I asked the rangemaster for some magazine sandpaper and emery cloth and he pulled out a piece of each. I sanded the magazine then used some emery clot... to smooth it out even more. I wiped the magazine with a slightly oiled paper towel and slid it in and out of the handle several times. I repeated the action with Fran’s magazine, and then handed it back to her. The rangemaster said, “Have you worked with guns much?”“My dad used to take me shooting a lot, and he loved new guns. He showed me how. “So you want to hear out my story also. Ok, then, have it.” And she started narrating:Dad was very kind to me, of course, no doubt. But I had become pregnant and was afraid that if dad came to know he would ask me to abort the baby. I wanted to have it. So I ran away from home with a man who was in love with me more than a year then. He was a South Indian and he brought me to this part of the country. He married me and we had our first baby, a boy, named after my dad, Anand.Two years since, one. ”“And that’s perfectly fine. But so you know, you will likely be Dire once the meetings start. I expect this to be a ‘death by PowerPoint meeting, and being able to see it would help. But this is a heads up, you are going to want to fight one of the changes to the structure that has been proposed.”“Why, what do they want to do?”“Well, one of the changes would shove both of your jobs into a department called ‘Paladin Affairs’. Fight them, insist that you remain with the science group and that. I guess I can always run awaylater." I hope you won't do that. It wouldn't be fair to your new family."It was as an outcome of that conversation that I was sitting readingthat afternoon with the head of the bed cranked up when a woman's headfirst peaked through the door at me. Then she gave a shout of greetingand rushed up to wrap her arms around me. "Oh, June! June, it's reallyyou!" she screeched before smothering me with kisses. "We've been soworried since we found out you didn't arrive at.