Free Excerpt from "Season of the Sand Devil"

A miniature whirlwind strong enough to whip dust and leaves and litter into the air

A dust devil or whirlwind is either a large rotating updraft, anywhere from 1000 meters high or more and tens of meters in diameter, to a small vortex a few meters high. In Australia, they are commonly known as willy willies, from an Aboriginal word.

The larger dust devils are often observed in times of atmospheric turbulence, especially common in the San Luis Valley of Colorado. Depending on the classification system used they may be considered weak tornados or land spouts. They are visible in the Great Basin and eastward to El Paso, for example. They are distinct from the common dust storms of this area, because they resemble small tornados. Due to this they are best viewed from a distance, and at a height (say, from a mountaintop). These whirlwinds are not extremely hazardous to biological organisms, but machines and electronics can suffer many severe malfunctions through repeated exposure to dust devil activity, including but not limited to increased wear from dust and short circuits or other physical damage caused by electrical arcing.

The smaller dust devils reach only a few meters or tens of meters in height, forming commonly in hot dry weather, most observably in fields or dusty flats, where the soil makes them visible, and which may be shorter-lived.

Kent Nicholson; 2007 Clarkesburg

There was no place else in town to get a cup of coffee, but the local pub. Not exactly the place of choice for Kent Nicholson who’d not had a drop of alcohol to drink since the incident. That was nearly six years ago. He motioned to the bartender to refill his cup with the hot and burnt liquid the place had the nerve to call coffee. The bartender rolled his eyes, threw the rag he was carrying around over his shoulder, and brought the coffee.Kent took a deep drag off of his cigarette and this motion brought more deep thoughts of his recent past to the surface. He’d never smoked before spending time in prison. Now, he smoked a pack and a half a day.

"You all set?" asked the bartender as he poured the dark, thick beverage into the ancient stained ceramic cup.

"You hiring?" asked Kent.

"Nope," said the bartender shaking his head.

"Then I guess I’m all set. Thanks."

Without a word, the bartender walked away and resumed his conversation with the other two patrons of the bar.

Kent was a stranger in this small town. He’d checked into the local bed and breakfast just two days earlier. He could have driven to Berlin or Gorham and probably would have found a much better cup of coffee for his money, but places like that didn’t let you smoke inside anymore. This place was a dinosaur destined for its own extinction, and the service was bad. He noticed the bartender look in his direction and then mumble something to the other customers and they all chuckled. Kent ignored their insolence and took another drag of his cigarette, then stamped it out in the ashtray that already had just under a dozen butts littering the bottom. Customer service at its finest, thought Kent to himself.

One more cigarette and one more cup of coffee later, Kent decided to walk back to the bed and breakfast across the street and spend some time alone. Not that the residents in the bar hadn’t done their best to make him feel that way while he was there. He just needed some time to review everything in his mind again. To rehash all the things that had gone wrong the last seven years. To visualize the way things were supposed to have been and no longer ever could be. To torment himself with his own thoughts.

The light of day made his eyes wince before they had a chance to adjust from the dark and dreary pub. It was windy and dry. Unseasonably cool for the early summer day. He wondered if it was always like this way, this far north in New Hampshire.

Not too far from the Canadian border, the small hamlet of Clarkesburg lay in the valley along the Androscoggin River between the White Mountains to the south and the foothills that opened the door towards the border of the north. A single rudimentary road scarred its way across the flattened landscape following the snaky curves of the river, and within its midst, below the bulking shadows of the foothills to the north and south, lay the village of Clarkesburg. A town that reminded him of the old humorous adage: don’t blink as you drive through it.

The bed and breakfast sat on the corner of Main and Bridge Streets, there was a small convenience store across the street and right next to it, the pub. Across Bridge Street on the corner opposite the bed and breakfast sat the elementary school. Up the street a few buildings was a single bay auto repair shop in dingy condition and next to that was an old fashioned barbershop, including the red and white spinning post proudly displayed on the outside. Directly across the street from the barber shop was the sole restaurant (other than the pub) of the town, a small pizza joint. It was the first place where Kent had tried the food and he had no intention of returning.

Further down Bridge Street, on the eastern side of the bed and breakfast, was the town hall. The small, brick building acted as not only the town hall, but also the selectmen’s office, police station, fire department, and ambulance rescue. Hard to believe the small, single-story structure could accommodate the entire town’s safety and political administrations, but then Kent figured most of it, at least the fire and ambulance service, was on a volunteer basis. Across the street from the town office building sat the post office and directly next door was the library, near the back side of the elementary school. And that was the village of Clarkesburg. The remainder of the community, besides a few houses located on both Bridge and Main Streets near the actual village, was spread out among the township on secondary roads that were in need of re-paving and dirt roads in need of grading.

As Kent reached his private entrance to the bed and breakfast, he noticed the proprietor Roberta Harper carrying some trash bags out of her patio door to the back yard.

"Well, hello there, Mr. Nicholson," she said in her boisterous voice.

"Hi, Mrs. Harper. Could I help you with those? And please, call me Kent." He was still uncomfortable, even in his early forties with being addressed as mister, especially when the addressee was older than him, as was Roberta Harper, by at least ten years.

