Mother Lode

Erin was named for her mother, who had died when her daughter was seven, leaving Erin to form the closest of bondings with her father. For six years she had looked forward to coming home, and now that she was here John Kenner had been dead five days. As she entered the house in which she had grown up, she had a feeling that her father would emerge from his office or from the kitchen where he had loved cooking dishes from recipes he'd collected on a score of planets. That, of course, did not happen. She was very much alone. Winter had come to the mid-continent. The outside temperature was just above freezing, but it was warm in the house because the climate control unit had been left on. John Kenner had liked the house to be warm. With a smile of fond memory Erin went to the control unit and lowered the temperature four degrees. As usual, the house was immaculately neat. The bed was made up in her father's room, where he had died in his sleep. Perishable foods had been removed from the kitchen storage units, although the pantry was stocked with staples and canned goods. In her father's office—he preferred that to calling it his den, saying, «I'm not, after all, some kind of animal,'—she found the same perfect order. She sat in his chair and stared at the holo-stills on his desk. The images were familiar. There was her mother, big Erin, with baby Erin in her arms. Erin at six, in miniature, looking as if she were alive, with a puppy in her arms and with her front teeth missing. Erin as a teenager in her first formal gown. Tears clouded her vision. She had not yet wept. She let it come in a flood of stomach wrenching sobs, for there was no one in the house to hear and she was more alone than she'd ever been. She put her head down on her father's desk as the sobs lessened and there began in her mind that age-old game of if only. If only Rimfire had finished her job a couple of weeks early. If only she had never left home. If only… But Rimfire had not finished earlier; and she had left home, encouraged by her father to make a life of her own. But if only she had been able to see him just once more. If only she'd been at home to comfort him in his last moments. «When we face the death of someone dear to us, honey,» John Kenner had said beside the grave of Erin's mother, «we weep for ourselves. We may think we're weeping for the dead. We're not, but that's all right. We're weeping for ourselves, and that's permissible because it hurts so damned badly. God knows how badly it hurts, so he gives us tears to wash away the pain that makes us think that it might be best to just give up and join her. The tears help us get through it and go on doing what we have to do.» Remembering, Erin wept harder. She was so lost in her misery, weeping, as her father had said, for herself, that she didn't at first notice a small sound at her feet. It was only when she felt a light touch on her knee that she lifted her head quickly to look into a pair of steady, large, chocolate brown eyes peering up at her from a bedraggled mop of blond-brown canine hair. In his last letter to her via blink beacon, her father had told her about his new companion. «Well, hi,» she said, snuffling mucus, reaching for a tissue. «Hi, there.» The dog was standing on his hind legs, forepaws on her knee, his liquid, warm eyes seeming to express concern. He was quite small, weighting only seven pounds. «I know you,» she said. He made a little sound. She reached down to pick him up. He leapt away, stood looking at her with his unwavering eyes. «You're Mop,» she said. «Dad named you that because he said when you lie down you look like an old-fashioned rag mop.» At the sound of his name one of the dog's floppy ears stood up. «I'll bet you've been lonely,» she said. «Come here.» Mop was doubtful. He crept closer. Erin didn't move. He put his paws on her knee, lowered his head so that his chin rested between his paws, and looked up at her. «Oh,» she said. This time he allowed her to pick him up. «Poor little fellow,» she crooned. «Who's been looking after you?» Mop licked her hand politely, just once. There was space on New Earth to allow old-fashioned burial of the dead. The Kenner family plot was situated two hundred yards from the house in an area of knee-high grass dotted with purple and yellow wildflowers. The dirt on John Kenner's grave was still fresh. Mop the dog, who had guided her down a pathway familiar to Erin because it led to her mother's grave, sat down and looked solemnly at the mound. The headstone had been in place since the death of John Kenner's wife. On her father's slab only the date of death had been left blank. She made a mental note to find out who could carve the letters and numerals into the stone. A cold wind crept up the skirt of her dress uniform. As if reminded of his loss by the moaning of the wind through the trees that outlined the burial plot, the little dog lifted his head and howled. «I know how you feel,» Erin said, her throat tight, her eyes stinging. Mop howled again and her own grief burst out of her again in harsh sobs. The dog stopped howling, came to look up at her with concern. She knelt next to him and said, «It's all right to howl. It hurts. If howling makes it feel better, howl your head off.» She threw back her head, looked up at a leaden, winter sky that promised snow, and turned her sobbing into an imitation of the dog's cry of loneliness. After one questioning tilt of his head, Mop joined her and the joint howls of anguish soared upward, out, and away to be absorbed in the dull, chill