Finally they dressed again and went down to supper. Afterward they danced, something they'd learned during their brief engagement. On their way back to the elevator, the bell captain asked if they'd like a beverage in their room, compliments of the hotel, and Macurdy said yes.
It arrived almost as soon as they did-champagne, with an ice bucket and long-stemmed glasses. Mary had never drunk before; the bubbles went up her nose, and she got the giggles. It was late before they slept.
It was nearly 10 AM when they awoke, languorous and somewhat sore, their morning kisses soft and loving, but not passionate. They ate breakfast by a window in the hotel restaurant, overlooking a river mostly in sunlight, the storm having migrated east to Idaho. Curtis, feeling experimental as well as famished, discovered cheese blintzes, and told Mary he hoped she'd learn to make them. After helping him eat one, she promised she would.
Afterward they walked the pebbled paths through the hotel gardens, which were somewhat bedraggled from their rainbattering, though gardeners were already out transplanting. Next they took a long carriage ride along the river, ate a midafternoon lunch, then stopped at the gift shop, where they bought magazines and a copy of Sunday's Portland Oregonion. Finally they returned to their room, where they made slow love.
It was already night when he found a notice in the Oregonian that shook them both.
Woman Injured at Wedding
Klara Preuss, mother of Nehtaka County sheriff Fritzi Preuss, was struck and seriously injured by a car outside the Nehtaka High School gymnasium, where she had been attending her granddaughter's wedding luncheon. Mrs. Preuss was seriously injured. Egil Nordby, of rural Nehtaka County, was arrested and charged with intoxication and reckless driving.
Curtis phoned the depot, made reservations on the early morning train, arranged an early wakeup, then phoned Fritzi to let him know they were coming. At 7:42 the next day, they were on their way back to Nehtaka.
Klara had a broken right hip and multiple fractures of the thigh-very severe injuries at age 72-and while her life seemed unthreatened (barring a thrombosis of course), Doctor Wesley said she wouldn't walk again.
Helmi had talked Fritzi out of telegraphing the newlyweds. "Call them on Wednesday," she'd said.
Now that they were back, they talked the situation over with Fritzi and Doctor Wesley. Because Grossmutter would be unable to shop, keep house, or cook, they'd move intake the front upstairs bedroom-and Mary would handle the cooking and housekeeping.
Curtis had no idea how important this would be to him, how critical to what would be the defining experience in his life on Earth.
9
The Peaceful Years: Husband, student, Lawman
When Klara Preuss arrived home from the hospital, a hospital bed had replaced her old one. It was Mary who looked after her, but it was Curtis the old woman asked for. "She says you can help her," Mary explained.
"But I can't talk German!"
"She says bloodstoppers can help bones knit."
Curtis blinked at that. Probably he could. Certainly he shouldn't have overlooked the possibility. He just didn't think like a shaman, he told himself Between Arbel and Omara, he'd learned, if not always fully mastered, a number of healing techniques, procedures, and principles. And from those could infer others.
He started by examining the fine structure of Klara's aura, and as a basis for comparison, examined and imaged mentally the thread-like energy lines around his own body and Mary's. Then he adjusted-normalized-the energy lines around Klara's.
They didn't stay normalized long, but while they did, healing progressed at a much increased rate, and normalization persisted longer with each treatment. At the end of her first week at home, Dr. Wesley visited, and commented on her surprising progress. At the end of the second week, he said he'd never seen anything like it before. After the third, she spent much of her time in her new wheelchair, and ate in the dining room or kitchen with whoever else was home.
Meanwhile the auric field around his father-in-law's right arm was quite distorted. Fritzi admitted that it ached chronically, especially when he tried to sleep, and agreed readily to let Curtis treat it as he had Klara's. The results were excellent, and surprisingly quick.
Macuurdy began to feel quite proud of his shamanic skills, when Klara began relying on her cane almost entirely, inside the house, taking to her wheelchair mainly for trips outside. He was doing with the help of analysis what Arbel had done largely by intuition.
Mary had anticipated problems with her Grossmutter-that having run the household for so long, she'd try to enforce her ways on her granddaughter. To Mary's surprise, however, Klara seemed pleased to let someone else run things. Not surprisingly, the old woman delighted in her grandson-in-law. His only shortcoming was that he spoke no German, so she set about to teach him. When they were in a room together, she'd point at or touch or slap an article and name it: der Tischl the table. Die Kaffeekannel the coffee pot. He was not only to repeat it, but pronounce it correctly, even if it took a dozen repetitions. Her repeated admonition was, "Du musst das richtig sagen!" (You must say it right!)
He enjoyed it, as a game and a challenge. It was easier than learning Yuultal had been. In fact, German grammar had parallels in Yuultal, and he discovered that quite a few German words were recognizably similar to English words meaning more or less the same thing.
Then Mary began working with him on verbs, while Fritzi taught him everyday phrases and simple sentences. Curtis began stopping at Sweiger's almost daily, for coffee and to exercise his expanding German on someone outside his own household. They teased him a bit about his baltisches Deutsch pronunciations, sometimes amusing word choices, and often clumsy grammar, but enjoyed and respected his interest and progress.
They never mentioned how Hansi was doing, or even if they heard from him, and diplomatically, Macurdy never asked. By summer he understood quite a bit that was said at the supper table. Of course, the others spoke more slowly and carefully than they might have, but it seemed to him that before too long he'd be modestly competent with the language.
One of the first things Fritzi had done, when Macurdy came on the job, was introduce him to the.38 police special-show him how to use and care for it. And talk with him about when, and more importantly when not to use it.
Although Macurdy had never before held a side arm, he proved a natural marksman. On occasion, off-duty deputies would get together on the department's makeshift firing range in what had been the Nehtaka Livery Stable, and before long he was firing the best scores in the department.
One day the following spring, Fritzi sent him with his undersheriff, Earl Tyler, to take a prisoner to Portland. After they dropped the man off, Curtis bought a large picture postcard showing Mount Hood, then wrote on it:
Dear Mom and Dad,
I am traveling and today have stopped in Portland I can see this mountain from the city. It is even more beautiful to the naked eye than in the picture.
I am feeling fine and doing well. I hope you are the same. Give my regards to Frank and Toodie, to Julie and Max, and to Ferris and Bob and Hattie. Also remember me to Trapjaw and Blaze.
I intend to get home someday for a visit, but it will likely be awhile. It is hard to get away from work long enough, and while I travel on the job, I never travel very far east.
Your loving son, Curtis
He gave them no address. Actually he seldom thought about his parents, or Indiana or Yuulith, or even Varia. Though occasionally he dreamed of her, the dreams invariably including sex.
Mary never asked if he dreamed of his earlier wives. If she ever should, he told himself, he could truthfully say he dreamt more often of Vulkan than of Varia-of a half-ton great boar more often than of his beautiful first wife. He'd never told Mary about Vulkan; that would be a little much even for her, it seemed to him-a sorcerer in the body of a giant wild hog! He could never remember much about his dreams of Vulkan, but somehow they seemed meaningful.