Etta - By Gerald Kolpan Page 0,1

that she's gone, my sister will be reading some of her diaries while I pore over a pile of scrapbooks. So perhaps a bit of light will be shed on that subject.”

At time of publication funeral arrangements for Mrs. Carr are incomplete.

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mong all the other things her father liked to call her, he could now add “thief.”

He had always had pet names for her. He would refer to her as “lamb” and “angel” and “picky,” which he explained was short for “pick of the litter.” When he was the worse for drink, he had other names for her. If the spirits had made him happy, he called her “pharo,” after his favorite game of cards; “lucky” if he was winning. If the whiskey had turned him maudlin, the tears running down his cheeks, he would sometimes confuse the girl with her mother. “Anna,” he would cry, “Anna, you've come back,” though the fantasized return would bring no comfort to him. When demon alcohol turned him angry he would accuse her of being disloyal or spoiled. He would even say she was never wanted.

And always in the sober light of morning, he would beg her forgiveness; always she would grant it.

Over the years, she had learned to dismiss both the drink and the words. He was her father, and she preferred to think of him only at his best: the father who had taught her what he knew, the father who, she became convinced, had loved her as best he could.

He had bought Bellerophon in Virginia only the year before from a genteel man named Mr. R. C. Campbell. A month prior to the purchase, the breeder had stood helplessly by as the stallion bit and kicked two of his stablemates to death. Campbell had sold the horse to Father at a bargain price, stating that he was “doing the Lord's work by lowering the tariff on a devil.” Less than five minutes after the deal was struck, Father was astride the giant animal, digging his spurs into the fat sides and galloping across the green meadow, his crop driving the demon toward ever-higher speeds. Whooping and hollering, he had disappeared from sight for over an hour, and when he finally returned the horse was covered in foam and he himself drenched in sweat. As the big man dismounted, the stallion reared and attempted to trample him. Father reached up and grabbed the bridle of the beast, pulling hard and laughing. With the help of half a dozen grooms, he managed to return the stallion to his paddock, complimenting the astonished Campbell on the quality of his stock. “This devil will do fine for me,” he told the breeder. “Either he will kill me or I will kill him. In either situation, the world will be minus one more ne'er-do-well.”

Now, as Lorinda rode Bellerophon through the fields she knew so well, the stallion felt ready to rebel beneath her; and so she rode him close, her mouth nearly kissing the black of his mane. It had been the work of months to get this far. She had waited until dusk every day, when she knew her father would be in the library of the main house, seated beneath his hunting trophies and too drunk to hear or interfere. As they raced across the lawns of the estate, she murmured as if to calm the horse, trying to allay both her own fears and his instincts to murder. The wind's tears welling in her eyes, she flew with him, her auburn hair strung behind her in near-perfect imitation of his swirling tail, her stomach vibrating with thrill and fear.

The hours in the saddle that began with her first pony the equestrian competitions she had begun winning at the age of six, and all Father had taught her had led to this moment. As she plucked the Winchester 94 from her saddle, the long gun buzzed with an electricity that seemed to flow through her arms toward trigger and stock. With the strength born of a life on horseback, she clamped her legs to the leather of the hunting saddle and, using only her thighs to guide him, maneuvered the demon around the circle of four targets.

Crack!

The first shot was wide of the center, landing in the red area of the target a centimeter or two from the dark bull's-eye. She kicked Bellerophon nearly deep enough to draw blood, battling him into position, and then fired from fifty feet. The black of the