Chapter 21: A Time To Heal And To Build

Now we get ti straighten things out. My apologies. Thanks to John it will all come together. I broke my hand in a bike wrecs and am now a one handed keyboardist? Keyboarder? Anyway here we go.

In later years we referred to it as "The Time Pa Didn't Run For Sheriff." After the way Pa handled things when that Jesse Farmer kidnapped Samantha, a few people, mostly members of local churchgoers decided that Pa would make a great sheriff.

Rubin Hankins, the old sheriff was corrupt in every sense of the word. Criminal charges were brought against him for corruption in office and grand theft. In a desperate move to hide his own chicanery, the wily district attorney leaked news of the pending charges to the sheriff and he disappeared into the night, never to be heard from again.

Woodman County was almost evenly split between the Republicans and the Democrats. Of course the Democrats wanted a Democrat appointed to fill out the unexpired term and the Republicans wanted one of their own. Mister Cossinger wanted Hank appointed to the remaining two years as a stepping-stone into state politics. Ed Ballinger, a local lawyer who ran the Republican machine wanted his son appointed to help him get his start in politics. Neither side thought all that much about what the people wanted.

While both parties were arguing and bickering, Brother Moore started a campaign have Pa as a write in candidate. He contacted the other churches in the area and quietly suggested that Walter Hansen would make a great sheriff. After all, he was big, strong, could take care of himself in a fight and was honest. Not only that, he was a regular churchgoer. Without anyone ever asking Pa if he wanted to be sheriff, the local ministers got busy and talked up his candidacy.

The first Pa even heard about it was the day we came in to get the new truck pa had traded for. The biggest bootlegger in Western Oklahoma confronted us as we were eating dinner in the Bid A Wee Cafe. Herm Larkin was a fat man. He stood about five feet ten inches tall and weighed at least two hundred fifty pounds. His two bodyguards looked tough enough to handle anybody who got in their way.

Larkin waddled up to our table flanked by his bodyguards. He glared down at Pa and said, "Withdraw from the race now and nobody will get hurt."

"What are you talking about?" Pa asked in surprise, "I ain't going to run in any race."

He started to take another bite of his steak and the bootlegger slapped the fork out of his hand. Slowly Pa looked up at the men and said in a low, quiet voice, "You and those two peckerwoods with you get away from us and don't bother us any more. This is the only warning I'll give you."

"Please leave us now," Ma told him in a stern voice. "You are interrupting our meal."

"Get 'em, boys," Larkin ordered his two bodyguards.

I jumped up from the booth and Pa slid away from Ma and came out from his side. Ma pushed the table away from her, stood and grabbed her meatloaf plate up and slammed the fat bootlegger in the face with it. He stood there in shock that anybody would dare do such a thing. Ma poured a cup of hot coffee over his head and grabbed up her purse. It had two bottles of Sloan's Liniment in it. She swung it hard sidewise and struck the man's temple. He fell to the floor in a sodden heap.

I went at the bodyguard that was coming at me and treated him like we were in a wrestling match. I grabbed him under the right armpit with my right hand and pulled myself toward him, continuing on around back. Before he could react I threw a three quarter nelson on him, thought for a split second and changed it to a full nelson. What the heck, there wasn't any referee to tell me my hold was illegal. I lifted him off the floor and dropped down and back.

If you do that move wrong you can kill a person. I just wanted to disable him. As we hit the floor I twisted both of us over till he was face down on the floor and I was on top. I spread my legs wide for leverage, let go of his neck and head and slammed hard on the back of his head with the heel of my hand. His forehead hit the floor with a loud "thunk." and he was out for the count and then some.

Pa lost his temper and hit his opponent as hard as he could, flattening the man's nose. As one of the man's hands flew up in the air, pa took it in an arm lock and dislocated the his shoulder and slammed against the joint of his right elbow. Then Pa stepped back and smashed him on the tip of the jaw. He fell to the floor. Pa and I dragged the two bodyguards outside and dropped them on the sidewalk.

As we returned to our booth, Ma poured the pitcher of ice water sitting on our table on the messy and unconscious bootlegger. He spluttered and unsteadily rose to his feet, holding a hand to his injured head. "Where's my men?" He looked wildly around and didn't see them.

