Tribute Piece

8/3/2019 Tribute Piece

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A Tribute

The folded yellow sheet of paper atop Terri Robersons crowded inbox

grabbed her attention. Plenty of assignment notes and memos from station

managers had piled up during her week of bereavement leave, but this one

seemed special. Her name only the first name was written across the top in

sloppy cursive with only one r the tell-tale sign that Big Roy, the managing

producer, had personally dropped it off. The note simply said see me ASAP. It

was her first day back, she had no make-up on, her dishwater blond hair fell

about her ears like old broom straws, and her wardrobe said tired, grieving

daughter more than ambitious reporter. She looked as professional as a loose

bag of potatoes, but she always answered to the top brass.

The trip from the cramped, musty reporters bull pen in the basement to

the fourth and highest floor of the network building outside Bismarck, South

Dakota was rarely eventful. Today, however, at least ten people, most of whom

Terri had never met, pulled her aside to offer condolences on her fathers

passing. She politely accepted their sentiments, knowing even strangers words

were genuine. Quite likely, none of them had met local celebrity Harold Range

Rider Roberson, but anyone growing up anywhere close to Bismarck knew the

name and knew his show. Countless thousands knew him that way, but to her,

he was a father first.

In the fourth-floor reception area, Terri accepted more sympathetic words


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from the middle-aged assistant at the desk who then buzzed her in to Big Roys

office. She smiled graciously and walked in. Her face felt sore from all the

smiling this week, and even though she was only 26 she felt wrinkles creasing

into her cheeks.

Big Roy Lattimer, managing producer of the fourth-largest independent

television network in South Dakota, sat behind an oversized desk, his round

form dwarfing the furniture. Hidden behind an opened newspaper, only a thick

pall of cigar smoke rising toward the cracked-open window offered evidence of

life. Once Terri walked in, the paper quickly came down and the mans jowls

rose in a big grin.

Well there, Terri Roberson Id guess, he said in a deep voice at a polite

volume, Welcome back, and let me tell you I am so terribly sorry about your

father. All my kids grew up watching your fathers show in the morning and

just loved him to bits I tell you. Even I must admit he was kind of like my

father too. He was family on the television for us, I must say. Sit down, sit

down, Terri may I call you Terri?

Yes, of course, she answered politely, settling in to a chair. Her

reporters instincts suggested something more than a formal condolence from

management. And thank you, I appreciate your kindness.

Big Roy rose from his desk and stepped around to offer Terri a

handshake, his thick hands dusty with newspaper ink. As she hesitated to

grasp his meaty, stained palms, he noticed the dinghy appearance and quickly


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drew out a handkerchief, wiping away the soot before extending his hand

again.

Sorry there, Terri. I started here on the newspaper side, and that inks

like baby powder for me. I forget how others dont always like getting it all over,

especially here on the television side of things. Shaking her hand, he smiled

with a toothy, sincere grin.

I understand, she answered modestly. Its not a problem, really. She

checked her hand afterward then discreetly wiped the dark grit on the back of

her black slacks.

Big Roy sat down in a neighboring chair that could barely hold his weight

and turned to face Terri, leaning forward to where his leather belt creaked and

his shirt buttons strained. Now, I wanted to tell you in person that the station

here wants to recognize your fathers many years of dedicated service. He put

35 years of his life into making Robersons Ranchthe single-most beloved kids

show around these parts, and its only right that we show our gratitude in

kind. We want to do a one-hour special dedicated to your father a tribute to

him and his fine work.

Terri felt a queasy excitement from the words, and her lower lip tightened

up. Her father had passed away just over a week ago, and her emotions had

been on constant display. Such a commemoration made her heart leap and her

cheeks grow warm, yet her instincts still said this was more than just a heres

what were doing, enjoy the moment get-together.


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Gathering up her composure and mopping away moist eyes, she spoke in

a mostly-controlled manner. Thats a lovely idea. I know he would appreciate

it, as do I. His fans meant so much to him. He loved their devotion.

