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school and had nowhere else to go.
"But if he had, and you was pregnant, nothin' would make me happier."
    "That way we'd have something of him left," his wife agreed. "And so would
you."
    She shared their regret. Jesse had been a part of her life since the awful day she
arrived in Garnet Falls, newly orphaned and unsure of her welcome in the big house where
her father had grown up. Her grandparents hadn't been easy with children, but they'd given
Madeline a home, and as much love as they were capable of. They had praised her
scholarship and her good behavior. They'd never been particularly affectionate.
    Jesse gave her hugs. Jesse always gave her hugs, from the time she was eight and
he was eleven until she was sixteen and he showed her that there was more, much more
than hugs, to loving a man.
    How desperate they'd all been to salvage something from the disaster of losing
their son and her lover. She and Jesse had stopped practicing birth control as soon as she
returned to Garnet Falls after her graduation from Boise State. They wanted babies. Lots of
babies. But he had died, alone and bleeding in the mud, just a week before their wedding.
When her period came, a few days later, it had nearly destroyed her.
    In retrospect, her decision to be inseminated had been for all the wrong reasons. It
was a good thing there hadn't been any kind of psychological evaluation to determine her
suitability as a parent. She would have failed spectacularly. Four months after Jesse's
death, she was in Portland for her first attempt. She'd specified a sperm donor with Jesse's
physical characteristics: sandy hair, brown eyes, long and lanky. On her second try, she'd
caught.
    Jesse's mother hadn't approved. But Jethro had, saying, "It ain't like having Jesse's
own blood children, Linnie, but the babies do make me feel almost like a grandpa." He
remembered them on birthdays and at Christmas. His approval made it possible for her to
be an unwed mother--by choice--in a small town where the sexual revolution was merely a
topic on the evening news.
    Now Jethro was selling out and moving to Arizona. "The winters are just too
much for these old bones, Linnie. If Jesse had lived...well, never mind. But I'm tired of
fightin' the beef market and the weather and the government. I've worked hard all my life
and I want to do a little playin' before my time comes."
    She couldn't blame him. But oh, lord, she would miss him. He was as dear to her
as her own father would have been.
    The telephone's ring brought her back to her kitchen. Harry Lindholm's request
made her wish she could cancel Monday and go back to bed.
    * * * *
    Erik looked down onto Main Street as he sipped his instant coffee. The studio
apartment above the Wooden Nickel was a far cry from his condo in Vienna, Virginia.
According to Lester Wood, who owned the building, the only time noise could be a
problem was on Friday and Saturday nights. "If you're like most young bucks," he had said
when he was showing Erik the place, "you'll be out whoopin' it up with the rest of 'em, so it
won't make no never mind."
    Erik had refused the free use of Amelia Warren's mobile home, for taking favors
from a County Commissioner would have been a conflict of interest, not to mention
putting him all too close to her interested view. But he hadn't been able to resist this
apartment, particularly when his own search for semi-permanent lodging had proved futile.
Amelia had sent him to Lester, and the furnished apartment had been cleaned and made
livable on Saturday.
    Home! For the next few weeks, at least. When he wasn't off on another of his
active projects. He'd certainly have to get back to Mississippi no later than next Tuesday,
to check on the progress of the coastal wetland the Trust was attempting to restore.
    Damn, but it had been inconvenient, arriving on a Thursday, in order to meet with
all the commissioners. Friday had been wasted, too soon to make arrangements for a
helicopter to fly them in to the site.