by Larry Hunt
Chapter Forty-Seven
HOW COME YOU KNOW’D US?
Turning to his delusional Jeep passenger the Captain mumbled, “Thank goodness! We made it! Now you and I can get warm.”
Walking across the Ponderosa’s front porch, Captain Scarburg could hardly feel his fingers within the leather, work gloves. He was about frozen to death. Approaching the front door he briefly wondered if he had enough strength left to knock.
Summing up all the energy he could muster, he slowly pounded on the door. It was only around five in the evening, surely with this blizzard howling, Clem and Penelope would be home. Once again he summoned up enough strength to pound again. He heard voices inside, the barking of a dog and was that footsteps coming toward the door? If someone did not come to the door he did not believe he could muster up enough strength to knock again. He was seconds from collapsing onto the frozen, ice and snow covered porch. If Clem and Penelope were not at home, Captain Scarburg final fate was to freeze to death on their front porch!!
Suddenly the door slowly began to open, there with a surprised look was the Captain’s old friend Clem. Penelope was standing to his rear. Weakly the Captain said, “Please, please… can I come in out of this storm? I have gone about… as… far… as I can… go.”
“Lands sake, don’t jez stand there Clem, git that poor man inside. He’s frozen plum neer to death.”
Once inside, Clem began stripping off the Captain’s snow covered outer garments and hanging them by the door to dry. The Captain made his way over to the fireplace, and immediately he felt the warmth on his face from the oak logs crackling and burning in the huge, brick fireplace. Removing his wet gloves, he held his hands close to the heat from the burning logs. At first he could not even feel the warmth in his hands, but within seconds, the blood’s circulation began to flow back into his fingers, and the effect of the soft glow of the flickering fire was beginning to take place. “My-oh-my, this feels good,” Captain Scarburg exclaimed. Looking down, he noticed the beautiful little Shetland sheepdog sitting next to him, rubbing her head against his leg and staring up, seeming to beg for a pet on her head. He remembered this little dog on his first visit, ‘Lady’, what a magnificent animal, he thought. Reaching down he stroked the dog’s soft, white and sable head, “Hey Lady, you’re a beautiful little dog.”
Without thinking, he turned to Penelope and asked, “Miss Penelope you got any of your hot Luzianne coffee with chicory brewing on the stove in the kitchen?”
“Sure do,” she said turning toward the kitchen, but within a step or two it hit her, ‘Miss Penelope... coffee brewing.... Luzianne coffee... with chicory... on the stove....’ how’d he know all that? She wondered to herself.
Clem standing next to the Captain at the fireplace asked, “Mister! What in the world wuz you doin’ out in this here storm? Even polar bears have more cents than that. They burry themselves up to caves and the like afore ventured out in a blizzard sech as this one. Yer mighty lucky to still be alive.”
“You’re right Clem, but I have an important mission, which could not wait. You see I am searching for two of my lost grandchildren.”
“Hold on thar Mister, how’d you know my name? And you said Penelope afore too, how come you know’d us? I don’t know you, we ain’t never met.” Frowning he added, “Have we?” Then added, “And how’d you know the dog’s name?”
“You both must have mentioned your names at the door when I arrived.”
“Naw, that ain’t right. I’m likin’ in lots of thangs, but memory ain’t one of’em.” Somethins’ wrong Mister, whats yer game?”
Penelope was returned from the kitchen carrying a steaming, hot cup of coffee. Handing it to the Captain, he quickly took a sip, but something was bothering him – he was thinking he should tell them who he actually was. Sitting the cup down he motioning toward the couch, “Clem, Penelope let’s go over here and sit down. I have a confession to make.”
“I knew it, I knew it, I told you Penelope. I told you somethin’ was wrong. Yer one of them escaped criminals or the like, right? I got me a shotgun if yer dangerous. Er you dangerous?”
“No Clem, I’m not dangerous, and I’m not an escaped criminal. To answer your question Clem, yes, you do know me, and yes we have met before today.”
