Author's notes: Hi all! Thanks to all those readers who have stayed with me through this story, and as always, double thanks to the reviewers. Sorry these last chapters have been slow in coming, but the whole relocating thing has been very complex. Thanks for your patience!
Disclaimers: I don't own the Dukes or any of the main characters, nor, for that matter, the settings. I have now seen the original 'Hazzard Square,' however, so maybe this will make writing in-town scenes a little easier. I own half of Andy, but he was only a temporary resident of the town anyway. No car chases in this chapter, so I don't have to warn you not to do what I write, but never, ever, take a wrench to your cousin's neck...
Chapter 12 – This One's Gonna Be a Him
The following week, the family went up to the old still and removed the copper "worm" from the works, rendering it useless, should anyone stumble onto it. Then they camouflaged the rest of the site so that it was unlikely that it would ever be found, by mistake or on purpose. Jesse could not bring himself to destroy the tools of his lifelong trade, so aside from removing the worm, the still itself was left intact. The remaining bottles of 'shine were collected and squirreled around the farm for, as Jesse put it, medicinal purposes. The copper worm was stashed in the loft of the old barn at the back of the property.
That ceremonial act performed, the family began to stumble through their new way of life. Daisy continued to work at the Boar's Nest, but only upon her uncle's insistence. At first she wanted nothing to do with Boss Hogg, but the man who'd raised her reminded Daisy that forgiveness was an important part of being a Duke, and besides, the job was something she needed in orderto fulfill her independent nature. Eventually, the young woman swallowed some of her anger and went back to work, much to the pleasure of the clientele.
Using a large chunk of their 'shine savings, the family invested in some Hereford cows, most of which they intended to resell for a profit at the annual Harvest Fair. The others would be sold throughout the winter, or if worse came to worst, used to feed the Dukes themselves. The Duke patriarch reminded himself that this was a one time investment only; they were not becoming cattle ranchers, just buying themselves a year until the next spring's planting, when they would put in new crops that had a greater value than corn on the open market.
Once the new fences had been built, the cattle had been settled and the altered routine of running a different kind of farm had been established, the boys involved themselves in two main activities: hunting game and hunting mechanical parts for their jailhouse-conceived project. Both of these activities were undertaken as a team, and kept the boys very busy.
They'd hunted game their whole lives, but now, thanks to the terms of their probation, they were doing it exclusively with bow and arrow. Both were already good marksmen, but they'd also been raised with a respect for the prey they sought. They had no desire to inflict more pain than was strictly necessary, and thus both strove for clean kills. Achieving this goal meant a lot of time together, practicing and learning from one another. Luke was stronger, Bo had the longer reach, and between them they quickly became extremely adept at the skill.
Hunting mechanical parts was also not exactly new to the boys. Along with Cooter, Brody and DoBro, they'd been climbing through junkyards almost since the day they could walk. When the family had gone over its finances, they'd parsed out a small amount of Luke's savings from the Marines to go towards the stock car they intended to build. After all, many a moonshine runner had turned race car driver before, so maybe Bo and Luke would be at the forefront of their family's new tradition. Every free moment they got or created for themselves was spent scouring junkyards, pestering Cooter for deals, or actually assembling the few parts they already had.
Spending that much time together was a necessity in order to ensure the family's survival, but the boys found it easier to do now than they had over the past few months. And if their uncle was quieter than he'd been before, and seemed to spend a lot more time thinking, they were almost too busy to notice.
Come September 5th, a full month after the boys' arrest, and nearly two months before the Harvest Fair, local elections were held. During the intervening month, the Sheriff's department had "raided" the chop shop, netting four arrests. Those taken into custody were the lower level workers, who knew only the other men working in the shop, but not the identity of the actual owner of the operation. The "foremen," which had included a couple of local boys named Winter, had disappeared across county lines, and were wanted, but somehow never caught. A photo of Sheriff Rosco Coltrane, cuffing one of the suspects, with his head cocked and grinning from ear to ear, was published on the front page of the Hazzard Gazzette.
