T. Parker - The Triggerman Dance

John stands there, watching them stuff Valerie back into her Jeep. The tablecloth skids across the gravel in the wind. The silver domes and china lie on the ground like old treasures. Susan Baum still sits at the table, silent, shivering and unseeing beneath the monumental bronzes of the Holt family.

Fargo drives the Jeep away.

You did your job.

A while later a helicopter descends toward Top of the World in a lazy spiral and three Bureau sedans trail their way up from the road below.

John is sitting on the stone bench next to Baum when the cars make the summit. Though he has an arm around her shaking body and though he mutters words of comfort to her, John feels nothing but darkness inside. And as he gazes out at the autumn splendor of Liberty Ridge, he sees nothing but darkness there, too.

Late that afternoon he packed up his things and set them on the breakfast counter of the cottage. Not that he had much: his personal effects, the clothes that he and Valerie had bought, half sack of dog food, his birdgun and a couple. boxes of shells. He stood for a while in the little kitchen and looked out at the lake watching his dogs in the water fighting over a ball. He slipped shell into the shotgun, let the action snap shut and put on the safety, leaving it on the bar, pointed toward the door. He took the. 45 from his coat pocket and set it on the bag of kibbles.

For the third time that day he walked across the meadow to the Big House. But for the first time, Lane Fargo was not there to turn him away at the door. He brushed his way past one of the cooks and walked down the tiled entryway, beneath the big timber beams, past the wrought iron candleholders and the oil paintings of the rancho days.

Valerie was in the living room, sitting before a small fire that flickered in the cavernous fireplace, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders and a cup of something on the rough-hewn table in front of her.

If she saw him come in, she didn't show it.

"May I?" he asked.

She looked at him for a long time, then nodded. He walked far around her and sat on a steerhide sofa on the other side of the table.

"Is there anything I can get you?"

She looked at him again, shook her head, then returned her gaze to the fire. "Mom doesn't comprehend. I tell her, but she doesn't get it. Says, 'oh, no-wait 'til Vanny hears.' "

John sat there for a long while, listening to the pop and hiss of burning wood. He watched Valerie in profile, her unblinking eyes vacantly attuned to the embers.

"Agent Dumars explained it to me," she said, without expression. "Who you are. What Dad did. I didn't understand why. I didn't understand why you did what you did to him."

"Did she tell you about the woman?"

"Jillian?"

"Rebecca."

"She didn't mention a Rebecca."

"She worked for the paper when I did. We were in love. She went to get Baum's car in the rain and your father shot her."

Valerie turned her head slowly to John. "It was your girl he killed, then."

"That's right."

"So you killed him."

"No. Joshua did. I thought… we wanted to arrest him. For Rebecca."

"Oh, it all makes sense," she said flatly, turning to the fire again. "All makes sense."

"I don't-" But John didn't finish the sentence. Instead he watched a shadow move way up on the stairway landing of the second floor, just a little motion between the bannister slats reflected on the wall from the fire. Then nothing moved at all. "I don't… I know you can't forgive me, ever. But I want to say a few things. Will you listen to me, for just a while?"

She shrugged beneath the blanket, but didn't look at him.

"First, I want you to know it wasn't supposed to happen the way it did. If I'd have known how it would end, I wouldn't have done it."

Valerie half-nodded, her chin lifting just a little, but never coming back down. "Not even for Rebecca?"

"No."

"Why. She was your reason."

"I never set out to get anybody killed. I… I worked awfully hard to make sure that wouldn't happen. I worked hard to make sure we had the right man and that they could arrest him. And I never set out to fall in love with you. "Then came the other half of Valerie's nod, a little downturn of her chin. She shivered and pulled the blanket tighter.

"It doesn't change anything," he said. "But I want you t know it."

No response.

"And I have to say this, hopeless as it is-I love you now and I'll do anything on earth for you. I want you whole again I'm yours. I know you won't have me but that doesn't change the way I feel. I want you to know that before I go."

She looked at him again for a long while. He could see the fire reflected in her eyes. "There's no room left for you, John."

"I realize that."

"All I feel is hate."

John looked at her until she turned her face away again back to the dying fire. He got up and threw on two more log. While the wood caught he glanced up to the second story landing where the bannister shadows sharpened on the plaster wall.

"There's something you should know too, about your future here. When I was looking for evidence to arrest your father someone on Liberty Ridge was helping me get it. Some of the help was subtle. Some of it was obvious. I thought Sexton, then didn't."

"No," Valerie said dreamily. "Lane. So he could run Liberty Operations."

"Yeah." John looked up to the landing. He almost said something about who shot the video tape of Rebecca, then he told himself again that he'd never have to tell anyone that. "Fargo, you want to add anything?"

A faint shadow moved within the sharper ones of the railing posts and Lane Fargo looked around the edge of the wall again: which he was sitting.

"Come down, Lane," said Valerie. "It doesn't matter. I'll shut down the Ops anyway. Never liked it."

Lane moved quietly down the stairs, easing into the living room like a ghost.

"Leave us alone," Valerie said. "Will you, please?"

"He's not telling you the truth, Valerie Anne. I can prove it if you give me a chance."

"Later, maybe," she said.

Fargo's face was tightened to a smirk as he looked at John and headed out.

"Anything else, John?"

"One thing."

"You're sorry. You love me. Watch out for Lane. What else?"

"Just that I know your father was a good man. The world turned him and he went bad. He lost a lot for no reason and then he lost himself. I wouldn't have done any better in his place. What happened up there on Top of the World proves it. And I was trying to do the same thing he was. I was trying to get back something I'd lost. But I didn't get back anything at all. I just lost you. And your dad never came any closer to Pat. He just got what was coming to him for killing an innocent woman. He'd be the first to admit that. And I'll get what's coming to me, too. That's the way it should be. I'm not real smart. But I know now that hatred isn't enough to live on. It'll kill you and everybody around you. Don't live that way, Valerie. If you're lucky enough to find it, love can fill the emptiness. You've got every bit of mine if you ever need it. Ever."

She turned her head toward him again and John could see nothing in her face but the emptiness of infinite loss.

"Come here," she said.

He rose and walked over to her and put his hands very gently on either side of her head. Something hard clacked to the tile and John could see Val's revolver spinning to a stop. A big teardrop landed beside it. Then the storm hit and all she could do was cry. He held her. He had never thought a person could cry so hard for so long. It was much later when he finally left her asleep on the sofa. He made sure the blanket was snug around her and set three more logs in the fire before he walked out.

Fargo was standing in the driveway, leaning against the red Jeep. His arms were crossed, his right hand snugged under his armpit, inches away from the handle of his automatic.