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anything we might do to help, Mrs. Grone . . .”
    Shotsie stiffened, jerking out of Helen’s grasp. She sucked in a breath before reeling back her head and hissing at the pair, “I don’t want anything from either of you, ya hear me? Nothing! As I see it, you as good as killed my Miltie. Because of all the trouble you caused him with your stupid threats, he’s gone and left me, you understand? And he’s not coming back!”
    Helen stood in stunned silence along with Ida and Dot.
    Shotsie squared her shoulders, wiped the roll of tears from her cheeks with dirt-smeared fingers, and strode toward the house. Once inside, she dropped the screen door shut loudly behind her.
    Until then Earnest Fister had kept a quiet vigil by the fence. Now he walked across the yard with its uprooted rocks and knee-high weeds. He stopped near the trio of women only long enough to announce, “I think this is where I come in. I’ll go talk to Mrs. Grone and try to calm her down.”
    Dotty clasped birdlike hands between her ample breasts and moaned, “What a horrible thing. Simply awful.”
    Helen patted her arm. “Yes, yes it is. Death is never easy.”
    “Oh, no.” Dot turned her plump face to Helen’s. “I meant what Mrs. Grone just said, that Ida and I are to blame for Milton’s passing. That simply wasn’t at all kind.”
    “She’s upset, Dot,” Helen reminded her. “She’s had a terrible shock.”
    “I don’t think anyone’s sorry that he’s gone,” Ida remarked in her overloud way. “I don’t mean to be crass, but he wasn’t the most human of beings. He treated us all like pebbles in his shoes. Without him around, life in this town will improve immensely.”
    “Ida, for goodness’ sake!” Helen couldn’t believe what she’d heard. It wasn’t like Ida to be so callous, most certainly not at a moment like this.
    Ida crossed her thin arms over her chest and set her booted feet apart. “I can’t help it, Helen. He was just plain no good. As much as I’m concerned with living creatures on our planet, I hardly had a soft spot in my heart for Milton Grone. All he’s done ever since his father died is stir up trouble. He turned bitter and mean, and it’s made Felicity a nervous wreck, the poor thing, having to live just next door. Now she’s free of him, isn’t she?”
    “Yes, now she’s free,” Dot echoed.
    Helen searched around them, having not seen Felicity since they’d reached Milton’s property. She finally spotted her across the split-rail fence, standing in her own yard, silhouetted quite clearly by her porch light.
    Her gaze followed Felicity as the woman walked toward a cluster of bushes and stooped to retrieve a pair of gloves from the ground. Those, she pressed into the large pockets of her duster.
    Then Felicity bent again, this time to grab the long handle of a shovel. She took it with her back to the house and leaned it against the porch before she disappeared inside.
    “Dear Felicity,” Helen murmured, unable to refute either Ida’s or Dot’s remarks about Milton’s death somehow freeing her.
    But then, Helen knew, Felicity would not be the only one breathing a sigh of relief now that Milton Grone was gone.

 
    Chapter 4
    E ARNEST F ISTER SAT at his desk in the small office at the rear of the chapel, staring down at the blank sheet of paper before him. He held his pen poised but was unable to write anything at all.
    That wasn’t like him.
    Earnest had always loved the written word. It had drawn him to the ministry in the first place. The Bible, as he saw it, was a book that overflowed with stories so well-composed, so well-told, they could do no less than convince their readership of the truths woven within.
    Earnest usually took great pleasure in creating the script for his services, drawing on pertinent passages to underscore the points he was to make.
    This day, though, he found putting pen to paper less a joy than a form of torture.
    He needed something for Milton Grone’s