"I’ll make a deal with you, Kent," she said ignoring his offer, "I’ll call you Kent and you call me Roberta," she said with a smile from ear to ear.

He nodded and returned the smile, placed the key in his lock, and said, "Have a wonderful day, Roberta." If it were at all possible, he thought her smile widened even more.

Kent was a good looking man, tall; lean yet muscular, with short, black hair and a neatly trimmed mustache that were both slightly seasoned with hints of salty gray. There was a day, before he was married, and long before the incident that he projected an aura of confidence around women. Now, things had changed. Women of all ages who didn’t know him, didn’t know about him, like Roberta Harper for example, still flirted with him from time to time, whether they were married or not. But his confidence was gone. He had not touched a woman for the past six years. The last one he had touched cost him a harsh price — his entire life and lifestyle.

He sat on the bed inside the small but quaint bedroom and pinched the bridge of his nose. It was a futile attempt to ward off an oncoming headache. He closed his eyes and lay back on the bed with his feet still planted firmly on the floor and thought about the day he had called Andy Ruderman. That had been four years ago.

"Hey Andy," he had said. "I’m out."

"Good for you, kid," was all Andy could say. It had been 18 months since they last spoke. Andy told him to call him when he got out and here he was. Now, it appeared he’d made a mistake.

There was an awkward pause, at least on Kent’s end. Andy could have probably cared less.

"You ... uh … told me to give you a call," said Kent, suddenly feeling inadequate despite his elation to be out of prison.

"Listen, kid," Andy still insisted on calling him kid which drove Kent nuts, but it was the way he always was. Kent could envision the rotund figure of Andy sitting behind his desk in his New York office, wearing his white button-down, short sleeve shirt with a sweat stain around the collar, while chomping on the stub of an unlit cigar. "I’m not going to tell you lies or make up fairy tales, here. Westsmith Publishing wants nothing to do with you, kid. You’re bad publicity. They can’t take a risk. They won’t take the risk."

"But, Andy," Kent interrupted.

"Hey," Andy said. "I ain’t done talking, kid. I know what you’re going to say. Another pseudonym, whatever. It ain’t gonna work. Westsmith is too afraid of the media finding out that you’re writing again and they’re the ones with the dirty hands caught publishing you. It’s bad press, kid. P.J. Nichols is done writing and so are you. What you need to do now if you want to keep writing, is find a small newspaper or something. Start an Internet blog thingamajig, whatever. You ain’t gonna get published by Westsmith or any other publishing house for that matter."

"Andy," Kent pleaded.

"Look kid, I know you got a raw deal." Was there a hint of doubt in the way he said that, Kent wondered? "For one moment in time," Andy said, "you took out your dick and used the wee brain in that head and you might as well have screwed yourself with it. You paid an ultimate price for it. It doesn’t change a thing. The media ate it up. They’re sharks. It got too much press and all of it was bad. The bottom line is, you were convicted, kid. You went to prison. They don’t give a shit if you were innocent or not, which you weren’t entirely." There it was again. "You were convicted. You went to prison. No one wants to read P.J. Nichols mysteries any more. He’s a rapist. He’s an ex-con. Do you understand what I’m saying, kid?"

Tears were streaming down Kent’s face. On one hand, he had sort of known it all along, but writing is what he did. It was all he cared about. And Andy had told him to call him when he got out. For what? His voice cracked as he said, "Yes."

"Hell, I’m sorry, kid. I wish things were different. Maybe someday further down the line, you should consider self-publishing an autobiography or something. Tell the people what really happened. Maybe then, you could re-popularize yourself. It’s just a thought."

"Yeah," was all Kent could say. He felt like hanging up right then, but didn’t. There was another long, awkward pause.

"Have you seen Danni?" Andy said attempting to break the ice.

More tears streamed from Kent’s burning, brown eyes. "No."

"Ah, screw her, kid. You’re better off. I never did like that broad much. Look, call me sometime soon. We’ll do lunch or play a couple holes of golf. Something, kid."

"Sure, Andy" said Kent knowing he’d never have lunch or play golf with him again.

"I mean it, kid." Andy must have recognized the doubt in Kent’s voice. "Don’t shut me out because of all this. It’s got nothing to do with me. It’s not personal, Kent."

"I know. Thanks Andy."

"You bet, kid. You keep in touch, you hear?"

"Yep." Kent hung up the phone and started to bawl like a teenaged girl who was just dumped by the starting quarterback of the high school football team.

He opened his eyes and he was back in the bed and breakfast. He hadn’t spoken to his agent, Andy Ruderman since that day four years ago and Andy had made no attempt to contact him. He hadn’t written a word on his laptop. He hadn’t touched a woman. He hadn’t heard from nor contacted Danni, his ex-wife. Things were so different for him now. He found it hard to fathom how life could change so abruptly, so violently from one ill-fated decision that wasn’t entirely his own fault. But here he was, living, breathing proof. He wiped another errant tear from his cheek and sat up in the bed and looked around the room.

Maybe the realtor would call today, he thought.