Hehe, well, if I had my way wed show his old episodes nonstop. They

always cheered me up. That puppet, Elkie the Nervous Elk that one alone

made me laugh every time he started stuttering and stammering, being worried

about hu-hu-hunting season just never failed. All these years and I still get all

giggly when I hear well, lets say your dad was the best, entertaining kids of

all ages. His puppets were great, I must say. When he would aw, listen to me

going on. Im sorry, where was I?

Some form of tribute?

Of course, of course! Big Roy straightened his back and adjusted his

pants before again leaning forward. We want most of the special to be about

his show and the whole Ranch-hand Puppet Gang, but we know that a good

number of his fans who grew up with the show, well, theyre older now, and

they want to know about the man himself. Thats where you come in, Terri

may I call you Terri? Anyway, we want to do a five- or ten-minute segment of

life before The Ranch the life of Harold Roberson before he became Range

Rider Roberson. We want to do some on-screen interviews with you, your

brothers and sisters

Im an only child, she interrupted.

Oh, well, that saves time. Is your mother still around?


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Terri put a smile back on. She just got back to Ohio. I can make

arrangements

Well send a camera crew, Roy continued. A little time with her, some

of Harolds friends, telling some stories to get to know him. But theres

something more for you on this.

Aha! Her mind raced excitedly with the thought of some camera

exposure. Id be glad to do any air-time you want.

Hehe, he chuckled, I must say, it helps that youre more than just

Harolds daughter. Since youre a reporter, wed like you to coordinate the

research on this story. Our research teams tied up with the fall harvest

approaching, and this job would be an easy day in the park for you, given hes

your father and all. You know, yearbook pictures, a baby picture or a wedding

shot, some bio information, that stuff. And if you do it as a story like a

feature for print it would get you a nice byline.

Do the research on my father? Her elation yielded to a sense of

suspicion. That seems way too easy.

It is! Roy threw up both hands excitedly. Its a simple way to put a lot

of meat on your rsum. Im no fool any reporter in Bismarck worth their

weight has eyes on moving up to the big markets Dubuque, Omaha, Topeka.

With a little experience in research and production under the belt, those doors

open kinda fast. So, what do you say? Roy reached back across his desk with

an audible strain and reclaimed his cigar.


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Terri thought about her career ambitions and the opportunity seemed too

good to pass. Ill do it. I can do the background work this week, and polish

something up for next Monday.

Hehe, theres a team player! Roy wiped off his hand and grabbed hers,

shaking it vigorously to affirm the deal. Now, I only know a bit about his real

life, so Ill leave the shaping of the piece up to you all in your hands. But I do

know he was a war hero, and Id really like to see some of that in the piece

show the Midwest how Harold was a hero to our country as well as our

children.

At the mention of that one subject, Terri knew why her instincts had

been so edgy. Her father had kept Vietnam far from discussion. His black trunk

of mementos in the basement was due for incineration after he died in

accordance with his wishes. He had even rejected a military funeral. She

planned to burn the trunk in a bonfire next weekend, but now it conflicted with

her goal of career advancement. A good reporter used plenty of routes to get a

story, but a truly inspired reporter could detach from the subject and do what

the story required. Still, the subject was her father, and with his sudden death

after church only eight days ago, trying to detach for a while felt like a problem.

Well, she said hesitantly, my father really tried to leave the military in

the past. Terri forced her fidgeting feet to stay in one place. He was about

bringing happiness and joy to those around him. I think that time was a very

unhappy point in his life, and maybe its best left out. He said he still had


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things that no man should have if I got his words right. Maybe for that section

we could honor him with a simple little mention like he served admirably in

Vietnam.

