Pawing Through The Past

"Let's raise the flag and see who salutes." Harry's voice filled with excitement.

"What do you mean?" Susan wondered.

"Leave it to me." Harry almost smacked her lips.

"She's incorrigible." The tiger cat sighed.

11

By eight-thirty the next morning, they had all the mail sorted and popped in the mailboxes.

Harry and Mrs. Hogendobber felt wonderful. Their job was easier in the summer. The catalogue glut diminished-only to return like a bad penny in the fall. A rise in summer postcards couldn't compete with the tidal wave of mail from Thanksgiving to Christmas.

Harry enjoyed reading postcards before sliding them in the boxes.Maine , an excellent place to be in mid-August, claimed four Crozetians.Nova Scotia , that exquisite appendage ofCanada , had one. The rest of the postcards were from beach places, with the occasional glossy photo of a Notre Dame gargoyle from a student on vacation dutifully writing home to Mom and Dad.

Miranda had baked her specialty, orange-glazed cinnamon buns. The two women nibbled as they worked. Miranda swept the floor while Harry dusted down the backs of the metal mailboxes.

"Why do humans have flat faces?" Pewter lazily inquired, made tired by this ceaseless productivity.

"Ran into a cosmic door." Mrs. Murphy cackled.

"If they had long faces it would throw them out of balance," Tucker said.

"What do you mean?" Mrs. Murphy didn't follow the canine line of reasoning.

"They'd be falling forward to keep up with their faces. Flat faces help them since they walk on two legs. Can't have too much weight in front."

"You know, Tucker, you amaze me," Mrs. Murphy admiringly purred as she strolled over from the back door.

Harry had put an animal door in the back door so the kids could come and go. Each time an animal entered or left, a little flap was heard. Mrs. Murphy was considering a stroll in Miranda's garden. Insect patrol. She changed her mind to sit next to Tucker.

The front door opened. Susan came in carrying a tin of English tea. "Hey, girls, let's try this."

"Darjeeling?" Harry examined the lavender tin.

"Miranda, tea or coffee?"

"This is a tea day. I can't drink but so much coffee when it's hot unless it's iced. Don't know why." She bent over to attack the dust pile with a black dustpan.

"Let me hold that, it's easier." Susan bent down with the pan as Miranda swept up.

"Have you made your morning calls?" Harry asked. Susan liked to get all her calls and chores done early.

"No, but Boom called bright and early, a switch for her. She wants to shoot the Best All-Round photo after Wittiest and I told her no. I need a month to lose seven pounds."

"Susan, you look fine."

"Easy for you to say." Susan felt that Harry would never know the battle of the bulge, as both her parents were lean and food just wasn't very important to her.

"She have a fit?"

"No, she asked again if I would help with Wittiest."

"Will you help?"

"Yes." Susan sighed. "What about you?"

"No!" Harry said this so loudly the animals flinched.

"One hour of your time," Susan cajoled.

"BoomBoom wanted to be the chair of our reunion, let her do it. I'm doing my part."

"Okay . . ." Susan's voice trailed off, which meant she was merely tabling her agenda until a better time.

The front door opened, and a well-built man of average height stood there, the light behind him. He had thick, steel-gray hair, a square chin, broad shoulders. He opened wide his arms as he walked toward the counter.

"Cuddles!"

Miranda squinted, looking hard at the man, thrust aside the broom, and raced to flip up the divider. She embraced him. "Tracy Raz!"

"Gee, it's good to see you." He hugged her, then held her away for a moment, then hugged her again. "You look like the girl I left in high school."

"What a fibber." She beamed.

Mrs. Murphy looked at Pewter and Tucker as the tiger cat whispered, "Cuddles?"

12

"How many of us are left?"Tracy reached over for another orange-glazed bun.

Harry, upon learning that Tracy Raz was a "lost" member of Mrs. Hogendobber's high-school class, forced her to take the day off. Miranda huffed and puffed but finally succumbed. She tookTracy home, setting out a sumptuous breakfast-homemade buns and doughnuts, cereal with thick cream, and the best coffee in the state ofVirginia .

"Forty-two out of fifty-six." Miranda munched on a doughnut. "Koreaaccounted for two of us,Vietnam one-"

"Who was inVietnam ?"

"Xavier France. Career officer. Made full colonel, too. His helicopter was shot down near theCambodia border."

"Xavier France, he was the last kid I would have picked for a service career. What about the others?"

"The usual: car accidents, cancer-far too much of that, I'm afraid-heart attacks. Poor Asther Dandridge died young of diabetes. Still,Tracy , if you think about it, our class is in good shape."

"You certainly are."

"You haven't changed a bit."

"Gray hair and twenty more pounds."

"Muscle." And it was. "How did you hear about the reunion? We'd given up on ever finding you."

"It was a funny thing." His movements carried an athlete's grace as he put the cup back on the saucer. "Naturally, I knew this was our fiftieth year. I hadn't much interest in attending the other reunions and I'll come to that later. I remembered that Kevin McKenna worked for Twentieth Century-Fox. I'd see his name in the papers. He's director of marketing. Got to be worth a bundle. I called and got the usual runaround but I left a message with my phone number and damned if he didn't call me back. He sent me a copy of the invitation. I was footloose and fancy-free so I came early. Thought you might need an old fullback to help you."

"Where do you live?"

"Hawaii. TheislandofKauai . After high school I enlisted, which you knew. Well, in our day, Miranda, you enlisted or you were drafted. I figured if I enlisted I'd get a better deal than if I let myself get drafted. Army. Got good training. I wound up in intelligence, of all the strange things, and once my tour was up I re-enlisted but I made them promise to put me through Ranger school. Now it's Green Berets but then it was Rangers. They did. I stayed in for ten years. Left after being recruited by the CIA-"

"A spy?" Her kind eyes widened.

He waved his hand to dismiss the notion. "That's TV stuff. I had a wonderful job. I was sent all over the world to see events firsthand. For instance, during the oil crisis in the seventies I was inRiyadh . Worst posting I ever had wasNigeria . But basically I was a troubleshooter. I'd be the first one in, scope the situation and report back. They could make of my data what they wished-everyone inWashington has his own agenda. My God, Miranda, bureaucracy will ruin this country. That's my story. Retired and here I am."

"Did you ever marry?"

He nodded. "A beautiful Japanese girl I met inKobe in 1958. That's when I bought a little land inKauai . Li could get back to her family and I could get to the States."

"I hope you'll bring her to the reunion."

He folded his hands. "She died two years ago. Lymphatic cancer. She fought hard." He stopped to swallow. "Now I rattle around in our house like a dried pea in a big shell. The kids are grown. My daughter, Mandy, works for Rubicon Advertising inNew York , John runs the Kubota dealership in Kauai, and Carl is a lawyer inHonolulu . They speak fluent Japanese. I can carry on a conversation but the kids are fluent, which makes them valuable these days. They're all married with kids of their own." He smiled. "I'm kind of lost really." He slapped his thigh. "Here I am talking about myself. Tell me what happened to you."

"I married George Hogendobber, he became the postmaster here, and we lived a quiet but joyful life. He died of a heart attack, nearly ten years ago. Sometimes it seems like yesterday."

"I don't remember George."

"He moved here fromWinchester ."

"Kids?"

"No. That blessing passed me by, although I feel as though Mary Minor Haristeen is a daughter. She's the young woman you just met."

"Miranda, you were the spark plug of our class. I've thought of you more than you'll ever know, but I never sat down to write a letter. I'm a terrible letter writer. You'll always be my high-school sweetheart. Those were good times."

"Yes, they were," she said simply.

"I wanted to see the world and I did. But here I am. Back home."

"I feel as though I saw the world, too,Tracy . I suppose my world was within. I've drawn great strength from the Bible since George died. Harry calls me a religious nut."

"Harry?"

"The girl in the post office."

"Yes, of course. Minor. The people out onYellow Mountain Road . He married a Hepworth."

"Good memory. She's their daughter. They're gone now."

"Whatever happened to Mim Conrad? Did she marry Larry Johnson?"

"No." Miranda's voice dropped as though Mim were in the next room. "Larry was four years older than we were. Remember, he was finishing college as she was finishing high school? Well, he did go to medical school. They dated and then the next thing I knew they weren't dating anymore. He married someone else and she married Jim Sanburne."

"That oaf?"

"The same."

"Mim marrying Jim Sanburne. I can't believe it."

"He was big and handsome. He runs to fat now. But he's a genial man once you get to know him."

"I never tried. Larry still alive?"

"Yes, he practiced medicine here for decades. Still does, although he sold his practice to a young man, Hayden McIntire, with the provision that Larry'd work just one more year, get Hayden settled with the patients. That was several years ago. Still working, though. Hayden doesn't seem to mind. Larry's wife died years ago. He and Mim are friendly."

"They were such a hot item."

"You never know how the cookie will crumble." She giggled a little.

"Guess not. Here I am. Miranda, it's as though I never left. Oh, a few things are different, like that old-age home by the railroad underpass."

"Careful. No one calls it that anymore, not since we're getting so close ourselves. It's assisted-care living."

"Bull."

"Well-yes." She smiled. "The town is much the same. There are subdivisions. One on Route 240 calledDeepValley and one on the way toMillerSchool . There's a brand-new grade school which cost the county a pretty penny. But pretty much Crozet is Crozet. Not beautiful. Not quaint. Just home."

"Do you need help with the reunion?"

"What a delightful question." She folded her hands together gleefully.

"That's a yes, I take it." He smiled. "Say, how does Mim look?"

"Fabulous. You know it's her fiftieth reunion this year, too, atMadeira . She endured her second face-lift. She goes to the best and truthfully she does look fabulous. Slender as ever."

"H-m-m." He dusted his fingertips to rub off the sticky icing. "Jim Sanburne . . . I still can't believe that. Is he good to her?"

"Now. For a long time he wasn't and the further apart they drifted the haughtier she got. She was an embittered woman and then a miracle happened. I don't know if you believe in miracles but I do. She was diagnosed with breast cancer. Larry broke the news. She had a mastectomy and reconstructive surgery. Jim stopped running after women."

"Stop drinking, too?"

"He did."

"He'd put it away in high school, I remember that. Class of '49. Good football player. I was glad I had a year after he graduated. Selfish. I wanted the attention."

"You were All-State."

"We had a good team for as small a school as we were." He paused. "I closed up the house inKauai . I'm looking to rent a house here, or rooms. Would you know of anything?"

"I don't wish to pry but what would you be willing to pay?"

"A thousand a month for the right place."

She thought long and hard. "For how long?"

"Well, until December first at least. Our reunion is Homecoming so I might as well stay a month after that."

She smiled broadly. "I have an idea. Let me check it out first. Where are you staying now?"

"FarmingtonCountry Club-pretty funny, isn't it? The way I used to rail about that place being full of stupid snobs. Now I'm one of them-on a temporary basis, of course. And I heard a young fellow was murdered there-what? Two days ago?"

"Unlamented, I'm afraid. People are lining up to lay claim to the deed." She stopped. "Not very charitable of me, but the truth is no one is very upset about the demise of Charlie Ashcraft. How about if I call you tonight, or tomorrow at the latest? I may have just the place."

"Whose animals were those in the post office?"

"Oh, those are Harry's. If they aren't the smartest and cutest helpers."

"I don't remember you being that fond of animals."

She blushed. "They converted me."

He laughed. "Then they do have special powers."

13

"Use this italics pen." Chris handed Harry the fountain pen with the slanted nib.

"Let me practice first." Harry gingerly scratched the pen over scrap paper. "Kinda neat."

"I've divided up those cream-colored cards, the two-by-threes. See? Print the person's name like this." She held up a card. "Carl Ackerman, with the name at the top, leaving room for the title below. Got it?"

"I'll never think of stuff."

"You will, but if all the name tags are done now it will make life easier at the reunion. You'll be surprised at the ideas that will pop into your head between now and then. I bet by the time of your reunion-when is it, again?"

"End of October. Homecoming weekend."

"Right." Chris picked a card off her stack, her deep maroon nail polish making her fingers seem even longer and more tapered than they were. "That's lots of time. How about if I take the first half of the alphabet and you take the second."

"All those M's and S's," Harry laughed. "Thanks for having me over. The cats and dog thank you, too."

"Thanks." Mrs. Murphy sat on the floor, her eyes half-closed, swaying.

