Cat's Eyewitness (13 page)

“I see you and you’re not getting one morsel off my plate.” Harry squinted at Pewter.

“We want you to start a petition so we can be the state cats.”
Pewter used her sweetest voice.

“And if we don’t get selected—good old everyday cats—then I say we call on all alley cats in the state to descend on the state house, shred furniture, pull out computer plugs, and pee on papers!”
Mrs. Murphy gleefully imagined the state house overrun by rioting cats.

“Bet the governor would have a fit and fall in it.”
Pewter laughed.

“He’s seen worse, but this would be a first, a first for the whole nation.”
Tucker liked the idea.

“You all are chatty.” Harry glanced at the newspaper. “Hmm, we still haven’t gotten all the money the federal government promised us for security.”

The animals as well as Virginia’s humans knew if anything went wrong, they’d be on the front line. The image, ever-present in their minds, was the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. Also, much of the Revolutionary War was fought in the state as well as sixty percent of the War Between the States.

“Why do people believe their government?”
Pewter asked.

“Because they have to believe in something. They get scared without a system. They’ll accept a system that doesn’t work rather than create a new one; they’re lazy. They’re like a pack of hounds that way,”
Mrs. Murphy, a cat and therefore a freethinker, remarked.

“I’m a canine.”
Tucker tilted her head upward toward the tiger cat.

“Of course, you are,”
Pewter said soothingly,
“but you spend your time with us. Our habits have rubbed off on you.”

Mrs. Murphy laughed.
“Maybe. But Tucker, it’s like this: if you or I are scared there’s a real reason—you know, the bobcat has jumped us behind the barn. We fight or run and then we’re over it. They carry their fear all the time. It’s what makes humans sick, you see. And it’s why they have to believe in things that can’t be true.”

“Like a bunch of men sitting on top of a mountain with no women, no children, and thinking a statue of the Virgin Mary is crying tears of blood.”
Pewter let her tail hang over the edge of the chair.

“You don’t believe in miracles?”
Tucker hoped that there were miracles.

“Every day you’re alive and someone loves you is a miracle,”
Mrs. Murphy wisely said.

“If Brother Thomas is resurrected, I’ll believe in the tears.”
Pewter giggled.

Brother Thomas had been resurrected in a manner of speaking. The smooth stone with his name, birthdate, and death date beautifully incised marked an empty grave. Who would notice since it was a fresh grave? And it was a grave dug with difficulty since the ground was frozen. A backhoe had been used, and it was still a chore. The earth was replaced and tamped down. The next snow squall would obscure even the lovely stone that Brother Mark had labored to make perfect.

17

O
n Tuesday, November 29, a crowd of two hundred people gathered before the closed iron gates at the monastery. Brother Handle refused to unlock the tall, wrought-iron barriers. But by Friday, December 2, when the crowd surpassed one thousand people, many of them holding candles while reciting the rosary, he relented. The people walked slowly, in an orderly manner, to the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mother. Many, like the late Brother Thomas had done, fell to their knees. Some people prayed, immobile, for hours in the frigid air. When they tried to rise, they found they could not and other supplicants had to help them. During the afternoon, when the mercury nudged up to thirty-eight degrees Fahrenheit, Mary’s tears began to melt and fresh ones slid down her cheeks, dripping onto the folds of her robe, onto the base of the statue. People dabbed handkerchiefs into the blood as it slid onto the base.

Fearing excessive devotions—perhaps a few pilgrims might be unbalanced—Brother Handle hastily organized a watch of brothers. These groups of four men took three-hour posts—one by the statue, the other three at the edges of the crowd. Another monk was stationed down at the open gates should anyone need assistance. In a concession to the cold, Brother Handle allowed them to wear gloves. Brother Mark, a month earlier accompanying Brother Thomas to a plumbing supply store, had cleverly procured heat packs from the mountain sports shop on the east side of Waynesboro. While others experienced shooting pains in their feet and hands, he stayed toasty.

Nordy Elliott tried to get a TV crew up to the statue, but Brother John, down at the gate, adamantly refused. This ultimately worked to Nordy’s benefit, because he interviewed the faithful as they returned to their vehicles. Many people cried, others couldn’t speak, but all believed that the Virgin Mary had sent them a sign. Nordy’s cameraperson, Priscilla Friedberg, used a lens almost as long as she was tall. She shot footage of Mary in the far distance, which made the statue and the crowds appear ethereal in the soft winter light.

The piece, which aired on the six o’clock news, looked terrific. Much as people would like television to transmit news, in essence the medium can’t do this. It can only transmit images, with a splattering of words. The fact that millions of Americans believed they were informed because they watched the news was both ludicrous and frightening. To understand any issue or event, a person must take time, time to read well-written, well-argued positions about same.

