by Nic Saint
“Thanks, Vesta,” said the priest. “Thanks for your wise words.”
And as he hurried out, she was smiling to herself. Wise words, Francis had said. She didn’t know if her words had been particularly wise, but she’d take any compliment she could get. And then she returned to the waiting groom to resume her game of Scrabble, and from time to time pick up the phone and advise her son-in-law’s patients with some more of her particular brand of divine wisdom.
12
“Max?”
“Mh?”
“Why is that man diving into that pond?”
“Because he thinks Angel might be down there, Dooley.”
“But why? Why would she be down there?”
“Because she might have accidentally stumbled in last night when she wasn’t looking, and drowned.”
“Oh,” said my friend, who’s never been one for the unhappy ending. “I hope she’s not in there. That wouldn’t be good.”
“Fifi and Rufus seem to think she is. So it stands to reason that they’re right.”
Fifi and Rufus, who’d done their bit for the good of the expedition, now gratefully accepted cuddles from Ted and Marcie, while Shanille, Harriet and Brutus stood watching the activity of that diver, and discussing his progress.
Marigold, meanwhile, stood talking into her phone, and looking extremely perturbed. Odelia and Chase, who’d arrived very quickly after Marcie had called 911, were searching around for potential clues as to what had happened to the missing girl, and when suddenly another person came crashing through the undergrowth, I wasn’t surprised. The scene was starting to resemble one of those mob scenes, where thousands get together to watch some car crash in progress. I was surprised, though, to find that it was Father Reilly who now stood before us panting a little stertorously after his short ramble through the woods. But I was even more surprised when he walked straight up to Marigold, and they hugged—and not a fatherly hug, either, but more the kind of hug we see Chase and Odelia exchange all the time.
“Um…” said Dooley.
“No, Dooley, I don’t know why Father Reilly is hugging his housekeeper as if they’re a long-married couple,” I said, anticipating his question.
“Maybe he’s very grateful that she keeps his house clean?” Dooley suggested.
But then things got a little weirder still when Marigold now buried her face in Father Reilly’s chest and gave free rein to her emotions by having a good cry, the priest patting her back consolingly and murmuring such evergreens as ‘There, there’ into her ear.
“If I didn’t know any better, Dooley,” I said after observing the twosome for a few more moments, “I’d say those two are definitely a couple.”
“I told you, Max—didn’t I tell you?”
“Yes, you did, Dooley. You called it.”
“Oh, that’s so nice. I like couples. They make the world a little brighter and always put a smile on my face.” He sighed. “Love is grand, isn’t it?”
“Love is grand, Dooley. But priests in Father Reilly’s church unfortunately aren’t allowed to marry, so this display of public affection is very much not done, I’m afraid.”
“So… Father Reilly isn’t allowed to hug his housekeeper?”
“He can hug her as much as he wants, but that’s pretty much as far as he’s allowed to go—his church pretty much has decided to draw the line there.”
“So…”
“So no kissing or … anything else.”
Dooley laughed. “What else is there, Max? Kissing is what people who love each other do!”
“Absolutely,” I said after a moment’s hesitation. “Yes, kissing is exactly what they do. Nothing more.”
“Well, they’re not kissing yet,” said Dooley, referring to the priest and his housekeeper. “So his church will be very happy.”
“Found something!” suddenly a voice rang out nearby. We all hurried to the edge of the pond, as the diver had resurfaced and was holding something in his hand. It was a pink and shiny object, and looked very much like…
“Angel’s phone!” Marigold cried, then burst into tears once more. The diver handed the phone to Angel’s distraught mother, who nodded and said, “It’s my baby’s phone!”
“So she definitely was here,” said Odelia, who’d come hurrying up from her search of the nearby area.
“All is not lost, Marigold,” said Father Reilly. “For all we know she simply dumped her phone in the pond and…”
“And then what?” She suddenly turned on the priest. “You should never have yelled at her, Francis—this is all your fault!”
“I’m sorry,” said the man of the cloth, who looked as upset as his housekeeper, which surprised me a little. I mean, it’s one thing to have a general affection for the members of one’s flock, but Father Reilly seemed to take this thing with Angel very personal. There was even a lone tear trickling down his rosy cheek, which he quickly brushed away with the back of his hand.
Before long the diver surfaced again, and all eyes turned to him once more. But the man shook his head. “Nothing,” he said. “Except for three rusty old bikes.”
“Oh, Francis!” Marigold cried, and this time buried her head in the man’s shoulder.
“I don’t understand,” said Odelia. “So her phone is in there but…”
“Did you search the whole area?” asked Chase.
The diver, who’d hoisted himself up onto the pond’s edge and was removing his diving gear, answered in the affirmative. “Searched every inch, Detective. Nothing.”
“But that’s impossible,” said Marcie. “I mean, surely if the dogs tell us that the trail stops here…”
“Are these trained police dogs, ma’am?” asked the diver as he gave Fifi and Rufus a critical look.
“No, they’re regular dogs,” Ted said.
“Well, there you go, sir. Only a police dog, trained in the search for a missing person will be able to give you the information you need, not your regular mutt—no offense.”
