“For two minutes, I was a diva!” she enthused.
Bill put the diamond back in the green box. “Would you like this wrapped?”
“No. I’m going to surprise her by placing it around her neck as she puts on her makeup to go out to dinner tonight. You didn’t fail me. The diamond is a perfect pear.”
As Victor left the store with his gift, Gayle called out, “Warn her that if she wears that in the daytime she’ll cause car wrecks.”
He stopped at the door. “Gayle, she’ll stop traffic no matter what.”
As the door shut, Harry opined, “Love.”
“And money.” Bill winked. “Then again, this could be to make up for past sins.”
“Oh, Bill.” Gayle rolled her eyes in mock disgust.
“Do you all really think forty is that big a deal? I didn’t.” Bill folded his hands, resting them on the counter.
“How do you know I’m forty?” Gayle lifted a shoulder.
“Had your firstborn at five, did you?” He needled her.
Howard Hyde, the miracle jewelry repairman, pushed open the door from his workshop, heard and saw his two co-workers, smiled at Harry, and disappeared back into his workroom.
“Bill, I know you too well.” Gayle nodded toward Harry.
“Don’t let me stop you. I’m ready to hear all your sins and forgive you.” Harry loved it when her friends carried on.
Blair Bainbridge walked through the store’s front door. “Harry, is that you?” he asked.
Harry threw up her hands. “Why is everyone surprised to find me at Keller and George?”
“Uh …” Blair fumbled.
Gayle came to the rescue. “She’s out of context.”
“Right.” Blair reached in his pocket and pulled out expensive cigars. “Howard!” he called.
Howard loved a good cigar.
“He’s back there.” Gayle pointed to the door.
Before Blair walked behind the counter to open the workshop door, he handed Bill a cigar. Then he held one up for Gayle.
The blonde smiled. “No, thanks.”
Harry called to him. “Miranda wants one, according to Herb.”
“Will do.” Blair disappeared into the workroom.
“I think I’d better go before someone else comes in and is surprised to find me.”
“Your pearls will be waiting for you,” Gayle said.
Harry looked from Gayle to Bill. “How many carats is that pear diamond?”
“Eight,” Bill swiftly replied.
“At about twenty-two thousand a carat,” said Gayle. “The price of diamonds just went up.” She thought the pear-shaped diamond utter perfection.
“Oh, my God,” Harry whispered.
“And the chain was platinum.” Bill smiled. “Just about two hundred thousand, all told.”
“I feel faint. I had a two-hundred-thousand-dollar necklace on.” Harry blanched.
Bill, ever gallant, replied, “You did it justice.”
“That you did,” Gayle agreed.
“Shall we assume there are a lot of car repairs in Charlottesville?” Harry laughed as she left the store, her right hand still touching her neck.
Sitting in the modest living room, Herb bowed his head in prayer. Sitting tightly together on the sofa, Sharon and Artie Meola did likewise. The husband and wife held hands.
“Heavenly Father, grant to these thy servants the warmth of thy love. Help them through this sorrowful trial. Let them know their daughter now resides with you, secure in the bosom of heaven. In time they will be reunited with Tara in great rejoicing.
“Grant them knowledge of her spirit united with your Son. Give them peace and show all of us the way to help Sharon and Artie transform their sorrows into deeper love.
“In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.” Tears spilled down his red cheeks.
Sharon sobbed. Artie put his arm around his wife of thirty-two years. He cried, as well.
Finally, Artie rasped, “Reverend, I don’t know if I will ever understand. Friends told me at the funeral, this is God’s will. How can it be God’s will to take our girl in such a horrible way?”
Tara, driving her old but sturdy Ford Explorer, was killed in a freak accident on the two-lane highway from Crozet to Whitehall. The old road contained numerous blind curves. Years ago, paving it was seen as a great victory by the state representative and by many residents. Others thought differently. Too much speed on a dirt road meant you’d skid out, your hind end would crunch sideways. You might go off the road. Or you might dampen your speed. Rarely were there deaths, although there were sure enough cars that crashed through wooden fences and wound up in the pastures. The paved road encouraged development, which in turn encouraged more traffic at faster speeds.
