Prairie Fire

by Kayt C Peck

  “Jump.”

  They did. Kathleen managed to roll easily, using the skills Judy taught her about avoiding injury when thrown from a horse. Injured back, shoulder, and leg handicapped Judy. She landed hard and with such intense pain that her vision darkened, starting from the outside and narrowing to a tunnel of light. Judy fought the darkness with every ounce of consciousness, but she still couldn’t make herself move. Kathleen jumped up, grabbing Judy by the shoulders. She started toward the open doors until a wild shot was fired from above. She reversed direction and jumped, pulling Judy with her to a space behind an old water barrel. Judy managed to get enough physical control to push upward and to the side with her legs, helping Kathleen propel them to momentary safety.

  Guy jumped too, landing with surprising agility. He stood, facing the two huddled women.

  “What do you know? A two for one special.” He pointed the rifle toward them, so close he didn’t bother to use the scope but just pointed from the hip. “I’m going to enjoy this.” He paused, a look of intense pleasure on his face.

  Judy felt Kathleen crouch, ready to spring. Judy knew that the second Kathleen moved, she’d be dead, so she held her back, cherishing these few seconds, closing her eyes and progressing to Plan C – praying for a miracle. When she heard the shot, Judy screamed in agony, not from physical pain but because she didn’t feel new pain. The bullet hadn’t been for her. Kathleen, no, not Kathleen, she thought in agony.

  Kathleen screamed too. Judy, no, not Judy, was her own agonized thought.

  In the confusion, an awareness drifted into Judy’s consciousness. Wrong…the sound was wrong, she thought. The blast had not been from a rifle. Judy realized it had been a shotgun. An airy gurgle caught the attention of both women; they looked up to see Guy on the ground, the rifle beside him. Bubbles of blood, mixed with the air from his lungs, flowed from his mouth and nose, and the front of his shirt was mangled and bloody, a hole the size of a half-dollar in his chest. The gurgling stopped as he exhaled his final breath.

  Judy looked toward the barn door opening. Silhouetted against the bright daylight was a tiny woman, a shotgun in her hand.

  “Pookie,” Judy said.

  Pookie walked into the barn, staring at the man on the ground. “I…I told you I wanted to know what to do if I saw a rattlesnake.” Her face was pale and her expression frozen in shock.

  Kathleen stood and walked to Pookie, putting her arms around the girl. “You did it, sweetie. You killed the biggest snake of all.”

  All three women cried in anger and pain but mainly relief. That relief was enhanced as they heard the sound of sirens in the distance.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Survived

  With her good hand, Judy hit the television “off” button on the remote control that was hard-wired into the hospital bed. She was careful not to hit accidentally the nurse call button. She had done so once in the night, when she’d shuffled restlessly, striving to find the position that caused the least discomfort to injured back and leg. The sour-faced night nurse had been so unpleasant about the mishap, that Judy now felt that the nurse call button was best saved for life-threatening needs.

  “If you had to get shot, you had a best case scenario,” the gray-haired Dr. Cunningham said as he made rounds shortly after Judy’s admission. “But we want to keep you a couple of days to watch for signs of infection.”

  Cunningham had delivered baby Judy. Although he was semi-retired, Judy still preferred his care and she’d asked for him while in the ambulance on her way to the hospital. He was there waiting when she arrived.

  “What the hell did you do, Judy Proctor?” the crusty old country doctor asked.

  “Guess I’m allergic to bullets, Doc,” she answered.

  “Then it’s best if you stay away from them,” he responded.

  “I’ll keep that in mind, Doc.”

  In the Emergency Room of the tiny Dulson County Hospital, Judy had received seventeen stitches in the shallow wound in her back. They’d done little more than bandage the entrance and exit wounds to the meaty part of her left thigh. Dr. Cunningham huffed with disapproval when the paramedic showed him the filthy burlap bags they’d used to cover Judy’s wounds.

  “Why didn’t you just lie down and ‘waller’ in the dirt?” the doctor asked.

  “At the time, we were more worried about bullets than dirt,” Judy answered.

