After the Bighorn Chapter Three: 'An unexpected Death', by Tracker

 

Shocking News comes to the Lazy F.

 

Early in the morning on July 14th shocking news came to the Lazy F.  Willard Frick, head of the Family had been murdered in London. (Steel Worlds, Chapter 28).  Despite the early hour, the Fricks on the ranch were already up and at breakfast, setting the tasks for the day.  The news pushed all that to the side. Woodrow Frick and his uncle Wilson set out immediately to see to the security of the Lazy F.  Every man capable of bearing arms was on high alert. Around mid-afternoon, Wilson and Woodrow met alone in Wilson’s office.  The meeting was grim, and the two men were wary of each other.

 

Wilson began.  “I have talked to Cousin Wyandotte Frick in Pittsburgh.”

 

“I as well.”

 

“Then you know the situation.  It was some kind of power play by the folks in London. They have been getting above themselves and denied Willard his rightful tribute.  And then they killed him with the Families Council on the line.”

 

Woodrow looked grim and strained.  “He was my father.  I need to take vengeance.”

 

“The Ubar of the North American Families will exact vengeance.  We need to pick a new leader for the Family. Urgently. The Family needs a leader.  My brother Willard left no son.”

 

“He left me!”

 

“Willard did not marry your mother. That matters on Earth.”

 

“They were Free Companions when I was born.”

 

“Except for those who have been to Gor, they don’t understand that.  Wyandotte understands, I understand, you understand, but the rest of the Family does not understand that, not in their bones.  Even many of the council do not understand and we need a leader tonight. London may take further action; our less friendly friends on the council may try to diminish us. Willard was removed from the council; we need someone who can push to have the Head of the Family back on the council. Otherwise, our interests suffer. Most of the rest of the cousins are too old or too weak. We need a leader right now.”

 

“Do you seek the Headship?”

 

Wilson shook his head. “I have been out of things here on the ranch, not in the centre of things at Willard’s right hand like Wyandotte was.  I have just called Wyandotte and let him know I will support him. I am to have more autonomy here on the Lazy F and it is to become our main shipping point.  London and Europe in general know too much about our Pittsburgh operation.”

 

Woodrow leaned back.  He relaxed a bit. It seemed a fight that he was braced for might not occur.

 

“Before I came into the office, I called Wyandotte as well.  I have pledged him my support. He is the only logical choice. As you yourself said, you have been out of things here on the ranch.  We need someone who can reclaim our rightful place on the council.  I just hope he is strong enough. He has mostly operated as a counsellor and aide to Willard.  He is going to have to lead now, not be an administrator. He will have to manoeuvre to regain our rightful seat on the Council of the Families; in our time of weakness, our rivals will try to take advantage.

 

As for me, leaving aside Free Companionship vs Marriage, I am too young at twenty-four, and have been away on Gor for eight years. I don’t know our operation, or the Council. It must be Wyandotte.”

 

Both men were more relaxed now that there wasn’t going to be fight for the Leadership.

 

Wilson poured them both drinks.

 

“There is one thing I want to know, really, I need to know.  I didn’t ask you before, it didn’t matter with Willard alive. How did you get to Gor?  You had no ring; Willard had the Frick ring.  No one has been to Gor since Wyandotte returned over fifteen years ago.”

 

“I used the McMurtry Ring.”

 

“In the name of the Priest-Kings, who are the McMurtrys?”

 

“They were one of the original North American families, going back to the beginning, like the Fricks or the Bannons.  My mother was the last of the McMurtrys. She was at least fifteen years older than he when I was born.  Then Willard terminated the Free Companionship when a better alliance came along. His new wife didn’t want a bastard baby under foot, so I was left with my mother, while Willard formed his disastrous first marriage.”

 

“Do you blame him for that?”

 

“No, my mother did, she was a woman, emotional. I understood he needed to make the best alliance for the Family.”

 

Woodrow nodded.  Women can be emotional; men need to understand strength and power.

