The Door to Mirabila
By Shine LeFlur
Copyright © 2011 Shine LeFlur
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction, and any actual events, names, or places are used fictitiously.
Smashwords Edition
PROLOGUE
“Look to your skies...a warning will
come from your skies” –1957 film
Earth vs. The Flying Saucers.
The meteor descended without design or intention. There were no sonic booms or fires in the sky, no harbingers or repercussions. It descended stealthily, unseen by human, radar, or satellite. A secret Air Force cosmic wave detector in nearby Louisiana recorded a dip in celestial radio wave background activity, but this went unnoticed because the computers were not programmed to watch for that.
Though not large as far as meteors go, this meteor fell slower than its mass should have dictated; in fact, its velocity was constant, pari passu, and trajectory precise, across vast venues of space and time. It arrived on Earth just before dawn in rural East Texas; impacting gently into a wooded hillside draw, it shimmered and abruptly stopped, nestled in humus-rich soil between greening Dogwoods.
The traveler arrived without fanfare or witnesses, save for a few invertebrates, a nest of sleepy squirrels, and a Horned Owl, who blinked and glared her disapproval. Except for a barely perceptible to humans violet glow, the meteorite sat benign and quiescent. Nearby arthropods, however, were stimulated into a herky-jerky frenzy, their attempts to escape rendered futile by an inexplicable tendency to travel in circles until they expired.
A small hazy area appeared above the space visitor, but reflective fractal qualities almost blended it with the background.
It was Sunday, May 25.
The year's at the Spring
And day's at the morn;
Morning's at seven;
The hillside's dew-pearled;
The lark's on the wing;
The snail's on the thorn;
God's in his heaven
All's right with the world.
–Robert Browning
Chapter 1
He stood in a watermelon patch. His watermelon patch. Tad knew this was his watermelon patch, but something about it felt wrong. He looked around and saw them. The melons were blobs: living, moving green blobs; they surrounded and closed in on him with grim determination. Trapped, on legs that would not move, he strained his mouth to cry out, but no sound came forth. The melon blobs grew into swollen, menacing giants with thundering heartbeats–their heartbeats? Boomba, boomba, boomba! Tad was doomed.
And yet, something about the blobs also seemed fragile, pathetic, as if they were trying to tell him–what? Then he heard it, with an inner ear, a faculty unused till now, and Tad's blood turned icy, his heart quivered in fright. For they chanted in shrill unison:
“Help, help us! Help, save us!” pleading over and over. But Tad, without breath, struggled desperately and faded away.
He woke up wild-eyed, bed sheets in a tangle and pillow askew, shivering with fright. Just a dream, a nightmare. That's all, a silly dream, he told himself. But he could not laugh it off, and it did not go away.
“Hind!”
“Say again?”
Tad moistened his parched lips. “Time!” he croaked.
“Time is 12:20 a.m.,” answered Cybert. Tad immediately cheered up. Today was Sunday, May 25, only one more week of school till summer vacation! He drifted uneasily back to sleep, the nightmare not quite forgotten.
Promptly at 8 a.m. Cybert, Tad's computer, began a wake-up routine, starting with Brahms’s Lullaby interrupted by a rooster crowing outside his window, then a brusque, threatening, gangster-style voice ordered him to “Get up or else.“
“Shut up, fool!” retorted the now-awake Tad, who continued to lie there, unmoving.
The computer remained silent a few minutes–Tad knew it watched him–and then a mesmeric, seductive voice from a nonexistent beauty lying beside him cooed in his ear, “Get up, Tad, I have something for you....”
WOW! Way cool! Even though he'd heard it a number of times, Tad still got goose bumps from this illusion. The Ventro software technology produced sound appearing to come from any desired spot within its range. Hopelessly outmoded, Cybert only had “Twin Ten” processors, but it did okay with simple stuff like sound and flat video.
Tad had hinted and chatted up Mo Mo, his grandmother, in hopes of getting a new computer for his upcoming birthday, ideally a Model 5. Of course he'd name it Cybert, too. Cybert 2? Maybe Cybert 5! Yeah, then he could run the latest VR games and novels, check out the neat new explorations.
Tad whistled a little mindless ditty. Only one more week of school: tests tomorrow and Tuesday, the class play Thursday, and the school trip Friday and Saturday. Maybe they'd go to New York or Mexico City! Maybe he could sit next to Alice Fay Smith on the bus! Why not? Summertime, and the living is easy….
“Better get ready for Sunday School,” Cybert announced authoritatively, interrupting his reverie.
“Shaddup, Cy-fart fool!” groused Tad. Sunday School! Jeez, like he was a little kid or something! Well, next month when he turned 13 he'd put a stop to this nonsense. A teenager couldn't be treated like a baby. He'd already told his mom and she hadn't disagreed; just kinda sighed and reminded Tad how much his grandparents enjoyed him going to Sunday School with them.
Maybe they did, but Tad figured more likely it had just become a habit for them. It wasn't so bad when he'd been a little kid. He could understand a little kid needing to know the Lord's Prayer, and the stories about Noah, Jonah, and the bread and fishes were okay for a kid, but he just didn't get into stuff now the way his grandparents did.
Several Sundays ago, his grandfather and old man Bud Adams got into it, arguing whether faith alone could save a body or if it required good works.
Adams fired the first shot, “Now Brother Sam surely knows that in Matthew 5, verse 16, the good Lord hisself said ‘Let your light shine that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in Heaven’.”
Gramps stood erect, his worn Bible open in his left hand, while his right beat the drum of perdition against Brother Bud.
“John 3:16 ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life’. We're talking about being saved here,” he added with a flourish, “not about glory and showing off!”
Now Brother Bud jumped up snorting like a bull on the warpath, thumped his Bible, and with sarcasm dripping heavy as molasses syrup, he thundered, “John 9:4 ‘I must work the works of him who sent me’. How much plainer can it be, Brother Samuel?”
Gramps jittered and skittered across the aisle, brandishing his Bible at Brother Bud like a broadsword.
“You want to see what the Lord Hisself said about works? John 6, verses 28 and 29 ‘They said what shall we do, that we may work the works of God?’ They're asking Jesus, you understand? Jesus answered and said to them, ‘This is the work of God, that you BELIEVE in him whom he sent’. Now,” Gramps continued, “any old fool should be able to understand that!”
Old man Bud hefted his Hickory cane.
