your mother's project a success.'
'Well, yes,' he said. 'But – I thought we'd have more time together.'
'You're welcome to spend all day in the booth with me,' I said.
'Gee, thanks.'
'You don't even have to work; just look decorative and amuse me. I don't think they'd let me into your regiment, even if I had a uniform. I'd flunk the physical.'
'The problem's not this weekend,' Michael said. 'The problem's every weekend. If you'd just try moving to Caerphilly. We don't have to live together if that bothers you, but if you could just try living someplace nearby. I'd move up to northern Virginia if I could, except I have to be near the college; you can do your iron working anywhere.'
'Not anywhere,' I protested. 'I couldn't do it in your apartment, for heaven's sake; I'd burn the place down.'
'We could find a place,' he said. 'Someplace this side of Caerphilly; we could find a place for half the rent you pay in northern Virginia, and you'd be closer to your family.'
'Closer to my family?' I echoed. 'I thought you were trying to talk me into moving, not scare me off.'
'Okay,' he said, smiling. 'The other side of Caerphilly if you'd rather. What's wrong with that idea?'
'Nothing, really,' I began. 'Except I want to – '
'Say no to corruption!' a voice screeched into my ear.
I started, and nearly dropped my knife.
'Get tough on crime!' the voice went on. 'Fenniman for Sheriff!'
'Hello, Mrs. Fenniman,' I said, turning to greet Mother's best friend. 'How's the campaign going?'
'Oh, it's you two,' Mrs. Fenniman said. 'Can't recognize anyone in these fool costumes.'
She was dressed all in black, as usual, and looked more at home in her colonial clothes than most of the veteran reenactors. She was in her early sixties, like Mother, but while Mother could easily pass for ten or fifteen years younger, Mrs. Fenniman, with her pointy chin and sharp, beady eyes, had looked like an old crone as long as I'd known her. She was wearing some kind of oversized black bonnet, which she pushed back so she could peer up at our faces – the top of her head only came to my shoulder.
'You're running for sheriff?' Michael asked.
'You're not registered voters,' Mrs. Fenniman said, frowning.
'I am in Caerphilly,' Michael pointed out.
'Fat lot of good that does me here,' Mrs. Fenniman said. 'And you, young lady – why the devil do you insist on living up there in the middle of that horrible druginfested city?'
'Good question,' Michael murmured.
'Actually, I'm pretty far out in the suburbs, you know,' I said. 'We have more trouble with possums than pushers.'
'We could use more enlightened voters in this county,' Mrs. Fenniman said. 'Well, if you can't vote here, at least make yourselves useful. Pass these out.'
She thrust a wad of campaign pamphlets at each of us.
'Oh, and Meg,' she added. 'You did bring the flamingos, didn't you?'
'Yes, of course I brought them,' I said, wincing.
'Flamingos?' Michael echoed. 'You never did tell me what that was all about.'
'Campaign's keeping me so busy I almost forgot to ask about them,' Mrs. Fenniman said. 'And when I went by your booth a little while ago, you weren't there, and neither were the birds.'
'I don't have them out in the booth,' I said. 'They're not period. But I've got them, don't worry. I was planning on bringing them by your house while I was here.'
'That won't work,' Mrs. Fenniman said. 'I'm so busy campaigning this weekend I'm hardly ever home.'
'After the festival's over, then,' I suggested.
'Don't be silly,' she said. 'I'll pick them up at your booth later.'
'What's the deal with the flamingos, anyway?' Michael asked.
'Mrs. Fenniman commissioned me to make a dozen wrought-iron lawn flamingos,' I said.
'Okay,' he said, in a tone that suggested he was hoping for a slightly more detailed explanation. With my family, there usually was a more detailed explanation, although he hadn't yet realized that sometimes he was better off not hearing it.
'It's to get back at the damned yard Nazis,' Mrs. Fenniman said.
'She means the landscaping subcommittee of the Visual Enhancement and Aesthetics Committee of the neighborhood association.'
'Whatever they call themselves,' Mrs. Fenniman fumed. 'Bunch of meddling busybodies if you ask me. What business is it of theirs what I have on my lawn? I own the place, don't I?'
'They passed a rule outlawing plastic lawn ornaments,' I explained. 'Mrs. Fenniman feels they were targeting her plastic flamingo herd.'
'I know they were,' she said. 'I've filed suit to have the rule overturned, but meanwhile they've gotten an injunction against my flamingos. And that damned idiot of a sheriff is backing them.'
'So you're escalating to wrought-iron flamingos?' Michael asked.
'The rule specifically permits both iron and stone ornaments,' she said. 'So it doesn't matter how much they hate 'em; they won't have a leg to stand on. Speaking of legs: you figured out a way to anchor them? I wouldn't put it past the yard police to steal them.'
'Each one has a base,' I said. 'If you want to set them on the ground, they'll stand up just fine. If you want them anchored, all you have to do is set the base in concrete, and they'd need a backhoe to steal them.'
'But are they pink enough? They have to be bright, bright pink.'
'The enamel matches the last sample I showed you,' I said. 'I'm not sure it's possible to make them any brighter than that. As it is, they glow in the dark.'
'Really?' Mrs. Fenniman said, brightening. 'That's outstanding! The plastic ones never did that.'
'You don't mean mat literally,' Michael said.
'Just wait and see,' I said.
'I'll come by your booth tomorrow to pick them up, then,' Mrs. Fenniman said.
'Just bring your checkbook,' I said.
'Pink, glow-in-the-dark flamingos,' Michael mused, as Mrs. Fenniman stumped off, raising a cloud of dust in her wake as her long skirts trailed on the ground.
'I just hope she comes by early, before there's much of a crowd,' I said. 'I do not want a whole lot of people to see the damned things.'
'Are they that bad?'
'Wait till you see them, gently glowing in the twilight,' I said. 'Or maybe not so gently. They rather remind me of the special effects they use in bad sci-fi movies to indicate lethal levels of radiation.'
'They sound perfectly charming to me,' Michael said. 'I bet you could sell a lot of those.'
'Quite apart from being glaring anachronisms, they're perfectly hideous, and I have no intention of selling a single one after Mrs. Fenniman claims her collection,' I said. 'It's hard enough for a woman to get people to take her seriously as a blacksmith; the last thing I want is for people to start thinking of me as that lady blacksmith who makes those cute pink flamingos.'
In the distance, we could see Mrs. Fenniman, haranguing people and shoving campaign flyers into their hands.
'Odd,' I said. 'On her, that outfit makes me think more of Salem than Yorktown.'
'Or the Wicked Witch of the West,' Michael said, as we resumed walking. 'I keep looking over my shoulder for falling farmhouses. So is that why she's running for sheriff? Because they outlawed her flamingos?'
