Mrs. Goodbea did not particularly care to house the Stormer children, but she had the extra rooms, and more importantly, her reputation to uphold. She figured that her compassion would cause her esteem to skyrocket among her peers and secure her sainthood. Besides, it was likely only for a few weeks, and soon enough she could dump the children in an orphanage somewhere. It took two days before the colonel noticed the girls’ presence in his home, such was his interest in his wife’s doings. His biggest objection was to the guards posted outside his house around the clock in case Max Stormer showed up to kidnap the girls.
When Mrs. Goodbea answered the doorbell she was surprised and delighted to see Katie Austin’s bright, cheery smile.
“Why, Katie,” she said, clasping her hands together. “What a wonderful surprise!”
“Hello, Mrs. Goodbea.”
“My, my, look at you! Come in, come in. Look at you!”
Katie glanced back over her shoulder and waved her hand behind her as she followed Mrs. Goodbea inside.
“My, my,” the woman repeated, “you are exquisite. It’s so nice to see a young lady in a dress for a change.”
“Thank you,” Katie said.
“You look so gracious and refined. College has been good for you. I can tell. You’re so grown up now.”
“It’s been an eye-opener, all right,” Katie said. She gazed about the large, tastefully-attired room in obvious admiration. “It’s been awhile since I’ve been here. I forgot how lovely your home is. And all these wonderful antiques…”
“That is my hobby you know,” Mrs. Goodbea said.
“They’re beautiful. Someday I would like to have a home like yours.”
“And why shouldn’t you? A bright, attractive girl like you. Why, you’d make a catch for the most estimable of men.”
“You mean wealthy,” Katie winked.
“It’s just as easy to fall in love with a rich man as a poor one,” Mrs. Goodbea said. “Just between us girls,” she added, lowering her voice to a whisper, “I could have done much better myself.”
“But you have everything,” Katie said. “The colonel has done very well it seems.”
“Oh, I can imagine better…and more.” A tinge of resentment laced her voice and a slight scowl flickered across her heavily made-up face.
“Where is the colonel? I’d like to say hello to him too.”
“Where else? Buzzing around his silly bees, of course.” She wiggled her fingers in the air. “So tell me,” she said, guiding Katie to an antique divan. She patted its floral cushion, indicating to Katie to sit. “How are mother and father? Things have been so crazy around here lately, I’ve hardly seen them.”
“They’re fine. They’re happy to see me.”
“As well they should be. They must be very proud…and relieved.”
“Relieved?”
“That you’re not mixed up in that horrible debauchery in town.”
“Oh, that…”
“What do you think about it, Katie? You’re their friend, why aren’t you with them?”
“A lot can change in a year,” she said with a hint of sadness. “I’ve sort of lost touch with my friends here.”
Mrs. Goodbea put her hand on Katie’s lap. “You’re growing up, Katie. It’s to be expected. You mustn’t feel badly. These kids are immature and lack your sophistication.”
“Maybe…”
“Certainly! Going to college was the best thing in the world for you. At least it got you away from that horrible Max Stormer. You are aware of the trouble he’s in, aren’t you?”
“I’ve heard something, yes.”
“Shameful. Simply shameful. Your mother and father are certainly happy that you two have broken up. You have broken up, haven’t you?”
Katie bowed her head and looked at her folded hands.
“Oh, honey,” Mrs. Goodbea said, stroking the back of Katie’s head. “It’s for the best, believe me. He was not good enough for you. Not at all. He deserves a tramp like that girl in the woods. What’s her name again?”
“Aidos.”
“Hmm, yes…peculiar name. Perhaps I should pity her.”
“She’s actually quite sweet.”
“Isn’t that just like you, Katie. Never an unkind word for anybody. Are you hungry? Can I get you anything?”
“I don’t want to be a bother, Mrs. Goodbea.”
“Gloria, Katie,” she insisted. “You’re a woman now and I’d like for you to call me Gloria.” She smiled as though she was giving Katie a gift.