As always, elections were a disorganized affair in Hazzard, thanks in large part to the fact that the polling location was also the town's only social gathering place, the Boar's Nest. One table was commandeered by the board of elections, while the rest of the place operated as normal. Fortunately the polls closed at 6:00 PM, before the roadhouse could get really rowdy. However, due to the constant traffic created by civic-minded Hazzardites, the Boar's Nest did more business during the day of elections than it did on an average Saturday night.
During a lull in the action, Daisy rested behind the bar. She'd managed to get beyond her anger at Boss Hogg, and seemed to have gotten past the worst of the aftermath of her relationship with Andy Roach. The revenuer was still stationed in Hazzard, though Daisy had heard through the grapevine that he sought a position in Atlanta. He'd come to the 'Nest a few times, where he and Daisy had seen each other, spoken of nothing more complicated than the weather, and settled into an uneasy coexistence that wasn't exactly pleasant, but did seem to be manageable.
Since Rosco was up for re-election, he could not oversee the polling process, which left Enos at the Boar's Nest for the entire day. The deputy was merely to watch, not to be involved with the election committee in any way, so he'd spent a mostly boring day watching people stuff their ballots, one by one, into the box. When the activity paused for awhile after lunchtime, Enos looked up to accidentally meet deep blue eyes. He instantly looked down again, and stumbled his way towards to bar for a chance to talk to his favorite girl.
"Hey, Daisy," he managed.
"Hey, sugar, how you handling that rough election crowd?" Daisy joked.
"Well, you know Daisy, it ain't really all that rough. Just nice people comin' and goin'," Enos answered, not understanding Daisy's giggles. In fact, in all the years he'd gone out of his way to sit next to her in math class, he'd never understood why she laughed when she did, but Enos didn't care. The sound itself was enough to make him happy.
"Well, I don't know about that Enos. I think they'd be a lot rougher if there wasn't a big strong man like you keepin' 'em under control," Daisy said with a wink. She knew she shouldn't tease him that way, after all, they weren't kids anymore, but she just loved to see that shy smile that he saved just for her, and only when she did tease him. Daisy had come to believe that there was something to be said for menshe'd known her whole life.
Enos began to feel distinctly uncomfortable with Daisy looking at him like that, and although he mostly didn't mind his discomfort, he was on duty at the moment and couldn't afford to let himself to get too excited right now. So instead he changed the subject.
"How's things at the farm, Daisy?"
"They're goin' great. We got the Herefords an' the boys have been clearing the south forty so's we can plant cotton out there next spring. We're still gonna grow corn, but the cotton will be our cash crop. An' the boys are workin' on some secret project in the barn…" Daisy hesitated. She didn't know what her cousins were doing in there; whatever it was, they locked it up every night in an old storage cabinet. She wasn't sure whether mentioning it to Enos had been a smart move or not.
"I sure am glad to hear that Daisy. I was real happy when the boys got probation instead of bein' sent away. An' I think it's great that things are gettin' back to normal for you all." Enos quickly left the beautiful young woman's side to return to duty, though there were still no new voters coming into the establishment. Her stunning smile could pull the truth right out of him if only she knew to ask. He'd been privy to the boys' visits to that cell they'd spent the night in a month ago, seen them studying the floor for faint markings that he'd somehow never been able to completely scrub away. He had a good idea of what they were working on in that barn.
Sheriff Coltrane was tired of being angry. He'd spent almost the entire summer in frustration over one incident or another, whether it was having to look the other way when a petty crime was committed, or feigning that his actions were of his own choice and not dictated by his brother-in-law. Even in his moment of glory with the chop-shop bust there's been the indignity of pretending not to have captured (and then escorted out of the county) the four most important criminals involved. So, on the day following Election Day, when the votes had been tallied and Miss Sue Ellen, election committee chairwoman, announced the results to him, Rosco was too tired to be angry anymore. Instead he simply left his office and walked over to the bank, where he knew he'd find the man in white.
