Mac concluded his remarks and indicated that everyone should sit down. While they were sitting, Crow leaned close to Val and whispered. “You okay, baby?”
She just squeezed his hand, keeping her eyes fixed on the urn and her mouth locked in a hard straight line. A soprano from First Methodist stood up and began to sing “Amazing Grace” while a bagpiper played along. When that was done they segued into another hymn that Crow didn’t know. He lost interest in it and went back to checking out the crowd. Near the front, Terry and Sarah Wolfe sat next to Saul Weinstock and his wife, Rachel. At one point Mark, who was only one day home from the hospital and seated in front of them, began to cry quietly, and Terry reached out and massaged his shoulders briefly and then leaned close and said something in his ear. Mark nodded, sniffed, wiped his eyes, and let out a deep breath. When Terry sat back, Crow could see Sarah lean over and kiss his cheek.
What held his interest, however, was not this simple kindness, or Mark showing some emotion other than bullish hostility, but the haggard look on Terry’s face and the shell-shocked expression Weinstock wore. If there was a competition for the most demonstrably stressed-out man in Pine Deep, Crow wouldn’t have known who to bet on. Crow could understand Terry’s stress, but why Weinstock looked so battered was an unknown. He tried to catch his friend’s eye, but Weinstock just stared at the soprano with utter rigid indifference.
A flash of light caught his eye and he looked past the crowd and the press to the winding path that led past the field and back onto the road. He could see a kid standing there, with one sneakered foot on the gravel of the road and the other on the pedal of his bicycle, a hand raised to shade his eyes from the intense sun glare, light sparking off of the bike’s reflectors. Mike. Good kid, nice of him to show up, even at a distance.
The soprano concluded her song and sat down while Mac stood up again, holding his hands wide as he blessed the crowd and then invited everyone to come up and file past the urn to pay their last respects. As soon as the service was concluded, Val turned to Crow and he took her in his arms and held her while she wept. He fumbled for a pack of Kleenex, peeled one out for each of them; she dabbed at her eyes and blew her nose. Crow got to his feet and took Val’s arm, leading her over to where Connie and Mark stood. Crow shook Mark’s hand and kissed Connie, whose eyes were nearly vacant. Crow wondered what pill she had popped before the service, but he was sure that if he knocked nobody would be home.
The four of them stood to one side of the table, and Mac came to stand with them as the tide of mourners funneled into a single file and came past, paused briefly before the urn, and then came down the line to say a word to Val or Mark, shake Crow’s hand, and shuffle off. Terry and Sarah were the first ones there, and as Sarah leaned in to hug Val, she said, “Look, honey, the caterers have probably already set up by now, so if you don’t mind I’m going to take over and run things up there. I don’t want you to have to be bothered with nonsense like how many canapés are left. You just stick close to Crow and every else will be taken care of.”
“You’re a doll, Sarah. I appreciate it,” Val said, looking greatly relieved, and kissed her.
Terry shook Mark’s hand and then Crow’s. “You holding up okay?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Crow said, “I’m good. You?”
Terry made a ghastly attempt at a lighthearted smile. “Life’s a real peach. See you up at the house.”
Saul Weinstock appeared next, smiling a tight and humorless smile that made him look pained. Unlike Terry, Weinstock’s grip was desperately strong and he gave Crow a quick hard pump, then used the grip to lean in close as he said, very quietly, “Let’s find a place later to have a word. Okay?” He moved on before Crow could answer.
The rest of the crowd was like a blur of handshakes and careful smiles. When it was over Val looked exhausted, and Crow wrapped his arm around her as they walked slowly up to the house.
(2)
It was a typical post-funeral affair, with small conversational groups forming, breaking, reforming. Crow wandered through, shaking hands, exchanging bits and pieces of conversation with some of the distant Guthrie relatives and the general Who’s Who of Pine Deep. The Philly cops were clustered together in a corner looking out of place; Crow saw Saul Weinstock come up and lead Ferro away for a private chat. They stood with their heads bowed together for five minutes.
While he was watching the crowds a couple of folks asked him for drinks and Crow realized that he had been standing by the small wet bar. Usually he avoided getting within sniffing distance of it, but he mixed and poured and tried not to remember their old familiar tastes.
“Can I put my order in?” Crow looked up from the Manhattan he was mixing and saw Ferro looking wry and amused, LaMastra flanking him. “You have time for a quick word?” Ferro asked.
“Sure,” Crow said.
Ferro turned to LaMastra, put one hand on his shoulder, and nudged him toward the drinks table. “Presto change-o! You’re now a bartender.” Then to Crow, “Let’s step over out of the line of fire.”
Crow let himself be led far away from the bottles. “Thanks,” he said.
“Hope you don’t think I was overstepping—”
“Hell, no. My AA sponsor would throw a conniption if he heard I was mixing drinks.”
Ferro gave him a dour nod. “I just had a brief chat with your friend, Saul Weinstock. He said that there have been some unusual things happening in town. Would…you know anything about that?”
“This is Pine—” Crow began but Ferro held up a hand to stop him.
“Please, Crow, if I hear that ‘this is Pine Deep, things are always unusual’ line one more time I think I’m going to go a bit postal. I know things are unusual around here. I know this is America’s ‘haunted holidayland,’ yada yada yada. What I’m asking you, given the normal flow of odd happenings in Pine Deep, have you noticed anything outside of what you people here would consider odd.”
“Hmm,” Crow said, “that makes me wonder what Saul told you.”
Ferro’s face had a thoughtful, almost calculating look. “Would you mind just making a comment first?”
Crow shrugged. “Well…I read the papers, I talk to people who come into the store. It’s been a rough season. We had the blight—still have the blight—and that means that there’s a lot of tension and stress. There have been some fights. Probably people blowing off steam. You work your ass off all your life to try and make it work and then a bad season comes along and wipes you out, that’s gonna hurt. People get frightened, they get angry, and they start swinging. Is that what you’re talking about?”
“Anything else unusual?”
Crow thought about it. “Well, we had a pretty bad fire last night. A whole family was killed.”
“What do you think it was?”
“I’m not a cop anymore, Frank, and I’m not a fire inspector.”
“A cop’s always a cop,” Ferro countered.
“Maybe, but I’m also out of the loop. Terry was my conduit into the department, and he’s been wired ever since the Ruger thing.”
Ferro nodded. “What about other things in town? Unexplained deaths, anything like that?”
“Not that I’ve heard of. Saul would be the one to talk to about…” his voice trailed away and he studied Ferro’s eyes. “What exactly did Saul tell you?”
“Hasn’t he spoken to you about his suspicions?”