  Dr. Cunningham’s face turned an angry red. His face reminded Judy how much this gruff but kindly man cared about his patients.

  “Who the hell did this?” Cunningham asked as he probed the exit wound in her leg, assessing the extent of damage. Judy refrained from expressing pain. She realized Cunningham knew her. He was counting on her toughness to expedite his examination.

  “Fella’ the name of Guy Guyette,” Judy answered.

  “They catch him?”

  “He’s dead.”

  The doctor stopped the examination, shifting his attention to her face. “You kill him?”

  “Pookie Thompson did. Young woman who’s living with Kathleen and me right now and helping out on the ranch. Saved our lives, she did.”

  Cunningham nodded his head in approval. “Good for her.”

  It was the third day of Judy’s hospital stay, and she was getting cranky. Most of the staff in the tiny hospital knew and loved the Proctor family, and the story of Judy and Kathleen’s near death experience spread across the county quickly. The tale was old news by the time it made it to the pages of the local bi-weekly paper. The semi-private room where Judy stayed was chosen, not to contain two patients, but so that Kathleen could stay watching after her partner in relative comfort. Flowers and potted plants overflowed past the tiny side table between the beds, even the ledge that extended across one wall under the outside window. Flowers had begun to accumulate on the floor.

  Judy turned her attention from the now silent television to the two guests who had just taken seats in chairs under the wall-mounted television.

  “Sure is sweet of you guys to drive all the way over from Amber just to see me,” Judy said to April and Sophie.

  “And to relieve me from having to deal with a cranky patient,” Kathleen said from where she sat on the room’s second bed. The Sapphire novel she’d been reading lay face down on the covers beside her.

  “Cranky is a good sign. Means she’s ready to get out of here,” April said.

  Sophia laughed a soft throaty laugh. “I agree, and I hope you don’t mind that we came for more than just a hospital visit.” She lifted her leather briefcase from the floor and put it on her knees.

  Judy sat up stiffly, moving awkwardly because of her injuries. “What’s up?”

  “We’ve been doing a little digging about this Guy Guyette fellow,” April said.

  Sophia pulled a stack of papers from her briefcase. “The social security number he gave your fire department was fraudulent, but he wasn’t very smart.”

  “How’s that?” Kathleen asked.

  “It belongs to a Georgia woman who died fifteen years ago.”

  “What the heck?” Judy said. “Why’d he use that number?”

  “That’s where he wasn’t smart,” April said. “The woman’s name was Bertha Pendergrass.”

  Sophie dug through the papers, finding a photocopy of a newspaper article. She stood and handed it to Kathleen. “When we looked up her obituary, there wasn’t much, barely a paragraph, but it did say she had one surviving son.”

  Kathleen looked at the article and then gave a humorless laugh. “Guyette Pendergrass of South Bend, Georgia,” she read.

  “Well crap,” Judy said. “Was he even a firefighter?”

  “That he was, and a good one, it seems. He was captain of the South Bend Fire Department, until—” April said.

  Sophia interrupted. “Until he was charged with assault and attempted rape of a female member of his company. Charges are still pending. That’s one reason we came to Dulson in person. We need to take documentati
on to the sheriff’s office. They should send a DNA sample from Guy to the South Bend authorities. That’s the only way we can legally prove that Guy Guyette is really Guy Pendergrass.”

  “When did this happen?” Judy asked.

  Sophie riffled through the papers again, pulling out a legal document. She studied the paper, looking for a date. “Charges were filed October twentieth two years ago.”

  “Damn! The girl okay?” Judy asked.

  “What girl?” Sophia asked.

  “The one he attacked.”

  “The articles don’t say. My guess is she’ll be glad to hear the news of what happened to him,” April said.

  “Pookie needs to know,” Kathleen said.

  There was a silence in the room.

  “How’s she taking it?” April asked.

  From the bedside tray table, Judy grabbed a magazine and thwacked it angrily against the bed. “Some ways I’m madder at Guy for what he did to her than to me. I can’t imagine what it’s like to kill someone, even a snake like him.”

  “I’ll be okay,” a voice said from the doorway.

