Fated Attraction

by byrhthelm

Dreams, dreams, dreams... But what if they were more than just dreams?

Fated Attraction

Harm carefully closed his office door and shut the blinds before he slumped into his chair, moodily staring at the overflowing in-tray on his desk. He was beginning to think he had made a mistake, a huge mistake, in having his designator switched back to JAG. Sure, the Admiral had welcomed him back, and then had promptly buried him under what looked like being a decade's worth of scut-work, most of which could and should have been handled by the senior Legalmen in the LSO office on the second floor.

He had, he reminded himself, been prepared that sort of treatment, as well as the hopeless case the Admiral had so casually thrown at him at staff call this morning, defending the SecNav's son against a charge of Wilful Disobedience; a case that was to be prosecuted by his very own personal Bête Noire, Lieutenant Commander Michael Brumby, RAN, who in Harm's opinion had grown far too close to one Lieutenant Colonel Sarah 'Mac' Mackenzie while he had been gone.

And that, or rather his relationship or lack of it with the aforesaid Lieutenant-Colonel was yet another burr under his saddle. Their farewell, in her office had been pretty emotional on both sides, and despite her question as they hugged as to why she was the only one crying, he too had had tears in his eyes, but once again his need to keep a tight rein on his emotions had prevented him from sharing that with her. As if their parting wasn't sufficient, it had followed hard on the heels of the deal they had made as they watched Harriet Sims and her newborn son leave JAG HQ in the ambulance that was to take them to Bethesda. He had suggested that if neither he nor Mac were in a relationship in five years time, they should have a child together.

God knows what she had thought he meant, but as far as he was concerned, the deal which they had sealed with a handshake, encapsulated the whole hog, and by that he meant courtship, marriage, pregnancy and birth in that order. That thought had sustained him the most of his shortened tour afloat, and his first inkling that all was not as he had left it had come when Mac, and Brumby, arrived on board the Patrick Henry to prosecute Lieutenant Buxton, who had requested Harm as his defence attorney.

Harm had been delighted at the thought of seeing Mac again and had almost danced a jig of impatience on the flight deck as he waited for the COD to land. Mac, for her part had seemed pleased enough to see him, but the change in their relationship became obvious when she shrugged out of the white flight deck tabard to reveal the new silver oak-leaves on her collar, marking her promotion to Lieutenant Colonel.

To say that Harm had been surprised would have been an understatement, given that she had only recently faced an Admiral's mast subsequent to her court-martial, he thought that any promotion must lie at least a twelve month in the future, but not only had she received the promotion, but having, at first not bothered to let him know, she now reminded him of the difference in their status at almost every other sentence, it seemed that she resented him for wanting to return to the cockpit, for wanting to close that chapter of his life on his terms. This morning had just about been the last straw. He had decided on trying an informal approach, to try to get back to the same sort of footing they'd had before he returned to flight duties. That, too, had been a mistake, a big mistake, a huge mistake.

He'd knocked on her door-jamb, "Hey, Mac, can you spare me a minute or two?" he had asked cheerfully.

The face she had turned to him had been anything but welcoming, "No, Commander, I cannot spare you a minute or two, but perhaps you'd like to enlighten me: Are you always so casual about military etiquette when you address senior officers, or is this a facet of your character that you reserve especially for my benefit?"

Harm felt the colour flood his face, as he drew himself up into a brace, "I beg your pardon, ma'am. It was a momentary lapse of concentration. I shall take care that it doesn't happen again!"

Her gaze was almost as cold as her voice as she responded in Arctic tones, "Good. See that it doesn't. Dismissed!"

"Aye, aye, ma'am!" he had gritted out between his teeth, and turning away from her open door the first thing that encountered his furious gaze was the broadly grinning face of Mic Brumby, "Hard luck there, mate. Looks like you managed not only to put your foot in it, but get bloody egg all over your face too!"

For an instant Harm felt an almost irresistible urge to pound his fist into the Australian's face but by summoning up every scrap of will power he had he fought down the temptation and merely brushed past the aggravating Australian SOB, his mood not helped by hearing him say, "G'day, Sarah, Rabb being his usual pain in the arse?"

And there was no censure for his lapse of military etiquette in Mac's reply to the Australian,"Oh... nothing I can't handle Mic, after all, I am a Marine!" she had replied cheerfully, almost coquettishly.

Harm had cringed inwardly and crossing the bull pen had sought his current refuge, followed by the troubled eyes of Lieutenant Harriet Sims.

His morose musing were interrupted by a sharp triple rapping on his door jamb. For God's sake, who the hell would disregard the signs – the closed door and the shuttered blinds – that he wasn't to be disturbed? The only person he could think of who would risk his wrath in such a manner was the Admiral... In which case he'd best answer the God-damned door!

Standing he crossed the few feet that separated his chair from the door and opened it in response to the repeated knocking, but to his surprise the Admiral was nowhere to be seen, instead it was the new, blonde, Lieutenant. For a moment he ransacked his brain as he sought her name and then... "Lieutenant Singer, how may I help you?" he asked frostily.

"If I might have a moment or two of your time sir?" she said coolly, apparently unimpressed by his hostility.

Rabb stepped back into his office, grimly amused by her presumption, "A minute only, Lieutenant!" he warned her and then his eyebrows rose as she stepped into the office, turning and making sure the door was closed behind her.

Turning back to face him she said without preamble, "The word is, sir, that you'll be defending the SecNav's son on a charge of Wilful Disobedience."

"And?" he prompted coldly, as he retook his seat.

"I'd like to offer myself as second chair, sir."

"That won't be possible, Lieutenant. Lieutenant Roberts has that detail."

The young woman inclined her head in acknowledgement, "in that case, Sir, I shan't take up any more of your time," she said placidly, and then added, "Maybe next time, Sir?"

Harm nodded, "Maybe next time," he agreed, "But, next time, leave the door open."

Once again, the young woman's response was a perfectly dignified and respectful "Aye, aye, Sir.

She did as he'd instructed, she left the door open allowing Harm to follow her with his eyes as she headed back across the bullpen to her own, smaller office. He'd barely seen her around the office, and apart from a muttered acknowledgement on first introduction when he had returned to Jag had never even spoken to her. Consequently he was at a complete loss as to why she should suddenly be so keen to work with him, especially on a case that seemed to promise nothing but grief to all concerned.

He was also troubled by the realisation that he found her attractive, and more than that, she seemed familiar and he found himself wondering just where he had met her before.

Lieutenant Loren Singer returned to her own office, a slight vertical crease appearing between her delicately arched eyebrows. Sure, she'd taken a chance, making such a bold approach to a senior officer, and if she was too late in making her approach, as it seemed, then of course it was only right that he should turn her down. But his voice and manner seemed much colder than any offence of hers might have warranted. And that didn't just sit right, not with his reputation, and certainly not the way in which the enlisted support personnel looked up to him, respected him and for all she knew talked about him. But, she sighed again, even when they turned to chips of blue-green ice there was something compelling, something attractive about his eyes. She slid into her chair leaned back and steepled her fingers, resting her elbows on her rib cage, a slow half-smile replacing the frown; their close encounter had, amongst everything confirmed what she had suspected from surreptitious, long-range, sidelong looks across the bull pen, or at staff call. Despite his icy stare and his set expression, he wasn't a bad looking guy. Absurdly tall, of course, but not bad looking.

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

Harm raised the shot glass to his lips, the bourbon now heavily diluted by the melted ice, and tipped the last of its contents down his throat, and for a moment considered pouring himself a second drink, but shrugging his shoulders, he decided against it, and screwing the cap back onto the bottle, he picked it, and his empty glass up, and crossing to the kitchen area, replaced the bottle in its rightful place in the kitchen storage closet and gave the glass a quick rinse and left it to drain until the morning before stretching, yawning and heading for the bathroom.

Twenty minutes later, freshly showered in a faded blue – almost grey – tank top and a clean pair of white boxers, he slipped under the duvet on his made to measure bed, stretched his six feet four inch frame, hit the light switch, closed his eyes and was asleep within seconds.

To find he was desperately running through dense woods, his boxer shorts substituted for buckskin leggings and a breech cloth while his tank top had been replaced by a light khaki coloured linen shirt that hung to his mid-thighs and held close to his body by a leather belt through which was thrust a tomahawk and from which hung a heavy knife in a beaded sheaf, balanced by a heavy pouch on his right hip and by a powder horn hung on a cord baldric from his left shoulder. In his right hand, carried at the point of balance, was a long-barrelled rifle. From somewhere ahead he could hear excited cries and whoops that he somehow knew were not friendly, together with curiously flat sounding single shots. Again, without knowing how he knew, he realised that he was running towards the sound of battle, and that he wasn't afraid, just supremely confident, with a fierce joy making his heart throb within his chest as he effortlessly hurdled a fallen tree trunk.

A piercing scream from his left had him skidding to a halt and twisting towards the noise, he brought the rifle up to his shoulder, his thumb engaging the old-fashioned hammer of its flintlock mechanism. His eyes searched for the source of the scream, and there, not a hundred yards away and slightly downhill he saw her. A slim, blonde woman, her gown ripped at the shoulder and her mob-cap dangling from its strings as she wielded a heavy tree branch in an effort to ward off two paint-smeared Huron warriors, one of whom clutched a knife in his fist, while the other wielded a fearsome, spiked, war club, which he'd raised in an effort to batter her makeshift cudgel from the young woman's hand.

Judging the warrior with the war club to represent the greatest danger, he took aim, squeezed the trigger and felt the recoil, although he almost didn't hear the bark of the rifle as it sped its ball straight into the warrior's spine. With a strangled cry he arched his back and then fell forward, colliding with the woman and bringing her to the ground with him as he fell.

The second warrior spun, and seeing only the one man, who now carried an an empty rifle, he screamed his war cry and ran towards the interloper.

"Come on then, my lovely!" he shouted his defiance as he too started to close the distance. It was, in the end, almost too easy, the warrior, a very young warrior, ran in, his knife raised high for a downward strike, and all he had to do, was use his forearm to block the blow, while the tomahawk in his right hand, swept up and around to cut deeply into the warrior's face, passing through his facial bones and up into his brain. The young warrior dropped without a cry, and Rabb moved swiftly towards the young woman, who having disentangled herself from the dead warrior, struggled to her knees and gazed at him with the beginning of hope in her eyes.

"Ma'am... I'm Eli Rabb, and if you'll allow me, I'll git you out..."

But before he could say more, a third Huron broke through the under-brush, a trade musket in one hand and a tomahawk in the other. Like the first two he was painted for war, but unlike the first two, he was older, more experienced, war-wise. Seeing Rabb he gave a short whoop and then advanced cautiously, knees bent in a half-crouch, his left hand, discarding the musket stretched out, palm down in front of him for balance.

Rabb took a deep breath as he too adopted a half crouch with his tomahawk in his hand As they approached the Huron took a half step to his left, the first step in a move calculated to interpose himself between Rabb and the woman, but Rabb was having none of it, he feinted to his right and then left, but instead sprang straight in, raising his tomahawk for a clumsy, overhand strike. The Huron grinned, he didn't know how the hated white-face had killed the two youngsters, but this was going to be almost too easy. With a casual sway of the hips, he shifted to his right to allow the wickedly sharp blade to clear his shoulder and ran straight into the muzzle of Rabb's rifle, thrust forward in a stiff-armed jab. A blinding white flash flared in front of his eyes as the steel muzzle of the rifle shattered his upper front teeth, followed by a wave of pure agony as the rifle's snout smashed into the philtrum, that tiny nexus of nerves just below the nose, and then carrying onwards and upwards pulverised the nasal bone. Giving a short scream of agony and rage, he dropped to his knees, his hands cradling his ruined face as he waited for the blow that would end his life.

Rabb didn't keep him waiting long, with a flick of his wrist, he reversed the tomahawk and struck down with all his might, so the spike that counter balanced the blade sunk deep through the Huron's skull and into the brain. With a shudder, the warrior collapsed soundlessly, his weight being sufficient enough to drag his corpse off the tomahawk.

Rabb panted for a second or two as the adrenalin dissipated, and then casually wiping blade and spike clean on his erstwhile enemy's clothing, he straightened and turned towards the women, even as he brought his powder horn around to measure a charge of powder into the muzzle of the rifle.

"Like I said ma'am, I'm Eli Rabb, an' if you're willin' to trust me..." he spat a ball into the muzzle of the rifle and started to draw the ramrod from its under the barrel channel, "I reckon I kin git you outa here..."

The woman regarded him dubiously apart from his white skin, there was little about his dress and equipment to differentiate between him and the savages, except maybe the honesty and integrity that shone in those eyes... and what eyes they were! Piercing aquamarine orbs that regarded her with appreciation, but frank, open and honest appreciation. An indication she thought that whoever this Rabb character was, he had been out in the woods for far too long, without the sight of a white woman. With her gown almost ripped from her upper body, her hair loosened from its intricate coil on the back of her head, and her mob cap hanging loosely from its twisted strings, she had a shrewd idea that she she wasn't looking her best. And she hadn't even figured in the dirt on her hands, face and clothes, or the after effects of fear and exhaustion.

"Mister Rabb , I am Laurel Singer, and would be greatly obliged if you could escort me back to the Harris settlement on the Susquehanna,"

Rabb nodded, as he added priming to the pan of his long rifle, "I kin do that ma'am... but it's gonna take a few days to git there..."

