the beginning of the 60's.
Nondescript was probably the only adjective Mick would have
aspired to and he more or less achieved it -- barring anybody
taking a close look at his deep-set cold, gray eyes. Those
eyes gave everybody, including Doris the willies occasionally.
He wore a pair of canvas deck shoes, corduroy pants with more
than the usual number of pockets, a light blue polo shirt and
a sardonic expression. Doris got out and leaned on the car
door, to stare back at him.
After a few moments, she asked, "Where's Tom, Mick? Out back?
I'd think you'd need to be helping him unload -- Tom's not in
that good a shape."
Mick nodded companionably. "Gene's helping him. They should
be about done by now."
"Gene?" Doris repeated in a musing tone. "Oh, right. Gene Van
Horn. Jeez, I would have thought he had more sense than this."
For the first time in her life, Doris saw a spasm of anger
flicker across Mick's face. It was gone quickly but for a
moment, Doris could believe some of the more unbelievable
stories she'd heard about Mick and exploding German staff
cars. His normally bland expression did yeoman work concealing
the professional field agent.
"There are some remarks, Doris, you'd be wise to leave
unsaid." He got up and came down the short stoop of four
steps. "C'mon. I told the two of them to be expecting you."
Doris fell in step beside him and thought. She didn't see any
way she could avoid shoving all three of the vets in jail and
she was just going to _hate_ doing that.
Tom Smythe stood to one side of Gene Van Horn as the latter
finished smoothing out what could only be described as a
miniature grave. Immediately to Gene's right was an already
dug hole the same size, only this one had the chubby, jovial
face of a lawn gnome peeking out of it.
That explained the lawn gnomes, Doris thought. She took a
quick glance around.
This was only the third time Doris had ever been in Tom's
backyard and he'd made a number of changes. While she had
expected the garden hillside of terraces and flowers
painstakingly tended to, she hadn't expected to see one third
of the hillside dotted with small white crosses. The last
three on the bottom right were brand new and only now was
Gene finishing the internment.
The last time she'd been here, there had only been the seven
pioneer graves Tom had showed her that time she'd visited,
all of which were marked with weathered granite markers.
Over his shoulder without looking, Van Horn called out.
"Thanks for coming, Doris. It's much appreciated."
Doris stopped, shook her head and then regarded Tom. "Evening,
Tom. You guys look like you're just about done."
Tom looked puzzled but came over and offered his hand to her.
"What's that, Doris? Fun? Not really ..."
Mick said in a stage whisper. "His hearing aids aren't working
too well, Doris. You better speak up."
Van Horn shot her a glance and then dropped down into the
last, still open grave and started to lay 1' 8" of tacky
sculpture to symbolic eternal rest. He paused for a moment
and then softly and slowly brushed a few particles of soil
away from the gnome's face. Doris found herself sighing.
"Right -- Gene, stop that. Climb up out of there and come sit
down. We have a few things to discuss."
Gene nodded but looked at Mick. "I think she's upset with us."
Doris just shook her head.
"Okay, guys, what the hell do you think you're doing? You know
I'm going to have to arrest and throw the lot of you into a
cell, don't you? You can't go around ripping off lawn
ornaments even if they do deserve to be buried face down in
concrete. You're going to end up in jail ... "
Tom had been fiddling around with his left hearing aid and
apparently, got most of Doris's little speech. "What do you
mean, stolen? These were donated. Every single one of them."
Doris looked at Mick who shrugged before she replied, "Not
hardly, Tom. I've got theft reports going back a couple of
weeks or so." Tom looked puzzled for a moment and then shot an
accusatory glance at Mick, who shrugged once again.
Mick held up a hand. "We -- Gene and I -- would have returned
them over the next couple of weeks. It isn't like we were
planning on keeping them."
Doris shook her head in disgust. "So? Damn it, Mick! I've
had neighbors getting ready to go to war with each other all
because you have some weird idea of observing Memorial Day.
Jeez, why couldn't you guys have simply asked people? Chances
are people would have let you borrow them."
Gene shook his head. "Come on, Doris. You know better than
that. If you think it's a goofy idea, do you honestly believe
anybody would loan them to us? Besides, this is private
business.
"In any event, Mick and I did plan on returning them so what
harm is there?"
"What--" Doris broke off. "Pink flamingos and lawn frogs too?
The birdbath you lifted tonight?"
"Birdbath?" This was from an increasingly confused Tom Smythe.
He frowned. "Doris, I owed it to them..."
"Owed..."
"...owed it to my mates. Damn it, there were only three of
us that got out. I'm the last of them and I ain't likely to
see another winter, let alone another spring or Memorial Day."
For the first time, Doris's expression softened. "I'm sorry,
Tom -- I don't... I mean, I didn't know--"
Mick shook his head and caught her attention. "I'll explain.
I sent word to Allied Command of the situation and so, in a
sense, I was a member of the team." Mick glanced at his two
contemporaries, got the high sign and began.
"It was sixty-one years ago day before yesterday. The Germans
were planning on bombing the hell out of the Allies in North
Africa and had decided to test a special bomb they'd been
working on for years. It was designed to blow up over a city
and spread anthrax spores all over hell.
"I learned about it and discovered the location of the
facility where they were doing the research about five weeks
before they planned to deploy for the test. I passed all of
that on to Allied Command, who quickly rustled up a team to
go in and blow up the lab. Tom was the second in command of
the commando unit that was sent in.
"To cut to the chase, they accomplished their mission even
though they lost sixteen of the nineteen men on the team.
