indoor altar with symbols of the season. Samhain is the last harvest, meaning I had to bring in any fresh rosemary, sage, and parsley I needed. After that, any plant still growing belonged to the fairies and pixies. I didn’t know if I believed in fairies per se, but it wouldn’t do to take chances with my herb garden. Anyone who’s a serious gardener appreciates the quirkiness of nature.
“I have something special I want us to work at Samhain,” Heather was saying. “The Nature Conservancy wants to buy some sixty acres of land near Bonds Pond. This would include an important feeding and nesting place for the red-bellied turtle, which is, as you know, an endangered species. Also we’d be getting a pristine pond shore for the Plymouth gentian, which is globally rare. And a nice pitch-pine forest for our declining songbirds and some exceptional insects.”
“Nature lover though I am,” Phillipa said, “if there’s one species that does not evoke my concern, it’s creepy, crawly insects, other than to keep them off my body and out of my flour bin.”
“No bugs, no songbirds, Phil,” Deidre said. “So what’s the problem, Heather? Doesn’t the Conservancy have the money?”
“Oh, sure—gifts and donations, you know, from individuals who care and companies who want to be seen as community-minded and environmentally sensitive, never mind that they produce beer or handguns. Anyway, the problem is there’s a central part of that acreage that used to be working cranberry bogs, owned now by a dyed-in-the-wool Yankee who refuses to sell.”
“Well, we’ll have to soften him up with a few well-chosen words. Name?” Fiona rubbed her hands together briskly, as if for a psychic warmup. The silver bangles she always wore tinkled madly.
“Clarence Finch.” Heather sighed. In small towns, the mention of one name can carry a great deal of anecdotal baggage.
“Uh oh,” I said. “Words of dynamite might be more like it. Isn’t he Iggy Pryde’s father-in-law-to-be?” We’d already had a run-in with Iggy over the illegal dumping of hazardous waste at his pig farm, and the arguments over who would be made to pay for the cleanup, Pryde or the companies involved, were still going on in the courts. As for the Finch connection, Wanda Finch, Iggy’s fiancée, a formidable, frizzy-haired redhead, had once threatened Heather and me with a rifle for trespassing. Clarence Finch, her father, owned a produce farm near Carver and several acres of cranberry bogs scattered around Plymouth.
“I’d venture a guess that Clarence Finch doesn’t give a damn about the red-bellied turtle,” Phillipa said. “Tight-fisted old sod. Bought all those abandoned cranberry bogs for next to nothing, and now he’s probably holding out for big bucks from some developer. The Bonds Pond Estates.”
“Never underestimate our powers of persuasion,” Fiona said. “But we’ll get to that later, at Samhain, when we are working between the worlds, such a lovely place to be. Perhaps we’ll invoke some spectral help.”
At Samhain, when the veil between life and death is so thin that a soul might traverse from one state to another, we would light candles for those we loved who had gone before us to Summerland. I could count on Heather for bunches of quirky handmade candles. I’d dedicate a special one to Grandma—how I wished she could fly in for a moment and bless my presence in the home she’d left to me, and the gardens, and all the herbal recipes and remedies written in her own spidery script.
Samhain is also the best night of the year for divination. Pagan time is not linear but circular, and on this one evening, when another cycle is poised to begin, the bonds of time are loosened and dissolved into the cosmic chaos. For a few hours, the world exists outside of time, and it’s possible to see in all directions, including ahead to the future. So this year Phillipa would read the tarot, and I—perhaps I would have another vision, one that would reveal the face of the poisoner.
“You’re on your way to where?” I wailed into the phone.
“To Greece, sweetheart. Now, let me explain it again. Picture this. We applied to the port of Miami for one week’s berth to resupply the ship, change crew members—that sort of thing. Well, I was specifically recruited to help conduct a few onboard tours, too, since the Esperanza is a retrofitted Soviet Navy icebreaker.”
“Sure,” I said. “Probably because you’re so smart and sexy.”
“There’s that,” he said with a chuckle. “Then a new engineer would come aboard, and I’d fly home.”
“The real engineer. A wizened old salt.”
“I’m not just smart and sexy, sweetheart—I’m a real engineer, too. But the port’s director refused to allow us to dock. Said we’d be too much of a security risk, requiring extra personnel, and citing the ongoing criminal case, although at worst, it’s only a misdemeanor. We couldn’t get any nearer than two miles. Helicopters buzzed us, Coast Guard vessels circled us, bullhorns warned us to move along. We faxed protests to everybody—the Coast Guard, the port of Miami, the county manager, the Miami Herald. No go. With all the uncertainty, my replacement was instructed to remain in Amsterdam. So the Esperanza is continuing its voyage to Greece for repairs, and I’m going with it. No one is more surprised than I.”
“Yeah, yeah. Like these detours never happen in Greenpeace. But when will you be home?” I really hated to hear that whining note in my voice.
“I’ll be flying back in a couple of weeks or so.”
“I guess it’s a good chance to visit your mom and brothers, right?”
“Hmmm. Well, my mother is getting on in years. I should fly to Athens. But trust me, I’ll absolutely be home long before Thanksgiving. So what are you doing right now?”
“Getting ready to celebrate Samhain. We’re having it here at my house…our house.”
“Admit it—I would only have been in the way.”
“Not at all. We might need a male sacrifice for some weird sexual rite.”
“If only you’d mentioned this earlier, I’d have been glad to sacrifice myself. What exactly is it you gals do at Halloween?”
“Oh, never mind. We’ll just have to find some other good-looking, lusty Greek guy.”
We carried that theme about as far as it would go, and the call ended in a pleasantly sexy mood. Still, when we hung up, I was looking at three or more weeks alone just as I had become used to sharing bed and board with a handsome husband, as well as never having to worry about changing fuses or flat tires. Damn!
Don’t feel sad, Toots. You’ve still got me to cuddle with. Scruffy always understands when I’m feeling a bit melancholy and might need some companionable nudges with a cold nose.
Samhain began just as the sun was setting. Later, there would be a tipped golden bowl of moon and a brilliant Jupiter blazing in the southeast sky. It was a clear, crisp evening, too cool for an outdoor ceremony, although I did light the walk to the back door with solar torches. I follow the New England Yankee tradition of reserving the front door for visiting dignitaries or departing coffins.
I’d decorated the living room window seat as an altar in black, orange, silver, and gold, with bouquets of dried mint, sage, and catnip (fortunately, no felines lived here to roll in the arrangements!), gourds, apples, and nuts, and a statue of Hecate, a loan from Heather, who favored that dark goddess.
Ugh, prickly stuff! And hard old nuts—what