"That's alright, Mister Rabb, it's taken a few days to get here from there!"

Rabb was about to answer when a noise in the surrounding brush made him grab the woman and push her to the ground while he stood in front of her. A flicker of movement caught his eye and he raised his rifle to his shoulder sighting along the barrel, only to lower it as the woman's voice came to his ears, "It's my husband! Mister Singer!" she called out as she scrambled to her feet.

The leader of the half dozen or so men who emerged from the trees was shorter than Rabb, but much more heavily built, with a broad honest face, which Rabb guess habitually wore an easy smile, but now was screwed up in a scowl of suspicion.

"Mistress Singer, are you well?" he called out.

"Yes, thank you Mister Singer, I am well. I am very well now!" she replied as she moved out from behind Rabb and crossed the clearing towards her husband.

Singer continued to glare suspiciously at Rabb, "Who is this fellow?" he demanded.

"My name is Rabb, from the Kishacoquillas Valley, about seven leagues north of here..."

"That's a fair piece off..." Singer allowed, "So what brings you down thisaways?"

"Huntin'!" Rabb said shortly. He was already getting tired of the other man' suspicions. After all he had just saved his wife and while he neither wanted nor expected the husband to fall weeping upon his neck, a word of gratitude would have been welcome.

"Could be that he was in with 'em, Lije..." one of Singer's companions muttered in an undertone, but not quite quietly enough for it to escape Rabb, nor Laurel Singer's ears.

"Albert Jethro Gibbs, you always was a fool!" she exclaimed indignantly, indicating the bodies of the three Huron warriors "if he was with them is this likely?"

"Woulda tooken 'em by surprise, thet's fer sure..." another one of the rescue party said dubiously.

"Yeah... an' that would explain how come he took on three on 'em an' got off withouten a scratch!" Gibbs added.

"Either that, or he's a better warrior then they were," Singer conceded, his arm now wrapped around his wife's shoulder and then looking down into Laurel's eyes he asked anxiously in a very quiet voice, "You didn't come to no harm?"

"No," she shook her head, "No harm."

"An this feller warn't with 'em?" he nodded in Rabb's direction.

Again Laurel shook her head, "No. never saw him afore he burst out of the bushes. He shot the first one, and then killed the other two with his hatchet!"

Singer nodded in acknowledgement of his wife's words while he considered them, and then looking Rabb straight in the eyes said, "We been pushing this war party non-stop, since they raided the settlement three days since, come noon-time. We got four of 'em, an' now you've tooken three. My guess is the others won't stop runnin' now 'til they git to the border, but withouten you comin' up on 'em..." he cast a troubled glance at his wife... "Looks like I owe you a lot, Mister..."

"Rabb."

"Well Mister Rabb... for me and my wife... thank you." He stepped forward and offered his hand.

Thanks and farewells said, Singer and his band pushed back through the forest to where they had left their horses, but from where he stood watching them go he could hear Gibbs' voice still complaining, "I still say he coulda bin with 'em, an' we oughta take him in until we can find out iffen he's who he says he is!"

But he could also hear Singer's rebuttal, "My wife vouches fer him, an' that's good enough fer me. An' she was right about you too Albert Gibbs; you always was a fool!"

Rabb allowed himself a slight wry grin, but as the larger party moved away, back to where they'd left their horses, he couldn't help feeling an inexplicable sensation of loss and regret.

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

Rabb sat at his desk covertly watching the latest attorney to join the JAG team. A casual word to Harriet Sims had elicted the information that the Lieutenant had been hand-picked by the JAG himself from her previous billet in the LSO office downstairs. Apparently she was too good a litigator to waste her talents on FOI requests, lease disputes and sailors' wills.

'Wish he thought the same about me!' Rabb thought as he disconsolately reached for a file from his in-tray, determined to achieve a full day's work, despite last night's dream, and the presence in the office of the woman who had obviously been the root cause of his sleeping fantasy. Rabb shook his head, 'Me as a woods runner!' he chuckled self-deprecatingly, and turned his full attention onto the file in font of him.

It was about ninety minutes later that on reaching for another file, he found to his pleased surprise that his in-tray was empty. A grin spread across his face and he allowed himself the luxury of a stretch as he decided that he could afford the time to reward himself for his hard work with a celebratory coffee.

The break room was empty when he got there, and so – naturally – was the coffee jug. Shaking his head at the laziness and/or inconsiderate nature of some people, Harm busied himself in throwing away the old grounds and filter paper, fitting a new filter and ladling in the requisite amount of coffee. He added water to the reservoir and leaned back against the counter top while he waited for the machine to work though its brewing cycle. He had waited, he guessed about half the time of the brewing cycle, when the door opened to reveal Lieutenant Loren Singer, a clean mug in her hand, obviously coming to the break room for the same reason he had.

She halted in dismayed confusion, "Oh... I'm sorry, sir... I didn't realise..." she started to turn away, "I'll come back late..."

"No need for that, Lieutenant, it's just about coming up to almost ready... here, give me your mug..." he reached out a hand and plucked the mug from her almost nerveless fingers, and just about managed not to let his surprise show as the young woman blushed a bright crimson as his fingers made fleeting contact with hers. Fortunately the characteristic gurgle made by the machine as the last of the water was siphoned out of the reservoir provided a distraction and allowed the blonde Lieutenant to recover some of her composure as Harm poured his own coffee before he turned to her and asked casually, "How do you take it?"

"Just with non-dairy creamer, please, sir,"

Harm nodded, added the creamer and passed Lieutenant Singer's mug back to her. For a moment he toyed with the idea of telling her that he'd dreamed about her last night, but almost instantly squashed that idea. She was too much of an unknown quantity, too new an acquaintance for him to be able to josh with her, and he certainly didn't want her screaming 'red light, Commander,' as had happened once with Mac when the subject of dreams had arisen. Instead he contented himself with a nod and a quiet, "Enjoy," as he slipped past her and back out into the bull pen, unaware that Harriet Sims' cornflower blue eyes held more than just a hint of concern as they followed him on his path back to his office. A concern that deepened when Lieutenant Witch followed him out of the break room, an enigmatic smile wreathing her lips.

Loren sat back in her chair, and regarded the mug of coffee on her desk. That had certainly been one for the books. It was, as far as she could remember the first time since she'd moved upstairs that anyone had bothered to pour her a cup of coffee, let alone asked her how she took it. And... he'd been so... so... so natural about it, as if it was in the normal order of things that a senior officer would pour for a junior, any junior, let alone one who had rapidly gained a name amongst her peers for being self-centred, egotistical and overly ambitious. And his smile, admittedly an impersonal one on this occasion, had really been a very pleasant, and very attractive smile. Loren let her own smile spread over her face as she daydreamed while drinking her coffee, only to have the muted knock of the empty mug as she put it down on her desk bring her back to reality in the shape of her need to read through the witness statements for the forthcoming Williams' conduct unbecoming Article 32.

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

The two horsemen rode slowly side by side, each muffled against the cold in a buffalo hide coat that reached their ankles, and each carrying a Hawken rifle in a buckskin scabbard across his saddle bow, and a pair of pistols in saddle holsters. Bowie knives and tomahawks were stuffed into their belts, and each of them had the look of eagles.. The taller of the two wore a wide-awake hat with a pair of eagle feathers stitched to the crown, while shorter rider wore a coonskin cap. Both horsemen were heavily bearded and both wore their hair shoulder length. Underneath their coats their buckskins were almost black from the accumulation of smoke, dirt, blood and grease. And could be smelled from a good fifty feet downwind.

Only a fool would ride these lands alone, they were the hunting grounds of the Crow who, unlike the Lakota with whom they'd overwintered, were no friend to the white man. True, having a partner meant halving the profit, but it also meant that they could reap more furs, as the two heavily laden pack-horses on leading reins testified, and more importantly stand a better chance of survival until the next Rendezvous with their scalps intact. So, this year he had teamed up with Bart Roberts. Roberts was a stocky, round-faced man, who made no secret that he hated life on the frontier and was only in it until he had amassed enough in gold to return to the Virginia Tidewater and persuade his sweetheart, Hettie, to marry him.

In the meantime, the early spring morning had warmed up enough for him to push his wide-awake hat to the back of his head and shrug out of his buffalo skin coat to let the power of the sun penetrate his fringed buckskin shirt.

Bart Roberts gave a him a flat glance of dislike, and huddled deeper into his own buffalo coat, "Gonna catch yer death o' cold!" he warned his partner.

"Nope, not gonna happen! This chil' done gonna die back east, in bed, age 'bout ninety six, with his childer, gran-childer an' great-gran-childer all 'round him!" he grinned.

"Yer pretty darn' sure," Roberts grumbled.

"Made a deal with the feller upstairs," Rabb grinned. "I'll be good an' he'll bring me safe to old age!"

Roberts spat a stream of tobacco juice, "Hell!" he said in disgust. "Ain't you larned yet? There ain't no law west o' the Mississippi, an' there ain't no God west o' the Missouri!"

Rabb looked at his partner in surprise, "Sure there is Bart, you think anythin' could have made this wonderful land 'ceptin' maybe God?"

"Nope, land is land, and while this may be purty, there's plenty o' purty places back to home!"

"Mebbe," Rabb conceded, "But there ain't many places back in Pennsylvania where a man can feel so close to his God!"

Roberts merely grunted his disagreement, and Rabb, knowing that his partner – and friend – usually took a couple of hours in the morning to regain his usually sunny temperament gave a short laugh, eliciting another scowl from Bart, and lapsed into silence.

They rode on in companionable silence for another four or five hours, Rabb was beginning to look for a suitable place to noon. They were crossing a vast upland meadow, and way of to the right he could see some black dots that were probably elk, but more importantly, dead ahead and no more than a couple of miles away – although in this clear air distances could be deceptive – was a hint of green such as might be caused by growth along a river bank.

His thoughts were distracted as Bart suddenly stood in his stirrups and sniffed loudly, "Smoke!" he said in a warning tone, and both he and Rabb shucked the scabbards from their rifles and both checked to make sure the percussion caps were still firmly seated on the nipple before drawing the hammers back to half-cock.

Both pairs of eyes scanned the area until Bart exclaimed, "I have it! Thataways!" and with his chin he indicated a segment of the greenery at half left to the direction of their travel.

Rabb squinted in the direction that Roberts indicated and sure enough, broken up by its passage through overhanging branches, there was the faintest of grey skeins of smoke rising into the sky. It was bad luck for whoever had lit the fire that there was no breeze this morning, the slightest puff of wind would have more thoroughly dispersed the smoke, and would quite probably have carried its smell away from the two riders.

Automatically moving away from each other to present two separate targets to anyone with hostile intent, they urged their horses forward at a walk and then when Rabb estimated they were still just outside long rifle-shot, he dropped his pack-horse's lead rein, knowing that the patient beast would quite happily stay ground tied while it cropped the rich grass, and glancing to his left he saw that Bart had done the same.

They had covered maybe another three hundred feet when the flat report of a rifle reached them at about the same time Harm heard the ball whimper through the air as it passed some feet above his head.

"Thet's fer enough!" a female voice shouted, "The next one won't miss!"

"Easy, there, ma'am, we're peacable!" Rabb called back.

"Yeah? Well you hold them long guns up where I can see 'em and you come on in real slow. You in that hat, I got you in my sights. Any trickery you'll be the first to die!"

Raising his Hawken at the point of balance above his head, Rabb gently urged the bay gelding on, holding it to a walk

He had closed to about fifty yards when the voice came again, "Who are ya, and what do ya want?"

Rabb stabbed himself in the chest with his left thumb, "Jacob Rabb, ma'am. An' that there's my partner Bart Roberts, we're heading for Rendezvous, an' at the moment we're looking fer somewhere fer our nooning..."

"Jackrabbit Rabb?" Harm winced, that nickname had cost him more than a few bloody fist fights at various Rendezvous over the years ever since Portugee Philips had saddled him with it his first year on the mountain.

"Turn your hoss to your right an' climb down from the saddle real slow... you first, Mister coonskin cap... an' keep that long gun where I kin see it!"

Bart felt uneasy. To do what the woman had ordered meant his back would be to her while he dismounted, "Jacob..." he started to protest only to be interrupted by the sound of a hammer being drawn to full cock.

"Mister, I got me three muskets all to hand, an' all ready loaded with buck an' ball, iffen ya wanna argufy about this ya jest go right ahead!"

Jacob Rabb glanced across at his partner, "I've a feelin' she's a-fixin' to do jest what she says, Bart. So whyn't you do as the lady says, an' climb down, nice an' polite...?"

With a distinctly unhappy scowl, Bart did as he was told, sliding gracelessly to the ground, with his rifle still held overhead.

"Now you, Mister Rabb!" the inexorable voice rang out again.

With a wry grin, Rabb slung his right leg up and forward over his horse's neck and slid to the ground, face forward.

"Pretty tricky!" the voice snapped, but Rabb was almost sure he heard a note of appreciation in it.

"Why, thank 'ee kindly, ma'am!"

"Okay, now walk on in, nice an' easy…"

With a shrug Rabb exchanged a glance with Roberts and with his rifle on one shoulder and his other hand clutching his horse's reins he approached the shallow coulée that the creek had cut.

In the shelter of the bank stood a two-wheeled cart, of the type known as a Red River cart and not too far from it a grid of smoking racks, laden with meat. But what captured and held his attention was the petite blonde, clothes in a faded, grey gown, the sleeves rolled up to her elbow, and holding with every evidence of familiarity a flintlock musket that wasn't quite aimed at him or at Bart. And true to her word two more muskets leaned against the cart ready to her hand.

