Danny’s outlook on life was quite a bit more positive after his unexpected encounter with Frenchy. Up till this point, he’d been driven for almost the last couple weeks by a combination of anger and resignation, but she reminded him that there was a future out there. He realized that the Redlite Ranch was really a strange place to find hope, but in only a few days he’d come to realize that for the first time in a long time, he was among friends. Real friends. It was strange, after all the years with Marsha.

That thought was still on his mind late that afternoon when he stood at the sink behind the bar rinsing out beer glasses. There was a customer sitting alone at the bar. He’d come in fairly drunk, anyway, and he’d been hitting them back pretty good. All of a sudden, he heard the guy say, "Hey, bartender. Which one of these bitches would you fuck?"

Danny furrowed his brow, cocked his head, and turned to the guy. "Excuse me," he said, just barely concealing his hostility. "What did you say?"

The guy was too drunk to realize his bad manners; he repeated himself: "Which of these skanks is worth the money?"

Danny could feel himself turning crimson, and the heat rising in him. Unlike all the times with Marsha, he didn’t hold it back. "Let’s get something straight, asshole," he snapped as he stepped out from behind the bar. "These are not bitches, these are my friends. This may be a bordello, but it’s a legal one, and the women here are professionals who take pride in what they do and try to do the best job they can. Now, you treat them with respect or I’m going to bounce your ass out of here."

"You’ve got an awful fast mouth for a pussy that works in a whorehouse," the guy said, getting to his feet and rushing Danny, getting set for a swing as he moved. He was a little bigger than Danny, and younger and in good shape – but he was pretty drunk. One good thing, maybe the only good thing about being married to a health food freak and fitness nut for all those years, was that Danny wasn’t in bad shape himself. It was like the old days when he’d been on the baseball team at Athens, the guy was coming at him like a breaking ball, and it was an easy shot toward center field.

Danny hit him so hard he knocked him to the floor – down, but not out. The man scrambled to his feet, grabbed a chair, lifted it over his head, and rushed Danny again. Taking his time, Danny ducked down, and placed a big fist right in the guy’s gut. There was an "OOOF," followed by a mess as he puked up most of an afternoon’s worth of beer.

That was enough for Danny. He gave the guy another couple well aimed shots just to make his point, then grabbed the guy’s collar and belt and started drunk-walking him toward the door, just as Shirley came rushing out of the office carrying a cop’s nightstick. Seeing that Danny had the situation under control, she just got in front of him and opened the door. Once Danny got him through the gate, he gave him a heave, with a kick for good measure. The guy collapsed in a heap in the parking lot.

"Thanks, Danny," Shirley said as they turned to head back inside, closing the gate behind them

"Always wondered why this place was fenced," he said conversationally.

"That’s part of it, anyway," Shirley grinned. "If he doesn’t get his ass out of here pretty quick I’ll call the sheriff. I thought from the start we might be looking at trouble with that dude."

"That kind of stuff happen very often?" he asked as he opened the door back into the lobby, and let Shirley go ahead of him.

"Not here," Shirley told him. "Back in the old days up in Ely, sometimes we’d have to throw out four or five guys a night, but this is the first time we’ve needed a bouncer in a couple of months."

Danny was a little surprised to be met by a crowd as they went inside – it was late enough in the afternoon that more than half the girls were on duty, and there were several customers hanging around, too. "Good job, Danny!" Frenchy grinned, giving him a pat on the back.

Danny and Shirley led the crowd back into the bar, where they found George mopping up the mess. "I got the signal," George said. "But you’d already thrown his ass out of here. Good work, guy."

"You got some good moves there," a big black girl by the name of Mallory said. "You know martial arts?"

"No," Danny said. "But my dad taught me a few things, years ago. He spent ten years teaching unarmed combat to Green Berets, so I figured he was worth listening to."

"Sure looks like it, Danny," Mallory laughed. "I’ve got a black belt and was coming to give you a hand, but you did just fine. Jeez, Green Berets! No wonder you know the dirty moves."

