Fair got up and refilled everyone's coffee cup. He noticed a pair of headlights coming down the drive. "Boom, are you expecting anyone?"
"No."
In the country, dear friends don't feel compelled to call first, so an unannounced visitor wasn't that out of the ordinary.
The car pulled into the drive, the lights cut off. In the darkness BoomBoom couldn't tell the make of the vehicle. The back door swung open and a teary Susan walked in.
"Susan, what's the matter?" Harry asked.
"Well, I drove to your house, then I remembered you said at the post office that Fair was checking Boom's mare and..." Susan rambled on before she got to the point. "Ned's staying in Richmond tonight. He said he has so much to do he needs to stay over, but when I called him back on his cell he didn't pick up."
Alicia got up and pulled another chair to the table, as BoomBoom fetched another plate and table setting. "Susan, sit down. Please join us."
"I can't eat. I'm too fat. That's why he's sleeping with other women."
"Susan, you don't know that. Now, come on. And he needs to stay in Richmond sometimes, but especially now." Harry led her to the table.
Fair, upset for Susan, poured a cup of coffee for her. "She's right, Susan. Don't worry about him not answering his cell. I mean, he might be in a meeting or the battery could need a recharge. Don't worry."
Susan wiped her eyes as Alicia placed a hot potpie in front of her.
"What am I going to do?" Susan asked in a flat tone.
"You're going to relax with your friends, enjoy this potpie, and we'll figure this out together." Alicia took charge.
"You'll feel better if you eat this." BoomBoom encouraged Susan. "Your blood sugar drops and everything looks much worse."
Reluctantly Susan pierced the pie, the enticing aroma curling up to her nostrils. She gingerly took a bite, then another. "It is good."
"The goddess herself made it," BoomBoom teased.
"Will you stop?" Alicia rolled her eyes.
"Susan, I don't think Ned is having an affair. Really. I'm not just saying that to make you feel better, but I think I'd know," Fair said.
"Would he tell you?"
Fair was reassuring. "Maybe. Look, he's never been in politics before. He probably feels he's over his head."
"I haven't heard a breath of scandal about Ned. If he were up to something I'd know by now." BoomBoom soothed her.
"I've been married to the man since I was nineteen. I know him. He's up to something. He's distant." Susan's lower lip quivered anew.
"Has it occurred to you that perhaps you're distant?" Alicia reached over to pat Susan's left hand.
"How's his health?" BoomBoom inquired.
"Healthy as a horse," Susan responded, then turned to Alicia. "Maybe I have been weird."
Harry asked as she cut into a spice cake with thick icing, "Susan, you said Ned is healthy as a horse. Wasn't Great-Uncle Thomas healthy as a horse?"
"He was. Why?"
"Why assume he died of a heart attack just because he was eighty-two?" Harry said as she passed a piece of moist cake to Fair.
"It's not an unreasonable assumption," Fair replied.
"But he had no history of heart disease, am I right?" Harry persisted.
Susan thought for a moment. "The Bland Wades live forever. He was worried about his heart. He'd been experiencing irregular heartbeats. But still, at his age that's to be expected. Like I said, the Bland Wades are tough. Brooks takes after that side."
"Danny looks a little like a Bland Wade," Fair said.
"I always thought he resembled his father," Susan hastily replied.
"He's handsome no matter who he resembles." Alicia thought Susan had lovely children.
Susan repeated, "He looks just like his father."
Harry got back on track. "Do you have any reason to believe Brother Thomas was sick?"
"No," Susan said.
"A major coronary would take him right out. There might not be any indication before the attack." Fair was thinking about the kind monk.
"You didn't ask for an autopsy." Harry was thinking out loud, not asking a question.
Susan answered, though. "Of course not, Harry, he was two years older than God. Let the poor soul be buried with dignity."
"I think you should exhume him and have an autopsy performed."
"Harry, we're eating," BoomBoom chided her.
24
On December 9, Friday, the few lovely days of the temperature climbing to the forties ended. Clouds, steel gray, unfurled from the west, winds led the clouds onward, and a low-pressure system made animals and humans tired. The temperature headed down, down.
A small crew stood around Brother Thomas's grave as Travis Critzer sank the big claw of the front-end loader into the earth, aided by Stuart Tapscott. Travis could operate anything with a motor in it. Skilled as he was, he was glad to be digging up the coffin before the hard frost returned, and he was glad to have his father with him. Although not his blood father, Stuart was the man who had raised him, taught him his trade.
Brother Frank and Brother Prescott stood, faces sour. As it was Friday, the day of public execution for centuries, it became considered the devil's day. It was devil's work disturbing what was left of a good and godly man. As the number-two man in the monastery, Brother Prescott volunteered to oversee this disgusting task. Brother Handle, overwhelmed with the response to the statue, gratefully accepted this offer. Dealing with the hordes of people, with unrest among the brothers themselves, made Brother Handle wonder why he ever thought becoming a monk would steer him clear of the world's follies. In fact, the pressures increased to the point where he offered no protest at the exhumation. Once a grave was consecrated, Brother Handle believed it should not be touched. However, Brother Thomas's family, under the leadership of Susan Tucker, was insistent. Brother Handle knew Ned Tucker had been elected to the state senate in November. Best to keep a Tucker happy.
Susan, Harry, and Deputy Cooper also watched the yellow claw dig into the flinty earth. A thin cover of soil was quickly stripped away; the subsequent layers were poor. That's why this corner of the monastery held the mortal remains of the brothers. No sense in wasting good soil.
The county coroner, Tom Yancy, waited, too, glad for a chance to escape the lab. He and Cooper had worked together over the years, a healthy respect developing between them.
Although it was Coop's day off, she accompanied Harry and Susan. She'd seen enough exhumations to know that they can be disturbing to next of kin or friends of the departed. Also, Harry had promised that afterward they'd drive up Interstate 81 to Dayton's furniture store, just south of Harrisonburg. Coop had saved enough for a sleigh bed, her Christmas present to herself, and Harry said Dayton's would have the best—not the cheapest, but the best.
Susan tightened the scarf around her neck. "Wind's come up."
"An ill wind that blows no good," Harry quoted the old saying.
"You're full of Christmas spirit," Tom said.
"Sorry. Kind of hard to be cheery at an exhumation."
"Look at it this way." The coroner grinned. "If the old fellow died a natural death, that will be good news. I know you two ladies haven't witnessed an exhumation. Brother Thomas won't be in that bad a shape; he hasn't been in there long enough. His nose might have crumbled a little, his cuticles might have receded, which will make it look as though his fingernails are still growing, but it won't be all that bad."
"What about the stench?" Harry wasn't one to mince on reality.
He waved his hand. "He won't smell like Chanel Number Five, but remember, it's been cold up here, and even though he's below the frost line, it's plenty cold down there. Might be blowing up some, but just step back and hold your nose. That way you won't get a blast and if you faint you won't fall into the coffin."
"I'm not going to faint." Harry's pride flared up.
"Might puke, though," he genially replied.
"Good God, this is so gross." Susan's eyes misted over. "I feel like I'm violating him."