"The air-conditioning is perfect." Tucker wedged next to Harry, who sat on the floor, using the coffee table as a desk.

"Right-o," Pewter agreed. She rested on the silk sofa.

Harry eyed the gray kitty. "Get off that sofa."

"Oh, I don't care."

"Silk is very expensive." Harry leaned over. "I told you to get off."

"You touch me and I'll sink a claw into this gorgeous silk." For emphasis Pewter brandished one razor-sharp claw.

"Hussy." Harry backed off.

"She's fine. I rather like having animals about. When I bought this house I liked the fact that it's on an acre. I thought someday I might get a cat or dog."

"Cat," Pewter encouraged.

"Dog," Tucker countered.

"Both," Mrs. Murphy compromised.

"They're funny." Chris laughed.

"That they are. Why did you come here? After the big city it must seem like the back of the beyond."

"Chicagowas all I knew. I came through here two years ago on a vacation-a history tour. I just fell in love with the place. Being a stockbroker makes me pretty mobile and when an opening popped up at Harold and Marshall Securities I said, 'Why not.' I'd saved a good deal of money, which I think will tide me over as I build a new client base."

"People are cheap here. What I mean to say is, it won't be as easy to sell as it was inChicago ."

"I already know that," Chris said matter-of-factly as she inscribed names, "but I needed a shake-up. I broke up with my boyfriend. My walls were closing in on me."

A car rolled into the driveway.

"Who goes there!?!" Tucker sprang to the door.

"Tucker, this isn't your house."

"Oh-yeah." Tucker returned to Harry as Chris opened the door, letting Bitsy Valenzuela into the cooler air.

"Hi."

"Hi, Bitsy." Harry didn't rise.

"A drink?" Chris asked.

"A Tom Collins would be heaven. I'll mix it myself." Bitsy knew the way to the bar in Chris's house, a rounded steel bar with squares cut into the polished steel harboring lights: red, green, yellow, and blue. "Harry, you drinking?"

"Coke."

"Such virtue," Chris teased her.

"That's me." Harry hated inscribing the names.

Bitsy joined them at the coffee table. She sat next to Pewter, who stared up at her and then looked away. "I'm not up to snuff," Bitsy observed.

"She can be snotty," Murphy commented.

"Flies on your tuna," Pewter grumbled, then shut her eyes.

"Where's E.R.?" Chris inquired.

"Home for a change. He's vacuuming the swimming pool. I told him I'd be back in a half hour. It's his turn to cook. He's a good cook, too. Say, if you're hungry I'll pick up two more steaks."

"No, thanks," Harry declined. "I am determined to knock out my half. I've got forty left."

Bitsy picked up a card. "Bonnie Baltier. Great name."

"Wittiest," Chris said.

"How do you know that?" Harry asked.

"Senior superlatives," Chris said. "I've studied your yearbook so much I think I know them almost as well as you do."

"This goes above and beyond losing to Susan Tucker at golf," Harry said.

"Well, I'm enjoying it. And to be honest, I'm hoping to meet some unmarried men through this. You never know." She shyly smiled.

"Take E.R.," Bitsy laughed. She loved him but she liked to complain of his foibles, one of which was the irritating habit of reading magazines backwards to forwards. "I could use a rest."

"Any husband that cooks, I'd keep," Chris told her.

"Amen," Harry said.

"Anyone seen Marcy today?" Chris asked. "I thought she might drop by this afternoon."

"I passed her on the road and waved." Bitsy swallowed half her drink. "She looked miserable. I wish she'd come out with it and say her marriage is crumbling-we all know. I think all this stress is making her sick. Her face is drawn."

"I'm sorry to hear that." Harry's eyebrows moved up in surprise.

"AnotherDeepValley divorce." Bitsy drained the glass. "They barely speak to one another."

"People go through phases," Chris blandly said.

Mrs. Murphy opened her eyes. "That's a nice way to put it."

"That's true." Bitsy got up to make herself another Tom Collins. "Chris, I owe you a bottle of Tanqueray. But how do you know what's a phase and what's a permanent part of character?" She returned to the original subject.

"You don't for a long time. By the time I figured out my boyfriend was a self-centered jerk, I'd put three years into the relationship," Chris complained.

The ice cubes tumbled into the tall frosted glass as Bitsy listened.

"What's the story on Blair Bainbridge?" Chris asked. "I can't quite get a fix on him."

"He's a model," Harry said. "Makes a ton of money. He dates Little Mim Sanburne as well as women from other places. He's kind of"-she thought for a minute-"languid."

Bitsy flopped on the couch, again disturbing Pewter, who grumbled. "He can be as languid as he wants as long as he stays that gorgeous."

"Amen, sister." Chris held up her glass, as if toasting Bitsy.

Bitsy asked Harry, "We all thought you and Fair might be getting back together."

"Did Mrs. Hogendobber tell you that?"

"No," Chris answered, "but it just seemed, uh, in the cards and Fair is very handsome."

"Fair Haristeen is the best equine vet in centralVirginia . He's a good man. He was a so-so husband. If he interests you, tell him. You won't upset me."

"Harry, I wouldn't do that." Chris blushed.

"I don't care."

"You do, too," Tucker disagreed.

Bitsy took a long swallow. "Harry, no woman is that diffident about her ex-husband."

"Uh." Harry changed the subject. "Market Shiflett is single. He's a nice guy."

"Doesn't look like Blair Bainbridge," Bitsy frankly stated.

"If you marry a drop-dead gorgeous man you have to accept that other women will chase him and sooner or later he'll be unfaithful. A man like Market is responsible, loyal, and true. Personally, I find those qualities very sexy. I didn't at twenty-two but I do now," Harry said.

"You've got a point there," Chris agreed.

14

There were three reasons that people attended Charlie Ashcraft's funeral. The first was to support his mother, Linda, who had never made an enemy in her life. Married young, dumped at twenty-one with a six-month-old baby, she had struggled to make ends meet. Like many an abandoned woman she spoiled her son-the only man who truly loved her-and she had bailed her offspring out of innumerable crises. Poor Linda could never see that she was part of the problem. She fervently believed she was the solution.

The second reason people came to the funeral was to see who else was there-namely, were there any teary-eyed women? Surprisingly, there were not.

The third reason people came was to make sure he was really dead.

A lone reporter from The Daily Progress covered the event but Channel 29 sent no cameras to mar the occasion. Then, too, the station manager had had his own brush with Charlie and enjoyed denying the egotist coverage of his last social event.

As people filed out of the simple Baptist church, Harry leaned over to Susan and whispered, "Did you notice there were hardly any flowers?"

"I did. Maybe people will give to charity."

"More than likely they'll give to an abortion clinic. That's where most of his girlfriends wound up."

Susan gasped, choking on a mint, and Harry patted her on the back. "Sorry."

Thanks to her beautiful voice, Miranda Hogendobber, a stalwart of the choir of The Church of the Holy Light, was invited to sing a solo at the funeral. Linda Ashcraft asked her to sing "Faith of Our Fathers," which she did. Walking out of the back of the church, her choir robe over her arm, she caught sight of Harry and Susan.

"Unusual," Mrs. Hogendobber said under her breath.

"Uh-huh," the two friends agreed.

They walked up the hill, the church cemetery unfolding in the deep green grass before them. Ahead walked BoomBoom, Bitsy, and Chris.

"Maybe they knew Charlie better than we thought." Susan kept her voice low.

"BoomBoom's tugboats. They're missing Marcy Wiggins, though. H-m-m." Harry thought a minute. "Boom probably called in tears saying she needed support since he was her first high-school boyfriend. Amazes me how she manages to be the center of drama." She stopped as they neared the gravesite.

Linda, already at the grave, was being supported by her brother-in-law. The poor woman was totally distraught. As they gathered around the opened earth, Harry, in the back, scanned the band of mourners-if one could call them that. Apart from Linda, the mood was respectful but not grief-stricken. Meredith McLaughlin, Market Shiflett, and Bonnie Baltier were there, all from their high-school class.

Big Mim Sanburne attended, Little Mim was absent. Who was there and who was not was interesting, and Sheriff Rick Shaw and Deputy Cynthia Cooper had attended just to study the gathering.

Although they were too discreet to make notes at such a time.

"Why don't we slip away before Linda comes back through the crowd?" Rick put his hand under Cynthia's elbow, propelling the tall woman toward the church.

Harry, noticing, left Susan and Miranda to catch up to Cynthia and Rick. She said, "Sad. Not because he's dead but because nobody cares other than Linda. Can you imagine living a life where nobody truly loves you and it's your own damn fault?"

"A waste." Cynthia summed it up.

The three stopped before a recent grave festooned with flowers. The granite headstone bore the inscription Timothy Martin, June 1, 1958 to January 29, 1997. A racing car carved at the base of the tombstone roared from left to right. At the corners of the grave two checkered flags marked Tim's final finish line.

"I didn't know they'd done that." Rick remembered picking up what was left of Tim after he spun out on a nasty curve coming downAftonMountain . He turned too fast on Route 6 and literally flew over the mountainside. He raced stock cars on weekends, was a good driver, but never saw the black ice that ended his life.

The flags fluttered. "It's nice that his family remembered him as he lived. He'd love this."

"They keep him covered in flowers," Cynthia remarked. "I hope someone loves me that much."

"Someone will-be patient." Rick smiled as he flicked open his small notebook with his thumb. "What do you think, Harry?"

"I'd question whoever isn't here and should have been."

He smiled again. "Smart cookie."

The crowd was dispersing from the gravesite.

"Let's forgo the reception. This is hard enough for Linda Ashcraft without two cops at the table." Cynthia headed toward her own car. They hadn't taken a squad car, and since the body was carried directly from the church to the cemetery there was no need for a police escort. Rick and Cynthia were uncommonly sensitive people.

Moving at a slow pace, Miranda, choir robe folded over her arm, and Susan came over the rise. They waved to Harry, who waited at the back church door.

Miranda exhaled, focusing on Harry. "I'd like a word with you." The two walked under the trees as Miranda encouraged Harry to take in a boarder, namely Tracy.

15

Like many doctors, Bill Wiggins, an oncologist, was accustomed to getting his way. "Stat" was his favorite word, a word meaning "immediately" in hospital lingo.

Sitting on his back deck surveying his green lawn, not one dandelion in sight, he also surveyed his wife.

"Marcy, you've lost a lot of weight."

"Summer. I can't eat in the heat." She watered the ornamental cherry trees at the edge of the lawn.

"You need to get a thorough checkup. I'll call Dinky Barlow."

Dinky Barlow was an internist at the hospital. He was unbelievably thorough.

"Honey, I'm fine."

"I'm the doctor." He tried to sound humorous.

"Probably need a B-12 shot." She smiled weakly. It would never do to tell Bill what was off was their relationship. They rarely communicated other than simple facts-like bring home milk and butter. Bill, like most doctors, worked long hours under great stress. He never quite adjusted to his patients dying, feeling in some way that it was a blot on his skills.

Marcy needed more. Bill had nothing left to give her.

Then again, he didn't look inward. As long as supper was on the table, his home kept in order and clean, he had nothing to complain about.

His silence, which Bitsy and Chris interpreted as hostility in their friend's marriage, was really exhaustion. He had little time for chatting up his wife and none for her girlfriends, whom he thought boring and superficial.

Bill flipped open his mobile phone, dialed, made an appointment for his wife, then flipped the phone so it shut off. "Next Tuesday. Eight-thirty A.M. Dinky's office."

"Thank you, honey." She hated it when he managed her like that but she said nothing, instead changing the subject. "You didn't want to go to Charlie Ashcraft's funeral?"

He swirled his chair to speak directly to her. "Marcy, the last place I ever want to go is a funeral," he ruefully said. "Besides, he was an empty person. I've no time for people like that."

"But doesn't it upset you just a little bit that someone in your class was killed? Murdered?"

"If it were anyone but him, maybe it would." He sat up straight. "You know what gets me? Death is part of life. Americans can't accept that."

"But Charlie was so young."

"The body has its own timetable. In his case it wasn't his body, it was his mind. He brought about his own end. Why be a hypocrite and pretend I'm upset? As I said, my dear, death is a part of life."

"But you get upset when a patient dies."

"You're damned right I do. I fight for my patients. I see how much they fight. Charlie squandered his life. I wish I could give my patients those hours and years that he tossed aside." He glared at Marcy. "Why are we having this argument?"

