The Triggerman Dance

He is soon lost to dreams, the same dreams he has had on October the fourteenth since he was twelve and hunted his first season with his father, dreams of birds rising in a blur of feathers and of pulling the trigger of a gun and watching as the birds— every one of them—fly untouched into the sky and disappear over a ridge ablaze with morning sun.

CHAPTER 13

By six a.m. on October the fifteenth Vann Holt felt like a new man, clipping along ten thousand feet above the California desert.

The Hughes 500 was set up for five passengers and cruise at a quiet 130 mph. Holt had included five in his hunting party which he believes is two too many for safe and good shooting His fourth was Juma Titisi, a Development Ministry Official from Uganda who is interested in hiring security consultants— team of them, in fact. The fifth was an old friend of Holt's from his college days, Rich Randell, now in charge of Liberty Op overseas paramilitary accounts.

Lane Fargo sat beside the pilot, lost in a conversation about grazing rights on BLM land, acres of which slipped past them ten thousand feet below.

Next to Holt was Valerie, at the window, her hair partial! stuffed up under the red Irish cycling cap she wears to hunt bird She listened politely to the Harvard-educated Titisi, holding fort on the destructiveness of tribal rivalries in his nation.

Holt listened also, or appeared to, but his attention was on his daughter, of whom he is often in quiet awe. He nodded along, looking at her from just over a foot away, pleased at the confidence he has cultivated in her, amazed at the breadth of her knowledge after taking a degree in English Literature at the University of California, Irvine. How could she possibly be familiar with the policies of Buganda province's fickle kabaka, or the hydroelectric plant near Jinja?

"I've always wanted to visit the college at Kampala," she said. "All the different African religions fascinate me."

Smiling, the tall and noble-faced Titisi invited her to stay with his family and visit the school. "You might be disappointed in its size and architecture, but the programs are rich in heritage and many of the classes are conducted in English."

"See, Dad?" asked Valerie, turning to her father. "That's why I studied English."

"It's all clear to me now."

"Dad lobbied heavily for engineering or maybe a pre-med program, but how could I let all those good books go unread?"

"And now that you've read your Shakespeare and Joyce," said Titisi, "you can think about doing something to help your country, your world."

"I've got vet school applications out."

"Overcrowded and competitive," said Randell. "Much less than a 3.85 and you're out of the running. I know because my son tried."

"I got a four-o, about two million assisting hours, and two field champion springers bred, trained and handled."

Vann Holt loved the way a young person could say the most self-aggrandizing things without sounding that way at all.

"I don't think I can help my country," Valerie continued, "but I could help some sick animals. Though here I am, going out to kill little innocent birdies and eat them for dinner. Maybe I should go into poultry ranching, more in keeping with my carnivorous lifestyle."

"Maybe you should help me run Liberty Operations," said Holt. This was an old refrain, but he had seen her interest rise in the last year. In fact, he was already luring her into the world of private security and privatized law enforcement with an odd job here and there.

Titisi and Randell laughed, and Valerie grinned at her father. Fargo looked back with his usual dour face, one thick black eyebrow raised like a gust of wind was about to blow it off.

"Have you shot quail in California?" she asked the Ugandan.

"Never."

"There's nothing like it," she said. "Although I'm sure the lions you took in the plains were pretty exciting."

Titisi looked at her a little uncertainly, not sure if this young

California brat was chiding him for shooting large cats for "sport"—though he had only done it once—or approving the primal ritual of a young Ugandan killing a lion.

"Oh, I did take one, once. Do you disapprove?"

"Yes," said Valerie. "I don't think I could kill unless I was going to eat. But I'm American and you're African, so a difference of opinion is pretty likely. I wouldn't tell a Honduran to leave his rainforest in place either, though personally I'd rather have the forest than a mahogany coffee table. Plus, we don't have lions here, so I can't be tempted. They are pure magnificence though—at least in parks."

"Miss Holt, they are more magnificent than you can imagine, running free on the Ugandan plains. And consider that then is a certain significance—for some peoples, at least—in killing an animal that could easily kill you."

Valerie went quiet. Her father watched her deep chocolate colored eyes, exactly the color of her mother's. Her hair too those pale golden curls so undisciplined and joyful—pure Carolyn, he thought. Carolyn.