"I didn’t learn a tenth of what he had to teach me," Danny nodded, the collapse of adrenaline beginning to hit him now. "He’s kept in practice, too. He works out with my sorta brother-in-law, who’s got a bunch of black belts. I sure as hell hope I’m in as good a shape as him at fifty as he is at almost seventy."

"Hey, Danny," Patty smiled, "I heard what you told that asshole. I think all of us here can say that we’re glad you’re our friend."

"You ladies are pretty cool," Danny grinned. "And George, too. Yeah, you’re all about the best friends I’ve had in years. As far as that asshole goes, though, it wasn’t anything, it was just part of the job."

Eventually things died down, and Danny got back to work, finishing with rinsing the beer glasses and setting up and serving several drinks. The evening was slow enough that Mike could handle the business, so when he came on, Danny ordered some dinner and clocked out, then sat back in the back of the bar watching the action while he ate and nursed a beer. As often happened, Peppermint Patty came over to join him for a while between sounds of the door buzzer and clients.

"Danny," she said. "I really meant that, what I said earlier."

"Hey, Patty, it wasn’t a big deal, it was just the truth."

"Yeah," she sighed. "Danny, you’ve been here long enough to see that some of us, even most of us, take a degree of pride in what we do. Our job is to make our clients happy, and most of us are pretty good at it. But not many of us will admit to just anyone outside of here what we do, because to most people we’re the scum of the earth."

"I don’t think that at all," Danny said. "I can see how assholes like that joker earlier can think it, because they don’t know any better and are too drunk to care. But I’ve seen you girls, watched you, and I know better. And, like I said, it’s been a long time since I’ve had friends this good. I’m really going to miss you when I head back home."

"You’re still planning on heading back to that frozen hole in the forest?" she smiled.

"Yeah, I guess," he sighed. "It’s home, and I’ve got stuff to do there, stuff that Marsha cheated me out of over the last eight years. Don’t get me wrong, this is a good place, a fun place, and a lot of neat people. It’s fun for a while, but I don’t think I want to build a life out of it."

"It wouldn’t be a good idea," she agreed. "I wouldn’t want to build a life out of this, either, but it’s good for me for what I want to do. Someday I’ll be able to put it behind me and get on with school and the rest of my life, but it’s doing what I want for now."

"I can understand," he told her. "Like I told you before, I envy you your goals. As for me, I think that it’s going to take going home and starting over to put all the insanity of the last few years behind me."

"You’re probably right," she nodded, and let out a sigh. "I really don’t have much of a home to go home to. It makes the time off tough."

"Yeah, you’re going to have to be taking some time off pretty soon, aren’t you?" he frowned.

"Yeah, tomorrow morning," she nodded. "I’ll have to be gone for a week."

"What’s the deal on that?" he asked. "I mean, why not work straight through?"

"It’s partly custom," she explained. "It’s tied in with our periods. That’s why most of the shifts are three weeks, although that doesn’t matter like it used to. George was one of the first people to start letting girls work shorter shifts, but that means he can be a little more flexible and bring in girls who don’t use this as their main source of income. It gives fresher girls, he thinks, and he may be right." She let out a sigh and went on. "But still, I guess I do need the break once in a while, a chance to get out of here and remember that there’s a real world out there."

"So, what are you going to do on break?"

"Not really a lot," she sighed. "I need to drop by and see my mother some time, but hopefully that won’t last too long. The less time I’m there, the better I like it, since I’m less likely to let a hint of what I’m doing slip."

"Yeah, I suppose," he nodded. "So, what else?"

"Well, I need to drop by UCLA and take care of some business. I’ve been working on a couple of independent studies, just to have something to do in my spare time. There’ll probably be a day or two worth of running around on that, and I want to work on the financial aid office some, although I won’t be able to get much financial aid when I get back, at least after I file my taxes. Other than that, I think I’m just going to find a quiet motel and a bookstore or a library, and just relax for a while. I might even slide back here a day or two early and just hang around out back. I don’t know. I don’t really want to start anything. Molly and I had been talking once about taking off and going to Hawaii for a few days, but I’d really rather save my money, and she can’t go now, anyway. Too much holiday stuff."

