M. Sellars - In the bleak midwinter

Eventually, he gave up and contented himself with working on the family farm. After that, he had no greater plans in mind other than convincing Kathy Higgins to marry him.

Then, the position for a deputy sheriff opened up. Sheriff Morton had taken a chance on him and soon afterward was making calls. No matter what the old man said, Skip knew he had called in some markers on his behalf.

And now here he was, on the verge of what could be his perfect career. The only problem was that the career was still on the horizon. Right now, he was just a deputy sheriff in a small town where the worst thing that ever happened was a drunk and disorderly call that didn’t even end up on the books because it was someone you knew and you just drove them home, or let them sleep it off in the holding cell for a few hours.

He had been trained, yes; Sheriff Morton had seen to that. But he hadn’t been prepared for something like this. Besides, training wasn’t everything; experience was often the real teacher, and that was something he sorely lacked. Even he would admit that he was green enough to sprout roots if he stood still long enough.

And it was for that very reason, as well as the fact that in Hulis everyone seemed to be family whether related by blood or not, that he did the only thing he could think of to do. He opened his mouth, and what came out was something that would have caused any seasoned law enforcement veteran to cringe.

“Don’t worry Missus Callahan,” he said. “It’s going to be fine. I promise I’ll find Merrie. I’m sure she’s just fine. I promise…”

PLASTIC slammed hard against plastic. The initial noise made by the sudden clash of handset versus cradle was short-lived, but the echo and resulting forlorn ping of the telephone’s metal ringer hung on a bit longer. Not only did they linger in the air, they joined together and carried through the open transom above the closed door of Sheriff Morton’s office. The blended sound continued, unhindered by obstacles from that point on as it zipped across the span of the room and entered Clovis’s ears.

She swiveled around, startled by the sudden noise and the resulting commotion. Through the large windows on the back wall she could see that the sheriff was up from his desk and moving about his office in a purposeful fashion. It had only been a couple of minutes since Missus Babbs had called and asked to speak to him, apparently at Skip’s insistence. She didn’t yet have the details, but she got the impression they would be coming soon. The urgency in the woman’s voice had already given her a very bad feeling.

And now there was this.

A few seconds later the office door swung open and Sheriff Morton stormed out. He was heading straight for her desk, one arm stuffed into a sleeve of his coat while he fought to fill the other as well. An index card was tucked between his lips.

Given his expression, he didn’t seem like he was angry. Actually, he appeared more than just a little concerned and without a doubt, completely driven. Now Clovis was definitely worried.

“What’s wro…” she started to ask.

He cut her off as he yanked the index card out of his mouth, tossed it onto the desk in front of her, and began to bark instructions. “I need you to get these descriptions out to Carl and tell him to keep his eyes open. Tell him if he sees this car, pull it over and radio for backup. Then call Joe and Edgar and give the info to them too. Tell them they’re on the clock as of ten minutes ago. You’ll want to plan on working late too. Might wanna call Carol too. Get her in here to help.”

Clovis glanced quickly at the card. The lined stock was covered with a scribble of notes, legible, but obviously jotted in a hurry. Before she could utter any sort of response to what had already been said, the sheriff continued. “I want you to send Joe to the west end of town; tell him the same as Carl, keep his eyes open. If he sees the car, pull it over, call for backup. Have Edgar head over to Bremerton’s to help Carmichael. And then I want you to get the Highway Patrol on the line…”

When he paused long enough to suck in a quick breath, Clovis jumped on the chance and interjected a question, “What’s going on?”

“A goddamned false alarm, I hope,” he replied, then grunted hard as he finally managed to force his free arm through the other sleeve and shrug completely into his coat. “But right now it sure looks a lot like we’ve got an abduction on our hands.”

At his words, Clovis felt her heart slide up into her throat. The sharp pain of sympathetic fear washed over her immediately behind the first sensation, causing a strange hollowness to form deep inside her chest. She imagined it was probably the empty space where her heart used to be.

“Are… Are you sure?”

“Not yet, but it sure looks bad. And, I trust Carmichael. Something had to set him off for him to have Ruth call me.”

“What do you want me to tell the Highway Patrol?” Clovis asked, croaking out the words past the sudden tightness in her voice. Still looking at the sheriff, she reached sideways for the base microphone and fumbled after it with a shaky hand until she managed to grasp the neck and pull it toward her.

“Everything I just told you,” he replied, turning and starting toward the front door. “And have them run this John Carter for priors, just to be sure.”

She shouted after him. “Where are you going?”

A swirl of snow streamed inward on the sudden draft that was created when he tugged the door open with a quick jerk. He started forward into the storm while calling back to her, “I’m heading over to the Greenleaf to check on something. I’ll radio in just a few…”

Harsh light spewed from a pair of un-shrouded flood lamps and pooled on the parking lot just beyond Bremerton’s back door. The bulbs themselves angled slightly downward and were screwed into a fixture that was mounted a few feet above the top of the opening on the outside wall. The glare spread outward, throwing itself with singular purpose at the encroaching darkness.

Undaunted, the artificial illumination put up an admirable fight against insurmountable odds, but in the end it lacked the strength to fully overwhelm the night. Somewhere near the center of the back parking lot the opposing forces grappled, blending together in a murky gray skirmish, flanked on either side by the two sworn enemies, light and dark.

Deputy Carmichael paused at the threshold and gazed out into the wide arc of diminishing light created by the ongoing clash. Fat, crystalline flakes were filling the air before him, streaming down, diagonally, sideways, and even twisting in violent, short-lived swirls on sudden gusts of wind. As the frozen precipitation plummeted toward the ground, it was simultaneously reflecting the brilliance of the high-wattage bulbs, and casting oblique, animated shadows upon the already snow-covered surface of the asphalt.

Skip had hurriedly walked the interior of the store, from front to back, calling Merrie’s name as he went, and identifying himself aloud as well. If the little girl was simply hiding, he wanted her to know that the police were involved now and that the game had moved from simply annoying to downright serious. However, he received no answer from her, and though he had said exactly the opposite to her mother, he hadn’t really been expecting one. In his mind, that lack of expectation was supported by what he found at the back of the store.

The first thing to catch his eye when he reached the “North Pole” fantasyland was the angle of the cardboard fireplace. In the grand scheme of things it wasn’t off by much. No more than a few inches, really. In fact, the average onlooker might not have even noticed anything wrong about it at all, but the disruption to its positioning was more than enough to grab Skip’s attention. The fake logs with their orange cellophane embers were still pretending to burn, most likely exactly where they’d been placed originally. The fireplace facade itself, however, was askew by more than enough to fully expose the motorized workings of the flickering light behind the glowing hearth. Moreover, it was resting at an angle that suggested it had been struck by someone or something that was headed for the nearby storeroom door, and in a bit of a hurry. Under everyday circumstances, while the disruption to the scenery was certainly something he would notice, it wasn’t something that he would consider all that important, because there could easily be any number of mundane explanations for the issue.