The Little Words Mean the Most

How chapter 41 ends

 

 

 

"No." He shut his eyes. Preparatory. "No!" His complete, total, utter, incontrovertible, inarguable rejection slammed down final as a fist; he kept his hands to himself, though. Ever the gentleman, despite his rights.    "You are wrong, Claire." His declaration; his exclusive Magna Charta. "This is not it."

         She recoiled. Asked herself, Could Catholics be any worse?

         There was more from her father. He was flying now. And collapsing, too, though a little dangerous still: like sparks from a burning field going unwanted places. Almost extinguished. Be watchful.

         "Not at all!" Mr. Stiles hook his head violently. "He didn't ask my approval. You did not ask my blessing." Ask was obviously important. "And so? No, Claire: this will not happen. You will not marry him. My final word." He paused. Daughter and mother stared back at him exhausted, without much interest left. "Which is the final word," he concluded. Well, there's the truth. For the moment.

 

"I'm asking now, Da," Claire demanded in seconds; just as rigidly. "Your approval?" She grimaced. "Your blessing? Can you do that?" Leaning in. "How can you not want me married?" she said, wide nostrils and all. That was the only question in her arsenal really; she was wilting.

         "You think that will make you happy?" her father insisted; he sensed weakness. "Ask your mother." He turned on his wife. "Did marriage," he argued, "make you happy? Tell her."

         Why not? Martha decided.

         "Yes, Jack, it did," surprising him as much as her. "Not this very moment. But yes." She stared at him. "I have Claire. I have you. I have my place in the world. Yes. Marriage did that. It's not all bone china and carriage rides, I'll grant you, Mr. Jack Stiles. Husbands take work. Though you less than others; for all your bluster and stubborn opinions. Marriage changed everything. It changed my life. It will change Claire's life. It makes something of a person. It's what adults are meant for."

         Jack's lips pursed. He made a noise, a wondering "Hmmmh," while his head nodded.

         He was startled plainly. He'd never asked his wife about their marriage or what she thought of it. And he'd just heard. He was surprised to hear that it pleased her. It pleased him very much quietly.

 

Claire sat stiff as an Egyptian pharaoh. Mrs. Stiles lifted an eyebrow. "I don't know," Stiles said, mostly to himself. Claire tried a bite of food. It had no flavor.

         "He should still ask me," her father said.

         "He will," Claire agreed in a rush. "With pleasure. He will."

         Then, why not, she couldn't hold back. Joy flushed through her.

         She jumped from her chair and grabbed her father's shoulders. She kissed him on the forehead, her aging auburn hair tickling both sides of his face; an intimacy they had not shared since she'd been a child shooed to bed.

         Then she pulled her mother into her arms.

         Suddenly Claire was famished.

        

 

 

 

How chapter 40 ends

 

 

 

 

"You are," Burke told Scanlon, "what we in Army Intelligence call a dupe. You know what that means? It's a technical term."

         Scanlon didn't answer. The major laughed, happy with the response. Jimmy Scanlon was exactly his kind of jackass. He'd deliver a very quick victory for Burke.

         Fifteen minutes later, they reached Ballymena. They took the turn for Glenariff. "This route takes you through the mountains to the coast. I figure this is where they'll hit you."

         Scanlon: Hit you?

         Amos instantly had regrets: don't, he warned himself, undermine the victim just yet.

         People want to live forever — even the cynical, even sacrificial lambs, even suicides: everyone wants to live forever! Ain't that odd. It was why Major Burke held so little to heart. Humans were unpredictable. He believed in Claire; she was rock solid. But traitors like Scanlon sometimes saw themselves as immortal gods.

         Meaning just that fools grew like weeds.

 

 

 

 

 

An entire chapter, mind: Chapter 40

 

Chapter 40

In front of the Belfast brig idled an olive sedan; new so not too loud. Major Burke stood full height at the sprung front door. "We're going for a ride," he told ex-Sergeant Scanlon, six inches shorter, when they were close.

         Didn't matter.

