“Oh, yeah,” Molly said, tracing the scar. “I remember old Jocko very well.”
“But did you learn anything from him?” Parnell asked.
“Well, I didn’t learn to stay out of the pasture, but I think I learned not to underestimate the adversary.”
Parnell’s ugly, drooping face came to animated life with his smile. “That cantankerous old bally bastard Jocko.” Admiration lit up his eyes. “That bull was faster than a six-legged jack rabbit.”
“And meaner than eight acres of snakes,” Molly said, knowing the Morriseys would recognize it as one of her father’s favorite expressions.
They all laughed. Rose fished a tissue from her purse and blotted a tear from under her eye.
“Don’t worry about me,” Molly told them. “I’m a sane and sensible middle-aged woman, forty-five next month. I give the Jockos of the world wide berth now, and I don’t take things to extremes.”
Parnell rolled his eyes.
Rose smiled and shook her head.
The door opened and Parnell’s secretary stuck her head in. “Senator Haney called, Senator. He says you’re late and they’re waiting on you.”
Parnell clapped his hands. “Ladies, I’m off. Rosie, are you going to stay here, or you want to come along?”
“I think I’ll stay here, dear, and work on my needlepoint.”
Parnell turned and put his hands on Molly’s shoulders. “Safe trip, sweetheart.” He kissed her on the cheek. “Give your Aunt Harriet my love.” He started to turn away, then paused and turned back. “Molly, she’s always been a fine woman, your Aunt Harriet—loyal and strong. I’m not sure you ever appreciated that fully.”
“Probably not,” Molly said.
Parnell leaned down and kissed Rose, gathered some papers from his desk, and left quickly.
When the door had closed, Rose said, “Molly, my dear, do you have time to sit with me a minute?”
Molly settled on the green leather footstool so she could be close to Rose. “I’m behaving badly, aren’t I, Rose?”
Rose laughed her old tinkling laugh that always reminded Molly of picnics and evenings on the front porch long ago. “You’re behaving like Molly Cates.”
“It’s time for me to grow up, isn’t it? That’s what Aunt Harriet would say—if she could still say anything. Here I am, the mother of a grown daughter, about to have my forty-fifth birthday, and I still don’t feel much like an adult.”
“I never could understand Harriet putting such stock in the virtue of being an adult. I think it’s greatly overrated, Molly. I know this is shallow of me, but I hate being old. If I could go back to being twenty, I would do it in a snap.”
Molly considered it. Certainly physical decay was the pits, and especially painful for one who had once been as beautiful as Rose. One of the few advantages of not being beautiful, Molly consoled herself, was that you didn’t have so much to lose with age. “I don’t think I would,” Molly said. “It was too painful.”
“But you haven’t experienced real decay yet.” Rose put the needlepoint down on the table next to her. “I started this damn thing last year, Molly. Haven’t done a stitch on it in two months.” She held her clawlike hands out in front of her and studied them. “My hands are too stiff.” She let them drop into her lap, rested her head back on the chair, and closed her eyes. “It’s like having some big dead lobsters grafted onto my wrists.” She gave a mournful chuckle. “Don’t get old, Molly.”
It was rare for Rose to be so candid. Molly studied the beautiful old face in repose—the delicate chin and finely sculpted nose, the wide, generous cheekbones, the large eyes, set far apart. It was all still there under that thin layer of old, wrinkled skin—the same face, the same woman. Even white-haired and nearly crippled, she managed to retain the glamor she’d always had for Molly. “Rose,” she said, “you’re still the most beautiful woman I know.”
Rose laughed. “Molly, Molly.”
“You have any messages for Aunt Harriet?”
Rose thought for a minute, her eyes still closed. “Tell her I think about her. I feel badly I haven’t seen her since Christmas.”
“Neither have I.” The familiar lump of guilt and regret nearly gagged Molly. “I’ll see her tonight.”
“Tell her we’ll come after the session’s over, when we’re back at the ranch.”