“Who you calling an old fool?” he yelped. Then cooler heads intervened, noticed the time, and brought the session to a close. Since then, the two old men had studiously avoided speaking to each other, but Tad knew it'd blow over before long. It wasn't their first encounter of the Biblical kind.
Tad sighed, almost 9, he'd better get busy. They'd be by to pick him up at 9:30 sharp, 30 minutes early as usual. He groaned and dispiritedly slouched over to his closet for Sunday clothes, threw them on the bed, and made for the bathroom.
Sunday School over, it approached 11 o'clock and time for the church devotional to begin. Tad sat in a back pew of the small church, practicing one of his favorite games he used to pass time in church: trying to find animal likenesses in the appearance of church members. Anyone was fair game, he didn't discriminate.
His grandmother Mo Mo, for example, with her beehive hair and glasses pushed up on her forehead, resembled a queen bee, and old man Adams a walrus, what with his walrus moustache and what little hair he had left sleeked back on his glistening scalp. The choir director, Anne Marie Edwards-Jones (or was it Jones-Edwards?), now actually the song director since the choir disbanded due to Sister Myrtle Hardaway's piercing off-key bellowing, with her close-cropped soft hair, little pointed ears, and long slim twitching nose, Anne Marie was clearly a rodent, a mouse.
Appropriate in a funny way, Tad thought. On more than one occasion she had mentioned that mice and spiders terrified her. He laughed out loud, then caught himself and assumed a more pious expression as old lady Hughes in the pew ahead gave him a look that would wither Johnson grass. Miz Hughes the Bulldog!
"Everyone stand and sing number 47," Sister Anne instructed. Tad stood and thumbed through the hymnal. "Rock of Ages". He mouthed the words, but no sound escaped his lips. "Rock of Ages, cleft for me". Cleft? Now what did that mean, cleft? And what good would it do to talk to a rock in the first place, no matter how old–and most rocks would be pretty old, no doubt about that. Would any meteorite rocks be older than Earth rocks? Three or four billion years, was that right? Oh well....
Sister Anne turned in profile, and Tad almost tittered aloud. A perfect mouse! What would she do if a real mouse hopped out and danced around her feet? Hmm...or if a Daddy Long-legs came out and sat down beside her?
No, spiders were too slow, a mouse definitely much better. Or, more than one: here a mouse, there a mouse, everywhere a mouse-mouse. Multimouses. A gaggle of mouses. A dozen meese, the 12 Disciples? Tad giggled but turned it into a cough when he caught a glare from the Bulldog, self-appointed scourge of juvenile miscreants.
The last amen and closing hymn carried, as usual, well past noon. Pastor Truegood's sermons never exceeded one hour in design and rehearsal, but in practice he always blew another 15 or 20 minutes explaining the various points which seemed to draw blank stares from his congregation. Those souls still awake, that is.
The Pastor’s low-pitched monotone delivery could hypnotize and render the most fervent believer unconscious inside 30 minutes flat. A few Sundays back, in the middle of his sermon, Reverend Truegood, to emphasize a point, banged on his pulpit and shouted, “REPENT, O YE SINNER!”
“AMEN!” cried out Brother Adams, suddenly awake, and blinking, he rose from his seat to go home.
Tad rode on down for lunch to his grandparents' house, a few miles south of Martins Landing, itself nothing more than the crossroads of State Highway 72 East and Farm Road 495. Mo Mo had sweet potato pie for dessert–his favorite–and Tad took along an ad for the Model 5 computer, which he intended to introduce cleverly into the after-lunch conversation.
Gramps had spent the last dozen or so years developing his new breed of cattle he called Brangulo, an intergeneric cross of Angus, Bison, and Brahman. These new animals were large, lean, and grew fast; they had excellent disease and pest resistance and adaptation to xeric habitats, yet under intensive forcing exhibited good feed-to-meat conversion ratios. Gramps had also recently applied for EPA low-flatulence certification.
Perhaps most interesting: an unexpected and valuable propensity for long life, half again as much as the average bovine. Practically, this meant that 20 year-old brood cows still produced calves. Gramps suspected, and a farm genetic service finally confirmed, that one of the original animals had been a “sport”, a mutant, with one or more allele genes. The allele battled to prominence in the final chromosome lineup.
“An act of God,” proclaimed Gramps.
“Simple evolution,” thought Tad dourly, but he wisely kept his opinion to himself. One didn't challenge Gramps’ pronouncements about the Almighty, or much else, for that matter! Gramps also remained a contractor for Global Beef's “Nature's Organic” division, producing ordinary beef calves for other of the company's grow-out operations.
After lunch, Tad found an opportunity to show Mo Mo the Model 5 computer brochures. She expressed great interest and listened enthusiastically as Tad explained the features and improvements of the new machines. Nonchalantly, almost as an afterthought as he finished, he said surely having one of these new helpers would greatly improve his school grades. When Mo Mo asked to keep the brochures a while, he knew he was in like Flynn. Whoever Flynn was–he found it in some old book.
Tad acted happy as a lark when his dad came later in the afternoon to take him home.
“Church apparently agreed with you today, son,” Gerald remarked. Tad scowled momentarily, then shrugged and smiled again. No use to try to explain, so he just didn't reply at all, and acted as if something out the car window was powerfully interesting.
“Don't forget, you need to weed your melon patch before the melon vines get too long,” reminded Gerald.
Tad sighed. “I will, dad, this last week of school is tough, all the finals and all, but I'll do it Monday week if I can't get it before then. I promise.” Gerald smiled, nodded, “Better late than never, I guess.”
Chapter 2
Tad hopped up alertly when Cybert woke him Monday morning for school. “Joy to the world," he lisped happily. "Glad I'm not a girl”, he added laughingly as a poetic anti-PC afterthought. The sun had come up brightly, this was the last week of school, and Tad was giddy with anticipation.
Mentally he again went over the week's activities: final tests today and tomorrow, Play practice Wednesday, their performance Thursday, and the “End of School” trip Friday and Saturday. And then–and then–FREEDOM! Summer vacation! And this would the best ever, he'd soon be a teenager, practically an adult. Yep, it'd be a summer to remember for the rest of his life.
The first test, “Language”, began in Miss Pritchet's room promptly at 8:30, and the old lady watched like a sentinel of doom as the students arrived and sat at their computers. Tad entered his fingerprint and stared at the video scanner as it verified his identity.
“Good morning, Tad, are you ready for the first language test?” the computer intoned in a neutral voice.
