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Crown Vic to a Parallel World: Stolen Love The third and final installment of the ongoing adventures of Church Philips
25
An Update
The Ecclesia apartment was the biggest of all the apartments because it was built for a family instead of a couple. It was also the only kid-friendly apartment, full of soft surfaces and bright colors. Bright colors were a trait of all spaces and people on Solum, but the Ecclesia apartment took this to a whole different level with splashes and streaks over every surface.
Bem welcomed Paul and I at the door and showed us into the dining room. Because the Ecclesia apartment was family sized, the kitchen was larger than the others and had an open-floor-plan dining room with a table to seat six. It still had the regular kitchen space with the two-spot island, but the whole first floor was stretched to accommodate the dining space and a larger living room.
Bem offered us seats at the dining room table. Paul and I took chairs that faced the rear outside wall of the house. The wall was set to clear, so we had a good view of the bright morning and the painted climbing wall of the mountain. Bem sat in a chair opposite Paul, between the table and the outside wall. Cass was present and was seated in the chair opposite me.
Cass's chair was turned around, so his back was to me. He sat with his legs stretched out in front of him and his feet crossed at the ankles. He also had his arms crossed over his chest as he leaned back in his chair and stared outside. I glanced at the climbing wall outside and at the back of Cass's grey head. I didn't see anything outside worth staring at, and I wondered if Cass saw something on the climbing wall that I didn't.
Mary and little Tobit were also present. They were in the middle of a game, playing with colored balls on the floor of the dining room. Tobit sat on the floor and cheered as both he and Mary rolled multi-colored plastic balls against the wall and celebrated when they rolled back. Mary was using a healthy dose of her telekinesis to make the balls roll all the way back to her cheering son, no matter how lightly he pushed them away.
"If only joy remained that easy." Paul observed as he settled himself into his chair and turned his smiling gaze on the game.
"It can be, my boy." Cass observed to the outside wall. "You merely have to allow yourself to be childlike in your pleasures. Jesus Christ himself said, `suffer the children to come unto me, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.' One might even take the position that my grandson is experiencing a small piece of heaven at this very moment, so joyful is the fun he's having with his dear mother. If my Bem's friend Jesus said something like that, it's good enough for me."
I stared at the back of Cass's head and tried to figure out if the man was completely sane and teasing us, completely insane and spouting gibberish, or something in between. Paul compounded my confusion when he added a comment to what I thought of as Cass's ravings.
"That's Matthew, chapter nineteen, verse fourteen." Paul announced to my increasing consternation. "A very popular passage. Cass has paraphrased it a bit, but the point he makes seems valid. In fact, it's an interesting take on that particular passage. It's an interesting idea that, when Jesus invited the little children into his presence, he also invited their nature into his preaching. We are all God's children. Perhaps we should allow ourselves to be childlike more often. Perhaps within that simple precept, we can better see the way to the kingdom of heaven."
I tapped Paul on the arm and waited for his attention. "Are you kidding?" I whispered when he gave it to me.
Cass answered my whispered question instead of Paul. "I should say that no one at this table is kidding, my boy. It sounds like Paul is well acquainted with my Bem's friend Jesus. I shall certainly have to meet him one of these days. He sounds like a very intelligent individual."
As I listened to the conversation going on around me, I felt the little bit of sanity I had left slipping away. I scrubbed my face with my palms to give myself a moment to gather my frayed emotions and tried to reengage with the group. I figured that I'd lost Paul to Cass's absurdity, at least temporarily, so I turned my attention to Bem with the hope that he hadn't been lured down the same path.
Bem seemed like he hadn't heard any of it. His attention was on his wife and son. Bem even wore the standard grin that he always wore when he was near his family. It was a grin that seemed to be a cross between joy and surprise. Not even his position as the head of the effort to recover a kidnapping victim could dampen his pleasure in his family. I took some solace from his projected peace. `Good for him.' I thought.