         Scanlon was clearly broken; cuffed, hands behind. Unrecoverable; judged hellbound by any standard of decent society. He'd killed his own. His friends and equals and just like him. That was unfixable; he knew that. He was prepared for that. He didn't expect to be rescued. At best he might try a pointless redemption gesture; whatever the authorities offered, Brit or American.

 

Corporal Loud hung off one of Scanlon's elbows.

         The major announced to them both, heading that way: "I'm driving." Then corrected himself, "Right." He'd headed toward the wrong side of the sedan. In Belfast the steering wheel was on the other side. At the same time Loud folded the disgraced ex-sergeant into the front-side passenger seat and got in behind. Then Loud leaned over the prisoner's shoulder saying nothing, like a sack of shame dumped exactly where it belonged.

         Major Burke pulled away.

         "Today, sergeant," he announced, "I am going to show you the exact route you will drive when we send you packing back to the IRA. You'll want to pay attention. Because we can't protect you if you vary from this route."

         Burke glanced over; no acknowledgement. "I'll be naming landmarks as we go. Pay some fucking attention," he finished harshly. Jimmy answered, "Yes, sir." Jimmy the ex-sergeant stared out the window, head swaying with the car. It was a dab of human at best; his response was close to a whisper.

         Burke told Jimmy: "It's just one big loop, OK? Keep it simple."

         "Sir." Jimmy's entire contribution.

 

The road out of Belfast threaded between low hills, past empty fields. They passed a sign for Larne, the ferry port for Scotland. "Ignore that. You'll come back that way. That's later. Head for Antrim, then straight north to Ballymena."

         Antrim was no distance at all. They were there in twenty minutes, driving past whitewashed merchants and finding the turn.

         Burke at the wheel glanced at Scanlon. "I bet you'd like to say some things to your man back in Boston." Scanlon swiveled his head away, wanting to ignore everything. "Father Mike? We'll be talking to him," Burke promised. "G-men will want a word with your good priest." Burke asked pointedly as an afterthought, "You know those IRA bastards consort with Hitler's boys?"

         Waited. No response.

         "Or maybe you don't exactly know what consort means, sergeant."

         "I know, sir."

         Burke approved. "Good Catholic education. I am not surprised. Those Boston nuns don’t stand for any of your nonsense, so I hear. I went to Catholic school, too, you know."

         This wasn't accidental. Burke was Philadelphia. Scanlon was Boston. But trust grew out of common ground; out of any shared experience. Catholic school was ideal. No matter where you attended, you smelled the same plain soap; the same obsessively polished floors, as if wood were eternal; the same dizzying hard work; the same iron-clad interpretation of acceptable behavior and gaudy sins. There was a culture of discipline inside Catholic schools that the U.S. Army could only envy. Burke knew he shared that with Scanlon. Burke knew that could be a bond maybe, saying nothing else worked.

 

"You are," Burke told Scanlon, "what we in Army Intelligence call a dupe. You know what that means exactly?"

         Scanlon didn't answer. The major laughed, happy with the response.

         Fifteen minutes later, they reached Ballymena and took the turn for Glenariff. "This route takes you through the mountains to the coast. I figure this is where they'll hit you."

         Hit you? Burke of course and obviously meant kill you. Amos instantly regretted the inference: don't, he stabbed, undermine the victim quite yet. People want to live forever, even the cynical, even sacrificial lambs, even suicides: everyone wants to live forever!

         Ain't that odd. It was why Major Burke held so little to heart. Humans were unpredictable. He believed in Claire; she was rock solid. But traitors like Scanlon would see themselves as immortal gods. Meaning fools grew like weeds.

what a half-billion $ case in progress looks like; lots of dead ends and bad-idea questions; symptom: you feel stupid

 

 

 

I gotta crow

 

The feedback from your session has been so great!  I am sorry we didn’t connect.  I was involved in a different workshop at another venue and just couldn’t get to you fast enough.  Several of the presidents who were in your session talked to me about it on Thursday and best of all, the conversation was all about how they want to change their messaging!

 

Thank you so much for making this happen.

