The Alpine Christmas Read Online Free PDF Page B

assignment reporting in a metropolitan area such as Portland and running a weekly in an isolated community like Alpine. My problems seemed trifling compared to Ben’s. As usual, I came away from our one-on-one session feeling as if his role in life far surpassed my own. He, of course, always insisted that this was not so.
    “You’re the community’s conscience,” he told me over coffee. “You not only inform, you serve by example. Anewspaper is a watchdog, a catalyst. Especially in a small town. Don’t shortchange yourself, Sluggly.”
    I appreciated his words. Indeed, they were mine, too. But I still felt trivial by comparison. Circulation was up by a small percentage in Alpine, yet elsewhere it was generally down, and newspapers were dying across the country. People didn’t read any more; they relied on TV. The print media might go the way of the dinosaur, but there would always be souls to save. If I hadn’t had to drive Ben back to the rectory, I’d have poured us a double brandy.
    Ironically, the only business that is more precarious than print journalism is logging. While Alpine hasn’t been a one-industry town since Carl Clemans’s original mill closed in 1929, forest products still provide a major source of income. There are three mills, two of them on the small side, and several independent logging companies. The threat of the spotted owl looms large over the entire Pacific Northwest, but nowhere does it flap its wings more ominously than in towns like Alpine. Ironically, the ski lodge, which had saved the local economy during the Depression, was beginning to suffer from the endangered species fallout. Sooner or later, I had to come to editorial grips with the issue. As a city girl, I tended to side with the environmentalists. But since moving to Alpine, I was beginning to realize that simplistic solutions don’t solve multifaceted questions. Ben agreed, citing the differences he had discovered not only on the Delta, but also on the reservation. Issues, like people, were never simple. And, as my brother pointed out, I was the community’s conscience.
    By morning, we had another six inches of snow. The plows were out early, while a sanding crew blemished the pristine new fall along Front Street, Alpine Way, and the third main artery in town, Highway 187. I crept down Fir Street to Alpine Way, taking the long route to work. The current issue of
The Advocate
had been hauled off to the printer in Monroe, but there was a good chance it would come out late. Ourdriver, Kip MacDuff, had broken his chains on the newly-laid gravel and had gotten off to a bad start.
    Vida, however, was beginning the day with a burst of creative energy. “I think I’ll do a feature on Bridget Nyquist,” she announced after I’d poured a cup of coffee. “For a young bride, she’s done oodles of charitable work since she came to Alpine. I doubt that she has a brain in her head, but I ought to give her credit for a kind heart. Besides, this old folks’ home story is a dud unless I perk it up with something personal. I’ll be a sap six times over if I write another word about that old blowhard, Fuzzy Baugh. He refused to carry a pack because of his lumbago and wouldn’t pad his stomach because he wanted to show off the ten pounds he lost at TOPS. Take Off Pounds Sensibly, my foot! They should have drained Fuzzy’s brain!”
    Having dismissed our mayor’s role as Santa with a slashing gesture of one hand, Vida turned to her battered typewriter. “I got the impression you weren’t wildly warm about Bridget,” I commented, perching on Carla’s desk.
    Vida shot me a look over her shoulder. “I’m not, but you know I like to be fair. The girl hasn’t had an easy time of it, I gather. Don’t you remember the wedding?”
    I didn’t. Vida swiveled around, took off her glasses, and rubbed furiously at her eyes. “Of course you don’t, you weren’t here. It was last November—a year ago, I mean—when you went to Portland