I used my advantage of height to watch my sister and her son and their game for what I considered was long enough to be polite, and then tried to open the conversation. "Well, where are we?" I asked and checked my phone to mark the time. "Where do we stand at eight-thirty on a Thursday morning. Paul and I ran into Lenis a little while ago. She mentioned another ransom installment."
Bem frowned at his attention being taken from his family and their simple fun, but he adjusted to the conversation rapidly and set his hands on the table in preparation to talk. "We've had some developments," he announced blandly, "but nothing big enough to warrant getting you up to share."
Mary clapped her hands and shouted a cheerful, "hooray" at the end of the table. Bem's grin returned for a second as he craned his head to see what had prompted the cheer. The grin faded as he brought himself back to the reality of the kidnapping.
"We questioned all of the servants except one. None of them had anything to do with the kidnapping. The one we didn't question, Ancillarum Ne, didn't show up yesterday. He also didn't call to say he wouldn't be here. We have not alerted the domestic help agency, because we don't want to alert the servant that we're interested in him. We have his name and address. Leah has gone after him."
I was a bit surprised that Bem had dispatched his stepdaughter to go after the missing servant, but then I realized that with her training, a domestic servant would be no threat. As if to reinforce my internal thought process, Cass added his opinion on the matter. "A very capable young woman my Bem has raised."
Cass craned his head back to make momentary eye contact with Mary. "Excuse me, Mary my dear, I do not mean to diminish your contribution to your daughter's upbringing. I do think, if asked, that even you would agree that my Bem has done well with her training."
Cass went back to staring through the wall at the mountain before Mary had a chance to say anything. Mary seemed to realize that Cass wasn't interested in her opinion, he'd merely deferred to her out of respect. Mary didn't bother to add her thoughts to the conversation. She went back to playing with Tobit and I put my attention back on Bem and the information he'd provided.
I tried to remember the servant, but his name called no image to my mind. With the constant rotation of personnel and the way the help tended to spread out over the estate, I didn't usually pay enough attention to the individual servants to pick one out from another. I didn't go out of my way to get to know them, either.
I was tempted to reproach myself for not knowing the servants who kept the estate running, but I was forced to acknowledge that at least some of my ambivalence toward the help was due to the way Cellarius ran the household. He didn't like the servants to interact with the residents. He very carefully orchestrated the activities of the staff so they would be as invisible as possible. The old adage about things out of sight' being also out of mind' rang true to the current situation. "Do you think?" I asked and left the rest of my question to Bem's imagination.
Bem tilted his head to the side in an implied shrug without the shoulder lift. "I don't know what to think. Anything is possible. It's possible he simply abandoned his job for reasons of his own."
Cass interrupted his son with a dry cough and sharp shake of his grey head. "No, no my boy, too coincidental."
Bem went on like Cass hadn't interrupted him. "It has happened. This is a difficult post for the domestics. They don't like being out here for two weeks at a time, even though you do pay very well. Cellarius has records going back to when you first established the household here. He showed me where no less than eight others abandoned their jobs with no notice. It could be a coincidence. Leah will let us know when she catches up with him."
Cass added his thoughts yet again. "Which she certainly will."
I glanced at Cass but didn't acknowledge that he'd spoken. I kept my attention and my conversation focused on Bem. "Where is she now?" I asked.
Bem played with his hands a bit on the tabletop before he answered. He seemed to risk a covert glance at his wife. Mary paused the game she was playing with Tobit and perked her ears up to listen to what Bem had to say about her daughter.
"She left here yesterday and drove across the plains to town. She arrived in Oppidum last night and stayed over at Shawn's practice. I didn't want it known that she was in town because I don't know who might be watching. I spoke to her an hour ago and she was getting ready to look for our man. She's to contact me as soon as she has something to share, but no later than ten o'clock."
Bem changed the subject away from Leah but stayed with the theme. "Hannah and Altus are in place. Altus is at the Vicina house, and Hannah is at a hotel nearby. The Vicina women were not thrilled about having a man in their home, but when Lenis told them Altus was looking into Verpa's business dealings, they welcomed him with open arms. Apparently, the ladies have a strong dislike of Shawn's father.
