by Chuck Redman
This Lark, stopping to shift her load of buffalo chips to the other shoulder, promptly counsels that when the Chief shows up with his hides and second-rate moccasins, Running Water should inform their Pop that she downright objects to marrying the cranky old lizard. “What does he need three—” Whoosh! The two gals flinch as a blunt-ended toy arrow comes whipping between them and plunks into the heavy brush to their rear. They look toward the creek but all there is is some suspicious ripples in the water and air bubbles poppin to the surface.
“I can’t,” laments Running Water, reminding Lark how much their Pop’s counting on this marriage to boost his status. “You know how he wants to become a council chief, and join the Kit Fox Society.”
Lark looks a little ticked off at this and, with a rising tide of emotion, she up and declares that the two of them gals must run away from their village, and seek a better life with Running Water’s people, the Pawnee. She tells her sister about the last straw, which was yesterday when she asked their Pop if she could speak at tomorrow’s Council Fire. “And he gave me that look, you know the one. ‘Lark,’ he says, ‘this is a war council. It’s either go to war or sit home weaving potholders.’ He said you and I can bring round the sage tea, but not a word may we utter. So I start arguing. That’s not fair, I told him, our scalps are on the line just like you braves. He got so upset,” and here Lark Laying Eggs shows an expression of pain as if she has personally did exactly what her name conveys, “he covers his ears and starts moaning. All about having a daughter who drives men away the minute she opens her mouth, and who by the way isn’t getting any younger.”
Running Water can’t help but shake her head and wince up at her sister. She admits she heard their Pop yowling ‘Bad Medicine’ yesterday sometime after everyone (but him) finished breakfast.
Lark raises her eyebrows. “He went off somewhere to build a sweat lodge so he could purify something or other before the Great Spirit.” Fine, she says, she’s through being pigeonholed. The two of them will run, and no looking back.
Running Water shakes her head and her deep-set eyes dilate. “I haven’t got your nerve. I’m Sioux now, the Pawnee wouldn’t know me from a stray rabbit.”
“You were captured from them, they’d be out of their minds with joy to get you back.”
“It’s too late.” Just off to the north now a young brave goes by the name of Lean Wolf comes over the nearest rise, carrying the carcass of a half-growed elk across his back and smiling in their direction with teeth like the Rocky Mountains. Running Water nods in his direction. “He won’t let you go.”
“It’s none of his affair,” and with her pretty nose held high and uppity against the cool breeze, Lark says she’d sooner marry the slimiest frog on that creekbank. Then she looks at Running Water like she just now realizes there’s a flesh and blood person standin there. Says she can’t believe she won’t have her sis to talk to. “Who’s supposed to listen to all my gripes?” Lark pert’ner breaks down, which Oglala gals generally save for funerals only. But she recovers and points her finger at her adopted sister like a warning. “We’ll be together soon, R.W., for good. In a better place. Understood?” Droppin her load of chips on the ground, Lark’s thick mantle of hair wraps round the sloping shoulders of Running Water, who she hugs with all the warmth of real true-blood kin.
So what in blazes are Zoning Petition 17 and Council Motion 188? Well guess what, mister. That big company out of Omaha? Euphemion Packing Company? You know, the one with the slogan “I like a good steak.” They’re jockeying right this minute to put one of their local meatpacking plants in this here little town of Cottonwood. And, exactly where do you suppose they resolved to put that facility? Smack dab, and I’ll be damned, on top of the oldest stand of cottonwood trees in town—in fact in the whole Platte Valley.
Now I ain’t no lawyer, but here goes. Article 7 of the Cottonwood City Charter provides as follows (I’m quotin’ verbatim here):
“It shall be unlawful to remove, relocate, cut, or encroach into the protected zone of any cottonwood tree, unless expressly permitted by the full Council upon a showing of an immediate danger to the health, safety or welfare of one or more residents.”
You see the issue now, my friend?
So, how’d this little town end up lovin cottonwoods so much? Seems that’s how it got sprung up in the first place: Them early pioneers on the Oregon Trail was pretty dang relieved when they got to this bend in the Platte River and run right into a stand of cottonwoods gianter than they’d ever seen, surrounded by about the richest soil on earth (I can’t take no credit—it was ol’ Water and Weather what done it). Well, they named the biggest, eldest tree Old Grateful, which they was. So the little town of Cottonwood got sprung up, and they made sure them cottonwoods was protected.