Rosco strolled past the teller area to the private section towards the back of the bank, where Boss Hogg sat in one of the four offices he'd created for himself around the town. For the briefest of moments, Rosco's lip curled in distaste as he regarded the man sitting before him with a fistful of money and a mouthful of cigar. But the moment passed almost before Rosco registered the feelings it contained.
"Uh, Boss?"
"Rosco, didn't I tell you never to interrupt me when I'm counting? Now I'm gonna have to start all over again."
"Gyu, well yes, you did tell me that, but you see, you also told me to tell you right away when the results of the election were in, and they're in now. Gyu."
"All right, all right, Rosco. What are they?"
"Well, khee, I was re-elected Sheriff," Rosco said with a tight, proud smile.
"Well of course you was. How could you not be, with my endorsement?"
"Right, Boss. But, uh, my pension was voted down. Twenty-five years of good service to this community and five years away from being eligible for it, and it was voted down. I tell you it just, it boils my liver."
"It what? Oh, never mind Rosco. You won't be missin' that pension none."
"Whaddya mean, I won't miss it? I miss it already and I ain't even had it yet."
"Oh, Rosco, listen," Boss signaled for the sheriff to move closer and began to whisper confidentially. "You ain't gonna miss it because we're gonna open a new franchise."
"Open a," Rosco began in full voice, then caught himself. "Khee, a new franchise? What's, what's that gonna be, Boss?" he finished in a whisper.
"Never you mind the details, Rosco. What you need to do is find me three dishonest men to run it. And Rosco," Hogg's jowls tensed, indicating his seriousness on this subject, "they gotta be from outside of Hazzard. We don't want no one bein' able to convince them to turn us in. You understand me?"
"Gyu, yes Boss."
"All right now, Rosco, you just go out and be Sheriff like the fine people of this town elected you to be."
"Gyu, right Boss," Rosco said. He lifted his chin and headed towards his patrol car, dismissing, almost before it was fully formed, the idea that the fat man had somehow engineered the demise of the sheriff's pension.
"I still say we should break into the jail and dig up that section of the floor. That way we wouldn't have to keep going back there."
"Bo, you have got to be the only turnip-brain I know that would break into a jail. Besides, if you'd ever learned how to study you'd be able to retrieve that drawing from your memory," Luke teased.
"Yeah, well if you're so smart, how come you have to go back there and consult it, too?" Bo challenged.
"I just go with you to make sure you don't get yourself into trouble is all," Luke answered as he tightened a bolt. The two of them had been working on the engine that would someday be the fastest in the county, just as they had promised each other. They frequently bantered like this while they worked, and Luke found it comforting. It was a way to keep things light, which he still preferred. He'd already told Bo more than he'd meant to about Vietnam, and now that he had a better grip on himself, he didn't plan to let go again. The truth was, he'd long ago figured out that they could have traced their original drawing onto onion skin paper and brought the sketch home. But as long as they were constantly active, moving from chores to hunting to working on this project, he could enjoy his cousin without the discomfort that he'd felt over the summer. And it also kept them away from places like the Boar's Nest, which still made the Marine uncomfortable. He knew he wasn't exactly the man he'd been before he went away, but he'd found a peaceful existence for now, and he intended to keep careful hold of it.
"Get myself in trouble? I ain't the one who started in on ol' Rosco the other day," Bo laughed at the memory. It wasn't what Luke had said, which was really just an off-hand comment on Rosco's driving skills, but the response he'd gotten. Bo did his best to recreate it now, "Wijit, khee, now Luke Duke, you just, you… you're makin' me mad, don't you tempt me now, Gijit!"
Both boys dissolved into a fit of laughter. Despite Luke's best efforts, Bo had grown up an awful lot during the summer. He could still be impetuous, but he had managed to become a little more deliberate at times, too, especially when dealing with his older cousin. At some point he'd figured out that the less he pushed Luke to open up, the more he got in return. But most importantly, he'd learned to accept his cousin as he was, not as he wanted him to be. Luke could still be incredibly frustrating to the boy, but if Bo didn't let on how much it bothered him, his cousin was less likely to take off and find some solo activity that did not include Bo.