"We also know that Primis arrived at Verpa's late last night. When he arrived in Oppidum to return his rental car, he was intercepted by a man and a woman. We suspect these two belong to Domus. They escorted him all the way home and have not left Verpa's house. Altus has been instructed to wait until mid-morning before he releases the compulsion. We hope that will be enough time for Primis to be questioned or read. If our timing is poor, and the fact that Primis is in our confidence is discovered, Altus has been instructed to do whatever he must to keep Primis safe."
"How do you know?" I asked. "About the two people who took Primis home, I mean."
Bem took up my question and Mary went back to her game with her son. "Oh, the Steward gave us access to the city cameras. We were able to follow Primis into town, right to the rental agency. We saw his...I suppose you could say `his capture'" Bem said with air quotes around the words, "though that term doesn't carry the right connotation. They didn't hurt him. They simply escorted him away to a waiting plane. Ars has the images and is trying to identify the man and woman. He's having trouble though. We suspect they were wearing some kind of prosthetic."
Bem must have noticed the question on my face and hastened to explain. "It's a basic technique to elude identification. You change something about your face, either artificially or medically, just enough that the software can't identify you."
"Gotcha." I said to let him know I was paying attention.
Bem changed the subject again. "We received another ransom note that reads very much like the first one. It came via Shawn's phone, just like the first one. We traced its origin to a dead-end number, just like the first one. This note calls for two billion credits and gives us until the close of business tomorrow to remit them." Bem used air quotes around the word `remit,' and I assumed that meant he'd taken the word directly from the ransom demand.
Bem tilted his head again, this time in the opposite direction. "I don't believe that will be the last demand. The two billion will be the last demand this week. They're going to keep squeezing until they think they've pushed their luck as far as it will go. The fact that they haven't asked for a massive sum up front tells us one thing that's encouraging. They have no idea how large your fortune is.
"That means they don't have an insider that's close enough to know your finances. They are either completely on the outside, or if this servant is compromised, that's as close as they were able to get. That's encouraging because lack of information forces them to be cautious."
Bem continued speaking. He'd lowered his eyes on the table in front of him and picked his words carefully as he said them. "If this plays out the way I think it will, they'll take the two billion, and issue a fresh demand over the weekend. They'll time it for payment when the banks reopen on Monday morning. I suspect the weekend demand will be for either three or five billion, then there will be one more demand in the middle or at the end of next week. I don't expect them to try to push their luck beyond next Friday. They'll want to stop this game while they're still ahead. That means we have until next Friday to get Shawn back."
"NEXT FRIDAY!" I shouted. My shout drew multiple reactions from the people around me. Bem glared. My sister glared at me from the floor. I glanced down at her angry face and noticed little Tobit. He looked up to my harsh outburst with shining eyes and his lower lip pushed out and quivering. FUCK!' My brain screamed. I called on all my creativity to do something that would keep my nephew from crying. I forced a smile onto my face and sang my next words to the tune of the first kid's song I could think of. The one my brain picked for me was Old MacDonald.'
"If Shawn's not back well be-fore then, I will kill my-self. I can't take much more of this, I'm beg-ging for your help. Old MacDonald, blah blah blah, Je-sus fu-cking Christ."
Tobit smiled at my song and clapped his neat little hands. I smiled my appreciation down at my little nephew. Cass enjoyed my tune as well and signified his agreement by applauding from his side of the table. Mary didn't clap or smile, but she didn't glare either. She went back to playing with her son and I went back to my conversation. "Please." I begged.
"We're trying, Big Guy." Bem offered in his most sympathetic voice. "These things take time. Hopefully we'll get to talk to Verpa today. In the meantime..." He shrugged a full shrug without the head tilt.
"I know." I said and rubbed my neck. "Keep it together and stay ready. Translation...there's not a fucking thing we need you for, so please stay out of our way and don't make a mess by breaking into little pieces."