Pete Osborne knew this. He read magazines and newspapers because he truly cared about government, world affairs, and the arts. To his credit he understood TV, tried to get the best images possible given the budget constraints of his small station. He checked all on-air copy. The material was cogent, concise, and packed with as much information as possible in the proverbial two-minute sound bite.

The tears of blood had a big bite.

Nordy’s career kicked into a higher gear, as did Pete Osborne’s, since NBC affiliates again took the feed from Channel 29. The difference between the two men was that Pete knew there would be a price to pay. He couldn’t, of course, have known how very high, but he did know that success was demanding. There was a reason the great bulk of humanity elected to be mediocre.

That evening at Alicia Palmer’s dinner party for the vivacious Maggie Sheraton, this topic was on all lips.

Alicia originally had envisioned a small dinner party where Herb could meet Maggie. BoomBoom brought up the fact that that looked like a setup. What if they didn’t take to each other? Better to protect them by having more people.

More people turned into Harry and Fair, Miranda and Tracy, Bo and Nancy Newell, Susan and Ned Tucker, Tazio Chappars and Paul de Silva (now dating), and Big Mim and Jim Sanburne. Little Mim and Blair Bainbridge were in Washington attending the opera. Little Mim still had not told her parents that she was engaged. Her father knew it was coming because Blair, quite properly, had asked him for his daughter’s hand, but the handsome male model did not indicate exactly when he would be asking for her hand, her foot, and other parts. The father was a bit nervous, which he prudently did not share with his wife. Big Mim had the skills to run the country, but she couldn’t run her daughter. This did not prevent her from trying, nor did it prevent the attendant resentment from Little Mim.

Alicia Palmer would have asked Deputy Cynthia Cooper, for she was a lively dinner guest, but she’d been tied up for weeks helping Sheriff Rick Shaw reorganize the department, top to bottom.

Patterson’s created an elegant, low, long centerpiece for Alicia’s dinner party. She had requested white, pink, and purple flowers. This was December 2, and Alicia wouldn’t decorate with red, green, and gold for a few more days. She thought it vulgar to rush the holidays. The decorations came down on New Year’s Day, too, just as Mary Pat Reines had done. Alicia had absorbed most of Mary Pat’s ways. Mary Pat was considered a rebel in her family, not because she was a lesbian (most families had gay members; however, they married and then discreetly engaged in affairs) but because she refused to marry and live by Reines standards. Mary Pat’s mother and grandmother had a servant behind each chair when they gave dinner parties. Life was grand indeed.

Mary Pat’s mother would visit the beautiful farm and gripe, “You live like a peasant.”

Alicia simplified life even more, but by most standards, except for those of a Saudi prince, she lived a beautiful and blessed life.

Alicia asked BoomBoom who she wanted as her escort. BoomBoom said Alicia could be her escort. The older woman laughed uproariously at this but was flattered. Alicia had abandoned the idea of an equal number of men and women at the table years ago.

Mary Pat’s idea for any party—and this held true for Big Mim and her aunt Tally—was to always have more men than women. Parties almost always had more women than men; changing the ratio ramped up the competition and energy among the men. It never failed. She’d raid the fraternities of the University of Virginia or call up a dear friend of hers who taught at Virginia Military Institute. She’d make a contribution to the group’s treasury, not that she told anyone. Her parties were wildly successful because they overflowed with handsome young men, each of them coached to pay attention to the various ladies regardless of age.

Alicia, when away from her husbands, would have parties of only drop-dead gorgeous young women, many of them hoping for a film career like that of their hostess. The attention lavished on Alicia picked her up better than any combination of alcohol or drugs. She wondered why so many people in Hollywood succumbed to pills, powders, and liquid fire. As time went by and husbands went with it, she changed. Most women become stronger with age. She no longer needed the secret parties away from her husband, or a secret lover or two on the side—usually female, sometimes male—to spice up her life. The older she became, the more she realized that what she wanted was a partner, a true partner. She certainly hoped the woman wouldn’t be ugly as a mud fence, but more than anything she wanted a woman in her life with a bubbling sense of humor, of adventure, of warmth and compassion. She would not turn away a gentleman with these qualities, but she found more of them in women than in men, or perhaps that was her illusion. Perhaps just as many men as women harbored these qualities. She leaned toward women intellectually, and her body gravitated toward the smooth skin of a woman. Long ago she realized there is no more reason to be gay than there is to be straight. It’s not a choice. It simply is. You are what you are and it’s up to you to make the best of it.

She sat at the head of the table, placing Herb at the foot. He protested that he didn’t deserve the honor, but she told him how lovely it was to have a man at the table. She put Maggie on his right hand. Technically Maggie should have sat at Alicia’s right as her guest of honor, but the hell with technicalities.