Theres your angle, Terri! Roy rose to his feet faster than his legs had

ever lifted his 300-pound body. Thats it! Show the viewers how he shook off

that horrible war and brought something good to the kiddies here! He sat

down again, leaning forward and resting his fingertips just on the edge of her

knee. Now, I dont know one man who had a good time in a war, and Im sure

your father was no exception. And I must say I dont want you thinking Im not

showing respect for your father I loved the man though I never really knew

him well. I want you to handle this story because you can give this the love and

care it deserves that your father deserves. Hell, anyone could do this story,

but no one could give it the caring touch of family. It needs to be personal, and

it needs to express the man in all his glory. Just give the viewers a chance to

see all of him. Show them Harold Roberson. Show them your father.

Instincts still on edge, Terri considered the matter. The past few days

had been all a blur of family visits, last-minute arrangements, and plenty of

neighbors giving her more casseroles and muffin baskets than she could ever

stuff down. All through this, she had barely taken two minutes for her own

mourning. Perhaps this could allow her to finally express her grief. And if it

gave her an edge into cracking into the competitive Dubuque news market then

all the better.


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Ill take it, she said, placing her instincts on hold.

The house felt painfully empty without her father. The big farm house

was her only home. She had been born in the back room that became her

childhood bedroom. They renovated the third-floor attic into her writing nook

during high school, and after college she lived on the second floor as her

fathers renter. Now as the only soul in the huge house, she walked cautiously,

trying to leave everything the way he left it.

Pictures of his puppets covered the walls, usually next to him wearing

his Range Rider costume. Tall and rail-thin with a gentle smile, the puppets on

his lap seemed more animated than he had ever been. A few of his older

puppets sat quietly in curio cabinets, still bright and lively, unaware that

Harold had died. The whole house felt like a three-story Harold Roberson

museum, with her as the only patron. Everything remained pristine except for

the piles of casserole dishes and mini-muffin baskets in the kitchen. And then

there was the basement, which had been a restricted area all her life. She

walked in there with plenty of reservation.

She had already put together a nice biography childhood in Michigan,

education, early friends, and his fascination with puppets, drawing and

entertainment. The piece she wrote about him moving to South Dakota in the

early Seventies, getting married and starting a family worked nicely. She even


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incorporated her parents divorce smoothly without controversy. These two

pieces of his life offered the honesty Big Roy wanted, the real Harold Roberson.

But the absence of his military life was a huge gap in the story that demanded

attention. Now she sat under an exposed light bulb in the basement, facing a

black trunk, ready for the task.

Terri remembered a few occasions as a child when she snuck through

the house in the middle of the night. Drawn by the light under the stairway

door she would peek into the basement. On rare moments, he would be there,

sitting in the spot she sat in now, staring at the trunk just as she was. On

several occasions he had a bottle of scotch by his side, and once he had a

pistol on his lap. On those nights she felt a ghostly, evil presence in the tense

air. That feeling always sent her back to her dolls and teddy bears, crying from

a sudden sadness.

During her junior year in college, she put together enough courage to ask

her father why he even kept that trunk. After dinner one night, she asked him

why he hadnt thrown it in a lake years ago. His thin face went stoic and his

grey eyes drifted away from her. He only said one sentence before retreating to

his den. She remembered that sentence all through her life.

If a man tries to destroy the past, the past destroys the man.

Her fathers words echoed in her mind now as she gingerly tugged on the

latch. Old tape and corrosion broke away as the hinge moved, possibly for the

first time since it went into the basement. The latch sprung open, years of


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tension released, and the lid rose ever-so-slightly. Nervously guiding her hand

to the beaten leather handle, she breathed deep and thought about what a

great investigative reporter would do. Mustering up some courage, she pulled

up and unleashed whatever lay inside.

A part of her mind expected nothing less than dark apparitions and

howling spirits to swarm out a la Raiders of the Lost Ark, so the actual sight

was anticlimactic. A folded captains uniform caught her eyes, hat placed in the

center. Next to it lay two American flags folded into triangles, each with a set of

dog tags on top and bound with a black ribbon.

Terri was no war buff, but she knew what some of these things meant.

Black recognized a casualty, so the flags were probably those of friends he lost.

The dog tags had the names if she needed them. She suddenly saw her father

as a man who lost close friends in a war. That moment made things real. She

ignored why he had the flags and not the next of kin, and dug into the trunks

contents.