“Ready as I'll ever be, 0 Wise One,” he quipped. The computer ignored him and began Test One instructions. Test One covered symbolic and written language: archaic, English, and foreign, although all answers were verbal. About the only use for keyboards or pointing devices involved certain math and graphics disciplines.
Before he finished the first test, Tad began to feel uncomfortable. “Stop the test,” he implored, “I gotta go to the rest room!”
“Gotta is not a correct word or phrase, Tad,” griped the computer, “Test is suspended, you may approach the Monitor.”
Teachers, and Miss Pritchet was especially outspoken about this, complained bitterly about being called “Monitors”, and their union threatened to strike over the matter, so the Education Commission finally agreed to a compromise wherein the word “Monitor” would change to “Instructional Liaison Official” in the next software release.
While true that human teachers had been unnecessary for several years except as minders or disciplinarians, it was equally true that their union had one of the most powerful political lobbies. The current iteration of instructional programming acted so humanized and responsive to individual student aptitudes and needs that the machines themselves had become almost invisible; they rarely needed attention, never complained, took sick, or went on strike, and student assessment scores climbed higher than ever before. Time and tide obey no human master; unions were an anachronism and a new generation of automatons brought their inevitable demise ever closer.
Tad completed the first test, and plunged on into the next. By the time the first day of tests ended, he was mentally drained but felt good about his day's performance. He finished almost an hour early, so he went to the Media Center to wait. Mary Sue Ebbers, Sal Montoya, and Elbert Russell were already there, and Alice Fay Smith came close behind on Tad's heels. His heart skipped a beat, and he swallowed hard as she entered. Alice Fay radiated a fresh, enchanting presence.
Tad was clearly under her spell, yet she appeared altogether unaware of her effect on him. Oh, she was polite and witty with everyone, but Tad alone hung on her every word and gesture, feeling that they were especially meant for him.
“Well, looks like you two finished together. Maybe you were ‘collaborating’ on the tests,” quipped Sal, voluble and somewhat of a wit.
“Oh, Sal,” added Mary Sue, “do you think Robin and Miriam are already rehearsing their parts?” Referring to the upcoming play in which Tad and Alice Fay played Robin Hood and Lady Miriam.
Alice Fay simply smiled and laughed, but Tad felt his face growing beet red from the roots of his brown hair all the way down his neck, and his throat threatened to choke him. He focused on a floor spot and tried to will his errant body back in control. Elbert didn't say anything; he rarely did, but simply smiled in his enigmatic, knowing way. Terrance Whitesell came in and, surprised to see the others already there, arrogantly pushed his way next to Alice Fay. Tad felt anger, or was it jealousy, slowly replace his embarrassment.
Finally recovered, he tried to change the subject, “Since you're so smart, Sal, want to bet who finishes first, Billy or Butch?” Billy meaning Billy Fears, a grossly overweight but harmless bumbledum, and Butch was Butch Bowers, an older sadistic bully two grades behind already. To say Butch was academically challenged would be charitable.
Sal did not intend to be so easily put off. “My money's on your girl Quindola,” he laughed, referring to Quindola Day, a student with a long-standing crush on Tad that had survived all his attempts to dislodge. QD, sweet though dumber than dirt, sported a long nose, big protruding ears, and a pockmarked face submerged in a sea of stringy yellow hair once reputed to house cooties and possibly mice.
How or why she picked Tad as her “object de affection” he didn't have a clue, but it may have been that, in the lower grades, he felt sorry for her and didn't join in the chants and taunts of the other kids. Back then Quindola had run away from school almost every day.
At any rate, this he could handle. “Ah, you're just jealous, Sal my gal,” he retorted. Cyril Duggan, Tad's best friend, came in just then, followed closely by Bonito Alveraz, Sissy Coleman, Jamail Johnson, and Elbert Russell. Quindola Day came smiling and loping down the hall a half-hour later.
Seconds before dismissal, Billy Fears rolled his way ponderously down the hall toward them.
“Yea, Billy!” Several cheered his apparent victory, but just then Butch Bowers shoved his way around Billy and burst through the door, apparently unwilling to be the last student to finish. The first day of the last school week was over, with only four days more to go!
Tuesday morning went much like Monday. The final test before noon was Ethics and Logic; Pete Hawkins, also the Physical Fitness and Diet teacher, monitored this class. Soon Tad drifted in a sea of confusing, if not downright tricky, questions: Ethics are often matters of perspective, culture, or tradition; it is ethical to employ unethical means to achieve an ethical result; ethics must be able to be explained logically; dialectic logic is a useful method to expose fallacies in a logical explanation; human logic can always be translated into computer logic; inferences within logical arguments are always the weakest links; ethics may be said to be subjective, logic objective; chaos implies: 1) illogic 2) logic beyond human comprehension 3) divine cause 4) the paranormal; emergent properties are logically predictable in theory; and on and on until poor Tad's head swam.
He became lost in threads of thought and met himself on the other side repeatedly; he felt confused and drained when he finally finished and escaped to the Media Center.
Incredibly, he found himself arriving with Afay again, she slightly in front of him this time, and they joined Mary Sue and Sal. A somber little group, even Sal apparently at a loss for his usual witticisms.
“What is this, a wake?” remarked Alice Fay. “Cheer up, you guys, that was the last test!”
Soon lunchtime rolled around and everyone trooped to the cafeteria. Tad waited his turn, inserted his card into the Foodmat, and then walked to the other end to retrieve the tray, with his name on it, which popped out. He maneuvered his way toward Alice Fay, sat down at her table, and took a look at his food.
The Foodmat was admittedly pretty neat, giving each student exactly the foods and portions they needed for their best health, and, quite often even giving them what they preferred. Tad also knew that nationally, student obesity was down and general health improved thanks to the robotic Foodmats, but he kinda missed old Miss Birdy, the cafeteria worker who used to fill their trays. She had worked for the school forever.
“Here you go, Tad sweetie,” she always said, “be sure you eat your beets, now!” She knew he hated beets. It wasn't the Foodmats fault Miss Birdie, well past retirement, had been let go. One just couldn't stand in the way of progress, of technology.
The first year the Foodmats appeared, there were a few rough edges. “Foodie” might calculate a need for a lot of a particular vitamin or mineral and put nothing but broccoli or carrots on your tray. Several times fat Billy Fears received an empty tray, Foodie apparently deciding that Billy needed to lose weight quickly. Tad grinned, remembering how Billy squealed like a starving pig. Billy was still as fat as Dallas, but it wasn't Foodie's fault.
