Maggie Daniels - Moonlight and Mistletoe

Take one pound of dried black-eyed peas and soak overnight in large boiler.

Next day add smoked ham hock, salt, and black pepper to taste. Simmer until very tender.

Pour over helping of cooked rice. Serve with side garnish of chopped sweet onion, ketchup, and Tabasco sauce to taste.

Guaranteed to bring good luck if youve got your mouth full when the New Year comes in. At least in the South.

Turn down those christmas carols, Sheriff Buck Grissom shouted. Confound it, this is supposed to be a jail!

As the recorded strains of Deck the Halls faded away under the invisible hand of a deputy in the jails office, he turned back to the county social worker. Am I glad to see you, Susan, he said fervently. I need some help.

Susan Huddleston looked at Sheriff Grissoms six-feet-four-inch, Marine-trained body in its crisp black and tan uniform, thinking shed hardly ever heard the sheriff admit he needed anyones help. In their now-past relationship this had been one of their great problems: Buck was as stiff-necked as they came, even as a lover.

Behind the sheriff hung the brass-framed, life-sized portrait of Bucks father, Sheriff William Rutherford Grissom, Sr. The elder Grissom had been big and handsome, too. That is, if you liked steely blue eyes, mahogany-red hair, and a jaw that looked as if it were carved from native north Georgia granite.

It must be something big, Susan said, choosing her words carefully. Ive never seen you this ah, concerned.

Concerned? He gave her a distracted look as he opened the door to the womens part of the jail. The way I feel I could cancel this damned Christmas altogether. I wish I had taken up my deputies offer of that expense-paid fishing trip to Florida, to go with that rod and reel they gave me on my birthday.

Susan fought down a sudden desire to smile. The Jackson County sheriffs department wanted Buck to have his long-delayed vacation. Christmas in the mountains was usually a crime-free, quiet time perfect, the department thought, for a Florida deep-sea fishing trip.

It wasnt that Bucks staff didnt love him, they just needed him out of their hair for a while. Anyone who had to live with the late William Grissom, Sr.s, hard-driving, sometimes unbearably perfectionist son needed some time off occasionally. But Buck had turned down what his deputies had considered a foolproof offer. His staff was getting a little desperate.

Now he held the door to the cell block open. Nothings going right, he growled in Susans ear. For one thing, Ive got that court injunction prohibiting the living manger scene from being shown in front of the courthouse, just served today. That manger scenes an institution, Susan, its been displayed since nineteen fifty-two. People around here just dont understand whats happened.

Susan looked around the cell block, never crowded at any time but now, at the Christmas holidays, virtually deserted. Buck, the issue is separation of church and state, she reminded him. And the courthouse lawn is government property.

He turned to glower at her. Dammit, Susan Christmas has nothing to do with civil rights!

She didnt blink. This time it does.

Now you sound like those parasite lawyers. He led the way through the mens part of the jail, empty except for one lone form sleeping in the drunk tank. Christmas, Sheriff Buck said firmly, is a time to bring folks together, not split them apart, and everybodys fighting over this thing. Ive had the whole of Jackson County all over me telephoning, dogging me at home, wanting to know why I cant do something about getting Mary and Joseph and Sally Holborns youngest that was voted Best Child to Play the Infant Jesus back in front of the courthouse in time for Christmas shopping.

Buck, hearing earsplitting screams, stopped so quickly Susan nearly ran into him. Just beyond the open door they saw a county deputy, Moses Holt, dragging a violently resisting female over the plastic tile floor. They couldnt see her face as she half slithered, half bounced along since it was hidden by a gypsylike mop of black hair. But a hiked-up skirt revealed two long, shapely if dirty bare legs, and a bottom covered with gray-pink underwear panties. The air was blue with language that Jackson County, still a stronghold of old-fashioned values, seldom heard from female lips.

Whew, Susan murmured.

Mose, we cant have this going on. The sheriff had to raise his voice to be heard over a colorful description of what Deputy Holt could do with his future existence. Wheres Mrs. Graham? The matron handled the prisoners on the womens side of the jail.

Deputy Holt didnt have time to answer. Dont just stand there, Sheriff, come help me, he panted as the prisoners free arm snaked out and wrapped around a bar. She grabbed hold of the desk while I was trying to fingerprint her, and it took me near forever to get her loose.

The girl suddenly swung her head close to the deputys ankle. Moses Holt jerked his leg away just in time.

Thats our problem right there, Sheriff Buck said, frowning. She might be a juvenile, Susan, but I cant say one way or the other. She hasnt stopped long enough for me to get a good look.

Carefully, Susan stepped back for a better view. If the girl was a juvenile she had no business in the county jail. Not that she wanted to get involved with this, Susan told herself; in the year since she and Buck had called off their engagement one could say they worked reasonably hard at a friendly, if not yet totally objective relationship.

What are you holding her on? she asked. Deputy Holt was now kneeling on the girls thrashing, shapely bottom to keep it immobile while he fumbled for a handkerchief for his bitten hand.

It was Mose Holt who answered. Miss Susan, there was two of them Scraggses. I brought them in for vagrancy and maybe assault the way the old lady was yelling, but the youngest Scraggs girl did a bolt and run just as I was getting them into the patrol car. The last time I saw her the one they call Farrah Fawcett Scraggs she was running fit to bust.

Scraggs? Susan turned to the sheriff. Buck, you cant mean -

He nodded curtly. Devil Anses granddaughters. And theres a lot of things Id rather find under my Christmas tree than any of that tribe.

I cant believe it, the caseworker murmured.

She turned back to the scantily clad hoyden who was now attempting to bite the deputys wrist. The outlaw Scraggs clan, the curse of the Jackson County law-enforcement and social-welfare services, seldom ventured very far from their hideouts in the hollers of the Blue Ridge. The family patriarch if you could call him that old Devil Anse Scraggs, had been north Georgias biggest bootlegger until he took up armed robbery, car theft, and other more sophisticated operations. At any rate his operational base was so deep in the mountains that even Bucks father, the first Sheriff Grissom, hadnt been able to rout him out.

Four months ago Sheriff Buck had managed to personally apprehend and send the oldest boy, Elvis Presley Scraggs, to state prison for car theft and attempted homicide, all accomplished one night when two of the older Scraggs boys had come to town for a little hell-raising.

Now Buck looked down at their struggling prisoner with an expression of bleak disapproval. Youd think the old reprobate would spend money on clothes for his girl children. Especially one as uh, well developed as this one. Go get a blanket, Mose, he told his deputy. Shes so cold shes blue around the edges.