“I’ll tell her,” Molly promised, thinking that Harriet was long past caring whether any of them came or not.
CAPTAIN LEANDER H. MCNELLY OF THE TEXAS
RANGERS … WAS NOT A LAW-MAN, BUT A GUERRILLA
SOLDIER, IN A LAND WHERE THE ESTABLISHED
FORMAL LAW WAS A FICTION.
—T. R. FEHRENBACH, LONE STAR
Since she had about an hour before she absolutely had to leave for the airport, Molly stopped in at the Senate hearing, the last one before Monday’s vote on the concealed handgun bill. The room was packed, every seat taken and people standing in the back. The seven members of the Criminal Justice Committee sat at the front, high on the dais, behind a curved table, while a representative of the Texas Police Chiefs Association read into the microphone a prepared statement about how allowing more guns out on the street increased the danger for police officers—a message Molly couldn’t believe was news to anyone.
She surveyed the crowded hearing room, surprised to see DPS officers in their olive uniforms and Stetsons stationed every few yards around its perimeter. She counted seven of them, five more than usual. It made her wonder if something was brewing. When one of the officers she knew slightly passed by, she followed him. He stationed himself in a corner, standing with legs braced wide, hands clasped in front of him, eyes panning the room.
“What’s going on, Officer?” she asked quietly. “You guys having a convention here?”
He hooked his thumbs into his belt and frowned down at her. “Ma’am?”
“Why do they need seven of you for this little bitty room? You expecting a nuclear attack?”
“They tripled us up for this hearing, ma’am.”
“How come?”
“This bill’s the hot one of the session. Tends to get emotions stirred up.”
“True.”
“Also, you get lots more folks carrying.”
“Carrying guns? Right now? Here?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Molly looked around at the crowd. “How do you know?”
He leaned down and said under his breath, “Well, you got to know where to look. See that fella there, standing off to the side next to the woman in red?”
Molly located him, a fat man with horn-rimmed glasses. “The fat guy?”
“Uh-huh. Watch when he moves. His jacket’s so tight you can see the outline of his weapon under his left arm.”
Molly watched until the man turned to talk to the woman next to him and sure enough, there it was. “He needs a better tailor,” she said.
“Or a smaller firearm,” the officer said, cracking a tiny smile. “I reckon a third of the folks in this room are carrying.”
Molly looked around the room. “A third? No way.”
“Look. See the guy leaning against the wall in back? Blue shirt, no jacket. See that pager on his belt?”
“Yeah.”
“See how lumpy his hip looks below the pager? He’s got one of those pager-pal holsters. Fits inside his pants.”
“Looks damned uncomfortable,” Molly said.
“And him.” The trooper looked to where the tall man in fatigues and yellow beret Molly had seen often before stood next to the door. “He’s certainly carrying, even if you can’t see it.”
“How do you know?” Molly asked.
“The type. He’s militia. I’d bet the farm on it. And, of course, with the ladies there’s no telling ’cause they usually carry in their handbags. But there’s Wanda Lavoy in the first row, and everyone knows she carries.”
“How does everyone know that?”
“The talk, rumors. And that guy waiting to tes
tify.” He pointed to a man in a brown polyester suit and string tie. “Right ankle. See how thick compared with the other one?”
“Yeah, but he looks like law enforcement.”
“Sure. He is, but most of them are carrying illegally.”
“So why don’t you arrest them?”
The trooper smiled. “We have orders just to watch them. So I’m watching. That’s why we’re tripled up.”
“Have you had any trouble?”
“This session, you mean?”
Molly nodded.
“Not with weapons. There was the fistfight between those two representatives—that actually spilled blood—and the guy who tried to bring a jackass in, actually got it into the elevator and up to the second level. That and a coupla vagrants who like to sleep up in the gallery is about all.”
Molly thought about the naked woman in the ladies’ room. “What’s the policy on them?”
“Vagrants? Oh, we don’t bother them if they don’t bother no one, if they don’t smell too bad. You know.”
