Chatters on the Tide

by Robert Mitchell, Jr

  Chapter 18

  In the attic Opal had found a heavy curtain, made of wine and sea-foam green brocade and once part of a set of formal drapes, to use as a tablecloth. Now it was laying over the picnic table in the dining room. She and Lucas were on one side, Tonya and Billy on the other. Opal had turned off every light in the house and lit a half dozen mismatched candles on a plate in the center.

  Tonya was shuffling The Tarot with her eyes only half open, the cards making a chunk-chunk sound each time she dropped half of the deck into the other half. With the attic fan off and the candles burning the room was sweaty and confining.

  "Don't you think..."

  "Hush Billy," Opal said. "She's concentrating."

  "It's okay," Tonya said. "Go ahead Billy. I can walk and chew gum at the same time."

  "I get what we're doing, but don't you think we should send a couple of guys to meet Monty, just in case?"

  "Nuh-uh," Lucas said. "You prepare for a confrontation and sooner or later you'll have one. That's the reason for the no weapons policy. You have a weapon, sooner or later you'll use it."

  "Aw come on..."

  "That's enough," Opal said, "Lucas is right honey. We're going to keep on using our heads not our muscles. To heck with the cost."

  Billy settled down some, but couldn't help adding, "Okay, but he's already on the way now, it's too late to do anything to help anyway."

  "That's not necessarily true," Tonya said. "Thanks for giving me the chance to help."

  "Thanks for offering," Lucas said. "It's a great idea."

  "Glad you think so. Now. Let’s get started," she said.

  Tonya selected the Page of Pentacles to represent Monty and placed the card on the table. She began laying out nine more cards in the pattern known as the Celtic Cross; one card across the first, one at each point of the compass, and four in a row to the right.

  "Lucas, you have asked what can be seen of Monty and the rings," Tonya said. "Those subtle things beyond our ken, these cards foretell the how and when. The Page of Pentacles signifies his reflective nature and bookishness. Pentacles often mean money, but they can also mean knowledge or craftiness." She turned the card lying across Monty. "This crosses him. The Ten of Cups reversed."

  In her heart she knew the card meant criminality and anger when reversed, or in this case, loss of fortune. But it was a pretty card with a family and a rainbow, so she said, "He's doing well, what a great card to see here," she lied. "So far so good.

  "Next we see what is beneath him. The Queen of Cups reversed. This means selfishness. I feel he's been worried about himself, really worried about his own ass, you know?"

  "I don't blame him," Billy said.

  "Shhh," Opal said.

  "The Page of Cups crowns him," Tonya went on. "It's responsibility that’s pushing him on. That's a good sign. What's behind him is the Judgment card. This is his escape from danger and his success. It's been a hard way to go, but he's survived and been judged a success. Now, what's before him is," she said, turning over The Sun, "is a promising future, happy reunions, and health. It's cool to see two of the Major Arcana in his reading, one before and one behind. That's great, really great.”

  "This makes me feel better," Opal said. "Not as worried."

  "Me too," Billy said. "But shhh..."

  "Shhh yourself," Opal said smiling.

  "Okay, now his fears," Tonya said. "The Seven of Pentacles, reversed. This means indebtedness. Perhaps he fears being in debt for the rings, owes somebody a favor, or maybe he has some guilt about how he got them. It could also me money, obviously. I'll have to give this some thought.

  "His family opinion is the Eight of Pentacles reversed, that’s destruction. People who care about him fear for his life. I think that's on target, really on target, don't you?"

  "In threes," Lucas said. "keep going. I want to see the final card."

  "Two more," Tonya said. "His hopes...the Two of Pentacles. He is hoping that new troubles won't begin, that he won't have to go on another trip, that everything has played out to the end and that his cycle is done, that wandering and searching are behind him.

  "Now, the final outcome," she said, and when she turned the card over she found the Knight of Cups reversed.

  "Well, hmmm," she said, knowing that the card means a liar, a treachery or betrayal, the cup upside down having poured it all out on the ground. The others stared at her, waiting for her words, thinking that they were going to hear something important and true.

  "This means departures. His fears are founded. He will be leaving again on another mission. Judging by the amount of Pentacles in the reading, I'd say he'll be leaving the first of the year, in winter, maybe headed east, but I can't be sure."

  "Any further east and he'll be underwater," Billy said. "This stinks. It don't add up."

  "I don't like it either," Lucas said.