She also sat BoomBoom smack in the middle of the table, not considered a favorable place by those who understood that your place was indicated, literally, by your
place.
But BoomBoom knew her place in this community and had no need of visual reinforcement. She wanted the dinner to be a success, so she herself suggested she sit in the middle. In case conversation lagged, she could rekindle it from that position.

Jim Sanburne sat on Alicia’s right. As Mayor of Crozet this made sense. His wife sat on Alicia’s left.

She cleverly placed Harry on Herb’s left, for Harry could be quite funny, often unintentionally so. She scattered everyone in a manner she thought would bring the best out in them, keep them alert, and she certainly kept Paul de Silva alert when she placed Fair Haristeen next to Tazio. She put Bo on Tazio’s other side and placed Nancy Newell next to Fair.

By the second course the table buzzed. First of all, everyone enjoyed everyone else. They hoped a spark might be kindled in Herb and Maggie.

“They’ll need the miracle of the fishes and the loaves,” Big Mim commented on the crowds at Greyfriars.

“Can’t the faithful brown-bag it?” Harry, ever practical, said, which elicited laughter. “Did I put my foot in it again?”

“No, it’s just you.” Susan smiled, happy that Ned was paying attention to her.

“Well, the Blessed Virgin Mother can bless a ham sandwich as well as fishes and loaves,” Harry commented.

A moment passed and Herb said, his voice deep, reassuring, “I called Brother Handle to see if I could be of service. He thanked me but said they could manage. He did say people are giving the monks money, leaving money at the statue, leaving burning candles in glass votives, leaving contributions in the shops. He mentioned that the order does not seek wealth. I replied that surely there is no injunction against wealth seeking the order.”

Maggie, who had done many commercial voice-overs, asked in her distinctive voice, “And what did he say?”

“That he would bow to God’s will.” Herb smiled broadly.

“Which means: take the money and run.” Ned laughed.

“Susan, did Brother Thomas ever talk to you about his life in the order?” BoomBoom asked.

Susan, wearing a forest-green dress that looked good on her, shook her head. “Not much. The only thing he ever said was, people are people, and I never quite knew what he meant.”

“That politics is politics and if you have more than three people in a room, you have politics,” Jim replied.

“In Virginia you only need one person.” Tazio, originally from St. Louis, laughed. “One Virginian can hold five conflicting opinions simultaneously.”

The conversation switched to a state senator from Rockingham County who they felt would run for governor next election.

Herb, tone measured, inclined his head toward Maggie. “Conservative fiscally but quite liberal on what I call personal-choice issues, an interesting mix.”

“The mix of the future.” Jim Sanburne became enlivened. “This country can’t continue with the kind of polarization we have now, a polarization because the extremes of both parties are controlling them. Americans aren’t extremists.”

“Only in defense of liberty,” Herb smoothly said, cribbing from the late Barry Goldwater, earning an admiring smile from Maggie.

“What the extremists have done, which I find very dangerous, is pull the debates away from the center. So the center is now thirty degrees to the right of where it might have been during the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower, a president who I feel was far better than he is credited for.”

“Isn’t that the truth,” Big Mim simply said in reply to Alicia’s astute observation.

“But all those men, men of that generation, whether Republican or Democrat, were fundamentally centrists,” Tracy Raz, retired from a long career in the military and then the CIA, offered. “What we are seeing now is a generation not tempered by World War Two.”

Paul de Silva, a South American with his green card—and therefore a lucky man—softly said, “You believe war brings wisdom?”

Herb, Jim, and Tracy had seen combat in World War II or Korea. Ned, a Navy man, just missed Vietnam but worked in the aftermath. Bo was in the fleet during Vietnam.

Herb lifted his chin. “What war teaches you is that you never want to see another one. I think the leaders that came out of World War One and World War Two did have a deep wisdom, a deep respect for human life. If lives must be lost, then the cause must be just and great. To squander an American life is a terrible calamity.”

The group was silent for a minute. All agreed with the good reverend.

Harry finally spoke up. “It is strange, though, isn’t it, that we can kill someone in a different uniform, but if we do that at home, it’s murder.”

“But maybe even murder is occasionally justified,” Tracy said. He quickly held up his hands. “A wife kills a drunken husband who has their baby by the heels and is threatening to destroy the child. There are no easy answers, I’m afraid.”

“And that’s a gift.” Alicia broadly smiled and brought them back to a lighter mood. “If it were easy, think how bored we’d be. Aren’t all the great questions of life irrational, irrational to the human mind but perhaps not irrational to a mind greater than our own or to nature?”