According to the team investigating the fatal crash, Tara was going the speed limit. She was on her way home to Crozet, heading south from Whitehall. As she approached a curve just beyond Chuck Pinnell’s leather business—formerly a large apple shed—a deer leapt out, crashing through the driver’s side windshield. Tara swerved her Explorer into oncoming traffic—which happened to be a mighty Range Rover, flying along at ten miles over the speed limit.
By the time the rescue squad was on the scene, Tara had bled to death. The driver of the Range Rover would never be the same. His only fault was speeding, but no one could foresee such an event.
Tara, just twenty-five, brimming with promise and so very pretty, had been the Meolas’ only child.
After a half hour of talking, praying, drawing closer together, Sharon asked Herb to please have a bit of lunch with them.
Some people would have refused this, fearing to put the distraught mother to more trouble, but Herb, wise in the ways of people and especially wise in the ways of Virginia ladies, readily agreed. Preparing the meal would give Sharon something to do, something at which she excelled.
She and Artie talked the whole way through a light delicious lunch about Tara’s dreams, her dating, and what a good volleyball player she was in high school and college. It was a way to keep her with them. In time, the stories of their daughter would subside, as would the grief. The questions over God’s plan, however, would never subside.
Herb, unlike many priests, ministers, and pastors, didn’t have a ready bag of pat answers. He couldn’t understand why snatching a lovely, good girl entering the prime of her life could serve any earthly purpose.
He had seen Tara grow up. He’d taught her catechism for two years, for which Tara evidenced little enthusiasm. She used to make him laugh and remember that when he was her age, he lacked enthusiasm for catechism, as well. When she took her first communion after the simple confirmation ceremony, she looked up at him in his vestments and he had to fight the urge to wink at her.
As Herb drove back to St. Luke’s—his Chevy running like a top after being fixed—he, too, asked God unsettling questions. The answers he received were the ones he always received: Faith. Trust. Love. He first heard that call as a young soldier in Vietnam. Back stateside, filled with dreadful memories of the horrors of combat, he entered seminary. Decades later: faith, trust, and love. Like most of us in this life, he had no assurance that his efforts truly helped anyone, but he nevertheless tried. He prayed for Tara and her parents and would continue to pray for them often.
With a heavy heart, he walked into the beautiful stone administrative building on the St. Luke’s quad. He passed his secretary, Lenore Siebert, who was about the same age as Tara. She opened her mouth, but before anything came out, Big Mim walked out of the living room, which was really a meeting room. Three cats and Miranda followed behind her.
Big Mim took his hand while Miranda took the other one. They walked him into the room, its windows wide open, and sat him down.
Big Mim took charge, as always. “Nothing can make this better, but we have something that might let the Meolas know how deeply we all care.”
Miranda handed Herb an envelope. “This is a start. Big Mim calle
d everyone in the parish, and the two of us made the rounds.”
Big Mim smiled. “Open it.”
Inside the envelope was a check for five thousand dollars, made out to the Tara Meola Scholarship Fund.
“Girls.” Herb’s eyes filled up again.
“Each year we will raise this amount or maybe more. We will ask Sharon and Artie to select a young person entering college who they think reflects some of their daughter’s wonderful qualities.” Big Mim, not always the most sensitive of people, smiled.
“Girls,” Herb repeated himself.
He was as moved by Big Mim’s compassion as the check. The old girl was changing.
Elocution, knowing her human was overcome, jumped on the back of the sofa and put a paw on his shoulder to give him a kiss with her rough tongue. “It’s all right, Poppy.”
“Miranda was with me every step of the way, even if she isn’t a Lutheran.” Big Mim reached for Miranda’s hand. “And so was Victor Gatzembizi. Catholic, you know. So many people pitched in.”
Herb held the check, studied it, glanced at the two old friends. “ ‘God moves in a mysterious way. His wonders to perform.’ ”
Standing in the equipment shed where the big tractor sat, as well as the smaller, thirty-horsepower unit, Harry took off her ball cap, throwing it on the crusher run. “I am bullshit mad.”