Bem's voice stayed tolerant, but it had an edge in it when he used it again. "When I can find something for you to do, I'll let you know."
I felt bad for mouthing off and said as much. "Alright...I'm sorry."
"And, Big Guy..." Bem added to make sure he had my attention.
"Yeah?" I asked my friend.
"I'd appreciate it if you would watch your language around my son and not violate the second commandment around any of us."
The first impulse I had after my friend's rebuke was to tell Bem to go fuck himself and the commandments he rode in on. I stopped myself in time. I recognized that he was trying to raise his family in a certain way, and my four-letter words and blasphemy didn't coincide with that way.
I reminded myself that Bem's reproach had been a gentle one. The fact that it was gentle instead of sharp made me feel like a real shit for being so wrapped up in my own troubles that I'd spouted foul language around an impressionable two-year-old. You're an asshole.' I thought to myself. I apologized to Bem and my sister. I hung my head in shame and split an I'm sorry,' between them.
To my complete surprise, Cass coughed to break into the conversation and spoke up. He took my side in the minor disagreement. "For shame, my boy." Cass said and turned his face to address his son. "For shame for chastising a man in turmoil over his language. Where is your charity of spirit? Wasn't it Jesus' friend Matthew who told you to turn the other cheek? Your friend is doing the best that he can. Forbearance, my boy, forbearance and charity. I believe it was almighty God himself who said, `if you're going through hell, keep going.'"
I raised my eyes from the tabletop to see if Cass was kidding or if he was serious. The angry look on his face told me he was serious. Bem stared at his father like he didn't know how to respond to the upbraiding he'd just received. Paul tapped an elbow into my ribs to add an additional layer of absurdity to the situation. "Winston Churchill." He whispered to me.
I turned to Paul so I could look him full in the face. "WHAT?" I asked.
"The quote Cass referenced. Winston Churchill said that, not God."
I felt my tenuous hold on reality slipping again. I rubbed my palms over my face while the crowd around me stayed silent. Even little Tobit seemed muted by the mad direction the discussion had taken. I looked up at Bem with a quick demand. "ARE WE DONE?"
"For now." Bem nodded once.
"FINE!" I barked. I bolted up from my chair and made a lunge for the door. "I'm gonna go...I don't know." I paused and looked back at Paul for a suggestion.
"A snack?" Paul asked.
"Another breakfast, maybe." I answered.
Paul stirred himself out of his chair. Cass bolted up from his and turned to face us for the first time. "I'll walk you out, my boy...my boys. It's time for my morning walk anyway. It's passed time." Before he left, Cass rounded on Bem with a question. "Where will you be at ten, Bem, my boy? I'm certain Church will want to be on hand when Leah calls you. At a bare minimum, and in deference to your friend's worry, you should keep him informed of all things relevant to the investigation."
The old man's words shocked me. I was shocked because once again, of all people, Cass seemed to be the one paying the most attention to the details of the discussion.
Bem made us wait for an answer while he craned his head over the edge of the table to glance at his wife and son. When he was done looking at them, he brought his eyes to mine. "I'll meet you in the main dining room. Plan to be there at ten."
I recognized what Bem was doing. It was clear that he didn't want me around his kid when I was an emotional wreck. He didn't say that out loud, but I could easily infer it from his careful maneuvering of the meeting location. I appreciated that he didn't give me another hard time for barking like I had when I'd stood from the table, but his earlier reproach over my language still stung. I tried to keep the hurt off my face and out of my voice when I answered. "Sure, thanks."
I turned to go again and had almost completed my about-face when some movement in my peripheral vision caught my attention and turned me back. My tiny nephew was smiling and waving his tiny hand at me as I got ready to leave. His little smile and his tiny wave melted my heart. I smiled in spite of myself and waved back to him and my sister. Mary added her wave to her son's and sent me on my way.