A scowling Butch Bowers interrupted Tad's reverie. “So, pretty boy, I hear you're making bets on me, calling me a dummy like that idiot Fears,” Butch barked. Tad sat immobile, frozen in terror, unable to move or speak. That bigmouth Terrance! Butch laughed, twisting his face into an evil sneer, “Cat got your tongue, sonny?” He reached down and in one quick move dumped Tad's tray into his lap. “Next time I'll take your head off,” he threatened.
Alice Fay jumped up. “Go pick on someone your own size, Jumbo Dumbo!” she yelled.
Butch lumbered off a few steps, then turned to hurl a final retort, “I'll get you, pretty boy, and you won't be able to hide your coward ass behind a girl!” Tad's face burned, his gorge rose, and the room seemed to swim and swirl in colors and currents. Alice Fay bent down and started cleaning up the mess.
Tad suddenly went from rigidity to uncontrollable trembling. Everyone stared at him. He was ruined, a coward. But even with his grief, in this, his darkest moment, Tad's subconscious began to plot revenge. Hot tears of rage filled his eyes; he jumped up and fled, leaving a confused and upset Alice Fay in his wake. She started to follow him, then stoically went back to finish cleaning.
Tad retreated to his computer. Students were permitted, even encouraged, to use their school computers during free time. This included internet access as long as not used for proscribed activities. For years now, so-called adult sites resided in restricted dedicated domains which, along with several other domain suffixes, could not be accessed by school computers.
Tad immersed himself in music, his favorite form of indoor escapism, and found several new cuts which he downloaded and redirected to Cybert. An activity not permitted, but it only took a moment, and anyway, who'd know, what did it hurt? Angry at Butch, angry at himself, he felt like lashing out at anyone or anything.
Tad spent the rest of the school day reading classics. One of his current favorites was Candide, said to have been written in only three days by the 18th century philosopher-troublemaker Voltaire. Candide is an honest but naive boy who endures many hardships and mishaps, each explained as “all to the good” by his erstwhile mentor, Professor Pangloss, who, of course, never suffers personally.
Tad also enjoyed Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, mostly the many pranks Tom played on Aunt Polly, and Huck's Sunday School experience, where he got all astir about Moses and the Bulrushes until he found out Moses had been dead for hundreds of years. Then he lost interest, saying he didn't put too much stock in dead people. Man, kids could really live and have cool adventures in the olden days. And that Becky Thatcher; Tad closed his eyes, trying to picture her. He saw Alice Fay!
First thing Wednesday at school, students held a Purple Martin Student Council meeting to discuss their end of term school trip. Purple Martin being the school mascot, of course. A few of the cheerleaders were less than enthusiastic about jumping around wearing the purple wings, but the old folks in the community–and scads of them lived here–would never agree for this to be changed.
Chances were, even if the mascot were changed to the “Avengers” or the “Invincibles”, the small school probably still couldn't win any games. Their only record, a state record, in fact, was for the longest string of losing baseball games.
“This Council meeting will come to order. First we'll have the school pledge,” ordered Mary Sue Ebbers, Council President. This brought an audible series of groans, but Mary Sue pressed ahead, waved for silence, and then began:
We're the Purple Martins
We fly fast and high
Over all opponents
Soaring through the sky
Fight! Fight! Fight!
Yeah, Purple Martins
Go, Flock, go!
Several recitations sounded slightly altered.
“Now we'll have the Secretary-Treasurer's report of our school trip finances,” said Mary Sue. Sal Montoya stood and waved a small notebook.
“First I have a little quiz for you: why do Mexicans hate to barbeque?” asked Sal, with his trademark grin. Sal, an inveterate joker who poked fun at everything, took great delight in making himself the butt of his jokes.
There was a moment of silence, and then Jamail Johnson, quite a wit himself, piped up, “Err–they can't catch the cats?”
“Beep, wrong!” said Sal. “It's because the beans keep falling through the grill!” After the laughter subsided, he glanced at the notebook and continued, “I regret to report that, as of this moment (here he dramatically checked his watch), 8:49 a.m., we have a balance of $684.22. Enough, according to my information, to get us our choice of a deluxe trip to either the southern island resort of Galveston, or that great Rose Capital of the world, Tyler.”
Another chorus of groans erupted, louder than before. “The Principal says we can leave at noon Friday, spend the night, and return late Saturday afternoon,” added Sal helpfully.
“Oh, WOW!” said Cyril.
“Far out!” added Sissy.
“Uh, what's a Rose Capital?” asked Billy Fears.
“Shut up, Billy,” piped up Quindola, uncharacteristically.
“Vote, vote!” urged Alice Fay. Then she leaned into Tad and whispered,
“Let's go to the beach, okay?” He nodded. He'd follow her anywhere, he'd fight dragons–die for her!
“Liar,” said his alter ego, “you're a weenie, a coward.” The vote was unanimous for Galveston.
Rehearsals for the play began in Miss Lucy Petty's Drama and Speech classroom; as Tad entered, Ms. Petty handed him a note to go see the Principal, Ms. Dunston, right away. He walked down to her office, wondering why she wanted to see him. Maybe about the run-in with Butch. Surely nothing had happened to his parents or grandparents.
Ms. Dunston ushered him into her office, her expression indicating nothing. “You're pretty good with our computers, huh, Tad?” she asked with a neutral smile. He wasn't sure how to answer; where was she going with this?
“Ah, I do like computers, they–I've learned a lot from them,” he replied carefully.
The principal stared at him, and then dropped her eyes to something on her desk. “Yes, and your grades are good. But what I want to know is why you downloaded some music from the Internet yesterday afternoon? Which, I might add, is strictly against the rules, young man?”
“Uh oh, somebody saw me and ratted,” thought Tad, racking his mind quickly. “That's true,” he confessed glibly. “I downloaded a song my mother likes called ‘How Great Thou Art’ for her Birthday ‘cause I didn't have enough money to buy it.”
“Why, Tad,” nodded Ms. Dunston approvingly, “isn't that sweet?” Tad tried to smile confidently, but his lips seemed to twist a little, and sweat popped up on his forehead. He opened his mouth a couple of times like a fish, but no sound emerged.
Ms. Dunston reached toward her computer. “Let's just have a listen,” said she, hitting a key. A raucous, strident techno-rap blared forth, as Tad shrunk in his chair. Ms. Dunston stopped the racket. “Rather an unusual rendition of ‘How Great Thou Art’–did you download that?” she demanded.