Chapter 2

Kent Nicholson; 2001 The Incident (1)

Kent had flown into Manchester airport a day early. His meeting with Andy Ruderman in New York had gone relatively well and the new P.J. Nichols mystery would be released in the fall. A hefty bonus check was waiting for him and Andy had wanted to celebrate and show him the town. After a couple days of Andy’s boisterousness, however, Kent had tired of the fast paced city and silently desired to come home and relax for a few days. Under contract, he had to have two more books finished by the following spring. He also had wanted to surprise Danni and maybe take her out to a fine restaurant and celebrate his newfound success in his own quieter style with his wife.

After a short drive from Manchester Airport to Candia, where their rural home was located, it was Kent who received the surprise. As he pulled his Lexus into the long, narrow driveway of their secluded gambrel log cabin, he noticed Jeff Trentwell’s car parked next to Danni’s SUV. Not exactly suspicious at first, his curiosity sank into angst as he stepped out of the car and could hear Danni moaning in ecstasy through their opened bedroom window. Jeff Trentwell, Kent’s best friend and their financial advisor, was having his way with Danni. Or was it the other way around? How long had this been going on? Kent’s head filled with thoughts of deceit and friendship and marriage. He forced himself to walk to the front door hearing Danni and her … sounds … all the while. They obviously hadn’t heard him driving in, but considering the noise she was making, he wasn’t surprised. He tried to remember the last time she had voiced her pleasure as she was doing now when they had made love … and couldn’t.

What should he do? What would he do? What could he do? Should he walk in and let them know that he was home? Catch them both with their pants down, literally. His mind raced. He began to sweat. This couldn’t be happening. How long had this been going on? How long had he been the husband of a cheating wife? How long had his best friend been screwing both him and his wife? A flurry of emotions overwhelmed him. He went from angst to anger to horror to denial in mere nanoseconds. He couldn’t think. Not over her …sounds.

"Oh … Jeff. OHHHHH! JEFF!" she was practically pleading.

Kent’s expression went to despair. He walked to his Lexus and retrieved the small gift bag he’d brought home from Sak’s for Danni. He leaned into the glove compartment and grabbed a pen and a small post-it pad. He scribbled "hey Danni! I got home a day early, but you and Jeff sounded kind of busy! Here’s a little something I picked up for you in New York! My lawyer will be in touch. Love Kent!" His handwriting was shaky. He could barely read it himself, but he didn’t care. He couldn’t control his emotions let alone the mechanics of his body right now. She’d see the package on the front stoop. She’d know he’d come home and found them sleeping together. Cheating on him. He considered going over to the bedroom window and surprising them, but wasn’t sure he could bear witness to them together, naked, sweating, and exchanging bodily fluids. He was positive he couldn’t handle that.

His weekend had just gone to hell. From success to an impending divorce in a matter of mere hours. He wouldn’t be able to forgive her for this. He couldn’t forgive her for this. And then there was Jeff. This was all just a bad joke. Maybe a nightmare. This wasn’t really happening. He felt like he was going to bend and heave right then and decided to get away as quickly as possible. Danni moaning and making her … sounds all the while. He put his hands to his ears after he placed the gift bag on the top stairs in front of the door and walked back to the Lexus. He practically jumped in and slammed the door hard in an effort to thwart his stealth. He turned the key in the ignition and revved the accelerator a couple of times before switching the shift into reverse and spinning the car around sending small crushed stones and dust up in a whirlwind of anger and emotion. He slammed the shift into drive and stomped down on the pedal, spinning the tires across the tarmac of the driveway and drove out as fast as he could. The last thing he saw that day was Danni looking out the bedroom window with the expression of pure horror on her face. It was the only satisfaction he could get from this whole … affair. And in the end, this was not the worst day to come for Kent Nicholson.

Kent sat at the bar and looked down at his wedding ring and he could feel the burn of tears threatening to spill out of his eyes. The bar was well over capacity with a variety of young people with suspect ID’s, and a lackluster band was playing a bad rendition of a popular song in the other room. Surely they hadn’t taken the time to synchronize their microphones to their amplifiers. The room was filled with cigarette smoke and although he’d never smoked before, he suddenly craved the art of holding on and trying.

Without so much as a mere thought, he spun his wedding band on his finger a couple of times and slipped it off, placing it in his pocket for … he wasn’t exactly sure what for. Reconciliation? That certainly wasn’t it. There was nothing to reconcile. He’d never be able to trust Danni again and more importantly, he’d never place himself in such a vulnerable position again. Not with her.

The young bartender, a man in his early twenties perhaps, stepped in front of him and without uttering a word, raised his eyebrows in the form of a question. He wanted to know if Kent wanted a refill. Kent hadn’t remembered downing the Johnny Walker Black on ice, but looking down at the glass suddenly realized that he had. He pointed to the glass and nodded in the universal language of a bar filled with college kids and music that was too loud for conversation.

"You look like you could use a cigarette," said a sudden sweet voice that tickled the hairs in his ears. He turned and the girl made no attempt to pull away. Her lips were practically on his ear. She had long dark straight hair and the bluest eyes he’d ever seen. She was wearing a tight white pullover that accentuated her perfectly mounded breasts and a short skirt that showed off her long, shapely legs. Young, but drop-dead gorgeous.