"I didn't think it was an argument."

"Oh." Confused, he slumped back in his chair.

She continued watering, moving to the boxwoods, which were far enough away to retard conversation.

16

The 1958 John Deere tractor, affectionately known as Johnny Pop, pop-popped over the western hay fields.

Bushhogging was one of Harry's favorite chores. She would mow the edge of the road, all around the barn and then clear around the edges of her pastures and hay fields.

The hay needed to be cut next week. She'd arranged to rent a spider wheel tedder to fold the freshly cut hay into windrows. Then she'd go back over the flattened, sweet-smelling hay with an old twine square baler.

Hard work in the boiling sun, but Harry, born to it, thrived.

Today she chugged along in a middle gear, careful not to get too close to the strong-running creek.

The horses stayed in the barn during the day in the summers, a fan tilted into each stall to cool them and blow the flies off.

Mrs. Murphy and Pewter were hanging out at the spring house. The cool water running over the stones produced a delightful scent. The mice liked it, too.

Tucker, sprawled in the center aisle of the barn, breathed in and out-little no-see-ums rising and falling with each breath-like an insect parasol opening and closing.

Harry loved this patch of Virginia. She had great pride in her state, which boasted two ancient mountain ranges, a rich coastline fed by three great rivers, and a lushness unimaginable to a Westerner. But, then, the Westerner was freed from the myriad gossamer expectations and blood ties inherited by each Virginian. So much was expected of a Virginian that ofttimes one had to escape for a few days, weeks, or years to rejuvenate.

A poplar tree downed in an early-summer storm loomed ahead. Harry sighed. She had to cut up the big tree, then drag the sections and branches to those places in her fence line that needed repair. Poplar didn't last as long as locust, but still, it was for free, not counting her labor.

She cut off Johnny Pop and dismounted. The spotted tree bark remained home to black ants and other crawlies. Although flat on its side, roots exposed, the crown of the poplar was covered in healthy green leaves.

"Life doesn't give up easily," she said aloud, admiring the tenacity of the desperately injured tree.

She bent over the creek, cupped her hands and washed her face. Then she let the tumbling cool water run over her hands.

It suddenly occurred to her that her feelings about Charlie Ashcraft as an individual were irrelevant. The swiftness of his end sobered her. Security was a myth. Knowing that intellectually and knowing it emotionally were two different things.

She shook her hands, enjoying the tingling sensation. The sensation of death's randomness was far less pleasant.

"Given the chance, I'll fight to the end. I'll fight just like you." She patted the thick tree trunk before climbing back onto the tractor.

17

"Smells okay." Tucker twitched her nose.

"You rely on your nose too much. You have to use your other senses." Pewter sat impassively on the sofa, watching Tracy Raz carry a duffel bag over his shoulder.

"Think this will work?" Tucker, also on the sofa, asked.

"Yep." Mrs. Murphy, alertly poised on the big curving sofa arm announced, "Tracy Raz will be a godsend."

"'Cause of the money? Mom's new truck payments don't leave much at the end of the month." Tucker, conservative about money, fretted over every penny because she saw Harry fret. A rent check of five hundred dollars a month would help Harry considerably. Tucker was grateful to Mrs. Hogendobber for sitting down both Harry and Tracy Raz to work out a fair arrangement.

"That, too, but I think it's going to be great for Mom to have someone around. She's lived alone too long now and she's getting set in her ways. Another year and it'd be-concrete."

Pewter and Tucker laughed.

Harry led the athletically built man upstairs. She walked down a hall, the heart pine floor covered with an old Persian runner, deep russet and navy blue. At the end of the hall she opened the last door on the right to a huge bedroom with a full bath and sitting room. "I hope it suits. I turned on the air conditioner. It's an old window unit and hums a lot but the nights are so cool you won't need it. There's always a breeze."

Tracy noticed the big four-poster rice bed. "That's a beauty."

"Grandmother gave it to Mom as a wedding present. Grandma Hepworth was raised in Charleston, South Carolina."

"Prettiest city in the country." He walked across the room, turned off the air conditioner, and threw open the window. "The reason people are sick all the time is because of air-conditioning. The body never properly adjusts to the season."

"Dad used to say that." Harry smiled. "Oh, here are the keys although I never lock the house. Let's see, I'm usually up by five-thirty so I can knock off the barn chores. If you like to ride you can help me work the horses. It's a lot of fun."

"Rode Western. Never got the hang of an English saddle." He smiled.

"I can't promise meals. . . ."

"Don't expect any. Anyway, Miranda told me you eat like a bird."

"Oh, if you don't shut your door at night the animals will come in. They won't be able to resist. Any magazines or papers you leave on the floor will be filed away-usually under the bed. If you take your watch off at night or a necklace of any sort put it in your bureau drawer because Mrs. Murphy can't resist jewelry. She drags anything that glitters to the sofa, where she drops it behind a cushion."

Mrs. Murphy, curiosity aroused, followed them upstairs. "I resent that. You leave stuff all over the house. With my system everything is in one place."

"Where we can all sit on it," Pewter, also brimming with curiosity, said.

"Those two culprits?" Tracy nodded at the two cats now posing in the doorway.

"Murphy's the tiger cat and the gray cannonball is Pewter. She used to belong to Market Shiflett but she spent so much time at the post office with my animals that he told me to just take her home. She also flicked meat out of the display case, which didn't go down well with the customers."

"They're beautiful cats."

"I knew I'd like this guy." Pewter beamed.

"He's handsome for his age." Mrs. Murphy purred, deciding to bestow a rub on Tracy's leg. She padded over, slid across his leg, then sat down. He stroked her head.

Pewter followed suit.

"I'll leave you to get settled. You can use the kitchen, the living room. I figure if something upsets you you'll tell me and vice versa. I'm going out to finish my barn chores."

"I'll go along. There's not that much in the bag to worry about. I thought I'd do a little shopping this week."

"You don't have to help me."

"Like to be useful." He beamed.

And he was. He could toss a fifty-pound bale of hay over his shoulder as though it weighed one-tenth of that. Although not a horseman, he had enough sense to not make loud noises around them.

Tracy whistled as he worked. Harry liked hearing him. It suddenly hit her how stupid it was to retire people unless they decided to retire. The terms "twilight years" and "golden years" ought to be stricken from the language. We shove people out of work at the time when they have the most wisdom. It must be horrible to sit on the sidelines with nothing vital to do.

Simon, belly flat to the hayloft floor, peered over the side. A new human! One was bad enough.

Harry noticed him. "Patience, Simon."

Tracy glanced up. "Simon?"

"Possum in the hayloft. He's very shy. There's also a huge owl up in the cupola and a blacksnake. She comes back to hibernate each fall. Right now she's on the south side of the property. I've tracked her hunting circle. Pretty interesting."

"That was the one thing I hated about my work. Kept me in cities most of the time. I worked out in gyms but nothing keeps you as healthy as farmwork. My father farmed. You wouldn't remember him, he worked the old Black Twig apple orchard west of Crozet. Lived to be a hundred and one. The worst thing we ever did was talk Pop into selling the orchard and moving to Florida. I'll never forgive myself for that."

"He's forgiven you."

Tracy stopped a moment to wipe the sweat from his face. The temperature hovered in the low eighties even though it was seven at night. "Thanks for that."

"Possums are interesting, too." Harry tactfully returned to the subject of Simon. "They'll eat about anything. There's a bug that infects birds and if the possums eat a bird with the bug they'll shed it in their poop. If horses eat the poop they come down with EPM, an awful kind of sickness that gets them uncoordinated and weak. If you catch it in time it still takes a long time to heal. Anyway, I love my Simon. Can't kill him but I don't want my kids here to, by chance, munch some hay that Simon has-befouled. So each night I put out sweet feed and the occasional marshmallow. He's so full he doesn't roam very far and there's no room for birds."

"I can see you're the kind of person who loves animals."

"My best friends." She slid the pitchfork between the two nails on the wall. "Mr. Raz-"

"Please call me Tracy."

"Thank you. And call me Harry. I hope you don't think I'm prying but I've just got to ask you. How did Mrs. Hogendobber come by the nickname 'Cuddles'?"

As they watched the ground fog slither over the western meadow and the meadowlarks scurry to their nests, the bobwhites started to call to one another and the bats emerged from under the eaves of Harry's house. Tracy recalled his high-school days with Miranda.

"Love bats." Mrs. Murphy fluffed her fur as a slight chill rolled up with the ground fog.

"Never catch one." Pewter liked the way bats zigged and zagged. Got her blood up.

"My mother caught one once," Murphy remembered. "It was on its way out, though. Still, she did catch it. You know they're mice with wings, that's how I think of them."

"Maybe we'd better catch the mice in the barn first."

Mrs. Murphy moved over to Pewter, leaning against her in the chill. "I heard them singing in the tackroom this morning. I expect them to be saucy in the feedroom. But the tackroom. It was humiliating. Fortunately, Harry can't hear them."

"An original song?"

The tiger cat laughed. "In those high-pitched voices everything sounds original but it was 'Dixie.'"

"Well, at least they're Southern mice."

"Pewter, that's a great comfort." Mrs. Murphy laughed so loudly she interrupted the humans.

"Getting a little nippy, Miss Puss?" Harry scooped her up in one arm while lifting Pewter with the other. "Pewts, light and lively for you."

A cat on each shoulder, Harry walked back to the house as Tucker trailed at Tracy's heels.

Tracy picked up where he'd left off when Murphy let out what sounded to him like a yowl. "-one of the prettiest girls in the class. Natural. Fresh."

"Was she plump?"

"Uh . . . full-figured. You girls are too skinny these days. Miranda sparkled. Anyway, we'd go on hay rides and trips to other high schools for football games. I played on the team. Afterwards we'd all ride back to school in our old jalopies. Fun. I think I was too young to know how much fun I was having. And World War Two ended five years before our graduation so everyone felt safe and wonderful. It was an incredible time." He chuckled as he opened the porch door for Harry. "Every chance I had I got close to Miranda and I nicknamed her 'Cuddles.'"

The kitchen door, open to catch the breeze, was shut behind them as the night air, drenched in moisture and coolness, was drawing through the house.

Harry put the cats on the kitchen counter. "Must be a cold front coming through. The wind is picking up. This has been an unusual summer. Usually it's brutally hot, like the last few days have been."

"Nothing like a Virginia summer unless it's a Delta summer. One year in the service I was stationed in Louisiana and thought I would melt. Heat and hookworm, the history of the South."

"Cured the latter. Did I interrupt you? If I did I apologize. You were telling me about Miranda."

"In my day we were all friends. It wasn't quite as much sex stuff. I had a crush on Miranda and we did a lot of things together but as a group. I took her to the senior prom. You know, I loved her but I didn't know that either. It wasn't until years later that I figured it all out but by then I was halfway around the world, fighting in Korea. I wish you could have known Miranda as a youngster."

"I'm glad to know her now."

"More subdued now. She said you thought she was a religious nut."

"I give her a hard time. She needs someone to give her hell," Harry half-giggled. "She's more religious than I am but I don't know as she's a nut. You know, Tracy, I've known Miranda from the time I was a child but what do children know? She was bright and chirpy. George died and she took a nosedive. That's when she turned more to religion, although she was a strong churchgoer before. But I've noticed this last year she's happier. It's taken her a long time."

"Does. Lost my wife two years ago and I'm just pulling out of it."

"I'm sorry."

"Me, too. You live with a woman for half of your life and she's the air you breathe. You don't think about it. You simply breathe."

"Poor fellow." Tucker whimpered softly.

"He's on the mend and he's sure good with chores so I hope he hangs around." Mrs. Murphy, ever practical, batted water drops as they slowly collected under the water tap.

The phone rang. Harry picked it up. Tracy noticed Mrs. Murphy and walked over to the faucet. He unscrewed the tap with his fingers, so strong was his grasp. The washer was shot. He put it back and grabbed a notepad by the phone and made a note to himself which he stuck in his pocket.

"All right, Susan, all right."

Susan, on the other end of the line, said, "Now the hysteria is, should BoomBoom use the picture with Charlie or not?"

"She should look at the proofs first."

"One of them is bound to turn out."

"Susan, what does she intend to do with the superlatives that Aurora and Ron are in? They're dead, too."