  They all turned to see Pookie standing there, Ted Rome in the hallway behind her. The two walked inside. Kathleen jumped off the bed and gave Pookie a welcoming hug.

  “You up to a little more company?” Ted asked Judy.

  “Better than sitting here watching soap operas or rerun Westerns,” Judy answered.

  Ted turned to April and Sophia, shaking their hands as Judy made introductions. “I heard some of what you were telling Judy and Kathleen about Guyette. Pookie and I have more to add.”

  “What?” April asked.

  “State police have taken over investigating the cash Judy found with the wildland tools. When they went to the salesman Guy bought the equipment from, he squealed liked a greased pig. Long story short, turns out Guy has a long habit of taking kickbacks from vendors. Police searched his house and found nearly a quarter million dollars in cash.”

  “That explains how he’s been able to avoid detection. He had plenty of money to pay for forged identity documents,” Sophia said.

  “And fire qualifications. The documents he showed us looked real,” Kathleen added.

  “He’d been a firefighter for over twenty-five years. He probably had authentic ones for forgers to use as templates,” Sophia said.

  Pookie was uncharacteristically quiet. Judy ceased paying attention to the overall conversation and was focused on her young mentee. “Come here, kiddo.” Judy motioned for Pookie to sit on the edge of the bed. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  Pookie leaned back, careful to avoid Judy’s injured leg, and looked at the ceiling. “I…I’ve had some bad dreams, but…but I’m really glad you and Kathleen are okay.”

  Judy squeezed Pookie’s arm lovingly. “We owe you our lives.”

  Pookie looked at Judy, tears in her eyes. “You don’t owe me anything! We’re family. I just did what I had to do. He shouldn’t…he shouldn’t have hurt my moms.” Kathleen crossed the short distance between the beds, and the three women merged into a spontaneous group hug.

  An empty room could not have been any more silent. The silence was broken as Ted shuffled his feet uncomfortably. “I guess…I guess knowing you ladies has made me look at what family means a little differently.” Ted cleared his throat. “Pookie and me, we got some more news.”

  Pookie pulled away from the group hug and smiled shyly, the first smile Judy had seen on Pookie’s face since before the shooting. “Yeah, good news.”

  “What?” Judy asked.

  “I’ve decided what I’m going to do about, you know, education…a job,” Pookie said.

  “Terry will be eager to hear this,” April said.

  “I already called her,” Pookie said.

  Ted stood tall and proud. “Think you can do without your top hand for a few weeks, Judy?”

  “For a good reason I can,” Judy responded.

  “You folks out at Coldwater have done so well with your rural station that I’ve got a couple more of the rural communities that want to start a station. I’ve convinced the county commissioners that I can’t oversee it all by myself. They’ve authorized me to hire a part-time county coordinator.” He crossed the room and patted Pookie on the shoulder. “I’ve offered the job to this little firebrand here, but she’ll have to go to the state fire academy first.”

  The women converged on Pookie, rounds of congratulations filling the air.

  Dr. Cunningham stood in the doorway. “What the hell’s going on here? This is a hospital, not a social club.”

  “Well heck, Doc. That’s what you get for keeping a healthy woman cooped up for so long,” Judy responded.

  “Guess you better just go home then,” he responded.

  “Works for me,” Judy responded.

  “I’ll give the nurse your release order and some prescriptions. I don’t ever again want to see you with any bullet holes. Hear me?”

  “Yes, sir,” Judy answered.

  The doctor turned and strode away. Judy’s feet were over the edge of the bed before he was out of the doorway.

  “Where’s my clothes?” she demanded.

  Kathleen turned to the group of visitors. “Thanks for coming, but unless you want to watch Judy do a striptease, it’s probably time to go.”

  “I’m outta here,” Ted said, as he headed for the door.

  “He’s my ride,” Pookie said, following him out the door.

  Sophia stood gracefully and then stared down at her lover. April sat unmoving.

  “Ready?” Sophia asked her.

  “To leave or enjoy the show?” April answered.

