Splinters
Chapter 4
Garrison sat at his desk and looked at the piles of paperwork in front of him. He idly doodled on the top of the paper he was taking notes on. Sometimes analyzing raw intelligence was interesting. This wasn't one of those times. It didn't help matters any this was the first nice warm day of the year. His shirtsleeves were rolled up his forearms and the top two buttons of his shirt were open. A gentle spring breeze blew through the open window at his back, ruffling the curtain behind the tied back blackout drape. It was much more entertaining listening to his men in the yard below the window.
"Hey, Terry's workin' tonight. How 'bout we sneak in to the Fox?"
There was a 'thunking' sound for a bit, followed by a "Blimey".
"And how do you propose we do this?"
"Sneak out the window and borrow the Packard," was the pat reply.
"Merde." It was said with resigned disgust.
"It ain't like we never done it before."
There was another thunk, followed by another British curse before the cultured voice continued. "Casino, your bad ideas are surpassed only by your bad grammar."
"Yeah, well, if you're gonna get insultin' about it, you can just stay here."
"Someone must be along to try to keep you out of the stockade."
"I can keep myself outta the stockade without your help," the safecracker retorted.
"Sure, Casino."
"Hey!" said a fourth voice. "You gonna sit and argue or throw that baseball."
"Keep your shorts on, Geronimo," growled Casino.
The conversations ceased and the only sounds were the 'thunking' and a higher pitched slapping sound. Garrison grinned and shook his head. He wondered if he should warn his sister, but decided she could find out about her predicted patrons the hard way. At least she was usually successful at keeping them out of too much trouble.
As though conjured up by his thoughts, Terry wandered into his office and sprawled into the chair next to his desk. She eyed the pile of papers that didn't appear to have diminished any. Loud male voices carried in through the open window in opposition to the clean scent of spring.
"How can you work with that racket?" she asked.
"Oh, I like listening to that racket," said Craig with a sly grin. "They don't know the acoustics are so good up here. I learn a lot listening to them when they don't know I can hear them."
"Sneaky," chuckled Terry.
Two voices grew louder. Goniff was teasing and baiting and calling someone names. There was also the 'thunking' sound. As the voices got closed, a loud, indignant one protested the way Goniff was playing. The voice had an Italian accent, a little higher pitch than normal and was followed by a string of Italian expletives.
Terry sat up straighter and shot a surprised look at Garrison. "That's not Casino, that's Actor!"
Craig grinned broadly. "Go look. You won't believe it."
Terry got up and went to stand behind the drapes, pulling one of the curtains back a little to look out over the sprawling back lawn. Goniff was jumping about teasing and egging his opponent on. The sight that caught Terry's attention was the totally undignified Actor. He was bouncing a soccer ball off his knees and feet. The man's hair was in disarray, his shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows and the front unbuttoned halfway down. The white shirt was wrinkled and dirty, as was Goniff's. Terry watched as Actor bounced the ball into the air and hit it with the top of his head, sending it flying over Goniff.
"Bloody 'ell, Actor!" yelled Goniff, running to chase down the ball. The Italian laughed heartily after him.
Terry pulled back into the room, turning to her amused brother with a look of surprise on her face. "I don't believe it."
"Told you," said Garrison. "They were driving me nuts with their whining about how bored they were, so I requisitioned some baseballs and footballs. I figured it would give them exercise too; maybe wear them out a little bit. Goniff wanted a soccer ball, so I got one. Come to find out, Actor's absolutely passionate about soccer."
Terry took her seat back. "I didn't think that man was passionate about anything except sexy women."
"He gets a little drooly over antiques too."
The game was still going on when Terry walked a wide berth around them to try to find more gardening tools in the abandoned stable. As she skirted around dusty debris and ducked under dangling cobwebs, she listened with amusement to the yelling and shouts of the men. Chief and Casino had joined in the game, neither of them knowing how to play. She found a shovel, a hoe, a rake and a cultivator in the corner of a stall and loaded them across her arms.
She was partway across the lawn, again skirting the game, when she heard Goniff urgently yell her name. Terry looked up in time to see the soccer ball making a rapid decent towards her. Gripping her tools tightly, she gave a hop to hit the ball with the top of her head like she thought the men had been doing. The tools dropped from her arms and her hands flew to the top of her head as pain exploded. She held her head tightly, her loud moan accompanied by the even louder male laughter.
Laughing heartily, Actor trotted up to the girl, followed more slowly by the other three men. He clasped her shoulders and pulled her to him.
"Come here, Little One," he chuckled.
Terry found herself leaning her forehead against his damp chest, surprised when he pulled her hands away and kissed the tender spot.
