Diver v. Dogcatcher

The lack of foresight on the part of the Dog Breeder - first for bringing her dogs to the dueling ground, and next for tying their leads to her arm while dueling - results in a series of complications.

The German schnauzers, in a frenzy of excitement and worry after their owner falls, begin barking and baying wildly. The Diver tries walking closer to calm them, but he's met with defensive snarls and quick bites from one dog, then three others. He backs away.

Stetson watches from the door of the cabin.

The Grave Digger arrives. He suggests shooting them all. One by one, he says calmly, in the gullet.

This is nixed by the Diver, holding the only free pistol, the other being beneath an increasingly tangled mass of leash and dog.

They watch as some of the squirming dogs begin whining, biting at each other.

Why not, offers the Grave Digger, shoot the dog you like least. Or two, three. The three ugliest dogs.

They all look alike! frets the Digger. I can't tell which is worse.

Oh the one with the limp, he's the worse.

Which one is that?

One being mounted by the ugly cur with dirt in its mouth, next to the one what's fighting with the other to lick the blood from the tit of the woman.

He thinks of shooting - even to the point of raising the pistol - but can't in good conscience bring himself to do it. They're all good dogs, he says dejectedly. I can't shoot any of them.

The Grave Digger looks to Stetson. Stetson shakes his head. The Grave Digger frowns deeply. With no other solution, he goes about an alternate plan.

Woosh, shoo, shah! he cries, arms high in the air, advancing on the dogs. They bark loudly, but - to the Diver's amazement - begin backing away. As they back away, they drag the tangled corpse of their master with them. Gun free, the Grave Digger grabs it. With only slight hesitation he aims and fires. The limping dog falls with a howl. The other dogs, shocked by the report of the pistol, fired so close, take off -- the six carrying both the body of their master and now one of their own.

As the Grave Digger aims to take out the second dog, the Diver dives (fitting), knocking down the Grave Digger, gun and all.

The dogs flee east, running headlong into the forest.

Ah spit! says the Grave Digger.

That night the Diver listens to incessant barking from far off in the forest. It dies off gradually sometime in the early morning.

When the Dogcatcher arrives, the Diver relays the events of the past day. The Dog Catcher identifies himself as such. He's a thin man with a purposeful look about him, the type of look that says to strangers: I'm a man completely invested, for better or worse, in the duties of my profession. And so he is.

I'll get those dogs back, he nods.

The Diver wants to tell him it's a fool's errand; that, either way, whether the dogs are recovered or not, nothing would come of them. But the conviction with which the Dogcatcher vowed their capture takes him aback.

Diver v. Dog Breeder

It seems almost a dream to him: was there noise, the low clank of gears first lumbering into motion, the gush of water, that night? The Diver stands at the bank of the creek and looks south. He hears water cascade from some hidden source past the white spires of dead pine, but whether the hum he hears is only the usual strain of ten thousand crickets or the spin of one far-off dynamo... he isn't sure.

He takes a seat in the grass near the Grave Digger. They both sit just outside Stetson's new bean patch. Stetson gently covers the last row.

He'd been telling the Grave Digger a story. The Diver, whom Stetson acknowledges with only a perfunctory glance, catches it en media res.

The end of Stetson's story:

Then two men, from behind birch trees, one to the left and one to the right, called out, asking me:

Stetson, what is the frequency?

They asked again while they beat me. Again, again: Stetson, what is the frequency?

The next day, after stumbling back to the cabin, I read the note the Contractor left on my table. He wrote about the AM station, and he gave the frequency.

The Grave Digger scratches his chest, nodding, interested.

It was difficult decoding the signal at first. But I have books, and the Cryptographer and I spoke; he suggested combinations. But now its faded. Earlier, when I first uncovered the pattern, the forecasts happened just minutes after I broke the code. I found this sequence -

...there is nothing surprising in this substitution...
...many of them had red edges...
...the hall seemed to rise before my eyes...

- which was almost immediately followed by a rustling of the trees along the ridge to the west. I watched as a gust of wind galloped down the valley - knocking papers from lap. In the stillness that followed, butterflies flitted before me - many with red edges around black wings. The potency of the technique floored me.

But ever since, after every reading, the time between decryption and the occurrence of the event has widened. From minutes to hours to days to... well. If I can look ahead, it's only far, far ahead.

That's why I didn't expect this, he says, touching his crooked nose.

Stetson's story ends here. Discussion never returns to anything as interesting. Soon after, all return to their respective homes, and to bed.

The next morning the Diver's woken by the sound of wild barking. He sees a woman walking to grounds, straining against seven leashes attached to seven giant German schnauzers.

Diver v. Doctor

Absently swatting mosquitos, the Diver looks out over the swamp to the south. He stands by the three cairns to the southeast. He sleeps there, by the cairns, that night.

It's there - at some late hour - that he hears the faint sound of machinery slowly rumble to life, and then the distant purr of water coursing into a shallow basin. The crescent moon shines enough light to show ripples form across the surface of the floodland. Looking higher he spies several small but sure lights very far away to the south, above the horizon, as if from a row of open windows or portals. They're so small they might easily be mistaken for stars in strange alignment. They even twinkle, in a way: the light breeze moves unseen branches, causing some lights to fade or black, then reappear, then dim again.

The Diver wipes his forehead of sweat (it's an unbearably hot night) before falling back into a ball in the tall grass by the creek.

Next day:

Well, the Hippocratic Oath doesn't necessarily prevent me from taking all life. I can't purposefully harm my patients. Or bring harm to others on behalf of a third party.

Except in Oregon.

Except in Oregon, you're right.

The Diver asks if there's anything else that might prevent them from dueling.

Not that I can think of, no.

Maybe you're not thinking hard enough.

The Doctor shrugs.

Distiller v. Diver

Again, after the duel, the Distiller hobbles back to the oak, hunkers down, and waits.

He watches as Pepple called Stetson hoes the last weeds in the plot between his house and the grounds, and begins planting.

Several hours of dull pastoral living pass by - made more insufferable given the stillness and humidity and mosquitos. Suddenly a low whistle's heard. Similar to the plaintive call of the loon. The Distiller shakes out of whatever thought possessed him at that moment and perks his ears. The whistle sounds again.

With great effort he stands and follows the sound east, to the edge of the forest. There, from the dark of the forest a figure crouches in the half-shadows of a low elm. He's tattooed, tattoos mixed with filth and streaks of caked dirt, above white skin. He wears a tattered, sorry loincloth with no shirt, frame thin and scarred. As light filters through the slowly waving branch that covers his head, inexpensive shell jewelry (necklace, earrings, beads) can be seen, adorning a gaunt, pock-marked face, gnarled beard and graying hair, matted but closely trimmed, with a knotted forelock running from the top of his scalp. In his left hand he carries war club. Across his chest loops the band of a dusty buckskin satchel.

The two men greet each other as old comrades. They talk in a strange dialect that suggests a form of demotic French, Industrial-era shop talk, and the echos of an ancient, forgotten branch of Iroquois. The Distiller's offered water and dried meat, both of which he cordially accepts.

Stetson leans on his hoe, watching the scene with great curiosity.

After more discussion - during which the forest dweller always acts in a respectful, deferential manner - the two men part, and the Distiller returns to the oak.

Stetson, his interest piqued, walks to the Distiller and asks him what he spoke to the man about.

He was an old trading rep with another tribe. He recognized me from early in my career. Congratulated me on the honor of being involved in the duel. Dubious honor in my opinion, but he didn't think so. I didn't know their territory stretches this far west. I invited him to sit with me under oak. Never say a man refuse quicker.

The Diver arrives the following morning.