An array of holstered pistols and sheathed knives lay underneath more

than she thought one soldier would carry with boxes of ammo. She paused to

thank herself for not dragging this into a bonfire, or it would have created the

most gunfire in South Dakota since Wild Bill Hickok. Examining a knife, she

noticed notches in the hilt. Others had similar marks, as did the handguns.

Then she realized than her father may have probably had killed people. She

never associated her father as someone who had taken a life, and these extra


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dimensions gave her a new respect for her father, the soldier. Maybe Big Roy

had known this when he handed down this assignment. She dug further,

feeling a renewed curiosity to discover these many new facets of her father.

A set of velvet cases caught her eye and she popped them open, finding

exactly what she expected. The medals still had a beautiful luster. She

recognized the silver and bronze stars, but most of the others would require an

internet search. The only other familiar one was easy to recognize the Purple

Heart. Yesterday she had thought of him as only a father and the happy host of

a childrens show, yet today he became a soldier wounded in action. She did

not even know he ever experienced pain.

Underneath the weapons and medals lay a bundle of photographs and a

sealed manila envelope. The reporter in her wanted to snatch up the envelope

immediately, but as a daughter she picked up the photos to see the man before

he was her father.

Looking at the top picture, it took several seconds to recognize him. The

black-and-white pictures had excellent detail, revealing the off-center cleft in

his chin that gave him away. She always knew her dad as just north of six feet

tall, but this man in the photo was also broad-shouldered and easily in

muscular excess of 200 pounds. Her earliest memories of him never included

muscles. He had been a wiry, straw-boned man who might have touched 180

pounds when he carried his bowling ball. The man in the picture had a hard

jaw and strength in his face. He stood with arms over the shoulders of his


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shorter fellow soldiers, his presence dominating. He resembled a Hollywood

action hero more than someone whose clothes were always one size too big.

Her father action hero. The thought pleased her.

The back of the picture had a caption penned in his distinct, structured

cursive, Jake, me, Bobby and Deuce Base Camp. Others had him at

different locations, a Buddhist temple, an old bridge or some landmark of note.

One had him standing with a can of beer amidst waist-high stalks of

marijuana. American beer and the best weed in Asia, said the caption. She

squealed aloud in surprised delight at the thought of her dad getting stoned.

That part could be left out of the news, but it would go in her scrapbook.

Finally dragging out the envelope, she noticed it had been opened and

resealed. Addressed to this house, the postmark from Michigan was almost

thirty years old, with plenty of old postage stamps. The return address simply

read Bobby.

Terri felt as if she was twelve, sneaking into the liquor cabinet and

silently worrying about getting caught. She nervously looked about, as if

expecting her father to step out from the shadows and tell her to put it all

away. After a moment, she dismissed it as only wishful thinking and opened

the envelope, setting aside her sense of taboo.

Reaching inside, she drew out a thick manila file marked Classified with

a note jotted on a blank sheet of paper. It said simply, Captain, heres the

originals. Nobody knows. Its done. Bobby.


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Turning about the paper as if more words lay hidden on the sheet, Terri

rubbed her forehead from the ominous note. The context eluded her, so for now

she assumed this was what her father referred to as the things that no man

should have. Possession of classified documents made her father adventurous

now, and she felt more than ever like a reporter as she broke the files seal and

pulled out the inch-thick stack of papers.

On top sat his enlistment photo a portrait of a handsome, fresh-faced

young man in dress uniform. It would be a perfect lead-in picture for his

service time, with an eager grin and a full head of black hair. He looked like a

model. Flipping further, the next pages were a bureaucratic blur of forms and

facts, possibly orders or assignments, many of which contained plenty of

names and locations in Vietnamese and had a Confidential stamp in red ink

original papers. A few sheets were even commendations listing meritorious

service, courage under fire, personification of leadership under adverse

circumstances, and the submissions for his medals all approved. Terris eyes

watered in pride.