Kent smiled and moved his mouth to her ear so she could hear him. "I don’t smoke," he said and smelled her perfume which was a hint of lavender and something else he couldn’t quite distinguish. Her shampoo, perhaps. Whatever it was, it was intoxicating.

"My name is Corinne," she said as they placed their mouths close to each other’s ears to carry on a futile but incredibly sexy conversation.

"Kent," he said getting another whiff of her. Was this such a good idea, he thought? She looks awfully young.

"Wanna walk a lady to her car, Kent?" she asked.

Without answering her, he turned his attention back to the fresh glass of Johnny Walker and downed it in one gulp, placed a twenty-dollar-bill on the counter and escorted her outside.

The night had cooled off a bit. It felt refreshing and the slight wind blew her scents into Kent’s nostrils. She looked in his eyes and smiled as she grabbed his arm.

"Do you mind?" she asked.

"Not at all," he said. She smiled again. There was something … somewhere … not quite right about the whole scenario. As unbelievable as Danni screwing Jeff had been to him, this current situation had a quality of its own surrealism. But, for the time being anyway, he seemed overpowered by its existence. It was like a little angel on one of his shoulders was saying You shouldn’t be doing this, Kent! While a little devil on the other shoulder was saying After what happened to you today, I thought I’d send you a little angel with a little bit of devil in her. You deserve this, Kent!

"Corinne O’ Donnell," she said out of nowhere and extended her well tanned hand with perfectly manicured nails.

Kent took her hand in his for a moment and felt her warmth and something, perhaps another warning, stirred a restless passion within him. "Kent Nicholson," he said.

She dropped his hand, but still clung to his arm and he felt her shiver slightly as the cool, night breeze picked up. Kent took off his sport coat and offered it to her, which she silently accepted and draped over her shoulders, beaming the most beautiful smile Kent had ever seen. Perhaps it was just because his sexual intensity system was on high alert. He wasn’t sure. He’d certainly never had any problems with the ladies in his single days. He considered all his traveling and lonely nights in hotel rooms away from home. If there were anyone in his marriage who would have the opportunity of philandering it would be him and not Danni.

"Do you mind?" she asked and Kent looked down to see what she meant. She held a cigarette that she had dug out of her small sleek black handbag. This time, it was Kent who smiled.

"Not at all."

Corinne retrieved a small lighter from her purse, but couldn’t get the thing to ignite. She kept trying and then looked up at Kent with a slight, sexy smile of defeat.

"I’d offer you a light, but I don’t smoke," he said.

"I know," she said, smiling, "Probably should give these nasty things up anyway."

"Well, maybe this is a sign of divine intervention," said Kent and she giggled.

Just then, two young men, most likely college students, were heading to the same bar Kent and Corinne had just left.

"Hey," Corinne said loud enough to get their attention, "can I get a light from one of you?"

Without a word, they both stopped and the one wearing a long gray hoody yanked a disposable lighter from his pocket and flicked her cigarette lit. She smiled and looked at him and Kent thought for a moment that she was giving this kid the same, flirtatious and sexy smile that had lured him to her.

"Thanks," she said and leaned into Kent and started walking with him again.

"Don’t mention it," said the young man and Kent could feel both the guys watching them … watching her … walk away and checking out her shapely legs and the way her fanny wiggled under her short leather skirt. Eat it up fellas, he thought, but tonight, at least for now, she’s with me. And then something deep down inside his head blared out like a siren of warning. Should he be with this young … lady? Was she even old enough to be a lady? She was in a bar, they must have carded her. She had to be at least eighteen years old. Right?

"Kent?" she said, as she stopped suddenly and turned to face him. Her eyes were so blue and she put this look on her face that Kent was unable to resist feeling certain ways about. "I have a confession to make."

"Okay," said Kent with scenarios playing out in his head. "Shoot."

"Please don’t be mad," she said looking in his eyes. She was so young and beautiful. Kent thought this girl … young lady, could manipulate any man with just the gaze in her eyes. "But, I really don’t have my car tonight." She took a drag off of her cigarette and Kent couldn’t help notice that she wasn’t a real smoker. She didn’t take a deep drag and hold it, she held the cigarette awkwardly between her fingers like she didn’t want the smoke to stain or stink them up. Hard core smokers, like Andy Ruderman, could care less how they smelled when they smoked. Hard core smokers smoked for the fix of the nicotine. Corinne O’Donnell was smoking for the way it looked and unfortunately, Kent thought, of all the things she was acting out so well tonight, this was not one of them. It made her look … seem … younger.

"So," said Kent. He felt uncomfortable with her, but he couldn’t seem to resist her eyes and her expression. "You need a ride, then. Is that what you’re saying?"

Her smile broadened and Kent noticed her teeth were so white and straight. Her skin was silky and yet tanned to perfection. "We could go to your place," she offered.

Kent thought for a second ignoring her offer because he knew it wasn’t possible and then asked, "How did you get here?"

"I came with a friend, but she already left with some guy she met."

"I see," Kent said. "So, I’m the guy you met for a ride home."