 

All the best,

Leslie

 

Leslie Pierce | Senior Vice President – Talent & Organization Development

Junior Achievement USA® 

O fudge

 

 

 

 

 

i just realized my piano is

my computer's keyboard

 

thinking of fundraising appeals as songs

 

thinking of cases as operas

 

 

 

 

wehave a ghost toad

 

Belfast 1942 CHAPTER 39 rewrite

 

Chapter 39

 

The dining room held one particular memory for Claire; seven years earlier, the night of her 21st birthday celebration.

         She, her ma and da, the three of them alone in their dark row house, enjoying sponge cake with 21 candles. And Claire had felt just old enough to tease her father a bit. She aimed at nothing weighty; no revolt nor rebellion. She was happy was all, with her slice of cake and two healthy parents.

         She'd announced to the room, "Tonight I greet you both for the first time as your equal, as an adult member of this family."

         Claire had grinned with cleverness.

         But then her father stood up suddenly and loudly and marched down the table to her side. Where he grabbed her emptied dessert plate and held it aloft. Crumbs fell silently to the carpet.

         "Yours?" he'd asked her, bringing his distorted face in close. His hot breath basked her cheeks.

         She was confused.

         "Is this yours, Claire?" he asked, shaking the plate in the air. "By law?"

         "Yes," she'd guessed.

         He balked, as if his next move would be to smash the plate across her skull. Claire's mother lunged from her chair to save the good china.

         "Don't!" he'd commanded them both. He'd turned his furious face toward Claire's.

         And she'd stared back, alarmed beyond thinking. "Father, what did I say?" Weeping now: panicked fountains of tears, her mouth a small delicate hopeless hole. She'd angered him and didn't know why. Irrational pain blinded her.

         "You are twenty-one as of today," Mr. Stiles agreed. "Law and custom might call you an adult. But not in this house. Not in my house. While you live here," he threw out his plateless hand for good measure, "under this roof, my roof, you are still a child. My child." He glanced provocatively at his wife. "My child." He'd a smile hiding and ready, though, if Claire proved compliant. Censure needn't be cruel. Give her something.

         And that night she'd instantly complied; mortified and repentant.

         Jack Stiles saw he'd made his point. He relaxed a fraction; adding a quiet postscript, since there was Jesus thank you nothing more really to say; he'd laid down his law. They now knew his law. "You will obey my house rules. I know that, Claire," he allowed. "And there will be no further discussion. From you," meaning his daughter. "Or from you," meaning Mrs. Stiles.

         Roughly he handed to his wife the dessert plate he'd wielded.

         Said as he left, "The pleasure of your birthday, Claire. I mean that." He'd pinched his trousers straight and headed for his overcoat; to spend an evening at the pub with his fellows. A daughter's doused birthday celebration was no great loss, she being female after all; the pub would loudly second that notion. So her da left contented, knowing the future and its uncertainties were within reason and his grasp. A man's home was his castle. And all within it served him. God's law. Nature's law. His law.

all the places I've spoken on this side of the planet; speaking has given me the world

 

 

 

the different colored dots reflect the warmth of my reception

where we sipped iced drinks on a 104F day, in Scituate, guests of the delish Kramers, and the beach where we chilled our ankles

 

Sim One had lavender lemonade. A tall.

 

The geology here in Scituate, MA, should be its own theme park. These excellent, healthy, ever-changing beaches are town beaches. Outsiders are discouraged by an absence of parking unless you have a sticker, which requires paying taxes locally.

 

That speck on the horizon between the rocks is (officially named) Minots [no apostrophe; sic] Ledge Light, a landmark of Cohasset, the next town up. I lived in Cohasset for a few months after university, as the guest of a patient friend; some of the worst and best days of my life. Wikipedia: "[Joseph G.] Totten's design [for Minots Ledge Light] was as simple as it was effective. With extensive experience building fortifications, Totten [Chief Engineer of the Army Corps of Engineers] fully appreciated the permanency and strength of granite constructions. He designed the lighthouse so the first 40 feet of lighthouse would be a solid granite base weighing thousands of tons. To secure the lighthouse to the ledge, he had several massive iron pins emplaced so that the lighthouse would be literally pinned to the ledge by its own weight. Working on the ledge could take place only in conditions when it was exposed at low tide and the sea was calm, so construction took years."

 

Sim One wears a statement