Whiskers in the Dark

by Rita Mae Brown

  Rachel gave Catherine the lurid details, especially about the pot.

  “Why doesn’t she just shoot him?” Catherine laughed.

  “You have a point.”

  They parted ways but were soon reunited at the splendid dinner for the Saltonstalls of Connecticut. John, tall, broad-shouldered, muscular, was not a talkative man. He was a hero at Yorktown fighting under the Marquis de Lafayette, so fortunately other men didn’t expect him to be a popinjay. Catherine would reach for his hand under the table, squeezing it. She was fascinated by the talk, John less so. Charles, on the other hand, fabulously well educated, Harrow then Oxford, delighted the men, and he could make the ladies laugh. Charles glowed each time he looked at his wife. Ewing, in his glory, was the consummate host.

  Rachel excused herself for a moment to check on the food.

  The summer kitchen was in full swing, like a clock, literally, although Bettina didn’t need a clock. She had the cooking times in her head. Large cast-iron pots hung over open fires in an open outdoor hearth. The meats were cooked on spits, with boys turning the meats every five minutes. The heat radiated outward from the two big outdoor fires. Bread warmed on an outdoor oven as well.

  “Bettina,” Rachel called to her. “They are beside themselves with your selection of dishes. Mrs. Saltonstall exclaimed when she cut open her small rolled pork to find little raspberries inside.”

  A big grin covered Bettina’s face. “Oh, just a thought.” She then turned. “Serena, not the oak. Have the boys put beech on the fire now.” She turned back to Rachel. “I can’t take my eyes off them. You never know but I am telling you, these younger people are dumb as a sack of hammers.”

  “You and Father.” Before she returned to the dinner Rachel couldn’t help from adding, “Bumbee talked to me but I know she didn’t tell me everything. I bet you know.”

  “Ha,” Bettina exploded. “You have no idea.”

  Rachel, reluctantly, returned to the elegant dining room, where she promised all that Bettina had invented a dessert that was out of this world and urged them to finish up. This was said somewhat in jest. But Rachel was dying to know what really happened with Bumbee and Percy, whom Bumbee always called Mr. Percy. Life could be so unfair.

  6

  April 9, 2018

  Monday

  St. Luke’s, covered in snow, looked like peace itself. Light from Herb’s office caught the falling snow and cast a pale glow across the white.

  Cazenovia, Elocution, and Lucy Fur, the three Lutheran cats, looked on as Herb studied accounts. Bookkeeping, done by a parishioner, was always accurate, but he felt it his duty to check and double-check.

  Upstairs, Herb could hear Harry’s light step as she checked the ceiling. Before the frosts arrived, in fall, a patch of slate roof had been repaired and now she wanted to see if any leaks occurred. Flashlight in hand, she trained it in the ceiling corner. Tight as a tick. She liked being in charge of building and grounds.

  Harry, practical and handy, contributed where she felt she could do the most good. Not social, not a born organizer like Susan, this was her participation in the church where she had been baptized. However, she also pitched in on whatever Susan cooked up, usually doing something aesthetic as opposed to pragmatic.

  Turning off the beam, she looked out the old hand-blown paneled windows. The large rectangular courtyards, white, were fading to pale gold, soon to pink, then gray as the sun was setting.

  Mrs. Murphy and Pewter sat on the window ledge watching the snowflakes. Tucker and Pirate reposed on the floor awaiting Harry’s next move. Usually the cats played with Herb’s three Lutheran cats, but today they had followed Harry up the stairs. The cats knew the church better than most of the parishioners as they trailed Harry on her rounds. The view from the second story was always good. One could really see the birds in the trees and this always provoked a promise from Pewter to send them to the great bird in the sky. No one paid the least bit of attention.

