| Black Mountain Lady |
Jay
Dyck
Dyck
Diary of a Goatherder 5 March 1980
Last Monday I went into town to cash my check and do some shopping. I rode a lot of
buses, ending up in Cardiff, where I stayed at my sister Katie's house.
The next day I rode buses back to El Cajon. On the way I stopped at Grossmont College
in La Mesa, to get information on attending. You see, if I go to college I can collect the GI
bill which will underwrite this goat project. From El Cajon I rode home with Danny.
Last Monday I went into town to cash my check and do some shopping. I rode a lot of
buses, ending up in Cardiff, where I stayed at my sister Katie's house.
The next day I rode buses back to El Cajon. On the way I stopped at Grossmont College
in La Mesa, to get information on attending. You see, if I go to college I can collect the GI
bill which will underwrite this goat project. From El Cajon I rode home with Danny.
| Chapter Thirty-seven ERUPTION OF GUNFIRE |
Cat one never inherited her mother's passion or talent for piano. But Vikor did. Andrea Clare showed him,
when he was just a boy with fingers, how to place them on the keys to make a chord. He went on from there, as
had his grandmother, (and inspired, perhaps, by her work, who knows?) to compose his own repertoire.
He never wrote any of it down. He never took lessons from John Taylor, in Dove Springs. During his life he
might go for months, for years, without dappling the ivories, and then he would come upon a vacant piano
bench somewhere. He would sit down, and he would play, like a child who plays in the sand, like a bird that
plays in the air, or like a waterfall that plays in the mind. Or like the wind.
He had never learned more than a few easy chords. In an hour he could run through his patient variations
and be done, his attention called elsewhere, maybe for a long, long time, maybe only until the following day.
But for that hour, how that boy's fingers would explore! Up and down through scales and lilts and lullabies and
weeping sorrows, soft and hard with rhythm and harmony, the notes would dance from the hammered strings
in familiar patterns.
Some of those patterns would have seemed familiar to Johnny Stream. He, who never had seen a piano
outside of a tavern, would have found his attention surrounded with waves of common yearning and harmony.
The handful of D's and G's that he picked from battered Stella would have blossomed, like a pinch of dandelion
seed that has turned the meadow to a symphony of gold.
He never heard his grandson play piano, but others did. The clearest trail that Vikor left as he prowled the
streets of America was the trace of melody that he carved in the memory of random strangers. Many were the
unknown fingers that paused in the air, gripping a whiskey glass or a bottle of beer hoisted to lips in the dark.
The fingers would pause while their minds were charmed by a cluster of chords from the corner that sounded
like love, or sorrow, or beauty. It was music that sounded like memory that made the customer in some
lonesome piano bar pause before his next sip. It was music that sounded like childhood and twilight that made
the solitary dame toy with her straw and close her eyes.
It was only Vikor, and they never would hear him again. Later they might read in the paper, these residents
and travelers in Birmingham, Boston, or Fort Worth, about the killing in their cities. Music lovers in El Paso,
Cleveland or Pittsburg might stir their morning coffee while the trace of a melody stirred on their lips and
never connect the carnage of the night to the solemn piano player who had amused them the afternoon before
in the cool dark of some anonymous lounge.
Folks in Atlanta, St. Louis or San Diego might hear him play while he passed the time, waiting for a flight.
They would listen to his plinks and never hear hear the loud stories that rattled through the keys. Eighty-eight
separate notes would wail contrition and murder, would scream the mournful injustice of a boy too nice to be a
killer. The listeners' own hearts would rage with whatever sorrow they could muster. The music would remind
them of the death of their own souls, the murder of their passions, the betrayal of their lusts, and the gambles
lost.
It did not remind them of murders not yet reported, or bodies not yet found.
Nor did it remind Vikor of the piano-playing of his mother, Andrea Clare Dolan. Perhaps it's a characteristic
of true creativity that it does not allow itself to see its true origins, so intent is it on its pell mell plunge into
imagination. But when Vikor was fortunate to play for a while on a grand, or a baby grand, the sight of the
parallel strings, shimmering in the dim light beneath the propped lid, would remind him of the harps of Diana.
when he was just a boy with fingers, how to place them on the keys to make a chord. He went on from there, as
had his grandmother, (and inspired, perhaps, by her work, who knows?) to compose his own repertoire.
He never wrote any of it down. He never took lessons from John Taylor, in Dove Springs. During his life he
might go for months, for years, without dappling the ivories, and then he would come upon a vacant piano
bench somewhere. He would sit down, and he would play, like a child who plays in the sand, like a bird that
plays in the air, or like a waterfall that plays in the mind. Or like the wind.
He had never learned more than a few easy chords. In an hour he could run through his patient variations
and be done, his attention called elsewhere, maybe for a long, long time, maybe only until the following day.
But for that hour, how that boy's fingers would explore! Up and down through scales and lilts and lullabies and
weeping sorrows, soft and hard with rhythm and harmony, the notes would dance from the hammered strings
in familiar patterns.
Some of those patterns would have seemed familiar to Johnny Stream. He, who never had seen a piano
outside of a tavern, would have found his attention surrounded with waves of common yearning and harmony.
The handful of D's and G's that he picked from battered Stella would have blossomed, like a pinch of dandelion
seed that has turned the meadow to a symphony of gold.
He never heard his grandson play piano, but others did. The clearest trail that Vikor left as he prowled the
streets of America was the trace of melody that he carved in the memory of random strangers. Many were the
unknown fingers that paused in the air, gripping a whiskey glass or a bottle of beer hoisted to lips in the dark.