  “Madre de dios!” Sophia grabbed April by the hand and pulled her to her feet. She turned to look at Kathleen. “What am I going to do with her?”

  At this point, Judy was limping toward the small closet where Kathleen had stashed a suitcase. “Did you bring me clothes? They cut off the ones I was wearing when they brought me in.”

  Kathleen looked at Sophia. “Don’t ask me. I can’t figure out how to handle the one I’ve got.”

  Epilogue

  Happy Endings

  Pookie was resplendent in her new dress firefighter uniform, her brass badge polished to a mirror-like sheen. She scanned the crowd of people milling in the yard of the Coldwater Community Building and Fire Station. Pookie thought she’d met everyone in the area, but she had no clue who half of them were.

  “Damn!” Pookie overheard old Mr. Johnson say as he stood beside the life-sized metal buffalo. “Never thought Coldwater would have its own sculpture park.”

  His wife looked on, shaking her head. “Oh hush! Just enjoy. Besides being real art, the women who made it were the ones who saved our place from burning to the ground. Something they wouldn’t have needed to do if you had just…”

  “Leave me be, woman. I won’t dump the trash burn barrel in the arroyo ever again.”

  Pookie laughed quietly as Judy and Kathleen stepped to her side. In the months since the shooting, Judy had progressed from crutches to cane and finally to a slight limp. Through it all, she’d never stopped working, although she had grudgingly allowed Pookie and Kathleen to do more around the ranch than before.

  “So how does it feel to be the featured artist at your very own opening reception?” Judy asked.

  “It was both of us,” Pookie responded.

  “You designed it. You built it. I was just the helper,” Judy said.

  “However it was done, I’m proud of both of you,” Kathleen said. She stepped between the two, placing an arm around each of their shoulders. Kathleen turned her attention to the sculptures themselves, now resting in their permanent home. Pookie, Judy, and their crew of volunteer helpers, mainly other firefighters, had finished placing the heavy sculptures earlier that week.

  The massive buffalo led the way. The structure was built entirely of bits of scrap metal, but somehow managed the effect of a living, breathing king of the plains. In a trail behin
d him, piles of stylized buffalo droppings were colorfully coated in polished enamel, starting with brown and green in the chips themselves, but surrounded with metal undulating fingers in red, yellow and orange, depicting the fire fuel the chips provided, making settlement of the plains possible. A smaller but still impressive Longhorn steer followed the buffalo, trailed by his own fiery droppings. A Hereford heifer, also in stylized scrap metal, finished the trio, but the cow-pies took on a different theme behind her. Instead of fire, growing from the droppings were metal depictions of wheat, sorghum, and corn, finishing the artistic depiction of the evolution of agriculture on the High Plains.

  Curley Thomas approached the three women, a half-eaten homemade donut in his hand and crumbs on his shirt front.

  “I like these art opening shindigs. Did you see the spread of food laid out in the community center? Makes our Coldwater holiday dinner look like a snack bar,” Curley said.

  “Who are all these people?” Pookie asked.

  Judy looked around at the crowd. “Folks from all over the county. Nobody’s going to miss dedication of the first sculpture in Dulson County.”

  “There’s never been another sculpture?” Pookie asked.

  “When I was a kid, they had a statue of a World War I soldier on the courthouse lawn, but that was on loan from Texas Tech. They took it back when I was in high school,” Curley said.

  “I didn’t know that,” Judy said.

  “No disrespect to veterans, but we were kinda glad to see it go. The artist wasn’t very good. Statue looked a little more like a dogcatcher than a soldier.” Curley turned to look at Pookie’s sculpture. “Now this,” he said. “This is for durned tooting a buffalo.”

  Pookie blushed with pride. Words of praise about art from Curley Thompson meant more to her than accolades from any art critic.

  “Thanks, Curley.”

  “Hey, look there,” Judy said, pointing toward the highway and an SUV driving their direction.

  “Who’s that?” Curley asked.

  “Friends of ours from Amber,” Kathleen answered.

  “You go say ‘howdy.’” Curley turned toward the old school house/community center. “I think I’ll see what kind of pies they have cut now.”