Well, I’ll stop yammering. Starting to feel a little parched in the gullet. My aquifer’s drying up, you know. I remember them old times, though. When water wasn’t no issue, I was as free as a lazy hawk, no fences and no boundaries. Now I’m treated like dirt, but don’t you ever call me that. You might as well call me Nebraska. That’s what people around these parts call me.
Now this issue is no small hay to the 8,716 people of Cottonwood. In fact, those’re the exact words of Milt Minsky at the morning coffee clique over at Nickano’s Downtown Diner on Platte Avenue between 13th and 14th Streets.
“Did you say ‘no small hay’?” asks Kenny Smold, and there’s the right side of Kenny’s mustache curling up as mocking as a crow on a cow barn.
“You bet your sweet bippy, I did,” says Milt like he’s swearing out a warrant for shoplifting. Milt, who owns the hardware store, the dress shop, and the Tivoli Movie Theatre, never missed an episode of Laugh-In, back in the day. Ol Milt he’s dunkin his sticky bearclaw in his coffee, which, as the senior member of the clique, he’s been doin for 34 years. Independent insurance agent Kenny Smold, on the other hand, is all about tryin new things, like them zucchini-avocado muffins and carob-mint scones that Nickano, Jr. has added to the yum yums in his bakery case.
“Well, potentially, Euphemion Packing could be the biggest employer in town, you know, and we could certainly use a shot in the arm, job-wise.” Bill McCarmady, president of the Outstate State Bank, has the Caterwauler open on the table and is running a thick finger down Janet’s Monday morning editorial as he speaks. “To her credit, she does mention that up front.”
“I don’t know, Bill,” sighs Ray Stidwell of Ray’s Fine Furniture, “our trees are what make our town unique. You know how nice and beautiful it is down there by the river.” With a far off look of woe on his long face, Ray gnaws at his right pinkie finger, tryin to dislodge a small sliver of oakwood from his skin, which is calloused from sleepless nights spent in his garage refurnishing finiture. Uh, refinishing furniture. Ray’s got whatchacall overactive brain activity, mostly in the brain. Last night he finished one hour of genuine sleep and six genuine wood chairs.
“You’re right, Ray.” Milt’s tryin to spoon a soggy bear-toe out of his cup, but the dang thing’s alive, it’s that slippery. “But that’s the only city parcel that’s not near residential. And nobody wants to live next to a slaughterhouse.”
“Meatpacking plant,” Bill corrects.
“Okay. Meatpacking plant. Same difference.”
“Yeah, okay, well even if we disregard the old cottonwoods,” says Ray, sitting up straighter and swirling the last ounce of coffee around in his shiny cup, “do you really wanna see Cottonwood become another Riverside or Concord? Those towns are full of illegal factory workers, man. They’ve got drunk drivers all over the place, a lot of—you call that half a cup? S’more like it—they’ve got, gee whiz, all kinds of criminal activity, even street gangs. You’ve read about it. Their schools are overcrowded, their E.R.’s are full. Some of their neighborhoods are getting run-down and folks that can afford it are moving outa town. Whadda we need that for?”
“Economic growth, man,” says Kenny, and I never could tell if K
enny’s being sarcastic or not. “How do you argue with that great American ethic?” For a moment or so, a rare thing happens. The morning coffee clique at Nickano’s is so silent you can almost hear the pita dough rising in the back. Well—that’s assuming that pita dough in fact rises.
So, which one a them four coffee-swilling philosophers went and sprung for this morning’s Caterwauler? Not a one. Never need to, the paper’s just sittin there snug every morning, awaitin that unicameral convention of thinkers. Each a which knows full well, but never lets on, that the slender Publisher herself is their own personal paperboy. Every morning, you see, on her early jog to the office Journalist Janet stops and plunks her own once-read copy of the Caterwauler into the first booth on the right at Nickano’s, and takes her coffee to go. The thin but weighty journal sits there like a scared rabbit til pert’ner 9:30, when them four dogmatic doughnut hounds start showin up.