The fingers would pause while their minds were charmed by a cluster of chords from the corner that sounded
like love, or sorrow, or beauty. It was music that sounded like memory that made the customer in some
lonesome piano bar pause before his next sip. It was music that sounded like childhood and twilight that made
the solitary dame toy with her straw and close her eyes.
It was only Vikor, and they never would hear him again. Later they might read in the paper, these residents
and travelers in Birmingham, Boston, or Fort Worth, about the killing in their cities. Music lovers in El Paso,
Cleveland or Pittsburg might stir their morning coffee while the trace of a melody stirred on their lips and
never connect the carnage of the night to the solemn piano player who had amused them the afternoon before
in the cool dark of some anonymous lounge.
Folks in Atlanta, St. Louis or San Diego might hear him play while he passed the time, waiting for a flight.
They would listen to his plinks and never hear hear the loud stories that rattled through the keys. Eighty-eight
separate notes would wail contrition and murder, would scream the mournful injustice of a boy too nice to be a
killer. The listeners' own hearts would rage with whatever sorrow they could muster. The music would remind
them of the death of their own souls, the murder of their passions, the betrayal of their lusts, and the gambles
lost.
It did not remind them of murders not yet reported, or bodies not yet found.
Nor did it remind Vikor of the piano-playing of his mother, Andrea Clare Dolan. Perhaps it's a characteristic
of true creativity that it does not allow itself to see its true origins, so intent is it on its pell mell plunge into
imagination. But when Vikor was fortunate to play for a while on a grand, or a baby grand, the sight of the
parallel strings, shimmering in the dim light beneath the propped lid, would remind him of the harps of Diana.
| * * * |
Diana never had a real harp, but she could try, and she could pretend. She spent many an hour on
Mecklinseck's ridge, listening to the wind in the high voltage lines. High on their poles the giant copper curves
would vibrate as though the air were fingers and thumbs. The same air would bring the wondrous howl of
tension into Diana's ears as she sat and listened in mystery. She would see her father's fingers in the empty
wilderness of air, and all of his songs would come back to her.
She would see him as she saw him when she was a babe in her mother's arms, the scruffy old cowboy that was
somehow a part of her. She would see his fingers dance on the strings. She would hear his wild and simple calls.
She lost him when she was seven. But that trail of campfire birdsong was forever blazed into her heart. In
school she learned about harps, the harps of the ancient balladeers of Israel and Greece and especially Ireland.
She even tried to make her own, working with crude scraps of wood and primitive tools and no instruction, so
that when she tightened her simple construction, using the old guitar strings that she found in her mother's
trunk, the tension proved too much for the fledgling harp, and it cracked and crumpled.
She had more luck with a natural fork of dead walnut that she carved and braced and strung. It worked but
the sound was faint, so she labored and carved the larger of the two tines, which had been part of the main
trunk of the old tree, into a hollow sounding box.
Had Johnny Dolan been her father, he would have coached her in his bright, sweet workshop, with blades as
keen as sunlight and wind to work the wood. All of her projects would have turned out perfectly, with smooth
fits and joints glued and braced. She would not have needed to resort to digging out the dry wood with the tip of
a screwdriver that she had sharpened on a rock.
Her pet dream was the harp she would build, were she able, in the big eucalyptus tree in Murphy's pasture.
The big tree had forked in its youth, and had forked again and again. Somehow, over the years, two of those
many tines rejoined and grew together as one trunk. The space enclosed was in the shape of a triangle standing
on its long point. This harp-like shape was a full ten feet from top to bottom, and seven feet wide.
Diana loved to imagine, as she lolled in the branches of the kind giant, how it would be to string the opening,
so that the wind could play. She could hear it in her mind, shrieking with the Santa Ana wind, crooning to the
ocean breeze, howling in a rainstorm, or quiet, plucked only by the vacant breeze.
Had it been Maggie Murphy who had the idea… had the rancher's daughter been there to make it happen…
the giant harp would have become real. For her it would have been no problem, had her partner said, "Look
how the limbs and the trunk of the big eucalyptus are formed to the shape of a harp." Maggie would have
known how; Maggie would have learned how. With brace and bits and ropes and come-along borrowed from the
ranch tool shed she would have been equal to the task of drilling and mounting eye-bolts, fastening and
clamping bright steel cables, twisting turnbuckles to tighten the strings and listening for the unmistakable
shiver of harmony.
But it was only forlorn Diana who contemplated the image of a wild harp playing at midnight in an empty
grove in a cattle pasture, and the grove itself a single, mighty tree.
Even that was gone when Vikor took his sortie through the old countryside in nineteen ninety-two. Cut down
with never a thought, he supposed. There stood a real estate office in its place.
And there was a paved road now, running right up through what had been Murphy's pasture. The real estate
office was housed in a portable building. Once the marketing of the new residences was completed, it would be
hauled away. The space would then be filled with commercial or professional buildings.
Mecklinseck's ridge, listening to the wind in the high voltage lines. High on their poles the giant copper curves
would vibrate as though the air were fingers and thumbs. The same air would bring the wondrous howl of
tension into Diana's ears as she sat and listened in mystery. She would see her father's fingers in the empty
wilderness of air, and all of his songs would come back to her.
She would see him as she saw him when she was a babe in her mother's arms, the scruffy old cowboy that was
somehow a part of her. She would see his fingers dance on the strings. She would hear his wild and simple calls.
She lost him when she was seven. But that trail of campfire birdsong was forever blazed into her heart. In
school she learned about harps, the harps of the ancient balladeers of Israel and Greece and especially Ireland.
She even tried to make her own, working with crude scraps of wood and primitive tools and no instruction, so
that when she tightened her simple construction, using the old guitar strings that she found in her mother's
trunk, the tension proved too much for the fledgling harp, and it cracked and crumpled.