"She can't make up her mind whether to use their old photographs either."

"I'll make it up for her. Tell her we all suffered in the heat for that photograph of her and Charlie, so use it."

"You know, Harry, that's a good idea. Hang up and call her before she emotes anymore. It is tiresome." Susan paused. "Go on, Harry. You call her."

Harry, grumbling, did just that and BoomBoom blurted out three or four sentences of inner thoughts before Harry cut her off and told her to just use the new photo. The whole idea was to see the passage of time!

Harry finally got off the phone. "This reunion is becoming a full-time job."

"Ours is going to be real simple," Tracy said. "We'll gather in the cafeteria, swap tales, eat and dance. I don't even know if there will be decorations."

"With Miranda as the chair? She can't have changed that much in fifty years, I promise you." Harry smiled.

"That's something about one of your classmates getting shot." Tracy noticed the weather stripping on the door was ragged. "Everyone seems calm about it."

"Because everyone thinks they know the reason why. They just have to find out which husband pulled the trigger. What has upset people, though, is the mailing that went out to our classmates before Charlie was killed. 'You'll never get old!' it said."

"Ever hear the expression, 'Expect a trap where the ground is smoothest'?" Mrs. Murphy commented as she wiped her whiskers.

"What made you think of that?" Tucker, now rolled over on her back, inquired.

"People have jumped to a conclusion. Charlie Ashcraft could have been killed for another reason. What if he was involved in fraud or theft or selling fake bonds?"

"That's true." Pewter, now on the table, agreed. "No one much cares because they think it doesn't have anything to do with them."

"Like I said, 'Expect a trap where the ground is smoothest.'"

18

The dually's motor rumbled as Harry leaned over to drop Tracy's rent check and her deposit slip in the outdoor deposit box on the side of the bank.

The truck gobbled gas, which she could ill afford, but the thrill of driving her new truck to town on her lunch hour superseded prudence.

Susan had given her expensive sheepskin seat covers, which pleased the animals as much as it pleased Harry. They lounged on the luxurious surface, the cats "kneading bread."

Harry flew through the morning's chores, then drove over to Fair's clinic at lunch.

"Hi, Ruth." She smiled at the receptionist.

"He's in the back." Ruth nodded toward the back.

Harry and the animals found him studying X-rays.

"Look." He pointed to a splint, a bone sliver detaching from a horse's cannon bone, a bone roughly equivalent to the human forearm.

"Doesn't look bad enough to operate." She'd seen lots of X-rays during their marriage.

"Hope not. It should reattach. Splints are more common than not." He switched off the light box. "Hello, kids."

The animals greeted him eagerly.

"Here, you're a peach." Harry smiled on the word peach. She handed him a check.

"What's this?"

"Partial payment on my old truck. Five hundred dollars a month for four months. I called Art for the real price. He told me to take anything you'd give me but I can't-really. It's not right."

"I don't want the money. That was a gift." He frowned.

"It's too big a gift. I can't take it, as much as I appreciate it."

"No strings. I owe it to you."

"No you don't." She shoved back the check that he held out to her.

"Harry, you can be a real pain in the ass."

"Who's talking?" Her voice raised.

"I'm leaving." Mrs. Murphy headed for the door, only to jump sideways as Ruth rushed in.

"Doc, Sheriff Shaw has Bill Wiggins in the squad car."

"Huh?"

Ruth, almost overwhelmed by the mass of curly gray hair atop her head, breathlessly said, "Margaret Anstein called from the station house. She's the new receptionist at the sheriff's office-or station house, that's what she calls it. She just called me to say Rick was bringing in Bill Wiggins for questioning about Charlie's murder."

"You can't get away with anything in this town." Fair carefully slid the X-rays in a big heavy white envelope.

"That Marcy is a pretty girl. Just Charlie's type." Ruth smacked her lips.

"They were all Charlie's type," Harry said.

"She wasn't at the funeral," Ruth said.

"Why should she be? She's new," Fair replied, irritated that Ruth and most of Crozet had jumped to conclusions.

"The other new people were there. A funeral is a good place to meet people," Ruth blathered.

"Unless they're dead." Pewter twitched her whiskers and followed Murphy to the door.

19

Harry no sooner walked through the back door to the post office than Miranda rushed over to her.

"There's been another one."

"Another what?"

"Mailing. Open your mail. You're always late in opening your mail."

Harry picked up her pile on the little table in the back.

"This one." Miranda pointed out a folded-over, stapled sheet.

"Who else . . . ?"

"Susan, BoomBoom, Bill, and-"

Harry exclaimed, "What a jerk!"

Mrs. Murphy and Pewter stuck their heads over the paper that Harry held in her hands.

"What is it?" Tucker asked.

"Typed. 'Sorry, Charlie. Who's next?' and a drop of red ink like a drop of blood," the tiger answered.

Harry flipped over the page, which allowed Tucker to see it. "22905. The Barracks Road post office again. It's funny no one said anything this morning."

"Because none of your classmates came in before lunch. BoomBoom was at her therapist's and Susan spent the morning in Richmond. The only reason I know that Bill got one was that Marcy called once she got home. Guess she opens his mail. Not right to do that." Miranda believed mail was sacrosanct, the last intimate form of communication.

Harry dialed Vonda, the postmistress at Barracks Road. "Hi, Vonda, Harry. How you doin'?"

Vonda, a pretty woman but not one to babble on, said, "Fine, how are you?"

"Okay, except my classmates and I have gotten another one of these mailings from your post office. Folded over, stapled. Looks to be run off from a color Xerox."

"Bulk?"

"No. They're too smart for a bulk rate. A regular stamp and yesterday's postmark. Did anyone come to the counter with a handful?" Harry knew Vonda would remember, if she'd been behind the counter.

"No. Let me ask the others." Vonda put down the phone. She returned in a minute. "They were pushed through the mail slot. Mary says they were in the bin when she started sorting at elevenish. Second full bin of the day."

"Keep your eyes open. This is getting kind of creepy."

"I will. But it's very easy to walk in and out of here without attracting notice."

"Yeah, I know. Thanks, Vonda." Harry hung up the phone.

"Barracks Road gets more traffic in a day than we get in a week," Pewter remarked.

"Second busiest post office in the county." Mrs. Murphy knew enough to be a postmistress herself. "Even busier than the university station." The main post office on Seminole Trail was the busiest, of course.

"Does Rick know?" Harry asked.

"Yes. Susan called him the minute she picked up her mail." Mrs. Hogendobber paused. "Did you hear that Rick hauled in Bill Wiggins for questioning?"

"Ruth told me. I stopped by Fair's clinic."

"Doesn't look good, does it?" Miranda pursed her lipstick-covered lips.

"For Bill?"

"No, in general."

"I want to know why Bill?"

"Perhaps he was Charlie's doctor. It's entirely possible that Charlie had cancer. He'd never tell."

"I never thought of that." Harry looked down at Tucker, who was looking up. "That doesn't mean Bill will reveal anything. Aren't doctor-patient relationships privileged?"

"I think they are. Doesn't mean Rick won't try."

Mrs. Murphy batted at the paper. Harry dropped it on the table. "What a sick thing to do. Send out . . ." She didn't finish her sentence.

Mrs. Murphy and Pewter both stared at the 81/2¢¢ x 11¢¢ white page.

"Looks like a warning to me," Pewter said.

"What happened back then? Back when Harry graduated," Tucker sensibly asked.

"I don't know. And more to the point, she doesn't know." Mrs. Murphy looked up at Harry. "If something dreadful had happened and she knew about it, she'd tell the sheriff." Mrs. Murphy sat on the paper.

"Yes. She would." Pewter shuddered.

20

Rick Shaw made drawings, flow sheets, time charts, which he color-coded, sticking them on the long cork bulletin board he installed at the station. Being a visual thinker he needed charts.

Every employee of the Farmington Country Club was questioned. Every member at the club that evening had been questioned also, which put a few noses out of joint.

He paced up and down the aisle in front of the bulletin board, eighteen feet. Although pacing was a habit he declared it burned calories. When he slid into middle age he noticed the pounds stuck to him like yellow jackets. You'd brush them off only to have them return. He'd lost fifteen pounds and was feeling better but he had another fifteen to go.

"You're wearing me out." Cynthia tapped her pencil on the side of her desk.

"Get up and walk with me." He smiled at her, his hands clasped behind his back. "This is such a straightforward murder, Coop, that we ought to be able to close the case and yet we haven't a firm suspect. Bill Wiggins is our most logical candidate but the guy has an airtight alibi. He was with a patient at Martha Jefferson Hospital."

She plopped her pencil in a Ball jar she kept on her desk for that purpose and joined him. "The fact that Charlie was shot at such a close range implies he knew who killed him."

"No, it doesn't. There's not a lot of room in the men's locker room. A stranger could have come in as though going to a locker. Charlie wouldn't have paid much attention."

"Yeah." Coop knew he was right, and it frustrated her.

"All we have is Hunter Hughes' testimony that he thought he saw a slender man come down from the landing. He heard the footsteps because he had left the counter in the golf shop and had walked outside for a smoke. He worked until nine that evening. He assumed the man was leaving the men's grill, heard the footsteps and as he turned to go back into the golf shop he saw the back of an average-sized male wearing a white linen-like jacket. This was close to the time of the murder. That's all we've got."

They both stopped in front of the detailed drawing of the country club golf shop, grill, and the men's locker room, along with a sketch of the buildings on that side of the club.

"But when we questioned the manager of the grill, he doesn't remember anyone at the bar about that time."

"Could have been a member passing through from the 19th Hole to the back stairway on the second floor, since it would be a faster route to the men's locker room."

"What if our killer came out of the pool side?" She pointed to the pool, which was behind the long brick structure containing the locker room and golf shop.

"Easy. It would have been easy to park behind the caretaker's house. The car would have been in the dark. Walking up here behind the huge boxwoods would have made it easy to escape detection." He pointed to the sketch. "For that matter the killer could have sat in his car. Who would notice back here? Whoever he is, he knows the routine and layout of the club. He knew no big party was planned that night. Then again, the schedule is published monthly, so it's easily accessible. It goes to each member plus it's posted at the front desk."

"A member." She nodded. "Knowing the layout points in that direction."

"Yeah, or an employee"-Rick folded his arms across his chest-"possible but unlikely."

"A jealous husband could have paid a professional."

"Could have."

She turned to face her boss. "But it smacks of a deeper connection. 'Up close and personal,' like they used to say during the Olympics coverage."

"Sure does. Our killer wanted to get right in Charlie's face."

21

"Not so fast!" Denny Rablan called from behind the camera. He was beginning to wonder why he was doing this, even if it was for his class reunion.

Bonnie, black curls shaking with laughter, sped on her bicycle toward a short but handsome Leo Burkey, also pedaling to pick up momentum. Bonnie and Leo screamed at one another as they approached. Chris Sharpton buried her face in her hands since she thought they'd crash.

BoomBoom, standing behind Denny, appeared immobile while Harry giggled. She knew Bonnie and Leo were thoroughly enjoying discomfiting BoomBoom, who was determined to follow through on her before-and-after idea.

The two pedaled more furiously, heading straight for one another, at the last minute averting the crash.

"That's not funny!" BoomBoom bellowed.

"Olivia, you have no sense of humor. You never did." Bonnie called BoomBoom by her given name.

Her maiden name had been Olivia Ulrich but she'd been called BoomBoom ever since puberty. Only Boom's mother called her Olivia, a name she loathed although it was beautiful. Once she married Kelly Craycroft she happily dumped all references to Ulrich, since the Craycrofts carried more social cachet than the Ulrichs.

Eyes narrowed, BoomBoom advanced on Bonnie, who merrily pedaled away from her. "Get serious, Baltier! This is costing us. Time is money."

"God, what a rocket scientist." Leo smiled, revealing huge white teeth.

"You're a big, fat help." BoomBoom pointed a finger at him.

"I thought dear Denny was giving us his services for free." He innocently held up his hands, riding without them.

"I am. Almost," Dennis growled. "A greatly reduced rate."

"Well, Denny, my man, if you hadn't pissed away a fortune, you could do this for free, couldn't you?"

"Leo, shut up. It's over and done. I live with my mistakes and I don't throw your screwups in your face."

Leo rode in circles around the tall, thin, attractive photographer. "Maybe you're right."

