Steeplechase: A Homer Kelly Mystery Part 17

"Oh, Miss Flint," said Mary faintly.

"But how did it happen?" asked Homer. "Why on earth did Howie burn down your house?"

"Mad at me, I guess," growled Julie.

"Mad at you!"

"Ten years ago, I invited poor orphaned Howie to share Thanksgiving with me. Well, it was a painful family duty. But that night, I found him stealing money from my desk drawer. When I bawled him out, he gave it back and sobbed and said he was sorry, but then during the night he started the fire and skedaddled, although I don't suppose that's a current expression." Julie smiled grimly. "So doing a favor for a tiresome young relative turned out to be even more painful than I'd thought."

Mary was indignant. "You mean he got away with it?"

"Clean away."

"What a horrible man," said Mary angrily. "He stole things from us, too. I mean from my sister and me."

"Listen here, Miss Flint," said Homer. "We just happen to know where Howard Flint can be found. He could be arrested and punished. He's a menace to the human race."

"Oh, never mind. The house was gone, but I sold the land for a goodly sum, and there's a jerry-built mansion on it now. Then I built this place on a piece of land I'd inherited. It was the remains of my great-grandfather's woodlot. Well, say now!" Julie grinned at them. "I should tell you about my great-grandfather. For thirty-five years, Josiah Gideon was pastor of the parish church, the one on the green."

"The church on the green," repeated Homer reverently. "You mean Joe Bold's church, the one everybody calls Old West?"

"Tell us about it," whispered Mary. "Oh please, Miss Flint."

"Now look here, you two, why don't you call me Julie?" The old woman unhooked a cane from the back of her chair and hobbled across the room to her disordered desk. For a moment, she shuffled among the books and papers, then pulled out one of the books. "Some of it's pretty sad," she said, glancing at Mary with one keen eye while the other stared blankly at nothing. "This is the medical record of Civil War cases handled by the surgeons who cared for my grandmother's first husband, Lieutenant James Shaw."

Homer was quick to speak up. "We saw his tombstone, Miss Flint," he said, but Mary murmured, "Wait, Homer, let her finish."

"It's a medical textbook," said Julie, handing the book to Homer. "Terrible pictures. Don't look at it now. Take it home."

Homer took the book and said, "Miss Flint, can you tell us anything about the history of Jean's little restaurant? Back in the old days, when it was a church?"

"Oh, you figured that out, did you?" said Julie, her old eyes glittering. "Yes, indeed I can. How much time have you got?"

She talked and talked. Laboriously, she shuffled back and forth across the room to fish among the papers on her desk and s.n.a.t.c.h out photograph alb.u.ms and newspapers and folders. She went on and on, as though she had been waiting for years to tell the story of Nashoba's Second Parish, and the small church with a homely steeple that had been built by her grandfather Eben and great-grandfather Josiah and all the rest of an obstreperous congregation of men and women intent on raising from the dead an ill.u.s.trious fallen tree.

The Stump in the Graveyard.

There was a sign at the gate: NASHOBA MUNIc.i.p.aL CEMETERY.

The Reverend Joseph Bold walked down the hill with Mary and Homer Kelly to the foot of the burial ground, where a stone wall meandered along Quarry Pond Road.

"It's somewhere in this clump of trees," said Joe. He led them ducking through a small forest of bushy saplings to an opening in the center, where a circle of small stumps surrounded a moss-grown giant like chairs around a table.

"It was huge all right," said Joe. He took a tape measure out of his coat, stretched it across the stump, whistled, snapped the tape shut, and said, "Eight feet, four inches."

As they fumbled their way out again, Homer said learnedly, "I've been reading about chestnut trees. The roots keep sending up shoots, but they don't last long. Ever since 1904, when the blight appeared, every chestnut tree in the country has been doomed to an early death."

"Just like James Thurber's aunt." Joe laughed and mopped at his eye, which had been sc.r.a.ped by a whippy twig. "If I remember correctly, she was the only human being who ever died of the chestnut blight."

"But it wasn't the blight that destroyed this tree," said Mary. "Miss Flint told us about it. It was cut down in 1868."

"By order of your predecessor in the pulpit," said Homer, prodding Joe's s.h.i.+rt with an accusing finger. "One Horatio Biddle. Act of vandalism."

