She had heard this argument before and really didn’t feel like fighting it. He was truthful. This was more of a generational thing. These days many a young man didn’t even bother to stand up when a woman entered the room. That just shocked her, and she attributed it to them being raised by Yankees who had moved south. Not always true, of course, but it gave her some comfort. It did not occur to Harry that a woman might not be able to have it both ways. And being a Virginian, she felt men should certainly perform all the proper courtesies.
Fair put his arm around his wife’s shoulders. “Honey, he is the Very Reverend, you know,” he said in his light baritone. “Time may come when you need Herb to put in a good word for you upstairs.”
They laughed, walking back to the church building. He was her pastor, her friend. He buried her mother and father when they were killed in a car accident while she studied at Smith. He comforted her and guided her. He married her to Fair and he never shrank from helping when Harry or another parishioner, indeed anyone, was in need. She decided to shut up.
“Let’s have a cup of tea or something more exciting. My throat went dry during the sermon.” Herb opened the doors to the small gathering room just off his office.
“Sounds wonderful.” Fair smiled.
The three cats shot ahead of their human, skidded to a stop in front of the cabinet at the small kitchen.
“Treats,” they sang in chorus.
“Whatever got into Edgar today?” Fair smiled as he asked about the choir director.
“We can’t clap for encores in church, but he was going for encores.” Harry laughed. “Every now and then Edgar and Dot,” she named the new organist, as the older lady had finally retired, “collude, I swear they do. She must have hit every note on that organ.”
Herb chuckled. “They don’t lack for enthusiasm.” He took a long, much-needed sip. “Feels better. I must have preached an overlong sermon. I’m too dry.”
“Twenty minutes,” Harry informed him. “I keep count.”
“So I see.” His eyes brightened. “I’ll remember that when I’m up there, looking down at you. To change the subject, what really happened yesterday at Sugarday? I’ve heard a few reports.”
“Susan, Ned, BoomBoom, and Alicia were there from St. Luke’s. Miranda was up at the house. Lots of people. The meet was well attended. Everyone wants to be out in this fabulous weather. I expect they told you the hounds found a body in that line of woods to the west of the house?” Harry remarked.
“Yes, and they also told me that Officer Cooper had you sent down to view the body,” he replied.
She nodded. “Sheriff Shaw and Coop wanted me to look at a brass rectangle on a chain around his neck. He’d been shot, fairly recently. He hadn’t been lying there for days. I was grateful for that.”
“What about the brass rectangle?” Herb was curious.
“Engraved on its center was Number Five and under that, Garth. About two inches long by an inch and a half wide. I took it to be a slave pass.”
“How odd.” The Reverend rattled the ice in his glass. “Did it look original? Not a copy or reproduction?”
“Looked original to me. I don’t think anyone makes reproductions.” Harry considered this. “Could make some people angry.”
“Would,” Fair agreed. “Assuming that pass was authentic, what might it possibly mean? Why wear it?”
“Why get killed in the first place?” Harry added.
“Well, it is peculiar,” Herb said. “St. Luke’s was built with slave labor as well as parishioner labor. I wonder if they needed those chits?” He thought for a moment. “Probably not since they came from the Garth estate and Mr. Garth’s son-in-law was the architect. We forget how highly skilled both slaves and freemen were. Well, we forget until we look at the evidence. St. Luke’s has stood for over two hundred years, and you, being head of buildings and grounds, know how sturdy those structures are.”
“I do. Downstairs in the vault where you keep the old papers, well, those on parchment, right?” Herb nodded, so she continued. “Did you ever find objects? Not passes but china pieces, stuff like that?”
“Whatever has been found over the two hundred years is in the vault. Mostly bits of glass, pipe bowls, and the reason for that is, I would guess, that most objects are underneath us. As they built, dropped, or discarded things, they built over them.”
“Probably,” Harry agreed.
“Still, they had to have had a garbage pit.” Fair finished his drink. “If that’s ever found and, say, architecture students or archeology ones create a dig, who knows what they’d find?”
“As long as it isn’t bodies.” Harry half smiled.
October 24, 2016 Monday
“I’m not talking to you.” Pewter sashayed in front of Tucker.
“Good. I need the break,” the corgi fired back.
“You think you’re so smart.” The gray cat fluffed her tail slightly so as to enlarge her person.
Truthfully, her person did not need enlargement.
Mrs. Murphy, trailing behind, veered clear of the two arguing animals.
Never took much to set off Pewter, but Tucker had sworn she saw a red-tailed hawk—of which there were many—and one should seek cover.
The cat naturally disagreed, said it was an osprey, a water bird, and the two barely resembled each other. Both started the day peevish over their breakfast bowls. How any creature, four-legged or two, could be peevish on such a spectacular October day was a mystery.
The sky sparkled a deep robin’s-egg blue with a few wispy, pure clouds high above. Last night was the first light frost. A slight wind caused the remaining leaves to rustle. There was enough color to lift one’s spirits, to celebrate fall in central Virginia.
The animals, domestic and wild, showed their lush winter fur, a dense undercoat adding more fluff and more protection.
“Think we’ll see more eagles?” Mrs. Murphy finally spoke.
“Making a big comeback,” Tucker replied. “That’s what Liz Potter said at Mom’s wildlife meeting, remember?”
“Nasty birds. Hate ’em,” Pewter declared.
“I still wonder why the one we did see was flying from the mountains. Eagles nest by water, big, high nests. Mom says there are lots down on the James River and even some on the Rockfish,” Mrs. Murphy mused.
“You’re right, but I’m sure he had a reason. Maybe fishing was better that day in the Shenandoah Valley,” Tucker said.
“Doesn’t explain the eyeball.” Pewter sniffed. “I really do hate big birds.”
“Birds like eyeballs,” Tucker announced, as though they didn’t know.
“Crows and vultures. Eagles are fish eaters,” Mrs. Murphy replied. “I suppose any animal, including a human, will eat carrion if nothing else is available. Some protein there.”
“Remember the time we came upon the corpse dressed as a scarecrow and the crows mobbed it? Sang a song about eyes, too, which was really horrible.”
Pewter puffed her tail out more. “Birds have no respect.”
“Neither do humans. It was a human who hoisted the body up on the pole,” Tucker wisely noted.