"I could name your screwups. They all have feminine names."

Leo stopped the bike. He put his feet on the ground and walked the few steps to face Dennis. "So many women. So little time. Not that I'm in Charlie's league."

"Guess not. Charlie's dead."

"Did you get that asinine letter?"

"I figured you did it." Dennis smirked.

"Sure. I drove all the way from Richmond to Charlottesville to send a mailing with fake blood drops. Get real."

"I wouldn't put anything past you."

"No?" Leo's light hazel eyes widened. "Remember this: I'm not stupid. You were stupid. Sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Jesus, Denny, by the time you got off the merry-go-round you were broken. How could you do that?"

"Too loaded to care, man." Dennis's mouth clamped like a vise.

"I think you broke bad in high school."

"Leo, I don't give a damn what you think." Dennis turned his back on the shorter but more powerfully built man.

The others glanced over at the two men, then glanced away. Dennis and Leo were oil and water. Always had been.

"Shiny nose," Bitsy Valenzuela, in charge of makeup, called out.

Bonnie, ignoring BoomBoom-something she had perfected throughout high school-glided over to Bitsy.

Chris Sharpton picked up the orange cone she'd dropped when she thought the two were going to crash at high speed. Stationed at the entrance to the high-school parking lot, she put the cone upright. If anyone drove in they'd see the blaze-orange cone, see her and stop. She could direct them toward the rear. She stood there forlorn since no one drove through this early September afternoon. Many of the kids were behind the school at football practice.

"Listen, you two, we haven't got all day. Just get in position. Put the bikes down."

Finally obeying, both Bonnie and Leo approached one an-other and screeched to a halt.

"Put that bike down carefully, Leo, it's an antique," BoomBoom again commanded.

"No one is going to know if this bike is twenty years old or not. You're getting carried away with this," Leo said, but he did restrain himself from saying other, less pleasant things.

Bonnie laid her bike down, turning the wheel up just as it was in the original photograph. Leo's bike took more work. It stood on its front wheel in the original photograph as though the wreck had just happened. Harry, Susan Tucker, and a very subdued Marcy Wiggins set two blocks on either side of the front wheel. Since Leo would be sprawled on the ground his body would cover the blocks. They then braced the back side of the bicycle with a thin iron pole. As this was a balancing act, the two principals lay on the ground. The first time the shot had been taken, in 1979, the bike kept falling on Leo. The next day he was covered with bruises. Harry, Susan, and Marcy hoped they had secured the bicycle better than that but they also held their breath, hoping Nature would do likewise.

"Hurry up, Denny, this asphalt is hot!" Leo barked.

"Stay still, idiot." Denny said "idiot" under his breath. He shot the whole roll in record time.

Bonnie, thinking ahead, had taped bits of moleskin and padding on her one elbow and knee. She was on them as though she'd just hit the ground on her side. Still, the heat came through the padding.

Leo got up. "That's enough."

"We just started!" BoomBoom exploded.

The propped bicycle wobbled, falling with a metallic crash, spinning spokes throwing off sunlight.

Harry ran over, picked it up. Luckily there were no scratches.

"If that bike is broken, I'll kill you," BoomBoom, often the butt of Leo's high-school pranks, hissed.

"Don't get your ovaries in an uproar, Boom. If the damned bicycle is scratched I'll fix it. You know, here it is twenty years later and you still haven't learned how to lighten up."

"Here it is twenty years later and you still haven't grown up," she fired back.

Chris left her cone. This was too good to miss.

Bonnie, ever the pragmatist, walked over to Denny. "Think you got it?"

"Yeah, that asphalt really is too hot to shoot this picture. The first time we did this it was later in the fall, remember?"

"October." Harry rolled the bike over to the two of them. "We voted on senior superlatives mid-October."

"What a good memory." Denny couldn't remember what he'd eaten for supper the night before but then, given his past, a bad memory was a blessing.

"Remember when Leo made a crack to Ron Brindell in the cafeteria the day after the results were announced? Remember? Ron won Most Popular and Leo said they should shoot his picture in the locker room." Harry continued to wipe down the bike.

Leo had joined them. "Yeah."

Chris innocently asked, "Why'd you say that?"

"Ron was such a limp-wristed wimp. I said they should shoot him in the showers bent over with the naked guys behind him. He took a swing at me, that skinny little twit. I decked him and got a month of detention."

"Was he gay?" Chris wondered.

"He moved to San Francisco." Leo laughed as though that proved his point.

"That doesn't mean he was gay," Harry piped up. "I liked him."

"Yeah, you aren't a guy." Leo smoothed back his light brown hair.

"Speak no ill of the dead," Susan Tucker admonished as she picked up Bonnie's bike.

"Three of the superlatives are dead." Leo slipped his hands in his back pants pockets. "Maybe it's a bad omen." Then he imi-tated the Twilight Zone music.

"Ron and Aurora died long before now," BoomBoom, tired of Leo, said. Her alto voice carried over the parking lot. "As for Charlie, bad karma."

"He should have gone into pornographic films. Charlie Ashcraft, porn star. He would have been happier than as a stockbroker," Leo laughed.

"Funny thing is, he was a good stockbroker." Bonnie peeled off the moleskin.

"He was?" Leo was surprised.

"Prudent. He made a lot of money for people." Susan added, "Odd, how a person can be so reckless in one aspect of his life and so shrewd in another."

Marcy and Bitsy had joined them, Marcy adding to the conversation, "My husband says that men can compartmentalize better than women. There's a compartment for work, for family, for sex. It's easy for them." She'd taken to talking more fondly of Bill lately, perhaps to ward off gossip about her alleged relationship with Charlie. She was too late, of course.

Denny shrugged. "I don't know. Charlie must have had some thick walls between those compartments."

Harry took one of the bicycles, rolling it over to her red truck. She'd placed blankets on the floor of the truck bed so neither the bicycle nor the truck would get scratched. She wanted to buy a bedliner for the truck but hadn't had time to get one installed. She lifted the bike onto the dropped tailgate.

Chris came over. "Let me help."

"Okay, I'll hop in here and if you hop in on the other side we can lift it to the back. I've got ties to keep it from slipping."

"Who's taking the other bike?" Chris asked.

"Susan. It's her son's. Good thing. I'd hate to stack the bikes on one another. I think the first scratch to this truck will be a blow to my heart." She smiled. "Silly."

"Human." Chris wrapped yellow rope under the bike frame.

Bonnie and Susan walked over. "Are you going to dinner?"

"No," Harry responded.

"What about you, Chris?"

She turned to Susan. "BoomBoom told me she'd promised dinner to Bonnie and Leo since they had to drive a bit to get here. I don't want to intrude."

Susan said, "We've decided on Dutch treat. Come on. It will be fun. If for no other reason than to watch Leo torment Boom. Sure you don't want to come, Harry?"

"No, thanks. I've got chores to do." She tried to tolerate BoomBoom better these days but she'd not volunteer to spend time with her.

As she opened the door to the truck, Chris asked, "Denny asked me to dinner this Saturday. I don't know much about him. Is he an okay guy?"

Susan replied, "He's made a lot of bad decisions but, yeah, he's okay. At least he has learned from his messes."

Chris looked to Harry, who shrugged. "Go."

"He's divorced?"

"Years ago. I don't know why he married in the first place. They had nothing in common," Susan said.

"Date a lot of men, it helps refine your standards." Harry laughed. "Advice I should have taken myself."

"Thanks." Chris smiled, then walked back to Dennis, who was putting away his equipment. He smiled as she approached him.

When Harry arrived home she found that the washer in the kitchen faucet had been replaced, the weather stripping on the door was replaced, a blackboard hung next to the kitchen door, a box of colored chalk was suspended by a chain attached to the blackboard. Written in green on the blackboard was the message, "Taking Cuddles to the movies. See you in the morning. Pewter has something to show you."

"Pewts," Harry called.

A little voice answered from the living room. Harry walked in to find Pewter proudly guarding a skink that she'd dispatched. Mrs. Murphy and Tucker flanked the gray cat.

"I caught him all by myself," Pewter crowed.

"Sort of," Mrs. Murphy added.

"Pewter, what a good kitty." Harry petted her. She went outside to check the horses, finished up her chores with fading light, and went to bed, glad she wasn't forced to relive old times at dinner.

22

The phone rang at the post office at seven-thirty A.M. just as Rob Collier, the delivery man from the main post office on Seminole Trail, dropped off two bags of mail.

"Sorry I'm late. Fender bender at Hydraulic Road and Route 29." He tipped his hat as he jogged back to the truck.

Mrs. Hogendobber answered the phone as the cats dashed to the mailbags. "Crozet Post Office. Mrs. Hogendobber speaking."

"I think movies were better in our day," Tracy replied on the other end. "That movie last night was all special effects. Was there a story?"

"Not that I could decipher."

"The best part of the movie was sitting next to you."

"You flatterer." She blushed and winked at Harry.

"I'll stop by on my way to Staunton. Harry left me a note this morning thanking me for the washer and leaving me five dollars for fixing it. You tell that girl she's got to learn to let people do things for her."

"Yes, Tracy, I'll try, but a new voice might get through. See you later."

"He's still got a crush on you," Harry teased Miranda, as she untied the first mailbag to the delight of Mrs. Murphy, who wriggled through the opening.

"Isn't paper the best?" The cat slid around in the bag, which was about three-quarters full.

"Tissue paper is better but this isn't bad." Pewter squeezed into the second mailbag.

"Paper? I don't get it." The dog shook her head, retiring to the small table in the back upon which Mrs. Hogendobber had placed a fresh round loaf of black bread, a damp dish towel over the top of it. The aroma filled the post office. Freshly churned butter in a large covered glass dish sat next to it.

"Come on, Miss Puss, out of there." Harry reached in and grabbed Mrs. Murphy's tail. Not hard.

"Make me." Mrs. Murphy batted away her hand, claws sheathed.

"You're a saucy wench this morning." Harry opened the bag wider.

Mrs. Murphy peered back, eyes large in the darkened space. She burrowed deeper into the mail. "Hee hee." Only it sounded to human ears like "kickle, kickle."

"Murphy, cut it out. You're going to scratch the mail. Federal property. Just think. You could be the first cat convicted of tampering with the mail. Federal offense. Jail. I can see the headlines now: Catastrophe."

"Corny," the cat meowed.

"I can't get Pewter out either." Miranda bent down a bit more stiffly than Harry, but she'd been gardening on her knees for the last few days, too.

"I can do it." Tee Tucker bounded over and bit, gently, first the large lump in one bag and then the larger lump in the other.

Two cats shot out of the bags as though shot out of cannons. They whirled on Tucker. After all, no human had jaws like that.

"Charge!" Mrs. Murphy ordered.

She leapt onto Tucker's back. Tucker rolled over to dispense with that, but when she did, Pewter jumped on her belly. The dog loved it, of course, but this was accompanied by furious growling. A few tufts of fur floated in the air.

As Pewter clung to Tucker's white belly, Mrs. Murphy grabbed the corgi's head, literally crawling on top of her, biting her ears.

"Uncle!" the dog cried out.

"You don't have an uncle." Mrs. Murphy laughed so hard she fell over, so now Tucker could put the cat's head in her mouth.

Pewter yelled, "That's cheating!"

"No, it's not. Two against one is cheating." But of course the minute Tucker said this she released her grip on Mrs. Murphy, who escaped.

"The jaws of death," the cat panted.

They'd all three exhausted themselves, so they fell in a heap between the mailbags.

"Crazy!" Miranda shook her head.

The front door swung open and Big Mim, wearing a flowered sundress and a straw hat, strolled in. "Don't worry." She held up her hands. "I know you haven't sorted the mail yet. Miranda, I've hired Dan Wheeler to play at your reunion. Okay?"

Miranda walked over to the divider. "He'll add so much to the event but we can't afford him. We've got the tiniest treasury."

Mim waved her hand. "I'll pay for it."

"Mim, that's very generous, especially since you graduated from Madeira."

"I might as well do something with the money. It appears I am never to have grandchildren."

Mim's daughter, divorced, was childless and not at all happy about either state. Her son, living in New York, was married to an elegant African-American model but they, too, had not produced an heir.

"They'll get around to it."

"I hope before I'm dead!" came the tart response.

"We've plenty of years left. Now you just come on back here and have a piece of my fresh pumpernickel."

