by Jim Payton
Chapter 6
One of the staff came and collected Janet's mug and plate while she continued to stand at the table. Janet automatically smiled her thanks, but her mind swirled with questions. What, where, when and how? She left the table and walked to her car. Before starting it, she sat trying to control a mind that seemed to be in overdrive. An almost euphoric feeling had her in its grip. Tears started to well in her eyes and then run down her cheeks. With great will power, she brought herself to the here and now and managed to drive back to her home.
Janet lived in the area between Ponsonby and Western Springs, known as Grey Lynn. She had inherited a reasonable sum of money when her Mum and Dad had died in a car accident. It had enabled her to purchase a house that she turned into a home. At one stage, the area had been pretty rough, but urban renewal had swept across Grey Lynn. Fortunately it had left some quiet little cul-de sacs, with solid villas, alone. Wisteria entwined the veranda. A hedge ran along the inside of the front picket fence. The garage sat at the end of the straight drive down one side of the house. There were sash type windows on both sides of a solid front door with a stained glass top panel depicting a flower.
Janet opened the driveway gate, drove the car down beside the house, and stopped in front of the garage. She automatically walked back and closed the front gate. If left open, dogs seemed to enjoy her back yard and leave deposits for her. Again, automatically, she took her mail from the letterbox and absent-mindedly glanced through it as she walked to the back door. The back door access was via a deck that the previous owner had built. With trellis and pot plants, it made an ideal spot for a barbeque or quiet contemplative time with a cup of tea. To the right of the back door was the washhouse, a nod to earlier times when washing involved copper boilers, and not automatic machines situated in an internally accessed garage. Janet unlocked the door and punched in the code for her burglar alarm. A passage ran directly from the back door to the front door. Janet often wondered what her mother would have thought of that. With Gypsy blood direct from Romania in her, she would have been horrified with such a set up. Such, according to her, would have allowed good fortune to go straight through the house without stopping. Consequently, anyone coming through either door would have been made to sit down in one of the rooms off the passage to ensure the leaving of some good luck or fortune behind. At least such a belief ensured some hospitality.
Janet returned to the car and carried her groceries inside. She emptied the bags and put her purchases away where they belonged. She then made a cup of tea and sat outside on her deck as she contemplated what had happened with Jude Prentice.
The setting was peaceful. Janet was not a great gardener so all she had done was maintain what had been present when she arrived. Clearly, the previous owner had known a thing or two about landscaping, and a beautiful lawn was interspersed with fruit trees, flower plots, and a small vegetable garden. Specimen trees and bushes called out for acknowledgement. While it could have been a busy garden, skill had made it a garden of tranquility.
Janet was a practical type of woman. At thirty years of age, she realised that spinsterhood was beckoning. While she was not averse to the idea of marriage and children, she had just never found a male with whom she connected. She had dated through college and over the years had her fair number of occasions where she had to struggle to retain her virginity, a struggle she later gave up. She realised that not only the students, but also many of her peers believed her to be 'on the shelf'. As a result, there was a hole in her heart that she longed to fill, but the shape of that hole had never been matched by another.
Turning to consideration of Jude Prentice, she acknowledged that she found him pleasant and warm. He had displayed manners and a humility that she found endearing. Men no longer displayed those characteristics. She realised that he had revealed little of himself, but seemed to know quite a bit about her. Then, out of the blue, it seemed to her, he had raised the question of her Christianity. Not only that, it appeared he had wanted her to make Joe Palmer a Christian. The thought actually filled her with horror. She believed her Christianity was a private matter. It was something that she acknowledged to herself and those who attended her church, or presented themselves as Christians or with Christian beliefs. On top of that, she did not like Palmer. She interacted with him on a social level, but since his involvement with Jesse's death, she had mainly kept her distance. As if that was not enough, Prentice had suggested she 'attack' him by challenging his stand on evolution. She was no scientist, and anyway, she 'sort of' believed that evolution and creation were pretty much one and the same.
"Oh dear," said Janet aloud. "I do appear to have got myself into quite a pickle." She smiled to think of Laurel and Hardy, or was it Abbott and Costello, who used that expression. The smile went as she returned her thoughts to Prentice. Why had he sought her out? Janet went inside and picked up the telephone. She dialed the Solomon's number and spoke with Mr. Solomani.
"Mr. Solomani, this is Janet Winter. I am sorry to intrude but I have just had an interesting talk with a Mr. Prentice, Jude Prentice. He said that he had been a friend of your family for some time."
"Ah," said Mr. Solomani. "Mr. Prentice. Yes, he is a friend. I did not see him at the Church, but then there were so many people."
"I am sorry to ask, but do you have an address or telephone number for him? I would like to speak with him some more."
"I am sorry Miss Janet, but no. He just turns up from time to time. He always has ever since Millie and I got together. He is a messenger for some big company but we have never known which. Usually he turns up when we have a celebration or something goes wrong. He is like a guardian angel according to Millie. Because he travels a lot, he does not have a permanent contact address or telephone number.
"Again, Miss Janet, thank you for coming today. I am sorry but I must go. A lot of people are still here."
"Yes, I understand," replied Janet. "Sorry to have bothered you."
"No problem Miss Janet," said Mr. Solomani as he disconnected.