“Now hold on a minute, we never seed you afore mister. What’s yer game?”
“Would both of you, please sit down? I will try to explain. This is going to sound strange, but I swear every word I am about to tell you is the truth, and as they say, in court, ‘the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.’ Where should I begin?”
“I’ve always heered its best to start at the beginning.”
“All right that’s where I’ll begin Clem and prove to you we have met. My name is Robert Scarburg, Junior. Most just refer to me as ‘Captain’ since I was a Captain in the U.S. Army.”
“Hold the fort! Hold the fort! That young lad that come here yesterdee’s name wuz Robert Scarburg, called hisself Forrest, is he related to you?”
“Yes! Yes! They were here? Thank goodness!! You’re right Clem his name is Forrest. Forrest is my grandson. He and his sister Olive Marie are two of my grandchildren. Those two are the reason I am out in this blizzard. They are the ones for whom I am searching.”
“You know when I heered his name ‘Robert Scarburg’ fer some reason I reckoned I had heered that name afore. And yes siree, her name wuz Olive, Olive and Forrest, well I’ll be – your grandkids!”
“You have heard my name - Robert Scarburg, Clem. I came here before, and you volunteered to help me on a job I had to accomplish in Dallas. I know your name is Clemson, and you are,” looking at Penelope, “Penelope, Clem’s sister. Clem and Penelope Ruby. You don’t like the name Clemson, so you use the name Clem, and this dog of yours, her name is Lady. I know so very well since I gave Lady her name. You had just been calling her Girl.” At the mention of her name, the dog whimpered, got up, moved from the spot in which she was resting and lay down beside Captain Scarburg’s foot.
“That ain’t proved nothing, everbody around here knows that my name is Clem, strange about you knowin’ about the dog tho’, and I ain’t never seed her take to anybody like she has took to you neither. Besides, we have always called her ‘Lady’ since she was jez a pup, but I do ‘member afore I come up with that name I wuz gonna call her jest ‘Girl’. I don’t know how you no’d that. You one of them mind readin’ circus or carnival pre-formers?”
“No Clem but speaking of a carnival reminds me of the merry-go-round or the carousel. I know you have an uncle named Jack Ruby who owns the Carousel Club on the corner of Field and Commerce Street in downtown Dallas. You call him Sparky. Miss Penelope you fed me a great supper served with cornpone. You have a sampler on your wall in the dining room stitched by your Granny Coker. The inscription reads, “Home Sweet Home” and along the bottom was a name and date, “Minnie Coker Three December In the Year of Our Lord Nineteen Hundred and One”. We were eating rutabaga turnips cooked with pork chops when you told me about your Granny Coker and her sampler she stitched as a child.”
“Clemson! Clemson, whats goin’ on?”
“Hesh up girl, this feller is right, you know not to call me Clemson! But yer right he knows thangs.”
“I know Clem, I’m skeered.”
“Penelope, there is no reason to be frightened. As I explained on my first visit, I am a traveler from the year 2012. I came back previously to your 1963 Universe to fix a problem, which greatly affected the latter part of the 20th and the first part of the 21st century. Clem you assisted, and you and I accomplished the job.”
“You jest makin’ this up, right? The year two thousand and twelve, come on!!”
“You have a tan overcoat in your hall closet, and in your little wooden box on the mantle where you and Penelope keep your valuables there is some money you have never been able to explain. There is a ten-dollar bill you think is counterfeit, and two U.S. quarters. One is dated 2004 and t
he other 2012. You probably have never been able to figure them out either.”
“Well I’ll be... them thangs are in that box all right!”
“I had given those items to you right before I left from the cow pasture, the pasture that’s at the end of the Saddleback Gulch trail. You told me Larry Brock owned that ranch. You carried me there in your Ford wrecker, yeah, the one with the spring sticking out of the seat.”
“Shore nuff, your right ‘bout that sprang – I been aimin’ to git it fixed. You no’d about the sprang?”