Pa walked up to him and said, "I will give you just one chance to answer, then you get hurt. Who are you and what is this all about?"

"Where's my men?" Larkin asked again.

"My boy and I hurt them." Pa cuffed him alongside the head hard enough to make me wince. I knew how strong Pa really was.

"You can't do that. They guard me." Larkin exclaimed.

Pa cuffed him again; "Well they didn't do a very good job, now, did they? If I hit you again, you're not going to be able to feel it, I promise. What is this all about?"

"We don't want you runnin' for sheriff. We was tryin' to scare you off." The man kept looking around for his bodyguards. It finally dawned on him he truly was all alone. He grabbed a small revolver from a shoulder holster under his suit coat.

I yelled and dove for the gun hand. Before I could reach it Pa grabbed the man in a wrist lock and applied pressure. When I collided with him, Larkin screamed. He fell and the wrist Pa had hold of couldn't follow so his arm broke at the elbow. He screamed again and passed out.

"I didn't know you knew how to wrestle, Pa."

"I learned it in the army, son." He was slowly calming down.

"Walter, we must find out what is going on here. You didn't decide to run for sheriff and not tell me, did you?" She stared hard up at him.

"Hon. I am as much in the dark as you are." He looked at Ma and said, "Let's find out how much damage we did. That fat slug on the floor is going to pay for it, either in money or I'll take it out of his hide."

Brother Moore came in the front door. He hurried up to us and looked at the man on the floor. I picked up the small revolver that had fallen to the floor and stuck it in my hip pocket as Brother Moore came rushing up. "Oh my. I see you have kicked off your campaign with a flourish. I was just coming out to see you. But since you are here in town I have been saved a trip."

"Do you know what in tunkett is goin' on here?" Pa looked down at the fallen Herm Larkin. "This pile of lard tried to have his two bully boys beat up on me and my wife and son. Now what is goin' on here?"

"Dear, you are dropping your gees again," Ma interrupted. She was bound and determined that Pa and I talked right, no matter what else was going on.

"Well," Brother Moore began, "A few of us have been talking that we didn't want a politician doing the job of sheriff. We wanted an honest, church going Christian, someone who was not afraid to stand against the bad element in the county."

"Well why didn't someone come and ask me if I wanted the job or not?" Pa looked like he was getting mad.

"That is what I was going to do this afternoon. Then I heard you were in town and I did my best to find you and ask you if you would be our candidate for sheriff. It looks like the other side was looking for you also. We have a rough crowd in this county and they won't go willingly."

Pa looked at him and said, "I ought to tell you no right off. But him and his two friends threatened me and my family. I won't stand for that." Pa looked at Ma and she shrugged her shoulders. "But, if enough people are fool enough to vote for me I'll give it a shot. But I won't make any speeches or kiss any babies. And my farm comes first. So if people want me that bad, I'll do it. But remember, I am a farmer and not a sheriff."

He nodded his head once and bent over the barely starting to stir bootlegger. He asked the man, "What pocket you keep your money in?"

He let out a whimper and said, "I can't reach my roll, my arm hurts."

"Where is it? I'll get it out. You're going to pay for the damage you caused. Now I either take it out of your wallet or your hide, your choice."

"My roll's in my right front pocket," he whimpered.

Pa was not gentle as he reached in the man's pocket and pulled out a big roll of bills. "Holy smoke." I exclaimed, "We're in the wrong business, Pa. Whatever business these guys are in pays better than farming."

"Don't you know who you were fighting?" Brother Moore asked, astonished.

"Nope," Pa answered, "I don't care if it was old Kaiser Bill himself. I won't stand for anybody threatening my family. He paused and asked, "Well, who is he anyway, you know?"

"Oh dear, oh my yes, that man is Herm Larkin," Brother Moore was surprised that Pa didn't know who he was.

"Oh, I know the name," Pa answered, "He owns that roadhouse outside of town going north and he makes corn whiskey."

"He is also a very dangerous man," Brother Moore said earnestly. "He has had some people hurt that went against him. He is a bad man."