I walked out of the apartment and waited for Paul and Cass to join me in the corridor. Paul came out first and Cass puttered along behind him. Cass shut the door and put both his hands in his pockets. He paused to peer up at me with his searching cobalt eyes.
"My boy," he addressed me with that high, quavering voice of his, "my Bem is doing his best to get your lovely husband back for you. You should be grateful to him. You should not be beholden to him. Don't let him take the moral high ground just because he quotes The Bible. Anyone can quote The Bible, even an old sinner like me."
I smiled at my friend's father like I'd smiled at my nephew. Cass's words made me almost as happy as the joy-filled grin of a child. "Have I ever told you I love you, Papa?"
Cass smiled with genuine pleasure. He nodded at me over his grin. "You're doing well, my boy. You're doing better than I might under the circumstances. He would be proud of how well you're doing."
"Thanks, Papa." I said to the man because I didn't know how else to respond to his praise. I didn't think I deserved any praise, but as long as he was dishing it out, I decided to accept it instead of arguing with him. I thought it funny how similar Cass's praise was to the words Bem had used from the hood of the Vic the night before...or I guess the night before that.
Cass nodded his head again and puttered away. "Time for my walk." He said again as he exited through the nearest door and turned right across the plains, toward the hanger.
I waited until he was gone and turned my steps along the corridor toward the main house. Paul waited until we'd neared the end of the corridor before he spoke. "I don't think I understand." Paul observed. "The conversation we just had is ringing in my head. Your brother-in-law calls out the commandments by number and his father quoted the book of Matthew and Winston Churchill. How is that possible?"
I used the heel of my left hand to rub the back of my neck. As it did it, the skin protested the action. The back of my neck felt like it had been sunburned. I guessed I'd been rubbing it too often lately, just like I'd been squeezing my bracelet too much and rubbing my face too much. Everything hurt. My face hurt, my neck hurt, my hand hurt, my heart and soul hurt. I wanted to scream my throat raw that I wanted my husband, but that would no more get him back than anything else I could do at that moment, so I left my cries unuttered.
I reminded myself that Paul had asked me a question and thought about how to answer him. As I did it, I rubbed my neck again. The skin smarted again. `Have to put a piece of tape on my palm like a two-year-old who won't stop sucking his thumb.' I grumbled inside my head.
As I brooded over how to answer Paul's question, he and I made steady progress down the hall, through the rumpus room, and into my kitchen. Paul sat at the island while I stood. I faced Paul and thought about his question again and rubbed my neck again. The skin smarted AGAIN. The dull-sharp pain of the raw skin proved too much for my restraint. The anger I'd suppressed since I'd been with the Ecclesia family broke the surface and I ranted in Paul's general direction.
"THEY'RE ALL OUT OF THEIR FUCKING GODDAMNED MINDS IS THE ANSWER!" I shouted and waved my arms in the air like I was trying to shoo pigeons from a city statue. Paul didn't react to my volume or my hand waving. He sat as placidly as if we were having a normal conversation at a normal volume and neither of us was freaking out.
His calm demeanor made me feel all the more unhinged by comparison. I took a deep breath and dropped my face in my hands. The skin of my face smarted and I almost screamed again. Instead, I took another deep breath and lowered my hands.
Paul remained placid. He waited calmly while I tried to get myself under control. I dropped my hands flat to the countertop and leaned on my arms. I took a deep breath and sighed it out in Paul's face. I hadn't meant to breathe at him like that and apologized for it. "Sorry, I'm sorry, for blowing my breath at you and for shouting. The religion thing is a sore subject."
Paul was the model of kindness as he responded to me. "We don't have to discuss it, my friend."
"No," I shook my head, "it's fine. It's actually a very simple story. When we were on Earth, Bem asked about the faith and Joe was only too happy to tell him about it. Bem was going through a rough patch at the time and the pretty story of The Bible was very attractive to him. When he and Mary fell in love, it became something they could bond over. She took over his catechism.
