Stained Glass Read Online Free Page B

her.
    â€œWhat’s the news, Mrs. Murkin?”
    Marie just waved in what was intended to be a reassuring way and continued to the staircase. Edna’s office was on the second floor, what had once been the office of the school’s principal, when it had been a school.
    Edna was seated at her desk doing nothing. She stared at Marie when the housekeeper entered. “Is he going to talk to the bishop?”
    â€œHe hasn’t decided yet.” She said this matter-of-factly. It was one thing for Marie Murkin to be critical of the pastor, but it wouldn’t do to have Edna follow suit.
    â€œMarie, is there any hope?”
    â€œThere is always hope.” Suddenly Marie felt like a pillar of strength, the one person in the parish who kept her wits about her and her chin high. “Make some tea, Edna.”
    Doing something is always better than doing nothing. Marie was awash in tea, but it was the principle of the thing. Edna was soon on her feet and a bustle of activity. Marie felt that she had already done good.
    Once the water was on, she suggested that she and Edna go downstairs and perk up the old people. “They’re just moping around, Edna.”
    â€œDo you blame them?”
    â€œOf course I blame them. They’re old enough to know that life has its ups and downs. Anyway, we aren’t down yet, not by a long shot.”
    When they came into the gym, they were soon surrounded, and Marie made a little speech, a pep talk. What did they think Father Dowling would feel if he saw them like this? Was he brooding in his
study, waiting for the other shoe to fall? You bet he wasn’t. He was going to go downtown and confront the powers that be. They were in good hands with Father Dowling. Everything was going to be all right.
    â€œSo let’s get with it! Let’s …” Marie paused and then in a high voice cried, “Let’s have fun!”
    From the doorway where he had been listening, Willie began a cheer, pounding the floor with the handle of his broom. The cheer was taken up, and Marie and Edna were lifted by it as they went back upstairs for their tea.
    â€œHow long have you been in the parish, Marie?”
    Marie pondered the question and the reason for its being asked. In the circumstances, it seemed understandable, but her old rivalry with Edna made Marie wary. She didn’t like to think how much older than Edna she was. Her fiction was that they were contemporaries, matched opponents in age at least. Was Edna suggesting that Marie’s career had been so long that having it stopped would mean less anguish?
    â€œIt seems like yesterday I came here,” Marie said.
    â€œI know. I feel the same way. I have gotten so used to it. It just never occurred to me that it could end.”
    â€œNow, now, cheer up.”
    â€œYou were wonderful downstairs, Marie.”
    Marie harumphed. “Well, Willie seemed to like it.”
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    On the way back to the rectory, she realized that she had not set her phone so that it would ring at the school; of course, when she left the house her destination had been the church. She went along the walk to where it intersected the walk coming from the rectory to the church. She stopped and looked at the side door of the
church. Go inside and pray? That seemed self-indulgent, a retreat from battle. You couldn’t expect God to do things you could do yourself. Besides, she had to check her phone to see who might have called in her absence. There had been several calls from Jane Devere.

7
    The grousing in the senior center about the threatened closing of St. Hilary’s took some days to find an appropriate form of expression. Marie Murkin’s pep talk had equivocal results.
    â€œHave fun?”
    â€œDancing on the Titanic .”
    Massimo Bartelli kept his peace, appraising the bewildered men and women around him. They were old, that was clear, creaky of limb, hunched, weighed down by a lifetime of ups