"That is supposed to make it better, I am told," he continued to laugh.
"You're not my mother," retorted Terry.
"I most certainly hope not," chortled Actor.
Casino had heard that exchange on his approach and could not resist slinging one back at the con man. "If he was he'd be the ugliest mother . . ."
"Casino!" two voices spoke together, the higher pitched one in outrage and the deeper one in warning.
The safecracker grinned and leaned a forearm on Goniff's shoulder.
"She all right?" yelled Garrison from the window of his office.
"Yes, Warden," Actor called back.
"I don't know how you do that," lamented Terry, straightening and rubbing the top of her head again.
"We grew up doin' it, didn't we Actor?" chirped Goniff. "We started when we was kids."
"Beautiful was never a kid," declared Casino with a shake of his head.
"Probably true," Terry played along, "but he does have a hard head."
"Thank you, Cara," said Actor indignantly. "And I was trying to be solicitous to you."
"You was tryin' to solicit her?" teased the pickpocket.
"Goniff!"
Garrison shook his head and went back to his paperwork.
Terry worked in the garden for the next hour. The onion sets were doing nicely. She wished the box of seeds would arrive from Montana. It should be here soon. Terry couldn't wait to get the seeds in the ground and have fresh vegetables without having to fight for them at the farm market.
It was close to noon when she heard the ball games come to an end and the men's voices fade away. That meant it was time to get lunch ready for the group. Terry leaned her hoe against the chicken fence. A quick study of the clucking brood inside the enclosure brought a Cheshire cat smile to the girl's face. Soon now, very soon . . .
The lunch dishes had been cleared away when Terry entered the common room to pick up empty glasses and teacups before starting washing the dishes. The phone rang and Terry answered it before Craig could pick it up.
"Miss Garrison? This is 'Arry at the post office. You got some packages from the States here. They're too 'eavy to deliver."
"She sent them regular mail?" asked Terry rhetorically. "Okay, I'll come in and get them."
"Uh, Miss, you best be bringin' one o' the lads with you. They're 'eavy."
Terry smiled in amusement. How heavy could packets of seeds be? "Okay, thank you, Harry. I'll be by in a bit."
She hung up the phone and turned to the men sitting behind her. Casino looked bored. Chief was playing chess with himself. Goniff was playing solitaire, and Actor was in the library.
"Hey, Casino, want to come to town with me. The packages of seeds came to the post office. Harry seems to think I won't be able to pick them up."
"How many seeds did Cinder send you?" laughed Craig from his office.
"I don't know," replied Terry. "I just told her I was feeding at least six of us and to send what she could."
Casino tossed his cards on the table. "Yeah, I'll go with you, Babe. Come on."
G
Terry hit the horn a good blast as she pulled the jeep to a stop at the base of the steps to the mansion. She grinned at Casino's laughing face.
"Boy, the Warden's gonna love this one," chortled the safecracker.
"I can't wait to find out what she packed in them," said Terry.
They got out of the jeep and went to stand on either side of the boxes that were wedged crookedly into the back. Craig trotted down the steps first, curiosity written all over his face at the sight of the pile of boxes. Actor followed a bit more sedately, to be passed by Goniff with his usual bounce. Chief brought up the rear.
"What did your sister do?" asked Craig, scratching the back of his head.
"My sister?" laughed Terry. "She's your sister."
"Okay," said Craig with a sigh. "Take a box."
The five men each took a box and hefted it, starting back up the steps.
"I swear all these are as heavy as that water heater jet engine you made us lug all over France," grunted Casino to the Lieutenant.
"Naw, can't be, Mate," said Goniff. "Nothin' was a 'eavy as that piece of junk."
Terry followed them slowly up the steps. "I think I'm glad I missed that one," she said.
"You'd a loved it," said Casino. "Actor made a great corpse. Best acting job he's done."
"Thank you for that wonderful critique of my performance," said Actor sarcastically.
Craig couldn't resist the opportunity, knowing his sister would have to come out with something. "He made a good monk too."
"Monk?" asked Terry. "As in man of the cloth, chaste, abstinent . . . HIM?" She blurted out.
Actor's head turned sharply toward her in indignation, causing him to almost miss a step. It brought laughter from the others and a twinkling-eyed grin from Terry.
The boxes were wrestled into the house and set on the floor by the game table. Terry pulled up a chair and flicked her switchblade open to cut through the tape sealing the boxes shut. Craig pulled out a chair and sat to watch. Goniff was peering over Terry's shoulder. Chief sat at the table. Casino stood by Terry's right elbow. Even Actor could not contain his curiosity and was resting his arm on Garrison's shoulder, leaning forward to see into the first box.