She had more luck with a natural fork of dead walnut that she carved and braced and strung. It worked but
the sound was faint, so she labored and carved the larger of the two tines, which had been part of the main
trunk of the old tree, into a hollow sounding box.
Had Johnny Dolan been her father, he would have coached her in his bright, sweet workshop, with blades as
keen as sunlight and wind to work the wood. All of her projects would have turned out perfectly, with smooth
fits and joints glued and braced. She would not have needed to resort to digging out the dry wood with the tip of
a screwdriver that she had sharpened on a rock.
Her pet dream was the harp she would build, were she able, in the big eucalyptus tree in Murphy's pasture.
The big tree had forked in its youth, and had forked again and again. Somehow, over the years, two of those
many tines rejoined and grew together as one trunk. The space enclosed was in the shape of a triangle standing
on its long point. This harp-like shape was a full ten feet from top to bottom, and seven feet wide.
Diana loved to imagine, as she lolled in the branches of the kind giant, how it would be to string the opening,
so that the wind could play. She could hear it in her mind, shrieking with the Santa Ana wind, crooning to the
ocean breeze, howling in a rainstorm, or quiet, plucked only by the vacant breeze.
Had it been Maggie Murphy who had the idea… had the rancher's daughter been there to make it happen…
the giant harp would have become real. For her it would have been no problem, had her partner said, "Look
how the limbs and the trunk of the big eucalyptus are formed to the shape of a harp." Maggie would have
known how; Maggie would have learned how. With brace and bits and ropes and come-along borrowed from the
ranch tool shed she would have been equal to the task of drilling and mounting eye-bolts, fastening and
clamping bright steel cables, twisting turnbuckles to tighten the strings and listening for the unmistakable
shiver of harmony.
But it was only forlorn Diana who contemplated the image of a wild harp playing at midnight in an empty
grove in a cattle pasture, and the grove itself a single, mighty tree.
Even that was gone when Vikor took his sortie through the old countryside in nineteen ninety-two. Cut down
with never a thought, he supposed. There stood a real estate office in its place.
And there was a paved road now, running right up through what had been Murphy's pasture. The real estate
office was housed in a portable building. Once the marketing of the new residences was completed, it would be
hauled away. The space would then be filled with commercial or professional buildings.
| * * * |
"Would you like a cup of tea?" asked twenty-four year old Cat Dolan. She was sophisticated now beyond the
need to flaunt her dedication to the hunt. But she had never been able to shed the Cat. It never matured into
Cathy, but Cat One was left to reside in the halls of childhood, so far as her family was concerned.
It surprised her therefore, to hear her reveal her whole name to the muscular elf who had just introduced
himself.
"I am Selabjun Kirkhaz," he stated with formal dignity and a generous dollop of native accent. Cat had
responded with aristocratic trifle.
"I am Cat One Dolan," she meowed. "Pleased to meet you."
need to flaunt her dedication to the hunt. But she had never been able to shed the Cat. It never matured into
Cathy, but Cat One was left to reside in the halls of childhood, so far as her family was concerned.
It surprised her therefore, to hear her reveal her whole name to the muscular elf who had just introduced
himself.
"I am Selabjun Kirkhaz," he stated with formal dignity and a generous dollop of native accent. Cat had
responded with aristocratic trifle.
"I am Cat One Dolan," she meowed. "Pleased to meet you."
| * * * |
The goatherder got his bucket and went down to milk the goats. It was just after sunset. It was nearly dark
and the milking done when he saw the truck coming back up the mountainside.
Danny had come by while he was milking. The involved neighbor. The cat's real father for all Johnny knew.
So, he knew, and this and that, and it all sounded like gossip already.
Now he was waiting on the hill. Low red streaked the sky. The pale blue pickup truck was screaming its way
up the hill. It stopped at the gate.
The goatherder crouched in the blackness. His hand was comfortable resting on his gun. He knew one thing.
They were both dead shots.
He had put on a shirt and jacket, blue denim. It was cooler now, and very dark. He was hidden near the water
tank. He heard the man raving. He heard his name called. He heard himself called chicken. He was asked to
fight. He was ordered from hiding. But he stayed where he was. He cowered like a dog. He was afraid. He didn't
want to hurt his friend. But was this a friend? Michael was crazy. Johnny could have shot him any time.
"I'll be back!" cried the maniac as he returned to his truck. He jammed it into gear and tore off down the
mountainside.
What's a person to do when he is threatened? How much do you take? When does a threat become a warning?
When does a warning become a prediction?
It's kind of a built in safety factor, that you cannot kill anyone for whom you have the slightest antipathy,
anyone for whom you have the slightest motive to want dead, without placing yourself smack dab on the trail
that the bloodhounds will be following. Caution, caution, caution. Draw on your saintly reserves to the max, if
you must, to preserve yourself from being martyred on the floor of any American bar over trivialities. The best
victim is totally innocent, and the more helpless, the better.
and the milking done when he saw the truck coming back up the mountainside.
Danny had come by while he was milking. The involved neighbor. The cat's real father for all Johnny knew.
So, he knew, and this and that, and it all sounded like gossip already.
Now he was waiting on the hill. Low red streaked the sky. The pale blue pickup truck was screaming its way
up the hill. It stopped at the gate.
The goatherder crouched in the blackness. His hand was comfortable resting on his gun. He knew one thing.
They were both dead shots.