"Yeah," he sighed. "I thought about sneaking off for a few days and heading home for Christmas, but I talked to my lawyer in Piute Wells, and he said it might be a better idea if I don’t. He said it could get sticky if Marsha finds out I’ve been out of state."

"That’s a bummer," she sighed. "At least you’ve got something to look forward to at home."

"There is that," he agreed. "I guess I won’t mind missing Christmas at home, since I know I’ll be shed of Marsha when I finally do get there."

"Well," she smiled. "You’ll still be here when I get back, then. Maybe I can give you that freebie I sort of promised you, maybe as a Christmas present or something."

"I told you, you don’t have to do that," he laughed. "I get just as much a charge out of talking to you."

Just then, the buzzer sounded for a lineup. "Gotta run," she said.

"I’m heading over," he said. "You take it easy on break, and I’ll see you when you get back."

For once, he was ready to take off a little early. Talking with Patty was fun, but it was getting in the way of things he wanted to think about. He sat back, and glanced at the girls heading out for the lineup – not many of them, since a number of those on duty were obviously busy – his friends. Interesting bunch of friends you have, Danny, he thought.

He finished up his beer, and bussed his own table, as he usually did, and headed out through the lobby, past the lineup, where Patty was getting picked out by a guy. Once again, she threw him a smile as she headed toward the back. Yeah, he thought again, an interesting bunch of friends.

Though he’d come to like and respect his friends in the last few days, they still made him sad, in a way. Most of them were in the business because of financial need – but then, everybody needed some income, and this was an easier way than most for most of them, one that agreed with most of them. However, Danny had heard indications that things were a little more forced for some than for others.

But he also knew that George didn’t like to hire girls who had been heavily pushed into the job from outside, and avoided them whenever possible. He’d heard stories from the girls that things, other places, mostly, weren’t always quite as nice as here, girls urged to take up the business to support husbands or boyfriends, another girl at another place who had been pushed into the job by her mother-in-law because she wasn’t contributing enough to the support of her son. And several girls knew people who had even worse stories.

He couldn’t think of many of the girls, besides perhaps Jennlynn, for whom the money wasn’t the primary issue. As far as that went, Danny wasn’t all that sure about Frenchy. Yeah, she’d been in and out of the business for a long time, but there was a lot unsaid about her and her husband, too. He wondered what that was all about, and realized that it wasn’t much of his business. And, Patty – she wasn’t supporting anyone but herself, but that included some huge college bills. At least she was facing the issue head on with serious determination. While she was one of the better money earners in the place, as far as he knew she was the only one saving up the vast majority of it for future goals. And that, too, was a little sad.

In the last few days, he’d enjoyed getting to know these people, learning his way around something that he’d never really contemplated. It was such a huge change from his life with Marsha, from the personal hell she’d been putting him through – and the warmth and the friendship here could be appealing. But, he was beginning to realize that it could also be something of a trap. This was a reasonable way to wait out the days he had left to qualify for his residency, but now, he was beginning to look a little beyond that point. Maybe it was time to start preparing the ground a little.

*   *   *

Danny’s internal alarm clock had gotten attuned to waking up at a normal time again after working several long days across the road. Once again, it woke him up about six thirty. While he often went over and had breakfast in the dining room before he went on shift, this was a good time to call home, too. He’d called home over the weekend, and had a chance to talk to his mother – again, it was hard to not explain what he was doing, and he realized he was going to have to think about that issue sometime soon, too. He’d told his mother he planned to call Brandy, whose hours as a teacher and a coach were a little weird, especially considering the time difference. It turned out she’d had the basketball team at a Saturday tournament, and Phil was out with the dogs, as usual.