  Leaving the clean room, closing the door behind her to conserve heat, Harry descended the stairs. A large closet under the stairs gave the cats a hopeful moment. Communion wafers were stacked in the closet along with red wine for communion. Years ago, when that door had been left slightly ajar, Mrs. Murphy and Pewter, along with Cazenovia, Elocution, and Lucy Fur, wedged in and pulled down communion wafers. Cat communion. What a glorious event. When Herb and Harry came upon them, Herb stopped, then burst out laughing. “I’d better confirm them,” he said, and Harry laughed, too.

  She knocked on the office door. “Hollywood calling.”

  A deep, deep voice rang out. “You need a phone for that. Come on in.” Herb pushed his sums away, looked up as she entered, cats and two dogs in tow.

  “Roof’s good.” She beamed.

  “Praise the Lord.” He smiled. “Caught it in time. Repairing a roof, especially a slate roof, isn’t cheap, but at least I could plan for it with the budget. It’s those unexpected bill bombs that get you.” He looked outside the symmetrical paned-glass windows. “Ah, a spring snow. We’re all waiting for daffodils, but it is very beautiful. When Charles West designed St. Luke’s, including the grounds, I often wonder did he carry with him ideas from England? Ideas of small churches in glens? The cathedrals impress to this day, but it’s the small churches wherein most of us gather. I never tire of St. Luke’s.”

  “Nor do I,” she agreed.

  “Coffee? Tea? A libation?”

  “Ah, well, maybe tea, a brisk afternoon tea as the light fades.”

  The office and small kitchen decorated at the turn of the last century by the Dorcas Guild retained its gracious atmosphere with modern conveniences. Those long-departed ladies felt the pastor should have a Chesterfield sofa and two matching chairs in dark brown leather in the center of the large room. The desk reposed near the corner window and probably hadn’t been moved since the day it was placed there. It would take four men to move it. The Victorians did not believe in spindly furniture.

  Herb walked to the kitchen, followed by Harry, as they caught up on church business and people business.

  The cats leapt off the back of the leather sofa, pulling down the warm wool throw as they did. It slid onto the cushions. The cats all moved toward the kitchen, where they knew treats would be dropped.

  “Come on, Pirate. The Rev is generous,” Tucker instructed the puppy.

  “Just ignore my beggars.” Harry glared at her pets really working their sweet number.

  “Ah, now Harry, the miracle of the fishes and the loaves applies to animals as well.” He pulled open a cupboard door. The doors were like little windows, glass-paned. “What do you think?” He showed her a tin of enticing fake fish as well as a bag of Greenies.

  “You spoil them.”

  Herb tossed each animal a goodie. “What’s the point of loving somebody if you don’t spoil them a little?”

  “I’m sure you’re correct.” Looking down, Harry advised her friends. “You are very lucky.”

  “We’re worth it.” Pewter happily snagged another fish.

  As the pets enjoyed the treats, the people waited for the water to boil.

  “So what have you all been doing? We’ve stayed inside. Boring, but I’m not going out there,” Lucy Fur announced.

  “I have been killing mice. Dozens of mice. I set a Virginia record.” Pewter dropped a few crumbs from her mouth.

  “There are that many mice at Harry’s farm?” Elocution suspected Pewter’s usual exaggerations.

  “Aldie.” Mrs. Murphy then informed them what Aldie was, the National Beagle Club, and the barn that truly was overrun with mice.

  “We saw a ghost.” Pirate, a little shy, wanted to join in.

  Cazenovia looked at Mrs. Murphy. “You said there had been a battle there. A ghost from the hospital or someone killed on the field?”

  Tucker, content fro
m her Greenie, said, “No, it was a beagle.”

  “He said he was there with a friend.” Pewter wanted to return to her prodigious hunting skills. “The barn will be filled with ghost mice.”

  Harry’s pets ignored this.

  “So he was there with his cavalryman?” Elocution, having seen ghosts in the graveyard at off times, was not too surprised.

  “He didn’t say,” Tucker responded.

  “The world is full of spirits. Some are unquiet. Others want to watch over someone they loved.” Elocution considered the reasons why a spirit would hang around.