 

“My mother was getting sick as she grew older and sent me to my father when I was twelve.  The first wife was gone by then. Mother died when I was fourteen.  When I was sixteen, a lawyer sent me a packet. In it was information about her family and a ring. I had been spending my summers on the ranch, one night I took the ring and summoned a ship to Gor. I was there eight years.  I was a warrior and a rider of Tarns.”

 

Both men took a sip of their drinks.  Wilson was entranced by the romance of the story.  He had been to Gor for a short period but had never ridden a Tarn. Woodrow went on.

 

“So, while Wyandotte stabilizes the strength of the Family after this disaster, and fights his way back on the council, and you run our operation here on the Lazy F, I suggest I travel around to our cousins, our Friends, and our assets to put the Family into fighting trim. We have become complacent and need to retire retainers and cousins who have grown too old or too soft. We must harden ourselves for the coming struggles to remake Earth and claim our rightful place in the new Order.”

 

“The Council would never have dared to remove Willard from its ranks if the family was stronger.”

 

Wilson demurred, “Willard was strong, we have strength here.”

 

Woodrow shook his head, “But there was no strength behind him.  He was a force, but he needed a phalanx of spearmen behind him. On the Lazy F, we had strength enough to resist attack, but not enough to go on offence.  We need power to attack, power to influence, and though my father would not admit it, we need friends and allies.”

 

Wilson nodded again. He was naturally taciturn; he was not the kind to influence a council with words.

 

The younger Frick took another sip. Talking was thirsty work.

 

“Another thing I want to do is find out what happened to the McMurtry money.  There was a lot of it, but little enough ended up in my mother’s estate.  Collateral cousins and dodgy trustees, I suspect.”

 

Wilson nodded.  “Thank you for filling me in on your story.  But you left out one important thing.  What City? To what city are the McMurtrys connected?  Our Frick connection is Glorious Ar, the greatest on Gor, as befits our standing; but what city for the McMurtrys?”

 

Woodrow laughed. It was a private joke he had been waiting years to share.  “It is Ko-ro-ba.  The darling of the Priest-Kings, enemy of Ar, and Home City of that posturing pirate, Tarl Cabot. And one of the Great Families of North America right under their nose.”

 

The two men smiled, finding humour even on this tragic day.

 

Then the phone rang.  Wilson answered and listened, his face becoming grave.

 

“With Willard dead, a patent troll from Silicon Valley has attacked our patents.  This could cost us hundreds of millions.”

 

“It would really weaken us.  How do we fight this off, with all our other problems.”

 

The answer came to them both at once.

 

“We have a Friend who is a patent attorney.  Let us see what his friendship is worth.”

 

“Patrick Skull-Ax”

 

“Patrick of San Francisco.”

 

Wilson picked up the phone.  That night Patrick Masters left for Pittsburgh to do battle on his favourite battleground.

 

 

Legal Combat with Vincent VanRijn

 

Patrick Masters’ Narrative

 

I took the redeye to Pittsburgh.  Wilson Frick apologized for not sending their private jet, but Woodrow was also on his way to Pittsburgh. I noticed in a small section of the San Francisco Chronicle that the old Grand Duke of Lutha had died.  I made a note to send letters of condolence to the Prime Minister, Count Rupert, and to the new Grand Duchess.  She is a young woman; I hope she has the sense to leave important matters in the hands of older and wiser men.

 

As I got out some of the legal papers on the Frick vs VanRijn case, I felt a pang of sadness for being away from Juli.  I truly leave her deeply, and so much more now she is in a collar.  Our relationship is so much better now it accords with the natural order.  Our bliss is great.

 

Business Class on the plane was not crowded. I had a row to myself.  A young woman, a stewardess, or as they say now, a flight attendant, welcomed me to the flight.  She was quite beautiful and not at all dismissive and snippy as was the other stewardess, a fake blonde with the name of Scarlett.  The name likely as phony as the blonde hair and the dismissive attitude.  She would be saving herself for a rich man.  With only seven passengers in Business Class, neither Scarlett nor her brown-haired colleague were overworked. Scarlett concentrated on two young men with open shirts, golden chains and loud voices.  They were trying to give off an aura of entitled wealth, and fake as they were, they fooled Scarlett into fawning all over them.  The other girl, Leigh, according to her name-tag, looked after me and the other passengers with quiet, self-effacing efficacy.  She seemed to have a kind smile. As I had done with greater frequency since I had returned from the Bighorn, I considered them both as possible captives.  Scarlett was the obvious candidate for a collar, but it seemed that Leigh might in time make the better kajira.  But for now, she seemed to be a proper young free woman.  