Tad hung his head. “Yes, Ma'am, I, uh, a….”
“Did the computer teach you creative lying?” she demanded. “Maybe I should confer with your mother about this.”
“No ma'am, the computer only teaches truth. Please don't tell my mom, I promise I'll follow all the rules from now on, Ms. Dunston,” Tad begged.
The Principal gave him an appraising gaze. “See that you do. My new ‘Spybot’ program watches everything on the school computers. I also expect an original one-thousand word essay on ‘Student Ethics’ to be on my desk before you leave on the school trip Friday,” she ordered, and dismissed Tad with a wave.
He slunk back down the hall. “Spybot,” he groused. “Jeez, what a sneaky, underhanded thing to do!” And there was the matter of the essay, but he'd get Cybert to write it and then he'd edit it carefully. Very carefully. Although Cybert rephrased information quite adeptly, the results still had a slight woodenness, a stilted flow, and even an academic preciseness that someone like Principal Dunston could detect.
Chapter 3
Rehearsals for the great epic, Robin Hood, were well under way when Tad slipped back into Ms. Petty's room. Ms. Petty herself had penned the screenplay and she was determined not to let anything go afoul in the maiden production. Her secret ambition: to be a famous star on Broadway or, failing that, at least a screenwriter of great renown.
“Robin, Robin,” she called out to Tad when she spied him. “Over here, over here!” When she was nervous, Ms. Petty tended to repeat everything.
“Robin, you and Little John go through your introductory scenes,” she instructed. Elbert Russell, Little John, grinned and good-naturedly brandished a stick, his cudgel, at Tad. Butch Bowers, the Sheriff of Nottingham, stood over in a corner and scowled. Tad ignored him. The Sheriff had few lines and always looked mean and scowled, so Butch was well cast, but of course he supposed himself the main star.
The rest of the practice went well enough, except that Tad had an inexplicable tendency to forget his lines when he and Alice Fay, “Robin” and “Miriam”, went through their scenes. Finally, an exasperated Ms. Petty said, “Robin, just imagine that Miriam is actually an ugly witch in disguise, and you'll be able to remember your lines!”
A red-faced Tad assured her he'd have the dialogue down pat for the performance. Alice Fay said nothing, just smiled sweetly with a serenity Tad found enchanting. “A witch?” he thought to himself. “That acting talent is beyond me!”
After the rehearsal, Tad and Cy had a private powwow for a few minutes, after which they invited Sal to join them. The three engaged in a low-toned, yet often spirited conversation until buses arrived to take them home.
For 800 years the historical-mythical story of Robin Hood had endured, often seeming to fade away, then reemerging like a Phoenix to beguile and charm a new generation of youth. Said to be historical in setting, it is also a tale of invention, romance, good versus evil, and above all, brotherhood.
Adults, cynical and knowing, their idealism long squashed by society and their brotherhood killed by me-ism, often see only anarchy and lawlessness in the tale. That such was the essence of the American (and French, etc.) Revolution never once enters their minds (“Our modern age is different, it is unique”). Youth wears no blinders.
All 200 seats in the Martins Landing school auditorium soon filled for the 6 p.m. performance of “Robin of Green Glen”, an original screenplay written, produced, and directed by Miss Lucille Marie Petty.
This exalted personage herself, well rouged and powdered, with freshly renewed blond curls springing this way and that, sat on pins and needles to one side of the stage, just behind, from the audience's viewpoint, a front side panel.
Ms. Petty, in her weaker moments, admitted she had been writing the play since age 27. Now 36 (or 46, depending on the source of the information), she knew, she knew beyond any doubt, this was the day she had waited and worked for most of her adult life. Bright lights, Broadway, candy and flowers, critics hanging on her every word. That was her destination, and this the vehicle to take her there. Adrenaline pumping, she squirmed and twisted, trying to collect her disparate thoughts and concentrate on the business at hand.
Sissy Coleman, the narrator, who also appeared as the character “Fate”, came out before each of the three acts to recite background and set the scenes.
Act I
“In the year 1066, Normans, originally from France, defeated the incumbent Saxons and ruled England. Soon, abuse, excessive taxation, and outright plunder grew commonplace. Out of a century of misery arose Robin Hood, champion of the poor and downtrodden. In 1189, Richard the Lionhearted, gone from England at the time, succeeded to the throne. His wisdom drew Saxon respect; he also initiated many reforms in the corrupt system.
“This time period also saw the European religious crusades against the Saracens in Palestine. Sadly, King Richard died in France only ten years later, but his legend, and that of Robin Hood, lived on far into the future. Mortals die, but the ideals they leave behind–of bravery, freedom, and compassion for the less fortunate–shall endure until the last human draws a final breath.
“Our story begins in Sherwood Forest, not far from the town of Nottingham. A few poorly paid foresters maintained the forest, a Royal game preserve belonging to the Crown. One of these, an honest woodsman named Paul Longbow, finally died of overwork and untreated disease, leaving his young son Robin, whose mother had passed away at his birth, little except a fine longbow and a skill for making arrows of exceptional quality. Robin's father invented the longbow, which, although it required much strength and practice to master, became one of the most formidable weapons of the time.
Scene 1: Robin, despondent, having just buried his father, travels through the forest to ask the Chief Forester for his father's job. Rowdies accost him; one, a bully known to Robin, is also a rival for the job. The bully taunts Robin, and then pulls a dagger; he and his friends pursue Robin with the obvious intention of killing him. Trying to flee, Robin turns and looses an arrow meant to be a warning, but the bully stumbles and the arrow penetrates his heart. Knowing he will be accused of murder by the other youths, Robin flees blindly into the darkest wilds of Sherwood Forest.
Scene 2: Robin's closest childhood friends, Dutch of Stone Creek Mill (Cyril), and Miriam of Buford (Alice Fay), search through the forest for him. Though Robin is accused of murder, they believe in him and want to help. They eventually find Robin in one of their old childhood haunts, but he is in such a black mood of despair that at first he tries to shun them, knowing they risk their own lives.
Through their love and trust, Dutch and Miriam convince the stubborn Robin that he must not give up, but fight to clear his name. Dutch insistently joins him, but Robin refuses to let Miriam lead such a life. Robin takes the name "Robin Hood" after a habit of wearing his cloak over his head, and declares their forest hideout "Green Glen". Miriam becomes their link to the outside world.