"You remember Bem's old career. He killed people. He had to do it. He killed to protect. All the people who met their end at his hands deserved what they got, but the fact that he'd taken lives haunted Bem. There were also a bunch of people who were executed by the state on his evidence. That bothered him too."
Paul tapped a curious finger on the island countertop. "How many people are we talking about, young man? How many lives?"
I wasn't sure if I should tell Paul. It wasn't my business to tell him. He'd asked me though, and I knew the man would keep anything I told him in confidence, so I told him. "I don't remember the breakdown between people he killed, and the number executed, but the total is around three-hundred. I think his kills are between ten and fifteen percent of that number."
Paul shook his head slowly. "That poor man. No wonder he's haunted. That's quite a past to try to overcome. It makes sense then, that he turned to religion to help relieve him of his guilt. In that respect, his story is not unlike my own. I've seen many like him. Many servicemen, police officers, even physicians guilty of mercy killings have come to me for council through my years as a priest.
"They all tell similar stories. It speaks to their humanity, ultimately to their caring natures, that what they see as their misdeeds keeps their souls from finding peace. When they cannot find it within themselves, they seek it from the Lord."
"That's Bem." I agreed with Paul's assessment. "When Mary taught him about God's mercy and forgiveness, that's what sold him. Bem jumped in with both feet. Funny thing is...or not funny, it's not funny, the odd thing is, I had the chapel built into this place for Joe. I figured he'd want to be the chaplain and keep the faith that he was so worried about on Earth. He's barely set foot in it."
I raised my shoulders in a shrug of defeat and frustration. "Bem immersed himself in the faith. He memorized The Bible and lives by it. He tries to make the rest of us live by it as well. That's why he quotes the commandments at us whenever we break them. I think he wants to make sure we all get to heaven together. He tried to proselytize me, but I told him to stuff it."
Paul grimaced at my comment, and I apologized for it even though I didn't have to. "I'm sorry Paul, but that's what I told him to do. I appreciated his effort, but I resented his presumption. It's the same level of arrogance that non-smokers use when they tell smokers that they're killing themselves. The smoker is well-aware. Often, he hates the habit far more than the non-smoker does. That's not the fucking point though!" I slapped an angry hand on the countertop to punctuate my sentence.
Paul winced at the noise my hand made. I realized I was getting overzealous again and adjusted my tone. I even admitted something to Paul that I'd never admitted to anyone else, not even Shawn. "I know, deep down, I promise I know that if I allowed myself to embrace religion, I'd feel better." I raised my arms like Moses parting the Red Sea and spoke like I was giving a sermon to a huge crowd. "Believe in something greater than yourself and find inner peace," I dropped my hands back to the countertop with a gentler slap, "or some such bullshit."
I drew a breath and softened my language again. "Not bullshit. It's not bullshit. It's just hard for me...for all the reasons you already know. I agreed to attend Bem's services and I do attend them. What's more, I even enjoy them. I feel a little bad when I go, because I feel like a hypocrite, but my presence makes Bem happy, and it makes Shawn happy.
"Even Shawn has started to talk like he believes. He hasn't said anything to me about it because I think he's afraid to. I think he's afraid of how I'll react, but I can tell by the way he's started to look forward to Sundays, that he thinks there's something to the salvation that Bem preaches." I shrugged again. "Good for him, I guess."
"Good for him, indeed." Paul agreed. "And...Cass and Winston Churchill?" He asked to gently change the subject away from the difficult topic.
Paul's mention of Cass reminded me of the strange little man and that he'd taken my side just a few minutes earlier. I couldn't help but smile. "When he moved in here, Bem started in on him. Cass loves his son, and I think he was so surprised and thrilled to be invited to live here, that he embraced the faith in gratitude. He and Bem lost a lot of time together, a lot of time. Bem moved out of his father's house and joined the service when he was eighteen or so. He didn't see his dad much for all the years he was with the special forces.
"I think, I think Bem was ashamed of himself. I think he was ashamed of the things he'd done. I don't think he wanted to be around his dad because he thought his dad would judge him for the...the people he killed and the people he befriended and then betrayed. He did those things for the good of the nation, but they weren't easy for him.