 

I wrote my letters of condolence to the Luthans on the death of their Grand Duke and put them in envelopes to mail when we landed. I then sent an email to Jerry Reiss, offering him temporary employment organizing the defence of the Frick Patents from my San Francisco office.  He is a hard worker and very organized and it will be good to get him away from that bitch Maya for a while.

 

At the Pittsburgh airport I was met by a young man who introduced himself as Zach Frick.  He looked about eighteen or so.

 

“I thought all the Fricks first name started with W, no offence of course, but I am curious.”

 

He grinned, I was to learn he was always grinning, as though he found life to be huge joke.

 

“Oh, that’s just the main branch, I am just a lowly second cousin. I help out running errands and doing odd jobs while I study for the bar exam.”

 

“You seem awfully young for that.”

 

“I am older than I look, I turn twenty-one next week.  I went to college early, then law school. I am supposed to be quite smart, but really I work hard, though I seem irresponsible.”

 

I could not help liking him, he was so irrepressible.  He stopped chattering and I studied some of the legal papers in the lawsuit which was opportunistic but meretricious. VanRijn was clever and unscrupulous, so defeating him would be difficult.  He likely would want to be paid money to go away, but my impression of the Fricks was that they were fighters. I expected them to decline that option.

 

I looked up as Zach Frick drove the car to the front door of a sprawling brick mansion. Like Drysdale House, it was of the Nineteenth Century, likely built by the same sort of Robber Baron.  From what I had seen on the Lazy F, I was sure it had facilities and kennels for the keeping and training of slaves and female beasts.  I hoped to get ideas for further improvements to Drysdale House while I was here.

 

Zach surprised me by getting my luggage and briefcase from the trunk.  I had expected to stay downtown, near the Frick offices, and to set up my team so we were close to all the papers of the Frick Companies.  I looked at Zack and raised an eyebrow.

 

That young imp just grinned.  Then he relented.  

 

“This was the great man’s house - Willard Frick’s place.  It has been occupied by the Head of the Family for a hundred and fifty years. Cousin Wyandotte will be moving in, and he wants you close for discussions that it would not be prudent to have in the offices where there are too many ears.  A great one for prudence and caution is Cousin Wyandotte.”

 

As we walked towards the entrance, the two great doors opened, each by a young, healthy woman, barely clad, with lovely legs and bosoms straining the front of the thin short dresses they wore.  The loose weave and the tightness of the material displayed them well. As we entered, they sank very gracefully to their knees, opening their thighs wide and sitting back on their heels, thrusting out their breasts. They were breathtakingly gorgeous.  Their collars, for of course they wore collars, had black ribbons woven around them, in token, I supposed, of mourning their slain master. I considered that much as I loved my own slave Juli, she needed further training in graceful movement from someone who was more than a novice.  They were, in their collars and training, so much superior to the stewardesses on the airplane. I was sure Scarlett needed a collar; I wondered if Leigh was too much the dignified free woman for a collar.

 

A dignified black clad woman of middle age approached us.  The two door slaves moved their legs together.  She glanced at them.

 

“Close the doors, you stupid girls, our guests are inside.  Just because the Master is dead is no reason to get slack.  It will be the switch for you if you fail in decorum again.”

 

The two girls looked frightened.  And she did seem very formidable. Her long black dress entirely covered her legs, torso and arms to the wrists.  A little bit of white lace at the throat was the only relief from the entirely black costume she wore.  Her face showed her grief.

 

“Welcome to Frick House.” She began but we were interrupted.

 

Another woman clad in black was coming down the grand staircase.  Her dress was tight, and quite short, like a black widow in a 1940s film noir trying to con the judge and jury into giving her the benefit of the doubt.  She had great legs.