Rabb dropped the reins and with his now free hand touched the brim of his hat to her, "Ma'am, this is a most unexpected but welcome meeting."

"Unexpected? Yeah. Welcome? We'll see."

Rabb frowned, there was something about this woman, about the way she looked, the way she spoke that seemed somehow familiar, although he was quite certain he had never met her before, those light blue eyes, now subjecting him to intense scrutiny were far too distinctive for him to ever forget having seen them before.

Bart Roberts was less impressed, it had been a long time by his reckoning since breakfast, and right now he just about in the mood to murder for a fresh-brewed coffee. "You alone, ma'am?"

"Nope, my husband ain't too far off, so don't you go getting' any fancy ideas!"

"Ma'am, the only idea we got, is to take a noonin', an' lessen you got any objection, we'll jest make free of a corner of your fire and brew us some coffee?"

The woman glowered at the two men, apparently considering her options, and then with a sigh said, "Make yerselves to home..." And almost reluctantly lowered her weapon.

Harm nodded his acknowledgement, "Thank ye kindly. Bart, you wanna get the pack animals?"

Roberts shrugged, and swung back into his saddle, while Harm eased the hammer on his rifle and slid the weapon back into its scabbard, before he off saddled and then slipped the bit from his horse's mouth to allow it to drink and graze.

By the time he completed his rituals Bart had returned towing both pack-horses behind him and Rabb busied himself with taking the packs from both of them while Bart off-saddled and un-bitted his dun gelding.

The two men squatted by the fire, Rabb setting their blackened coffee pot to heat, while Roberts mixed flour, meat fat and water to make corn cakes to go with the pemmican he had already laid out.

The next hour passed almost in silence as the two men ate and drank, and despite offering to share their food with the blonde, she shook her head in negation.

While he had been eating and sipping at his coffee Rabb had been more or less surreptitiously checking out the camp-site. The cart, although covered by a tied down sheet of canvas, seemed to be pretty well loaded, but there were no signs of any draft animals, not even an accumulation of dung, although the short grass to the rear of the cart showed no sign of wheel tracks, suggesting that had been exactly where it was for at least forty-eight hours. Uneasy at the idea of a lone woman in this country, he coughed and cleared his throat.

"Ma'am, jest how long's it been since your husband left you here?"

"Coupla hours mebbe." She replied, although she seemed unable to look Rabb in the face she spoke.

"Nuh, I ain't buyin' that!" Bart Roberts interjected. "Your campfire ashes tell the tale, you've been here at least two days, I'm a-guessin', an' there ain't no hoss droppin's..."

"An' the tracks you made comin' in have done grown over."

"You ain't got no call to be a-callin' me a liar!" the blonde retorted furiously.

"Ma'am, I hope I would never call no lady a liar, but it's got me in a puzzle what your a-doin' way out here on your ownsome. I don't know iffen you know it or not, but this is Crow country, an' I reckon there's nothing more than some young buck would like than your pretty yaller hair a-danglin' from his coup stick."

"I kin take care of myself! I stopped you two in pretty short order!"

"That you did, ma'am, that you did. But, like I said at the start, Bart an' me, we're the peaceable type, but there are some fellers on the mountain that ain't, an' it might jest be that the Crow ain't the only folks you should be ware of."

Laura Singer regarded the two men bleakly, they had seen through her pretence, and there was something about them that said they could be trusted. As Rabb had said they were peaceable, but she was well aware that there were other man on the mountain who weren't, which is why she concocted the fiction of her husband being near at hand. After a long few moments she sighed, lowered the flintlock's hammer and let her shoulders droop as the tension drained out of her.

She lowered herself to the ground, sitting with her feet drawn up to one side and indicated the steaming coffee pot at the edge of the fire, "Kin I?" she asked.

"Jest go right ahead and he'p yoursel'," Bart invited her, giving a nod of approval, which was echoed by Rabb as she took the precaution of wrapping her hand in the length of cloth before picking up the hot coffee pot. She gave further evidence of camp-craft when she had poured a measure of coffee into a tin mug, setting the now hot mug to one side to cool slightly rather than risk burning her lips on the hot metal.

"So, how come you-all are out here all on your ownsome?" Rabb asked.

Laura bit her lip and studied the ground before her for a few more seconds before she raised her eyes to meet his, "Me an' my husband, Mike, are on our way to Rendezvous, we got the cart loaded with flour, salt, terbaccer, trade blankets, calico shirts and other fixin's. We figured iffen we freighted in goods that you can't git on the mountain, we'd make a pretty fair profit."

Both Jacob and Bart listened to this first part of her explanation with approval, the cargo she'd listed would indeed bring a fair price once it got to Rendezvous, the trick was as they knew, even if she did not, was getting it to Rendezvous.

"Still don't 'splain how you ended up alone," Jacob prompted her.

Laura eyed him with resignation, it was obvious that she wasn't going to be able to get away without telling less than the whole tale. She took a deep breath before speaking again, "You were nigh on right, we pitched up here three days ago and set up end of day camp. We un-hitched the hosses from the cart an' Mike took 'em to the crick to water 'em. There was some sort o' critter t'other side of the crick that set up some caterwauling an' spooked 'em. Mike held onto the leader, but the wheel hoss broke free and stampeded out across the meadow there; seems the fool critter didn't have no lick o' sense an' put its foot in a gopher hole, or some such, snapped the cannon bone clear across.

"Next mornin' we tried movin' the cart with just the leader, but it was too heavy for one hoss, so Mike slapped his saddle on the beast an' headed off for Rendezvous to trade for another hoss, and then come back fer me an' the cart."

Rabb under Roberts exchanged an appalled glance, their enforced close companionship while overwintering had made each of them pretty familiar the other's way of thinking, and in this case their thoughts ran on parallel tracks.

"Why, in the name of God, didn't your husband take you with him?" Jacob asked.

"We put everythin' we had into this venture, an' we cain't afford to lose the stock in trade."

Rabb stared at her in surprised disbelief for long moments, not that he doubted her words, but because he found it difficult to believe that any man would abandon a woman these circumstances. If it had been a man they had encountered he and Bart, in accordance with the mountain man's Creed that said if the man was big enough to leave tracks he was big enough to know his own business, would have shared their coffee with him and ridden on regardless, but a woman? Here? Alone? That was a horse of an entirely different colour. Bemusedly he shook his head, and hands pressing on his knees for leverage gracefully rose to his feet, "Bart, I figure that crick ought to have mess of a trout in it, what say we go take a look-see?"

Roberts glowered at him for an instant, once again able to almost read Rabb's thoughts, but with a sigh of resignation he rose to his feet and the two mountain men crossed the twenty or thirty feet to the stream.

They halted with their backs towards Laura and although she couldn't hear what they were saying, it was pretty evident from their body language, Rabbs' extravagant gesticulations and Roberts' mulish shaking of his head, that the one was trying to convince the other to agree with his point of view. And eventually seemed that Rabbs' enthusiasm won out over Roberts' obstinacy, as the latter threw his hands up into the air and received a slap on the back.

Pretty sure that she had been the object of their discussion Laura found herself holding her breath as the two men returned to the fireside.

"Miz Singer, it's thisaway, we jest cain't bring ourselves to leave you here on your ownsome. So, bein' as it is that you won't leave the cart, we figure if you can find room on it fer our pelts, we kin put our packhorses to the shafts, an' we'll ride with you to Rendezvous an' bring you safe to your husband."

"Them packhosses is harness broke?" Laura asked, more in an effort to gain time than in any real doubt.

"Not 'xactly, but they're used to hauling travois, an' shafts won't be too much differin' for 'em." Roberts replied.

Meanwhile Laura was having a furious internal debate, it would be almost unheard of for a woman to spend however many days, and more importantly nights, unchaperoned with two strange men. On the other hand, the two men had declared their peaceable intentions, and if they had any hostile intentions, they had already had ample opportunity to rob her, rape her, slit her throat and leave her to the wolves, bears and buzzards. And anyway, there was something... trustworthy in Rabb's eyes, and despite his sometimes querulous attitude, there seemed to be something innately kind in Roberts' eyes. Laura took a deep breath.

"That's mighty obligin' of you, but I ain't one to freeload. I'll play my part, an' in return fer the loan of your pack animals, I'll cook for you, an' I'll even wash them buckskins you're wearin' - they smell pretty ripe - but, I won't lie with you, either of you. Do we got a deal?"

"Deal!" Rabb announced, while Roberts nodded his agreement. "Now, how long before we kin git all these traps loaded up an' git on our way?"

"Less than an hour, 'ceptin the meat, that prob'ly won't be cured till mornin'," Laura said.

"Yeah, 'bout that meat, you bin huntin'?" Rabb asked, worried that if she had any gunshots might have been heard.

"Nope, that's what's left of the wheel hoss. What?" She continued as she saw their startled looks, "there weren't no sense in letting five hundred pounds of meat go waste!"

"Nope, I guess not." Rabb said.

Laura nodded and then eyed the two men grimly, got to her feet, crossed to the cart and returned bearing two brightly woven blankets, "There ain't any more sense in wasting daylight, so the two of you kin go right ahead and shuck out of them buckskins, an' if you're wearing long drawers underneath them go ahead and shuck out of them too! An' after I've washed your clothes, I suspicion that washing yourselves wouldn't come amiss neither! In the meantime, wrap yourself in these…" She threw them each a blanket, and stood in foot tapping impatience waiting for them to pass her their dirty clothes.

The two men huddled in their closely-clutched blankets, while the woman busied herself in wetting their clothes before rubbing soap root into them to produce a lather and then vigorously beat the buckskins against the rocks to dislodge at least some of the dirt and grease with which they were so richly endowed.

The clothes washed and hung to dry, Laura was hard put to avoid open laughter as the two men, hardened mountain men, trappers and Indian fighters that they might be kept their blankets nervously clutched around them.

Nervous Rabb might have been, but he couldn't shake the conviction that he had met this woman before, although it took until that evening as they spooned up a rich smoked horse-meat stew, that he screwed his courage up to the sticking point.

"Ma'am, I've no wish to be over familiar, but I can't shake this feelin' but I've seen you somewheres afore."

Laura froze for a few seconds, her horn spoon suspended between plate and map, this was just the sort of thing over which she had been concerned. It didn't matter a good damn for some reason or other she felt attracted to the taller, slightly older mountain man. The be all and the end all was that for better or worse she was a married woman, and she could no more betray that that she could fly. Those thoughts, conflicted with her feelings, so her voice may be sounded a little flatter, a little more sarcastic and a lot more hostile than she felt as she replied, "It's likely. I've been thar!"

Bart was quick to pick up on the chill in her voice, and a quick glance at his partner showed that Rabb was at a loss, stepping in, Bart asked, "And just about where was it that you've been?"

"Somewhere." Laura said flatly, putting a summary end to the conversation.

It took six days to reach Rendezvous, and both Rabb and Roberts agreed that for those six days they had never eaten so well on the trail, and in return Rabb furthered Laura's mountain education. Each afternoon they stopped just long enough to cook and eat a meal before moving on for a further hour or two before making a cold camp overnight.

But each day of that journey saw Laura and Rabb almost imperceptibly become closer, and most evenings after supper saw the two of them in conversation, while Bart's presence more or less ensured the bounds of propriety were not exceeded.

"It was the smoke that told we 'uns that someone was camped on that crick where we found you, an' you done good in building the fire under the trees, but there weren't enough leaves on the trees yet to break up the smoke complete, so once we smelled the smoke it was easy enough to see." Rabb told her one evening.

Laura nodded gravely, taking in and hoarding his trail-wise lore, and beginning to wonder whether her husband, for all his self-confidence and bravado, really knew what he was doing out here in the wilderness.

He may not have been as knowledgeable as Rabb or Roberts in the wilderness, but on the trio's arrival at Rendezvous, it was soon apparent that he had made himself to home.

It was late afternoon when the Red River cart rolled in among the throng of mountain men, friendly Indians, fur traders and sutlers and even a few enterprising soiled doves, all hell-bent on securing a profit and kicking up a ruckus for the sheer enjoyment of it.

"Well, we made it!" Bart Roberts exclaimed somewhat unnecessarily.

"We sure did," Jacob Rabb replied with a grin.

"So, what happens now?" Laura Singer asked from her perch on the driver's bench of the cart.

"Let's get unloaded, and settled, then I gotta go find who's offering the best prices for pelts, an' while I'm a-doin' that, I'll ask around fer your man."

Even in the few minutes since they'd stopped, the arrival of a new, white woman had attracted attention, and nodding at the gathering circle of on lookers, Bart Roberts sent Jacob a meaningful look, "I've gotten a touch of my old misery in my knee, so I figure I'll jest take it a bit easy, and jest he'p out with the unloadin'. But while you're checking prices, don' fergit that we need powder, lead an' caps, jest as much as we need cash!"

Jacob nodded, easily able to follow Bart's reasoning, while most of the men present wouldn't, whilst sober, offer any woman any insult, one of the facets of Rendezvous was the consumption of vast amounts of rot gut trade whiskey, and the rum freighted in by the British Hudson's Bay Company.

It took Rabb about an hour to ascertain that it was the same Hudson's Bay Company that were not only offering the best price for premium quality pelts, but were also offering a generous discount on powder and lead, and were paying in gold.