Daisy could hear the boys laughing in the barn, and knew they were working on whatever it was that they hadn't showed her. Bo and Luke had always been close and over the years she'd tried, half-successfully, not to feel left out. She'd joined in their activities and they'd always been sure to include her, and there was no question that they all loved each other dearly. But the bond between the boys was something that she couldn't come close to experiencing, or hadn't, except with a certain hazel-eyed revenuer, thoughts of whom still provoked intense pain…
That thought shook her back to her purpose in coming out here in the first place. While she wouldn't exactly mind startling the boys into showing her whatever it was they'd been doing out here, the primary reason for her visit was to settle things between the three of them. She knew that Jesse'd told the boys about her and Andy, and she'd even held a brief and extremely awkward conversation with them on the subject herself, during which they'd admitted to having been mad at first, but not for long. Despite her protests to the contrary, Bo and Luke believed that the revenuer's feelings for Daisy had been a part of why Agent Roach had helped them get off the hook in the end, so they claimed to no longer be upset. And much of the time she'd felt that their words were true, but when they began working on something that they weren't sharing with her, she wondered whether their trust in her had been more shaken than they let on.
Daisy took a deep breath and entered the barn, quietly calling, "Hey, fellas," to announce herself.
"Daisy, what are you doin' in here?" Bo asked, disappointed that he hadn't had the time to shove what he was working on into the storage cabinet before she'd seen it.
"I'm sorry, fellas," Daisy said, looking down. "I know you didn't want me in here, but I need to talk to y'all."
"It's okay, sweetheart," Luke said gently, shooting Bo a quick look. His blonde cousin already looked so contrite that Luke knew he didn't have to say anything to him. "What's up?"
The young woman sat on a bale of hay, slightly away from the boys. She wasn't sure how she expected them to react to the upcoming conversation, but she wanted a little space between them. Well, what she really wanted was to go and put her arms around each of them, but if they were really upset with her and they pulled away… that would be worse than her already being across the barn's aisle from them in the first place. She looked at her hands and quietly began to say what she'd rehearsed in her mind all week.
"I just, I wanted to tell you all about what happened with Andy and me."
"Did something new happen?" Luke asked carefully, not sure why this was coming up now.
"No, it's just, we never really talked about it, or not all of it." She felt the bale shift a little as Bo sat down beside her.
"What else is there to know?" her younger cousin asked.
"Only that, when I started to see Andy, I never knew what was gonna happen later on. I knew he was a revenuer an' all, an' I was careful never to tell him anything. An' he never told me anything either, so I didn't know he was wacthin' you boys."
Bo actually smiled. "Well we know that Daisy, otherwise you would have told us what was comin'."
Daisy was surprised at the faith he had in her, after all that had happened. "I just wanted you boys to know that I would never do anything to hurt you. Not on purpose."
"Shoot, darlin', we know that," Luke said, bracing himself on the small bit of hay that was available on the opposite side of Daisy from Bo.
The young woman scooted over closer to her younger cousin, making more room for the older one. "An' that I'm sorry I didn't tell you who was bringin' me home at night," she added, confessing to what she knew was her worst crime. Bo's arm came around her shoulders.
"Well, I wish you had, Daisy-girl, but I ain't holdin' it against you," he said. "I can see where you wouldn't want to tell us."
Luke gave her a token swat and added, "You ever do that again, an' I'll be really mad, but I'm gonna forgive you this time. Remember what I said, though. The fallin' in love part just kinda happens. The part you control is what you do about it. So, next time what you do about it is you tell me the whole story, okay?"
Daisy managed a small smile. "And what would you have done if I'd told you?"
"I don't rightly know," Luke admitted, "but I don't want us keepin' secrets from one another. It ain't a good idea. We need to trust each other."
His female cousin's smile grew a little bit. "You don't want us keepin' secrets."
"No, I don't," Luke said with a frown.
Daisy stood up and walked over to where the boys had been working. She had something of an understanding of mechanics, having learned from her uncle alongside the boys. But whatever this thing was, she didn't recognize it. "What's this then, Mr. No Secrets?"