Scene 3: Will of Norwood (Sal) and Little John (Elbert), both also wrongly accused of crimes by the Sheriff, meet with and join Robin; others, including Fate, soon follow. Initially, the Green Glen group makes longbows, arrows, and leather goods to sell; they eat deer and other game of Sherwood Forest; Dutch brings flour from his father's mill. The Sheriff of Nottingham posts a reward for the capture of Robin, and higher taxes are imposed on Saxons.
Lady Elaine of Maple Leaf Castle (Mary Sue), a kindly Saxon widow who purchases many of Robin's goods, helps many of the oppressed pay their taxes to avoid losing their property. Lady Elaine is one of the few remaining wealthy Saxons.
Act II (Narrator):
“Several years go by. Green Glen is well organized, Robin and his men have trained many long hours learning to use the longbows and practicing other combat skills. To Robin's amazement, Miriam, who visits often and practices with her own longbow crafted by Little John, becomes the most accurate shooter of his group, although her endurance is less.
“High taxes, oppression, and numerous property seizures have resulted in widespread hardship, poverty, and unrest.
“Lady Elaine's castle taxes are increased so much she is finally unable to pay, and the Sheriff threatens to foreclose and force her out.
Scene 1: The Royal Tax Collector and his entourage pass on the road beside Sherwood Forest, is ambushed by Robin and his men, and relieved of his load of gold and silver taxes. Several fat and greedy Norman lords suffer a similar fate. Robin distributes funds to the poor and dispossessed, and helps others escape oppression. Downtrodden Saxons begin to see Robin Hood as a symbol of freedom and justice, a champion they can rally around.
Scene 2: The Sheriff is in the process of seizing Lady Elaine's castle, but Miriam suddenly arrives with enough gold and silver to pay the tax and save Lady Elaine. The Sheriff is furious. Knowing Robin is behind this, he devises a clever trap: an archery contest to be held at the upcoming Nottingham Fair, for which the winner will receive a solid gold arrow. Sure Robin's pride will entice him to enter, the Sheriff hires a locally unknown ruthless mercenary, Bart of Blackhill (Terrance), to kill Robin when he appears at the contest.
Scene 3: As the champion of the underdog, Robin is encouraged, and even expected by the public, to challenge the Sheriff's best archers and take the golden arrow. But Robin, seeing the elaborate preparations, the offer of amnesty for all entrants, senses a trap and wisely declines to attend. He reluctantly agrees to let Little John go, disguised as a wrestler, in order to spy out the Sheriff's intentions.
At Nottingham Fair the shooting event begins, and the crowd is in awe of a longbow archer they take to be Robin Hood, with the same slender height, and a hood covering most of his face and head. Black Bart, one of the most skilled archers in England, the Sheriff's secret weapon, easily bests all the other entrants; and then the hooded archer incredibly wins by splitting Bart's best arrow down the center of the shaft. The crowd goes wild.
Little John, amazed and curious, has worked his way close to the action; he sees Bart suddenly take a dagger and strike “Robin” from behind. As the hooded figure falls, Little John recognizes that it is actually Miriam in disguise and jumps to her aid. The crowd surges around, making it difficult to know what is happening.
Act III (Narrator):
“Miriam, badly wounded, is whisked away in the confusion by Little John, with the aid of other wrestlers who lend him a horse. Little John hurriedly takes Miriam to the secluded forest chapel home of Friar Tuck (Billy), who asks no questions and begins preparing healing herbal remedies. Little John leaves at once in great haste to fetch Robin.
Meanwhile, Black Bart and his cutthroats track the escapees, Bart still convinced it is Robin he wounded and now intends to kill.
Scene 1: Robin and his men arrive at Friar Tuck's chapel; Robin goes quickly to Miriam's side, shaken and grief-stricken by the realization that she had risked death for his honor and love. Miriam is delirious; Robin, at long last, realizes and admits his love and devotion to her and prays for her recovery.
Robin's lookouts signal danger; his men take their positions, and unleash their own trap on Black Bart and his force entering the clearing. A desperate battle, during which Green Glen loses several men and Bart even more, finally brings Bart face to face with a healthy and enraged Robin.
The surprised Bart, thinking Robin has magical powers, never recovers and is defeated and killed by Robin. The rest of Bart's men flee. Robin knows the Sheriff must now hunt him down at all costs, so he accepts Lady Elaine's offer of refuge in Maple Leaf Castle, a fortification affording excellent defense as well as care and protection for Miriam.
Scene 2: A spy brings the Sheriff, who sits drinking in the Nottingham Pub, news of Black Bart's defeat and Robin's escape to Maple Leaf Castle. The Sheriff understands that he has no choice but to get personally involved if he is to survive the fomenting rebellion, and issues orders for emergency mobilization of all regional forces of the Crown: to immediately prepare for battle under his command. As the curtain begins its descent, the Sheriff chugs down the bottle of ale (ginger ale), his Worthiness unaware that the drink contains a double dose of Aunt Bessie's "Never-Fail-to-Move-Quick" constipation formula. Several sets of eyes glittered in the dark as the ale disappeared.
Up to this point, things had gone swimmingly, even Billy had delivered Friar Tuck's one line, “Put her over here” flawlessly. Bard Lucy slowly relaxed; tension drifted away in harmless sighs of relief and delight, replaced by sweet warm feelings of success. Broadway had never been so near; Lucy smelled the roses.
Scene 3 opens at Maple Leaf Castle: Robin's and Lady Elaine's men take defensive positions, and Robin exchanges a few words, perhaps a final farewell, with Miriam, who is slowly recovering. They each affirm their love for the other and await their fate. The Sheriff's loud voice is heard calling for Robin to give himself up to avoid harm coming to Miriam and Lady Elaine.
Robin looks out over the Sheriff's immense, well-armed force, and is torn between the instinct to fight, never give up, and a sinking feeling of despair, that they are all doomed. He also knows the Sheriff will not spare any witnesses, even the women. Lady Elaine urges Robin to remain courageous and steadfast; assuring him the strong castle gate and walls will make the Sheriff's men pay dearly. Suddenly the sound of a distant trumpet echoes across the castle. Little John, manning a high lookout post, peers out and sees a mounted column of soldiers riding from the forest. A bright pennant flies proudly in the morning sun.
“Robin, look yon!” cries Little John. “It's the King! King Richard the Lionhearted (Bonito)! He’s come here!”
The King enters the scene, followed by the Sheriff, whose nervousness is not an act. Lady Elaine steps forward, hugging the King and calling him Richard, and they talk of their childhood. It turns out that they grew up together, had been childhood friends; Lady Elaine had recently sent a secret message informing the King, just returned from a crusade, of the many atrocities taking place in his name.