Tom barely pulled through himself -- he spent the whole
summer recovering while we shifted him from safe house to
safe house until he healed up enough to travel and we had
a suitable route set up.
"They never released the information and Tom and the other
two were ordered to keep their mouths shut -- and like
patriotic soldiers they did."
"Why on Earth did they do that?"
Mick shrugged. "Because they were worried our own attempts
along those lines might surface if the word of the raid got
out. The Nazis weren't that much further along then we were."
Doris sighed. "Okay, I can see where this is headed." She
thought quickly for a minute and then shook her head. "I'm
still going to have to take you all in ... "
Van Horn spoke up. "The US honors the dead of the Indianapolis
and that ship carried two atomic bombs. We killed thousands
with those bombs. Here Tom and his mates stop the use of
biological warfare and get nothing. No word of thanks, no
acknowledgement of sacrifice, not even medical disability for
what they suffered. Those that survived were badly shot up --
Tom included -- and all had long term health problems stemming
from those wounds. You know what sort of shape I was in after
I got liberated from the Japanese POW camp I was in. Tom was
nearly in as bad a shape. The VA wouldn't even look at them.
The government ignored them completely."
Doris glanced at Smythe. He nodded. "It's true. What money
I get from a pension is from the school district and Social
Security." He glanced over at the memorial the three of them
had constructed. "Brian and Rob never got anything either
and when Rob died earlier this year, I..."
"...had to make some acknowledgement. Ah, crap..." Doris
sagged back in her seat. Doing the right thing is sometimes
the wrong thing, especially whenever large-scale bureaucracies
are involved.
Very softly, Mick added, "Where's the harm, Doris? Really,
who's been hurt here?"
The owners, you sawed-of Mephistopheles, she thought. The
neighbors who aren't speaking to each other anymore and are
thinking of setting up razor-wire fences.
She didn't say anything for several seconds and then looked at
Mick. "Why gnomes?"
"It seemed appropriate. The code name for the operation was
Gnome King."
Doris closed her eyes and shook her head before she looked
away toward the hillside that sported eighteen symbolic
representations of doing one's duty. She looked at Smythe,
the only living representation of how a nation rewards
inconvenient to remember service.
_Click._ It should only have been audible to Doris since it
was merely a mental affectation, but she watched Mick stiffen
with a certain amount of pleasure. "Okay, guys, you got me.
I can't force myself to haul you in. However ... " Doris let
the pause linger and stared at Mick, "here's what you're going
to do..."
Mick didn't like it one bit, but he saw the symmetry of it.
Not any of the humor but he _did_ see the symmetry. Score:
Doris 3, Mick 1, called in the ninth inning because of common
sense and perhaps, a touch of justice.
It took them ten days and cost them $992.31 but every one of
the lawn doodads and grass eyesores got returned. The owner
would step outdoors and crack a shin on the little blighters,
but all that would be forgotten when they noticed the envelope
stuffed with rental money and a written apology. And all of
the owners went to their graves wondering about the name and
rank on the tag on each lawn gnome. At least this legion of
now found gnomes would not be unknown soldiers.
Tom Smythe died comfortably fifty-nine days later, in his
sleep one hot, bright, summer afternoon as he relaxed in the
hammock which stood between two birch trees at the foot of
the private memorial.
And Doris never explained to Milt why she brought home a
rather jaunty lawn gnome, with one arm upraised and one finger
extended. She faced him eastward the day after Tom died, under
the apple tree and declined comment.
T.G. Browning (tgbrowning@comcast.net)
------------------------------------------
T.G. Browning is a traffic engineer in Oregon and has had
several stories published via the web, although he generally
spends his time writing novels.
===========================
LastText by Jason Snell
===========================
When I started InterText, I was a college student with too
much time on my hands. I always figured that once I had
children, that would be the cue to stop doing InterText.
As it turned out, having kids did coincide with the right
time to stop doing this magazine.
A lot of other life events interceded, too. My job continues
to offer me more and more challenges that leave me less time
for outside-work pursuits. My intersts on the Internet have
changed, too: I've got several other Web projects that fit
more with my interests as a 34-year-old, while InterText fit
much better in my life when I was 20.
Doing InterText as a short story magazine was always a lot
of fun, but this will be the final issue. I will tranform
intertext.com into something different, pursuing that which
interests me today. But it's my intent to keep InterText
online at www.intertext.com/magazine into the future.
As I wrap things up, I want to thank a few people: Geoff
Duncan, without whom this whole thing would never have gotten
off the ground and certainly wouldn't have stayed airborne
for as long as it did; Jeff Quan, who created such amazing
cover art over the years; Joe Dudley and the rest of the
submissions panel, who kept InterText alive much longer than
it would have lasted if I had to read every submission myself;
to all our loyal readers who have enjoyed the interesting and
quirky collections of stories we've published over the year;
and finally, to the writers of those stories, without whom
there would be have been no InterText. Not a single one of
them got a single penny from us for their stories; that
they contributed them to the cause of online publishing
is something we should never forget.
Goodbye, and good luck.
--Jason Snell
=====
FYI
=====
Back Issues of InterText
--------------------------
InterText's complete 57 issues can be found at:
<http://www.intertext.com/magazine/>
....................................................................
Hello -- I must be going. I cannot stay, I came to say,
I must be going. I'm glad I came, but just the same
I must be going.
..
This issue is wrapped as a setext. For more information send
e-mail to <setext@tidbits.com>, or contact the InterText staff
directly at <editors@intertext.com>.
$$