With just one stiff tot of rum warming his stomach, Jacob made his way back to their camp-site to find that Laura was still the object of a lot of interest, and while she was doing her best to ignore it while she readied their evening meal, the tinge of colour in her cheeks was not just the product of the fire which she tended.

Jacob swiftly imparted his news to Bart and then turned to Laura, "I ain't heard nothing of your man, but I left word with North West an' Rocky Mountain traders, but…" He cast a wry grin at the circle of fascinated mountain men who hovered, albeit at a respectful distance, "but I misdoubt me iffen we have to wait overlong fer every child o' man to hear that you arrived."

Laura nodded, "I hope so, we came here to trade, but I don't feel like it's fittin' fer me to trade on my own..."

Jacob nodded in understanding, and then as she handed him and Bart a plate of stew each he sank to the ground, and once again sitting Indian-style, he helped himself to the biscuits she'd made.

"So… Take the pelts to Hudson's Bay in the mornin', buy us some necessaries, an' then what?" Bart asked.

"You don't got no powder and lead?" Jacob queried Laura.

"No, jest what we figured would supply us out an' back." Laura confirmed.

"That's fair enough," Jacob commented, "but, you mentioned flour, baccy an' similar, so come daylight, have a walk around with me or Bart, see what them kinda goods is going for, an' then mebbe we can start a-dickerin' for 'em..."

Before Laura could make a reply the scene was interrupted by a roar of rage, as a burly man about the same age as Jacob thrust aside Rendezvous etiquette and stormed into their camp, "You goddamn' harlot!" he yelled as he kicked the campfire, scattering blazing wood and ashes in Laura's direction, causing her to shriek in dismay and drop her meal as she rolled out of the way.

"I cain't leave you alone fer five minutes, not even in the middle of the mountains, before you start a-whorin'!"

Whatever else the stranger had in mind to say would never be known, after a second's stunned pause, Jacob was on its feet, his forearm pressed against the other man's throat as he pinned him to the side of the Red River cart, and the tip of his bowie knife pricking the other man's lower eyelid. Despite having taken a drink of his own, Jacob could smell the cheap whiskey on the other man's breath.

"Git your hands offen me! Or by Christ I'll..." the bigger man blustered.

" Go on, give me a reason!" Jacob hissed, applying just the slightest more pressure with the point of his knife, "it won't take much fer me to gut you like a hog, an' leave you fer the buzzards – or better yet, call a camp meeting and let everyone know how you ran out on your wife in the middle of Crow hunting grounds!"

The other man's hot, brown eyes clashed with Jacobs blue-green ones, icy in the intensity of his anger. Something about that stare sobered the other man quickly, and he swallowed convulsively, but before either man say anything else Jacob became aware of a gentle tugging on his knife arm.

"Let him go please, Mister Rabb," Laura begged. "He'll be fine, once I've got some coffee into him and spoken with him."

"You really want me to let him go?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"He's my husband."

"You love him that much?" Jacob asked in some surprise.

"He's my husband," Laura avoided answering the question directly.

Jacob spat in disgust, and sheathing his knife released his hold on the other man, who had the sense to remain leaning against the cart's side. "Bart, git our things together, Miz Singer, we'll be back come sun-up fer our packs, an' our hosses."

"They'll be waiting for you, Mister Rabb," she said meaningfully.

That meeting seemed to have sucked the joy out of Jacob Rabb, and if he'd had any plans for a prolonged stay at Rendezvous, they were quickly changed, so it was at daybreak only three days later that Rabb and Roberts, their pelts sold and their packhorses now loaded down with flour, coffee, sugar, molasses and two small jars of rum together with powder, lead and percussion caps rode quietly away from the still sleeping camp, the faces turned to the south-east, to the hunting grounds of the Lakota band with whom they'd spent the last winter.

The early departure from Rendezvous suited Bart Roberts, the less time he spent at Rendezvous the less he was likely to spend, but Jacob Rabb's morose expression told a different tale.

Relying once again the close companionship between them Bart rode in silence for a couple of hours before he spoke, "She is his wife, Jacob."

"I know that. But he don't deserve her, she's one to ride the river with. As for him... lower'n a snake's belly. I'd ha' bin doin the world a favour iffen I had slit his gizzard."

"Mebbe, mebbe..." Bart conceded, but then added shrewdly, "An' iffen you had, d'ye think she'd ha' fallen into your arms?"

"No, dammit!" Jacob spat out.

"So what now then?" Bart asked.

Jacob gave a short laugh, "Back to Matoskah's lodges, an' see if Tahcawinskah is still inclined to be friendly."

Bart made the translation of the Lakota names, "Old White Bear's daughter, White Doe, hey?"

"Yeah, she cooks a mean dog-stew!"

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

It was a warm spring day, although the Navy community in DC hadn't yet transitioned from winter blues to summer whites, so Harm was grateful for the chance to eat his lunch outside the cafeteria, at one of the tables under the shade of one of the blossoming cherry trees. He had brown bagged today, bringing in a chilled seafood and pasta salad, together with a bottle of sparkling mineral water, all of which had spent the morning in the fridge.

He popped the lid of the Tupperware container, and twisted the cap off the bottle and was about to pick up his fork when he became aware of a presence at the table. Looking up, his brows knitted in mild vexation, his heart skipped a beat when he realised the presence was Lieutenant Singer, whose alter egos had disturbed his sleep on two different occasions during the past three weeks.

"Yes, Lieutenant?" he snapped brusquely.

"I've been trying to pluck up the courage to have a word or two with you, Sir, and without making a song and dance over it."

For a fraction of a second Harm was tempted to dismiss her, but apart from his dreams, which had only started after he thought he recognised her from somewhere, here might, at last, be a chance to get to the bottom of part of the mystery that was Lieutenant Loren Singer.

"If it's that important that you feel you can breach protocol, then you'd best take a seat and have your say."

"Thank you, Sir," she replied demurely, and placing her own Tupperware container on the table she smoothed her skirt under her as she sat.

Rabb ate for a few seconds in silence allowing her to unpack her own lunch, which consisted of a submarine type sandwich with salad and some dark filling, and a can of diet Pepsi, the condensation beaded sides of which bore testimony to its chilled state.

"So... what was it you wanted to speak with me about, Lieutenant?"

"Last month, Sir, when I asked if I could sit second chair the Nelson case, I left the office feeling that I'd annoyed you somehow or other… And to be quite honest, if I did I just want to apologise. I really don't want to annoy anyone. In fact, Sir, I was rather hoping you'd accept my offer. I did pretty well in criminal law and conlaw at law school, but ever since I graduated NJS most of my work has been civil law in the LSO, apart from my first tour as a Lieutenant, spent afloat, and again, most of that was sorting out wills, and lease disputes for the enlisted. Thirty-six months... and can you believe I only prosecuted or defended eight minor courts martial cases, and the one major case that came up, they parachuted in the prosecutor from Naples and a defender from the SJA's office at Rota, I didn't get a look in at all, not even as second chair. It wouldn't have been so bad, but the offence took place on the Abe Lincoln, my billet."

Harm was hard put to resist grinning, the young woman had tried so hard to filter any trace of resentment out of her voice, but he could almost hear her rather low-pitched voice in his head, 'and it just wasn't fair!'

Instead he pointed out reasonably, "Well, a DDO isn't exactly a major case."

Loren Singer cocked her head to one side "The fact that it was the SecNav's son made it pretty major case, and with respect Sir, if you had gone the constitutional rights way, it could have been bigger."

"And if you'd been sitting second chair, that's the way you have chosen to go?"

Loren nodded, "It's an option I would have brought to your attention, Sir."

"It might interest you to learn, Lieutenant, that it is an option I did consider, and one I decided not to take up." That, as far as it went, was true enough, but Bud Roberts hadn't brought up the option, and when Harm had announced that that wasn't the way he wanted to play the case Bud had acceded without demurral or question.

Loren took a bite of her sandwich and chewed and swallowed, "M'mm..." She cocked her head again, and this time recognition dawned as the almost forgotten face and the personality to which it belonged was suddenly there in Harm's mind's eye.

"Forgive me for changing the subject for a moment, and for being maybe a bit personal, Lieutenant, but to the best of your knowledge do you have, or have you ever had a female relation by the name of Meghan O'Hara?"

Loren's brow creased in a frown, "No… Not that I know of, I'm from a pretty big family, but as far as I'm aware I know all of my cousins, and there's definitely no O'Haras among them... but why do you ask, sir?"

Harm felt the tips of his ears burn red, "This is going to sound like the lamest pickup line ever, but ever since I changed my designator back to JAG, and I first saw you, I had the strangest feeling that I'd seen you somewhere before and it was bugging the hell out of me. When I heard that your last billet had been the LSO downstairs, I figured that was it. But the way you cocked your head just then was exactly the same way, with exactly the same expression that Meghan O'Hara used to use."

"Used to use, Sir?" The blonde Lieutenant asked.

"Yeah, used to. She died." Harm said flatly.

"I'm sorry, Sir," Loren said quietly, resisting an urge to reach out and take his hand in a gesture of comfort.

"No, are you? Why?" Harm replied shortly, his defences slotting smoothly into place.

"I'm sorry on two counts, firstly I'm sorry for causing any distress and secondly I'm sorry for your loss, she obviously meant a lot to you."

"Actually, no, she didn't. I barely knew her…"

"Then I'm triply sorry for being presumptuous," Loren said quietly, while thinking, 'Yeah, and I was born yesterday, if she didn't mean a lot to you, then you had at least thought that there was some potential there.'

Harm made a huge effort to bring himself back under control, whatever his feelings might have led to with regard to Meghan it was not the Lieutenant's fault that she bore a striking resemblance to the dead assassin, and it would be inequitable to blame her for that. And as for the other woman's name... well, he only had the dead assassin's word for that, and how likely was it that she would have disclosed her true identity? Not very, he was compelled to admit.

"Now that's settled," he said, making an effort to instil a cheerful note into his voice and eyeing her sandwich "we can move right on... I'm a pretty fair hand in the kitchen, but I don't recognise your sandwich filling…"

Loren was sharp enough to realise that any further referral to her doppelgänger would be unwelcome, so she smiled, a tinge of colour coming to her cheeks. "It's a variation on an old family recipe, it's pemmican, but I've substituted TVP for the meat."

"Old family recipe?" Harm asked with a grin.

Loren nodded, "My five or six times great-grandmother was married to a fur trader way back in the days of the old mountain men, you know the days of Jim Bridger and Portuguee Philips and Liver Eating Johnson. Family tradition has it that she used to go with him each year to the Rendezvous at Horsehead Creek on Green River in Wyoming, of course it wasn't called Wyoming then, and that's where she learned to cook Native American style, but that's just probably a family tall tale."

Harm stared at her in amazement, for a second it felt like he'd been gut-punched, and all the air had been driven out of his lungs. Eventually he managed, "Yeah, I guess. My own family has a couple of legends that they always insisted are the truth."

While Harm might have felt he been struck in the solar plexus, that same feeling was flooding through Lieutenant-Colonel Sarah MacKenzie, she'd been devouring her Philly cheese steak, together with a large side of fries and coleslaw at a table at the other end of the row of cherry trees, so it wasn't until a crowd of enlisted at an intervening table cleared away that there was an unobstructed line of sight. Even then she hadn't noticed what was happening until Mic Brumby seated opposite her suddenly grinned, "Bloody hell, the man is bloody stupid."

"Huh, what do you mean?" Mac asked.

Mic nodded over her right shoulder, "Rabb, setting himself up for a fraternisation charge!"

Harriet Sims, who together with her husband Bud Roberts shared the table with the Australian and the Marine, cast a troubled glance first at Harm and Lieutenant Singer, and then the Australian officer.

"I doubt there's any fraternisation going on, just probably Lieutenant Witch trying to smarm her way into the Commander's good graces." she said, her bright blue eyes drifting towards the smirking RAN officer as she silently continued her thought, 'Just the way you've smarmed your way into the Colonel's good books.'

Harriet Sims considered that she and the Colonel to be good friends, she also considered that she and the Commander were friends. After all they were both godparents to her only child, she knew too, that the Colonel had desperately missed the Commander while he was away on flying duties, which made her reaction to him once he'd returned a total mystery, and an even bigger mystery was the way she interacted these days with the Australian. When you thought about it, it was totally inexplicable, it wasn't so long ago that he had branded the Colonel a total slut in open court, and had tried to get her convicted of murder.

Harriet had tried on several occasions to point out the inconsistency in her senior officer's behaviour, only to have the door slammed in her face at each attempt. Now, she'd given up and resigned herself to being as supportive, and silently condemnatory as she could.

Mac, looking over her shoulder, was even more displeased at the sight of Harmon Rabb, her Harmon Rabb, leaving the break area in company with the wicked witch of Washington, who walking beside him, actually had the nerve to smile up at him as he spoke to her.

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

It seemed to Harm that solving the puzzle of why Lieutenant Singer had seemed so familiar had brought an end to his dreams, or given their coherence, his sleeping visions, or whatever they were, at least they'd stopped.

In the nearly two weeks since their lunch together, he had slept peacefully. Oh, he was prepared to accept that he had dreamed and that like most people his dreams hadn't been profound enough for him to remember them once he had woken. And that suited him just fine. But he found himself at odd moments recalling the blonde Lieutenant's claim that she'd had a great great something grandmother who had been to the mountain men's Rendezvous. That claim, coming as it did, such a short while after the most vivid and complex dream yet, left him feeling deeply uneasy. He prided himself on being a rational person, one who didn't believe in the psychic world. He was a military man, a Navy Aviator, trained and drilled to deal with concrete events, and the suspicion that perhaps there was another world out there filled him with unease.