Fair burst out laughing. He couldn’t help it.
“Oh, boy, she’ll really get hot now.” Tucker stepped farther away from the humans.
Mrs. Murphy and Pewter, perched on the high tractor seat of the eighty-horsepower John Deere, watched, big-eyed.
“What’s funny? What’s so damned funny?” Not a woman given to profanity, Harry was losing her composure.
“Baby, you’re acting just like your father.” Fair put his hands in his pockets.
A long pause followed, then Harry laughed. “Daddy did have a habit of throwing his cap down, didn’t he?”
“Hey, when his Orioles cap hit the dirt, you knew to clear out.” Fair laughed. “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”
Her voice lightened. “Well, I am mad. I shouldn’t swear about it, but, Fair, if you could have heard that twit. Sanctimonious twit.”
“He’s not my favorite, but I only see Yancy Hampton in passing.”
“Fair, he gave me a decent price for the sunflowers per hundredweight. But I just don’t know if I can do business with him. I really don’t.”
“Why don’t you wait a few days before making that decision? An early purchase is a hedge against a drop in prices. Then again, it’s a loss if prices rise—but you know that as well as I do, honey. Mother Nature can and does throw plenty of curveballs. Plus, Hampton’s money might help pay the tractor repair bill.”
“I know.” She leaned against the big tractor, unaware that the two cats looked down at her from the seat. “I canceled the tractor pickup. Too much money. I’ll try to get Dabney Farnese to fix it. It will take longer, but he’s reasonable.”
Fair picked up her faded, worn red ball cap, handing it to her. She clapped it back on her head. “I shouldn’t let it get to me. Guess I’m tired and maybe still upset over finding that body. Tara Meola’s funeral service got to me, too.”
“All of us. You never know.”
“No, you don’t.” She looked up at him, wondering what would happen if he died first.
For all their former troubles, Harry couldn’t imagine life without Fair. For one thing, he was much more attuned to emotions than she was. She blocked emotion, even while being aware that sooner or later those stashed-away pains and troubles would inevitably leak out.
“Sounds like he was impressed by your sunflowers and the ginseng.”
“It’s still early in the season, but so far so good, and I have laid them all out properly.”
“You’re good at what you do, honey.”
She smiled at him, loving the praise. “Here comes the good part. Hampton asked me about when and how I fertilize. I said I use turkey or chicken poop and I put it down usually in the fall. I always read The Farmer’s Almanac, though, and if they predict a drought for the fall, I wait until spring.”
“And?”
“You would have thought I said the earth was flat. The Farmer’s Almanac. He cited all the studies I should read, all the computer-generated statistics, and then—oh, this is what really fried my two remaining brain cells—he excoriated me for using chicken and turkey poop, because who knew what parasites might be thriving in the poop? I just about lost it.”
Fair breathed a mock sigh of relief. “But you didn’t, so he has his front teeth, thank goodness. You have a mean right cross, sugar.”
“I counted to ten. A few times. I replied that my father used natural fertilizer and it has always served us well. Actually, when I was little, Papaw used to get muck from the Chesapeake as well as crushed seashells. Can’t do that anymore, but each year Papaw and Dad would vary which field received what. Well, he didn’t want to hear any of that. He lectured me on the proper nitrogen, phosphorus, selenium, you name it, balance in soil, depending on crops, and why commercial fertilizers are better. Yes, and right now they are three hundred dollars per ton more than last year, too. So I just said I would continue to use natural fertilizer, which reduces my reliance on foreign oil.”
Fair clapped his thighs with his hands and laughed. “Good one.”
“Hey, it’s the truth. All that stuff has a lot of gunk in it, for lack of a better word. Given that Yancy is the type that uses curly lightbulbs and feels superior to the rest of us, he had to shut up. Ass.”
Fair laughed again, moved over to the tractor, and gave his wife a big hug and a kiss. “Have I told you today that I love you? I never quite know what you’re going to do and say, but I’m never bored.”
She kissed him back.
As this heated up, Mrs. Murphy leaned way over to try to snatch Harry’s ball cap off her head.