“Okay, thank you… But I was just out for a stroll. I didn’t intend—”
“No bother, dear. I was in the midst of making myself a sandwich when you rang. You just relax. I’ll be right back.”
Mrs. Goodbea got up and started for the kitchen.
“Excuse me…Gloria?” she called out after her. “Is it true that the Stormer children are staying with you?”
“Why, yes,” she said, turning back around. “In fact, I just got word this morning that an orphanage somewhere back east has agreed to take them in. I’m to take the girls to the county office for processing tomorrow morning. They should be on a flight east by evening.”
“That was very kind of you, Mrs. Good—Gloria, to take such an interest in their welfare. Especially since, well…”
“It’s not their fault, poor things, that they have such a terrible brother.”
“May I see them?” Katie asked. “I mean, even though Max and I no longer, well, you know…”
“I understand, dear. They’re upstairs. I’m sure they will be thrilled to see you. I haven’t told them yet that they’ll be leaving. Perhaps you might tell them?”
“Yes, I’d be glad to do that.”
“Fine, and when you come down, we’ll have lunch out back and you can say hello to the colonel.” She smacked her lips together, very pleased. “It’s really lovely you stopped by, Katie. Just lovely. We have so much catching up to do!”
As soon as Mrs. Goodbea disappeared into the kitchen, Katie rose and sped on tiptoe to the front door. She opened it quietly and peered outside.
“Psst!”
“Here,” April whispered, stepping out from behind a large bush at the side of the porch, Patty behind her.
“Ten minutes,” Katie said. “You’ll have to run or you’ll miss the plane. The streets are jammed, so cut through the woods. Mr. Brodie is waiting for you at the hatchery turn off.”
“Okay, hurry,” April said.
Katie closed the door and sprang up the winding staircase. When she opened the door to their room, the two little girls shrieked with joy and ran to embrace her.
Katie laughed and gave them a loving squeeze. “How are my two favorite munchkins?”
“Where’s Max?” Ricki asked, her voice filled with concern. “Why isn’t Max with you?”
“Listen,” Katie said, pulling the girls into a huddle. “Everything is fine, but you have to do exactly what I tell you, okay?”
The twins exchanged puzzled looks.
“There’s no time to explain, okay? I want you to pack a small bag with just some warm clothes, and when you see that no one is in the house, run downstairs and out the front door. April and Patty are there waiting for you. They are going to take you on a little adventure.”
“I like April and Patty,” Samantha said.
“Me too,” Ricki said.
“They’ll tell you everything you want to know, okay?”
The girls nodded trustingly.
“But you must hurry as fast as you can and be very, very quiet.”
“What about you, Katie?” Samantha asked.
“I have to stay here for now, but I’ll see you soon enough, I promise. You know I always keep a promise, right?”
“We love you, Katie,” Samantha said.
“I love you too.” She pulled them to her and gave them both a kiss. “Now hurry, and remember—quiet as mice.”
Katie flew back down the stairs. She took a deep
breath, straightened herself up, and entered the kitchen.
“How are they?” Mrs. Goodbea asked, putting the finishing touches on lunch.
“They’ve really grown,” Katie said. “I hope they haven’t been too much trouble.”
“Nothing but, if I’m to be honest. But I suppose that was to be expected…”
“I think it was very noble of you to go to all that trouble for them.”
“Well, somebody had to come to their rescue.”
Katie nodded and sucked in a smirk.
“…And I guess that’s part of my calling in life. How did they handle the news of their leaving?”
“They were a little puzzled.”
“Mm-hmm,” Mrs. Goodbea said, slicing the cucumber sandwiches into diagonal halves. “Quite understandable. They’ll be fine.”
“That’s what I told them.”
“I’m sure that coming from you, dear, it was very reassuring.”
“I hope so,” Katie said. “Let me carry that—” She picked up the silver tray with the sandwiches and glasses of lemonade and followed Mrs. Goodbea to the back door.