He had put on a shirt and jacket, blue denim. It was cooler now, and very dark. He was hidden near the water
tank. He heard the man raving. He heard his name called. He heard himself called chicken. He was asked to
fight. He was ordered from hiding. But he stayed where he was. He cowered like a dog. He was afraid. He didn't
want to hurt his friend. But was this a friend? Michael was crazy. Johnny could have shot him any time.
"I'll be back!" cried the maniac as he returned to his truck. He jammed it into gear and tore off down the
mountainside.
What's a person to do when he is threatened? How much do you take? When does a threat become a warning?
When does a warning become a prediction?
It's kind of a built in safety factor, that you cannot kill anyone for whom you have the slightest antipathy,
anyone for whom you have the slightest motive to want dead, without placing yourself smack dab on the trail
that the bloodhounds will be following. Caution, caution, caution. Draw on your saintly reserves to the max, if
you must, to preserve yourself from being martyred on the floor of any American bar over trivialities. The best
victim is totally innocent, and the more helpless, the better.
| * * * |
When Cat One had said, "But my desire is still alive," Agnes Tawny had responded with a question:
"Oh. And what then do you want?"
"Why, nothing," said Cat One. She blushed. "Nothing that I know of. Nothing that I have had. But
something, something new, anything."
So here it was. Here he was.
Her mother had lied to her when she told her that she herself had abandoned the trail because she fell in love.
The stone that she heaved in rejection had flown before she met Johnny Dolan. The situation had gone too far
for Andrea Clare. If her life was free she was forever in repentance of such sins of assumption and pride, if
freedom led to this. Take back, kind goddess, your protective control of my life, and save me, is what she would
have cried, had she had her voice.
Take this much of the responsibility, for I don't ever want to be anything but a victim, one of the victims, of
this horror. So she had pitched the crystal that throbbed like a red-hot serpent coiled in her fist.
"Oh. And what then do you want?"
"Why, nothing," said Cat One. She blushed. "Nothing that I know of. Nothing that I have had. But
something, something new, anything."
So here it was. Here he was.
Her mother had lied to her when she told her that she herself had abandoned the trail because she fell in love.
The stone that she heaved in rejection had flown before she met Johnny Dolan. The situation had gone too far
for Andrea Clare. If her life was free she was forever in repentance of such sins of assumption and pride, if
freedom led to this. Take back, kind goddess, your protective control of my life, and save me, is what she would
have cried, had she had her voice.
Take this much of the responsibility, for I don't ever want to be anything but a victim, one of the victims, of
this horror. So she had pitched the crystal that throbbed like a red-hot serpent coiled in her fist.
| * * * |
"I don't know," Cat One had added, looking at Agnes. And Agnes had nodded in assent, which could mean as
little as mere agreement to stay out of her way. Cat wore the crystal, now, in a pouch at her waist.
She knew all about her mother's lie. She had watched in the crystal and seen the past and the imaginary, her
mother's fear and torment during the interrupted rape, and the interruption that claimed the lives of those
that would have been, to Cat, Aunt Gloria, Uncle Tom and Uncle Joe. She had seen as well the bloody chaos
when the nameless strangers from the city had assaulted Carol Gallagher and Maggie Murphy, and the
combination of salvation and murder that Johnny Stream and Bob Cabler had brought in resolution.
Cat One had seen the final composition of rape and murder, the cold, naked body of Diana.
little as mere agreement to stay out of her way. Cat wore the crystal, now, in a pouch at her waist.
She knew all about her mother's lie. She had watched in the crystal and seen the past and the imaginary, her
mother's fear and torment during the interrupted rape, and the interruption that claimed the lives of those
that would have been, to Cat, Aunt Gloria, Uncle Tom and Uncle Joe. She had seen as well the bloody chaos
when the nameless strangers from the city had assaulted Carol Gallagher and Maggie Murphy, and the
combination of salvation and murder that Johnny Stream and Bob Cabler had brought in resolution.
Cat One had seen the final composition of rape and murder, the cold, naked body of Diana.
| * * * |
Ed French was still nursing the private scolding he had received from mysterious powers-that-be-higher-up
after his handling of the Pine Valley desert sheep debacle.
He was right then, too, and he still grinned with pride in himself over his bold action. Ed French had been on
the guest list for a reception at one of the fancy mansions tucked back into a grove of pines and manicured
lawn. This was in the community of Pine Valley, several noses up from places like Guatay and Descanso. He
was moving up in life, he told his wife, Marsha, as they approached the ornately carved front door. As game
warden, he was one of the local powers that the rich felt the need to cultivate. Ed and Marsha would be there in
the company of a retired judge, a prosperous rancher, a doctor, a school board member, and even a member of
the county board of supervisors, and others, as well as their wives and husbands.
He was right about all of that too. It was a wonder someone didn't park their cars for them. They had a
delightful evening, from the caviar to the brandy and Benedictine, from hobnobbing with the landed gentry to
enjoying the hired pianist and the sumptuousness of all in the environment that came with the evening.
The house was a mansion of big wood and stone. Cathedral ceilings vaulted over crystal chandeliers. Leather
and velvet and polished brass were keynotes. Hardwood floors and scattered Belgian carpets, tall, thick candles
and luxurious drapes, sweeping banisters, wainscot, custom molding and plush furniture made it a comfortable
home. The gates and the two inch oaken doors, the wrought iron, the alarms and the arsenal, cradled in its
walnut gun rack on the wall in the entryway, made it a castle.
Marsha's heart was swept away by the taste and the refinement. It was too bad that they were never invited
back.
Ed's own heart was stirred by the power. He was especially moved by the heads. The nameless politician,
whose home this was, was a head-hunter, a big game shooter who hung the heads of his prey on the walls of his
living room and den. He had deer and elk, moose and caribou, and African antelope till hell wouldn't have it.