"Love pumpernickel." Mim whizzed through the divider.

As Miranda cut through the warm bread the glorious scent intensified. Tucker opened an eye but couldn't bring herself to move. Harry brewed a fresh pot of coffee.

"Why hasn't Tracy Raz come to see me?"

"He's just gotten here." Miranda handed Mim a napkin.

"He's been here almost a week. You tell him I'm miffed. I expect a call. Maybe we didn't go to the same school but we were all friends. After all, I was home every holiday and every summer."

"Yes, dear." Miranda had learned how to handle Mim decades ago and was amazed that the woman's daughter had never figured out the trick: agree with her even when you don't. Over time, bit by bit, present opposing points of view. Nine times out of ten, Mim would hear it. But oppose her immediately or rain on her parade and her back would go up. You'd never get anywhere. Mim's mother was the same way, as was her ancient Aunt Tally, alive and exceedingly well.

"Harry, how's your reunion coming along?"

"BoomBoom has done a good job organizing. I have to give her credit. She has some original ideas."

"That's gracious of you." Mim beamed. "Now girls, I have a bone to pick with Market Shiflett and I want your support."

Both Harry and Miranda looked at one another and then back to Big Mim. "What?" they said in unison.

"He's moved that blue dumpster parallel with the alley. Looks dreadful. I should think it upsets you, Miranda."

"Well . . ." She measured her words. "He has created more parking and this was the only way he could do it."

"He could go back to garbage cans." Mim pronounced judgment.

"He even tried chaining the garbage cans. That didn't work. He painted them orange and people still ran over them," Harry offered.

"I know all that," Mim replied imperiously. "Then he can set the dumpster sideways under the privet hedge and he can build a palisade around it."

"But the dumpster is picked up once a week on a huge flatbed and a clean one put down in its place. I don't see how he can build a palisade around it." However, Miranda liked the idea.

"Oh yes, he can. Put big hinges on the long end, the end facing the parking lot, such as it is"-her voice dropped-"and put rollers on the bottom. In essence it's a big gate. When the pickup truck comes all Market has to do is roll that gate back or swing it out, whichever makes the most sense. He'll have to figure that out but I know it will work. I'm going over there to speak to him right now. Could one of you come with me?"

"Uh . . ." Harry stalled.

"Harry, go on. I'll sort the mail. You're better suited than I am."

"I don't know if that's true." Harry wiped her hands on the napkin.

"Harry," was all Mim said.

"Okay," she replied weakly, "but before we go in there, let's look closely at the site and the dumpster. Maybe we can figure out ways to improve it even more, you know, some plantings or something."

"Excellent!"

Miranda dropped her eyes lest she laugh by connecting with Harry. If there's one thing Mim couldn't resist it was a gardening idea. Harry was shrewd enough to maneuver her into yet an-other beautification plan.

As it was, Mim struggled valiantly with the garden club to accept her plans for filling downtown Crozet with profusions of flowers for the spring, summer, and fall bolstered by masses of holly, pyracantha, and Scotch pine for the winter. Her master plan for the town was stunning and everyone admitted that Crozet needed help. But money could never be found in the town budget and Mim, generous though she was, felt strongly that if the plan didn't generate community support she wasn't going to cough up the funds. She'd enlisted Miranda's aid and if she could interest Harry and Harry's generation, she thought she just might pull it off.

Harry and Mim walked out the back door as Tracy walked in the front door. He'd finished his errands and returned to see Miranda.

Mrs. Murphy got up, stretched, and followed Harry out.

Tucker, exhaling loudly, did the same. Pewter, sound asleep, didn't even open an eye when Miranda picked her up, gently placing her in an empty mail cart.

The two humans and two animals stood before the blue dumpster. It was unsightly but at least it had a lid on it. Having it open would have been a lot worse.

Mim used her right hand. "Swing the dumpster around like so. He can still use it with ease but it will free up more space. The palisade on the alley side could swing out or roll back for transfer."

"If it swings out it will block traffic."

"How much traffic is on this alleyway," Mim snipped, then thought a minute. "You're right. If it rolls straight along, it will block his parking lot for a minute but the alley will be free. 'Course, the truck will be in it anyway. However, I take your point and think rollers toward us is a better idea. Did you think perhaps planter tubs on the parking lot side?"

"No. I thought since that palisade part is stable why not build three tiers and fill them with geraniums, petunias, and even ivy that could spill over."

"Now that is a good idea." Mim's eyes brightened. "It will add to the expense."

"He's got a daughter in college." Harry need say no more.

"H-m-m, I'll think of something."

"Something's not right." Tucker lifted her nose and sniffed deeply.

Mrs. Murphy, nose not as sensitive, also smelled blood. "Let me jump up."

"Lid's closed." Tucker barked loudly.

"Maybe we can get them to open it." Murphy soared onto the slanted lid, sliding a bit but quickly jumping over to the flat side. "I smell blood, too. Maybe there's a beef carcass. I'll get some of it for you," Murphy promised her grounded friend.

"No, this isn't beef, sheep, or chicken. This is human," Tucker adamantly barked.

Mrs. Murphy thought a minute, then said, "Together."

The cat and dog howled in unison. The humans looked at them as Pewter hurried out the animal door to the post office. "What's going on?"

"Come up here."

She leapt up next to Mrs. Murphy, sliding down harder than the slender cat. Harry caught her.

"Yell," Mrs. Murphy directed.

Pewter bellowed. She surprised Harry so much that she dropped her. The cat shook herself, then leapt up again. This time she managed to get over to the flat side. "Uh-oh." She smelled it, too.

All three of them hollered for all they were worth.

"What's gotten into them?" Mim put her hand on her hip, then reached over and lifted up the slanted lid. She dropped the lid with a thud reverberating throughout the alley and sending the two cats off the dumpster. She took a faltering step back. Harry reached out to catch her.

Mim's face, bone-white, frightened Harry, who at first thought the older woman might have suffered a heart attack or stroke. Mim moved her lips but nothing came out. She pointed to the dumpster lid.

"Are you all right?"

Mim nodded her head. "Yes." Then she took a deep breath and opened the lid again.

"Oh, my God!" Harry exclaimed.

23

Sitting on top of the squad car, Mrs. Murphy laconically commented, "Could have been worse."

The assemblage by the dumpster would have disagreed with her if they had understood what she was saying. Mim called her husband, Jim, the mayor. He rushed over. Tracy put his arm around Miranda's waist. She was upset but holding together.

As luck would have it, Marcy Wiggins and Chris Sharpton had stopped by to pick up their mail. Fair Haristeen had also come to the P.O. Marcy fainted and Chris, with Fair's help, carried her into Market's air-conditioned store. Market, rushing around the store, revived her with a spot of brandy. As soon as she was somewhat recovered he hurried back outside again.

"In my dumpster!" He wrung his hands.

Tucker, as close to the dumpster as she could get without being in the way, asked Pewter, "What did the body look like when you first could see in?"

Pewter peered down from the limb of the pin oak where she was reposing. She wanted a different view than Mrs. Murphy. "Leo's mouth was open and so were his eyes. He'd stiffened up but it wasn't too bad yet. They'll have a hell of a time getting him out of there now."

"What I meant was, can you see how he was killed?" the dog persisted.

"Right between the eyes. Like Charlie Ashcraft," Pewter informed her with some relish.

"Flies are what made the humans sick." Murphy watched intently. "They're in the dumpster so they crawled all over him but really, it could have been worse. He's not been dead half a day." She was matter-of-fact about these matters, but then, cats are.

Rick and Cynthia, having finished their work, had to turn to Jim Sanburne, the crowd growing by the minute behind the yellow tape. "Jim, I prefer they leave but I doubt they will so keep them back. If they break through the tape they may compromise evidence. Can you call in anyone to help you?"

Tracy stepped forward. "Sheriff, Tracy Raz, I can help."

Tracy was off in the service when Rick was young so he didn't remember him, but he knew the Raz name. "Thank you."

"I'll help, too." Fair towered over the other two men.

Tracy, accustomed to command, faced the murmuring crowd, some with handkerchiefs to their mouths. "Folks, I know this is extremely upsetting to you all but please leave. The more of us that crowd around, the more possibility that valuable evidence will be destroyed. Sheriff Shaw is doing all he can right now and he needs your help."

"Come on, gang." Fair gently shepherded his friends and neighbors back down the alleyway.

As people walked slowly they turned to see what else was happening. The last thing they saw was a big blue truck, Batten Services, come down the lane with Joe Batten emerging, his assistant and cousin, Harvey Batten, along with him. He ran the trash-removal company and he was going to take off the door to the dumpster so they could remove the body.

"You girls go back into the post office," Tracy soothingly directed, "because that's where people will gather and they'll need you to keep your heads."

"Quite right." Miranda nodded. Violent death shocked her. But she'd seen enough death in her life to accept it as inevitable, although she never could accept violence.

The cats and dog stayed at the scene of the crime. No one paid attention to them because they were careful to stay out of the way, even though Mrs. Murphy brazenly sat on top of Rick's squad car.

Joe glanced at the body, pulled a heavy wrench from his leather tool belt around his waist, and started turning a nut. "Harvey, you crippled?"

Harvey swallowed hard, walked over, and crouched down to work on the bottom bolt. He was eye-level with the loafers on the corpse but he did not look inside.

As the men worked, Diana Robb and the rescue squad crept down the alleyway, clogged with cars. The people moved away but they'd left their cars.

Diana hopped out, marched up to the opened dumpster, and peered inside. "Like Charlie. Powder burns."

"Uh-huh," Rick noncommittally grunted.

"You ready for us?" She noticed the crushed green and orange 7 Up cartons under the body.

"Yeah, you can take him." Rick leaned against the squad car to light a cigarette.

"Those things will kill you," Mrs. Murphy scolded.

He looked up at the cat looking down at him. "You don't miss a thing, do you?"

"Nope."

"Need a hand?" Tracy offered.

"We've got it, thanks." Diana smiled.

Tracy asked Rick, "If you don't need me anymore I'll be going."

"Where to?"

"The post office."

"I mean, where do you come from?" Rick inhaled.

Tracy briefly filled the sheriff in on his background. "Retired now. Came back to help with our high-school reunion."

Rick reached out to shake his hand. "Rick Shaw, sheriff."

"Deputy Cynthia Cooper." She shook Tracy's hand also, as did Fair.

"I'm renting rooms at Harry's farm. If you need me I'll be there." He opened the back door to the post office, slipping inside.

Fair, face white with upset, hands in jeans pockets, said, "Quite an ending for someone as fastidious as Leo Burkey. To be dumped with garbage."

"Harry made a similar comment," Rick noted.

Market bustled back again. "Sheriff, I hope you don't think I did this. I couldn't stand Leo, but I wouldn't kill him. Besides, he lived far enough away he didn't work on my mood." Market's voice was tremulous, his hands were shaking.

"Market." Rick paused. "Why didn't you like him?"

"Smart-ass. In high school-well, always."

"Yes, he was," Fair confirmed.

"As bad as Charlie Ashcraft?" Cynthia watched as Joe and Harvey lifted the blue metal door off its hinges, leaning it up against the side of the dumpster.

"What's worse, reaching in the garbage or picking up the body?" Pewter giggled.

Tucker whirled around, hearing before the rest of them. "What's worse is here comes Channel 29."

Diana, now seeing the van with the dish on top, as she was looking down the alleyway, urged, "Come on, let's get him out of here and in a body bag before they jump out with the damned cameras."

Too late. Even before the van pulled over the cameraman was running toward them.

"Stand back!" Rick barked, holding up his hand.

A brief argument followed but the cameraman and on-air reporter did stay twenty yards back as Diana, with three assistants, lifted out the body. Since rigor was taking over, getting him into a body bag required effort.

"Why don't they break his arms and legs?" Pewter sensibly suggested.

"They'd pass out. Humans are touchy about their dead." Mrs. Murphy noticed the outline of his wallet in his back pocket. It would appear robbery wasn't the motive.

Market returned to the question Cynthia had posed before they were interrupted by the television crew. "No, Leo wasn't as bad as Charlie Ashcraft. Charlie was in a class by himself. Leo wanted us to think he was a ladies' man but he was more bark than bite. He had a smart mouth, that's all. Hurt a lot of feelings. Or I should say he hurt mine. And he was handsome, I couldn't compete with him for the girls. Not too many of us could." He looked up at Fair. "Like you, the class ahead. You always got the girls."

