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| in time to see Rick staring into the library. He too stared in disbelief. It looked like Sonderburg's home, when they had went inside minus the body, thank Allah. Papers, books, furniture and pictures were all in disarray. Whoever it was, was just as through. Nothing seemed untouched. With hands on his hips, Rick glared at the destruction. "Well this just keeps getting better and better!" Heidi Rittner ([email protected]) December 11, 2002 Evie gasped. �My library! What happened to my library?!� Evie squeezed past Rick and Ardeth running to straighten out pictures and pick up items that were laying on the ground. �Evie, I thought I told you to stay upstairs,� Rick shook his head. �Why do I even bother wasting my breath.� Evie ran to her books that were scattered here and there from being thrown off the bookcase. �Oh my precious books!� She began collecting them and lovingly placing them back in order on the shelves. �Kinda wish they�d been taken. Damn things are a curse,� Rick said under his breath. Evie threw Rick a look that told him he was in trouble. �I heard that. It looks as if they�re all still here.� Evie turned her back to Rick and faced the bookcase again. A sly grin spread across her face. �That�s odd.� She put on a straight face and turned to face Rick. �Your metal of honor seems to be missing from it�s case.� �WHAT?� Rick ran to the bookshelf and nearly knocked Evie over in his haste. It was still there. What was she talking about? Then he heard Evie caught in a fit of laughter. �Oh you�re gonna pay for that!� Evie gave a half-hearted attempt at running from him but was soon caught up in his arms laughing harder as he began to tickle her. The laughing and joking subsided and they just held each other. Ardeth watched from the doorway smiling sadly. �It amazes me to see such affection and happiness among such chaos.� He gestured with his arms referring to the mess. Evie stepped out of Rick�s embrace and walked to Ardeth placing a hand on his arm. �You miss Nefret, don�t you? You know you don�t have to stay and help us, Ardeth. You can go back to her. I�m sure she needs you more than we do, especially since she is with child.� Ardeth shook his head and took Evie�s hand and squeezed it affectionately before letting go. �I appreciate the offer, but I am needed here. She is still in the beginning stages and besides, Gabrielle is taking good care of her.� He smiled reassuringly. �When I return to her, she will most likely be past the morning sickness stages that I grow weary of being blamed for.� He chuckled. �That woman has quite an arm on her. I�ve had to pack away the more expensive breakable things. And, of course, the solid things. Those can hurt and I have the bump on my head to prove it.� Rick laughed. �You think that�s bad, just wait until the day the baby wants out. I practically had to clear an entire room of anything that wasn�t nailed and tie Evie down! And the curses she sent my way.� Rick shook his head and smiled at Evie. �She could have made a sailor blush!� Evie blushed. �I did no such thing! I was perfectly calm.� It was said half-heartedly because she knew as well as everyone else within a mile radius that day that Rick was right. She changed the subject from off of her not so ladylike day of behavior to the serious matter at hand. �What are we going to do about all this?� �Don�t worry about it now. We�ll clean it up when we get back,� Rick said. �For now, we need to get some sleep so we�re not walking into things tomorrow.� Rick bent down and righted the table so he could move the things that had landed on the couch onto the table. Evie sat down and Rick plopped down on the couch and gestured to the big chair. �Have a seat and we�ll go over a few new plans I have.� Ardeth picked up a round-shaped dark brown wrinkled looking thing with black strands coming out of one side of it that had landed on the big chair then sat. �What in the name of Allah is this?� He turned the object over and his eyes nearly bugged out as he threw it away from him. �Was that a human head or did my eyes deceive me?� Rick laughed. �No. Your eyes did deceive you.� At Ardeth�s sigh of relief Rick added, �It was a shrunken human head. But you can call him �Lucky�.� Evie lightly punched Rick in the arm. Ardeth blanched. �He did not seem like a man who possessed any good luck.� Evie shook her head. �Alex named him. He says Lucky is his little souvenir from the good ol� days. He pocketed it while at The Oasis of Ahm Shere.� Rick shook his head remembering when Alex had proudly shown him his �souvenir�. He had had much the same reaction. He lightly shook his head to clear it. �Okay. Let�s get down to business. Here�s my plan.� Penny ([email protected]) December 12, 2002 If any more heat came rolling out of the back seat of the Beauford, the car would probably burst into flames. For the tenth Rick glanced at his irate thirteen year old son in the rear view mirror. "No!" he told Alex. "You are not going this time. Your mom has already talked to your Aunt Maggie and you're going to stay with her till we get back. End of argument, end of discussion." "But Dad! She's about a million years old! What do I do if she pops off?" That earned the boy an, "ALEX!" from his mother, who sat in the front seat. "That was uncalled for." Alex tried to look contrite but, it just didn't have the desired effect on his Mum. "Alex," she warned. "But it's an honest question! What do I do if she decides to drop over?" Rick shook his head at the question. "Has she got a gardener?" Evie looked suspiciously at he husband. "Yes, why?" "There ya go, son. Just borrow a shovel. Problem solved." "DAD!" "RICK!" That's when Jonathan decided to put in his two cents. "If she pops off it's probably because of the prunes. Prune juice, prune cake, prune muffins, stewed prunes, baked prunes, boiled prunes, a little nip of homemade prune...wine." Rick scrunched up his nose. He hated prunes anyway. "Wine?" "Wine," Jonathan confirmed with a nod in the rearview mirror. "Prune wine, if you can believe that, old chum. For eighty five years old, she does move kind of fast." "I guess so." "But DAD, you know I hate prunes and besides her house smells!" "That's because of the incense she burns, Alex," Jonathan told him. Then he screwed up his bruised face and said, "When her rheumatism acts up and she can't move fast enough." "Eeeee! MUM! DAD! Please don't make me stay with her! Look how old and wrinkled she is!" "You are what you eat," Rick snickered, pulling into the country estate of old, smelly Pruneface herself. "I can help you guys! I can shoot as good as you Dad. I can handle a rifle as good as Mum and Uncle John! I can..." "ALEX, NO! You stay here! That's final, Son. HERE!" Alex gave an exaggerated sigh, sounding a bit too melodramatic for his father, who turned up the corner of his mouth and looked at him over the back seat. "Look. I know you don't like this but, it will give your Mom and Uncle John and I some peace of mind knowing, you're at least safe with Aunt Pruneface, than right in the middle of something, that may be a lot more dangerous than mummies and really big bugs. Now, let's get your bags and get you settled." "He wasn't very happy, I must say," Jonathan said from the back seat, an hour later. Rick remembered how grateful he had been just to get back out into the cold fresh air, after sitting inside the Victorian |