Pewter, whose bulk was an impediment, coached, “A little to the left. You got it.”
Mrs. Murphy hooked the cap, tossing it on the crusher run.
Harry didn’t notice.
The three friends observed the two oblivious humans.
“Aren’t they odd creatures?” Tucker commented.
“One minute she’s ready to kill Yancy Hampton, and the next she’s wildly in love with her husband. One extreme to the other.”
Nick Ash by lavished attention on his 2009 Subaru Impreza WRX STI. He figured for one-third the price, he got 70 percent of a Porsche’s performance. Since he was six feet two, the pocket rocket forced him to bend over just to get in. Fortunately, he carried no fat, or the steering wheel might have bisected his belly.
The amazing acceleration and fine suspension made up for a somewhat hard ride. Okay with Nick. He didn’t want a luxo-barge. His black coupe sped through the night, twisting up Route 22 near Cismont Manor. After work, he’d search out the best roads to push the car and himself, back roads like the old Route 635 in Nelson County or the old roads in Albemarle to Greenfield. He’d put the windows down just to listen to the engine, out of which he’d wrung more horsepower, thanks to his mechanical skills. The 305 horsepower off the lot had been bumped up another twenty horsepower and married to the six-speed manual transmission. Nick would wind that sucker up or down.
He needed all his skills at 9:30 P.M. on Wednesday, May 30. Behind him roared the new yellow Chevy Camaro with its big V8, sold at 426 horsepower, tweaked to 444. Nick knew the car and its driver well. Sweat rolled down his face. He could feel the heat of his body as he tried to tear away from the larger car. His one hope was that the STI proved more maneuverable; plus, the Camaro suffered from dreadful sight lines. He could hope the big car would spin off the road, but so far it had not. Chevy hit a home run with the Camaro if one loved muscle cars. Except for the sight lines, the damned thing was about perfect.
Muscle cars had made a spectacular comeback with the Dodge Charger, the ever-cool Ford Mustang, and the C
amaro. Those Americans who loved cars loved powerful, quick cars, and no amount of gas prices could quite kill that love.
The STI hung a curve—no slide, no nasty feedback from the steering. Nick heard the Camaro break slightly, then the roar of the engine as the driver made up for the slight slowdown. That man, too, knew the capabilities of the STI. Much as the pursuer scoffed at anything manufactured by the Japanese, he appreciated what the machine could do.
Nick knew this part of the county well. There was a dirt road a quarter mile up ahead, just after a sharp right curve off a bit of a rise in the road. It was well hidden. If he could get on that, he could cut his lights and keep moving, as he had long ago disabled the computer chip that kept lights on at night whether you wanted them on or not. As the pursuing Camaro rode up the rise, its lights might just miss him. Nick floored it, flew over the rise—wheels off the ground—and came down with a thud, despite the good suspension. Cutting his lights, he turned a hard right. He peered into the darkness, slowed, then stopped to listen. He heard the huge engine in the Camaro whine by.
Putting his head on his sweat-soaked hands, he slumped back on the seat. He laughed a short dry laugh. If nothing else, that son of a bitch in the Camaro had learned Nick Ashby could drive with the best of them. Creep never would give him credit at the drag strip, either. He waited until he could no longer hear the rumble of the Camaro, cut on his motor, cut on the lights, and drove at forty miles an hour down the dirt road. It would get him out to Black Cat Road, where his new girlfriend, Hilary Larson, lived.
He crept out onto the tarmac of Black Cat Road, drove two miles, then turned left onto her dirt driveway. He’d been planning to stop by earlier, so once he hid his car behind her house, he explained that he’d run into some trouble. He didn’t tell her what trouble. And he apologized for tardiness, for parking behind the house.
A fright, a sporting event, anything that ramps up the adrenaline, also ramps up the sex drive. She forgave him, didn’t seem all that put out, and Nick had a great night. He’d worry about tomorrow tomorrow. He thought he’d be safe at work. Granted, Walt Richardson hadn’t been safe at work, but Nick figured Walt had just taken too big a bite out of the pie.
The Big Cat Nap Page 8