"Well, he'd need someone else do the hurting for him. He couldn't do much." Pa looked down at the man and counted out some bills from his roll. He handed them to our waitress. "For damages." He nodded to Brother Moore and said, "Let's go home. I'm still hungry. You fix us something, Hon."

He dropped the rest of Larkin's money roll on the floor and led us out the door. We got in our car and started off toward home. The other two were still lying on the sidewalk where we dropped them. I looked back at them and grinned, "Pa that arm lock is illegal in amateur wrestling, you know that."

"Well, so was your full nelson, Davy. But when you are defending yourself, amateur doesn't count any more." He looked at Ma and grinned, "What was in your purse that laid that bootlegger out so fast?"

"Two bottles of Sloan's Liniment. They were on sale so I bought two. If you're going to be the next sheriff, perhaps we should get some more." I wasn't sure if Ma was joking or not.

"Pa." I exclaimed, "You're going to be sheriff? You?" This was too bizarre to believe.

"It is very doubtful, Davy. I meant what I said; I will not run for sheriff. I will not put myself on the ballot and I don't want the job. I'm a farmer and a good one, if I do say so myself. But if enough people are foolish enough to write me in, we'll see."

You really took care of that guy real good, Pa," I told him. "How did you ever learn to do a take him down like that, so easy?"

I could hear the laughter in Pa's voice as he answered, "There was a lieutenant in our outfit who coached amateur wrestling back home. He taught us the different wrestling styles and how to apply them. We learned Cornish style and even Greco wrestling. He was a good teacher."

I teased Ma, "You did great with your purse. You really let that man have what for when you smacked him. You ought to play baseball."

"I played softball when I was growing up at the school where your grandparents taught. I was quite good at it." She smiled her little smile of self-satisfaction. "Besides, that rowdy person needed to learn to respect others." She gave her head a little nod in agreement.

"Davy, I saw how you did a perfect takedown on that rowdy who came after you. Your slip around was just about the best I ever saw. I didn't even know you wrestled. How come you weren't on the wrestling team? You sure looked good enough there at the cafe."

"Mostly because there just wasn't time for it, Pa. The coach was always pestering me, but we have so much to do at home. I cut most football practice because of the chores. Like you always said, 'Chores first, fun later.' Besides, if I had been on the wrestling team, Ma would have worried I wrestled too rough." I was referring to the time Ma wanted me to quit football because she felt I played too rough with the others.

I grinned and reminded her, "You remember what happened when I wrestled two years ago, Ma?" She snorted and shook her head.

"Well, why didn't you say anything, Son?"

"Pa, what could I say that wouldn't sound crybaby? You know how you feel about whiners. Well, there just wasn't enough time to do everything and I wanted to be on the football team like you were."

"Davy, I would have made time for you to wrestle if you truly wanted to, you know that." Pa sounded sad and apologetic.

"Pa, I had to make a choice, set my priorities, as Ma says. Besides I got to wrestle during winter gym classes. That was good enough. Chores first, you always said, Pa." I truly didn't see why Pa was making such a to do about wrestling.

"David, you are what I never was, a natural. You just seem to do naturally what I had to work hard to learn. When I was on the football team, I had to work hard. I was always strong enough, but I didn't have your easy way of moving. I feel I've cheated you somehow."

It surprised me to hear Pa talk that way. I always considered myself the luckiest boy alive, growing up as I did with two such great parents. "Pa, you and Ma are the best mother and father anyone could ever hope to have. I love you both more than I can ever tell you."

Ma had a little moisture in her eyes as she told me, "David. That is the nicest thing you could ever say to either of us. As you already know, we feel the same about you."

"Y-yup," Pa said in a choked voice.

The rest of the trip home was in silence. Sometimes there just aren't any words that need to be said.

Dog greeted us with his usual romping good humor when Pa drove up into the yard. "Hi, boy, did you miss us?" I asked him as I got out of the car. He jumped up and planted his front paws on me and grinned into my face. It seemed that he got bigger every day. Pa took our only bag of groceries into the house. I stayed outside and paid attention to dog. We roughhoused a while, all thoughts of the confrontation in town gone.

After a few minutes I told Dog, "Let's go get the cows."