"That said, from what I've learned of Cass since he's lived here, I don't think he would have judged Bem, even if he knew. I think he loves his boy. I think he believes in his son and would have supported him. I think the biggest shame was the time they lost."
Paul made an observation to remind me that he was listening. "He sounds like a great dad."
"I think he was a great dad. I think when Bem's mom left, when Bem was a kid, I think Cass was really there for his son. I think Bem was a lucky guy to have a dad like Cass. Like I said though, they didn't see much of each other for about seventy years. Bem only decided to get reacquainted with Cass when Bem moved his family here to the estate, and Bem and Mary decided to get pregnant. I think when Bem and Mary decided to have their own children, Bem started to feel like a family man and wanted to get back in touch with all the family he had. He went to see Cass and brought him back here.
"When Cass first got here, he cried a lot. I'd catch him all the time, walking around the estate with that red ball of his, doing his tricks and blubbering while he did them. He'd break down at dinner. He'd be sitting there eating and he'd look up at Bem or Mary, or Tobit after he was born, and just start bawling. I think he was so happy, overwhelmed with the happiness of being here with his son. I think he'd given up Bem for lost, and when Bem invited him to live here, I think it touched the old man's heart.
"I think because of that, or at least partially because of that, he embraced everything and everyone here. He wanted to know all about me and the Philips family and where we came from and everything. We didn't hold anything back from him. When we told him about Earth, the idea of the Earth and another dimension and all that, it fascinated him. He asked so many questions that eventually, we gave him access to the interdimensional internet terminal so he could do his own research.
"Cass spent a huge amount of time learning all about Earth and America and the Catholic faith and everything. He's got an incredible memory, so when he learns something, it stays learned. The trouble is," I tapped my temple to illustrate Cass's problem area, "with that screw he's got loose and all the reading he did at once, I think he digested too much too fast, and it got muddled. That's why he thinks Jesus is friends with Bem and that God signed off his news broadcasts by saying `good night and good luck,' like Walter Cronkite."
Paul grinned at me again and shook his head. "That was Edward R Murrow who said good night and good luck. Cronkite was `that's the way it is.'"
"Anything you say, Paul." I shrugged again as I wrapped up the tale of Cass. "The point is, most of the time, or a lot of the time, Cass gets right under my skin. Sometimes, though, sometimes like today, when he seems lucid, like he's really in there...I don't know. I guess I really do love the guy, even though he drives me nuts. I admire the father he was to Bem. If I'm completely honest, I'm jealous of Bem for having such a great guy for a dad. Good old Papa Cass."
"A fine man." Paul agreed with me. "A good father and a fine man."
I nodded to Paul and smiled in spite of myself. As I did it, I realized the conversation we'd had served to unwind some of the tension I'd been feeling. I wondered if that was Paul's plan all along or a happy coincidence. I decided it didn't matter. I felt a little better, and I had Paul to thank for that. "You're the best, you know that?" I said to my friend.
"Ye-es." Paul admitted with some feigned reluctance. "But that doesn't mean I don't like to hear people agree with me from time to time."
I laughed out loud and wondered if arrogance, even if it was fake arrogance, was a sin. `Probably not if it's done to help a friend.' I reasoned. I took a breath and tried to figure out what it was that I'd originally planned to do when I brought us to my kitchen. I remembered that I'd promised Paul another breakfast. I had an idea for a one that was more interesting than just eggs and fried meat. "Do you like quiche?" I asked Paul.
"Yes, I do."
"Good. I'm gonna make every kind I can think of." I opened the cabinets that held my oven pans. I pulled out four black glass muffin pans and set them out. "I'm gonna make little muffin-sized quiches. A whole bunch of different kinds. What do you think of that?"
"That sounds wonderful...and time consuming. How about some green tea while you make me wait." Paul teased.
I got a cup of tea for him and started programming the ingredients I needed.