Deep into the sheaf, the style and format shifted from cheap military

carbon copy to bonded paper, the heading now citing a hospital in Hawaii. The

Purple Heart situation, she thought immediately, putting simple facts together

as any reporter would do. This was a part of his life she had never even known

existed, and she read the pages eagerly, trying to decipher the wealth of

military lingo and uncover more facts about her father.


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Terms like behind the lines infiltration, social disruption and

demoralization and engendering fear within enemy territory littered the

paragraphs of his recent history, concluding with extraction and relocation of

surviving forces for rehabilitation. The last words raised her eyebrows, and she

turned to the next page. What she saw in the black-and-white picture that

came next chilled her to the core.

It was her father in a hospital bed, the picture taken portrait-style like a

case study. Now he carried the thin features of the father she grew up with, but

his gaunt face carried an unexplainable malevolence. His slight smile cut into

his cheeks with wicked curves, turning an easy-going grin into a lopsided

sneer. Once-short hair had grown wild, gray shocks cutting haphazardly

through the black morass that fell over his ears. And his eyes, usually so

soulful and caring, had sunk back behind heavy eyelids. Combined with thick

eyebrows and a slight forward lean, the shadows turned his eyes black, without

reflection or spark. He looked sinister, almost evil.

That cant be him, she said aloud. Flipping over the picture, she gasped

upon seeing his name written on the back.

Digging into the pages, medical terms swarmed through her head.

Phrases like psychosis, homicidal mania and extreme detachment disorder

leapt at her, capturing her attention and forcing her to turn the page only to be

struck by more disturbing notes. She only found sanctuary upon coming

across hand-written pages secured into the file and in her fathers


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penmanship. His caricatures and playful doodles filled the margins, offering

much-needed refuge from the medical psychobabble that confused her so. She

read into his notes in hopes of feeling the warm hug that was his voice and

wisdom. Each entry showed another facet of the man her father had become,

and a part of her fond memories died with each passage.

Villagers didnt scare much when we snuck in at night and ripped apart a

few old men it didnt really shake things up like we wanted. When we really

turned up the heat though, and one morning those gooks found a pile of their

women hacked up in the center on the road, some real fear set in.

Her eyes could not leave the page. She read the entry again looking for

words she had misread or interpreted wrong, but no other explanation leapt off

the sheet. The words only grew more bitter as she continued.

I cant stand anyone calling them gooks even human,a further entry

said. They sure dont scream like humans. Knife them in their gut and they

squeal this high whine like a damn pig. Leave one skinned up and dying out in a

field, and it just whimpers like a dog. Whatever the hell they are, human aint it.

The penmanship showed skill and control, not the frenzied scrawling of a

madman, yet these inhuman thoughts lay on the page before her, written by

someone she knew as the most humane person on Earth.

All the scaring and demoralization of these native fucks cant win the

damn war. We should start a fire in Saigon and push those flames clear to Hanoi.

Burn every animal alive, every pathetic dog, cat, warthog, tree and bush! Put


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every damn slant-eye into the fire!

Terri felt a level of disgust she had never known, and could not believe

she directed it at her father. Her mind wanted sorely to think this was a bad

dream or a twisted prank some file of military misinformation in her hands.

Yet here it was, as true and honest as anything she knew. The handwriting was

her fathers. The caricatures in the margins and on the bottom of the pages

were his style. But then she looked closer at the cartoons and her hands

started shaking.

Each little face or inked scene displayed some unspeakable perversion.

Two soldiers roasted marshmallows over a burning person. Disemboweled

people with exaggerated Asian features hung by their necks off the loops in

his js and gs. When she saw the penned-in character of her father sitting in a

chair, happily talking with two mutilated bodies on his lap held like puppets,

Terri suddenly threw up.

