The Triggerman Dance

The light of her approach brings out only the darkness in his own killer's soul. He goes out to the shaded cool of the porch to welcome her. He smiles but it feels like a grimace. He watches as Boomer, Bonnie and Belle charge into the meadow and commence an assault upon the springers. Valerie stops to watch, then joins John in the shade. She smiles.

"Dad wants us to have dinner with him tonight."

"He's back?"

"Called from the jet. He'll be here by six."

"Everything okay?"

"He sounds elated. I suspect Titisi has signed on."

"That's good news."

She turns and looks back at the meadow to the dogs. Her hair is stacked up under the cap and coming loose like it always seems to be. "Whatcha been doin'?"

"Making a list of editors to call. I'm thinking I might not want to live out in that desert anymore."

"Be nice to have you closer. Help me with the dogs."

"That would be nice."

"You don't have a crush on me, do you?"

"No.

"She tries to smile, but her smile is buried by the sudden redness of her face. "Lane says you do. And that you're trustworthy as a rattlesnake. That's what this revolver here is for—rattlers."

"Thought you were going to say for me."

"Naw. I couldn't shoot the guy who saved my virginity. Not until I properly thanked him, anyway."

She pauses and looks at him with a half-grin on her face, the kind where the bottom teeth show just a little and give her a look of mischief. Then she blushes again, washing the smile away.

"Just a little crush, maybe?"

"Maybe."

She takes a deep breath. "I'm going for a walk. Wanna come?"

"Sure."

They start out around the lake. The dogs thunder past them and crash into the water, fighting over a stick. Boomer has it and all the others appear to be tearing him to shreds to get it away. The sun is warm on John's face and for a moment, the cold dead feeling inside him is in abeyance. When they reach the place where he had seen Vann, Carolyn and Pat Holt some twenty-three years ago, he tells her the story of Carlos and the cave and how her mother looked with Valerie inside.

Valerie stops. "Right here?"

"Yeah. About here is where they were. You were."

"I'm kind of moved by that."

"It's just a story."

"No. It's more. I think you're somebody. Somebody who was sent here for a reason. Sent you then, and sends you now. God, maybe, or the devil."

Her unwitting accuracy corners John into silence. He nods. "She was wearing a white dress."

"Mom always wore white. Did you see the spring in the cave?"

"I slept beside it."

"It's still there, you know. I mean, I haven't been to the cave in years, but the spring's still there or the lake wouldn't be. We should go see it sometimes. How about tomorrow afternoon? I'll pack more food and we'll call it a picnic. Sick of my cooking yet?"

"That quail was world class."

"Settled, then.

"They continue on for a while without talking. John feels the jitters leaving his nerves, replaced by the mild happiness of knowing one's body is alive, of feeling it move, of being in the company of someone it is drawn to.

He notes something shiny on the path before he even sees it. He feels his body draw up tight as he registers the shape, a shape familiar to the deep part of the human mind—a very large rattlesnake stretched out in the dirt ahead. Reflexively he reaches for Valerie but she has already stepped forward, holding her revolver with both hands, glancing quickly back at the dogs. The sound of the gun slams into John's ears, the barrel jumps and the sand explodes red around the snake's head. The serpent retracts into tight coil, rattle buzzing off, then on, then off again. The dogs blunder toward it and John tries to grab Boomer's collar.

"Don't worry, it's out of commission," says Valerie.

"I'm not so sure."

"I am."

The springers try to converge but Valerie yells them off. John's dogs obey her firm command to sit. Boomer eyes John with the pride of finding an item of such vast importance. Valerie touches the snake with her boot and it strikes, knocking its heat less stump of a neck against her ankle. It rattles again. She slide her toe under it and flips in into the bushes. It twists white in the air, then vanishes out of sight, still buzzing.

"I don't like to do that," she says. "But I lost two pups to rattlers. One died and the other one couldn't move his legs, so we had to put him down. Rattlesnakes aren't welcome on Liberty Ridge anymore."

John looks at her and sees a darkness of mood has pushed the softness from her face. It is a wholly new countenance, or that speaks of regretful obligation, of acts finished only to the soul's remorse. She looks more like her father than herself.

"Well, nice shot," he says.

"Pretty easy, if you graduate from the Liberty Ops pistol school at the age of seventeen."

"Top of the class?"

"Yes. Dogs are family to me. And I'll do anything to protect family."