He had pronghorns. He had cape buffalo. And in one special room, the room with the pool table and the beer
tap, there was one very special row of noggins. In the center of the five was a mountain goat, pure white with
horns as dark as his sightless, glass stare-balls. He was flanked by an equally magnificent Dall ram, and, on the
other side, a Stone ram of breath-taking proportions.
It was one of the heads on the end that captured Ed French's attention for good. A casual glimpse would class
it with its opposite number on the other end of the row of five horned heads, a splendid Rocky Mountain
bighorn. They were both full-curl specimens, not so rare as the Stone, not so resplendent as the Dall, not so
unique as the mountain goat, but adequate to fill out the ranks, to add impression to the hunter's shrine.
Except that the one on the end nearest to the beer, the one with more slender horns and lighter color, the one
on Ed French's right, as he stood and marveled at the gall of the greedy show off, who would display his
mischief like a senseless child, was not a Rocky Mountain sheep at all, but a desert bighorn. It was totally
protected. In California, it was not permitted even to possess the head of one of these endangered creatures,
not even if it had been imported from another state.
Ed French minded his own business that evening, taking polite notice of the surroundings, escorting his wife
and mingling with the snobs who assumed that he too was a snob.
He minded his own business the following morning when he appeared back at the residence of the great white
hunter in the company of several deputy marshals from the state, and with a warrant. They relieved the master
of his desert bighorn head, permanently, and Ed slapped a summons on the enraged but outgunned citizen
which ultimately concluded in court with the assessment of a steep fine, a conviction and a suspended sentence,
and a scolding from the bench.
It was his own scolding that left Ed French with his largest impression of the whole affair. Ostensibly friendly
warnings and suggestions from his superiors said that promotions for Warden French might come easier in a
different part of the state, if not another state altogether, and that his behavior in the continuance of his duties
at his current post must be henceforth circumspect. Or else.
His wife's apprehensions hit from a different quarter, from a strong but vague sense of polite propriety. "For
goodness sake, Ed," she expressed when he told her what he had done. "We were there as guests. You were
invited into his home as a guest. Doesn't that mean anything?"
"He knew what he had there. He knew it was prohibited. He knew what my duties were," replied Ed in self-
righteous defiance.
"So, what does that mean?"
"It means either one of two things. Either he figured me to be too stupid or ignorant to recognize a doggone
desert ram, or he figured that I would overlook it, that I would shut up and keep his little secret!"
"Oh, I don't think he thought anything of the sort…"
"No? Then why didn't he do me the courtesy of putting it out of sight in a cabinet during the reception? Why
doesn't he just hang it in his bedroom if he needs to have it so badly? He didn't invite me in there."
"Oh, come on, Ed. He probably never gave it a thought."
"No?"
"No. Honey, what's the big deal anyhow? You tell me that he says he didn't shoot it, that he bought it from
some guy, that it didn't even come from the California desert, so where is the harm?"
"Even if all that is true," Ed began and stopped. "Listen, Marsha, everybody would like to hang a desert
bighorn on their living room wall. But the law says they can't. The same government that pays this jerk's
salary says no to that. So why should he get to?"
"Do you want a dead sheep's head on your wall?"
"No," he said, and they made up. This was when he arrived home on the day that he did the deed, confiscated
the trophy and all. Marsha had no idea what the impact on their lives was really to be, as a result of her game
warden husband's high-handed tactics. They were to fight about it again, but the next time she was on his side
against the tide of bureaucratic jackass-ism that sought to overturn, derail or discredit the charges before a
court date could be kept.
after his handling of the Pine Valley desert sheep debacle.
He was right then, too, and he still grinned with pride in himself over his bold action. Ed French had been on
the guest list for a reception at one of the fancy mansions tucked back into a grove of pines and manicured
lawn. This was in the community of Pine Valley, several noses up from places like Guatay and Descanso. He
was moving up in life, he told his wife, Marsha, as they approached the ornately carved front door. As game
warden, he was one of the local powers that the rich felt the need to cultivate. Ed and Marsha would be there in
the company of a retired judge, a prosperous rancher, a doctor, a school board member, and even a member of
the county board of supervisors, and others, as well as their wives and husbands.
He was right about all of that too. It was a wonder someone didn't park their cars for them. They had a
delightful evening, from the caviar to the brandy and Benedictine, from hobnobbing with the landed gentry to
enjoying the hired pianist and the sumptuousness of all in the environment that came with the evening.
The house was a mansion of big wood and stone. Cathedral ceilings vaulted over crystal chandeliers. Leather
and velvet and polished brass were keynotes. Hardwood floors and scattered Belgian carpets, tall, thick candles
and luxurious drapes, sweeping banisters, wainscot, custom molding and plush furniture made it a comfortable
home. The gates and the two inch oaken doors, the wrought iron, the alarms and the arsenal, cradled in its
walnut gun rack on the wall in the entryway, made it a castle.
Marsha's heart was swept away by the taste and the refinement. It was too bad that they were never invited
back.
Ed's own heart was stirred by the power. He was especially moved by the heads. The nameless politician,
whose home this was, was a head-hunter, a big game shooter who hung the heads of his prey on the walls of his
living room and den. He had deer and elk, moose and caribou, and African antelope till hell wouldn't have it.
He had pronghorns. He had cape buffalo. And in one special room, the room with the pool table and the beer
tap, there was one very special row of noggins. In the center of the five was a mountain goat, pure white with
horns as dark as his sightless, glass stare-balls. He was flanked by an equally magnificent Dall ram, and, on the
other side, a Stone ram of breath-taking proportions.
