“Mom?”
Her mother jumped at the greeting, and quickly tried to assume her usual confident look of parental authority. Sheridan appreciated the attempt although it was a failure.
“Are you okay? Is Dad okay?”
“Okay is not the word for it,” her mom said. “I just talked to him. He’s at the hospital. Our friend Robey Hersig is in critical condition and not expected to last the morning.” Her mom took a deep breath, fighting back tears of frustration, and when she did so Sheridan felt a sympathetic welling in her own eyes even though she didn’t yet know what the situation was, only that it was affecting her mother so deeply that she was talking to her adult-to- adult, which was both thrilling and frightening at the same time.
“Robey was shot last night up in the mountains where your dad was. Two other men were killed, one by accident, one not by accident—”
Sheridan interrupted, “But Dad’s all right?”
Her mom nodded and her face softened. “He’s not hurt. But he’s hurting, and I feel for him. He said the man who shot the hunter came back and killed Robey and another man I don’t know. It’s complicated. He says he feels guilty he’s the only one who made it through unscathed, that it was pure luck.”
“Thank God he’s okay,” Sheridan said.
“Yes, thank God for that. But poor Nancy Hersig and their two children. I can’t even imagine . . .”
Sheridan pictured the Hersig kids. A boy who was a junior in high school and somewhat of a derelict, and a girl in junior high she’d last seen clutching a lunch sack and backpack on the school bus.
“Will Mr. Hersig make it, do you think?”
“Joe said the doctors doubt it. But we can pray for him.”
Sheridan shook her head. She didn’t want all the horrible details but she was confused as to what had happened. She wasn’t sure her mom even knew everything.
“Come here,” her mom said, extending her arms.
Sheridan did, and let her mother pull her close and squeeze her the way she hadn’t, it seemed, in years. Sheridan squeezed back.
“Your poor father,” her mom said. “He’s sick about this.”
“I’m just glad he’s not hurt.”
“Me too, darling,” her mom said. “Me too. But like him, I feel a little guilty for being so happy he is the only one who made it through the night.”
“What’s going on?” Lucy asked from the doorway.
Sheridan and her mother quickly released each other, her mom becoming a mother again. Sheridan morphed into the role of older sister.
As her mom sat Lucy down to tell her everything was all right, that there’d been an accident but her dad was okay, the telephone rang. Sheridan answered, hoping it would be her father.
“Hello, little lady,” the voice said. “May I please speak with Joe?”
“Who is calling?”
“My name’s Spencer Rulon. I’m the governor of Wyoming.”
At the name, Sheridan narrowed her eyes, pursed her lips, said, “Quit trying to get my dad killed.”
“Honey . . . I . . .” he stammered.
Her mom wrenched the phone away from her before she could say more.
KLAMATH MOORE paced the front of the classroom like a big cat in a cage, his shoulders thrust forward, his hands grasped behind his back, moving as if propelled by internal demons that would not let him rest.
Mrs. Whaling said, “By point of introduction, I’ve been following Mr. Moore and his cause for quite some time, long before I moved here from Vermont. I read his blog daily and I’ve seen him talk and debate on CNN and other networks. He’s very controversial but very interesting, and he has some important things to say. When I heard he was here in our little community, I just had to invite him to school. Please welcome Mr. Klamath Moore. . . .” She stepped back and clapped, which at first was a dry, hollow sound in the room until the class got the message and joined in.
He said, “When your teacher called me this morning to ask if I could come talk to you before my press conference this afternoon, I jumped at the chance. Because any opportunity I have to address our nation’s youth is vitally important. I appreciate it very much, and I thank you, Mrs. Whaling.” He nodded to her as he said her name, and she blushed.
“Life without hunting is not only possible, it’s important,” Moore boomed. “Think about it. There was a time when it was a matter of life or death for human beings to hunt animals in order for people to survive. If the caveman didn’t go out and kill a mastodon, his babies didn’t eat. And even a hundred years ago there were still places in these United States where people hunted for subsistence because they had no choice.”
Klamath Moore suddenly stopped and swept his eyes across the room, pausing for great effect, before whispering, “That time has passed.”
He made it a point to find and hold sets of eyes until the viewer had no quarter and was forced to look away, conceding Moore’s superior focus and passion. His voice was deep and raspy, his words dramatic, if well rehearsed, Sheridan thought. She recognized much of the exact wording from his website.
“I’m not saying there aren’t still a few places on this earth where hunting is necessary, for remote tribes in remote places. But in this day and age, where technology has made it possible to feed us all without our having to go out and get our hands bloody, hunting is an anachronism. Can anyone in this room tell me why there are men in the richest country on the face of the earth who find it necessary to take a gun they shouldn’t be allowed to have in the first place and go out into our nature—that’s right, it belongs to all of us—and kill an innocent animal with a
