“I don’t mind their living in the moment. It’s when the claws come out. I mind that a lot,” said Tucker, who had been scratched on the nose a time or two.
“Harry, my girl, I left my key in my other coat pocket.” Tavener put both elbows on the counter.
She reached into the back of the postbox, pulled out a handful of envelopes and two magazines, which she slid to him over the counter. Behind her a sign read, PLEASE DON’T FORGET YOUR KEY. MAIL CANNOT BE HANDED TO YOU OVER THE COUNTER. This was yet another federal regulation ignored because it made not a bit of sense in a small community. Most farmers and merchants in Crozet were responsible, hardworking people, who had the great good sense to set aside the morass of state and federal regulations whose only purpose was to drag down productivity and increase paperwork.
In fact, most Virginians went about their business minding their own business. If they absolutely had to do something like get a county sticker for their vehicle, they did. But the motto of residents of the Old Dominion was, “That government governs best which governs least.” This was first uttered by another Virginian, Thomas Jefferson.
Of course, if Jefferson could return to see the mess of it, just the tax laws alone, he’d pass out. Then he’d wake up and get to work cutting the Gordian knot the rest of us have allowed to become entwined around ourselves.
When Tavener took the mail from Harry’s hands, he blinked, then reached for her right hand. He held it, turned it back side up. “Holy Cross. Haven’t seen one of those rings in years. Mary Pat wore one.”
“This is Mary Pat’s,” Harry quietly replied.
Tavener gasped. “My God, where did you get it?”
“Found it in Potlicker Creek. Both Sheriff Shaw and Deputy Cooper examined it. Couldn’t find anything. Didn’t expect to, anyway, so they gave it back to me.”
Tavener sagged and Fair caught him. “Tavener, are you all right?”
He nodded, then leaned his elbows and weight on the counter. “I never thought I’d see that ring again. She was good to me. I worshiped that woman. I worshiped the ground she walked on.”
Fair patted Tavener’s shoulder sympathetically while Miranda, the most expressive of the group, flipped up the divider and came around. She gave Tavener a good hug.
He hugged her back. “Not a day goes by I don’t think of her and give thanks she walked into my life. I wouldn’t be where I am today if it weren’t for Mary Pat.”
“She was a good soul.”
“And beautiful. I was ten when she vanished, just old enough to begin to look at women but not old enough to know why I was looking at them.” Fair remembered her honey brown hair, which had streaks of blond in it, hair so shining that light seemed to come from it instead of reflecting off it.
“Mary Pat was one of the great beauties of her generation.” Tavener stood up straight, wiping his eyes with his forefinger knuckle. “Sorry. Shocked me—seeing her ring.”
“Maybe one day we’ll know what happened to her,” Miranda said.
“I hope so, but I gave up on that years ago.” Tavener picked up his mail. “Harry, it would make her happy to know you wear her ring. You were just a sprite when she left us, but you could stick on a horse and Mary Pat liked that. Yes, it would make her happy.” He opened the door and shut it softly behind him, too overcome to stay.
“I feel awful.” Harry bit her lower lip.
“Honey, you didn’t do anything,” Fair comfortingly said.
“I had no idea.” Harry turned as Mrs. Murphy and Pewter both came back in, the animal door flapping.
“That was very nice of him to say that Mary Pat would have liked you to have her ring. She never had any children and I think she regretted that. She liked you and Susan and BoomBoom. You were all such happy, feisty little things.” What Miranda neglected to say was that she, too, regretted not having children. For whatever reason, she and George just hadn’t had them. In those days, fertility studies hadn’t progressed very far.
“How old was Mary Pat when she disappeared?” Fair asked Miranda.
“Mmm, late forties, maybe about forty-five or forty-seven. And still beautiful. Maybe more beautiful,” Miranda said. “The money. We always thought maybe she was killed for money, but Alicia Palmer, hot-blooded though she was and young as she was—in her middle twenties, I guess—just didn’t seem the murdering kind.”
“Women can lose their tempers and kill. I don’t know if we don’t kill as frequently as men or if we don’t get caught.”
“It was all so long ago, and now it’s stirred up again and, really, we have a recent serious matter. What if whatever killed Barry is out there and kills again? I wouldn’t rest too easy until we know more about that unfortunate young man’s end.” Miranda sighed.
“She’s right,” Tucker resolutely agreed. “Brinkley!” Tucker bounded to the front door as a handsome, well-groomed yellow Labrador retriever, tail wagging, waited on the other side of it. His human, Tazio Chappars, opened the door.
The two dogs rapturously greeted each other. The cats, on the divider now, liked Brinkley but thought it prudent not to be too effusive. That was dog stuff.
The humans chatted. Tazio, who was half Italian and half African-American, was warm, gentle, and very, very gifted. Young as she was, she was being sought out for large commercial commissions ever since her design won the competition for the new University of Virginia Sports Complex.
Just then Paul de Silva came in to pick up his mail.
“Paul, hear you went up in flames.” Fair pointed to Paul’s cute, tight rear end.
A small burn hole in his left back pocket was evident.
Paul, embarrassed, told his story and was delighted when Tazio laughed, too. They walked out together, his heart beating so hard in his chest he could barely breathe. He still couldn’t work up the nerve to ask her out, but she smiled at him, giving him hope.
Miranda, observing this from inside the post office, said, “They make a cute couple.”
Harry and Fair turned to look.
“They do.” Fair smiled. He was much more romantic than Harry.
But even Harry agreed. “They do.”
“Of course, not as good-looking as you and I.”
“Fair.” She punched his arm but was nonetheless pleased at the compliment.
Mrs. Murphy rolled her eyes.“Another woman would have kissed him, but, no, Harry punches him.”
“She’s dyslexic,” Pewter said.
“She can read fine,” Tucker opined.
“Emotionally dyslexic,” the gray cat shrewdly said.
The other two remained silent but knew there was truth to Pewter’s insight.
10
Potlicker Creek earned its name in the early nineteenth century. The runoff from the eastern slopes of the Blue Ridge Mountains, clear and cool, tumbled into Potlicker Creek and many others that ultimately rolled into the James River, the first river in the New World to nourish an English colony, which survived back in 1607.
The Native-American name of Potlicker Creek had been lost along the way. The strong-running waters took on a succession of names over the centuries depending upon who owned the land, but finally, after the War of 1812, Potlicker Creek stuck. The many stills tucked away in the hollows along the creek testified to the curative effects of the water when distilled.
Harry and Fair worked the western bank while Susan paralleled them on the eastern. The cats stayed with Harry, while Tucker and Owen assisted Susan.
The deep pools under the overhanging trees remained still, the current gentle underneath. Small schools of smallmouth bass called rockfish in these parts lazed there along with other fish.