 

“This is unacceptable.  Wyandotte shall not have my house.  I am my father’s heir, his only legitimate child.  I am the Tatrix of the Fricks.”

 

The last words were almost in a shout.

 

The older woman slapped her face.  Then slapped it again.

 

“Chelsea Frick, you shut your mouth.  Behave yourself.  The Fricks are led by men, strong men, not silly girls.  You shame yourself; you shame this house with such antics.  You go upstairs, you wash off that whore’s make-up, and you dress yourself properly.  Then you come down and beg these gentleman’s pardon.  On your knees.”

 

Chelsea Frick was crying. She turned and ran up the stairs.

 

The severe woman turned back to Zack and me.  

 

“I am sorry you had to see that.  The poor girl was distraught with grief.”

 

It seemed to me that Chelsea had been full of anger and self-pity, not grief, but I accepted the lie at face value.

 

“I am the housekeeper, Mrs Magruder.  Please come this way.”

 

She led us into what I imagine was the formal parlour when the house was built.  The two girls followed and, when we were seated, they knelt by the fireplace.  I tried not to stare.  Mrs Magruder had the two girls serve us coffee.  It was so gracefully done it took my breath away.  They went to a side table, where there was a carafe of coffee, and two china coffee mugs, and silver containers for milk and sugar.  The carafe, the creamer and the sugar bowl were all of silver, with silver tongs for the sugar.  One of the girls, asked how I took my coffee, then held the china cup up between her breasts, slightly warming the cup.  As she pushed the cup against the thin material, it stretched it more, clearly delineating her curves.  She then put in the milk, I don’t take sugar, and filled the cup with coffee, bringing the cup against her chest then raising it up to me from her knees. The coffee was good too.  I wondered if I would be given the opportunity to console this pretty morsel in her grief for her master.

 

Zach Frick was then served in the same way.  The girls left the room to return to the door.  Zach and I sipped our coffee.  He finished his quickly and excused himself to be about other errands for the family.  This left me alone with Mrs Magruder.  After an awkward silence, Mrs Magruder spoke again.

 

“Willard Frick was a great man.  You didn’t know him, I understand.  He was a force of nature. A True Man.”

 

I could hear her capitalize the last words.

 

She leaned forward. She was under a great deal of stress.

 

“I have worked in this house for the Fricks for thirty years.  I don’t know where I will go now.”

 

I didn’t say anything.  I didn’t want to break the thread of her thought.  

 

“Mr Wyandotte has his own housekeeper, one used to his ways.  I expect he will want to have her take over here and serve him.  I expect I shall be sent to the ranch in retirement.  I don’t know if I am ready for that.”

 

It was likely the first time in her thirty years in this house that a personal emotional confession had broken her reserve.  I did not embarrass either of us by saying anything.  We sat in silence sipping coffee until we were interrupted.

 

The girl, Chelsea Frick, came into the room.  Her face was bare of makeup, but angry marks showed where she had been slapped.  She wore much more modest clothing and looked younger than the termagant who had raged about the unfairness of not being made head of the family.  She begged my pardon most humbly for her display.  It is always pleasant to have a woman kneeling in front of you.  She kissed my hand as I granted her pardon. Her demeanour was humble, but her eyes showed how much she hated kneeling and begging pardon.  She then rose and knelt in front of Mrs Magruder, thanking her for her discipline and bringing her to her senses.

 

I did not show it, not in the House of the Fricks, but I thought how suited Chelsea Frick was to being on her knees, how good she would look, collared and naked, her curves displayed for the appreciation of men, her body trembling in submission and need.  I thought how good she would look; the tips of her breasts quivering in anticipation and need.

 

Of course, to even think such a thing about a daughter of the Fricks was a severe disrespect to the House and a free woman. No Friend of the Fricks could contemplate dishonouring them by collaring Chelsea.  But it was clear to me that, like the stewardess, Scarlett, Chelsea Frick belonged in a collar.

 

I could hear the front doors open in the entrance hall and the door slaves greeting Wyandotte Frick.  I rose to meet my new client and thrust ideas of Chelsea Frick caressing my manhood from my mind.