He’d tried to call Jennifer, too, but at coming up on eight months pregnant, she was having trouble sleeping, and when she did get to sleep, Blake didn’t want to wake her. He’d never gotten to know Blake very well – he was a little distant, and very attached to Jennifer, and they had only come to Spearfish Lake about the time that Danny was leaving. But still, he was friendly, and told Danny that he’d be sure to let Jennifer know that he’d called, and that Jennifer had heard about his leaving Marsha from their father and had told him, and both thought it was a good thing; it should have been done long ago. One of the things he wanted to do was to get to know Blake and Jennifer a lot better; it had been a long time.

But they’d never had a lot in common, partly due to the age differential. Jennifer was seven years older, which meant that he’d been starting middle school at the time that she was starting her career in Nashville. She’d been gone, living out of town most of the rest of his time in Spearfish Lake, and he’d never gotten to know her well as an adult. And then, Marsha had stood in the way of any chance to get to know her better, anyway. Another fence to mend, and about all he could do for now was to let her know that he intended to start mending it soon.

He’d put off calling Josh for a few days, even after his discussion with his father. There’d been a lot of water go down the river in a dozen years, and though they’d been best friends before, their lives had become pretty different. Even though he’d seen Josh messing with the dogs in the early years, and had followed the races on the Internet when he could in the years since, there was an unreality about the way he’d changed, a distance between them.

He’d worked with Josh as a brakeman for years, sometimes directly with him, other times at the same time. It had made a good summer job, and he’d made a respectable amount of money from it, though not a fortune. Any of the girls across the highway would be likely to earn more from a couple clients than he had in a week of ten- and more-hour days. And there was a reluctance to go that far back and start over – but then, maybe that was what he needed to do, to get Marsha out of his system, if nothing else.

When he’d seen Josh briefly last summer, his old friend had told him that if he ever found himself splitting up with Marsha and coming home, there’d still be a job as a summer brakeman waiting for him. At this distance, there was no telling if Josh had been bullshitting him, just trying to cheer him up at a particularly down time for him – but maybe he ought to call and sort of open a line of communication. There weren’t a lot of jobs up around Spearfish Lake, after all, and when you got right down to it, going back to being a brakeman was a desperate stopgap that only settled a small part of the problem. But at least it was a thought to cling to. He might as well find out.

It took a couple minutes to get the number for the Camden and Spearfish Lake; after ten years, he couldn’t remember it. The woman who answered the phone was new since the last time he’d called, and he didn’t know her name, but he asked for Josh, who she said happened to be in the office. In a few moments he was on the line. "Sure is strange to find you in the office," he said.

"Jeez, Danny!" Josh laughed. "It’s strange to even be in the office, especially in the winter. Every time I look out the window I think I ought to be out behind some dogs."

"So, how are things up on your end of the phone line?" he asked.

"Oh, pretty good," his old friend replied. "I talked to your dad out at the café a few days ago – he said he thought you’d be calling one of these days. So you finally came to your senses, huh?"

"It wasn’t easy," he replied, knowing that he was talking about Marsha. "Josh, I tried to do the right thing, I tried to keep it going. I’ve come to the conclusion that I tried too hard for years."

"I thought that for years," his friend’s voice came over the phone. "But I never figured I ought to tell you that."

"Yeah, I probably wouldn’t have listened, anyway," he said ruefully. "Anyway, Dad says you and Tiffany aren’t doing the race this year."

"It was hard to give up," Josh replied. "Tiffany and I started talking about it way last winter, and we went round and round about it all summer. It just came down to the fact that we had too much to do, and we had to get rid of something. The Iditarod was the most expensive in time and the least rewarding in dollars, so it was the obvious first thing to scratch. But for as long as we’ve done it, it wasn’t easy to make the break."

"I guess," Danny admitted. "It wasn’t easy to do what I had to do, and I don’t think I enjoyed it as much as you did the racing."