"Well, that's more of a surprise," Bo began.
"No, seriously boys, what is it?" Daisy asked, picking up a small assembled section.
"Hey!" Luke was suddenly at her side, rescuing his prized possession from her grasp.
"It's only the fastest engine in all of Georgia," said Bo, his voice full of wounded pride.
"For what? A lawnmower?" Daisy asked, eyebrow arched. Bo made a grab for her, and she turned to run from him when Luke caught her from behind.
"Now you ain't gonna get to ride in it," the blonde warned.
"Ride in what? There ain't nothin' to ride in," Daisy said, pressing her luck.
"Not yet," Bo informed her. "But when there is, you're gonna be sorry. You'll be beggin' us to let you drive him."
"Him?" Luke asked.
"Yeah, I got a feelin' this one's gonna be a him."
Luke laughed, "And Daisy, honey, when he's done, that yellow car will be yours, okay? You always liked it better'n me, anyways."
Daisy turned in his arms and hugged him back, "Thank you, Luke." She moved away from her older cousin to take hold of the younger, "Love you, Bo."
"Love you too, Daisy," he answered, planting a kiss on the top of her head.
"Just," Luke said to Daisy, "make sure you actually take old yeller there out for a real spin every now and then, not just your wimpy female kind of driving." He winked at Bo.
"Luke!" Daisy turned back to take on her older cousin.
"Ah, cousin, you know she can't help it. I mean, she is a girl after all, ain't she?" Bo fed the fire.
"Bo!" Daisy reached for a good sized wrench.
"Well, and what do you expect," Luke said, stepping closer to his blonde cousin, anticipating what was coming. "Takin' it shopping and to the hairdressers and all. No wonder the poor car gets the vapors." Before another word could be said, both boys took off running at top speed.
Jesse Duke was doing his best to adjust to the changes in his family. There was a saying in these parts about old men like him having 'shine in their blood, and Jesse thought that it was probably at least partially true. Not that he'd consumed so very much of the stuff; leastwise compared to most of his colleagues in the business, his own drinking habits were very moderate. It was more that once you'd spent a lifetime making and delivering moonshine, it was very hard to stop doing it.
The Duke patriarch had spent a lot of time talking with his maker. He'd meant every word that he'd said to the boys about it being time for the Dukes to find a new line of work. It was just the doing part that was so hard. He knew he had the support of his children, and that helped. But he also sought guidance from above, wanting some confirmation that he was doing what was best for his family.
From where he sat on the porch of the old farmhouse, he could look out across the fields that made up the Duke property, or what was left of it after the depression had forced his own father to sell a few parcels off. It was beautiful land, with some of the best topsoil in the county. And the boys had done a fine job of turning some of it into pasture, while all four of them had worked together to prepare another section for the following spring's planting season. They were good kids, all three of them, and they deserved a stable living. Moonshine would have provided them with more money, but he hoped that farming would be a safer endeavor for the Duke clan in the coming generations.
Jesse started when he heard a shriek, followed by laughter. Before he could even pull himself onto his feet, he saw one blonde streak and another brunette, both flying towards the old oak tree in the middle of the farmyard, not fifty feet away from where he sat. Right behind came the slender lines of his niece, carrying a much misused tool in her hands.
"Y'all get back here. You're gonna take that back if it's the last thing you do!"
"No way," hollered Luke, running away from the tree and distracting one cousin so the other could climb to relative safety.
"I'm gonna make you eat those words," Daisy screamed, chasing after her older cousin while he used his fondly remembered high school football maneuvers to evade her.
From up on one of the lower branches of the tree, the youngest called out, "Take her up on it Lukas! It'll probably be better than whatever she makes for dinner!"
As Daisy changed direction, looking to use the wrench on Bo's neck, and Luke headed for yet another oak, seeking whatever shelter it could provide, their uncle finally found his feet.
"You kids behave yourselves now!" Jesse called out gruffly, and his white beard hid a peaceful smile.
Where one story ends, another begins...