Shaking his head in disbelief at what he turned his own foolishness, he drained his coffee cup, gave it a rinse under the faucet and set it upside down on the draining board to air dry, before clapping his cover on his head and checking his reflection in the mirror. Satisfied that his summer whites had survived breakfast in pristine condition, he let himself out of his apartment, and partly for the exercise, and partly through mistrust of the antiquated elevator, he half ran down the stairs to where his beloved Corvette waited for him.

The first part of the morning passed peacefully enough, his "Good morning, ma'am," addressed to Lieutenant Colonel MacKenzie when he encountered her in the breakroom received a disinterested acknowledgement in the form of his rank.

Then had come staff call, where he was detailed to prosecute the case of the USMC Corporal charged with the attempted rape at knifepoint of the daughter of one of Norfolk's city councillors, the Admiral passing the defence of the case to Commander Alan Mattoni.

Admiral Chegwidden had looked around the table, his eyes resting for a moment on Lieutenant Bud Roberts before he spoke again to Harm, "Commander, you might benefit from a second chair on this one, perhaps Lieutenant…"

"Yes, Sir!" Harm took the risk of interrupting his chief, "Lieutenant Singer could be of great help in this case, Sir!"

For almost thirty seconds there was dead silence, not even the sound of a breath being drawn, if ever there was an occasion when the listener could hear a pin drop this was it.

"Lieutenant Singer? Very well, make it so!"

It was impossible to tell what the former Seal was thinking from his tone of voice, and a surreptitious glance at the Admiral's face showed it to be set in an expressionless mask. Harm took a mental deep breath and braced himself for later fireworks.

It appeared however that Chegwidden had an act of revenge at his fingertips, "We haven't quite finished here this morning, but this won't take long - Attention to Orders!"

Everyone in the room snapped to attention, as Chegwidden picked up a slim, blue folder from his desk, moved to stand in front of Harm, opened the folder and started to read, "During a combat mission over the former Yugoslavia Lieutenant Commander Harmon Rabb, Junior, was flying escort to a photo reconnaissance F-Fourteen aircraft when it was badly damaged by hostile anti-aircraft fire. In order to prevent his comrades from being captured or killed, Lieutenant Commander Rabb unhesitatingly and with consummate skill used his windscreen to push the aircraft by use of its lowered Tailhook twelve miles to the sea, where both pilot and RIO were rescued. Lieutenant Commander Rabb's gallantry was in the finest traditions of the naval service, and reflects great credit upon himself, naval aviation, and the United States Navy. He is hereby awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, second award."

Closing the folder Chegwidden stepped forward and carefully pinned the decoration to Rabb's shirt and then passing the folder to Rabb's left hand he offered his own hand in a formal handshake, "Congratulations, Commander!"

"Thank you, Sir!" Harm replied equally formally.

Chegwidden looked around with a touch of dry humour on his face and in his voice, "Seeing that you're not married, and your mother is not present, and I sure as hell ain't willing, perhaps the Colonel would do the honours?"

Mac looked stunned for a moment, she certainly hadn't expected this when she'd put on her make-up this morning, but a suggestion from a two star Admiral was virtually the same thing as an order, so taking a breath she stepped forward and stretched up to plant a chaste kiss on Harm's cheek hearing his whispered joking, "Gently, Marine!"

Tempted to give him an Arctic glare, she settled for giving him a tight lipped smile, satisfied with the almost perfect imprint of her lips as her lipstick had left on his cheek.

"Alright people, we have work to do, so let's be about it!"

As the assemblage dispersed, Harm took a step towards his CO, "Sir, I'm very proud to receive this decoration, but I'm also slightly confused, I thought I'd requested no ceremony."

"Yeah you did," the Admiral replied offhandedly, "I ignored it."

Effectively rendered speechless all Harm could reply was, "Aye, aye Sir!" And still somewhat bemused returned to his office to ponder over the morning's events. He didn't fool himself for a second into thinking that there was anything except duty behind Mac's kiss, the coolness with which she had regarded him afterwards left no room for mistake.

He was still struggling with his thoughts when they came a rap at his door. Looking up he found Lieutenant Singer regarding him with a quizzical expression on her face.

"Come on in, Lieutenant, and take a seat. You've got a seabag packed?"

"Uh... No Sir." The Lieutenant looked uncomfortable and embarrassed as she made the confession.

"Alright, this time, but take a hint, keep a seabag packed with a fresh uniform of the day, a couple sets of peanut butters, slacks as well as skirts, and any other necessaries… Enough for a three-day absence."

"You do that, Sir?"

"Certainly do, and I keep the seabag in the trunk of my car. He leaned forward his elbows on his desk and dropped the school master-ish tone,"You see Lieutenant, when you sign in on any given day, you never know where you will be sleeping that night. I've been pulled off my morning run, and helo'd straight out to a submarine, where I spent seventy-two hours before I got back to dry land."

Loren Singer nodded, "Thank you, Sir. For the advice, and asking for me as second chair… And if you don't mind me asking you, Sir, why did you request me? I was sure the Admiral was going to nominate Lieutenant Roberts again."

"So was I, Lieutenant, which is why I risked interrupting him. During the course of our last conversation on second chairing, you proposed an option, you were proactive. The fact that I had considered that option and discarded it in no way diminishes the value of your suggestion. And I figure that on this case you might just be able to come up with an option, or two, even, that hadn't occurred to me."

Loren looked across the desk at him, her eyes wide in surprise. In the few weeks she had been in JAG ops, no other senior officer had ever given any indication that her opinion was of any value.

"Tha... Thank you, Sir!" she stammered.

"Alright Lieutenant, I have a couple of cases here to sign off on, but be ready to move to Norfolk at midday. We can stop by your place for long enough for you to pack your seabag. In the meantime, get your office secured, and tell Tiner we'll want a pool car, fully gassed, for midday, and will require two rooms for two nights at Camp Elmore VOQ."

"Not commuting Sir?" she asked.

"Damn straight I'm not commuting!" Harm said emphatically, "the best part of six, maybe seven hours a day stuck in traffic on the I-95? Nuh-huh, it ain't gonna happen!"

"Oh, no, I hadn't thought that one through had I? It's just that people tear off to Norfolk on almost a weekly basis, and the way they're so casual about it it's like it's almost next door."

Harm nodded, "Yeah, that's always a danger, we get blasé about travel, and the next thing we know, we're missing evidence because investigations have become routine. So, it's up to you keen youngsters to make sure that us jaded old hands don't get into that state of mind!" He smiled to show that he wasn't being entirely serious, and was rewarded by a flashing grin from the normally serious-faced blonde.

"I'll try to bear that in mind, Sir."

"Good, now get those details squared away, and leave me to get my office in the same state!"

Just for once the grin stayed on the younger officer's face, "Aye, aye, Sir." She almost bounded to her feet and practically twirled out of the office.

Harm grinned, it had been a long while since he'd felt quite that degree of enthusiasm, especially when the case involved an investigation at Norfolk.

Two other pairs of eyes, one cornflower blue, and the other deep chocolate regarded Loren's departure from Harm's office with much less approbation.

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

It was with mixed emotions when at just short of sixteen thirty hours Harm piloted the Navy issue sedan through the gates at camp Elmore, Norfolk. The traffic had been worse than he'd anticipated, and they had lost nearly an hour trapped on the Beltway while police and rescue services righted an overturned eighteen wheeler on the off-ramp onto the I-95. And even then once they had got rolling it took nearly twenty minutes for the concertinaed mass of traffic to shake itself out and start moving at anything like the speed consistent with an interstate highway.

As a result, Harm and Loren barely had time to pay their respects to the base Commander, a grey-haired burly Marine Corps Colonel, before he secured for the day and headed home to his wife and family.

Much to his surprise, although taking into account the base's minor position on the scheme of things around the Norfolk Naval base it shouldn't have been, Harm found that there was only one block of VOQ, for both male and female visiting officers, and he and Loren had adjoining rooms on the second floor. But at least, they were far more comfortable rooms than they would have gotten if they'd had to take rooms at the main base's notoriously uncomfortable VOQ.

Harm had dropped his sea-bag at the foot of the bed, and almost immediately turned around knocked on Lieutenant Singer's door, to remind her that they did need to move quickly if they were to be lucky enough to find something edible in the mess hall.

Loren had coloured slightly, "if it's okay with you Sir, I'd rather get a shower and changed right now, and then find something off base a little later. I... I don't much like Navy chow, and I've never had the opportunity to get used to Marine Corps chow. It all has too much meat in it for me…"

"You're a vegetarian?" Harm asked in some surprise, the revelation of Loren's fur-trading ancestress had caused him to forget completely her mention of TVP pemmican during their shared lunch.

She shook her head, "Not totally, Sir, I'll eat fish and seafood, and an occasional piece of chicken, but that's it."

Harm nodded, "You could be in luck, that is if you don't mind my company for dinner; I just happen to know the whereabouts of a local restaurant that serves the best seafood I have ever eaten!"

Loren smiled, "That recommendation sounds good enough for me, if you can give me half an hour, Sir?"

Harm looked at his watch, "There's no hurry, Lieutenant, make it an hour!"

The restaurant was all that Harm had promised it would be, and the two JAG officers enjoyed a meal that Loren had no qualms in endorsing as the best seafood she'd ever eaten. Conversation during dinner had been light and inconsequential, and the two glasses of Spritzer each had consumed during dinner lubricated the conversation without leading either into dangerous waters.

So, it was with a feeling that all was well with his world that Harm had said good night to Loren as each fumbled with the keys to their respective rooms. A quick shower later, and Harm slipped under the covers of the bed, and turning off all but the bedside light picked up the case file to re-cap the salient points, but his eyelids drooped and with a silently amused, 'What the hell...' He flicked off the light and closed his eyes.

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

It was broad daylight, a blazingly hot midsummer day, and by the angle of the sun not far off noon. The powerful bay gelding beneath him walked steadily across the upland Meadow, the grass, turning to hay even as it grew brushed his stirrups and tickled the bay's stomach, causing it to give an occasional little jump and an offended snort when the sensations became too much for it to bear, but continually stirring up hordes of insects that earlier in the day had provided a moving feast for flocks of turtle doves, quails, warblers, flycatchers and other insect eating birds. Their enthusiasm for the feast had, Rabb guessed, been diminished by the heat of the day and he suspected that they had all found shady refuges, where with open-beaked panting they sought to keep from overheating.

"Easy does it old feller!" He gave the horse a comforting slap on the neck, as it gave a little hop, its belly once again brushed by the fluffy heads of the tall grasses, and was rewarded as the gelding dropped back in his normal walking pace.

Rabb looked around, the Hills which had seemed so far off early this morning were appreciably nearer, and with any luck, he'd be through the Rabbit Ears Pass before nightfall. If not, then he'd make a dry camp this side of the pass, in the twelve years since he'd mustered out the Fourteenth Pennsylvania cavalry, and been hired on as an army Scout it wouldn't be the first time. The local tribe, Utes, were generally peaceable enough, but they had been unsettled over the last two or three years by the influx of gold hungry miners, and there had been some isolated instances of conflict between white man and red, that had led to bodies being left for the scavengers.

Then last fall word had filtered down from the North of the Custer massacre, unsettling the southern tribes en masse. Colonel Pritchard, commanding the Fifth Cavalry, to which Rabb was attached, was an experienced frontier hand who had seen close-up the effects of Indian raids, and had proved astute enough as a politician to keep the mutually hostile miners and Utes tolerably satisfied with the status quo.

Even so, Rabb's quality horse, plus his 44/40 Winchester rifle and his Colt Frontier revolver made him a prime source of wealth, and so a prime target, for any discontented buck who happened across him, so prudence dictated that if he didn't make the Rabbit ears in time to cross tonight then it would be a cold camp, and a wait until morning, even so and despite any urgency a nooning to at least let the horse cool down and drink was no bad thing, after all there was no telling when he might have cause to call on the bay's last reserves of speed, stamina and courage. And besides, he rather liked the idea of a mug of coffee to wash down the beef jerky and hardtack that he'd packed for trail rations. And the idea became more appealing as he dwelled on the benefits of finding shade, where he, like the birds, could attempt to avoid overheating.

There was a straggling belt of trees that meandered down off the mountains a fair way off, but they did promise shade, and the way they straggled across the meadow even suggested that there might be water to be found. With a grin of anticipation he pressed his legs more firmly against the girth and the bay quickened his pace in response.

Eager to find shade, and if possible, running water he may have been, but Rabb wasn't about to neglect routine precautions. He nudged the bay to the right, heading towards where the trees petered out into the grasslands, checking the powerful animal's sudden surge as it caught the scent of water. The bay responded to the check with an up-thrown head and what Rabb whimsically decided was an indignant snort.

"Easy there, big feller, easy now..." he soothed his mount as to the relief of both of them they entered the still hot but shady embrace of the trees. Rabb held the gelding on the edge of the woodlands and listened intently, all was quiet, except for the chirping of some sort of cricket in the background, and the buzzing of assorted bugs as they flew past the man and horse. Nevertheless, he slid the Winchester out of its boot, and slowly and quietly worked the lever action, feeding a round from the magazine into the breech and then with rifle balanced across the saddle bow, he gently urged the horse on, paralleling the stream while keeping an eye open for possible enemies as well as a suitable place to make his noontime halt.

