Jon Reskind: Caesar comes book I

"M-My God! Are you saying that this… this Caesar was their…?" Jean cried, spellbound in her spine-chilling, mesmerization.

"Hush, girl! Hear me out this one time!" the old woman insisted, lowering her voice. "Soon, my daughter will make you leave… so listen now! My mother was a Cherokee squaw. My father, an Indian trader, bought her and took her away from her people… brought her here and claimed land in the valley. When Caesar and the pack came, she warned him about what would happen, but he didn't believe her. Girls were raped, and scared, drunken men died in the hunt, shooting each other as they tried to destroy the pack! But there was no destruction, no elimination of that passel of wild beasts! Nothing… until one day they suddenly left of their own accord… but with them went my mother and several more Crescent Valley women and girls… went of their own accord because they wanted to… and to what, blonde girl? To what…? Heh… what do you think?"

Jean could only sit there and gape at her unseeing, aged, story-teller in breathless awe. She shook her lovely head as if to throw off the illusory cobwebs the old woman had spun. It had to be the monotone of her voice, Jean thought, getting to her feet. She had nearly hypnotized her…!

"I know… I know," Granny Obert said, rocking her chair and puffing at her pipe. "You've decided I'm some sort of old witch, haven't you, Jeannie girl! Well… that's the first stages of belief, my mother used to tell me… recognizing a witch when you see one…!"

The withered woman was still laughing when she left, rocking, smoking, laughing, and Jean doubted if she'd heard her goodbye… but that hardly mattered to her. As she waked slowly toward her own house, she was only concerned with how soon Mark would return home…

"Let's have another round of drinks, here, Ted!" Link Morgan ordered, grinning and massaging his heavy-bearded chin. "The men are with me. Blakely has twenty-four hours… and that takes him up to shortly after midnight tonight… then, we take over. Right, boys?"

"Right!" the resounding answers came from the men moving in tight to the bar for their free drinks.

"Take over what, Link?" Mark questioned, standing inside the doorway to the Inn's barroom. "What do you have in mind?"

Slowly, the powerful, barrel-chested man turned to face his chosen enemy, his drinking cohorts falling into a sudden silence. A dozen, maybe more, verbal retaliations raced through Link Morgan's brain at that particular moment. But none of them seemed appropriate. He ran his tongue wetly over his thick lower lip and said, "The girl raped was my niece, Deputy! Had it been that new young wife of yours with her cunt split wide open by that dog, how would you feel?"

Mark stood fast, his strong face ungiving. But he hadn't expected that jab. He took several steps into the room and stopped again, his tired brain racing for answers. He suddenly had a whole town to placate, he realized.

"I'm not questioning the nightmare that's happened, Link," he replied in a level tone. "There isn't a man in here, along with myself, who doesn't feel the utmost sympathy for Annie… and who doesn't want to see that dog pack destroyed! But it has to be… is going to be, done by proper authorities! Just as I told you last night, Link, I don't intend to see a flock of wild, half-drunken men with rifles and shotguns out there blazing away at each other!"

The big man resoundingly set his drink on me bar, turning fully to face the uniformed deputy sheriff. Accordingly, his own shrewd brain was racing for answers. He said: "And supposing your proper authorities don't bring that sonofobitch down, Deputy? Suppose we move into another night when wild dogs can slink into town and gang-fuck young, innocent girls?"

"I've thought of that, too," Mark replied. "The best thing I believe we can do is post armed sentries… volunteers to guard the streets…"

"Oh Christ, that's wonderful!" Link grinned. "Now, we've got to put guards on our streets to safeguard our homes and families…!"

"That ain't a bad idea, Chief," one of the big man's friends put in.

"Shut up!" Link barked at him without moving his head.

Mark couldn't help but momentarily relive the episode of his dad's controversy with Link Morgan in this very room those seven years past! And that had been over nothing more than a sporting bet on a horse race, one word leading to another until they'd met bare-chested in the street and his father had unmercifully beaten Link with his fists. Less than two weeks later, his dad had been accidentally shot on a cougar-hunting posse… shot and killed by Link Morgan…!

"It's your jurisdiction, Link," Mark said, moving further into the room. "Do whatever you think best. That was only a suggestion."

"Some Goddamned situation when you've got to post sentries in a modern town to protect its citizens!" the gray-haired, huge man spat, picking up his drink. "You might just as well know, Blakely, that I've called Frank Hester about this! I don't think he's going to sanction any wild dog pack raping a town's women, either…!"

"Deputy Blakely! Sir… telephone!" Ted Green, the bartender motioned. "You can take it in the lobby… right over there, Sir."

"Thanks," Mark replied, thinking of Link calling the sheriff as he walked toward the phone booth. He'd undoubtedly done it, all right, called Sheriff Hester at the County Seat to try and throw some weight around. But Mark wasn't worried about that. Sheriff Frank Hester had taken Link Morgan's measure a long time back. Frank was a dedicated man, unmoved by politics…

"Hello," he said, tiredly reclining against the booth's wall.

"Mark…?" an unmistakable feminine voice questioned.

"Yes, Lydia, this is Mark," he answered, suddenly wondering what had kept her from calling this long. "How are you?"

"So so, I suppose… but that isn't why I called you, Mr. Deputy," the husky female voice proclaimed. "We lost four sheep and three dogs last night. The sheep we can stand, Darling, the dogs… no. It's that Goddamned pack again. What're you going to do about it?"

"Join it, I think."

"What…?"

"Nothing… just babbling. I'll be out to take a look?"

"Well… I'd hoped you might. How's the new married existence?"

Mark detected the acid in her tone. "Beautiful," he snapped. "Absolutely beautiful!"

"She doesn't befit you, Markey baby," the throaty voice came back, evenly, yet cutting. "From what they tell he, she's quite a doll. Has the appearance of being unplucked… that right, Darling?"

He sensed the hackles on the nape of his neck rising. "I'll be right along, Lydia."

"And I'll be at the front gate waiting with two horses and a picnic lunch. It's all up on the west range, lover."

"Never mind any lunches," he said, remembering the untold number they had partaken of on the A and B. "I only have a few minutes…" and that's what he repeated as he climbed onto the back of the waiting sorrel she had readied for him. "I only have a few minutes, Lydia…"

"I know," the auburn haired girl in riding shirt, blouse and boots replied, sitting tall and lovely in the saddle and holding her big bay with skilled horsemanship. "Word carries fast here in the valley, Deputy. My hands tell me that Annie Purcell was deflowered last night, and by dear old Caesar."

Mark couldn't help but glare at her severly attractive young face. "That's not to be taken lightly, Miss Newell," he snapped, reining the sorrel to his presence on the animal's back, and simultaneously weighing his proximity to this twenty-six year old girl he'd known too many years. "The town's is in an uproar."

"I'd expect that… with Link Morgan spiking it. Right?"

"Right."

"Well… while that Caesar bastard was cavorting in town his uglies were raising hell with our sheep, Darling," she said, her large green eyes engulfing him. "We can stand the herd loss, but they killed three of my best dogs. Something has to be done, Mark."