Authors: Jan Karon

Light From Heaven (56 page)

BOOK: Light From Heaven

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“I’ll say!”

“You got sugar?”

“The whole nine yards, except for the basics here.”

“There you go, then. Done deal.”

“Many thanks.” He dug in his pocket for his billfold. “May as well give me two of everything; we have a new Sunday School under way and the children are fond of cake.” And wasn’t Dooley coming home in no time flat? “Then again, make that three of everything. Are Miss Lottie’s needs taken care of?”

“They are. Her brother left her in good shape.”

“I’ll be back now and then,” he said. “May I use your phone?”

“On th’ wall over there.”

No, Cynthia told him, Sammy hadn’t come home. He heard the anxiety in her voice.

He left Greer’s Store with a sense of dread.

Cynthia was beaming as she handed him the manila envelope he’d waited for.

“Congratulations, darling.”

They hugged, wordless.

They were the proud new parents of a hundred-and-sixty-pound boy.

Dear Father Tim,

The Mitford Muse kindly shared your address.

You won’t remember me, but Frank and I attended the nine o’clock at Lord’s Chapel when we came up from Fort Lauderdale each summer.

Frank has passed on, and I am emptying our honse, Overlook, just two doors from poor Edith Mallory’s Clear Day. You would be so welcome to our piano! Frank played it at every single one of our parties for thirty years! Gershwin was his favorite, esp. “I’ve Got Rhythm!”

And while we’re at it, could you use a nice card table and four chairs, a hall runner, an umbrella stand (very nice, only one dent), and a lamp made from the horns of a rinoscerous (sp?)?

I am downsizing.

Yours sincerely,

Marsha Ford

P.S. I hope all this would be tax deductible. One must think of these things. Anytime Tuesday would be convenient for you to pick everything up.

Dear Mrs. Ford,

Of course I remember you. You enjoyed wearing hats, a fashion which clergy are known to appreciate! And Frank was fond of giving out round tuits; I believe I still have mine.

We would be delighted to take the whole kit and caboodle and yes, indeed, all should be tax
deductible. I will supply something on paper four your records.

I know precisely where you are and shall be there on Tuesday at eleven.

My sincerest condolences; Frank was a very cheerful and upbeat fellow who made a difference in our midst.

Yours in Him Who loved us first,

Fr Timothy Kavanagh
†

The letter written, and his wife painting like
a maniac, he preheated their fastidiously clean oven to 375, according to instructions.

There was a sense of waiting in the air, something palpable; he was listening for a step on the porch, a knock on the door, the ringing of the phone; his shoulders were hitched up around his ears.

He would try to forget what he was beginning to think, and surrender his all to this cake ...

He plucked three brown eggs from the blue bowl and went about the exceedingly mysterious ritual that would result in laughter and happiness on Wilson’s Ridge.

“It’s beautiful!” she said, meaning it.

He’d gone up to heaven and beseeched his wife to come and see the common miracle he’d performed.

It sat on a cream-ware cake stand in the center of the pine table, and he was smitten with it.

“It worked,” he said. “I can’t believe it.”

Even Buster and Lloyd had been impressed.

“But it took two hours,” he lamented. “And that’s out of a box. Think what it would take from scratch.” He was mortified.

“Two hours’ work,” she pronounced, “will last a mere fifteen minutes at Holy Trinity.”

He could hardly wait ’til Sunday.

“I can’t be brave any longer,” she said. The sun had just disappeared behind the mountain, and they sat, worn from waiting, in the old wicker chairs on the porch.

“I don’t feel brave at all,” he confessed. “Worried sick is more like it.”

“Me, too.”

“The police, then.”

“Yes.”

He rose from the chair; the enormous weight of his body astonished him.

Unconsciously, he shook his head all along the hall to the library. The prospect of a revolving blue light provoked in him a mixture of nausea and dread.

He prayed as he dialed.

Our Lord Emmanuel, thank You for living up to Your name and being with us ...

He had walked out to the porch to wait for the county police when he heard the crunch of footsteps on the gravel. He knew at once ...

Sammy ambled toward the porch, his tall, thin frame a silhouette in the dusky half-light.

“Hey.”

“Hey, yourself. Where have you been?”

“Around.”

“Around where?”

Sammy shrugged.

“Answer me, please.”

Sammy sat down on the bottom step, his back to the vicar. “I spent th’ n-night in th’ b-barn.”

“Come up to the porch. We’ll talk face-to-face.” He was giving it all he had to keep his voice calm.

Sammy took his time rising from the step and walking up to the porch.

“Sit down,” said the vicar. “Tell me everything.”

“They’s snakes in y’r barn.”

“Not that.”

“I hitched t’ Wesley this mornin’.”

“Keep going.”

“I waited ’til th’ p-pool hall opened. B-Bud wadn’t there.”

Sammy jiggled his leg and looked at the floor.

“I’m waiting.”

“I lost all m’ m-money.”

“All.”

“Yeah.”

“Yes, sir.

“Yes, sir. Dunn whipped my ass.”

“You asked for it.”

“Yeah.”

“All your life there’s been no one to care where you are or what you’re doing. The minute you stepped foot on this place a few weeks ago, that changed. Now you have someone who cares very much where you are and what you’re doing. You also have someone to report to—and that someone is me.”

Silence.

“Listen carefully, and mark my words: This won’t happen again.”

Sammy shrugged.

“Did you hear what I said?”

“Yeah.”

“Yes, sir. What did I say?”

“It w-won’t happen ag’in.”

He heard the wheels of the county car crunching on the gravel.

“It’s the police. Walk out with me.”

“W-what’s happenin’?”

“Walk out with me.”

Father Tim went down the steps and out to the parking area. He turned around and waited for Sammy, and they walked to the car as it wheeled in. He was thankful there was no flashing blue light.

An officer opened the driver’s door and stepped out. His partner stepped out the other side.

“I’m Officer Justice; that’s Officer Daley. This th’ right place?”

“Father Tim Kavanagh.” He shook hands with Justice. “It is the right place, and I owe you an apology. There’s been a mistake.”

“We were told somethin’ about a missin’ boy.”

“Yes, well, he isn’t missing at all. Standing right here in the flesh.”

“Hey,” Sammy croaked.