“So, other than the nature of this bill, you don’t have any special reason to worry about security?”
He straightened up, suddenly remembering he wasn’t supposed to be talking. “No, ma’am.”
Molly was thinking it was time to leave when the next witness was called: Cullen Shoemaker. Surprised, Molly watched as he strode to the microphone. Dressed, as usual, in a dark suit, white shirt, conservative striped tie, and shined shoes, his bearing was even more self-important than usual—a young man with a mission. As he stood at the microphone and faced the committee, his back to the audience, Molly could see enough of his profile to notice that his face and even his scalp under the military-cut blond hair were flushed a tomato red. But he began in a strong voice that re vealed no trace of nerves or doubts. “Mr. Chairman, committee members, and fellow Texans, my name is Cullen Shoemaker and I am speaking against this bill.”
Molly stood where she was, amazed. Against the bill. He couldn’t be.
Senator Garland Rauther, sitting up on the dais, stared down at the witness with his mouth gaping. It was clear he hadn’t known his young protégé was planning to speak against the bill he was sponsoring, the bill they had both been working to get passed.
Molly looked around the room to see if Elizabeth Shoemaker was here. She spotted her down in front. She was leaning forward, her eyes fixed intently on her son.
Cullen said, “I am speaking now as a representative of the McNelly Posse. We are a service fraternity of two hundred native-born American sons, all students at the University of Texas.
“In the interest of full disclosure”—he cleared his throat—“I was also an aide to Senator Garland Rauther, one of the sponsors of Bill 98. I was, that is, until right now.” He paused and looked up at Garland Rauther, still sitting stockstill with a stunned expression. “Senator, I am tendering my resignation, effective right now.”
The speaker paused for dramatic effect and it worked. There was a rustling and murmuring around the room. Cullen Shoemaker was well known among those who took an interest in this bill. The senator wasn’t the only one he’d just sandbagged.
“I want to explain my reason for resigning. It is because I have changed my mind about this bill. Let me explain why.
“Most of you probably know that my sister and her three children were slaughtered two years ago at the Pizza Parlor in Liberty. My mother was shot, too, and nearly died. If my mother had been armed she could have halted the massacre there.
“I believe our right to bear arms is the rock our democracy rests on, and when I started working for Senator Rauther, I believed this bill would help us enlarge that right.” Cullen’s left foot, Molly noticed, was drumming up and down on the base of the lectern. He was a man loaded with nervous energy. “But this bill is not what I thought it was. And it is not what you good people out there believe it is. I have new information it is critical that I share with you.” He leaned forward toward the committee. “I now know, beyond a doubt, this bill is part of a secret plot of the federal government up in Washington, D.C., to disarm all of us.”
Cullen paused to let it sink in.
“Now I know many honest people are supporting this bill, like the senator I worked for, the honorable Garland Rauther.” He nodded at his former boss, who was still staring at him open-mouthed. “Senator, I admire you. I know how much work you have put into this bill.”
He gestured to the left side of the room. “And the other folks working for this bill, the Texas Rifle Association and the National Rifle Association. These are honorable men. They believe in the Bill of Rights and the Second Amendment. They believe this bill will advance the cause of our freedom to bear arms, as I once believed. But they are wrong. Deluded.”
He paused, letting the silence work for him. Molly looked around to see what the audience reaction was. Everyone was rapt. Cullen Shoemaker was a certifiable nut, but an effective speaker.
“Here’s what this bill will result in, pardners: licenses that lead to lists, lists of honest citizens who apply for licenses to carry handguns. The lists will go right to the federal government up in Washington, D.C., to the computers at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms and, before you know it, they will come knocking on our doors.” He rapped his fist hard on the lectern, three times, and shouted into the microphone, “ ‘Open up! It’s the ATF, come to confiscate your guns. We know you got ’em because you’re on our list.’ “
He paused again, looking hard at each member of the committee.
