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“Er…” The Little began sucking her thumb again. “A big, noisy, shooty gun?”
“It’s a Colt 1873 Single Action Army Revolver,” barked Rip. “And very soon, you’re going to have one in the palm of your hand.”
The Little closed her eyes.
“Look at the gun!” Rip yelled. “For Chrissakes, look at it!”
This was ridiculous. If the actors couldn’t even look at a picture of a weapon, what hope did they have of holding one?Firingone?
Surely they were just acting up to this. Right?
The Little shook her head.
“Open your eyes!” shouted Rip. “Or I’ll open them for you!”
At that moment, there was a rustle, and then a sudden bang as Rip’s blackboard was knocked over.
“What the…?”
A young petite woman with a nest of dirty blond hair appeared behind the blackboard. A woman who, it turned out, had just kicked over the easel and was now eying him with disdain.
“How dare you talk to her like that?” said the young woman, her hands on her hips. She gestured at the girl, who was now sucking her thumbandcrying.
Rip felt the anger rise in him like a shook-up bottle of lemonade on a hot day. “And. Who. The. Hell. Are. You?”
The frazzled-looking woman grinned at him. She was probably five foot one at the most. Like a dirty little goblin. And yet she held herself as though she were a giant.
It was only now that Rip noticed exactly why he found her so off-putting. It wasn’t the fact her face was smeared with mud. It wasn’t her baggy, mucky, unflattering overalls. It wasn’t the fact she was dressed as a fucking queen. Like, as in, Her Royal Fucking Highness the Queen of Dirtsville, Tennessee. It wasn’t any of those things, because weirdly, there was this… vibe about her. This stupidly attractive quality that Rip tried not to see, but which somehow burned into his eyeballs like an angry sun.
No. What made her seem so off-putting, in his eyes, was her expression. It was the fact that she looked like she owned the entire goddamn world.
“You want to know who the hell I am,sir?” she said, her head held high in the air. “My name is Mabel. It just so happens that I am the new Protector of all of these fine people. So, from now on, you want to talk to them, you go through me. Capiche?”
Rip had to try hard not to laugh. Here she was, this tiny little goblin, ordering him around.
“I can see that you’re not taking me seriously,” said Mabel. “So how about this?” She turned to all the Littles. “Right guys,” she said, clapping her hands together. “I think that’s enough boring old gun talk for one morning, don’t you? Time for a shopping trip!”
Rip looked around the old, mostly abandoned town of Liberty. He looked at the movie set with its fake building facades and at the cavernous old mineshaft behind him.
“Shopping,” he said, smirking. “That sounds… completely impossible in this place. Unless you’re planning on taking them all to the General Store to stock up on jawbreakers.”
Mabel stuck a finger in the air. “Jawbreakers! That’s a great idea. I’ll add that to the list. Come on then, everyone! Let’s skedaddle!”
The Littles looked at one another, dumbstruck, but slowly, fearfully, they began to stand up and gravitate toward Mabel.
“Don’t even think about it,” Rip snapped. “Or it’ll be twenty laps around the Change House before lunch.”
Mabel put her hands on her hips. “You’re meant to be a Weapons Master,” she said. “Not a personal trainer.”
“And who the hell areyoumeant to be?” asked Rip.
“You can take that up with Haze while I’m gone,” Mabel replied. She held up a set of keys and pointed to a white van over near the make-up trailers.
“Haze lent you his minibus?” Rip asked.
“Yep,” said Mabel. “Plenty of room in the back for all of us — plus the sacks of toys we’re going to buy.”
“No way,” Rip replied. “You’re not Santa Fuckin’ Claus. You’re a… goblin. We’reworkinghere.”