“Right Clem, you don’t have to sit on it!” The Captain said laughing. “We used your tan Nash Rambler you keep around back in the shed next to the chicken coop to get to Dallas. Oh, I almost forgot... Penelope in your ‘valuables’ box you have a note written in your hand stating, Auburn 10 Alabama 8 Iron Bowl November 30, 1963.
“Clem, you said my grandson stated his name was Robert Scarburg. That is his name all right. He is Robert Scarburg the Fourth. I am Captain Robert Scarburg, Junior. Why don’t you take out the gold wristwatch? You know the one with the broken face crystal. It is in the valuables box also. Turn it over and read the inscription on the back.”
Clem walked over to the fireplace, picked up his sister’s keepsake box and removed the watch. He slowly turned it over and rubbed the lettering on the back with his thumb. Pretending to fumble in his pockets he handed the watch to Penelope. “Here Penelope you read this, I seems to have misplaced my readin’ glasses.”
Taking the watch she read aloud, “Capt Robert Edward Scarburg, Jr. 5th SF (ABN), RVN, 1968.”
“I gave you this watch Clem, and in exchange you gave me your old cowboy hat.”
“Dadburn Penelope, I been telling you I had an old hat around here sommers, and you jest said it weren’t so. See I told you.”
“Your right Clem, right as rainwater. Who would’ve know’d”, Penelope replied.
“Penelope, thar’s no way he could be makin’ this up. What he’s tellin’ us must have happened. He knows to much about us. I’ve wondered about the watch and the funny money, and in a ways, I can almost remember what he’s sayin’ but I jest can’t get it all to come thru clear.”
“All right,” Captain Scarburg said, “I’m going to prove to you once and for all I have been here before.” Saying this he pulled his Iphone from his pocket. Pressing the Itune App the lyrics and melody of George Strait’s number one country hit from 1987 began softly to play,
“♪All my Ex’s live in Texas and Texas is...♪”
“Yeah... yeah Captain, that does sound like somethin’ I’ve heered afore. It shore is a purty tune.”
“Impossible Clem, pretty or not that tune will not be recorded for another twenty-four years!”
“What? No, that can’t be true?”
“Okay, here it is,” the Captain said touching the Iphoto App. Instantly the screen was filled with the images of Clem and Penelope sitting on the exact same couch they were now sitting on, and Captain Scarburg’s voice on the Iphone saying, “Hey, both of you. Look this way and say cheese.”
“Well, I’ll be,” commented Clem in amazement.
“Captain, what did you come here fer the first time?” asked Penelope.
“Well right now, it’s not important, the problem was taken care of. You do not need to trouble yourself with it. My two grandchildren that’s what is essential now... I must find them. They could be in trouble – I’m talking about real trouble. The kind that could get them killed!”
“By the way Forrest and Olive wuz drivin’ that old green Ford truck of Larry Brocks. They must’ve got it out of his old barn. How in the world did they find it? What wuz they doin’ up at his cattle ranch place anyhow?
“I will explain it all later Clem. Right now finding those kids is my most important job.”
“Captain, they left us a note when they left. It said they wuz goin’ to the ‘Murdock place’ and anyone lookin’ for them would know what that means.”
“Hmmm, say they said the ‘Murdock place’ huh?”
“Yeah, the Murdock place. Do you knows what it means, Captain? And another thang Captain, they done left us some more of your funny money. There were two of them ten-dollar bill looking thangs on the table next to the note they left. You and them must’ve got that fake money at the same place, fer yours and they’ers looks jest alike.”
“I sure do, Clem I know the Murdock place, and don’t worry about those fake ten dollar bills, just keep them as souvenirs, they will be good money someday, and for the second time, thanks, thanks a million, but Clem enough talking, I’ve need to get going.”
“You be careful, ye hear?”
“By the way, Penelope that wouldn’t happen to be chicken and dumplings I smell is it?”
The time was 7:15 Thursday night, November 21, 1963.