It was one of the heads on the end that captured Ed French's attention for good. A casual glimpse would class
it with its opposite number on the other end of the row of five horned heads, a splendid Rocky Mountain
bighorn. They were both full-curl specimens, not so rare as the Stone, not so resplendent as the Dall, not so
unique as the mountain goat, but adequate to fill out the ranks, to add impression to the hunter's shrine.
Except that the one on the end nearest to the beer, the one with more slender horns and lighter color, the one
on Ed French's right, as he stood and marveled at the gall of the greedy show off, who would display his
mischief like a senseless child, was not a Rocky Mountain sheep at all, but a desert bighorn. It was totally
protected. In California, it was not permitted even to possess the head of one of these endangered creatures,
not even if it had been imported from another state.
Ed French minded his own business that evening, taking polite notice of the surroundings, escorting his wife
and mingling with the snobs who assumed that he too was a snob.
He minded his own business the following morning when he appeared back at the residence of the great white
hunter in the company of several deputy marshals from the state, and with a warrant. They relieved the master
of his desert bighorn head, permanently, and Ed slapped a summons on the enraged but outgunned citizen
which ultimately concluded in court with the assessment of a steep fine, a conviction and a suspended sentence,
and a scolding from the bench.
It was his own scolding that left Ed French with his largest impression of the whole affair. Ostensibly friendly
warnings and suggestions from his superiors said that promotions for Warden French might come easier in a
different part of the state, if not another state altogether, and that his behavior in the continuance of his duties
at his current post must be henceforth circumspect. Or else.
His wife's apprehensions hit from a different quarter, from a strong but vague sense of polite propriety. "For
goodness sake, Ed," she expressed when he told her what he had done. "We were there as guests. You were
invited into his home as a guest. Doesn't that mean anything?"
"He knew what he had there. He knew it was prohibited. He knew what my duties were," replied Ed in self-
righteous defiance.
"So, what does that mean?"
"It means either one of two things. Either he figured me to be too stupid or ignorant to recognize a doggone
desert ram, or he figured that I would overlook it, that I would shut up and keep his little secret!"
"Oh, I don't think he thought anything of the sort…"
"No? Then why didn't he do me the courtesy of putting it out of sight in a cabinet during the reception? Why
doesn't he just hang it in his bedroom if he needs to have it so badly? He didn't invite me in there."
"Oh, come on, Ed. He probably never gave it a thought."
"No?"
"No. Honey, what's the big deal anyhow? You tell me that he says he didn't shoot it, that he bought it from
some guy, that it didn't even come from the California desert, so where is the harm?"
"Even if all that is true," Ed began and stopped. "Listen, Marsha, everybody would like to hang a desert
bighorn on their living room wall. But the law says they can't. The same government that pays this jerk's
salary says no to that. So why should he get to?"
"Do you want a dead sheep's head on your wall?"
"No," he said, and they made up. This was when he arrived home on the day that he did the deed, confiscated
the trophy and all. Marsha had no idea what the impact on their lives was really to be, as a result of her game
warden husband's high-handed tactics. They were to fight about it again, but the next time she was on his side
against the tide of bureaucratic jackass-ism that sought to overturn, derail or discredit the charges before a
court date could be kept.
| * * * |
Cat One bit her lip, and the wind howled. The ash was stinging her eyes and her cheeks. She squinted and
looked about her. Agnes was gone. The crystal was gone. The only sound was the wind lashing about her ears
and her hair. The ash moved, in clouds like swirling smoke, but silent, as if in a dream. She took a step and
ashes crunched beneath her feet. She looked down. She fancied that she could see, in the crumbled chunks of
burned residue, bones.
She fancied she could hear them shriek, but it was the wind that screamed. She fancied she could hear the
elaborate scorn of persecution, but it was the wind that laughed. She thought she heard the weeping of mothers
and widows, but it was the wind that cried.
looked about her. Agnes was gone. The crystal was gone. The only sound was the wind lashing about her ears
and her hair. The ash moved, in clouds like swirling smoke, but silent, as if in a dream. She took a step and
ashes crunched beneath her feet. She looked down. She fancied that she could see, in the crumbled chunks of
burned residue, bones.
She fancied she could hear them shriek, but it was the wind that screamed. She fancied she could hear the
elaborate scorn of persecution, but it was the wind that laughed. She thought she heard the weeping of mothers
and widows, but it was the wind that cried.
| * * * |
Seems like everyone was carrying guns out there in those days. Friends and strangers. And the police. Every
confrontation involved guns. Even the women had `em.
At some of the parties, with all the drinking that was going on, things got pretty weird.
Especially after Bob Cabler arrived. That was later on. But a few years earlier, Bob had been working and
living in his aunt's stables east of Del Mar, on the south fringe of Rancho Santa Fe. Johnny was on a ship in
San Diego at the time, and on nights with a full moon they would ride till near dawn. Bob had a horse, Spot.
Johnny would ride Widowmaker, a compact, spirited mare. They knew all the trails that spread like a maze
through the canyons and mesas surrounding Black Mountain.
Drifting around the hills, galloping down the cool dust, hard winter mud, bean field stubble, grass, they passed
a jug of wine; they shared cans of Copenhagen snuff. Hill rats.
One morning, New Year's Day, as a matter of fact, Bob was up early to feed the horses. He went into his
aunt's office to straighten it up. They had sat in there the night before, drinking wine and tequila, playing a
phonograph and singing along with Roy Roger's songs.
There was a typewriter on the desk. In it was a piece of paper. He began to read.
"Once upon a time there were two friends named Bob and Johnny." And it went on to describe them as
reckless, happy-go-lucky sorts who chose to spend their time riding horses through the hills and canyons
around Black Mountain.