"You’re probably right," Josh laughed. "I have to admit, though, when I was up hours before dawn, feeding dogs in twenty-below weather, there were some times I wondered just how much I enjoyed it, too. But, this year has been a lot simpler. I’m still getting in quite a bit of time on the trails, but we’re only trying to get one team up for the race this year, rather than three last year, so that helps a lot. And then, my brother and his wife and kids have been helping out a lot."

"That’s John, right?" Danny nodded. "I don’t think I’ve seen him in, hell, fifteen years, and I don’t think I’ve ever met his wife. I can’t even remember her name."

"Candice," Josh said. "That’s kind of interesting. They both had their jobs loused up last spring, down in Decatur, and they moved back up here. John bought into McGuinness Accounting, it’s the McGuinness-Archer agency now. Candice was originally a farm girl, but she was pretty much a suburban mom when she got up here, worked in a bank, pretty much a business-suit and high-heels person. She was looking for something to do, so Tiffany and I hired her to help out in the store, so we could have more time with the dogs. So, last fall, she came to us and said she missed her kids not having animals to take care of like she’d done on the farm; they needed to learn that kind of responsibility. Tiff and I told her that she was welcome to come out and learn to do feeding. So she did and dragged John along with her and the kids. I didn’t think it’d last a week, but they’re still doing it. John isn’t crazy about it, but she’s getting into it, and has put a lot of training miles on in the last couple months, too. John and Tiff and I were all surprised to discover that under that business suit, there was the heart of a true musher beating. John doesn’t know what to make of it. He still thinks she should be a suburban mom working in a bank, not wearing jeans and Carhartts messed up with dog shit."

"Damnedest thing," Danny agreed. "You never know, sometimes. People aren’t always what they seem on the surface, or what your preconceived notions are. Boy, have I learned that in spades."

"Yeah, I guess you have," Josh said. "I take it Marsha wasn’t too happy about you leaving?"

"You could say that," he said. "And you could say downright pissed. I, uh, sort of showed how pissed I was when I left, and she didn’t like it very well." And boy, is that the understatement of the month, he thought. But Josh doesn’t need to know the details, not now, and maybe not ever. Better change the subject. "Dad says you’re sort of running the railroad now."

"Well, sort of," Josh reported. "You remember Bud, of course. You heard his wife died?"

"No, never heard that," Danny said. Bud Ellsberg was the railroad president, and Danny had been in the cab with him lots of times, since the Camden and Spearfish Lake was a small enough short line that Bud often had to schedule himself as an engineer. He’d never known Kate Ellsberg well, and hadn’t liked her much from what little he had known of her, but she and Bud had been close, even though it was common knowledge that he’d frequently been irritated with her.

"Cancer," Josh said. "Turned out she’d had it for years, and they never let on till down toward the end, that was a year ago last summer. Not long after that, Harry Masterfield died. Bud and Kate and Harry and Jane had been best friends since clear back in the fifties, some time, so it didn’t surprise anyone when the two of them took off for a long trip in Harry and Jane’s motor home last spring, leaving me behind to run things. Then, they did it again last fall. They were home for about three weeks, got married while they were here, and now they’re off in Florida. I’m going to Alaska with Phil to help him out up there, middle of February, and Bud better damn well be back for that. But I’ll bet when I get back from Alaska, I don’t see anything but tail lights again, at least till the rock season gets running. I need him back by the middle of April, then. Tiffany and I are going to go on an honest to God vacation. First time ever."

"No shit?" Danny said. "Something interesting?"

"Should be," Josh said. "Two winters ago we had this gal working for us as a dog handler. Her summer job is guiding rafts in the Grand Canyon, and she invited us to come out some time. I won’t go into the ins and outs of it, but we’re leaving the tail end of April, going to spend two weeks down there."

"Sounds neat," Danny said with envy. "I always wanted to do something like that, but Marsha wasn’t an outdoor person in that way – you know that."

"Yeah, she was only good for lying in the sun and playing volleyball," Josh snorted. "She ever add on anything else?"

"Not much besides sustained bitching," Danny snorted. "Oh well, maybe someday. I get my shit pulled together, maybe I can do a little outdoor stuff some time."

