Mad Dog and Englishman: A Mad Dog & Englishman Mystery #1 (Mad Dog & Englishman Series) Read Free Page B

emerging ethnic pride than nostalgia for lost youth, though. Somewhere about the time he began to contemplate his own mortality, Harvey Edward Maddox became Harvey Edward Mad Dog, born-again Cheyenne.
    “How’d you know it was me?” Mad Dog asked the shadow in the truck’s cab.
    “Who else would do something this silly? Besides, I recognized your Saab parked down at the corner. Which brings me back to my original question. What the hell are you doing?”
    “Vision quest.”
    “Say what?”
    “Vision quest. You got a problem with that? This is a public park and I’m a member of the public. You gonna tell me I need a permit to sit here and fast and pray for a vision?”
    John Stewart finished explaining why you can’t go back to Kansas and the sheriff thought he had a point as he reached over and turned the CD off. The only sounds that remained were the smooth idle of the pickup’s 350 cubic inch V-8 and the stirring of gentler than usual morning breezes through the park’s trees.
    “No. Especially not until somebody complains, which they may well do when they start arriving for services at the church just across the street here. I’m not gonna give a damn what you do in this park. You know me, Mad Dog. I’ve got a strong commitment to individual liberties, so long as they don’t interfere with anybody else’s.”
    “Well then, Englishman, you’ll excuse me if I get back to setting up my stuff. I want to get started long before sunrise.”
    The sheriff hated being called Englishman, which was one of the reasons Mad Dog so consistently used the nickname. Given his own name, English, and his relationship to Mad Dog, it was a natural. Folks all over Benteen County knew who you were talking about if you mentioned Englishman.
    “Mad Dog, you are about the contrariest person I ever knew.”
    The sheriff didn’t see the big smile that lit his older brother’s face. The Cheyenne were known for their Contraries. They were the fiercest warriors, men who chose the difficult task of living their lives backwards, doing the opposite of what they were asked, always fighting alone on the flanks of battle and taking the biggest risks. Being a Contrary was an awesome responsibility and a tremendous honor. Mad Dog was delighted with his little brother’s comment, regardless of how he’d meant it.
    “Vision quest,” the sheriff muttered as he reached over to punch John Stewart’s
Phoenix Concerts
back into stereophonic life. He put the truck in gear and headed down the street toward the Benteen County Courthouse.
    ***
     
    A magnificent sunrise was followed, shortly, by the arrival of a goodly portion of the citizens of greater Buffalo Springs. Parking was haphazard around the town square, there being no marked spaces. Some folks preferred parallel, others pulled in straight, but most favored an angle related to the direction from which they’d arrived or in which they intended to depart.
    The area in front of the Buffalo Springs Non-Denominational Community Church, and, across the street, bordering the Veteran’s Memorial Park in which Mad Dog was conducting his first annual summer vision quest, drew a heavy crowd—thanks to Mad Dog, one heavier than usual. At the opposite end of the square, the immediate vicinity of Bertha’s Diner drew a slightly larger multitude, evidence that feeding the soul ranked behind feeding the body in Benteen County.
    Mad Dog’s modified lotus position behind the cow skull drew the curious, but he maintained his solemn and unresponsive vigil, despite a disconcerting tendency for residents to recognize him in what he had expected would be, if not a disguise, at least major camouflage. He drew a larger crowd than he might have since the Reverend Simms failed to show for services, but, as the sun began to beat the dusty square instead of merely illuminate it and the usual stiff breeze failed to materialize, the Reverend’s contingent headed either for home or Bertha’s. By late morning,