The top layer of carefully folded newspaper was removed.
"The Cut Bank Press?" asked Craig hopefully.
"Yeah," answered Terry, looking for the date. "And it's only a month old." She tossed it to her brother, who placed it reverently on the table. Terry's eyes widened with surprised delight. "Oh, Cinder, you are an angel!" she exclaimed. "No wonder it's heavy. There are five pound bags of flour in here." She started pulling the bags out of the boxes and handing them to Casino who in turn handed them around to Garrison to put on the table. A large taped paper shopping bag contained the seeds for the garden, but there was more. "Peanut butter!" shrieked Terry, pulling out two jars of the treat.
"Peanut butter toast!" said Casino with uncharacteristic enthusiasm.
Terry kept digging. There were bags of dried beans and tomatoes and fruit. Two tins of real coffee got almost the same reaction as the peanut butter. Smaller bags contained herbs and spices that Terry had been sadly lacking. Another bag held last year's dried chili peppers. There were small tins of chocolate bars, a bottle of honey, and cakes of yeast. Another heavy bag was wrapped in a muslin dishtowel. Terry opened it and gave another shriek.
"Five pounds of sugar!"
"Can't be," said Craig. "Where would she get that much sugar?"
"I don't know," replied Terry. She handed her brother an envelope. "Here's a letter."
"That musta cost a fortune," remarked Casino, shaking his head at the pile of foodstuffs on the table.
"The postage alone would be terrible," added Actor.
Craig read the letter and chuckled. "Ma had her hand in this too. What have you been telling her about us?" he wanted to know. "And how did you get it past the censors?"
"I just said how difficult it is to feed five grown active men on what we get in rations and what I can get off the Black Market. I send the letters out through Chris and I write the ones to Ma in French or Italian. Why?"
Craig handed the letter to her. "She wants to be sure 'all the boys' are well fed."
"Well, this will help," said Terry.
Later that afternoon, Garrison was locked in his office with paperwork and Terry was tearing the kitchen apart, rearranging cabinet contents to accommodate the new supplies. Actor quietly called a conference around the upstairs game table. They all leaned in and listened quietly to the confidence man.
"Gentlemen, Mrs. Garrison and her daughter have been extraordinarily generous to us. I for one intend to write a letter to them expressing my appreciation of their generosity." His eyes swept the table with significance.
"So you think we should all write a letter to them?" asked Goniff.
"I think it would be the polite thing to do," said Actor.
The men all retired to their rooms and sat down at their desks with paper and writing instruments. For some the letter writing was easy; for others not quite so easy or downright difficult.
Actor rested his cigarette in the ashtray by his left hand. He contemplated the blank piece of fine linen writing paper in front of him and smiled. He recalled a much earlier conversation with the Lieutenant who had mentioned his mother spoke fluent Italian and French to the kids and Teresa had mentioned her letters to her mother were sometimes in Italian. With a fountain pen and in his flowery handwriting, he began: Gentili Signora Garrison e Signorina Cinder . . .
Casino looked at the blank piece of writing paper in front of him. Jeez, how did somebody go about writing to the Warden's mother? He wasn't any good at formal stuff. Well, what the heck, Mrs. Garrison was still a mother, so he would write to her like he wrote to his ma.
Goniff had the least trouble. He had automatically come to the conclusion he would write to Mrs. Garrison like he would his mum. Anyone who was the mother of the Warden and Terry and Chris had to be a nice lady.
Chief sat with a frown on his face. Reading and writing were not things he did well. Oh, it was getting better, what with Actor secretly teaching him, but what would Mrs. Garrison think of him? His handwriting was illegible, so he decided to print it. It took him five tries. Though his was the shortest letter written, it was the last one to be handed over to Actor to present to the Warden.
The next morning, Actor entered Garrison's office with a tidy bundle of sealed letters and presented them to the young officer. Craig took them with raised eyebrows.
"We would appreciate these being included in your next posting to your dear mother. That is if you do not object to our communicating with your mother and sister," said the con man. "However, I might suggest the post go out via Christine."
Both were aware Garrison was required by the army to read and censor all of the cons' mail before posting. Craig looked at the bundle in his hand and slowly picked up a manila envelope from his desk, slipping the letters, undisturbed, inside.
"I think that can be arranged," said Craig.