“Well, things will finally be back to normal around here,” Mrs. Goodbea said, “and no more pesky guards either.”
“What guards?”
“Oh, the police have been watching our house day and night in case Max Stormer showed up to kidnap the girls. They left shortly before you arrived. The mayor needed reinforcements in town. I expect they’ll be back shortly. It’s all so absurd. Imagine that boy thinking he could raise two girls on his own. Just think of it, Max Stormer a father!”
“Yes,” Katie said, setting the tray down on the patio table. “Wouldn’t that be something?”
“You can say that again.”
Katie smiled—a deep, rich, satisfying smile. The smile of the just.
“What’s so funny?” Mrs. Goodbea asked.
Katie pointed across the yard. “The colonel in his bee suit,” she said quickly.
“Silly old man. I suppose things will never really be normal around here. Now come, Katie, tell me all about college. Have you met any nice boys…?”
59
A Lot of Swearing Going On
The twins arrived at the county airport only minutes before take off. The small airport was overrun with reporters and media crews who came from all over the country to cover the extraordinary event that was quickly capturing the imagination of the entire nation. Jason Brodie was alarmed by the presence of helicopters, and the conspicuously large number of army personnel. Media persons, however, found the presence of the National Guard invigorating, and it spurred the reporters on to even greater excitement.
The Stormer children were met at their destination several hundred miles away by a tall woman with waist-long blond hair, brown eyes, and a most engaging white-toothed smile. Gretchen Calhoun, Katie’s best friend at college, put the girls into a jeep and drove them forty-five miles to her brother’s farm where they were to stay until further notice. Seven years earlier Gretchen’s eldest brother, Page Calhoun, and three army buddies, purchased the farm in the desire to live simple, self-sufficient lives. They raised horses, cattle, and poultry, and grew organic fruits and vegetables. They struggled for the first five years, but the last two had moved them into the black. The four ex-Army men asked few questions. They were not big fans of suits and civil authorities, and Gretchen’s word was good enough for them.
In order to avoid the backed-up traffic, Mr. Brodie returned to town via a circuitous route of old logging roads and other dirt and barely negotiable byways that only an old-timer in the area like Jason Brodie knew existed.
Pinecrest was almost unrecognizable. The town was in chaos, and traffic was backed up for dozens of miles coming and going. The grassy island that was the base for the initial handful of fettered and determined patriots was barely detectable under the feet of the more than one hundred youths that now congregated there. More arrived every hour, on foot and on bicycle, until the entire town square was under their dominion. They came from along the length of the mountain ridge, some having cycled more than seventy miles to reach their destination.
The junk pile in the town square had become a veritable mountain. One reporter commented that it looked as though a caravan on the way to Walmart had been hijacked, and its contents dumped in the town square. At one point, somebody counted fifty-six television sets. Clothes and sportswear, whose various commercial logos and trademarks could be easily read at a distance, draped over the heap of cast-off consumerism, and flapped in the wind.
Mayor Fitch felt like a prisoner in his third-story office that overlooked the bedlam below. With him were Jack Austin, Mason Kohl, and Gary Webber, the latter of whom had only recently arrived. He had to leave his car two miles outside of town and walk in.
The men’s tempers reflected the desperate situation. The previous day’s storm had downed power lines and telephone poles in parts of the town and the streets were too clogged for any repairmen to get out and fix them. The mayor’s phone, however, was unaffected by the outage, and it rang incessantly. His secretary, fed up with the mayor’s abusive temper, had quit and gone home, leaving the mayor to answer all calls himself. On top of this, the reporters drove him crazy. He had to lock his door to keep them from barging into his office.
“I knew it was bad,” Gary Webber said, looking out the window, “but I had no idea it was this bad.”
“Everything would have been fine,” the mayor growled, “if the damn press hadn’t shown up.”
“Everything would have been fine,” corrected Mason Kohl, “if you had listened to me from the start and arrested these punks day one.”