King Richard speaks of this, then, after they take an oath of fealty, pardons Robin and his men, and makes Robin his Royal Forester. Next, the King strips the Sheriff of his title, orders him to give the stolen money he carries to the poor, and appoints Little John Sheriff.
The hapless and disgraced Sheriff, by now much wild-eyed and disconcerted, squirmed and shifted nervously–Ms. Petty thought it a masterful performance. Robin and Miriam embrace, “Robin” hoping the moment would never end.
The script called for the Sheriff to open his basket and throw the “gold”, actually gold coin candy, into the audience as the final curtain begins a slow descent. The Sheriff, hopping on first one foot and then the other, intended to do just that, and then make a quick dash for the hall restroom, but when he groped wildly for a handful of candy he pulled out a writhing mass of snakes!
The plotters assumed he'd simply drop everything at this point and run, but the law of unintended consequences jumped in, and Butch, howling a genuine cry of the wild, threw the basket into the audience and ran down the aisle emitting clouds of gas and other smelly unmentionables. The poor reptiles were only garter snakes, but Butch and the crowd didn't see it that way.
Whooping and hollering in the dark like so many banshees, the audience performed an emergency exit the Fire Chief would have approved, if Martins Landing had a Fire Chief. Lucy Petty just sat there, sat there like a stone. Sat there in sackcloth and ashes, her dreams and visions of that Great White Way inexorably fading, sinking. Her life's crowning moment turned to dust in a phantasmagoric time warp of seconds.
She would never write, would never direct, another play. She would become a nun, wear black, perform penance, and never speak to a human again.
Actually, it didn't work out that way. Every member of the audience bragged and carried on that it was the best and most exciting and realistic performance they had ever witnessed, and they demanded that Ms. Petty do a repeat of the play. The big city newspaper in Nacogdoches even printed a front-page article of praise, short on precise detail, but effusive in terms of artistic portrayal and effect.
And school was out! Butch Bowers reportedly took up residence with relatives in Arkansas and never again set foot in Martins Landing. It was Arkansas's gain!
Chapter 4
Galveston Texas was, perhaps, at least in the eyes of some, a decrepit replica of its past grandeur. After the town's incorporation in 1836, it quickly grew, with a deep-water port and 30 miles of white pristine beaches, to become Texas' largest city in the late 1800s.
No seawall existed to protect the island when Mother Nature unleashed a powerful hurricane in 1900. Monster waves rolled across the island, sending buildings crashing into one another in a frenzy of mutual destruction. When the storm passed, some 6000 souls–there was no way to know precisely how many–had perished. Their bodies, bales of cotton, and assorted timbers washed up for weeks.
The island was bitterly cursed and abandoned, but a core of determined survivors and cotton financiers had a new vision and constructed the now taken-for-granted seawall. As time dimmed memory, Galveston recovered, but it would never again match its original naïve glory.
Before the name Galveston, before the Texans, before even the Mexicans, Spanish, and French, fierce Indians, unlike any other Native Americans, roamed and ruled the island. These bloodthirsty cannibals, the Karankawa, are said by some to be remnants of Aztecs or Incas who came by boat to escape whatever the fate was that had doomed their homeland.
This tribe offered a chilling, if not downright warm, welcome to hapless sailors who had the misfortune to wreck on their beaches.
Ultimately the bravery and brutality of these natives were done in, not by muskets or swords, but disease carried by European explorers, a common occurrence in the New World.
Jean Lafitte, the controversial French pirate, set up shop on Galveston Island and reigned briefly from 1817 to 1821. Lafitte was variously portrayed as a learned and gracious gentleman–a hero of the Battle of New Orleans–or as a cruel and barbaric despot. Perhaps Robin Hood could have appreciated the irony. In any case, it is a fact that treasure hunters still search for Lafitte's buried gold.
In the first half of the 20th century, Galveston became the sin city of the South, a Las Vegas before Vegas existed, perhaps due in part to the national backlash against Prohibition and popular belief that robber barons controlled government.
Nothing characterized or defined this Galveston period so well as brothers Sam and Rose Maceo’s infamous Balinese Room. Over three decades its veneer of decadent ambience and silky hospitality drew the rich and famous and the wannabes, but it was said to be fueled by bribery, corruption, and intimidation.
Reformers finally pushed out much of the blatant corruption, and by the 1950's only a few giant bingo palaces remained. Families brought their children to the beaches again, and to Pleasure Pier to ride the largest wooden roller coaster in America. Then a couple of cars zoomed off the tracks to tragedy one fine summer day, and the structure was soon demolished. Tad knew all about this because Gramps’ grandfather, a boy at the time, had ridden the ill-fated attraction earlier the same day!
Principal Dunstan was not at her desk when Tad crept into her office, laid his essay down carefully, and made a quick escape. He would never know she did not even read it, just grinned and tossed it into file 13.
Much later, she would think back, remember, and regret her impulsive act, wish she had the essay back. Regret is a bird that flies, never dies; a stone that weighs upon the soul; a persistent shadow that dog's one’s journey and creeps uninvited into dreams at night and thoughts by day.
In an attempt to avoid bickering and squabbles, the class had been pre-assigned bus seating; seat numbers were passed out 30 minutes before time to board. Naturally this set off a mad frenzy of bartering and trading seat number coupons.
Tad finally emerged from the fray victorious and smiling, the ticket with the seat number next to Alice Fay's clutched tightly in his hand. The girls stood apart from this madness, coy and demure, and subtly revealed their seat numbers to those favored.
Tad had to beg, connive, and finally buy the precious slip of paper from Billy, who might not be too bright, but knew he had a gold mine when Tad's voice betrayed his eagerness. Lucky that Mo Mo had given him an extra 20 bucks; heck, he'd have paid 100 if he'd had it. Terrance was P.O.'d, he'd only been willing to threaten Billy, a tactic that usually worked, but Billy had finally rebelled.
During the journey, Tad, Cyril, and Sal were uncharacteristically silent when their classmates turned to the matter of Robin Hood's unorthodox finale. The rest of the group argued and conjectured at great length about the genesis of the snakes, Butch Bower's sudden malady, and his present whereabouts. Omerta ruled and the “mysterium tremendum” remained just that. Alice Fay had her own suspicions, and when she asked Tad a seemingly innocuous question regarding the happenings and he answered cryptically “God is great”, she knew. Bread and fishes were one thing, but snakes quite another.
