State of Rebellion

“Ah, well, please thank her for me, Consuela.”

“Si, Senor, but you can thank her yourself, Mr. Franklin,” she said, pushing the cart through the double French doors.

Puzzled, Franklin ignored her parting comment, thinking she was talking to herself. The woman had been acting strangely of late. Perhaps she needed a vacation, or better yet, early retirement. He returned his gaze toward the ocean, watching as the sun concluded its daily journey over the United States of America. Thereafter, somewhere beyond the International Dateline, and 7,500 miles south-southeast, it would begin its new day rising above the eastern shores of New Zealand.

At that same moment, Daniel Rawlings and Nicole Bentley were relaxing on the wrap-around deck of Dan’s father’s home in the Bay of Islands. The trip to New Zealand had been prescribed by Dan for the convalescent benefit of the reluctant patient. Nicole had gone to her sister’s home in Connecticut, where she had spent three weeks with her nieces and nephews and regained her strength. Then came Dan’s offer of a trip to New Zealand to meet his father and the New Zealand branch of the family. In addition to almost immediately liking the beautiful and gracious woman, Tom Rawlings had seen the healing that Nicole had brought into Dan’s life, and for the first time in several years, Tom could see that Dan looked forward to his future. The elder Rawlings couldn’t have been more pleased for his son.

Shortly after dawn the next morning, the gardener found John Henry Franklin still seated in his rocking chair, dead, with a ghastly picture of a truck full of dead Mexican immigrants pinned to the lapel of his expensive silk smoking jacket. The old gardener failed in his frantic attempt to find Consuela, the housekeeper and domestic help manager, to report the tragedy.

Consuela, now well-rested and content in her comfortable Mazatlan retreat-a place she had acquired from the proceeds of her years of service to her deceased employer-had no doubt that John Henry Franklin had been unable to thank her niece, Carmen, for her unique coffee blend. His kind of devil, Consuela thought, as she prayerfully fingered her Rosary beads, does not mingle with the saints.

Epilogue

Rumsey, California

December, 2012

From the hillside above and behind Jack’s home, Dan watched the clouds form patterns over the western slopes that ringed Rumsey Valley. Looking down the hill at the neatly kept, twenty-acre almond orchard, Dan could see, in his mind’s eye, a six-year-old boy running after a man as they worked to change the sprinkler pipe. The boy, struggling to keep up and to carry his share of the burden, wrestled with the eighteen-foot sections of aluminum pipe, which were not heavy but unwieldy for such a young lad to maneuver between the symmetrical rows of almond trees. Dan continued to envision the scene as the older man watched the lad, his young grandson and protege, who was the latest in the line of pioneer ancestors who had settled the valley many years earlier.

As the boy and his grandfather worked together, the man would relate the history of their pioneer forebears- tales of struggle in the early days, of victory and failure over the elements, of life and death. And the voices became real to the young lad. Those voices were muted now, put to rest with the completion of Voices in My Blood and the immortalization of those whom he had come to love vicariously. The remaining voice, now seemingly heard again as Dan continued to look down at the tidy orchard, was that of the old man as he spoke to the boy.

Have I told you the story about my father and the time he came face-to-face with a cougar up on the east bench? Well, it was getting on toward dark, and. .

Now that singular voice had been stilled-mingled, Dan surmised, with that of Grandma Ellen’s as she had called for the old man to join her. Dan’s view of the orchard, so small and insignificant on a worldly scale, was obscured by the very real tears that now filled his eyes and filled his heart, empty for so long, until. .

Nicole slipped her arm gently through Dan’s as they stood, viewing the California valley, which now remained part of the whole-part of the heritage his forebears had forged with their blood. Blinking the tears away, Dan covered Nicole’s hand on his arm and looked softly into her eyes, unspoken words passing between them as they surveyed the landscape, newly discovered by the woman, but part of the soul of the man.

“Have I told you the story of Jack’s house?” Dan asked, nodding toward the old, weathered farmhouse. “It’s the fourth house in a series.”

Nicole smiled at Dan, listening to his life and family history and absorbing it into her character.

“In 1866, when he came out after the Civil War, Howard Rumsey drove his Conestoga up this valley and staked out his tent, not far from where the house now stands. In four months, he’d built their first home-a two- room log cabin. Three years later, after a mill had opened down the valley, he made the round trip each week to bring freshly milled lumber to build his wife a proper home. That home stood for nearly thirty-five years, and then, shortly after the turn of the century, Jack’s father built his home, a few yards from the first.

“Then, in 1945, after Jack came home from his generation’s war, and after his father died in ’48, Jack tore down both houses and built the house you see down there now. He took care of his mother there until she died-that house is over sixty years old and has seen its day.”

Dan turned to look at Nicole, taking her face in his hands, stroking her hair, and bending to kiss her softly. He thought how she had stood by his side, risking her life to save his, and he felt his love for this woman welling up inside him.

Nicole’s recovery from the gunshot wound had taken longer than anticipated, and her medical retirement from the FBI, required because of a collapsed lung that had not healed completely, had been a hard blow from which she had not yet fully recovered-a lifelong career dream shattered.

“Jack had only one child,” Dan said, “my mother. In his will, Jack left all this to me. It’s time, I think, for a fifth house, but. .” Dan stopped.

“But what?” Nicole asked.

“But it’d be empty, Nicole, unless you would share it with me. I know I’ve been hard-pressed to let go of the past, and you’ve been very patient with me. But I also know that you know I love you.”

Nicole returned Dan’s kiss, then laid her head against his chest for awhile, the two of them content to stand and watch the sunset gather over the western end of the valley. She’d noticed, the first time he came to the hospital after returning from Washington, that he had removed his wedding band. She had taken it as an admission that he had let go of the past and that he loved her.

“What will you do, Dan?” she said, not lifting her head from his chest.

“Well, for one thing, I’ll continue to write. There are a lot of stories left untold.”

“And?” she said.

“And Governor Dewhirst is not going to run again,” he said, a grin on his face.

At that, Nicole raised her head and looked into his eyes. “So you thought you’d remain in politics?”

“I’ve thought that perhaps I could contribute to the effort. I’m still a bit young to fun for governor, but I might try to keep my legislative seat for a few years.” He smiled. “We still have this secession issue to deal with. It’s not really a done deal yet. In fact I’ve received an invitation to meet with several state and national elected officials from Oregon, Arizona, and even Nevada. They want to discuss some options. That will be in January. I don’t have a handle on what they want, but I intend to listen. Nicole, since being elected, I’ve learned a lot. In many respects, the secession mania has been a diversion, helpful to the current crop of elected officials actually. California is