Spirit of Steamboat

     Legend has it that Steamboat was the greatest bronco of all time. He never let any cowboy ride him: tough as nails. This horse was so famous that Wyoming put an image of him bucking a rider on its license plates. At least, this is the story Craig Johnson tells in his newest Walt Longmire novella. Sheriff Longmire is sitting at his desk on Christmas Eve reading A Christmas Carol by Dickens. (It's a tradition.) His under sheriff is in Brazil with her mother and his daughter is in Pennsylvania; ready to have a baby. His dispatcher, Ruby, tells him there is someone there to see him. A small wisp of a woman with porcelain skin and dark hair carrying a black garment bag walks into Walt's office and asks if he is the sheriff. She speaks to him like she knows him and she asks about the previous sheriff, Lucian Connally. Walt takes the woman to the Durant Home for Assisted Living where Lucian has just shot out the T.V. in the rec room. Lucian answers the door to his apartment wearing nothing but his boxers, a wife beater t-shirt, and only one leg. After all the pleasantries are out of the way, Lucian asks her what the reason for her visit is. She replies, "Steamboat."
    With that, we flash back to 1988 when Walt has just been elected sheriff for the first time and his daughter, Cady, was only 9 years old. Again, it is Christmas Eve and Walt is anxiously awaiting the med-evac flight of a little girl who has just lost her parents and great-aunt in a fiery car crash. There is a blizzard blowing their way and no one is sure that the helicopter carrying the severely burned girl will make it to Denver. It is slow and unable to maneuver in the high winds and icy conditions. Walt asks if the old B-25 34030 sitting in the hangar could make the trip. Yes, no, maybe is the answer he gets. Even if it could there is no one to fly it. But Walt knows someone; Lucian Connally flew one of these very planes in WWII over Japan. So, with the EMT & pilot of the med-evac helicopter refusing to fly in the gathering storm, and a little girl's life hanging in the balance; Walt enlists, Lucian, a reluctant co-pilot named Julie, and Doctor Isaac to help get the B-25 in the air and the little girl to Denver's Children's Hospital. Walt goes along for the ride, as does the little girl's grandmother; who doesn't speak any English. The harrowing ride that follows tests them all in ways they could not imagine, but the little girl gets to her destination and twenty-five years later, she comes back to Durant to get the whole story and to return a memento to Lucian. Why the mention of the bronco? The name of the plane: Steamboat.