Joe held up protesting hands. "Don't blame me. It was long before my time. Now, if you two will excuse me, I've got an appointment with an engaged couple."

Mary smiled. "You're going to lecture them about their marriage vows?"

"On the contrary-they'll lecture me. They'll want a service expressing their innermost convictions." Joe said good-bye and ambled away, mumbling, "Big chunks of the Rubaiyat, I'll bet. 'A jug of wine,' et cetera."

Mary and Homer were in no hurry. The graveyard looked like a gold mine. For the rest of the afternoon, they wandered up the hill and down again, reading tombstones. Surely some of the dramatis personae in Julie Flint's stories and recollections and miniature biographies lay buried right here beneath their feet.

They began with the impressive tombstone at the top of the hill. "Deacon Samuel Sweetser," said Mary, reading the inscription. "It looks older than the rest."

Deacon Sweetser's monument dwarfed the small stone beside it: THE REVEREND HORATIO BIDDLE.

1820a1868 Pastor FIRST PARISH OF NASHOBA.

1851a1868 Mary frowned. "Wasn't he-"

"You bet he was." Homer made a kicking motion at Biddle's tombstone, but he stopped his big shoe before it struck. "Horatio Biddle, he's the vandal vile, remember? The one who gave the order for the felling of the chestnut tree."

"Oh, ugh," said Mary, moving on.

Halfway down the sloping burial ground, they found the splendid memorial to the next pastor of Nashoba's First Parish: THE REVEREND JOSIAH GIDEON.

1823a1903 Cherished Pastor FIRST PARISH OF NASHOBA.

1868a1903 and His Beloved Wife, JULIA LORD GIDEON.

1828a1908 "Julie's great-grandparents," said Homer. "And this one marks the grave of her grandfather."

EBEN BARTHOLOMEW FLINT.

1847a1928 Pvt., 2nd Maryland Volunteer Infantry, 1863 Architect, Deacon, Selectman, Moderator of Town Meeting Let us now praise famous men, And our fathers that begat us.

All these were honoured in their generations, and were the glory in their times.

"Eben Bartholomew Flint," said Mary. "Remember him, Homer?" He was Ida's younger brother. Did Eben have a wife?"

"Well, of course he must have been married," said Homer, "if Julie's his granddaughter. Look, we've got to go."

But on the way back up the hill, they were attracted by the inscription on another stone. "Look, Homer," cried Mary, "here are Jean's ancestors, the Spratt brothers."

Homer laughed, remembering the twins in their bowler hats. "Not only were they born at the same time, but they died in the same year."

"Maybe it was a joint decision."

"Or perhaps they were called home at the same instant by the dear ones who had gone before."

"Or it could have been a scientific miracle of molecular sympathy. You know, a simultaneous decay of protoplasm."

"Well, whatever."

Here Lie the Mortal Remains of Two Brothers.

JOHN AND JACOB SPRATT.

Portrait and Aerial Photographers.

1843a1913.

May their souls fly to heaven As their bodies flew on earth.

The Forbidden Book.

It was Homer's turn to take the wheel. On the way home, Mary reached between her knees into the bag of books that had been loaned to them by Julie Flint.

"Oh, I remember this one," said Mary, laughing. "There's a whole shelf of Tom Speedy books in my sister's house; they were written by our great-grandfather."

"My G.o.d." Homer pulled the car to a stop on the shoulder of the road and leaned sideways to gaze in wonder at Tom Speedy's Aeroplane. "Do you mean to tell me Horace Morgan was your great-grandfather?"

"Of course he was. Didn't you know that?"

"I did not." Homer was ecstatic. "If I'd known you were Horace Morgan's great-granddaughter, I'd have fallen to my knees right way. They were such great stories-Tom Speedy and His Motorcar, Tom Speedy and His Locomotive, Tom Speedy and His Hot-Air Balloon. Well, I suppose n.o.body reads them anymore, but I had a pa.s.sion for them when I was ten."

At home, they went straight to the kitchen. Homer opened two bottles of beer and Mary sliced tomatoes and cuc.u.mbers from their garden patch and dumped them in the food processor. As the machine whirled them noisily around, she shouted a question at Homer. "Why do you think she retired from the world?"

"Julie Flint?" Homer looked down at his empty bowl. When Mary turned off the noisy machine, the clock ticked in the silent kitchen. She poured the gazpacho into the bowls and sat down, and at last Homer said solemnly, "Because she's not wearing rose-colored gla.s.ses."