"No! It’s not like that, I swear to God! I saw you sitting there and you looked so sad with your big, brown puppy dog eyes…"

"So then, you felt sorry for me…"

"Kent," she stopped him. "You might be a little older than me, but you happen to be a major hotty in the beefcake department." Kent couldn’t help but grin from ear to ear. "I’m not using you for a ride. I saw you sitting there, I thought you could use a friend, and it took me a half hour to build up the nerve to approach you."

"Really?" Kent was impressed.

"Really." She stopped then and turned looking straight into his eyes. Kent couldn’t resist the stirring taking place in his loins. "Your place?" she asked while raising her eyebrows and curling her lower lip to one side and Kent just about melted.

"My place is no good," he said. "It’s … ah … being renovated. I … ah … needed to get a hotel room here in Manchester for a few days." He was thinking on impulse, but surmised his details weren’t off by much. What else was he intending to do, anyway? Go back home to Danni? Maybe ask her how the sex with Jeff was? Certainly not a viable option. He still had his suitcase in the Lexus from the New York trip, so he was packing.

"Perfect," she said. "Which one are you staying at?"

"I haven’t picked one yet," he confessed. "I needed a drink first." Suddenly, he was feeling the effects of Johnny Walker. "A close-by one, maybe."

She smiled coyly and raised one eyebrow without saying a word. Kent felt himself stiffen. And then for some reason he thought to himself… the Lord giveth (Corinne) and the Lord taketh away (Danni.) Oh, how the Lord works in mysterious ways. Reassuming her grip on his arm, she flicked the half-smoked remnants of her cigarette away and leaned in on him as they walked the rest of the way to Kent’s Lexus.

Chapter 3

 Rhonda Lary, 2007

Rhonda Lary stared at the files on her desk in the small, makeshift office that comprised the headquarters of the local police department of Clarkesburg. She was the sole officer and acting Chief of Police in the town, as well as the fulltime postmaster. After leaving the Post Office at 5, she decided to check into her night owl, part-time position and see if there were any new developments in the quiet, northern town. Practically no crime other than random acts of juvenile vandalism occurred in Clarkesburg, and when incidents like that happened, she could recruit the assistance of Berlin P.D. a couple of towns south with both a higher population and a more endowed roster of officers.

Her elected position had come from being married to a State Police Trooper who had been stationed in Twin Mountain when he had been alive. Her desk proudly displayed a picture of her and Dennis with their daughter Ashley on a much happier summer day in their back yard. She reached out and touched Dennis’s face feeling a sudden burst of grief and melancholy. She missed him so badly.

Dennis had been killed in action while chasing a car in his cruiser in 2002 on Route 2 in Jefferson. It had started out as a random pull-over, but Dennis had suspected the driver from Massachusetts to be intoxicated and when he had asked the man to get out of the car for a field sobriety test, the guy flipped him the finger and took off at a high rate of speed. Dennis had run back to his cruiser and called in the chase requesting back-up. A few miles down the road, as his cruiser was closing in on the car, a moose had walked into the southbound lane and when Dennis maneuvered his cruiser to avoid colliding with it, he lost control and fishtailed into the other lane with a large logging truck coming the other way. He was killed instantly. Rhonda remembered the call from the Sheriff’s department. It was from Sheriff Marcel Thibeault, who had been a good friend and a mentor to Dennis. She knew immediately that something was wrong. She had underestimated just how wrong it was. Sheriff Thibeault wanted to not only express to Rhonda how sorry he was for her loss, but to assure her the driver had been caught and was going to be charged the steepest penalty the state could summon.

Her hand recoiled from the picture and she fought off a sudden burst of tears when she heard the front door of the town hall open half the building length away from where she sat. Just in case it was someone there to see her, she composed herself. She sighed with relief as she recognized Roberta Harper’s voice talking to Jean Gagnon, the town clerk and the town busybody. She wasn’t much interested in what was going on in their little world, but she decided to strain her ears and listen to get her mind off her current train of thought.

It seemed some nice looking fellow had checked into the bed and breakfast a couple days ago and was not only apparently single, but quite good looking. She listened to all the details that Roberta described to Jean including how nice his fanny looked in jeans. She heard Jean giggle like a schoolgirl despite being middle-aged, then jokingly threaten to tell Roberta’s husband Francis what she had just said. The whole conversation took less then three minutes and then Rhonda rolled her eyes as she heard them say their goodbyes promising to catch up later. The door to the town hall opened and closed and everything went back to quiet.

Rhonda immediately returned her attention back to the photograph on her desk. Reflections of her life spun inside her mind and she gasped aloud as a fresh batch of tears threatened to spill out. At 35, Rhonda was a widow. It’s not exactly what she had planned for herself when she married Dennis. The fulltime postmaster position was a lucrative occupation coupled with Dennis’s income; they had bought a modest house on a few acres of wooded, country land on the east side of the Androscoggin River. It would be a wonderful house and yard to raise a child. Six months after they moved in, Rhonda became pregnant. Ashley was born in September of 2001, six days after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Towers. Not a friendly year to begin rearing a family, but fighting through the inconceivable, they persevered and were happy with their family. The anthrax scare put some pressure on Rhonda at the post office as it did everywhere. Things were just nuts in the world for a little while, even in a small, remote town this far north in a seemingly safer environment. Two years later, she suddenly found herself wearing a black dress and toting her two-year-old daughter to her husband’s funeral.