It didn't take too long to find the right place to stop, but for the moment he merely made a mental note, and then pushed on upstream for about another half a mile, looking and listening for any signs of other human presence. Satisfied at last he was alone, he turned at the big bay and headed back to his chosen spot.

It was the work of a few moments to unsaddle the bay and using his head rope to tether the animal to a tree until he'd cooled down. It didn't take much longer to build a small fire, just big enough to boil the water in his old enamelled coffee pot. Then, as he ruefully chewed on his hardtack, which even when softened by dipping into the coffee presented a challenge to his jaw muscles, his attention was caught by a splash in the stream. Coffee and hardtack forgotten for the moment, he concentrated attention on the surface of the water and gave a gratified grunt, as another splash advertised the presence of a trout rising to a fly.

An anticipatory grin lit his face, and rising from beside his fire he opened his saddlebags, and pulled out a buckskin pouch, his grin grew even broader when he saw just how much of the soap root was in the pouch. Replacing half of it, he took the rest and strode a dozen or so paces upstream where he soon found what he was looking for, a rock whose top surface was intermittently washed by the ripples of the stream. Placing the soap root on the rock he raised his heel and crushed the root, almost immediately a milky fluid started to drift downstream. Nodding his head in satisfaction, he raced ahead of the current, stood in the middle of the stream and waited. Within two minutes he had gathered half a dozen trout, stunned by the effects of the soap root in water. With more than enough for his immediate needs he pulled back out of the stream, and dropped the fish next the fire and then froze, suddenly certain that he was being watched.

As unobtrusively as he could, he slipped the peace thong off the hammer of his Colt, and crossing to the bay, he made much of the big horse, gently pulling its ears and rubbing its nose, all the time his eyes under the shadow of his hat brim scanning the surrounding bushes, pulling on the quick release knot he said aloud, "I figure you're cool enough now feller, c'mon, let's get you watered."

The bay whiffled impatiently, tugging on the lead rope, as he realised that at last he was being allowed to drink. Rabb stood ankle deep at the water's edge, his left hand holding on to the head rope, while his right hand rested oh so casually on his belt, scant inches from the butt of his revolver while the horse eagerly sucked up the cool water. His obvious precautions had effect, or maybe he reflected with a wry grin they hadn't been needed, the sensation that he was being watched dissipated, and he felt the tension ease out of the early afternoon.

The bay, satisfied at last, started pawing the water, for no other reason that Rabb could tell other than the sheer hell of it. With both of them liberally splashed with water, the chuckling man led the horse back and once more tethered him to the tree.

The horse having drunk so much Rabb would have to delay feeding him any corn, or making him do any work, but that was no hardship. He still had six sizeable trout to clean, to cook and to dry.

Feeding the fire once more, he quickly gutted the fish and butterflied them and then passing a willow wand through their gills he propped them over the fire. By his reckoning would take about ten minutes for the fish to cook, plenty of time for him to drink another mug of coffee.

It wasn't until nearly an hour later, that with two more mugs of coffee and two of the trout in his belly, that he used his canteen to douse the fire, and then it was the work of less than a couple of minutes to re-saddle the bay.

Once mounted, loaded rifle held across the saddle bow, he urged the big gelding towards the edge of the trees, to hold him there before emerging into the open. His breath caught in his throat, thankful for his ingrained caution, as he then quietly backed the horse deeper into the trees, before dismounting, tethering the animal and retrieving his field glasses from his saddle bag. Approaching the fringe of the trees once again he sank to his belly and ensuring that the arch of his fingers were shading the lens of the field glasses he focused on what lay in front of him.

By his count, there seemed to be a band of about three hundred... 'Yep, Utes, men women an' children of all ages, so that figures out to be somewhere near sixty men of fighting age'. "An' that, old horse, is just plain too many fer me to take all on my ownsome!" he told the bay gelding as he led him back to what was to have been a temporary stopping place.

Although he had no intention of re-lighting his fire, he wasn't too impressed with the idea of sixty odd curious Utes coming to investigate the smell of wood smoke, it was almost force of habit that made him regard the old fire site as the centre of his camp. Almost regretting now that he hadn't taken the chance of a further cup of coffee he cast a regretful look at the damp ashes and the surrounding them, and then again froze. Plain to see in the damp mud was a footprint, a small, slim bare foot that could only have belonged to a child, a large child, or a small woman. Hastily looking around he noticed that the bay was staring at a patch of bushes across the stream, his ears pricked right forward.

Squatting back on his heels, he plucked a half burned twig from the ruins of his fire and twirled it between his fingers. "You can come out now, I'm not going to hurt you," he said in what he hoped was a reassuring voice.

He thought he almost heard a soft gasp, and a faint splash. For a long minute, or so it seemed, he held his breath, waiting to hear something, anything, else. Eventually with a resigned sigh, he relaxed until once again the only noises he could hear the chirping of the crickets, the buzz of the flying bugs, and the occasional stamp of a hoof as the bay changed position.

He checked the time on his pocket watch and decided to lie doggo for an hour before he went back to the edge of the timber to check if the coast was clear. So, with his rifle across his lap and his hat tilted forward to shake his eyes, he sat with his back supported by a tree and while keeping alert tried to relax as much as he could.

Rarely had an hour seemed to drag so much, the hands of his watch seeming not to move for minutes at a time, and he was tempted more than once to bring the watch up to his ear to make sure that it was in fact working. But eventually the minute hand ticked over to mark the passage of the hour and Rabb rose to his feet, ready once again to scout potential enemy. But for some reason, one that even he didn't quite understand, he paused to pick up willow wand and jam one end of it into the earth. On the other end he hung one of the now cold trout. Then with a self-indulgent shake of his head and a rueful smile on his lips, he slipped almost silently into the undergrowth.

Ten minutes later he was back, swearing silently and savagely at the unkind fates; the damn' Utes were erecting their wicki-ups, and to all intents and purposes he was temporarily trapped. Still, he could have been trapped in worse paces... here at least he had plenty of water, and there were fish in the stream... That thought brought his head swivelling around to the ashes of his old fire. The willow wand still stood rammed into the earth where he'd left it, but the trout that had hung from it had gone. His smile was grimly amused; he wasn't sure just who he'd fed but the footprint he'd found was too narrow he figured that to have belonged to an Indian, only white people were dumb enough to force their feet into rigid leather shoes, while almost without exception the tribes wore soft moccasins which allowed their feet to spread, leaving broader footprints on the ground.

But, if the child or woman was white, then unless he could be sure of her safety, there was no way he could leave her here with a village full of potentially hostile Indians on the doorstep. He grinned at some his thoughts, he was becoming more convinced that it was a woman, even though that might be just wishful thinking, but it would be no laughing matter if she was discovered by the Utes. And that was almost an inevitability, the straggling line of trees demanded that the tribe's hunters, at least, would explore them, looking for any signs of game, if for no other reason.

And that meant he had to find another way out of here, for two people one of whom probably was afoot, and he needed to do it damned fast

Another quick glance at his watch told him that it wouldn't be long now before sunset, and he needed to get settled in for the night, the last thing he needed was to be blundering around these woods after dark. Moving swiftly, efficiently and with an economy of movement he first fed and watered his horse before he saw to his own slight needs, which were easily catered to by a fist sized lump of beef jerky, a round of hardtack and a few swallows of water from his canteen. About to put the remains, about half a pound, of the jerky back in his saddlebags he hesitated and with a self-deprecating shrug splashed across the stream and place the chunk of dried meat on a flat-topped rock.

Satisfied with his arrangements, he returned to his blankets, and using his saddle as a pillow and with his colt in hand settled himself to sleep.

He slept as experience had taught him, a succession of brief, shallow naps interspersed with periods when wide-awake he lay still and smiled and listened to the darkness, and checking that the bay was relaxed. His reaction therefore when he finally awoke to the moist greyness of pre dawn was chagrin as he looked across the creek to see that the lump of jerky had gone. 'Still, it could have been a critter,' he told himself, but the urge to check was too great. He splashed through the shallow water, looking for raccoon or even coyote tracks - anything bigger would have alarmed the gelding, and the horse's alarm would have awoken him, so he discounted any possibility of meeting wolf, lion or bear.

The track that he found belonged to neither raccoon nor coyote, but it was the same slim, barefoot track that he'd seen before, and this one was fresh, very fresh, the water still seeping into it. Rabb froze, once again feeling the overpowering sensation that he was being watched. Slowly straightening from his inspection of the track he said in a conversational tone, "You can come out now, I won't hurt you…"

He stood when he was maybe two or three minutes, until resigned to the fact that his unseen visitor was not going to reveal herself, he turned to recross the stream. As he did so, a flicker of movement caught the corner of his eye, and his heart leaped.

"I'm Lauren Singer, and I'm most glad you found me," she said simply.

Rabb turned his head slowly towards the voice, "I'm Davy Rabb, and I am most pleased to meet you, ma'am."

The woman nodded, "Thank you for the fish and the meat, it was most welcome. I prayed to the Lord for help, and it seems he sent you."

Rabb rasped a thumb on the stubble on his chin and gave a self-deprecating shrug, "I never figured myself as some kinda heavenly messenger, ma'am, but if you need my help, then you have it."

The woman nodded again, "Thank you, Mister Rabb," and raising her skirt just enough to prevent it dragging through the stream, she waded across and stood before him on the bank, looking up at him with unsettlingly pale eyes.

All at once Rabb felt his stomach lurch. It was physically impossible, he knew, but he was suddenly overwhelmed with the conviction that he had met this woman before. She was petite, her head barely topped his shoulder, slender, with faint, fair eyebrows in a delicate arch on a lightly tanned face. Her hair was covered in a once-white bonnet-cap, its strings hanging loose to trail over a similarly once-white bib apron that almost entirely covered her severely-cut plain, black woollen dress. The cuffs of the dress' long sleeves and the hems of the skirt and apron were ragged, and the elbow of the right sleeve was almost worn through. The style of dress rang an almost forgotten bell, but it was more than that, there was something about this woman's face, figure and yes, even her voice and way of talking that was so, so familiar...

"Ma'am, I don't know what the…uh… I don't know what it is you're doing out here, or how you come to be out here, but I'll do my best to get you safe and sound back to where there's some decent folks. But for the moment, there's a passel of Utes, who may or may not be friendly, less'n two miles from here. Now, I figured on going to take me a look-see and see whether I can figure out iffen they're staying put, or if this was just an overnight camp for them. It'd be best I reckon, if you stay here with the horse, and I'll be back in mebbeso twenty minutes. Once I figured out what them 'uns are a-fixing to do, then we can make us our own plans for getting out here."

A cautious approach to the edge of the straggling woods brought Rabb back to within sight of the Indian village. To his disgust he could see through his field glasses that the women of the village were setting out the drying frames for hides and meat, an indication that this was indeed more than just an overnight encampment. Muttering a vicious curse under his breath he retreated once more to the stream, and as he did so he thought he'd solved the mystery of the Singer woman's familiarity.

Fourteen years ago he had been a Lieutenant of the fourteenth Pennsylvania cavalry, part of Powell's cavalry division during the phase of the Shenandoah Valley campaign known as The Burning, part of Sheridan's policy of depriving the rebel forces of food, clothing, equipment and shelter. On one occasion his troop had just torched a small farm, driving off a couple of horses that were any good and half a dozen head of cattle. The rest of the livestock lay slaughtered in and around the burning barns, themselves surrounded by the burning crops in the fields. It was a foul job for soldiers to do, and every time he gave the orders Rabb felt heartsick and it seemed to him that the smell of burning would never completely leave him. On this occasion as he gave the order to mount his eye fell on the woman of the house, tears of rage in her pale blue eyes, and a small child on her hip.

"You Yankee son of a bitch!" she hissed at him as he urged his horse forward, "You could have taken what you needed, and left me and my child with something! But you've taken everything, and here is one more thing you can take, you can take my curse, because if there is a God in heaven, you will never lie in an easy grave!"

Rabb's troop sergeant had cursed the "Secesh Bitch" and it looked for a moment as if he was about to ride down the woman and child until Rabb ordered him back into line. Barely able to meet the woman's furious and scornful gaze, he had given the order of the troop to move on out.

With that memory fresh in his mind, and made uneasy by a guilty conscience he made his way back to his overnight camp-site, where he found Lauren Singer sitting placidly on a fallen tree trunk, her hands neatly folded in her lap.

Rabb hunkered down facing her, examining her more carefully in the growing daylight. He found it impossible to judge her age with any degree of accuracy, as far as he was concerned she could be anywhere between her mid-20s and her mid-30s.

There was only one way to satisfy his curiosity, and he wasn't sure what answer to his question he wanted to hear. He hesitated slightly before he spoke, "Ma'am, do you hail from, or have you ever lived in the Shenandoah Valley?"

She shook her head and allowed a half smile on her face, "No Mister Rabb, I have never been to that place in my life. I was born, raised and married in Lancaster County, of Pennsylvania. That's in the Susquehanna Valley, a long way from the Shenandoah."

Rabb felt a weight lift from his heart, although he was still puzzled by the sense of familiarity he was getting from this woman. "I know Lancaster County, ma'am, my family's from further up-state."

"Then you too are a long way from home Mister Rabb."