By that time, while the citizens of Cottonwood, Nebraska are still digesting this mornin’s editorial, Janet is already up in her corner office overlooking the main intersection in town (corner of Platte and Cottonwood Way) settin her sights on the Caterwauler’s next volley against the meatpacking proposal. She’s got that Omaha conglomerate in the cross-hairs.
Her long unpainted fingertips perch themselves on her keyboard like jaybirds ready to squawk. She stares down at her editorial template. She frowns, and you don’t ever wanna see a frown like that at this hour of the mornin. “When a city loses its moral compass,” swoop her fingers, finally, with some caution, “to the point of destroying its very namesake, its oldest citizen—” And this is where her frown hardens and her fingers start hopscotching all over them keys. Strong words like “greed” and “self-mutilation” start showin up on Janet’s computer screen. “If this were McKinley, Alaska, would we level the Mountain to make room for a Wal-Mart?” Her blue eyes has taken on a gleam that reminds you of the feller in that old flick who’s stompin on the white knuckles of the other feller who’s hanging off the side of that building. Anyways, pretty soon the Editor-in-Chief’s pounding her laptop fortissimo like a Liberace, only she ain’t as dainty as Liberace. “Every big city problem you can think of,” she types at the end of the second paragraph, “will soon settle in Cottonwood—without bringing along any of the resources that big cities have.”
Comes a knock on Janet’s door. “What!!” I gotta take my hat off to ol Galen Nicolette, the advertising sales rep who sticks his brave young head in that doorway.
“Hey Janet,” says he while he coaxes the rest of hisself into that hallowed office. “Can I offer a twenty-five per cent discount to John Cox for his regular ad?” Galen’s referrin to the owner of the Happy Strikes Bowl and Brew, up north of town. “Because he doesn’t wanna renew, he doesn’t see enough business from it lately.” Galen’s kinda smiling at his boss, but it’s the smile of a man whose head hurts.
She says no awful quick, and unfortunately she puts a pretty strong word before the no. “They can go bury themselves, for all I care.”
But Galen’s a gutsy feller. He rests one paw on the dusty glass case of golf trophies next to the shredder. Galen points out that there ain’t no other advertiser to fill up that half page, especially on short notice.
“Who needs them?” says the boss lady, in a voice that could give hate a bad name. “Their ambiance stinks anyway. Their beer, I’d rather drink floor wax.” I don’t think any recognizable words come outa the young man’s throat before he retreats through that doorway and closes it tight, probly wishing he had one of them beers right about now.
Which leaves her back to glaring at her computer screen, and I think I heard somethin like “chhhhe” come out of her gloomy mouth. Anyways, it’s a good thing when she’s workin in the office nobody can see or hear Janet Hinderson cept a horde of pictures on the wall. Some are black’n white, some are color, but all of em are pictures of a feller having his picture took with other folks. Some of em the feller’s young, some of em he ain’t so young, but all of em he’s got a crew cut and he’s wearin a short-sleeved dress shirt and tie. Cept the ones where he’s playin golf. The other folks in the pictures—well, you might recognize a governor or two, a coupla writers, a coupla ballplayers. Oh, the wall’s got some other things besides: some framed headlines and editorials, some kind words of appreciation on wooden plaques—nice swanky wood, not like these cheap walls which are fake wood paneled.
Best thing about the office, if you ask me, is the big picture window overlookin the street, which ain’t all that clean. I mean the window, not the street. The street’s mighty clean, fact the whole town of Cottonwood is clean as a bell, like all these little Nebraska towns. If Janet was of a mind, she could look out and see pert’ner the whole town from here. There’s the post office across the street, which besides the Caterwauler building itself and some of them downtown storefronts, is the only one of the classy old buildings left standing. Over across U.S. Highway 30 there (we call it Cottonwood Way goin through town), you can get an eyeful of the BigMart discount store, on the exact spot where the old Cottonwood Palace Hotel was tore down in ’63. That hotel was as pretty a thing of red and white bricks and arches and gables as ever you did see. In its last days it was kind of a old folks residence, with its age-old lobby of walnut and mahogany kind of a meetin place for anyone who liked books, paintin, stamp collectin, or just passin the time. Last one to get kicked out fore they tore her down was old Mrs. Van Druten, the piano teacher. Weren’t for her, I don’t suppose no kids in Cottonwood coulda played so much as “Chopsticks.”