"Hope I didn't have a smart mouth." Fair still watched fix-edly as they struggled with the body.

"You were a good guy. Still are," Market said. He leaned against the car with Rick, as he couldn't stop shaking. "I don't know what's wrong with me. I feel dizzy."

"The shock of it." Rick patted Market on the back. "No one expects to come to work in the morning and find a dead body in the garbage."

"If I'd kept those old garbage cans it wouldn't have happened," Market moaned. "That will teach me to leave well enough alone."

"Until they scattered all over the alleyway again," Fair reminded him. "You did the right thing. Someone took advantage of it, that's all."

"Someone who doesn't much care about how they dispose of bodies. Two men, same age, same high-school class, shot between the eyes and left for the world to see. There's a message here." Mrs. Murphy walked over the back window, careful not to smear paw prints on it. "Like those stupid mailings. I think the message will get more clear in time."

"Both senior superlatives, too." Pewter backed down the tree to join her friend. "That's odd."

"Mom's a senior superlative." Tucker barked so loud she distracted one of the rescue-squad men and he tripped, then righted himself.

"We know," the cats said. Then Murphy continued, "But so far the murdered are handsome men, well-off. Don't panic yet."

"I'm not panicking," the dog grumbled, "only observing."

"They say that when someone dies their features relax." Pewter walked toward the post office, her friends walking with her. "But Leo Burkey looked surprised, like a bear had jumped out at him, like something totally out of the blue had shocked him."

"We didn't see Charlie but it's a sure bet he was surprised, too." Tucker pushed through the animal door into the post office.

Mrs. Murphy sat in front of the door, irritating Tucker who stuck her head back through to see where the cats were. "There's human intelligence to this. That's the trick, you see. Killers often start from an irrational premise and then are completely rational and logical when they act."

24

Glad to be home after an extremely upsetting day, Harry wearily pushed open the screened porch door. It didn't squeak. She noted the hinges had been oiled. She heard pounding behind the barn.

Mrs. Hogendobber had given her freshly baked corn bread in a square pan which the older woman had thoughtfully covered with tinfoil. Harry placed the pan inside the refrigerator.

"Look!" Pewter trilled.

Mrs. Murphy, whiskers swept forward, bounded up to Pewter in front of the refrigerator. Tucker ran over, too, her claws hitting the heart pine floorboards with clicks.

"Wow, this is a first," Tucker exclaimed.

Harry grinned. "Hasn't been this full since Mom was alive."

Milk, half-and-half, bottled water, and Dortmunder beer filled the beverage shelf. Chicken and steak, wrapped in cellophane, rested on another shelf. Fresh lettuce, collard greens, pattypan squash, and perfectly round cherry tomatoes spilled over the vegetable compartment. On the bottom shelf, neatly placed side by side, gleamed red cans of real Coca-Cola.

Stacked next to the refrigerator were a variety of cat and dog canned foods with a few small gourmet packs on top.

"A cornucopia of delight." Pewter flopped on her side, rolling over then rolling back in the other direction.

"He must be rich to buy so much food at once." Tucker admired the canned food, too.

"It is amazing." Murphy purred, too, excited by the sight of all those goodies.

Harry closed the door, turned to wash her hands in the sink, and noticed her yearbook and a 1950 yearbook resting on the table side by side. She opened the 1950 yearbook and saw Tracy's name in youthful script in the upper right-hand page. Strips of paper marked her yearbook. She flipped open to each one. Tracy had marked all the photographs in which Charlie Ashcraft and Leo Burkey appeared.

She closed the book and walked outside toward the sound of the pounding.

Tracy, shirt off, replaced worn fence boards with good, pressure-treated oak boards, piled neatly in one paddock.

"Tracy, you must be a good fairy or whatever the male version is." She smiled.

He pushed back his cowboy hat. "Oak lasts longer."

"Please give me the bill for the wood and the groceries. Otherwise, I'll feel like I'm taking advantage of you."

"I love for women to take advantage of me." He laughed. "Besides, you don't know how good it feels to be doing something. Bet the post office was wild today, wasn't it?"

She knew he'd changed the subject because he didn't want to hear anything more about repayment. "Yes."

"Damn fool thing. I read through your yearbook. I hope you don't mind."

"No."

"Dead bodies don't bother me. Got used to that in Korea. But wanton killing, that bothers me."

"Me, too. Can't make rhyme or reason of this."

"Patience." He lifted another board, she grabbed the far end to help.

"What's that expression, 'Grant me patience, Lord, but hurry.' I recall Mom saying that a lot." She stepped to the side, nearly stepping on Tucker, who jumped sideways. "Sorry, Tucker."

"Cutest dog."

"Thank you." Tucker cocked her head at Tracy.

"Being all over the map, I couldn't keep a dog. Li had one. Well, I guess it was mine, too, but since I was on the road so much it was really hers. Beautiful German shepherd. Smart, too. I knew as long as Bruno was with her, she was safe. You know, two weeks after Li died, Bruno closed his eyes and died, too. Granted he was old by then but I believe his heart was broken." Tracy's eyes clouded over.

"I couldn't live without Mom." Tucker put her head on her paws.

The cats listened to this with some interest but neither one would admit to such excessive devotion. The truth was, if anything ever happened to Harry, Mrs. Murphy would be devastated and Pewter . . . well, Pewter would be discomfited.

Harry stooped down to pat Tucker's head, since she was whining. "When I was little Mom and Dad had a German shepherd named King. Wonderful dog. He lived to be twenty-one. Back then we had cattle, polled Herefords and some horned Herefords, too, and Dad used King to bring in the cattle. Mom always had a corgi-those dogs herd as efficiently as shepherds. Someday I'd like to get another shepherd but only when I'm certain a puppy won't upset Tucker and the kitties. They might be jealous."

"A puppy! I'll scratch its eyes out," Pewter hissed.

"No, you won't. You'll hop up on the table or chairs. You like babies as much as I do." Murphy laughed at the gray blowhard.

"No, I don't and I don't recall you liking puppies or kittens that much. I recall you telling those two kittens of Blair Bainbridge's ghost stories that scared the wits out of them."

Murphy giggled. "They grew up into big healthy girls. Of course, we hardly see them since they spend half their life at the grooming parlor."

Harry lifted another board. She and Tracy were getting into a rhythm. "Corgis are amazing dogs. Very brave and intelligent. Tee Tucker's a Pembroke-no tail. The Cardigans have tails and to my eye look a little longer than the Pembrokes. Pound for pound, a corgi is a lot of dog." She bragged a touch on the breed, a common trait among corgi owners.

"I noticed when I came out back this morning-back of Market's, I mean-that Pewter was in a tree. She could see everything. Mrs. Murphy sat on the squad car. She, too, could see everything, as well as hear the squad radio calls. And Tucker sat just off to the side of the dumpster door. Her nose was straight in the air so she smelled everything. Miranda said it was the animals that called attention to the dumpster."

"I did." Tucker puffed out her white chest.

"True, you have the best nose. I'd bet you against a bloodhound." Mrs. Murphy praised the dog.

"Don't get carried away," Pewter dryly said to the tiger.

"Chatty, aren't they?" Tracy pounded in nails.

"You sure notice everything."

"That's my training. I noticed something else, too. When they pulled the body out of the dumpster there was a stain across the seat of his pants, noticeable, like a crease. The killer sat him on the edge of the dumpster before pushing him back into it. As Leo was a big man and as the crease was pronounced, he sat there for a minute or two at the least before the killer could maneuver the body into the dumpster and close the lid. That's what I surmise. Can't prove a thing, of course. And I asked Miranda if she heard a car back there but her bedroom is away from the alley side of the house. She said she heard nothing. I would assume, also, that the killer was smart enough to turn off his headlights and that Leo Burkey's car will turn up somewhere."

Harry stepped aside as he nailed in the last of the boards. He'd also brought out the fence stain so he could stain them right away. She counted twenty-seven boards that he'd replaced.

"I'll get another brush." She walked to the toolshed where she kept brushes of every shape and size, all of them cleaned and hung, brush side down, on nails. Harry never threw out a paintbrush in her life. By the time she returned he'd already painted one panel.

"It's not going to look right with some freshly painted and the others faded so I'm going to do the whole thing. Now you don't have to work with me. After all, this was my idea, not yours."

"I'd like to work with you. I'm so accustomed to doing the chores alone."

"When was the last time you stained these fences?"

"Eight years ago."

He studied the faded boards and posts. "That's good, Harry. Usually this stuff fades out after two or three years. I pulled five gallons out of the big drum you've got there. I'm impressed with your practicality. Had the drum on its side on two wrought-iron supports, drove a faucet in the front just like a cask of wine. You know your stuff, kid. What is this, by the way?"

"Fence coat black. You can only buy it in one place in the U.S., Lexington Paint and Supply in Lexington, Kentucky. They ship it out in fifty-five-gallon drums. I've tried everything. This is the only stuff that lasts."

"Smart girl." He whistled as he painted, carefully, as he did everything. He was a tidy and organized man. "Is there a connecting link between the two victims?"

"Huh?"

"Leo and Charlie."

"Well, they graduated in 1980 from Crozet High School. They were both handsome. That's about it. They weren't friends. I don't think they saw one another after high school."

"Nothing else? Did they play football together or golf or did they ever date sisters or the same woman? Were they involved in financial dealings together?"

Harry was beginning to appreciate Tracy's ability to construct patterns, to look for the foundation under the building. "No. Charlie wasn't much of an athlete. He thought he was but he wasn't. Leo was much better. He played football and basketball in high school and then he played football in college, too."

"Where'd he go?"

"Uh, Wake Forest."

"What about Charlie?"

"He went up north. Charlie was always smart in a business way. He went to the University of Pennsylvania. Charlie had a lot of clients. He was an independent stockbroker. I don't know if Leo was one or not, though I doubt he was."

"Anything else?"

"They were both senior superlatives. I can't see that as much of a connection, though. Not for murder, anyway."

"I saw you had two superlatives."

"I know you were Most Athletic."

"Yep. We have that in common." He smiled at her. "Keep a notebook handy. Has to be little so you can stick it in a pocket. When ideas occur, write them down. No matter how silly. You'd be surprised at what you know that you don't know."

"Interesting." Murphy got up and headed for the barn.

"Where are you going?" Pewter enjoyed eavesdropping.

"Tackroom. I am determined to destroy those mice." She flicked her tail when she said that.

Tucker laughed. Murphy stopped, fixing the corgi with a stare, a special look employed by Southern women known as "the freeze." Then she walked off.

"We'll find the killer or killers before she gets one thieving mouse." Tucker laughed loudly.

That quick, Murphy turned, leapt over a startled Pewter, bounded in four great strides to the corgi. She flung herself upon the unsuspecting dog, rolling her over. Tucker bumped into the big paint bucket. A bit slopped out, splattering her white stomach.

"Murphy!" Harry yelled at her.

Murphy growled, spit, swatted the dog as she righted herself, then tore toward the barn, an outraged Tucker right after her. Just as Tucker closed the gap, Murphy, the picture of grace, leapt up, and the dog ran right under her. The cat twisted in midair, landed on the earth for one bound, was airborne again as she jumped onto the bumper of the red dually, then hurtled over the side into the bed. She rubbed salt into the wound by hanging over the side of the truck bed as the dog panted underneath.

"Cat got your tongue?"

"Murphy," Tucker said between pants, "I'll get you for that."

"Ha ha." Murphy jumped onto the dome of the cab.

The truck, parked in front of the barn entrance, gleamed in the rich late-afternoon light.

Harry laid her paintbrush on the side of the can. "Don't you dare put paw prints on my new truck." She advanced on the tiger, who glared insolently at her, then chased her tail on the cab hood to leave as many paw prints as possible.

Just as Harry reached the door to open it so she could step inside and gain some height to grab the little stinker, Murphy gathered herself together, hunched down, and then jumped way, way up. She just made it into the open hayloft, digging up the side with her back claws as she hung on with her front paws. Her jet stream rocked the light fixture, which looked like a big Chinaman's hat poised over the hayloft opening.

She looked down at her audience. "I am the Number One Animal. Don't you forget it." Then she sauntered into the hayloft.

Tracy laughed so hard he doubled over. "That's quite a cat you've got there, Harry."