"It might seem that way ma'am, but I got a bad case of itching feet, the farm goes to my eldest brother, and out here a man can breathe, and there ain't no man-made fussing rules to abide to." Rabb paused for a minute, "Now to my mind that just about accounts for me being here, but how come you're here, and all alone?"

The look of sadness settled on her face, "I was with my husband, we were headed for the goldfields in Denver. We set up camp one night, and some Indians came, my husband stood up to greet them, and they shot him with arrows, he yelled for me to run, and I ran off. The Indians took our horses, killed our oxen and burned our outfit. They looked for me in the darkness, but I hid and they left."

Rabb nodded, it wasn't an unusual story, but there are a couple of things he didn't quite understand. "You and your husband were travelling alone, you weren't part of an emigrant train?"

Lauren Singer nodded, "We were. We joined the train at Saint Louis, but it was filled with rough, ungodly men, and although my husband remonstrated with them, he could not prevail upon them to cease their drinking, fighting, cursing and blasphemy, and then when… their behaviour became less restrained, he feared for my honour, and we left the train…"

Rabb nodded, he could easily envisage a situation whereby a married couple would feel extremely uneasy travelling with a group of gold-fever struck would-be miners. But there was still another aspect of her story that made him feel uneasy, "Ma'am, you say when the Indians approached your camp your husband went to greet them, why didn't he take cover and warn them off with his rifle?"

The woman shook her head and gave him a pitying smile, "We are peaceable people, Mister Rabb, we do not believe in violence, we didn't carry any guns."

Rabb was stunned into silence and all he could do was stare at her in disbelief for a long minute, "You set out, just the two of you, through hostile country without a single weapon?"

"We trusted in the Lord, Mister Rabb stop and although it grieved me that the Lord saw fit to take my man from me, it is not for us to question Him. By His grace, I was saved. And also by His grace you have been sent to guide me out of here."

She spoke with such certainty that Rabb immediately saw the futility of arguing with her, the truth be known, he admitted wryly to himself, he had no notion of how to argue in the face of such faith.

"Well, getting us out of here ain't gonna be quite as simple as I'd hoped. I need to head West, and I was hoping to use the Rabbit Ears pass, but them Utes have gotten plumb between us and the pass, and too near the pass to be able to get round them. We can follow the stream down around to the East for a day, and strike North, and then turn West and aim for Fort Morgan on the old Overland trail. Should take us six, maybe seven days..."

"If it is to take us so long, then had we not best make a start, Mister Rabb?"

Rabb pulled himself to his feet, "Yep, we need to do just that..."

During the eight days it took to reach Fort Morgan, Rabb came to realise that he'd never had a more restful travelling companion. Lauren Singer was quiet, self-contained, and perfectly content to walk or ride for hours in silence, yet was instantly ready to smile and converse whenever Rabb felt the need.

For most of the journey she perched high on the big gelding's back, almost in a side saddle style with one knee crooked around the saddle horn while her other foot rested in the very much shortened stirrup. Rabb, who had perforce walked most of the way had rarely been so glad he was wearing flat, Navajo style calf length moccasins instead of the high heeled Western boots most of his contemporaries wore.

Each evening he teased a little more of Lauren Singer's history from her. She'd been hiding in the woods where he found her for nearly two weeks surviving on wild salads, roots and fish. In answer to his query as to how she caught the fish she looked at him in wide-eyed surprise, "Why, the same way you catch fish, with soap root."

Rabb had looked at her in surprise, "How… How come you know about soap root?" he asked.

She laughed, "Mister Rabb, soap root isn't totally unknown in the Susquehanna!"

Rabb felt his ears and then his face burn, "No, ma'am," he grinned sheepishly.

It was the fourth night of their journey, Rabb had seen signs of jackrabbits, and had gone out to set snares. He'd shot a white-and tailed deer two days before, but they hadn't been able to spend time curing the meat. What they hadn't already consumed was beginning to turn rancid, so fresh meat, even jackrabbit was more than just welcome.

He returned to the fire, moving, as was his habit on silent feet, just as Lauren had finished turning the two still just about edible venison steaks, and as he drew near he could hear her singing to herself in a low voice,

"Muss i' denn, muss i' denn
zum Städtele hinaus, Städtele hinaus,
Und du, mein Schatz, bleibst hier?
Wenn i' komm', wenn i' komm..."

Suddenly all the clues to which he'd been so blind over the last few days fell into place. Softly calling out so as not to startle her he walked up to the fire, squatted down and poured himself a mug of coffee. "That was German, wasn't it?" he asked.

"Ja... uh... Yes, sorry, yes it was German."

"German-speaking, from Lancaster County, peaceable folk." he said ruefully, and then injecting a note inquiry into his voice, "Mennonite?"

"Yes. Mennonite." she agreed.

"Uh-huh... When we get to Fort Morgan, what will you do?"

"I'll find work, save enough for my stage fare and go home to Lancaster County."

"You wouldn't consider staying out here?"

She shook her head, "No, that's not possible. There is no community out here, I couldn't stay as an unmarried woman."

"Why not? You're an attractive woman Lauren Singer, and women of any sort are scarce out here. You wouldn't have any problem in finding a husband."

Again she shook her head, "I couldn't marry out, I couldn't become English."

Rabb heard the note of finality in her voice, and once again recognised the futility of arguing against it.

Four days later, he led the bay gelding through the gates of Fort Morgan, and reported to the commanding officer. Lauren Singer he handed into the care of Colonel Forbes' wife. The next morning with barely a backward glance, his supplies replenished, he rode out through the Fort gates.

It was six months before he returned to Fort Morgan. Lauren Singer had closed her eatery some ten days before his return and had taken the stage back towards Kansas City and points east.

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

It had taken Harm and Loren three days first to try to persuade a reluctant Corporal Woods to testify against the Marine accused of the attempted rape, and then when Woods went UA to track him down, only to find that the last-minute that he was in custody of the US marshals witness protection program, and was afraid to testify for fear that he would be recognised by members of his old gang, who would then take revenge on his widowed mother.

It was Loren who had seized on his fears for his mother, and parleying them into the fear that every woman in Norfolk would feel if the attacker was not convicted, and it was Corporal Woods' testimony that would clinch the prosecution's case. Without that the case boiled down to a 'he said, she said,' scenario, which would probably create a reasonable doubt in the panel's mind would result in a potential rapist walking free.

Loren's simple argument got through to the tall Marine where all Harm's impassioned arguments had fallen upon stony ground.

Once Woods' deposition had been taken Harm and Lauren assured him, with the help of the US marshals, that his mother would be safe, and he once the court-martial was over, would be transferred to a different Marine unit, and with a new identity.

That, had been another sticking point as far as Woods was concerned, he had turned his juvenile life around and had become a good Marine, one who his company Commander pointed out, was on the list for the next round of promotions to E5.

And once again, it had been Loren who had tentatively suggested to Woods' battalion Commander that he was too good a Marine to lose, and that surely something could be sorted out to the mutual benefit of the Marine and of the Corps.

Harm gave full credit to Lieutenant Singer in his report to Admiral Chegwidden, and it was noticeable to the fury of Lieutenant-Colonel Mackenzie and the chagrin of Lieutenant Sims that in the aftermath of their investigation in Norfolk, that Commander Rabb seemed to be taking an interest in the unpopular lieutenants' career, quietly offering suggestions as to the course she should take in some cases, and was always there with a "well done" if she won, or a sympathetic, "next time," when she lost. What wasn't generally known was that after each case, win or lose, the Commander would invite the Lieutenant to a working dinner, where he would conduct an autopsy into each case, gradually honing her skills, and gradually getting to know the prickly young woman better.

On one such occasion, he had asked casually where she came from. She paused, a fork full of creamy vegetable fettuccine halfway between plate and mouth, "My family is from Berlin, Holmes County, Ohio..." she replied.

Once again Harm felt as if he'd been gut-punched, "Isn't… Isn't that Amish country?"

Loren nodded again and managed a wry grin, "At last my awful secret is out. Yes, my family is Amish, but I'm not. I had my reasons, not that I want to go into them, but I went English after my Rumschpringe, and left the community. I went to college through ROTC to help with fees, took my LSATs, went on to law school, graduated NJS and three tours down the line here I am."

"Where did you go to law school?" Harm asked, more for the sake of something coherent to say, as another piece of real life seemed to corroborate his dream life.

Loren blushed and mumbled something around her mouthful of pasta.

"What did you say?" Harm asked.

She swallowed hastily and took a rather generous sip of wine before she glared at him almost defiantly across the dining table, "Harvard."

Harm looked at her almost blankly for a few seconds and then grinned, raising his own glass in an admiring salute, "Well, that's put me firmly in my place!"

Loren stared at him suspiciously for a moment, then said, "Yeah, I guess it did." And her own smile, a very attractive smile, Harm noted, not for the first time, spread across her face.

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

"Unh!" The grunt was forced out of his lungs as his parachute filled and abruptly arrested his fall. Looking up, he grasped the risers and checked the canopy, everything in order... now only a few seconds to look around, yes, there were some of the other 'chutes from his stick, now... where was he going to land...? What the fuck? Below his boots he could see the reflection of moonlight off water. Water? There wasn't supposed to be any fucking water within miles... The tracer rising from the ground wasn't too surprising, the battalion had been briefed that they would likely have a contested DZ, but there was a hell of a lot more fire than he'd anticipated... and that was a town for Chrissakes! There wasn't supposed to be a town anywhere near the DZ – and it was on fire! Even as he watched, the fire lit up a 'chute drifting down into its heart and he had to fight down a surge of nausea as the 'chute delivered its occupant straight into the centre of the inferno. Blessedly, there was a burst of bright light as the explosives the paratrooper carried were ignited by the flames, killing him instantly, saving him from the agony and terror of the flames.

So... the choices seemed to be landing in the middle of an inferno, or landing in water. Water that he had no means of knowing just how deep it was... but there was a triangular spit of darkness, leading away from both fire and water. Desperately tugging on his risers, he kicked and swung trying to spill air from his canopy, to try and bring himself down in that blessed darkness.

It was too late to take any sort of evasive action however when he saw that he was heading straight for a greenhouse in the backyard of a row house. Gritting his teeth and hoping that he wouldn't be too badly cut up, he tugged on the piggin string that secured his musette bag to his leg and felt it drop to the end of its twenty foot rope. The sound of shattering glass rewarded his efforts and less than a second later he found himself enveloped in rigging lines, silk, glass shards and crushed vegetables, as he bounced awkwardly through the remains of the greenhouse's roof.

Hastily disentangling himself from the wreckage, he drew his M1911 Colt .45 Auto from its holster and carefully tugged open the door of the now ruined greenhouse, just as someone else tugged open the back door to the house.

He spun on his heel, his heart pounding as he raised his pistol to point it at a ghostly figure, and in the reflected glow of the fire, he could make out a white clad figure, a thick rope of blonde hair twisted into a plait hanging over the shoulder of her white night dress.

"C'est l'invasion?" the figure whispered.[1]

A woman, and by her voice, a young woman. He licked his dry lips.

"Oui, Madame, c'est l'invasion, je suis Américain!"[2]

She nodded, evidently having understood his meaning, "Mais, vous êtes seul? Alors, Prenez garde, la ville est plein des boches!"[3]

She nodded in the direction of the town centre, turning as she did so that the reflected glare of the fire lit her features. Rabb's heart leaped, and although he knew he had never seen this Frenchwoman before, he felt a spark of recognition. But even as he watched, her face took on an expression of concerned dismay, "M'sieur, venez, vite!"[4] she hissed, at the same time throwing open wide the door to her house and making a sweeping come here motion with her arm.

For a moment Rabb hesitated and then his ears too caught the sound she'd heard, the sound of hobnailed boots on cobblestones.

Squeezing past her through the doorway, he found himself in a large kitchen, dominated by a massive wooden table, but before he had more than a second or two to take in his surroundings he was being led towards the window next to the door and the blonde was making gestures indicating he should crouch down below the level of the window, from where he could hear the German troops exclaiming over the sight of the remains of his parachute still entangled in the ruins of the greenhouse.

"Restez ici, je vais aller parler avec les Boches!"[5] she hissed as there came a hammering on the back door, and then held a finger to her lips in the universal gesture for silence.

"Woher kommt dieses Fallschirm?"[6]

"Je ne sais pas, M'sieur... Il y avait un soldat...Il est tombé du ciel, et puis quand il a atterri sur le terrain, il s'enfuit - dans ce sens! Then seeing the look of incomprehension on the soldier's face she tried again in German,"Uh...Ich weiß es nicht. Es war ein Soldat. Er fiel vom Himmel, und als er landete lief er weg - in dieses Richtung. Schauen Sie sich mein Gewächshaus! "[7]

She stammered slightly over the German pronunciation, but it seemed that she made herself understood to the German NCO, who gave her a hard stare and then grunted, "Komm, Kerels!" and led his men out of the back yard and into the alley than ran down behind the row of house.

Rabb, eased the safety catch back on to his pistol, not that he had been aware of thumbing it off, and cautiously stood, taking care to stay to one side of the window, "Vous êtes une très brave femme, merci, madame!"[8] he said, but before he could say more, a sleepy, piping voice came from the door leading to the other parts of the house.

"Maman, qu'est-ce qu'il se passe?"[9]

In a blur of white, the woman rushed past Rabb, and scooped the child, who seemed to Rabb to be two to three years old, off the floor, "Tout va bien, ma belle! Tout va bien!" and then she turned to Rabb, "C'est est ma fille!"[11] she said almost defiantly.