He ran on ahead as usual. By the time I got to the cows, he had them rounded up and on their way to the barn. Later, while we were milking, I told Pa, "If old Dog had hands, he would probably do the milking for us too"

Pa turned around and gave me a mock look of worry, "Don't give him ideas, Davy." Dog sat in the middle of the cats with his mouth open as he waited for his squirts of milk. To my way of thinking we had a perfect life.

By the time the chores were done, ma had dinner on the table, I gave Dog one last ear rub and went inside to wash up. Ma set cold sandwiches on the table, along with iced tea and a salad. As she placed the food on the table, she said, "Walter, I'm still angry at the way those hoodlums interrupted our meal in town."

"Well, Ma," I began and looked at Pa. He grinned back at me and we said in unison, "Your meatloaf is better." We three laughed and sat to eat.

Then Pa put the damper on our laughter, "What bothers me is that no police ever showed up. It's almost like they were warned off. I don't like that a bit."

"Aw, I don't think they'll bother us any more. We showed them what would happen if they messed with us." I was positive everything was settled and we had nothing else to worry about, at least from that bunch.

"Son," Pa started in a very solemn voice, "Evil has a way of striking back again and again. I'm afraid they will feel they have to have their revenge. We publicly humiliated that fat man and his two stooges. He can't afford to let that go unanswered.

I pulled the man's pistol from my hip pocket and laid it on the table. "Well, he's going to have to get another gun," I told him.

"I forgot all about that thing. Why don't you give it to your mother? It's small enough for her to handle. That old pistol of mine is made for a man's hand."

I smiled at Ma and pushed the little firearm toward her. "Oh, Walter, do you think this is necessary? Surely that horrid person won't bother us again."

"Martha today is just the beginning, I'm afraid. I surely do wish my name hadn't popped up as a candidate for sheriff. They meant well, but I have a hunch today was the first installment." As it turned out, Pa was right...

A few nights after the set to with Herm Larkin there was a loud hammering on the back door. I hurried to see who it was, Pa right behind me. The first thing I saw when I opened the back door was a glow in the southern sky. Next my eyes focused on our neighbor, Jake Emerson. He exclaimed, "That's the place your Pa bought you for a marriage present. Y'all's house an' th' barn an' all th' out buildings is ablaze."

The first words out of Pa's mouth was, "Anybody hurt?"

"Naw, the old lady says she heard a car go drivin' by fast just afore she saw th' blaze. It appears someone set it all on purpose."

I looked at Pa and saw him looking back at me. "You think that no good Herm Larkin did it, Pa?"

"My thoughts exactly."

"You all got Herm Larkin mad at you? How did you do that?" Jake looked from one to the other of us.

"He doesn't want me to run for sheriff." Pa sounded as calm as could be.

"Well, if he don't want y'alls runnin' for sheriff, you better not run. That man is real mean. I hear people get hurt bad when they run afoul of him."

I laughed and told him, "Pa and I kind of whupped up a storm on his two bodyguards."

The first I knew Ma had joined us was when I heard, "Don't say 'whupped, ' David."

Pa laughed and said, "My wife Martha, well she knocked Herm out cold with her purse."

"Y'alls jokin' ain't you?" Jake's eyes were round with amazement. He just couldn't believe that anyone would be brave enough or foolhardy enough to go up against Herm Larkin and his crew of toughs.

"Well, Walt, you're livin' real dangerous, y'all know that."

"Thanks for waking us up. We had better head over there and look things over. If it was Larkin who did that, he did us a favor, right, Davy?" Pa was all but laughing out loud.

"Yes sir, he truly did," I agreed and explained to the mystified Jake, "I was going to burn that place down to the ground anyway." There was so much termite infestation we didn't figure any of the wood was worth saving, even for firewood."

"Thanks again, Jake. Davy and me will head over there right now." He kissed Ma and we headed for the old Ford truck. I cranked while Pa slid in and set the spark and throttle. Like Old Faithful, it started right up. We could have taken the sedan, but there were tools on the back of the truck.

We were at my place in minutes. The flames had started to die down. I felt anger and some sadness at the same time. We were going to do this anyway, burn it all down, but to have someone do this in such a way was an expression of contempt my heart did not want to leave unanswered.