  “The unquiet worry me.” Lucy Fur switched her tail.

  “I wonder if we’ll see the beagle again.” Mrs. Murphy headed toward the living room, the sofa and chairs. “We’ll be back at Aldie again this coming weekend.”

  Harry picked up the wool throw as she returned with her tea, placing it over the back of the sofa, then sat down. “What do you think of a St. Luke’s homecoming? We could do it on the day the cornerstone was laid or the day the church was finished, organ inside.”

  “I never thought of that.” Herb settled down, happy not to be looking at accounting sheets.

  “Just think. The children you baptized. Those of us you taught catechism. Those you married. Those whose family members you buried. By now, Rev, it has to be so many people.”

  “Well”—he paused—“yes, I’m almost eighty.”

  “You’re the youngest person I know.” She meant it. “While we’re at it, we can celebrate your eightieth birthday, which I think is close to the day the cornerstone was laid.”

  He waved his hand. “I forget.”

  “Bullpucky.”

  He laughed. “You know, given people’s schedules, a late spring day or early summer might be better. You know, when colleges are out for the summer. If we announce this early, then people can plan for it.” He brightened. “Harry, what a good idea.”

  “Sure. Susan, organizer extraordinaire, can send out RSVP forms or people can do it via email so we can plan for enough food. If we’re going to do this, we better do it right. The fishes and the loaves.”

  They both laughed.

  “Do you think we’re losing it?” she then continued. “Churches, I mean? We used to be the nerve centers of the countryside, towns, and even big cities.”

  He folded his hands over his chest. “Well, we’re losing congregants. Not so much here, but we are in a unique position. Same with St. Paul’s Ivy.” He mentioned a county Episcopal church. “People come together but there are so many competing messages now, families rarely are close to one another, not like in my childhood. I worry about it. I believe in the church.”

  “You make us believe in the church. You are a remarkable pastor.”

  This touched him. “Thank you. I never know if I’ve fulfilled my responsibilities as well as I should.” He glanced outside. “This snow won’t stop.” He paused a moment. “It’s April ninth.”

  “Well, we’re in Virginia. I doubt anyone has really forgotten.”

  April 9, 1865, was when Lee surrendered at Appomattox.

  “November eleventh is another one. Always sticks.” He tapped his head.

  “As near as I can tell, Reverend Jones, ending a war solves one set of problems and creates an entirely new set.”

  “April ninth is one of those days. Henry V was crowned king in 1413. Agincourt.” He grinned. “Now there’s a story. Here’s another. The child king, Edward V, should have ascended the throne in 1483. I think this would have been the exact day much postponed, and then he and his brother disappeared forever. The princes in the tower. History spills over with unsolved crimes, odd events, and truly odd people.” He shook his head. “Then again we have enough of that now.”

  She agreed. “I guess where I struggle is accepting that good can come from evil and evil can come from good. For instance, terrible wars and yet medicine advances due to war. Our ability to mobilize and organize advances. Well, if you win, I guess, but think of it. It seems like such a contradiction. Kind of like the #MeToo movement. Pain, frustration, and sorrow but something good will come of it. Not overnight but a reflecting, rethinking of how we treat women, or I should say how men treat women.”

  He nodded. “How those in power treat those who are weaker, or who are trying to hold on to a job. The one thing that strikes me about predators is how they identify their victims. It’s not at all like war. That is clear and in many ways simple. Or at least it seemed so to me when I was in Vietnam.”

  “Do you think any good came from that?” Harry, at forty-two, was too young to have been involved in all that.

  He sipped his tea, thought. “I’m not sure I’m the person to ask. It certainly caused us to question civilian leadership, whether the presidency or Congress. But then again, new military leadership began to develop. People, mostly men, of course, due to the times, who were more flexible, who realized we had to engage the local populations. The Vietcong were way ahead of us. General Giáp was an outstanding leader, even if on the wrong side. The other thing, and I turn this over in my mind a lot, I think the war helped break down racism.”