Look out Janet’s window westward down Cottonwood Way, you’re sure to notice the Japanese Dealership Mall, with new and used cars lined up and sparklin, day or night, for almost a full block. Yup, you recollect right: that’s where Meadowlark Classic Books and Music sat, once upon a time, in the old Hobart Mansion. With nothin else, just trees around it. It got tore down too. Sometimes I almost forgit the way it was.
Look a little further and you got Tacky Taco, Bargain Burger, and all those other joints you see poppin up everywhere. You can’t see it from here, but down south on 6th and Platte stands the new City-County Center, where the old courthouse was. The old Courthouse was brown bricks, wide steps goin up to the portico, a bronze dome and spire on top, murals inside, and the cedarwood courtroom that softened the gavel raps of even the meanest judge. The new City-County Center is concrete painted peach, with a X-ray machine to get in.
Well, if you had X-ray vision, you could see right into the Cottonwood County sheriff’s department on the first floor of the City-County Center. And being it’s Monday morning you’d be right on time for the weekly crime briefing. Crime in Cottonwood County ain’t quite up to the level of daily briefings. Weekly’ll do.
If you’re thinkin about having a sheriff with a nervous condition, Cottonwood County is probably as good a place as any. And most folks figure that’s what Sheriff Wendy Healy has: one of them syndromes? You know, one of them kind of heartbreakin deals that brings on sudden head jerks, nose twitches, eye blinks, or maybe blurted-out cuss words. In Sheriff Healy’s case, the condition takes the form of mangled words, especially when she gets riled up. But I wanna let you in on the deep dark truth: it ain’t no syndrome. Sheriff Wendy Healy ain’t from around here. She’s all the way from Brooklyn, New York, fifth generation. After high school and two years Brooklyn College, Wendy went in the army and wound up at Fort Riley, Kansas. She liked the open spaces and easygoin folks so much, she never left the plains. After the army she got hired as a sheriff’s deputy for Cottonwood County, and pretty soon got elected sheriff. She was a natural. But, somewheres along the way Wendy Healy had got the idea that her normal speech, which sounded a little like Al Capone after a root canal, kept her as something of an outsider with the Kansas and Nebraska folk. So she went and got some of them speech lessons that’s supposed to make you lose your accent. The thing is, the lessons only did about ninety-nine point five percent of the job. Which is where the alleged s
yndrome comes in.
“Okay,” announces Sheriff Wendy Healy in perfect diction, as she lays out the usual platter of New York style bagels and cream cheese on the large oak conference table of the briefing room. Why she lugs bagels and not doughnuts when she’s trying to fit in with a bunch of small town cops is a mystery in itself. I guess she don’t get the connection. “Let’s get started. What happened out there on State Route Twelve last week? Why are we missing these thefts of northbound highway mile markers until they’re cold cases and we have zero leads? Why is mile marker nine at Pond Lake the last one standing until you get to mile marker sixteen at Norbert? What could we be doing better? Smarter?”
“Um, how about authorizing a little more overtime, Chief?” says a scrawny hawkeyed deputy who’s the first to attack the platter and fingers just about every bagel on it before he finally picks whole rye with carraway seeds.
“Not in the budget, Gillespie. And how many times do I have to tell you don’t call me Chief.”
“Sheriff,” commences a young blond-haired deputy roughly the size of Wichita, “I hope I speak for all of us when I say that while we’re out there patrolling in God’s country, we need to do a little more praying, and a little less playing.” Judging by nine sets of darting eyes, the entire police force of Cottonwood County just went on high alert, anticipating trouble.
Sheriff don’t look any too tickled at the remark, and she’s the one that recruited the erstwhile linebacker from her beloved K-State Wildcats. She pats her short dark curls, which still smell like Tracy Ann’s Hair and Nail Salon. “Let’s not deviate from the agenda, boys, we’ve got plenty of—”
“I saw you roll your eyes, Anderson,” snarls the oversized Wildcat to a balding deputy at the west end of the table, “you damn atheist, you.”