This task had become torture. The file in her hand was a book she did

not want to read, a movie she wanted to walk out on. Her father, the mild-

mannered Range Rider Roberson from Robersons Ranch, had in one night

changed into the heroic John Rambo from First Blood, and then into Colonel

Kurtz from Apocalypse Now. And yet she knew that somehow her father had

moved beyond some self-destructive destiny. Somewhere lay a happy ending to

this story, and her inner journalist would see it through.

Picking up the file and brushing off stray drops of vomit, she went to the


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end. His general discharge papers offered little hint, but just before them lay a

final copy of hospital notes, and one sheet on hospital letterhead with her

fathers writing. There were no cartoons, just sentences written like prose, and

she ventured carefully into the words.

Instead of her Monday morning routine of searching the news wire, Terri spun

a quarter on top of her desk, the computer monitor already switched to the

screen saver, her coffee untouched for the past twenty minutes. A bankers box

sat by her feet, her few personal effects and some stolen office supplies neatly

stashed away. She had thoroughly prepared for the inevitable.

Over the last few days she had digested what she could of her fathers

records and wrote the only story that felt right. The news anchors had

interviewed her on camera for their own pieces, and she put forth a noble smile

while answering their questions. She offered an anecdote here, an old saying

there, but felt like a stand-in actress playing Harold Robersons daughter. Her

smile was a veneer, her happiness a faade covering what she truly felt a

numbing emptiness. Hopefully someone in editing could make her seem

believable.

Last night she stayed up until midnight putting together the last pieces

of her submission and resisting the urge to break into the scotch or start

smoking again. The piece ran for four-thousand words, give or take, from his


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birth forward, and she saved it just after midnight. She fell to sleep at her little

desk in the third-floor attic, knowing it was her best work ever.

And she knew Big Roy would hate it.

She spun her quarter again on the desk, glancing at the clock as the coin

spun about. It was 8:20 in the morning, so the story her copy, brief notes and

her fathers enlistment photo had been in Roys hands for twenty minutes at

most. She had dropped off the story prior to Roys eight-oclock arrival, made a

photocopy, went to her desk, packed her things then spun the coin while

waiting for his response and her inevitable dismissal. On her 43rd spin of the

quarter, her phone rang. It was Roys assistant, calling her up to his office.

With the quiet acceptance of the condemned, she went to the elevator and her

fate.

Roys assistant silently gestured Terri toward the office door and she

walked in, not bothering to knock. Big Roy paced about in front of his desk

with the most animated steps she had ever seen. One hand held her copy in

front of his face, the other scrubbing over his scalp in either frustration or

anger. As she answered, his response was immediate.

Now Terri may I call you Terri? he asked as a formality, I thought we

had ourselves a little sit-down here and you were gonna hand me a good story

with a goddamn hero in it! Wheres my goddamn hero?

So Im fired? Her voice matched her tired, sagging eyelids and hang-dog

expression.


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Fired? Why the fu just sit down for a moment here, he ordered,

waving her to the same chair she used just last week. She sat down, quietly

awaiting his next outburst.

Now, this is good work good work I must say, but I cant let you gloss

over big parts with just a little sentence like He riffled through the copy,

searching for the particular section that infuriated him so. Yeah! Right here!

Like saying, he served admirably in Vietnam. I cant let you get away with

that! Where did he serve? What unit? Did he earn a medal? Give me something

I can use!

Terri let out a deep, exasperated sigh, too tired to fight though aware of a

brewing anger. I think it works fine. Its brief, to the point, and says everything

the viewers need to know.

This show isnt some need-to-know piece, Roy fumed. Were trying to

tell his fans all about the man things theyd want to know about their own

kinfolk!

Maybe Dad didnt want them to know about things, she replied,

keeping herself contained. Hes still entitled to a few secrets.

Theyre his fans, theyll love him no matter what you say!

No, they wont, she exploded. I was his biggest fan, and Im not sure

how I feel about him now! My own father! You wanna know what I found out?

Do you want to know?

Roy stammered for a second, so Terri rolled over his attempt to talk. I


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found a man who was as honorable and outgoing as anyone youd want to

meet, and he got thrown into a place no man should be! I found a man who got

consumed by everything our society abhors! I found out that my father the

man who I saw as an upstanding model for everyone around him was the

shattered fragments of someone else entirely! He was just wreckage!