Later that year, the board of Selectmen in Clarkesburg had decided, that with the population in the area growing, due to many residents from the southern part of the state and beyond striving to get a piece of country life and away from the overcrowded and vulnerable cities, that they would elect a part-time police chief. The Berlin Police coupled with a few state troopers from time to time cruised the roads in Clarkesburg, but they were situated well over 20 minutes away or longer. It was time for their town to show off a little muscle and they purchased their own cruiser, a retired Ford Explorer from the Berlin P.D., and began the election process for the police chief. Rhonda Lary jumped at the opportunity despite already having a full-time occupation. It would be just enough hours to keep her busy and her mind off of her recent tragedy. It was hard, at first, to be away from Ashley so much, but she found, in Liz Woodward, one of her two employees at the post office, an excellent babysitter. Liz covered her shifts at the post office, and covered her shifts at home with Ashley when Rhonda was putting hours as the Chief of Police. It turned out during the election, that Rhonda had the most experience to pull off the position since she had been married to a state trooper. No one else in town seemed to mind that the police chief was a woman, and more so, no one else desired the burdens that came with the position. There were two other factors that weighed in on the situation as well. The first was that no one in town actually took the position very seriously. It was, after all, designed to be nothing more than a mere appearance of police presence in the town, so even a woman could handle that. And the other factor was that everyone in town was feeling Rhonda’s pain. She was voted in by proxy and pity on the same ballot. She knew this, but she didn’t let it bother her. It was, after all, a small town with small town problems. Should be simple enough to keep the peace and if anything ever escalated to a serious situation, she always had Berlin or the troopers to call in for back up. She could simply wait things out until they arrived. As it was, she used Berlin P.D. as her dispatch liaison and any 911 calls went directly to them.

She turned her attention to the image of herself in the photo. She hadn’t changed too much since the picture was taken. It was a few months before Dennis had been killed, four years ago. Maybe she had put on a few pounds, but she stopped stepping on the bathroom scale after the funeral. It wasn’t that she didn’t care how she looked anymore as it was that she had always fought hard to maintain a certain weight. Dennis had always told her that he didn’t care. In a world that seemed to worship size 4’s and 6’s, Rhonda was between a size 12 and 14, depending on where she bought her clothes. Dennis would call her curvy and vivacious. At five feet five inches tall, she had all the curves of a woman and they were all in the right places. She had given up trying to squeeze into tight clothes to satisfy the needs of society. This was her body and with her shoulder-length, natural, auburn-colored hair along with her dark green eyes, and her cream colored skin tone, her presence still turned the heads of many men, married or otherwise. Not that she ever took advantage of that. She missed the touch of a man, more so, the way Dennis would touch her. The way he held her, the way he kissed her.

Another gasp and another set of stinging tears just beneath the surface of her lower eyelids and she decided it was enough pain for one day. She looked at the clock and logged in her two hours and grabbed her car keys.

As she walked down the long, narrow hallway and reached the town clerk’s office, she noticed the plump figure of Jean still sitting behind the desk despite her office being closed since 5. Jean didn’t get along too well with her philandering husband Maurice, so she spent as much time away from him and his ways as she could. She also spent a lot of time sticking her nose into other people’s business in the small community. If you wanted someone to know something in town and didn’t want to go through the undesirable process of telling them yourself, Jean was the one to go to … and all you had to tell her was don’t tell anyone, but… and it would hit the front page headline of the local newspaper by the following day.

"There’s a new guy in town, Roberta tells me," said Jean looking over the top of her bifocals. "He’s staying at their bed and breakfast. She says he’s a real looker."

"I heard some of it," Rhonda said smiling. "Probably just passing through."

"Odd time of year to be passing through, don’t you think?"

Rhonda didn’t care, she was suddenly very tired and even though she wouldn’t mind having the opportunity to spot this piece of alleged eye candy, her body was telling her it was time to go home, relieve Liz, read Ashley a bedtime story, and get to bed herself.

"I don’t know, Jean," she said with a degree of impatience. "Should I question him on the time of year he decides to visit our humble little town?"

Jean frowned at the comment and exhaled a verbal snort through her nose. "Just letting you know what I heard, Rhonda."

"Have a good night, Jean. Don’t be too much longer, okay?"

"I don’t work for you, Rhonda, let’s not forget that."

"I wasn’t telling you as the Chief of Police. I was telling you as a friend."

"Uh-huh. I’ll go home when I’m done, thank you for your concern." Jean practically barked the words.

Rhonda shook her head slightly, rolled her eyes, and walked out the front door of the town hall without saying another word.

Chapter 4

Kent Nicholson; 2007 The Realtor

Kent had drifted off. Without a television in the bedroom, there wasn’t much else to do. He could have gone out and watched the television in the great room where all the guests, when there were some, would go to gather for the complimentary continental breakfast that Roberta put out every morning. As it was now, she pretty much was asking Kent, the sole tenant, what he wanted and was cooking it to order in her kitchen. That is, when he decided to have anything at all. He wasn’t too big a breakfast man. Coffee and maybe a quick donut could generally hold him over until the early afternoon. On many days, another coffee or two in the afternoon, coupled with a few cigarettes, could hold him over until dinner. The telephone had awakened him. He looked at the clock on the nightstand by the frilly bed and saw it was almost 4. Good luck getting to sleep tonight, now, he thought to himself as he reached for the receiver of the phone.