“Listen, Kohl,” the mayor shouted, his face red with rage, his eyes swollen from sleeplessness, “don’t go pointing your finger at me. These kids were your responsibility. They came from your school. If you had been doing your job right to begin with—”
“I do my job fine,” Kohl snarled. “Your job was to arrest Stormer and you failed. I warned you about the danger he presented months ago.”
“Dammit, Kohl!” Fitch said.
“Hey,” Jack Austin hollered, “would you two shut up. The troopers are going to be here any minute and the way I see it, by the time this mess is over you’ll both be out of a job.”
Gary Webber said, “If you had Stormer, you could probably settle this in a minute.”
“We don’t have him, you idiot!” the mayor said, furious.
“Yes, but they don’t know that,” Webber said. “Announce that you caught him and that if they all disperse, you’ll let him go.”
“I can’t do that,” Fitch said.
“Sure you can,” Jack Austin said, thinking the idea brilliantly simple. “Hell, why not? What do you have to lose?”
“What if they demand to see him first?” Kohl said.
“It’s a gamble,” Webber said, “but I don’t see as though you have any other option. You’re the mayor, do what you’re supposed to do—deal.” He spoke the word with a wicked grin. “What’s Stormer’s status, anyway?”
“Last I heard they’re hot on his trail,” Fitch said. “Even the National Guard is looking for him now. Twice yesterday they thought they had him, and both times he got away. The lucky little punk must have a guardian angel looking after him.”
“They shouldn’t be wasting their time trying to catch him,” Kohl said. “They should just shoot him and put him out of everyone else’s misery.”
Gary Webber said, “I say first we diffuse the situation, and then we worry about what to do about Stormer.”
“I don’t know,” Fitch said, shaking his head. “It might make things worse.”
“Worse?” Webber said. “If the troopers come breaking this thing up, you’re looking at a possible riot. Right now it’s pretty damn peaceful. Except for that crazy junk pile, they haven’t done a thing. Pull this off and you might just save your ass. Let the troopers do it for you and you’ll be laughed out of town.”
>
The mood was inversely festive around the flagpole. Although another, larger storm was forecast, for now the sun was playing peek-a-boo between fat, puffy clouds. The youths milled about as if they were at a party. They strolled with their signs slung over their shoulders, seemingly unconcerned with what might happen next. The new arrivals needed no introduction to the situation. They felt united in a common cause, as if something in their collective unconscious had explained the situation to them already.
Aidos was not an unfamiliar name to the teens. Many had spent one or a number of thrilling afternoons on the mountain with her and had helped to spread her fame. The youths had never met anyone like her. Aidos’ talents, poise, and beauty astonished all who met her, boys and girls alike. Whereas elsewhere in the country teens worshipped this or that celebrity; for those who lived along Pinecrest’s ridge there was no ticket to any concert they wouldn’t trade for an hour of walking and talking with Aidos. Individually, like the Olympians, they too began leaving behind old habits and assumptions as they endeavored to live more deliberately, and with new ardor and awareness.
And Max, long known for his athletic prowess, was certainly no stranger to the communities he had been sporting against during his years as captain and quarterback of the Pinecrest Panthers. Despite their rivalries, every student of every school along the ridge knew that Max Stormer was an exceptional athlete. After having spent time with him on the mountain, they came to respect him for much more than his golden arm. When Max Stormer failed to show up in the last season, his absence was more than conspicuous; it was thought-provoking. Although Pinecrest was the only town to lose its entire team, it was not the only town to lose players.
The Olympians were astonished to find so many people rushing up to greet them and speak the same thoughts and feelings. The newcomers felt that something momentous was about to happen. They said they came because they had to come, as if they had been summoned there. The gathering was more like a religious revival than a protest, though no hymns were sung and no sermons were given. A gospel of sorts, however, did suffuse the congregation. The good word was the good life—simple, free, unspoiled, and self-reliant.
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