Rabb relaxed, "D'accord... mais... mais... votre mari?"[12] he asked, somehow disturbed that the man of the house hadn't come to investigate the disturbance.

She gave a fatalistic Gallic shrug, "Il est mort." she said emotionlessly, "Tué par les Boches!"[13]

There was something so desolate in the way she spoke that Rabb felt a tug on his heartstrings, without thinking he took two swift steps across the kitchen, halting just in front of her. With a strong but gentle forefinger he raised her face, and bending his head planted a gentle kiss on her forehead.

She looked up at him thunderstruck, almost if it had been a poll axe and not his lips that he had used.

"Je dois partir, ma chère," he whispered, "Mais je vais revenir!"[14] and pistol once more in hand, he slipped out of the door and across the backyard, back to the war.

He didn't come back until June the next year; smart in his class A uniform, his overseas cap bearing the Paratroopers badge and his boots spit shone to a high gleam.

He looked around eagerly, trying to get his bearings. Yes, there was the square with the church at one end, and the burned-out ruins of the Hotel de Ville at the other. So… that side street over there should lead him to the alley that ran behind her backyard.

He parked his Jeep and climbed out of it, stamping his feet to settle the trouser blousing over his jump boots, and crossing the square he strode down the street and into the alley. And stopped. Where the stone-built row houses had been was a huge crater, already overgrown with grass, moss and weeds.

He tried to tell himself that it was probable that she and her daughter hadn't been in the house when it was destroyed, but a sick feeling in his stomach told him that he was only trying to fool himself.

Returning to his Jeep, he garnered a few curious looks from the inhabitants of the place, and for some reason he felt his anger growing. Hundreds of his paratrooper brothers had died or been maimed for life in making this the first town in Nazi-occupied Europe to be liberated. He hadn't expected to be mobbed as he and his comrades had been at Njimegen, but the indifference he encountered here was unsettling.

Shaking his head he approached one of the passers-by, "Pardonnez-moi monsieur, où puis-je trouver Monsieur le Maire?"[15]

The Frenchman looked surprised at being accosted and then shrugged, "Dans la Boulangerie, peut être!" indicating one of a row of shops that lined one side of the square.

"Merci, M'sieur!" Rabb's long legs carried him swiftly across the square to the shops, and stepping inside the butcher's he saw three men, none of who seemed to be buying and selling.

"Je cherche le maire!" he said without preamble.

The butcher, a man in his fifties raised an eyebrow at this unceremonious demand, and taking in Rabb's uniform, he said in heavily accented but understandable English, "I am le maire, m'sieur le Capitaine; 'ow may I 'elp you?"

"I... I was here last year... when we landed... and I met a young woman..."

"Ah... so many of your young men did," the mayor smiled.

Rabb shook his head, "No, this was different, she was a widow... une veuve... she had a little girl, une petite fille, maybe two or three years old. She was young, blonde. She lived in a house off that street over there" he indicated the direction with a backward stab of his thumb "... but the house has gone..."

The smiles at his enthusiasm disappeared as he explained and the three Frenchmen exchanged solemn looks, "I am so sorry, m'sieur, this woman, she meant much to you?"

"I don't know... we only spoke for ten minutes, and there were Germans all over the place..."

The mayor shook his head, his voice gentle, "Hélas, m'sieur, c'était la guerre.[16] There was a... combat entre avions[17]... one of them fell from the sky and landed on the houses, there was a fire and an explosion... nobody got out..." his voice trailed off as he saw the distress on Rabb's face.

"Perhaps M'sieur le Capitaine would wish to pay his respects..."

Rabb let himself be led out of the shop to the churchyard across the square until he was stopped in front of a plain marker which bore only a cross and the legend, 'Lorraine Chanteuse, 5 Avril 1921 – 17 Juin 1944. et sa fille, Mathilde Chanteuse, 13 Fevrier 1941 – 17 Juin 1944'.

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

Harm gasped and bolted upright in bed, his body soaked in sweat and tears running down his face. 'It was only a dream!' He told himself furiously, 'Just like the others! I've never been a woods runner, a mountain man or an army scout. And I certainly haven't been a paratrooper, and I didn't land in Normandy on D-Day! But where the hell are these dreams coming from? And why are they so damned vivid! And why the hell is it always the same damn woman – Lieutenant Goddamned Singer!'

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

All day Harm had been wrestling with himself. It was getting so that he was almost reluctant to close his eyes at night. It wouldn't have been so bad, he tried to kid himself, if in his dreams he could at least have got the girl, but each time, husband, war, or fate intervened. Hell, as far as romance was concerned, his dream life was getting as bad as his real life!

Securing his office, his briefcase in hand and his cover tucked under his arm he headed the double doors on the far side of the bullpen that led to the hallway which in turn led to the elevator. He was three quarters of the way across the bullpen when he realised that the light was still on in the end office. Altering course he angled across the bullpen to that office door, stopping and tapping gently on the door-frame once he had reached it.

Lieutenant Singer looked up from her computers' monitor, "Sir?"

For some reason or other Harm's perfectly fitting shirt collar suddenly seemed too tight. Resisting the temptation to ease it with a finger, he swallowed nervously, "Lieutenant, I need to speak with you."

Taken slightly aback by his attitude, far more serious than he'd recently been with her, Loren frantically searched her memory for any sins of omission or commission, but came up blank, "Sir?" She repeated with a worried frown on her face.

Harm read her frown, and managed what he hoped was a reassuring grin, as he replied, "Relax, you haven't done anything wrong, but it's not the sort of conversation I want to have here. Unless you have any other plans for this evening, could you make it to my place for nineteen thirty hours? I'll cook, and I might even be able to find a bottle of drinkable wine?"

"Are… Are you inviting me to dinner? Like… Like a date?" A suddenly flustered Loren blurted out.

"Good God no! Certainly not…" Harm started to reply, and then it was if he just received a slap around the back of his head, "Um... Belay that, yes, yes, I suppose I am inviting you to dinner, like on a date."

"Oh… In that case…" Lauren was about to decline the invitation, and was preparing to cite the fraternisation regulations as her reason for doing so, but to her stunned amazement she heard her own voice say, "yes, thank you, I'd love to have dinner with you…"

She arrived at the loft promptly at nineteen twenty-nine hours, dressed in one of her favourite pale blue blouses, and a simple charcoal grey skirt, with just a touch of make up, and with her freshly washed and conditioned hair, loosened from its workaday bun, cascading in golden waves to her shoulders.

It took nearly the whole course of dinner for the impact her appearance had made on Harm to resolve itself, and although he was burning to have the talk with her the best he could manage while they ate was light inconsequential chat. It wasn't until he conducted her from the kitchen/dining area to the lounge and had provided them both with coffee and a slice of tiramisu - "bought in, I'm sorry," he confessed - that he broached the subject that had been preoccupying him.

"Loren, you said a while ago that you had a five or six times great-grandmother who was married to a fur trader, and went to the mountain men's Rendezvous for a few years. Was her first name Laura?"

Loren's eyes flew open to their widest, "Have... have you been checking up on me?" she said in some alarm.

Harm shook his head, "No, nothing like that, on my word. Please bear with me just another couple of minutes and then I'll explain everything… Or at least try and explain everything, I give you my word that what I tell you is true, so there is either something very, very strange going on, or I'm headed for a padded cell."

Loren picked up her temporarily discarded plate, "Go on, then," she said doubtfully.

"I had an ancestor called Jacob Rabb, who had a partner, Bart Roberts. They were mountain men, and they knew Laura Singer. Jacob was in a fair way to falling in love with Laura, but she was married."

Loren put her plate back on the occasional table, "That is so weird!" she exclaimed.

"It gets even weirder," Harm said almost mournfully, "Jacob married twice, his first marriage was to a Lakota girl. They weren't married long; family legend has it that she died less than a year after they married. After that Jacob came back to Pennsylvania where he married again, this time he had two sons, Harmon and David. When the civil war broke out Harmon stayed on the farm with Jacob, but David enlisted, and fought through the war, finishing as a Captain in one of the state cavalry regiments. After the war he moved out West, and took on as a scout for the Army. On one of his scouts he met a woman, her husband had just been killed by Indians and he escorted her to safety. Turned out that she was Amish, she'd had enough of the frontier, so she went back East." Harm looked at Loren straight in the eye, "Her name was Lauren Singer."

Loren looked at him blankly, "But... but that was the name of Laura Singer's daughter in law…"

Harm took a deep breath, "It goes back further even than that, right back to the days of the French and Indian War. Eli Rabb was the wild Rabb of his generation. Seems every time there's more than one male Rabb there's one of them just can't settle down, and Eli apparently was a woodsman, with all that entails, you know, all the 'Last of the Mohicans' stuff. Anyway, some of the tribes allied with the French and they raided Pennsylvania pretty well. During one raid they took a white woman prisoner, and Eli came across them and rescued her. Her name was Laurel Singer."

Loren's hands were now tightly gripped together, and she shook her head "This is so freaking weird, if you hadn't given me your word, just about now I'd be accusing you of lying!"

Harm nodded his head miserably, "It gets worse," he admitted before he asked her, "do you know if you have a French branch to your family?"

Loren shook her head, "Oh, no..." then she took a deep breath and braced her shoulders, "Yes, we did, for a short time. Great great uncle Philip ran away to France in nineteen fourteen, and joined the French Foreign Legion. He fought all but the first couple of months of WW One in France, then after the war he settled in Normandy..."

"Where he had a daughter, Lorraine." Harm finished for her, "in June nineteen forty-four she met an American paratrooper, Daniel Rabb. He promised he'd come back for her, and her daughter. When the war finished he did, he went back to Normandy only to find she'd been killed about ten days after he left her."

Loren's blue eyes were now filled with tears, "We never knew what happened to Philip, now at least I know." She shook her head once more, "But it is so strange, that you know all this, and then our two families seem to have crossed one another's paths so many times over the years…"

Harm smiled grimly, "That's not the weirdest part. Firstly, all the Singer women I've mentioned look just like you, or you look just like them. Secondly, until about two months ago, until I met you, I didn't know any of this."

"Then… Then you have been checking up on me?" Loren stammered.

"No, no I haven't. And this, this is going to be the hardest of everything to believe; I dreamed it all."

"You… You… You dreamed it?" Loren demanded incredulously.

"Yeah," Harm admitted sheepishly. "I know it sounds totally unbelievable, and the only reason I can think of is that somewhere somehow, we were fated to meet. How else would I have felt, before I even had the first dream that not only did I know you from somewhere, but that I was also attracted to you?"

"Maybe because of that O'Hara woman you said I reminded you of?" Loren suggested.

Harm shook his head, "No that's not it, there was always an edge with Meghan, I didn't know her very long before she... died, but if there was a spark it had an edge to it. I never felt at peace in her company as I do in yours."

Loren nodded, was about to say something, and then something Harm had said resounded loud in her ears, "Just hold up there a minute, Mister… Did you just say you were attracted to me?"

Harm nodded, "I did."

"Yes, I thought you did… And… I'm glad."

"You are?" Almost totally stunned Harm managed to reply.

Loren blushed, and could only meet Harm's eyes with great difficulty, "Yes, I am, and I'm also very relieved that it's not a one-way street…"

"Not a one-way street? Do you mean that you… I mean me… I mean you and me?" Harm stammered his courtroom honed eloquence entirely deserting him.

Loren's blush deepened, "We don't seem to stand much of a chance, do we? I mean in two hundred years this is the fourth or fifth time a Rabb male and a Singer female have found each other, this time there are no husbands, no wives, no wars in the way… Who are we to say 'no' to fate?"

"So, are you willing to see if there's more than just dreams between us?"

Loren blushed again. "Yes, yes I'm willing!"

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

Three months later Loren and Harm exited the Admiral's office, broad grins on their faces and the Rabb family engagement ring on the third finger of Loren's left hand.

Two months after that Lieutenant Loren Singer took up her new post as Legal Aide to the Director ONI at the Pentagon.

Six months after that Rear Admiral (Upper Half) A J Chegwidden lent Lieutenant Loren Singer his arm as he walked her down the aisle of the little Episcopalian chapel in Falls Church, to give her in marriage to Commander Harmon Rabb, and the only person in the chapel who didn't have a smile on her face was Lieutenant Colonel Sarah Brumby.

Fourteen months after that Loren Rabb lay back in her hospital bed against the pillows and smiled indulgently at her husband as he sat on the bedside chair thoroughly absorbed in his one hour old daughter, Laura Patricia Rabb.

The End

xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

Translations

[1] Is it the invasion?

[2] Yes, ma'am. It's the invasion. I'm American.

[3] But you are alone! Be careful, the town is full of the Boche!

[4] M'sieur, come, quickly!

[5] Stay here, I'll go talk to the Boches!

[6] Where did this parachute come from?

[7] I don't know, M'sieur... there was a soldier, he fell from the sky and then when he landed on the ground he ran away – in that direction! Just look at my greenhouse!"

[8] You are a very brave woman, thank you, ma'am!"

[9] Mommy, what's happening?

[10] It's all right, my pretty, it's all right!

[11] She's my daughter!

[12] OK... but... but... your husband?

[13] He's dead. Killed by the Boches.

[14] I must go, my dear, but I'll come back.

[15] Excuse me. Sir. Where can I find the mayor?

[16] Alas, m'sieur, it was the war.

[17] A dogfight.