"Heatstroke," Tucker grumbled furiously.

"More like the big head," Pewter replied.

"I still say she won't catch one lousy mouse."

"Tucker, if I were you, I wouldn't say it any too loudly. Who knows what she'll do next?" Pewter advised.

25

"-everybody."

"That's very edifying." Rick leaned toward BoomBoom sitting opposite him in her living room. "But I'd like to hear the names from your lips."

"Well, Leo Burkey of course, Bonnie Baltier, Denny Rablan, Chris Sharpton, Bitsy Valenzuela, Harry, Marcy Wiggins, who mostly stood around, and Susan."

"Then what?"

She shifted in her seat, irritated at his pickiness. "Have you interviewed everyone else?"

He counted names on his notepad. "No."

"Are you going to tell me who's left?"

"No. Now, BoomBoom, get on with it. What did you do, and so forth."

"We were reshooting the senior superlative which was Wittiest with Bonnie Baltier and Leo Burkey for the reunion. After we finished, everyone went to the Outback to eat. Marcy called her husband, Bill, who met her after work. They're making a point of spending time together. And Bitsy called her husband, E.R., to invite him. He took a pass, said he was tired. Funny, he was such a quiet guy in high school. To think he'd go out and start a cellular phone company. He has no class spirit, unfortunately. Neither does Bill."

"No tension at dinner?"

"No, because Harry went home. She doesn't like me," BoomBoom flatly stated. "And I have tried very hard to make amends. It's silly to carry around emotions, negative emotions."

"I wouldn't know." He reached in his pocket for the red Dunhill pack and offered her a cigarette. "Mind?"

"No. Those are expensive."

"And good. I tried to wean myself off smoking by buying generic brands. Awful stuff."

"I have some herbal remedies if you decide to stop again."

"I'll let you know."

"Anyway, nothing much happened. We all ate, told tales, bored Marcy and Chris and Bitsy, but they were gracious about it. Denny flirted with Chris. She didn't seem to mind. Then we went home."

"Did Leo linger with anyone in the parking lot? Talk to a waitress?"

She put her finger to her chin. "He cornered Bitsy for a minute as we left, but well, you'd have to ask her. I think they were discussing mutual friends and whether E.R. could give Leo a deal on a cell phone."

"Uh-huh."

"Do you have any leads? I mean surely you've noticed the two victims were killed right after their senior superlative reshoot. That's what bothers me. That and those offensive, cheap mailings!"

"Yes, we have leads." He exhaled, then continued his questioning. "Did anyone wear L.L. Bean duck boots that night?"

"What?"

"You know, the boots that made L.L. Bean famous. We call them duck boots but I guess today that means the short rubber shoe. Short, tall, did anyone wear them?"

"No. That's an odd question."

"Did anyone wear heels? Not spike heels, but say about two inches."

"Do you think I spend my time cruising people's feet?" She laughed.

"I know you are a woman of fashion. I expect you take in everything, BoomBoom."

"Let's see." She studied a spot at the left-hand corner of the ceiling. "Baltier wore white espadrilles. Susan wore navy blue flats, Pappagallo. Susan loves Pappagallo. Bitsy wore a low heel, Marcy wore sandals, Chris wore a slingback with a bit of heel. Harry wore sneakers, as you would suspect, since it's summer."

"Why?"

"Harry wears sneakers in the summer, Bean boots in the rain, or riding boots. Oh yes, and her favorite pair of cowboy boots. That's the repertoire."

"Did she wear her Bean boots?"

"No, I just said, she wore sneakers."

He dropped his eyes to his notes. "So you did."

"How big are the footprints?" BoomBoom asked.

He crossed his arms over his chest, uncrossed them, picked up his cigarette out of the ashtray, taking another drag. "BoomBoom, you don't ask me questions. I ask you."

"I hate to think of Leo like that." Her eyes brimmed sud-denly with tears, but then it was well known BoomBoom could cry at a telephone commercial. "He was such fun. He-" She shrugged, unable to continue.

Rick waited a moment. "He was an old friend."

"Yes," came the quiet reply.

"Did you know he was divorcing his wife?"

"Yes." She opened her hands, palms upward. "He told us at the Outback. I think he was upset, although Leo always made a joke about everything."

"Will you go to the funeral?"

"Of course I'll go."

"It's in Richmond, isn't it?"

"Yes. St. Thomas. The most fashionable church in Richmond."

"Leo from a good family?" He dropped the verb.

"Yes, but he married higher on the social ladder. His wife is a Smith. The Smiths."

"And I don't suppose they've named any of their daughters Pocahontas."

"Uh . . ." The corners of her mouth turned upward. "No."

"I expected you to be more upset." He ground his cigarette into the ashtray until tiny brown strands of tobacco popped out of the butt. "You're the emotional type."

"I guess I'm in denial. First Charlie. Now Leo. It's not real yet."

"Did they ever date the same girl?"

"In high school?"

"Any time that you can recall."

"No. Not even from grade school."

"Can you think of anyone who hated Leo?"

"No. His wit could rip like a blade sometimes. But a true enemy? No. And I don't think his wife hated him either. After all, divorce is such a pedestrian tragedy."

"That's poetic."

"Is it?" She batted her long eyelashes at Rick, not a conventionally handsome man but a very masculine one.

He smiled back. "If you think of anything, give me a call." He stood up to leave and she rose with him.

"Sheriff, do you think Charlie and Leo were killed by the same person or persons?"

"I don't know, and I'm not paid by your tax dollars to jump to conclusions."

She showed him the door and bid him good day.

Later that same day he compared notes with Cynthia Cooper. Between the two of them they had buttonholed everyone who'd been at the shoot that day. Better to catch people as soon after an incident as possible. Rick was a strong believer in that.

They'd found Leo's car still in the parking lot at the Outback. None of the restaurant staff remembered seeing him get into another car, but they had been inside working. The small gathering of friends didn't remember him getting into another car either.

They sat in his office drawing up a flow chart for Leo. Each person's story confirmed what every other person said. There were no glaring omissions, no obvious contradictions.

"Boss, he could have picked someone up after the dinner and gone to wherever they went in their car. Charlottesville is a college town. There's a semblance of night life." Not for her. She fell between the college students and the married, which put her in the minority.

"Could have."

"You think he knew the killer just as Charlie probably did, don't you?"

"If he didn't know the killer I'm convinced the killer is innocuous in some fashion. A nonthreatening person or functionary, you know, like a teacher." He stopped. "Someone you wouldn't look at twice in terms of physical fear. Leo could have been killed by a woman for that matter."

"She'd have to be fairly strong to hoist him into the dumpster," Cynthia said.

"Yes, but it could be done. The man Hunter Hughes saw go into the locker room at Farmington was thin. Average height, but as it was from a distance the man could have been shorter. Doesn't mean it's our killer, and it doesn't mean the same person killed both men. But it's odd."

"That it is."

"Have you talked to Charlie's ex-wives?"

Cynthia cracked her knuckles. "Yes. Finally reached Tiffany, wife number four-don't you love it-'Tiffany,' in Hawaii. Said she'd heard he was shot and she was sorry she hadn't done it herself. When I asked for suspects she said, apart from herself, the person who hated him most when she was married to him was Larry Johnson."

"Larry Johnson? That doesn't make any sense." Rick ran his hand over his balding head. "Or maybe it does."

"Abortions. Does Larry perform abortions?"

"He's a general practitioner, so no, he doesn't. But he knows where the bodies are buried, as they say." He noted the clock on the wall, five-thirty in the afternoon. "The best time to talk to Larry is in the morning. Maybe we should both make this visit. Oh, did you talk to Mim yet?"

"Yes, she's fine as long as she knows things before anyone else does."

"I asked BoomBoom about shoes. She remembered everybody's shoes. Another thing: for BoomBoom she was remarkably self-possessed. No vapors. No lace hankies to the eyes and thence to the bosom. Another oddity."

"What do you think of Tracy Raz?" Cynthia asked.

"A trained observer and a damned sharp one at that."

"Ran a check on him. Legit. Korea. A solid Army career, Major when he mustered out and into the CIA."

"If he hadn't pointed out those prints in front of the dumpster before more people walked around I might have missed them. He said nothing. He motioned with his eyes and then turned to push the gawkers back. He's a pro." He slapped his hand on his thigh. "You know what I'm going to do?" She shook her head and he continued. "Take the wife to the movies."

"Good for you." She wished she had someone in her life. She'd go out with a guy but eventually her schedule and work would turn him off. "I'll see you at Larry's office. Seven."

"Yep."

He stopped at the door. "Two footprints next to each other at the dumpster isn't much to go on. The Bean footprint is a man's, size eight and a half or nine. The heel footprint, well, we couldn't tell, since the toe would have been on a rock."

"Could have been a man and woman, side by side, heaving in Leo," Coop said. "He was a short, but stocky man. But then, some of the trash in there was heavier than cartons."

"Some memories are heavier than others, too." He opened the door. "I don't think it's coincidence that Charlie's death came now. And now Leo." He shrugged. "Gotta go."

26

Fair measured Poptart around the girth. He'd dropped by to see how Harry was doing after the shock. He glanced at last week's figures on the chart hanging outside each horse's stall.

Poptart quietly stood in the center aisle. The horse, a big girl, half-closed her eyes.

Mrs. Murphy, sitting on the tack trunk, asked, "Don't you ever get hungry for meat?"

"No."

"Not even an eensy piece?"

"Do you get hungry for timothy or for grain?" Poptart's large brown eyes focused on the tiger, now standing on her hind legs to touch noses with the large creature.

"No. You're right. I can't expect you to like what I like and vice versa."

"We like lots of the same things. Just not foods."

"You'll be surprised at how much less grain you'll need to feed her."

"I like my grain," Poptart protested.

"She's an easy keeper." Harry patted the gray neck. "I give her half a scoop, a couple of flakes of hay, plus she's got all that grass to eat."

Fair also patted Poptart on the neck, then led her out to the pasture behind the barn, where she kicked up her heels and joined Gin Fizz and Tomahawk, who had been measured before she had.

"How come you didn't tell me about Tracy Raz?"

"Fair, he just started renting here."

"Seems a good man."

"Miranda likes him. I've noticed she doesn't quote the Scriptures around him as much as she does around us."

Fair laughed as he leaned over the fence. Poptart bucked, twisted, and bucked some more.

They walked back to the house. The evening had begun to cool down. Tracy was calling on Big Mim. They sat in the kitchen together along with Murphy, Pewter, and Tucker.

"Sure you're okay?" He reached for her hand.

"Yes." She squeezed his offered hand. "It shocked the hell out of me. Both Mim and I about fell over."

"I would have about passed out myself."

"A dead body is bad enough but the"-she paused-"incongruity of it . . . that's what shocked me."

"It looks like this reunion might be, uh . . . eventful."

"Well, that's just it." She grew suddenly animated. "I don't remember anything from high school. I mean I don't remember some awful thing that would provoke revenge. Especially senior year, the big one."

"Yeah. I can't remember anything either. But maybe something did happen in your senior year. You know how sometimes things are vague or you're on the edges of it? Obviously, I was a freshman in college. All I remember from that year is missing you."

"I wrote you a letter a day. I can't believe I was that disciplined." She laughed.

"Maybe you loved me," he softly suggested.

"I did. Oh, Fair, those were wonderful and awful times. You feel everything for the first time. You have no perspective."

"You had some perspective by the time we married. I mean, you dated other men."

She patted his hand, removed hers, then noticed the animals, motionless, had been watching them. "Voyeurs."

"Interested parties." Murphy smiled.

"If this is going to get mushy I'm leaving," Pewter warned.

"Bull. You're as nosy as we are." Tucker giggled.

"I feel like we're the entertainment tonight." Fair spoke to the animals.

"You are," Pewter responded.

"They're my family," Harry said.

"So am I. Like it or not." Fair leaned forward in his chair.

"Can you remember how you felt back then? The wild rush of emotion? The sense of being your own person?"

"I remember. People grow in lots of different ways. Sometimes they stop. I think Charlie stopped. Never got beyond high school. Leo got beyond it but his defenses stayed the same: shoot from the hip. Susan has matured." He thought for a moment. "I think I have, too."

"Have I?"

"Yes, but you won't trust anyone again."

"I trust Mrs. H. I trust Susan."

"I should have said men. You won't trust men."