"Well, we can darn sure get you started, down at the store," Josh said. "So, what are you doing these days?"

"Not much of anything," Danny lied; he wasn’t sure he wanted to tell the truth about what he was doing to anyone in Spearfish Lake, not now, maybe not ever. It was something he was going to have to work out before he got back to Spearfish Lake, that was for sure. "Mostly, just watching the calendar pages turn until I can get my six weeks Nevada residency in." His eyes lit on War and Peace, which he’d laid on the desk nearly a week ago when Art had invited him across the road, and he hadn’t touched it since. "Trying to read a little. Got a job doing a little bartending in a place out here – that helps a little. About another month and I can get out of here."

"Gotta be dull," Josh said. "But you’re doing the right thing. You coming back here after that, or going back to Florida?"

"Florida, no way," Danny told him. "There’s plenty of reasons to not even think about it, both good and bad, starting with the fact that I’ve come to hate the fucking place. I shoved my job when I shoved Marsha out of my life. I don’t know what I’m doing for sure, but I do want to come back home at least for a while, just to get things back together again, pick up where I left off." Now, Danny thought, just how in the hell do I nudge him about working for the railroad without actually nudging him? Oh, hell, might as well just go ahead and do it. "Actually, I was sort of thinking about what you said last summer, about being a summer brakeman again. Do I have to talk to you on that, or do I have to wait for Bud to get back?"

"Realistically, you talk to me," Josh told him. "Like I told you last summer, there’s a job here waiting if you want it. The thing is, we do it differently than when you and I were braking. Now, we try to keep the hours around forty, and under thirty for the college kids. That fifty- or sixty-hour shit gets old in a hurry."

"Oh, it’s not that bad," Danny said, thinking that Patty’s normal weeks were over a hundred hours. My God, he thought, how does that woman put up with a schedule like that? Or, any of the girls, for that matter? Of course, Patty isn’t really actually working all that much, she just has to be on call, and like she said there really isn’t that much else to do, anyway. And, as far as that went, he wasn’t working that much less, even though he was working fairly hard. But, it wasn’t like he had anything else to do, and it wasn’t going to last forever, anyway. But still, working those kinds of hours for sixteen months three weeks on and one off had to seem freaking endless to her. Yeah, she needs a few days off. "Beats sitting around doing nothing, I’ve learned that the last few days."

"You may think so," Josh said. "Our insurance company begs to differ. Besides we can’t work the college kids full time, anyway. Here’s the deal. I think I got two college kids next summer; one’s worked one summer, one’s a newbie. We’ll also have one regular brakeman, he was new last summer, and the deal with him is that I have to work him full time. If you’re interested, I can put you in the third college kid slot. Now, whether I can work you more than thirty hours a week, I don’t know, because if I do that it opens up full time employee issues, benefits, and like that. You’re pretty rusty, but you got further along in switching moves than either of the kids we’ll have working the rock trains this summer, so maybe we can work you a little more to back up Stormy some."

"Sounds fair to me," Danny said. "I’m not sure I want to spend the rest of my life doing it, but a bird in the hand, and all that stuff."

"Well, I won’t hold you to it," Josh said. "I just won’t tack anyone down for that third spot for a while, in case you want it. The rock trains won’t start running until along in April, and we’re set real solid till then. You’re going to be back before then, aren’t you?"

"Probably, unless I have to contest the divorce," he replied. "No reading on that yet, and I may not know for another four weeks. Assuming it goes through, I should be back by the end of January."

"Good enough," Josh said. "I really ought to tack something down before I head off to Alaska, because I’m going to want to have the rock trains running smoothly before I take off for the Grand Canyon. But if it slides back into February, give me a call and we’ll see what I can do."