Big Roy shrank back to his own chair, fearing the woman who didnt

quite stand up to his nose. Listen there, Terri may, may I call you

She stood up, drawing a photocopy from her pocket and waving it in his

face. Let me tell you the last thing he wrote in the service! This is everything

he thought about his time over there! She unfolded the copy and read the

oratory aloud, trying to keep her voice down and remembering to breathe.

I think of my last six months in country, and it feels like someone else has

possessed my body. I had a dream the other night and many nights prior that I

existed within the body of a madman. This horrible person did unspeakable

things, and I could not control him but only watch his terrible actions. I could

neither turn away from the carnage nor wake up from this terror. As much as it

frightened me though, I recognized that the dream was not a nightmarish

convulsion, but memories that I both desire to forget and insist on keeping forever

in my mind.

The conclusion I have come to from these dreams that I can no longer call

nightmares is that when I experience them, I am not the madman. I am also not

the terrified witness. I am the dream itself the embodiment of that world. I am


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both the torturer and the persecuted, I am the rage and the fear, the hunter and

the prey. For all the evil I am capable of and have committed, I hope I am equally

able to offer in compassion and humility. I have lived in one extreme and

returned, and while I hope to never know that world again, I have to accept that it

always exists within me, and it is in my capacity to travel there if I do not keep

myself in check.

There is nothing I can do to change the past it is tragically, indelibly

etched into the universe. I can only hope that in this, my final testimony as a

soldier, lies some evidence that I can be a better man in the future. If I never

reach that state, then let it be said that I tried, and I pray mercifully for the fires of

hell to consume me quickly so my suffering can be over. Captain Harold

Roberson

Her breath totally spent, she collapsed into an exhausted heap in the

chair, head in hands, too drained to cry. Silence filled the room, the only sound

the low creak of the floor panels underneath Big Roys feet. She felt so worn out

that even if Roy were to suddenly plunge through the floor and down to

accounts receivable, she had no strength to jump back in panic.

Terri, Roy finally said, not going through his redundant formalities,

maybe it wasnt my best idea to dump all this on your shoulders. Im not

saying you couldnt do the job hell, you did some fine work with all kinds of

good writing but sometimes people arent meant to know too much about

their heroes. I must say I do feel horrible that you found out things you didnt


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need to know about your father. I know I cant change any of that, but maybe

its best we run your write-up just the way it is. Terri nodded silently, still

devoid of energy. And I must say, he added, holding up Harolds enlistment

photo, your father was a handsome young man.

Yes, he was back then, Terri answered, not yet looking directly at Roy.

But I think Ill just remember him with about fifty less pounds, a little less

hair and a lot more compassion. He never wanted me to know who he was

before I was born, and I think Im going to respect that. You can keep the photo

if you want.

Roy looked at the picture, tapped it a couple of times against the copy in

his hands, and smiled. Walking softly past Terri, he placed a gentle hand

against her shoulder and patted it once. Stay there as long as you need, Terri.

Youve earned it. He went around to his desk, keeping quiet about the gritty

smudge now on the shoulder of her blouse.

Before too long, the network ran its one-hour special tribute: Harold Roberson:

Life on the Range featuring Range Rider Roberson and the Ranch-hand

Puppet Gang. In the local market ratings it was a smash success, and other

networks throughout the Dakota region called for rebroadcast rights

immediately after it aired. Network executives decided to show it periodically,

probably around Thanksgiving, to recognize how Harold Range Rider

Roberson had shaped the youth of the area into fine citizens. The network


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recognized him as a hero, and wanted to honor him accordingly. And as the

credits rolled after every broadcast, one part toward the end said, Research

Coordinator: Terri Roberson.

The only thing that the fans ever found out about Harold Robersons

military life was that he served admirably in Vietnam. That was everything

they needed to know, and nobody ever complained.

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