GGGGG
A month later, the front door opened and the tall blond woman hurried in from the cold, laying the stack of mail on the table beside the door before removing her damp stained Stetson and hanging it on the coat tree. She shrugged out of her heavy sheepskin-lined jacket, hanging it below the hat. Cinder picked up the mail and headed for the warmth of the kitchen. She sat down at the table and pushed the bills and other letters to one side, keeping the large stuffed envelope in front of her as a cup of steaming barley coffee was placed by her. Cinder pushed her blonde hair back and slit the top of the envelope with the buck knife that was strapped to her jean covered hip. It was raining again as usual for this time of the year in Montana. She was grateful for the excuse to sit by the warmth of the big AGA wood cook stove.
Josie Garrison, hair still dark, figure still slim in a shirtwaist striped dress, despite being the mother of six grown children, was just finishing cleaning her stove top. She looked forward to any missives from her children in Europe. She had long since given up trying to understand why her two youngest girls and teen-aged son had gone to a war zone, let along stayed there doing who knew what kind of dangerous work.
"A big one from England this time," remarked Cinder, taking a sip of coffee to warm her insides.
She dumped the envelope open end down, eyes widening in surprise at the number of letters that landed on the table. Cinder started laying the letters out separately, her attention drawn to four of them addressed to 'Mrs. Garrison and Cinder' in unfamiliar handwriting.
"Hey, Ma, look at this will you?" said the oldest Garrison girl.
Josie wiped her hands on her apron and sat down across the table corner from her daughter. Curiously, she picked up one of the letters and opened it. Her eyes went first to the signature.
"This one is from a 'Chief'." Said Josie was a smile. She read the letter slowly. The sentiment was polite and appreciative of the food and supplies sent to England, but the grammar, spelling and printing were those of a child or illiterate person. It was very curious.
"This one is signed 'Goniff'," said Cinder. "That a name or what is it?"
"I believe it is Yiddish for 'thief', dear," replied Josie.
Cinder looked up under raised eyebrows. "Craig's hoods?" she asked in disbelief.
"It would seem so," replied Josie in interest, picking up another letter.
Cinder read the one she had and had to grin. "This Goniff sounds like a cute bugger. He says he really likes the chocolate and peanut butter."
Josie chuckled softly. "I don't know a boy who doesn't like sweets."
"He writes funny," said Cinder. "Everything's got an extra 'u' in it." She held the letter out for her mother to see.
"That's British," said Josie. She opened the next letter and looked for the signature. "This is from 'Casino'."
"Don't these people have names?" asked Cinder skeptically.
"I don't know, dear. Maybe it's code. Craig is doing Special Forces. Maybe they don't use their real names."
The letter from Casino was very polite and nicely worded. The lack of education was not as blatant as the previous letter.
Cinder opened the last letter and stared at it. "Uh, Ma, I don't think these are 'boys'. You have to see the handwriting on this one. And it's in Italian."
That caught Josie's attention. She held her hand out eagerly. The only time she received letters in Italian was when Terry was writing something about Craig or the rare one received from her sister in Italy. The handwriting on the sheet of linen writing paper was script-like and flowing. As Josie read the formal Italian her mouth curled up in a smile of delight. The letter was longer than the others. This man started off thanking them for the precious packages and how much the contents were being enjoyed and would enhance their daily lives with the rationing in England. He went on to say what a dedicated and accomplished officer Lt. Garrison was. From there he mentioned what lovely young women Teresa and Christine were and for her to rest assured the men were all looking out for the safety and well-being of both when they were with them. He told her what a wonderful job she had done raising such fine children. He hoped she and her daughter were well and that sending so many wonderful food items had not inconvenienced them too much, but to rest assured their efforts were greatly appreciated.
"This one is definitely not a boy," said the older woman. "Very European . . . very well-educated. Your sister is not Terry, she is 'Teresa'." Josie gave the name the same Italian pronunciation the confidence man did. "And Chris is 'Christine'."
"What's this one's name?" asked Cinder, surprised at the animation on her mother's face.
"Actor," Josie replied. "He could be one, stage maybe, the way he uses his words. Or old world aristocracy," she mused. "His wording is eloquent and his handwriting is almost script."
"Can't be," Cinder shook her head, not buying it. "They're all hoods."
"Now, dear, just because they have broken the law does not necessarily mean they are not educated," admonished Josie.
It would be another month before a packet of letters arrived in England. Josie had written a note to each of the men, but the one to Actor was a little longer than the rest and in Italian. Terry and Craig kept curious eyes on the con man. He sat in his chair, puffing on his pipe and reading the missive with a smile on his face. After reading the letter, Actor looked up at the siblings.
"Your mother is a very gracious lady," he said.
"Yes, she is," agreed Garrison.
Craig went back in his office to read his letter and Terry followed him.
"Damn," said Craig quietly impressed, "he got to Ma too and she's never laid eyes on him."
Terry muffled a laugh. "That's Actor . . ."