"Why would anyone come out in bitter cold—and he's been here awhile"— Pewter's dark whiskers swept forward and then back—"to kneel and pray? This is beyond devotion. Why would the Virgin Mary want someone to suffer like that? No." The gray cat shook her head, snowflakes flying off like white confetti.
"Maybe he had big sins to expiate." Tucker couldn't believe her eyes.
"Mmm, whatever they were, they had to do with humans. They never pray for forgiveness for what they do to us." A bitter note crept into Mrs. Murphy's voice. "Humans think only of themselves."
"Not Mom. Not Fair." Tucker stoutly defended his beloved Harry and her ex-husband.
"That's true," Mrs. Murphy agreed.
Pewter sat in the snow, her fur fluffing up. "It's hateful cold. Let's go back. There's nothing we can do for this one. Maybe he's found Mother Mary."
"We ought to check for tracks," Tucker sagely noted. "In case there's more than one pair."
The three fanned out, soon returning to the frozen corpse.
"Tucker, there's so much wind and snow this high. The statue's on the highest point here. If there had been someone else, the tracks are covered, which makes me believe he's been here since the middle of the night," Mrs. Murphy said.
"Why did we look for tracks, anyway?" Pewter realized she'd cooperated without putting up a fuss or demanding a reason.
"Maybe he didn't die in prayer," Tucker simply replied.
"Or maybe he died with a little help," Mrs. Murphy added, finding the sight of those snow-filled eyes creepy.
"Absurd. Who would want to kill a praying monk?" Pewter again shook off the snow.
"Maybe I should bark and get someone up here."
"The buildings are down that hill. The brothers can't hear you, and if Mother can, you'll only make her frantic." Mrs. Murphy started down the hill, dropping into deep snow here and there.
Tucker pushed in front of her. "I'll go first. You and Pewter can follow in my wake." She put her head down, pressing forward as the wind suddenly gusted out of the northwest.
Pewter grumbled from the rear, "I still can't imagine going out in the middle of a snowy night to pray in front of a statue, even if she does have blood on her face."
"On her hands." Mrs. Murphy fired back, then corrected herself. "No. Not Virgin Mary She is love."
"He froze to death in prayer or had a heart attack or something. We've all been around Harry too much. She can't resist a mystery. She's still trying to find out who had Charlie Ashcraft's first illegitimate child almost twenty years ago. She's rubbing off on us." Pewter laughed at her friends and herself.
"You're right. The brothers will eventually find whoever that is, then there will be a burial and prayer service. That will be the end of it." Tucker dropped over snow-covered stones.
"Yeah. Who would want to kill a monk? They don't have anything to steal." Pewter could hear Harry calling faintly in the distance. They'd traveled farther than she remembered.
"Like I said, the service will be in the paper and we'll know who it was and that will be the end of it." Tucker, too, heard Harry. "Murph, you're not saying anything."
"I don't think that will be the end of it. This is the beginning." The tiger felt the snow turn to tiny ice bits between her toes. She wanted to hurry back to the truck. She wished the strange, uneasy sensation washing over her would ebb away, a sensation deepened by the sound of wings passing overhead, the snow so thick she couldn't see the buzzards. "Buzzards' luck," she thought to herself.
11
Not necessarily." Rev. Herb Jones's gravelly voice had a hypnotic effect on people.
"I've become a cynic, I fear." Alicia's lustrous eyes, filled with warmth, focused on Herb.
They'd run into each other at Pet Food Discounters. Alicia was buying toys and pigs' ears for Maxwell, while Herb carried flats of special cat food for his two cats. He'd placed them on the counter, then walked to the toy section for some furry fake mice, when he bumped into Alicia.
The subject of the "miracle" came up and Alicia asked if Herb thought this might be a scam.
"Your line of work taught you not to trust." Herb placed his hand on Alicia's shoulder, feeling a pleasurable twinge when he did so. No man was immune to her beauty.
"And your line of work taught you the reverse." She smiled at him.
He reached for the furry mice with pink ears, little black noses, little beady eyes, the tail a dyed bit of thin leather. "I'll ponder that, Alicia. I have learned to trust God in His infinite wisdom, but I don't know that I always trust man—or should I say people?" He blushed. "Words change, you know. I'm beyond being politically correct. I, uh, well, I still think it's proper to open the door for a lady."
"So do I." Her laughter sounded like a harp's glissando. "But, now, Herb, do you think I'm a hard-edged feminist and will take offense if you use 'man' to mean humankind?" His eyebrows raised and she continued. "I won't take offense, but I will take note." Now her eyebrows raised. "So long as 'man' is the measure of all things, women will be shortchanged. I guarantee you that."
"Point well taken." He rubbed the fur on the mousies. "Antonia Fraser wrote a book some years ago. I wish I could remember the title but it was about men being the measure of all things in the seventeenth century, I believe. Quite good. I like her work even if I have forgotten the title."
"I do, too. That's one of the things we share, you know, a love of books." She selected a fake sheepskin doll, a sheepskin bone, and put them in her shopping cart. "Maxwell adores these toys. I tell him, 'Bite the man,' and he runs for the doll. If I say, 'Bite the bone,' he goes and shakes it and then brings it to me. You know, Herb, the love of a dog is the most perfect love in the world."
He chuckled. "Elocution and Cazenovia will disagree with you."
"Your communion cats." She laughed again, because all of Crozet had heard the story of Herb's cats eating the communion wafers, assisted in this desecration by Mrs. Murphy, Pewter, and Tucker.
"They're very religious cats."
At this they both laughed.
He accompanied her as she walked down the aisle, which was stacked with foods, medicines, toys, and new products. How marvelous it was to walk with a woman. His wife had passed away some years ago. Grief still sat heavy on his shoulders, although he tried not to burden his friends. Only within the last six months could he imagine dating again. Imagining and doing were still worlds apart. He fretted over his age. Was he too old? Was he too set in his ways? Was he too overweight? Yes. Would he go on a diet? Maybe. Food was a comfort. He'd tussle back and forth with himself until he realized he most likely wouldn't do much of anything until he found a woman who caught his eye. Alicia did that. But, then, she knocked everyone for a loop.
As he strolled with her, chatting, reaching up high on shelves for her, placing twenty-five-pound bags of feed in her cart, energy flowed through him. When young, his father and mother had patiently counseled him on the qualities of a good mate, and he'd listened. His wife, very attractive, had been his lover, his friend, his partner. He'd chosen wisely.
He felt empty without a woman, and it wasn't just sex. He loved doing for a woman. He loved picking up the twenty-five-pound bags of dog food for Alicia. She could pick them up herself, but he could do it with such ease. The thousand small attentions a Virginia gentleman pays to a woman made him feel like more of a man. Without a woman to care for, dote over, occasionally fuss with and then kiss and make up, what was life, really?
"I'm so glad to be home. I don't know why I waited so long to come back." Alicia placed the furry mice in Herb's cart.
Herb put in a trial can of cat food that supposedly controlled hairballs. "If you want to get rid of hairballs, shave the cats." He laughed.
"Then you'd have to buy them little mink coats."
They laughed again. The glass front door opened. Harry and Susan swept through, Susan marching in front. She spied Alicia and Herb.