The Miracle of the Images. Welby Thomas Cox, Jr.

drinking and wild women were all a part of the syndicate control of this northern Kentucky community.

      Long before Jennifer Flowers and Bill Clinton there was another hooker/dancer/singer by the name of Flowers...seems she slipped something in the drink of the Kentucky Sheriff by the name of George Ratterman. You know the guy who was the all-American quarterback and pro bowl football player. Ms. Flowers and others took several illegitimate photographs in an attempt to frame the good Sheriff in what was deemed an inappropriate circumstance. Fortunate for George it didn't work...he won reelection and set about to clean up the levee along the Ohio River across from downtown Cincinnati. It only took about forty years to do so and George Ratterman long since passed into oblivion or wherever else old football heroes go.

      It wasn't that Aldo was the hell raiser from Texas...he just liked to let his hair down and have a good time. These folks sure knew how to do that and there was no interest in seeing an identification card of any type. Show your face and get the pass. Have a good time, make no trouble and you were always welcomed back with open arms. Want to shoot dice...they had it...want to play poker...always a game under way...there was pool, there was live music and there was lots of cold beer. Yeh northern Kentucky was a happening place and it was a place into which Aldo could fit right in.

      In those days he had a young man's appetite for cold beer and sexy women. He remembered the first time he had been with a woman...she was a pro but it mattered little to Aldo...he paid the price up front and there were no questions or lingering on the back end. Her name was Ella...like himself just a farm girl looking for a way to support her exodus from the farm. Aldo wondered how long it would take before Ella became as hardened looking as most of the women selling their wares in the bars along the river. For now it was enough that she was there next to him, warm and a reasonable facsimile of a woman with emotions enough to pretend that the moment was special.

      Her fragrance was strong as was her breathing. Aldo closed his eyes and listened...it was strong and healthy, even vital. The longer he listened the more sensual her breathing seemed to become. In time he began to feel the press of her body against his. Felt himself breathing with her, as if the rise and fall of their chest was the same. Her breathing became deeper, overriding his. He felt her own hand touching him and then her own breast. And then Aldo reached out, wanting to touch her and to keep touching her, exploring her in a way far more provocative and passionate than any way he had gathered from the men's magazines.

      In the morning Ella would be gone, perhaps she had left in the night to complete the many task at hand...working the men who came for comfort and a few moments of tenderness which she faked as well as the orgasm making them feel that they had shared some compelling moment. Leaving the fluid of life and contemptuous thoughts of other farm boys who had mouthed the words of affection but were not there for her when her time came to deliver the child that neither wanted.

      If she was really lucky, someone would come along and be the real thing for her, someone who would demonstrate emotional connections and unconditional love. Marry her and carry her back to the farm were she would welcome the seasons and the family which she had heretofore disdained. She had the looks, she had the breeding and Aldo hoped for her that she would recognize the moment and accept it for what it was...the opportunity to move on to some semblance of normalcy... of a life on the farm.

      Aldo was no longer a virgin, and he had not been dishonest during the act...he did not tell her he cared for her nor did he expect to hear it from her. The moment was... what it was for the two of them...raw sex, played out in a cheap motel to the sound of the Tommie Dorsey Band and the plastic curtains blowing its own sound.

      IV. THE ROMANS ARE COMING

      The wait for the response from the Vatican was not long in coming. On October 26, six weeks after the September 12th meeting with Father Francis, the Vatican entourage showed up in the small village of Germantown, Ohio. Headed by Monsignor John Voght, a graduate of Notre Dame and therefore readily acceptable to Father Francis. Monsignor Voght also had Father Tim Dalton a native Ohioan to carry his bags and make any advance registrations which might become necessary.

      The call to Aldo came from Father Francis. He explained to Aldo that the Vatican entourage had just arrived and would like to come to the farm for a visit the next day if at all convenient. Aldo explained that he had chores that would keep him busy until dinnertime and that would be the most convenient time since they had to eat as well. Father Francis agreed and in the process was given the most direct route to the farm. They agreed that dinner for the four to include Father Francis would be promptly at six o'clock...just after the evening angelus. The beautiful sound of the bells in the bell tower, which Aldo had purchased, completely automated three times daily, to call the farm hands to meals.

      Aldo also invited one or more of the priest to stay at the farm. He advised Father Francis that there were no hotels that he could recommend nearby but there were plenty of clean free rooms at the farm and they might enjoy waking to the farm freshness and a wholesome country breakfast. Father Francis was already in Aldo's camp, suggesting that he thought both might stay if Aldo was certain it would be no inconvenience.

      The next day Aldo set about preparing for his chores and the evening meal as well. It was not something that he could spend much time fretting over, so he simply put a nice rump roast (adding potatoes, carrots, celery and onions later) into the oven for a slow bake to be completed at the precise hour for dinner. Cooking approximately four hours, the meat would be quite tender and the vegetables could be added about one hour before they were ready to eat or as Aldo figured it about the time he came in for his shower. A simple meal that all should enjoy with some fresh bread and sweet tea which he needed only to drop into a boiling pan of water. Perhaps even a glass of the farms wine.

      There would be coffee after dinner with a pound cake picked up from the bakery at Kroger. The convenience of living on the edge of a new mega center which had taken fifty acres from Aldo's farm on the far east side (The worst of the farm acreage which was unsuitable for farming) and which had fetched a reasonable price as negotiated by the farms attorneys, Handmaker & Handmaker who also handled the investment of the funds through the law firm which required no identification from Aldo so long as the fees to the firm were paid. The law firm maintained a list of clients seeking a source of discriminating and readily available funds at twelve percent per annum.

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      Aldo started with the big Jersey cows who stood waiting, mooing in low guttural sounds indicating the need for immediate relief from the large bags which hung precariously between the hind legs dripping rich milk as they walked into the prearranged slots for the attachment of the electric milkers as the cows dropped their heads while munching hay from the racks. The electric milkers were additions to the farms milk program in the early eighties. Although it was hard work, Aldo found that he and one farm hand could milk one hundred cows in a setting in just over one hour. Of course there was clean up on the electric milking machines, and the storage of the milk in the large cooler for pick up by the Co-op... but the faun hand dispatched with this chore within a couple of hours and then joined the other hands now working at various chores as defined by Aldo for the balance of the day with a break for lunch at noon, in time for the angelus which called the hands into the farm kitchen for the meal.

      Aldo had help with the lunch. He had been fortunate to find a divorced woman with three small children who lived near the farm...enjoyed being up early, liked to cook and clean and the best part for her, was that Aldo paid her in cash each day and she was home in time for her children to come home from school. Aldo had even offered to set up a double wide trailer near the barn for she and her children but she had been able to rent a tenant house on the farm next door and it was an easy commute for her old car. Aldo wanted to help but did not want to make waves.

      Her name was Rita McCann...a big Irish woman who knew her way around work, was honest and dependable. She was a wonderful addition to the farm, handling those chores which Aldo had trouble working into his schedule or the schedule of one of the men. Besides it was nice to have a woman's touch around the house and on occasion, the children even came over if they were out of school early for some reason.

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      The timing worked out