I thought Rufus looked a little rueful, but Fifi looked indignant.
“I can tell you right now that I did not make a mistake, sir!” she yelled, though her barking didn’t seem to affect the diver in the slightest.
“I think the key must be in those three rusty bikes, Max,” said Dooley. “You better tell Odelia to tell that diver to bring up those bikes so we can take a closer look at them.”
“Oh, Dooley,” said Harriet, dismissing my friend’s comment out of paw.
“So you found this pond, Rufus,” said Brutus. “Which we’ll attribute to beginner’s luck. But you better step aside now and let the actual police dogs pick up the trail, okay?”
“I don’t understand,” said Rufus. “I’m sure that the trail stops here. I’ve walked all around the pond and nothing. I can’t pick up the girl’s scent anywhere. Plenty of other scents, mind you, but not Angel’s particular scent.”
“Almost as if she vanished without a trace,” said Fifi, then slowly raised her head to look upward. And since it’s very hard not to look up when one of your small company looks up, we all followed suit, and soon found ourselves staring up at the treetops—pine trees if I wasn’t mistaken—and that small patch of blue sky visible beyond the foliage.
“Aliens,” suddenly said Dooley. “Angel was abducted by aliens. And of course they left her phone, since that’s ancient technology for them.”
“I hate to admit it,” said Harriet, “but I think for once Dooley just might be onto something.”
“Aliens,” Rufus murmured. “What do you know?”
I saw how Shanille had joined her humans and was offering her support by giving them gentle nudges with the top of her head. I walked over and said, “Shanille, can I ask you something?”
“Can’t you see I’m in the middle of something, Max?” she said.
“Your Father Reilly and Marigold,” I said, trudging on regardless. My curiosity had been piqued and it simply had to be satisfied, pronto! “Are they an i
tem?”
Shanille looked up sharply at this. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she snapped.
“It just seems to me as if they’re very, um, well, tactile. More tactile than I would have expected from a priest.”
She glanced up at her humans, who stood staring at that pond, as if hoping Angel would suddenly pop up like the Lady of the Lake, holding perhaps not Excalibur but at least one of those three rusty bikes.
“Not here,” Shanille barked—if a cat can bark, of course—and walked off into the woods. And since I figured she meant for me to follow her, that’s what I did. Once we’d removed ourselves from the pondside melee, she turned and said, “You can’t tell this to anyone, Max.”
“Okay,” I said, wondering what could possibly be so big that she was swearing me to secrecy.
“But swear to it, Max.”
“I hereby solemnly swear I won’t tell anyone what you’re about to tell me, Shanille,” I said, deciding to go through the rigmarole and satisfy Shanille’s weird demands.
She looked off into the middle distance, as if wondering how to formulate her next statement, then decided to come right out with it. “Yes, Francis and Marigold are a couple.”
“And Angel…”
“Is their daughter.”
“And does she know…”
“No, she doesn’t—and that’s the thing. Marigold has been wanting to tell her ever since she was old enough to understand, but Father Reilly made her swear not to.”
“But why?”
“Isn’t it obvious, Max? The Catholic Church doesn’t allow its priests to have affairs with their housekeepers, and much less have kids with them. And so if this became known, and how could it not become known if Marigold told Angel, who would immediately post a heartfelt and extremely poignant update on Facebook, Snapchat, Tik Tok, Instagram, Whatsapp and Telegram, then that would be the end of Father Reilly as parish priest. He’d be suspended and would have to find another job.”
“But wouldn’t he be much happier being married to Marigold and officially recognize Angel as his daughter?”
“You don’t get it, do you? Father Reilly has given his life to the church. It means everything to him. His whole identity revolves around his position at St. John’s. Having to give that up would be like giving up a part of himself—the part that makes him who he is.”
“I think he would be fine.”
“He could always join another church,” suddenly a voice piped up behind us.
“Dooley!” Shanille cried, horrified that our friend had followed us out there.
“Well, it’s true, isn’t it? He could join a church where priests are allowed to marry. There must be plenty of those around.”
“Yeah, the Protestants, for instance,” I said. “They’re allowed to marry, aren’t they?”
“It’s not that simple!” said Shanille, spacing out the words and giving them some bite.
“It is simple if you make it simple,” said Dooley. “Do you want us to tell Gran about Father Reilly and Marigold? And then she can tell Father Reilly to join some other church.”
“No, Dooley, I do not want you to tell Vesta—in fact I don’t want you to tell anyone!”
“What can’t you tell us?” asked Harriet, who also came wandering up now, followed by Brutus.
“Oh, my God!” Shanille cried. “Isn’t anything sacred!”
“What secret?” asked Brutus.
“I think she said sacred, not secret,” said Harriet.
“Father Reilly wants to marry Marigold, the mother of his daughter Angel, only he’s afraid to change churches,” said Dooley, filling in the newcomers.
“Dooley!” Shanille cried. “What did I just tell you about not telling anyone!”
“Oh, but Harriet and Brutus aren’t just anyone,” said Dooley with perfect logic. “They’re friends.”