"Can’t ask for anything more," Danny agreed. This had gone about as well as could be expected, in fact, a lot better than he had expected. True, it wasn’t a full time job and the hours could be odd, but there was the chance he could help his father out at the store some, too. It wouldn’t add up to a lot of money, or a real job, for that matter, but it was likely that he’d be living at home, at least for a while, and that would simplify matters. If neither looked like turning into a fulltime job, well, there would be time to research other options. He’d always shied away from the thought of a job in the plywood plant, but that was then; right now a stable job at home seemed a little different than it had when he was in high school. "I’ll sure keep in touch with you."

"So, what’s Nevada like, anyway?" Josh asked, changing the subject. Your dad didn’t say where you were at. Vegas, I guess?"

"Well, a ways outside of Vegas," Danny explained. "That’s a goofy damn town, a good place to waste your money. This is just out in the middle of nowhere, dry and dusty and empty. So empty that they used to set off A-bombs not all that far from here."

"Yeah, I guess you’d want it empty for that," Josh laughed. "They don’t do that anymore, do they?"

"Naw, not for years," Danny laughed. "One of the chief local industries is watching the skies for UFOs."

"You’re kidding." Josh snorted.

"No, I’m not," Danny laughed, and explained about the two guys in the motel that spent the nights shivering out on Telegraph Peak, looking for the knockoffs of the UFO that supposedly crashed in Roswell about the time his father had been in high school.

"Boy, don’t that beat all?" Josh laughed. "You ever go out UFO watching with them?"

"I thought about it," Danny grinned. "It gets cold as shit out here in the desert at night, I thought it might be good training for coming back to Spearfish Lake. But after spending the last eight years in Florida, I’m not so sure how much I’m going to love freezing to death, and I don’t want to confront it until I have to."

"Aw, hell, this ain’t cold," Josh laughed. "Now Alaska, it does get cold there, sometimes."

"I’ll bet you have some stories to tell," Danny laughed.

"Yeah, a few," Josh replied. "We’ll have to get together some time and tell some of them. What with your UFO crazies, it sounds like you might have a few to tell, too."

Oh, Jeez, Danny thought. Yeah, I’m going to have the stories to tell. But will I ever dare tell them? For an instant, he remembered the summer he’d spent braking the rock train with Josh, the first summer Bud had let the both of them go out by themselves. There had been a girl up in Warsaw, a couple hours up the line, who they saw out sunbathing topless about every second or third day. They’d gotten a big charge out of that, teasing each other that they ought to go up to Warsaw some time and look her up, but they never had. Maybe sometime in an engine cab, he might be able to tell a story or two about the Redlite Ranch. But he’d have to stop and think about it. "Yeah, one or two," Danny said. "Nothing like you’ve got, I’m sure. Pushing quack herbal remedies doesn’t put together stories like running dog sleds across Alaska."

"That’s probably true," Josh agreed. "Well, it’ll be good to see you again, old buddy. I don’t want to put you off, but I have to get some paperwork done here, and then get out and get a few miles on some dogs for Phil. It’s not like I’m done doing dogs all the way."

"Yeah, have fun," Danny said. "Hell, maybe next winter I’ll be able to help you out with it some."

"Might be," Josh laughed. "Hey, good buddy, you take it easy, and don’t be pushing too many quarters into those slot machines."

"Haven’t put a quarter in one yet," Danny replied. "With any luck, I won’t ever do it. I’m financing this divorce on a credit card, and I don’t have the money to throw around. I’ll catch you around, maybe call in a few days or something."

"Do that," Josh said. "It’s been good talking to you. If you can get here enough before I go to Alaska, Tiff and I will have to have you out for dinner or something."

"Looking forward to it," Danny laughed.

He hung up the phone in a good mood. It wasn’t the perfect deal for going back to Spearfish Lake, but it was a foot in the door. And, apparently he still had one good and loyal friend left there. Things had changed a lot in the years since he’d known him well, and a lot of stuff had obviously happened that he hadn’t known about. But yeah, maybe he could go home again.

He let out a sigh, and glanced at his watch. If he headed over for breakfast now, maybe there’d be the chance to say goodbye to Patty before she headed out to Los Angeles on her break.