By the fourth week, Julie was primed for disaster. Although Robin may have recognized that the future predicted in the cards wasn’t fixed, Julie had no such notion. Especially after her love affair — every detail of which had been spelled out in the cards — and the events of the last few weeks. She arrived for her session in a state of extreme agitation. She was pale and jumpy; she appeared to have lost weight.
“C’mon,” said Robin blithely after Julie had confided her apprehensions. “What else could go wrong?” (Little did she know.) “Besides, don’t you know that bad luck comes in threes? You’ve just had a run of it, that’s all.”
After Julie had carefully shuffled and cut the cards, Robin proceeded to lay them out. The spread wasn’t coming out well at all. Swords — the suit of strife and misfortune — were everywhere; there were lots of reversed cards, too, which generally weren’t a good sign.
“You’re going to fall ill soon,” Robin said as she threw the card for approaching influence. “It’s going to be a serious illness involving your heart,” she added as she turned over the card representing the immediate future.
“But how could that be?” Julie cried. “I’m only twenty-seven.”
Robin shrugged as if to say, There are no accidents.
Julie thought for a moment, and then added, “As a matter of fact, I haven’t been feeling well lately. I have this sensation that my heart is beating too rapidly.” She raised her palm to her chest. “It feels like a bird beating its wings.”
Robin nodded knowingly. “Maybe you should see a doctor,” she suggested as she turned over the card for how others viewed the subject. It was as frail and vulnerable, which confirmed how Julie was feeling about herself. Then came the card for her hopes, which were for a renewal of love. Finally, there was the outcome card.
Julie watched intently as Robin turned the card over. It was the thirteenth card of the major arcana: the Death card. A menacing skeleton armed with a scythe cleared the ground around him, in which were scattered the heads and hands of his victims.
“Death,” Julie whispered. Her eyes bulged and a sweat broke out on the fine, youthful skin of her temples.
“The final outcome,” Robin said solemnly. The divinatory meaning of the Death card was rarely physical death; it was too limiting. It was usually transformation or renewaclass="underline" getting rid of the old in order to make room for the new. Death was something that was always happening in life; we die to the present so that the future can unfold.
It was the tarot reader’s responsibility never to predict physical death because of the likelihood that the card represented one of these less tragic interpretations. But there were circumstances in which the thirteenth card had a literal meaning.
And this was one of them.
“There are no accidents?” Julie asked softly, in hopes of being contradicted. Her voice was the merest whisper.
Robin shook her head.
She died the next week. A heart attack. An unusual occurrence in a young woman of her age, but not unheard of. A coronary embolism. Probably from the birth-control pills she’d been taking. A side effect that was rare, but occurred nevertheless. Ron went to the memorial service. “A young woman I knew from work,” was how he described her. She’d been depressed, he said — an unhappy love affair.
Robin wasn’t surprised. She’d seen it in the cards.
Three Happy Widows
by Julie F. Crary
Three widows sat and sipped champagne, a taste of freedom once again.
The last man dead, their plans complete, the taste of vict’ry oh so sweet.
They’d spent long hours on their plan: the perfect murder of a man.
A foolproof plan was what they sought, without a chance of getting caught.
They’d talked about a hired gun, but that would cost them all a ton.
And then there was no guarantee that he’d stay mum and they’d stay free.
The next plan looked like suicide, then followed thief and cyanide.
“Aha!!” at last one lady cried, “I know a plan that’s not been tried.”
So back they’d gone to their own homes, their kitchen sinks and cleaning foams.
Three better wives there never were, to wait upon each thankless cur.
The first wife was a wondrous cook, the greatest care is what she took.
To serve up all his meals in bed, a big fried steak and homemade bread.
She did the chores and let him be, while he ate snacks and watched TV.
The husband of the second wife enjoyed an even better life.
“You rest,” she’d whisper in his ear, “sit back, relax, and have a beer.
Feel free to go out with your friends, and stay until the last call ends.”
Husband number three, it seems, just couldn’t give up nicotine.
It didn’t matter — chew, cigars, or cigarettes with all that tar.
She took this habit in her stride, and all she said was, “Smoke outside.”
Now husband number one has died; with racking sobs, his good wife cried.
“Oh what a pity,” neighbors said, “a heart attack, and now he’s dead.
It seems that his cholesterol completely plugged his right heart wall.”
The second husband followed suit, the reason why they’d not refute.
“A pickled liver,” people heard, “cirrhosis” the official word.
Devoted wife that she had been, she looked depressed, red-eyed and thin.
Now cancer’s caused the third man’s death; he had to fight to get his breath.
The oxygen had been routine, his lungs destroyed by nicotine.
His widow pale, her lips compressed, from head to toe in black she dressed.
Three widows sat and sipped champagne, a taste of freedom once again.
Cholesterol, tobacco, booze. A brilliant plan; they could not lose.
“There’s nothing anyone can say; we knocked them off the legal way.”
The Cherub Affair
by Peter Robinson
Best known for his award-winning Yorkshire police series starring Inspector Banks, Peter Robinson is also the author of non-series books and a score of short stories. His stories have claimed several awards, including the Macavity, the CWA’s Short Story Dagger, and 2001’s Edgar for Best Short Story (for “Missing in Action” from EQMM). Mr. Robinson’s latest Banks novel is Close to Home. This new tale introduces a Toronto P.I.
1
Dazzling sunlight spun off the glass door of Angelo’s when I pulled it open and walked in at eleven that morning, as usual.
“Morning, Mr. Lang,” said Angelo. “What’ll it be?”
“I’ll have a cup of your finest java and one of those iffy-looking crullers, please.”
“Iffy-looking! All our donuts are fresh this morning.”
“Sure, Angelo. I’ll take one anyway. How’s business?”
“Can’t complain.”
“Watch the game last night?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Don’t tell me, they lost again, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
Angelo is a diehard Blue Jays fan. He gets depressed when they lose. He’s been depressed a lot this summer.
Angelo looked over my shoulder, out to the street. “Hey, wonders never cease,” he said. “Looks like you’ve got a customer.”
“Client, Angelo, client. You get customers. I get clients.”
“Whatever. Anyways, this one you’ll want to see.” He whistled lasciviously and sculpted an impossibly voluptuous shape in the air with his hands.