After Bob read the story, he folded it and put it into his wallet. It stayed there for years, becoming tattered
and weak on the creases, being hauled out at parties over the years to be read again, a traditional legend.
One day, so the story goes, these two were out riding. Bob was on Spot, and Johnny was on Widowmaker.
They were making their way at a relaxed pace through one of the narrow, brush-lined canyons way out near the
mountain. Suddenly they heard a woman scream. They spurred their horses to the top of a rise, and observed
what was going on in the hollow ahead.
First off, there was a Studebaker panel truck, parked out "where Studie-panels were never meant to go." To
the two young men in this very short tale, it looked like the two young women were being raped by a gang of
city-slicker hooligans. Hard to know what was going on in the head of a character that was made up on the
"spur" of the moment by a drunk in a barn on New Year's Eve.
The story went on, however, with events degenerating at a violent rate. In fact, the reader is suddenly treated
to the scene of an afternoon that "erupted in gunfire". Whether this page was just a rough draft or what, the
narrative is not very explicit as regards details of this part.
Some of these details are supplied here.
There was a tall, lanky fellow, mean-looking, tough-looking. Wearing engineer boots, a dirty tee-shirt, a dirty
silver studded belt. He had angular features, and scruffy whiskers trimmed in a way that suggested antagonism
and inbreeding, possibly brain damage.
He was hit in the elbow by a bullet… actually his elbow was blown to bloody mush by a .44 slug. To hear this
guy, you'd think a puppy was being skinned alive. He was hopping around, spraying blood on everyone.
Meanwhile, the so-called "hail of lead" was being acted out once more. In this case, most of the shots seemed
to be hits, rather than misses. The boys just weren't missing anything for a while there. It was real bloody, but
then Bob's horse got to bucking, with all the noise and yelling. He was drunker'n shit and just sailed right off
and hit the open door of the panel truck edge-on. It just about killed him, did kill him eventually, if you think
about it.
At any rate, his face was split open, besides which he fell down beside the girl, the same girl that Mr. Tall and
Tough's partner had been raping or molesting or beating or whatever before he had been shot. This girl grabbed
a rock the size of a tennis ball and started caving in the back of Bob's head. Whack! Whack! Whack! Each blow
reduced the target further to a mass of tangled yellow hair and blood. On the third "whack" the girl's own head
shattered from the last bullet out of Johnny's gun.
confrontation involved guns. Even the women had `em.
At some of the parties, with all the drinking that was going on, things got pretty weird.
Especially after Bob Cabler arrived. That was later on. But a few years earlier, Bob had been working and
living in his aunt's stables east of Del Mar, on the south fringe of Rancho Santa Fe. Johnny was on a ship in
San Diego at the time, and on nights with a full moon they would ride till near dawn. Bob had a horse, Spot.
Johnny would ride Widowmaker, a compact, spirited mare. They knew all the trails that spread like a maze
through the canyons and mesas surrounding Black Mountain.
Drifting around the hills, galloping down the cool dust, hard winter mud, bean field stubble, grass, they passed
a jug of wine; they shared cans of Copenhagen snuff. Hill rats.
One morning, New Year's Day, as a matter of fact, Bob was up early to feed the horses. He went into his
aunt's office to straighten it up. They had sat in there the night before, drinking wine and tequila, playing a
phonograph and singing along with Roy Roger's songs.
There was a typewriter on the desk. In it was a piece of paper. He began to read.
"Once upon a time there were two friends named Bob and Johnny." And it went on to describe them as
reckless, happy-go-lucky sorts who chose to spend their time riding horses through the hills and canyons
around Black Mountain.
After Bob read the story, he folded it and put it into his wallet. It stayed there for years, becoming tattered
and weak on the creases, being hauled out at parties over the years to be read again, a traditional legend.
One day, so the story goes, these two were out riding. Bob was on Spot, and Johnny was on Widowmaker.
They were making their way at a relaxed pace through one of the narrow, brush-lined canyons way out near the
mountain. Suddenly they heard a woman scream. They spurred their horses to the top of a rise, and observed
what was going on in the hollow ahead.
First off, there was a Studebaker panel truck, parked out "where Studie-panels were never meant to go." To
the two young men in this very short tale, it looked like the two young women were being raped by a gang of
city-slicker hooligans. Hard to know what was going on in the head of a character that was made up on the
"spur" of the moment by a drunk in a barn on New Year's Eve.
The story went on, however, with events degenerating at a violent rate. In fact, the reader is suddenly treated
to the scene of an afternoon that "erupted in gunfire". Whether this page was just a rough draft or what, the
narrative is not very explicit as regards details of this part.
Some of these details are supplied here.
There was a tall, lanky fellow, mean-looking, tough-looking. Wearing engineer boots, a dirty tee-shirt, a dirty
silver studded belt. He had angular features, and scruffy whiskers trimmed in a way that suggested antagonism
and inbreeding, possibly brain damage.
He was hit in the elbow by a bullet… actually his elbow was blown to bloody mush by a .44 slug. To hear this
guy, you'd think a puppy was being skinned alive. He was hopping around, spraying blood on everyone.
Meanwhile, the so-called "hail of lead" was being acted out once more. In this case, most of the shots seemed
to be hits, rather than misses. The boys just weren't missing anything for a while there. It was real bloody, but
then Bob's horse got to bucking, with all the noise and yelling. He was drunker'n shit and just sailed right off
and hit the open door of the panel truck edge-on. It just about killed him, did kill him eventually, if you think
about it.
