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Bear Derrick was a local skin, and a reporter.
Hunching his shoulders he glared at Benny on the trip north to Moyock.
"Why won't you tell us, Grey?"
Benny looked back. A cool, bitter smile mocked John
and his friend.
"Everything comes in time. Let it be."
Benny's hand slashed a line between them the reporter could not cross. In the
back of Derrick's mind an eagle screamed a warning. The howl of a wolf rose
above the soft keening of millions of the People. Cold sweat darkening his
jacket collar, Derrick scowled.
"Not a believer?" Benny mocked him with a
cold look a John. "You been away from the People, man. You left the
Eagle-Way."
Benny smiled to himself.
"Stands-around-the-fort."
Derrick's teeth showed.
"I am not an apple."
"What moves you? Gas?" Getting only a bland
smile, the reporter cursed under his breath. "Look, I only want to stop
them before they do our People more harm." Almost driven to violence by the
blank face Derrick shook his head.
"Gee, no BS?" Benny laughed. "You only
want an exclusive."
Benny turned away from the shouts rising at him to
stare at a bleak winter's landscape. He closed his eye to it.
'Come home come home come home.'
Balancing on the top rail, Little John held hard onto
Benny's shoulder. The boy was running a currycomb down the black dorsal stripe
of one of the mares.
Benny smiled encouragement at John and pushed gently
at the mare with power until she dozed, her velvet soft muzzle brushing the last
of the sweet feed in her manger.
The thread of a presence warned him. Benny looked up
and the door opened. To his relief Millie stepped inside. She smiled at Benny, a
brief painful spasm.
She stood near them until John demanded, "Down.
Gotta go the babe's legs, man."
At the attempt by her grandson to imitate Benny,
Millie chuckled.
"Nah, bro. You gotta move on out. It's almost
supper time, and you need to get the horse cleaned off a you." In an aside
to Millie, Benny whispered, "He fell in one of the stalls before I cleaned
it." Benny grinned, his teeth a flash of pure white in the dim lighting and
he held his nose.
"Oh lord." Millie's eyes rolled upward in
mirth. "Boys. A mother's favorite, a father's renewal."
The boy scampered out of the barn without a word of
protest, something Millie noted with awe.
Benny untied the mare, and she blew a cloud of
molasses scented chaff in his face. He stroked her muzzle and smiled at her.
Benny glanced at Millie. She was relaxed and enjoying
the pleasure horses brought, just by being near.
"Millie?"
Something in the tone of his voice brought her up
sharp. She looked at Benny. He glanced away.
"I . . . got to be going. Leaving, I mean."
Feeling awkward before the woman (chrisake, a history teacher), Benny mumbled an
apology at the straw in the bricked aisle way under their feet.
Millie went very, very still. "Ron . . . won't
like it, Benny. the investigation is still on-going. Could be for quite a
while." Forever, she hoped. Dear Lord, don't let him leave. Only by
strength of will did she keep from wringing her hands.
"I didn't do it, and they all know it."
Benny tried to smile. In the back of his mind he could hear them calling to him.
Wild geese . . . going north, going home.
They left the stables, and Benny held the door for her
against the gusts of wind coming up from the south. Millie took the wood chip
path rather than the more direct route through the garden. She needed time to
think, to calm herself. Sorrow laced through her heart, and they walked up the
steps to the back porch. The sun was casting its shadows through the trees.
Millie patted Benny's arm and motioned at a rocking chair. She took the other.
Benny slipped off his jacket and gingerly took the
chair. Ron's chair. That alone made him nervous. Taking out his bandanna, he
patted the sweat from his face and neck. Moisture pooled in the empty socket of
his right eye, irritating him, but he ignored it. No use spooking Millie with
the scars. Some women liked it though, like Sweet-Bottom. It made things hotter
all around. Benny almost smiled at that. Sweet-Bottom's lips and tongue driving
him wild. Benny let a sigh escape his mouth. She was better off. Even the
Project would think twice before snatching an officer of the Corps.
His back itched, right between his shoulder blades. It
was driving him nuts. Like he was being watched.
His good eye swept the forest. The ravens were busy
hunting bugs and crap like that. If someone strange were in the woods they'd be
going wild.
Slow and measured, she rocked. Millie glanced at Benny
and started to speak several times only to close her mouth. He wasn't hers, no
matter how her heart ached to comfort him.
"I got a call from Terry Marie this
morning," she said, and they watched a raven drop to the ground to hunt
mice.
"Oh?"
"She said she wouldn't be going to America de Sud
next month. In fact, she's going to be taking an indefinite leave from the Corps
starting this spring. She'll be coming home for her leave." Millie took a
deep breath and closed her eyes and didn't say what she needed to say. Lord
knows Terry Marie worshiped Benny, despite the few years difference in their
ages. But did she really know him? Benny was soft-spoken, each word chosen
carefully, every expression on his face schooled, almost wary. He was so gentle,
loving and kind.
But had he murdered the Longs?
Millie shook her head. He couldn't have. Not Benny.
Yes, he was a good boy. He adored children and old people. He refused to take
anything for lending a hand. And he loved women. Perhaps too much. She watched
him build a smoke.
It wasn't her place to question Benny. If Ron actually
believe Benny had killed the Long couple he would have taken Benny into custody,
not sheltered him under his own roof. Millie sighed. They had no hold on the
boy. Except for Terry Marie. He would stay for Terry Marie's sake, of that she
was certain.
Voice shrill with guilt at her part in this
blackmailing, she said, "Terry Marie is with child."
He stared at Millie. It was on the tip of his tongue
to ask whose child it was. And couldn't. Terry Marie was a lot of things, but
she wasn't promiscuous, and she always used protection, had an implant. He
flushed and the cigarette cupped in his hand shook ever so slightly in the dying
light.
Sweet-Bottom . . . she complained that her thigh was
sore. Had a sore spot. God, no. She had worn a Band-Aid where the implant should
have been during their last few weeks, down on LeJeune before that argument.
He stood, flicked the cigarette over the banister of
the porch.
"Millie-"
Looking at the woman, he ground his teeth together and
thrust his hands deep into his back pockets. Turning away, his eye searched the
horizon for the geese he could hear so plain but could never see. Benny knelt at
her feet. "When they ask who the father is, she has to tell them he's
somebody else's. Some guy that died or moved away. Please, Millie?" He
touched her arm, his eye clouded with unwanted moisture. "Terry will know
why. If . . . the Feds find out about the kid they'll take him. Her, too, maybe.
Ask John about the Project. God, Millie, don't look at me that way."
Before she could speak, he leaped to his feet and
bounded over the rail of the porch. In numb silence she watched Benny vault the
rails to the pasture and then he was gone.
The door opened. She looked up at her husband.
"You tell him?"
Millie nodded, and the phone started to jangle.
Feeling the years press her down, Millie stood, moved
passed Ron into the kitchen to answer it.
"And?"
She measured her words, schooling her emotions.
"He said he can't stay with her, Ron. We have to call Terry Marie and find
out why."
©2003 StoriesByEmail.com
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