Sanctuary by Gary D. Svee

see those shacks or those red-skinned ghosts anymore.… There might be a lesson in that.”
    â€œI just want to rent some land for a garden,” Mordecai replied.
    Topple cocked his head and squinted at the preacher. He scratched the back of his neck without taking his eyes off Mordecai. “Well … Mary Dickens would be most sympathetic, but I don’t know what good that’ll do you. Mary came here from back east—Connecticut, I think—and got involved in the Women’s Christian Temperance Union. When a couple of seats opened on the council, the union decided it was time for a woman councilman. Mary was the only one wasn’t married and didn’t have a husband weighing her down, so they picked her.”
    â€œAlthough the women in the union couldn’t vote, they put posters all around town that said, ‘If you don’t vote for Mary Dickens, you don’t know beans—yet’”
    â€œAll the men were laughing about that until they found out what it meant. The ladies served them beans—just beans—morning, noon, and night, for a week. Said if Mary wasn’t elected, they’d be eating nothing but beans until they sprouted.”
    â€œMen had a big meeting down in the saloon, but wasn’t anything they could do about it, so Mary won. Got more votes than the mayor.”
    â€œBut the first night she took her seat on the council, Mayor Barnaby rose on a point of order. Said that Mary had won fair and square, but since she was a woman, she would not be allowed to vote. You should have seen those women in the audience fume, but—” Topple shrugged.
    â€œSo Mary sits on the council, but she can’t vote. You wanted the name of someone on the council? She’d be the most sympathetic, but she has about as much influence as those ‘ghosts’ down by the dump. Mayor Barnaby struts and frets his piece on the stage, but only that. The real push and shove on the council is Anthony Goodnight, but he’s one of the marchers in the Reverend Eli’s church, and he isn’t likely to smudge his soul dealing with haunts.”
    â€œI know he won’t deal with a ‘blasphemer.’” The lines in Topple’s forehead deepened, and his eyes almost disappeared as he studied the preacher’s face. “Didn’t take long for that story to get around town.
    â€œMary’d be your best bet,” Topple concluded. “She’d take great pleasure in putting one across on those stiff-necks after what they did to her.”
    Topple pulled a gold, hunting-cover watch from his pocket. “Mary teaches school. Classes are out in about fifteen minutes. School’s on that bluff overlooking the river on the northwest edge of town. She’ll either be there or in the teacherage out back—nowhere else for her to go.”
    Outside, Judd pressed himself against the back wall of the printing shop, willing himself into the pores of the unpainted wood, willing himself invisible.
    Time stretched until it sang like a telegraph wire in a winter wind. Why was the preacher taking so long? Why had Judd agreed to wait?
    With his ear pressed against the back wall of the Bugle building, Judd could hear the rumble of voices inside, but he couldn’t understand what they were saying.
    A moment ago, the back door of the haberdashery next to the printing shop had opened and the owner dragged a barrel of waste paper into the alley. He had glanced in Judd’s direction, but his eyes were empty as the eyes of the catfish the boy sometimes caught in the Milk River.
    Still, when the door to the haberdashery closed, Judd could hear the latch click shut. Perhaps the owner sensed that invisible people were about and that his goods were in jeopardy.
    Judd shivered. He should have known better than to follow the preacher into such peril. To be in the middle of town in daylight was too risky.
    Judd wanted to run, but to run was even