"Hello?"

"Mr. Nicholson?" said a rather pleasant female voice. "It’s Carol Goodwin from Gables in Granite Realty." Her voice was no indication of what she looked like in person.

"Hi Carol," said Kent. "Please. Call me Kent."

"Yes. Right Kent, I forgot. Always a professional first, I guess."

"What have you got for me, Carol?" asked Kent.

"Well," she replied eagerly. "I think you’re going to be excited. I found a listing right in Clarkesburg, but on the western edge, getting close to Lancaster. The taxes are dirt cheap, but I’m going to tell you right off the bat that it’s a fixer-upper."

"How bad of a fixer-upper?"

"It hasn’t been lived in or cared for, for the past ten years or so. The yard would need some light work; it could obviously use a fresh coat of paint on the outside, probably the inside, too. It’s cheap, Mr. … I mean Kent."

"Yeah?" That got his interest and he could tell by her pause that she knew it. "How cheap?"

"I’m not supposed to be telling you this," didn’t all sales people tell you that when they were trying to sell something badly? "But it’s bank owned right now and I’ve heard through the grapevine that they want to unload this property. You could probably take a look at the place and make your own offer."

He suddenly imagined a dilapidated farm house with broken windows, shutters hanging askew on broken hinges, a sunken roof with crumbling shingles, and an old, leaning barn that should have been torn down in the sixties.

"It also has a barn that could be used for a garage," she said as if in sync with his thoughts.

"Any land?" Now a thought of knocking it all down and rebuilding it was dancing through his mind. After all, she said he could pretty much just make an offer. Did that mean they would accept just about anything? And if so, just what kind of condition was this place in?

"Just over ten acres," she said.

"Really?" He was being too excited and he knew it. He tried to remind himself not to act so, or sound so eager. Calm down, Kent.

"When can I see the place, Carol?"

"Well, I’d say tonight, but I promised my girlfriend a night out on the town." Kent wondered in what sense she meant the word girlfriend. "How would tomorrow morning grab you?"

"Sounds great. What time?"

"I’ll pick you up at 10?" she asked.

A broad smile spread across his face. His own place. He hadn’t owned his own home since he lived with Danni and that seemed like a lifetime ago to him now. "See you then, Carol. Thanks."

The next morning, Kent was sitting on the hood of his bronze 1997 Mazda Protégé (a far cry from the Lexus he used to drive) smoking a cigarette while he waited for Carol. He noticed an attractive, young mother walking her son to the schoolyard playground across the street. She was probably in her mid-twenties with long blonde hair and a nice tan. She was wearing a bright, multi-colored windbreaker and jeans with open-toed sandals. She smiled at him and said "Hi," and he returned the gesture. Small towns where everyone is friendly, he thought.

He looked at his watch and noticed Carol was ten minutes late. Not off to a good start. He didn’t care much for people who were late when it came to business and he never had. He walked over to the entrance the bed and breakfast to a clay urn filled with kitty litter that had a handwritten "for butts" sign on it and snubbed out the cigarette just as Carol’s red Monte Carlo pulled around the corner and into the wide driveway.

In the short ten-minute drive to the house, Kent had learned a lot about its history from Carol. She was a native of Berlin and had done some research, but had admittedly not been privy to all the details. The house had been renovated, actually rebuilt might have been a better term, in the 1930’s. The original house had burned down in a forest fire and the second owners of the property had used the original rock foundation when they had rebuilt.

Carol maneuvered her car over a bumpy secondary road, took a swift left, and followed another bumpy road for a few miles while telling Kent what details she knew. She knew the name of the second owners to be Henson, but she couldn’t remember the original owners’ names. The Henson’s had rebuilt the place and not long after, the husband died and the woman remained living alone there until she died, which was about ten years ago. Carol took an abrupt right hand turn and followed a long narrow curvy dirt driveway through some dense foliage. Kent couldn’t help but notice black raspberries bushes growing wild along the perimeter of the driveway.

As Carol steered her car around a particularly sharp corner of the driveway, the house came into full view. There stood a red, standard, two-story colonial, with white trim and badly in need of some tender loving care. To its right sat a large two-story barn of the same color. Kent’s first impression was that the house was much too large for just him, but before he opened his mouth to say so, he decided to find out what the hunting price might be. After all, living in a bed and breakfast wasn’t an enduring option.

Carol was silent sitting next to Kent letting him take it all in. Kent was lost in his own thoughts of what he would have to do to the place, at least from the exterior perspective, to make it more habitable. A fresh batch of tiger lilies surrounding the circumference of the main structure was almost lost in the neglected front lawn.

Suddenly, he felt Carol’s eyes boring into him and noticed from the corner of his own eyes that she was smiling broadly. She knew what he was doing. Taking it all in and imagining himself living here and the things he would be able to do here. He was day-dreaming and that was exactly what she wanted him to be doing. He turned to face her and could almost see the dollar signs replaced in her eyeballs for pupils.