  “I never thought of that.”

  “Fighting next to a man who has your back, you forget about color even if it was once important to you. You forget about a lot of things. It’s a hell of a way to learn. Harry, you ask the damnedest questions.”

  “Sorry.” She paused. “From my reading, I think Vietnam’s antiwar movement overlapped the civil rights movement, which nudged along feminism. You lived it. I just read about it.”

  Pewter came up to pat Herb’s leg.

  “I think you’re right. It was a volatile time. I reckon 1968 was the bombshell year and then the counterculture took off. You know, Harry, Americans are a pretty tough people.” Herb mused.

  “Don’t give her any more. She’s too fat,” Harry requested.

  “I am not fat. I have big bones.” Pewter sang her usual aria.

  The other animals wisely kept their peace.

  “Speaking of mysteries, old stories, we still don’t know who was laid on the Taylors’ caskets.” Herb shifted in his seat. “I really think we have to give her a proper burial. After all, she was unearthed in November 2016. Obviously, no one is going to claim her, or they would have done so by now.”

  “You’d think they’d claim the pearls. People don’t know Keller and George is keeping them in the vault, but I believe they are part of this attempted exhumation.”

  “I wonder about that,” Herb said. “I believe whoever tried to disturb the Taylors’ grave must have had some information, information that has lain dormant for over two hundred years.”

  “That’s just it, Rev.” She called him by her nickname for him. “Whoever did it is still out there and why now, well, in 2016?”

  “I don’t know. But back to the subject. She deserves a proper Christian burial.”

  “You can’t bury her in the graveyard. She wasn’t a parishioner. We’d know. That death would be in the records.”

  “I’ve thought about that. We know either she was in the way or hated. Her neck was snapped. The medical examiner said it was clean. One powerful snap and she was gone.”

  “I vote for hated. The pearls were left. I would think another reason other than hatred, even if the killer had to hide for years, would ultimately have brought him back to the grave to dig up the booty. And I expect it was a him because of her snapped neck.”

  “Yes, that, too, has occurred to me. I propose, and I will bring this up to the Dorcas Guild and St. Peter’s Guild”—he named the men’s guild—“that we fashion a wooden casket, something appropriate to her time on earth, and bury her under the red oak. It’s lovely and not far from the cemetery.”

  “But what if she really was an awful person and that’s why she was killed?”

 
“We all must ask for God’s forgiveness. It is not our place to judge.”

  “You know I will support whatever you think best. I wonder if whoever was rooting around that grave will be drawn to the service.”

  “Chances are whoever did that isn’t a Lutheran.”

  “No, but the paper will print this. It’s too good not to make the news. What I’m trying to say is perhaps this is a very old crime that isn’t over.”

  “We’ll see.”

  “If she’s vengeful, let’s hope she knows we aren’t the wrongdoers.”

  “ ‘Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord.’ ” Herb paused. “The ghosts at Aldie have made an impression.”

  “Oh, people there say they’ve seen them in what was the hospital. I don’t know, I’m just running at the mouth. Then I think about what you’ve said, about the princes in the tower. Maybe they’re still there, wandering the halls. I wonder.”

  “Trust in the Lord, Harry, trust in the Lord.”

  7

  September 6, 1787

  Thursday

  “Keep your hands off Reynaldo’s bridle.” Jeddie Rice stood two inches from Ralston’s face.

  “I’ll do what I want.” The tall young man nearly spit in Jeddie’s face.

  Jeddie worked the blooded horses at Cloverfields. The young man possessed good hands, a light, sure seat. Ralston had a long leg but not the sensitivity a good rider needed. Catherine, who worked well with Jeddie, had put the young man, nineteen, in charge of the blooded horses. The two of them would go over conditioning routines, food, turnout depending on season. She put Ralston in charge of the everyday farm horses but not the driving horses or the draft horses. Catherine had a soft spot for the big, gentle drafts.