The three-hour trip turned into four hours after a tire on their bus blew out, giving the girls, and Billy, something to scream about; then they all got a preview of tropical beach heat as the temperature bumped 100° under a blazing Texas sun and the bus air conditioning croaked. Undeterred, the youngsters opened all the bus windows, and Bonito, who had astutely brought along a cooler of ice, did a booming business at 25 cents a cup, albeit mostly on credit.
The bus driver, Mr. Pete Hawkins, hot and hotter himself over the tire and air conditioning, finally stopped north of Houston at a Global Beef “Nature Burgers”. Pete and Elbert managed to get the balky air conditioner going again and the intrepid trippers resumed their Odyssey, fat and sassy. They roared off the Mexican Interstate and onto the Galveston Causeway in no time at all. Ms. Ida Mae Cheever, persuaded against her better judgment to chaperone the girls, sighed in relief and went back to her magazine article on the origins of math and ciphers.
The happy trippers turned rowdy, yelling out the windows, when the bus turned east on Seawall Boulevard in search of their accommodation and they caught sight of the gulf. At high tide, with moderate surf, countless wave crests glittered and shimmered with tiny fiery suns. The horizon, stretching endlessly, mesmerized and seemed to say “Here lies exotic and mysterious pleasures”.
Captivated, the group fell silent for a few moments, each person caught up in a personal vision of paradise. Except Billy, who broke the spell by bellowing loudly, “I can't swim! They’s big sharks out there!" This was rather a long outburst for Billy, who apparently had been fixating on these terrors for some time.
Terrance fed the fire, “Yeah, Fears, you know they look for fatties to eat. I heard about one shark even coming up on the beach to chomp a chubby morsel like you!” Everybody laughed, even Mr. Hawkins suppressed a grin, but Billy turned green.
Jamail beat Sal to the punch: “Here lies Billy Fears. Well, most of him, except his arms, legs and ears!” Hand on mouth, Billy ran to the back of the bus, and Mr. Hawkins waved a warning to end the episode.
Days earlier, Principal Dunstan had arranged their hotel reservations on the net, quite proud of her ability to negotiate such a favorable group rate at such a prestigious and prominent establishment. How fortunate for her that she could not accompany the beneficiaries of her astute bargaining. While true enough that the Galvestonian Pride graced Seawall Boulevard, not far from the new Pleasure Pier and sandy beaches, it was equally true, if less obvious on the net, that her glories were long past. Current owners put funds into their website advertising instead of maintenance and repairs on the aging structure. The immediate neighborhood had fared in similar fashion: one side sported a massage bathhouse and the other side a tattoo parlor.
Pete Hawkins and Ida Mae Cheever stared in disbelief when he found the address and swung the bus into a front, mostly vacant, parking area. Pete actually swore under his breath as he stared fixedly at the hotel sign, hanging somewhat askew as it swayed precariously in the Gulf breeze. They were stuck. Stuck like Chuck, with the funds already transferred. Pete got a headache; Ida glanced around wildly as if she expected half-naked Karankawas to leap out and attack them.
The happy young invaders from Nacogdoches hardly seemed to notice, except for Mary Sue, who well knew the difference between a four star hotel and a rundown hunk of junk. But even Mar Sue's frown became a grin as she turned her gaze toward the wondrous inviting gulf scene. They were only going to be there one night–heck, pup tents down on the beach would be fine for them!
Pete eventually culled out several of the better rooms in one wing of the first floor: guys on one end of the hall and girls on the other end. The boys got into a brief contest to find the biggest roach, quickly forgotten when Pete asked if they'd all like to hit the beach and cool off.
Within 10 minutes they all stood on the beach impatiently while Pete gave them their do's and don'ts, “safety rules”, he said:
“Don’t leave the hotel by yourself. Don't go more than three or four blocks away from the hotel. Don't go in the water unless he or Ida Mae came along. Everybody in their rooms from midnight to 6 a.m. Don't use the phones except to call him or Ida May in an emergency. And lastly–he grinned–no guys in girls’ rooms at any time.”
“Any questions?” He paused, waiting the inevitable.
“So, girls in guy's rooms is okay?” This from Sal.
“Absolutely not!” sputtered Ida Mae. “Our young ladies wouldn't dream of such a thing. You boys better mind your P's and Q's if you know what's good for you!” The girls rolled their eyes and traded mischievous grins.
The revelers cackled and cavorted in the surf until almost 5:30 p.m. They even finally persuaded Billy to wade in up to his ankles, but he refused to face away from the water and stepped carefully forward and back with the waves to avoid being in too deep. Quindola, trying to get Billy to lighten up, snuck up behind him and very quickly dropped a tiny land crab down his shorts.
Billy lightened up, all right; he very nearly dropped his drawers, and his yells fetched two lifeguards from 500 yards away! Billy, both looking and seeing red, chased Quindola a few yards, threatening her with dire consequences, before tiring; she easily danced out of his reach, mocking and taunting him. Pete captured it all on his wrist video camera–a Kodak moment to savor! Ida Mae scolded Quindola, but her heart wasn't in it and Tad thought the old lady had a twinkle in her eyes.
They lunched at the Lobster's Lear, buffet style, all the deep-fried soft-shell crabs, stuffed crabs, boiled crabs, fried oysters, and shrimp–fixed five different ways–you could eat. Billy now took his revenge the only way he knew how.
Chapter 5
Tad didn't really have his mind on the food; with heart in throat, he hesitantly asked Alice Fay if she'd like to go for a walk on the beach after they finished eating. She said sure.
They strolled eastward awhile, the low sun behind them casting long, grotesque shadows which menaced and dared, then flitted ahead in a parody of dance. Suddenly the shadows appeared to zoom off ahead and fade.
Tad and Alice Fay turned and were instantly captivated by the most gorgeous sunset they had ever witnessed. The bright yellow disk, still fully visible, hung just above a graying horizon; it turned orange, then red, before it finally plunged into the sea. Low, scattered cloudbanks all across the western sky faithfully recorded its passage, displaying layers of fleecy silver, yellow, orange, and finally crimson against a background of blue to gray sky.
“Blood red,” thought Tad. “It's like somebody killed the sun and it's dead and gone,” he blurted.
“God, how romantic,” thought Alice Fay. Aloud: “Don't worry. It'll be back on duty at 6 a.m. sharp.” She leaned over and lightly kissed his cheek.