At any rate, his face was split open, besides which he fell down beside the girl, the same girl that Mr. Tall and
Tough's partner had been raping or molesting or beating or whatever before he had been shot. This girl grabbed
a rock the size of a tennis ball and started caving in the back of Bob's head. Whack! Whack! Whack! Each blow
reduced the target further to a mass of tangled yellow hair and blood. On the third "whack" the girl's own head
shattered from the last bullet out of Johnny's gun.
| * * * |
It became all too real for Cat One Dolan, and even that she had asked for, when Diana came back at her
through the mystical, crystalline web and demanded with the proprietary authority of a goddess, the sacrifice of
Cat's first-born, Vikor.
The irony of Cat One's temptation cannot be grasped without understanding that she herself thought that "all
too real" became so when she was forced to spread her legs for Selabjun Kirkhaz, her Central Asian conqueror,
her Genghis Khan.
Certainly it was all too real when she finally asserted the primal dominance that has always been the last
resort of submissive but ultimately triumphant female-kind. She had not been defeated in the muscle to
muscle struggle on the ledge. She had retreated, had measured her opposition and responded analytically, had
circled through time and humility, had sacrificed herself, had let go of herself like a thrown axe and had
fiercely drawn herself free of her savaged target.
Selabjun relaxed, spent with the exertion, and the release, of his consummation with his American Mara. He
did not see it as rape. Resistance and submission were merely part of a sequence to him, a sequence that began
with the offer of a cup of tea.
through the mystical, crystalline web and demanded with the proprietary authority of a goddess, the sacrifice of
Cat's first-born, Vikor.
The irony of Cat One's temptation cannot be grasped without understanding that she herself thought that "all
too real" became so when she was forced to spread her legs for Selabjun Kirkhaz, her Central Asian conqueror,
her Genghis Khan.
Certainly it was all too real when she finally asserted the primal dominance that has always been the last
resort of submissive but ultimately triumphant female-kind. She had not been defeated in the muscle to
muscle struggle on the ledge. She had retreated, had measured her opposition and responded analytically, had
circled through time and humility, had sacrificed herself, had let go of herself like a thrown axe and had
fiercely drawn herself free of her savaged target.
Selabjun relaxed, spent with the exertion, and the release, of his consummation with his American Mara. He
did not see it as rape. Resistance and submission were merely part of a sequence to him, a sequence that began
with the offer of a cup of tea.
| * * * |
The afternoon erupted into silence. Johnny was still on his horse, Bob was unconscious but breathing, and the
other girl was alive.
The story brushes over most of that. The storyteller rushes on to the end, which is a nostalgic remembrance
of these two colorful characters who had both since died but were buried "right around here" somewhere. It
turns out that one of them was the father of the story-teller, whom by the tone of her tale one takes to be a
young lady who probably drawls in an appealing and country way that suggests illiteracy and freckles.
But her mother "never would tell" which one of these two bold heroes was really her dad, so she was more or
less free to have both.
She talked about it this way, though none of this was in that first hastily typed draft:
"It really was like I had two daddies, the way I remember them. I was pretty young still when they both died.
But I remember how both of them were always around, those years. By the time I was born, Daddy Bob was all
better from the big battle. I always heard about how Ma had took care of him and nursed him back to health.
That was when him and Daddy Johnny and Ma and me were all hiding out in the arsenic mine. And I guess I
was born there. Imagine being born in an arsenic mine! No wonder they say such things about me.
"But back then… oh, I don't know, it was a different kind of life. Even when we had a house. `Course later on
we had a house all the time, but that was after my daddies were killed. Before that, I remember once we lived
in a barley silo for a while in the winter. That was nice. Compare that, I guess, to when I was still a baby and we
spent rainy nights under the Shaw Valley bridge with the water level rising, everybody cold and huddled
together, and me the only one with a full stomach, `cause I was still nursing.
"But I can remember later times when it was good. We had that one old place for more than a year. You
couldn't even drive to it; nobody knew it was still there, but there we were, the four of us just like any home,
with pots and pans and dishes, and sheets and books sitting around. And outside the giant chaparral crowding
around the old shack like a thousand year old enchanted forest."
other girl was alive.
The story brushes over most of that. The storyteller rushes on to the end, which is a nostalgic remembrance
of these two colorful characters who had both since died but were buried "right around here" somewhere. It
turns out that one of them was the father of the story-teller, whom by the tone of her tale one takes to be a
young lady who probably drawls in an appealing and country way that suggests illiteracy and freckles.
But her mother "never would tell" which one of these two bold heroes was really her dad, so she was more or
less free to have both.
She talked about it this way, though none of this was in that first hastily typed draft:
"It really was like I had two daddies, the way I remember them. I was pretty young still when they both died.
But I remember how both of them were always around, those years. By the time I was born, Daddy Bob was all
better from the big battle. I always heard about how Ma had took care of him and nursed him back to health.
That was when him and Daddy Johnny and Ma and me were all hiding out in the arsenic mine. And I guess I
was born there. Imagine being born in an arsenic mine! No wonder they say such things about me.
"But back then… oh, I don't know, it was a different kind of life. Even when we had a house. `Course later on
we had a house all the time, but that was after my daddies were killed. Before that, I remember once we lived
in a barley silo for a while in the winter. That was nice. Compare that, I guess, to when I was still a baby and we
spent rainy nights under the Shaw Valley bridge with the water level rising, everybody cold and huddled
together, and me the only one with a full stomach, `cause I was still nursing.
"But I can remember later times when it was good. We had that one old place for more than a year. You
couldn't even drive to it; nobody knew it was still there, but there we were, the four of us just like any home,
with pots and pans and dishes, and sheets and books sitting around. And outside the giant chaparral crowding
around the old shack like a thousand year old enchanted forest."
