“I like to think of you as women of a certain age.” He smiled at Mrs. Marshall. He had a breathtakingly charming smile when he used it. “And we also have a few gentlemen on our list as well. Folks who live by themselves. Did you come by for a checkup?” His voice sounded doubtful.

“No, Clare and I came to deliver some bad news to Allan Rouse in person.” There was a noise from the second floor and they all looked up. “Although perhaps this isn’t the best time.”

“Mrs. Marshall runs a trust that’s been giving money to the clinic for years,” Clare explained. “She’s decided to dissolve it and sink the principal into the repairs at St. Alban’s.”

“I’d have to agree with you then, Mrs. Marshall. I don’t think now is the time to tell Dr. Rouse his funding is getting cut.”

There was another noise upstairs. It sounded like someone stomping back and forth. Mrs. Marshall pinched her fuchsia-colored lips together. “Tomorrow, then. Clare, I think I’ll just powder my nose and then we can go.”

Clare nodded. She and Russ stood silent while Mrs. Marshall made her way around the corner of the back hall, where an arrow under the universal male and female symbols pointed visitors to the bathrooms.

“So you found a way to get the money to fix your leaky roof,” he said when they were alone. His voice was neutral.

“It’s more than a leaky roof,” she said. She knew she sounded defensive, but she couldn’t help it. “It’s the roof, the stained-glass-window setting, there’s damage to the exterior wall, and we need new guttering to redirect the water away from the foundations. It’s the most expensive work St. Alban’s has undertaken since the ’93 parish hall restoration.”

“Don’t churches usually raise money from their members for this sort of thing?”

“It wasn’t my idea,” she burst out. “I wanted to apply for a couple of loans. But it turns out St. Alban’s is in hock too deep to take on any more debt. And it’ll take months and months to raise sufficient monies from a capital campaign. Maybe a year. We don’t have that kind of time. The repair work needs to begin now.”

He looked down at her, carefully, as if he was trying to understand her. “So you’re taking money away from the free clinic.”

She wanted to explain, to tell him all about Mrs. Marshall’s trust, and her family history, and the architectural heritage of St. Alban’s. But when it came down to it, those were all just excuses, meant to make her look better. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, I am.”

The thunk-thunk of Mrs. Marshall’s old-fashioned rubber-heeled snow boots interrupted anything he might have said. “Ready to go, dear?” the old woman said.

“Yes.” Clare fished in her pockets for her gloves.

Mrs. Marshall took her arm. “It looks like I’ve wasted your morning, dragging you down here for nothing.”

Clare met Russ’s bright blue eyes, then let her gaze slide away. “It wasn’t for nothing,” she said. “There’s always time to deliver bad news.”

Wednesday, March 15

Clare had installed one of those large read-it-from-inside-your-house thermometers on the high fence separating her rectory drive from the tiny parking lot behind the church. She didn’t know why she had done it, really. To torment herself about the miserable weather in this miserable, godforsaken part of the world. She read the dial face now, as she stood in her kitchen, waiting for the AAA guy to show up and jump-start her car. Fifteen degrees Fahrenheit. That was, of course, without the windchill.

The phone rang. She lunged for it, hoping that it was the AAA dispatch, calling her back to say the road-service truck was on its way.

“Hello?”

“Hello, dear. It’s Mrs. Marshall. You’re still at home.”

Clare steadied the coat tree beside the door, rocking from her dash for the phone. “My car won’t start. I’ve called AAA, but they told me there were cars stalled all over the area and it would be forty-five minutes to an hour. I’m sorry, I should have rung you first thing…”

“Don’t worry. I’ll tell you what, I’ll head over to Allan Rouse’s house, and if you still want to come, you can meet me there.”

“Absolutely. Tell me how to find it.” Clare grabbed a pen out of her junk drawer and jotted down Mrs. Marshall’s directions on the back of a Niagara Mohawk power bill. After assuring Mrs. Marshall that she would drive carefully and watch out for black ice, she hung up. The phone hung on the wall between her kitchen door and window, beneath an ecclesiastical calendar with all the saints’ feasts and commemorations delineated in bold black print. The first day of spring, bright in red lettering, was only a week away. She glanced out the window again at the heaps of ice-crusted snow threatening to close off her narrow drive completely. It was never going to be spring. The sooner she reconciled herself to that fact, the calmer she’d be.

The phone rang. She snagged it, a bit less hopeful than last time.

“Hello?”

“Hi, it’s Karen Burns. I called over at the church, but Lois said you were still at home.”

“I’m waiting for AAA to come and start my car.”

“My sympathies. You really ought to think about getting a winter rat with a monster battery.” Karen and her husband, Geoffrey, owned a Land Rover, a Saab, and a beat-up little Honda for tooling around in the slush and salt. Clare refrained from pointing out that she could barely afford one car, let alone two. Karen went on, “The reason I’m calling is that I’ve made an appointment to see Debba Clow, and I wondered if you wanted to sit in, since you’re counseling her.”

“I’m not-” Clare paused. Of course she was counseling Debba. “Sure. When is it?”

“Noon. It’s trickier for her to haul her kids around, so we’re meeting over at her house. I’m going to bring Cody. Sort of a legal strategy session slash play date.”

Crud. There went her lunch with Russ. “Sure, I’ll be there. Did she give you any details about what happened at the clinic?”

“Not as many as you did when you asked me to represent her. I got the impression she’s still pretty pissed off at the old guy, but doesn’t want to admit it.”

“I’m going over to Dr. Rouse’s house this morning, as soon as my car’s resurrected.”

“Boy, you do get around, don’t you?”

“Mrs. Marshall is going to tell him about using her trust for St. Alban’s building fund. Geoff told you about that, right?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Well, I thought that as the official representative of the church, I ought to be there when he got the bad news. Anyway, I’ll try to sound him out as to whether he’s going to go ahead with a restraining order against Debba.”

“Great. We’ll see you later, then.”

“Karen?”

“Yes?”

“Will the squeaky toy be there?”

Karen laughed. “Of course. Wherever Cody is, there also is Squeaky the Squirrel.”

Clare replaced the phone on the hook. She was going to spend her lunch hour trapped in a house with three kids, a lawyer, and the most obnoxious baby toy ever created. Instead of sharing chili and conversation with Russ. And when did lunch with Russ Van Alstyne become the highlight of your week, missy? Her grandmother Fergusson would most definitely disapprove.

The phone rang. Clare eyed it. She didn’t get this many calls in her office.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Father.”

“Mr. Hadley.” Glenn Hadley, St. Alban’s sexton, was the only person on the planet who called her Father. Not Father Fergusson, just Father. He never referred to her predecessor by his last name, either. He was simply “the late Father” or “the last Father.” She figured Mr. Hadley had totally embraced the concept of “It’s the office, not the officeholder.”

“I’m afraid I’ve got some more bad news.”