In the Bleak Midwinter

There was a Pathfinder parked next to the Fowler’s Explorer at the top of their long, well-plowed drive. Clare pulled in close behind them and killed her engine. The two hulking SUVs could probably four-wheel-drive straight over her windshield and down the back of her car without noticing more than a little bump. She rested her head on the steering wheel for a moment, reaching for the sense of someone outside her and within her, looking for strength, looking for courage. Asking for the right words to come when she needed them.

Gravel and snow crunched underfoot as she walked up to the side porch. The Fowler’s home was a modern interpretation of a Georgian house, a sweep of white clapboard frequently broken by double-glazed windows with Palladian arches. At some point, the rolling acreage upon which the house sat must have been a farm, but it was all pleasure land now, the pastures used only for cross-country skiing and snowmobiling. Idyllic spot to be a retired gentleman. Pressing on the bell, Clare felt like the angel with the flaming sword, sent to roust the inhabitants out of their Eden.

“Reverend Fergusson! What brings you out here?”

Edith Fowler was a horsy-looking woman whose extreme slenderness was beginning to look bony with age. Her short brown hair was clipped to a sporty, no-nonsense length and she wore pearls and a shetland sweater over a monogrammed turtleneck. Clare pulled her hat off. If someone had been strangled with a shetland sweater from Talbots, she had said to Russ, laughing at the idea of one of her congregants commiting murder.

“Honey? Who is it?” Vaughn Fowler crowded around his wife’s shoulder as she was standing back to let Clare in the door. “Clare. This is an unexpected pleasure.”

Clare stuffed her gloves into the pockets of her oversized parka and pulled it off. “I apologize for intruding, but I needed to speak with you.” Edith Fowler took the coat and hung it in the hall closet. “Both of you.”

The couple looked at each other. “We’re entertaining right now . . .” Edith said hesitantly.

“It shouldn’t take long. It is important.”

Vaughn gestured her through the kitchen door. “Of course.” Inside the kitchen, preparations for a brunch were obviously in progress. Bowls of batter, a carton of eggs, cutting boards of chopped vegetables. And, sipping what looked like mimosas, were the Shatthams. Clare smiled feebly. Great. They were probably getting ready to toast Wes and Alyson’s engagement or something.

The Shatthams greeted her warmly, which made her feel even guiltier for what she was about to lay on the Fowlers. “Clare needs to speak with me and Edith for a few minutes,” Vaughn said. “I know you two can entertain yourselves.”

“Barb, give a quick poke to the sausages, will you?” Edith asked.

“In here’s my study. Right next to the kitchen in case I get a snack attack while working.” Vaughn let Clare and his wife enter the room, then shut the door behind them. The study was a monument to Fowler’s family and military career. Photos and maps and trophies and a few threadbare battalion flags.

“Working?” Clare asked, temporizing the moment of truth.

“On a history of Washington county.” He waved toward a pigeonholed desk, where an electric Remington typewriter sat next to several hardbound books. “It’s going to fill in the gaps other histories leave out.” Clare bent down to examine a black-and-white photograph of a lean young man in fatigues standing next to a general with a whole salad of ribbons on his chest. Both men were squinting into the sun, smiling stiffly.

“Sir. Is that you?”

“With my father. 1965. Day before I shipped to Vietnam.”

“You look just like him.” Clare straightened. Edith Fowler looked at her husband, who cocked his head toward Clare.

“You needed to speak with us about . . .”

She took a deep breath. “Sir . . . Vaughn . . . you recall when Chief Van Alstyne was showing the photographs of the dead girl in the parish hall? You said you’d never seen her before.”

“Of course I remember. That’s not the sort of everyday Sunday you’re likely to forget.”

“We know the girl’s identity now.”

“Yes, I know. Mitch and Barb told us all about it. Alyson identified her as one of her classmates.”

“Yes, sir. Her name was Katie McWhorter.” Clare clasped her hands behind her back. “Did your son ever mention that name?”

Fowler looked at his wife. “No,” she said. “What on earth does this have to do with Wes?”

“Today I discovered your son was seeing Katie McWhorter secretly. They were volunteers at the Infirmary together, as well as being in the same class at the high school. The director of nursing told me he used to see them sneaking off to neck. Whatever it was, it probably started in the fall, when Katie broke up with her boyfriend. It was certainly going on at Christmastime last year.”

“Wait a minute,” Fowler said, turning toward his wife again. “Wasn’t he going out with Alyson last year?”