air. Night. She went from room to room turning on all of the lights, Mop following her every step. She discovered his water and food dishes in the kitchen, saw that both basins were stocked. Someone had been looking after him. He followed her to the main room of the house where a front wall of glass gave a view of the Canadian. The river was up from heavy rains in the hills to the west. Muddy water filled the wide channel from bank to bank. In the summertime, she knew, there would be only a four or five foot wide trickle of clear water making a runnel down the center of the half-mile wide, sandy riverbed. In the glow of the lights on the patio, big feathery snowflakes began to fall and, although it was warm and comfortable in the house, she shivered. She tried the holo, flipped through the available channels, turned the power off. The image of a newsman in business dress faded quickly from the viewing square. Mop was sitting in front of her, his long hair hanging to the deep pile of the carpet. «So what do you think?» she asked. He barked twice, with some urgency. «You are kidding me,» she said. «You really don't want me to let you out.» The dog barked excitedly. «Out?» More excited barking, a run toward the glass wall. She opened a door. The dog dashed out. Snowflakes and a cold wind hit him in the face. He ran back in faster than he had run out. «So?» she asked. He lay down and assumed his mop pose, head between his legs. «Well, if you can hold it, all right,» she said. «However, I am not accustomed to cleaning up after some hairy little bugger like you.» It was too early to go to bed. She had talked with no one other than the taxi driver who had known her father. She was sure that John Kenner had had his affairs in order, but she imagined that there'd be some matters that would require her attention. At that moment her plans didn't go past calling her father's bank and, if he'd had one, his attorney. She went into the office and opened the middle drawer where her father had kept his bank book. The bank balance was small, under two hundred standard credits. The current power bill, unpaid, was stuck in the checkbook. She began to explore other drawers in the desk. John Kenner had prided himself on having a clear title to the house and three hundred acres of reforested hills and rolling meadowlands. With New Earth becoming more and more popular as a quiet haven, such retreats were accruing in value. The Kenner place, should she decide to sell it, would bring a good price. There was a chrome steel strongbox in the bottom drawer. She punched in her mother's birth date as the combination and the box opened. The first piece of legal paper she opened was a copy of her father's will. No surprises there. Everything had been left to Erin Elizabeth Kenner. But under the will was a blue-wrapped mortgage on the house and land. Less than a year ago John Kenner had borrowed to within a few thousand credits of the value of his property. Instead of leaving his daughter a valuable piece of real estate free and clear, John Kenner had left her a sizable debt. «So, Mr. Mop,» she said to the dog, who had climbed to her lap and then to the desk to lie there watching her as she riffled through the drawers, «what is this?» The doorbell rang. The dog leapt to the floor, barking. «I hear, I hear,» Erin said. She detoured past her bedroom, got her regulation X&A hand weapon from her bag, held it behind her as she walked to the side door which was the house's front door, facing west. It was strictly illegal for her to have a Service issue hand weapon, but if every retired X&A officer who had managed to hang onto a saffer were arrested, the Service would have to work overtime to discover another planet to be used as a prison for them. Bearing arms was still looked upon as one of the personal freedoms, and saffers were, after all, inexpensive. X&A didn't make too much effort to prevent the taking of one deadly souvenir by a departing officer. Erin looked through the viewer and saw a tall man, young of face. His unruly brown hair was sprinkled with snowflakes. Mop was still barking frantically, but in a different tone, as if he were thoroughly excited. «All right,» she said. «That's enough.» The dog paid no attention. In fact, the pitch of his bark rose. «Who?» she asked, after pressing the button that activated the talk-through. «Miss Kenner?» «Yes, who are you?» «I'm Denton Gale. I'm a friend of your father's.» She opened the door, letting the X&A saffer hang down by her side in plain view. Mop rushed toward the visitor, yapping happily. «Hey, Moppy,» Gale said, bending to rub the dog's head. Mop's stubby tail was doing overtime in circles. The young man picked him up and rubbed him, then looked at Erin. His eyes widened when he saw the weapon. «You won't need that, « he said. «I hope not,» she said. «Look, if you'd feel more comfortable if I come back during the day—» On the hardpad she saw an aircar, sleek, silver. «I apologize for my caution,» she said. «I suppose if my little buddy there knows you—» «I work at the port,» Gale said. «I rebuilt the computer on the Mother Lode for your dad.» «Run that by again?» she said. «Look.» When he smiled he looked very young. «You're letting all the warm air out and, quite frankly, I'm freezing.» «Come in.» «I heard that you had come home,» he said, as she closed the door. «I would have been here in daylight, but I had an emergency call.» She stood in the center of the room, the saffer held behind her. «Gale?» «Denton Gale.» «And you work on computers?» «Yes.» «And you did some work for my