“See!” said Harriet. “I told you that Angel is Father Reilly’s daughter!”
“You absolutely did,” Brutus confirmed.
“So why don’t they get married?”
“Because he’s a priest!” said Shanille, who seemed to get a little overwrought now. “And priests aren’t supposed to get married!”
“That’s nonsense,” said Brutus. “Plenty of priests are married with kids. Chase’s aunt’s cousin’s uncle is a priest and he’s been married for over forty years. Though listening to him he’d prefer not to be married, but that’s a different story.”
“It’s the Catholic priests that can’t marry,” I explained. “Their church doesn’t allow it.”
“Well, that’s just plain weird, isn’t it?” said Harriet.
“What is?”
“Well, they marry people every day but can’t get married themselves? That doesn’t seem fair.”
“That’s just the way it is.”
We all watched Father Reilly and his ladylove, and I have to say the sight warmed the cockles of my heart.
But then Dooley’s words brought us all back to reality with a bang: “So what are the aliens going to do with Angel, Max?”
13
“Max, you’ve got to help us,” said Fifi.
We were on our way back to the main road, since there didn’t seem to be anything else we could do out there.
“Help you with what?” I asked.
I noticed how both Rufus and Fifi had flanked me, and were talking in low, urgent tones, clearly not wanting the others to know what we were discussing.
“You have to help us figure out what happened to that missing girl,” said Rufus.
“We all want to know what happened to Angel,” I pointed out.
“No, but we’re in a real pickle here, Max,” Fifi confessed.
“Our reputation hangs in the balance, Max,” her friend chimed in.
“What reputation? What are you talking about?”
“When we accepted this assignment to find Angel, we were sure we couldn’t miss,” Fifi explained.
“Yeah,” said Rufus. “Sniffing for a missing person is a no-brainer, whatever that idiot diver says.”
“But then the trail suddenly went cold on us.”
“Angel vanished—poof! Into thin air!”
“So now this whole thing is making us look bad, Max.”
“Real bad,” Rufus specified.
“What if the others find out?”
“And they will find out,” said Rufus.
“What others?” I asked, mystified by this entire conversation.
“Other dogs, Max!” Fifi cried.
“Our names will be mud,” Rufus said. “Dogs will say we’re a disgrace to the good name of dogs everywhere.”
“Can’t even sniff out a simple missing girl, they’ll say.”
“So you have to help us, Max,” Rufus said in conclusion.
“Find Angel before the news breaks that we weren’t able to find her,” Fifi explained.
“And then when you do find her, you need to give us the credit, Max.”
“Yeah, give us the credit…”
“… and spread the word far and wide, Max.”
“As far as the word will go!”
“To the four corners of the globe!”
“Can I say something now?” I asked when finally the crosstalk seemed to be at an end.
“Only if you say yes,” said Fifi, then quietly added, “Just kidding.”
“Okay, so first off, we all want to find Angel, not just you guys. In fact it’s imperative that we find her as soon as possible.”
“I know—for our reputations!”
“Nobody cares about your reputation, Fifi,” I said, perhaps a touch too heatedly, but I don’t enjoy being cornered like this. I mean, cats have their pride, and don’t like to be engaged by a couple of dogs to do their work for them.
“See?” said Rufus sadly. “What did I tell you, Fifi?”
“I know, Rufus. I thought Max was a pal, but obviously he’s not.”
“I am your pal,” I said, “
and as your pal I can tell you in all honesty that nobody is going to think any less of you simply because you couldn’t find Angel.”
“That’s what you think,” Fifi scoffed.
“No, but look here—you found the place where she disappeared—you found the place where she dumped her phone—or it was dumped for her—and the fact that the trail runs cold tells us that something happened out there, and so now we need to find out what. I think everyone will agree you did a great job, you guys. An absolutely stellar job.”
“You think so?” asked Fifi dubiously.
“Absolutely. Without you, we wouldn’t know what we know now.”
“Which is?”
“Well, um…” Frankly I had no idea what we knew, except that Angel was still missing.
“We found out that Angel is Father Reilly’s daughter,” said Dooley, who’d joined us at the head of the small procession.
“Dooley, you promised!” Shanille cried from a few paces behind us.
“But Fifi and Rufus are friends, Shanille! And you don’t keep secrets from your friends!”
“Do you think Angel being Father Reilly’s daughter is related to what happened to her?” asked Fifi.
“I have no idea,” I confessed. “But it’s definitely something we need to look into.”
“Could be that Angel found out that Father Reilly is her dad and decided to run away,” Rufus offered. “Without leaving a trace, which is why she jumped into that pond, dumped her phone, and this way managed to wipe every trace of herself.”
“But why would she do that?” asked Dooley. “If Father Reilly were my dad, I’d be very happy. He’s such a nice man.”
“I don’t think it’s that simple, Dooley,” I said. “If she found out—and that’s still a big if—we have no idea how she felt about it.”
“Okay, so if she did run away,” said Fifi, “why would she go out with her friends first? That doesn’t sound like a person in distress. No,” she said, shaking her head. “I smell a rat.”