"Well, neither are we."

"Oh yes we are." Homer picked up his spoon. "Everybody who isn't a recluse or a suicide wears rose-colored gla.s.ses. That includes you and me. We have to look through some kind of distorting lens, because if we got a really good look at the various miseries in the world, we wouldn't be able to carry on from day to day."

After lunch, they carried the bag of Julie's books into the front room. Mary took out the forbidden book and set it on the coffee table. It was an oversize clothbound volume, its black cover stamped with gold. She looked at it fearfully. "Julie said to open it with care."

"Well, go ahead."

"I'm afraid of it. It's full of terrible pictures, she said."

"Well, I'm not afraid; I'm curious."

"Okay, you look at it then."

Homer reached for the book, opened it, and turned the pages slowly. s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up her courage, Mary said, "Okay, show me."

"No," said Homer, and he slammed the book shut.

"Homer dear, I happen to be a grown woman."

"Of course you are. Forgive me." He opened the book again and they looked at it together.

It was an atlas of Civil War injuries photographed "by order of the surgeon general." Some of the pictures were of gangrenous limbs before amputation; some showed the postoperative stumps, others the odd shapes of resectioned arms and legs. The most harrowing were photographs of facial disfigurements-missing lower jaws and noses, drooping, sightless eyes, mouths hideously crimped to one side. Among them were studies of heroic attempts at surgical repair.

The last page described the case of Lt. James Jackson Shaw. Mary made pitying noises. James was blind in one eye. The bridge of his nose was gone and part of his lower jaw. His arms were stumps. Below the photograph was his medical history.

Homer and Mary read the surgeon's dry report.

2nd Lt. James Jackson Shaw, 32nd Ma.s.sachusetts Volunteer Infantry. Severely wounded, April 1, 1865, at Five Forks, Virginia, in one of the last engagements of the late war.

His wounds resulted from the premature explosion of a sh.e.l.l as it was rammed home in the muzzle of a twelve-pounder Napoleon. His injuries were multiple. The humors of the right eye were evacuated, the nasal bones fractured, and a portion of the inferior maxilla carried away, resulting in great deformity and loss of speech.

Worse still was the catastrophic destruction of both hands. Within an hour of the explosion, amputations were performed in a field hospital. Both arms were removed at the wrist. The wounds cicatrized well and the patient was transferred to St. Joseph's Hospital in New York City, where portions of exfoliated bone were removed and the first of four facial operations performed by Dr. Gordon Buck. Over a two-year period, there were three other attempts at repair with successive skin grafts.

Homer closed the book. When he could speak, he said, "Well, it's war. It's any war. Even now, the worst casualties are spirited away somewhere. n.o.body's allowed to photograph men as damaged as this. Why, dear me, it would be in such poor taste. So the poor guys spend the rest of their lives hidden away in veterans' hospitals. Their fellow citizens hear the statistics-you know, how many men were killed and how many wounded-but they never see the worst that can happen to the young men they so blithely send off to war. Otherwise, they might refuse to send them."

"But sometimes we have to send them," murmured Mary.

"Only when the particular war we send them to is chosen pretty d.a.m.n carefully," growled Homer.

A Bad Day for Homer.

Sometimes, Mary Kelly imagined going back in time to the moment when she and Homer had first met. What if they could relive that crucial encounter? Given a second chance, would Homer murmur, "Excuse me" and turn his back? Would she?

Poor Old Homer, his new book was done, hurried to a finish. At the last minute, he had added an exciting new chapter about the lost and found church in the town of Nashoba, and then he had rushed the ma.n.u.script to his editor by overnight mail.

Next day, Luther called to say, "Well, it's about time, Homer. Your last bestseller has slipped right off the bottom of the list, but now, please G.o.d, you'll be back on top again."

But the publis.h.i.+ng world proved fickle. Luther called a few months later to say regretfully, "Sorry, Homer, but this one's a dud, I'm afraid. We fired off a couple hundred review copies, but n.o.body took the bait."

Mary took him out on the river to cheer him up, but it didn't work. "It's not just the new one that's failing," said Homer gloomily, dipping his paddle in rosy pieces of reflected sky. "Luther says Hen and Chicks is going out of print."