"Don’t even say a word yet," she said. "Let me bring you inside."

Kent remained silent and tried to look around more to take in as much as he could for this first visit to this house. It wasn’t exactly what he had imagined. The roof wasn’t sagging for one thing; the barn might even be functional, for another. It was just … plainer (despite its ancient coat of red) than he had envisioned. A front door centered perfectly, four front bottom level windows matching four upper level ones. Nothing unique about it. Too large for one person. And then an inner voice interrupted his thoughts. Beggars can’t be choosers and your used car isn’t exactly a head turner.

"Follow me," said Carol as she fumbled through her handbag and extracted a pair of keys on a single ring with a white plastic tag on them and walked to the front door. Kent scoped out as much as he could and had decided, despite its current condition of neglect, that it offered a very impressive and secluded yard. The house itself could have been a single wide trailer and the land would have been attractive enough to have grabbed his attention. Taking a quick glance at the open area surrounding the house, he guessed he’d need a riding mower to maintain the property, but these were details he needed to keep calm about. Letting this real estate broker know he was getting all giddy about the place was not a great financial decision. She’d take as much out of him for her own commission as she possibly could. After all, it’s how the business worked.

As Carol turned the key into the lock and pushed the large creaking door open, a sudden burst of wind blew out at them as if coming from within the house. The air was stale, yet somehow, eerily lifelike. Kent turned his head in an effort to ward off the sudden burst and noticed the treetops on the property beginning to dance and if one followed the brisk breeze that just occurred, one might have noticed the two whirl winds that erupted from the house out onto the driveway past them. Like small tornados, they whipped across the front yard and danced briefly, malevolently before moving onto bigger and better places down the driveway and into the surrounding wilderness, taking last fall’s leaves along with them

"Okay," said Kent looking at Carol. "That was a bit weird and a little spooky. You’re not selling me a haunted house, are you, Carol?" Despite the tone in his voice, he wore a wide smile. All Carol could muster was a nervous giggle which then raised Kent’s suspicions. Either she didn’t know as much about the house as she was trying to pretend, or … she knew more about the house than she was admitting. One or the other and Kent was leaning towards the latter.

"Under the circumstance," she said, "I think you’ll find this house well within your price range."

When Kent had first met with Carol a couple of days ago, he had told her he intended on paying cash for the house. This was all the money he had left in the world, and although there wasn’t much left from the civil court case against him and what he’d lost in the divorce, it was enough to buy a house of this condition, at least this far north, and not have to endure the monthly mortgage payments that could stifle his lifestyle and well being.

The interior of the house was plain, and despite a lot of dust, it was quite clean. The front door opened into a large living room area with an exceptionally high ceiling. A set of stairs going to the second floor immediately greeted them, but Carol took him around the base floor to start the tour. A large combined kitchen-slash-dining room with an attached pantry and a door leading out to the back yard led off to the right. Down a brief hallway, and to the left, was an oversized master bedroom. Between the kitchen and bedroom was a cleverly situated bathroom with all the amenities save for a shower head. An old-fashioned over-sized claw-foot tub sat against the back wall with a high, shallow window above it. It was the kind of window which would open, leaning in on a slant, to allow air and a small amount of light in. A toilet to the right and a hand sink to the left. The clapboard walls were plain and in need of new wallpapering or a coat of paint. Easy enough and he’d have plenty of time on his hands until he could find a job. The next part of the tour took them up the flight of stairs back in the living room where there were four more rooms that were probably intended for bedrooms. It had appeared they weren’t used in many years. As storage rooms perhaps. Kent could certainly use them for storage, and make a nice writing nook-slash-den out of another. He was hoping for a second bathroom upstairs, but it seemed houses of this age never offered such a luxury. Well, if he was ever writing again and was working hard in his den and he the urge to tinkle, he’d just have to get up off his ass and walk all the way back down the stairs. In his mind, he was already moving in, already living here. He wanted to make an offer right then and there, but decided it would be better to maintain his composure and see how cheap he could actually get it for. It would be nice to have some extra money to buy some new furniture and yard equipment with.

"You mentioned this was built on the original rock foundation," Kent said. He didn’t remember seeing a cellar door anywhere on the first floor.

"That’s right," said Carol. "We’ll check the back yard for a bulkhead."

Back down the stairs and through the kitchen to the back door led them outside into the wide-open back yard where the winds were still gusting strongly. And sure enough, situated in the center of the house was an ancient bulkhead covered in a layer of rust and age. It appeared it hadn’t been opened in a hundred years.

"The details say it’s a full, unfinished basement," said Carol.

"I’ll take your word for it then," he smiled.

"You can feel free to go down there, if you like." she said. "I’m just not sure what kind of lighting is down there, if any. I’ve never been."

"It’s not important right now," said Kent. "Let’s go have a cup of coffee and talk some turkey. My treat." Kent thought Carol’s face would split in half from the broad grin that spread across the features of her face. He was anxious to find out how much he could get this house for and he was even more anxious to get settled and established. Somewhere. Anywhere.

Copyright © 2006 by J.L. Campbell.  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from the author. This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.