“So licenses lead to lists, which lead to loss, which leads to lament, and lament is where we are headed with this bill. Believe me, pardners, there will be plenty of lamenting and wailing and gnashing of teeth across the land when they come to take our guns away.
“Let’s not play into the hands of these jackbooted Nazi thugs. Anyhow, this bill is not necessary, is it? Why should my mother be required to get a license to exercise a right she already has? Do we need a license to practice our religion or express political opinions under the First Amendment?” He looked at each member of the committee in turn, as if demanding a response. “No, we do not,” he continued. “And we don’t need a license to bear arms, which is already guaranteed under the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and Article 1, Section 23 of the Texas Constitution.”
He ran his hand over his crew cut, then said, “Before I stop, let me tell y’all about the McNelly Posse, the group I represent. We are a committee of vigilance modeled on the committees forced into existence on the Texas frontier of the nineteenth century. Our group is named in honor of Captain Leander H. McNelly of the Texas Rangers, a man of vigilance and action, a man who could teach us all a thing or two about enforcing the law. Back in 1875, when the Mescans and the Indians were in the unfortunate habit of raiding across the border and stealing Texas cattle, Captain McNelly did something no one else had the gumption to do: he got back the only stolen cattle ever returned to the Texas side.”
Cullen paused and glanced back at the audience behind him, at his mother who was nodding solemnly. “The only time, pardners, that hard-working Texas ranchers ever—in all Texas history—got back property stolen from them by foreigners making raids across our borders. Now how did McNelly do this? Not by getting a permit from the local police to carry a gun, I’ll tell you that, pardners. And not by opening his arms to welcome every foreigner who sneaks across our borders to steal, rape, and murder. No. Captain McNelly led his men down to the border and crossed that river and attacked those thieves and took the cattle back and brought them home to their rightful owners here in Texas. He got those cattle back by being tough and, pardners, he got them back by being armed.
“Now I know better than most of you that this bill has enough votes to pass the Senate vote on Monday. But I believe it will lead to lists, loss, and lamenting. Senators, I beg you to rethink this. On behalf of the McNelly Posse and all law-abiding, freedom-loving native Texans, I ask you to defeat bill nine
ty-eight. Stop it right now by refusing to report this bill out of your committee. Stop it before they disarm us, pardners, and do to us the same thing they did to those folks in Waco—cold-blooded massacre. If we let those jackbooted thugs from the ATF get us on their list, then we are up shit creek with no paddle. That will be the end of our freedoms, pardners, the end.”
As he walked away from the microphone, there was just enough applause to send a little ripple of fear through Molly; surely no sane person could see that speech as anything but rabid paranoia. Senator Rauther was sitting back in his chair, staring down at the papers on the desk, looking shell-shocked. Molly yearned to be a fly on his office wall later to hear the discussion when he got hold of Cullen Shoemaker.
Molly checked her watch. She’d already stayed far longer than she intended, but she was eager for a few words with Cullen Shoemaker, so she rushed to the door to intercept him before the rest of the crowd got to him.
“Cullen, I am astonished,” she said.
He stopped and regarded her gravely. “Why’s that?”
“I didn’t know you were such an accomplished public speaker.”
“I’ve been going to Toastmasters.”
Molly had to restrain herself from smiling at this. “Well, it sure is a recommendation for Toastmasters. But I had no idea you felt that way about the bill.”
“Then you haven’t read my manifesto yet?” His blue eyes were icy.
The paper he’d given her—she’d totally forgotten about it; it was probably still in her purse, stuffed down at the bottom. “Not yet, Cullen.”
“I’d really like to get your ideas on publication.” He glared at her.
To change the subject she said, “The McNelly Posse? I’m a little weak on my Texas history, but wasn’t McNelly the one who wiped out the wrong village on the way to get those cattle back?”
He glanced at his watch, then snapped his fingers. “Oh! About your interview—Rauther says he’s real busy this week, but he’d be glad to talk to you right after the Senate vote on Monday. You’re planning to be here for the vote, aren’t you?”
All the Dead Lie Down Page 14
