"Barkeep!" barked the stranger. "Get me a bottle of your finest Croatian moonshine, and I mean pronto!"

The barkeep turned away abruptly to hide his disdain. "Americans," he muttered, only half to himself. They were transparent to him by now, with their shoulder holsters, their luggage tags, their laissez-faire haircuts. This one was probably already half-drunk, a shallow dish of rumballs nearly empty before him. "Nina," he called back to the kitchen, "we've got Americans again."

"Oh Christ," replied his contractually unmarried life partner. "We only just got rid of the last ones." Her voice was calm, but her anger manifested itself through her fingertips and later, the knedles would be wonderfully tart with the subtle flavor of fury. "Tell them we're closed for the season."

The barkeep nodded and pulled a warm Grolsch from the cabinet, knowing the American would never know the difference. "Here you be, guv'nor," he said, turning back to the bar. "Be careful, or she may burn ye on the way down." The Philly accent was intentional, if not exactly authentic. The stranger appeared not to notice the dialect, but he was unfortunately just cosmopolitan enough to recognize beer when he tasted it.

"D'oh! Bart! This is beer, you lowlife mongrel!" The stranger lunged over the bar and the currencies of a handful of nations sprayed from his pockets to spin in circles around the floor of the inn. The barkeep stepped back, but he was wedged between the liquor cabinet and the chocolate safe and there was nowhere to run.

BLAM! The shotgun blast left one suitcase a tangle of debris, Christmas ornaments glistening as they fluttered aimlessly through the air. Nina pumped the action expertly with one hand as the stranger realized that it was getting rather late, wasn't it and he really must be getting on, thanks all the same. He ducked out door and vanished into the dusk. Outside, the rain was silent and unimaginative, a gentle hammer in the fist of history, unchanged since the dawn of man.

"Thank you, dear," said the barkeep.

"Don't mention it, babe," said Nina. "Somebody's got to keep it real around here."

Chip Howland
howland@skypoint.com