Mr.Patterson drew himself up.“We won’t playyour games,” he said firmly.“You know what we’re talking about.And more importantly, God knows.”
Mrs.Patterson nodded supportively.“I neverthought I’d see the day when we’d have to remind a priest of that,but I never thought I’d see the day when someone like you wasassigned to tell people like us how to live our lives!”
Mark had rebuttals, but the flame within himsputtered out as suddenly as it had blazed up, leaving behind coldashes that made him feel almost queasy.This wasn’t a surprise.Hehad always known there was a faction of the congregation thatdidn’t approve of him.He’d thought he wanted to hear the words,wanted to hear the bigotry clearly expressed instead of hiddenbehind disapproving but vague glares.It had been a mistake;sometimes uncertainty was a comfort.“I suppose God is watching usall,” he said quietly, and he turned away.
He was only a few steps away when he heardMr.Patterson mutter, “Sodomite.”
It made him stumble a little, as if the wordwas a physical blow.He’d never been flamboyantly gay and hadgenerally run in quiet circles where personal insults wereconsidered inappropriate, but it wasn’t as if he’d never had ahomophobic slur directed toward him.But this one, so archaic, anddrawn from the same Bible that had given Mark so much peace andjoy…
He could feel the pressure building up fromhis gut.It felt as if all the words of protest and anger that he’dswallowed over the years had finally become too much and he wasgoing to vomit them all over the church steps.There was a momentwhen he really wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to controlhimself, but he managed.Instead of screaming obscenities at anelderly couple, he forced himself to straighten his shoulders andcontinue down the stairs.He would never change their minds, and heshouldn’t let them change his standards of behavior.
He was halfway down the block before herealized where he was going.He’d been planning on driving to thefarm, and he still wanted to do that.He wanted to take sanctuary.But there was something else he needed to do first.
He pulled open the glass door and steppedinside the simply furnished foyer.He was vaguely familiar withDaniel Cohen but had never had much to do with him, certainly noton a professional basis.The lawyer was new to town so he wouldn’thave known Mark’s father professionally, either.
And the most important thing Mark knew?Daniel Cohen wasn’t an Anglican.
Mark smiled at the woman behind the tallwooden counter.“Megan, hi.I was wondering if Daniel might have afew minutes?I’ve got a few things I’d like to ask him about.”Employment law, the rules about defamation of character…Mark wasn’treally sure where he wanted to start.But he was pretty sure thathe needed to start somewhere.Turning the other cheek wasn’t goingto be something he was willing to do forever.
ChapterTwenty-Nine
Father Webber got to the farm later thanusual.Not that Lucas was waiting for him, or expecting him.It wasjust that Lucas was a creature of habit, and he’d gotten used tothe priest arriving in the early afternoon.That was all.
As it was, Lucas was actually watching forthe school bus to drop Alex off by the time the priest’s batteredsedan appeared on the dirt road.And the man who stalked up thehill after parking the car did not look like the mild priest who’dbeen helping out for the last week or so.
“Bad day?”Lucas asked quietly.
The priest looked startled, then snorted.“Bad week, month, year…but, yeah, an extra-bad day.”He made aface.“Sorry.It’s not your problem.”
“You want to spend some time with Rascal?Shecould cheer you up.Or would you rather work some of it off?”
“Work it off?”The priest’s expression wasblank.
“Yeah.You know…when you’re mad aboutsomething, you can, I don’t know, hit a punching bag or something.Like that.Work it off.”
The priest looked like he’d never reallyconsidered that approach before.Probably he didn’t get angry veryoften.Maybe he wasn’t even angry now—it wasn’t like Lucas was anexpert at reading people’s expressions.“Sorry, I just thought…wecan just do regular stuff if you want.Just the chores.I’ve gotthe barn cleaned out, but you could check the water, and there’sthe afternoon feeds to measure out…”
“No.The ‘work it off’ idea…that sounds good,actually.”
“Yeah?”Lucas cast an appraising gaze at thepriest.The man was lean enough, but he looked like just what hewas: someone who spent most of his day sitting on his ass.Heprobably wasn’t going to be a whole lot of actual use, but at leastmaybe he’d feel better afterward.“Okay.Excellent.Alex issupposed to help me, but he’s been trying to squirm out of it fordays.”
He pulled his leather work gloves from hisback pocket and started around the side of the barn.The buildingwas from an earlier time, back when hay was stacked and storedinside instead of being covered in plastic and left in the fields.And since Elise preferred the smaller, old-fashioned bales, sayingthat they made it easier to feed different kinds of hay todifferent animals, the farm still used the barn in the waysoriginally intended.There was an earthen ramp built up along thefar side of the building so that wagons could access the loft, andthat was where Lucas led Mark now.
“Grab those gloves, there,” he said,gesturing to the heavy gloves by the door.“They’re probably prettystiff, but you’ll get them loosened up quick enough.”
He swung easily onto the first of the wagonsparked inside the loft.“The idea is to stack these pretty tight,and not spread out all over the place—we get a bunch of differentkinds of hay in here and we need to be able to get at the one wewant, not have it buried under a bunch of the wrong kind.I’ll tossa few bales down and show you how we stack them, and then you cancome up and toss them down to me for a while.”Once the first fewbales were off, it wasn’t that hard to throw the rest down off thewagon, so hopefully the priest would be able to handle it.Lucasclimbed up to the top of the tightly stacked bales, unwedged a fewand tossed them gently to the wooden floor of the loft.
“They weigh about seventy pounds each,” hesaid as he jumped down and landed next to the bales.“And they’repretty scratchy, so you need to keep long sleeves on, even if it’shot.”He didn’t bother to mention how the little bits of hay wouldstick to sweaty skin and work their way under even the tightestcuffs.Let the priest discover that itchiness for himself.“If onebreaks—like, the twine comes off—pile the loose hay over by thattrap door.And make sure you don’t leave any twine in the hay.Someof these animals will eat anything, but it might not come out toowell.And if you see or smell a bale that seems a bit funky, tossit off the other side.Sometimes things get caught up in the baler,but we don’t want them rotting and spreading whatever it is to therest of the bales.”Lucas had helped on a farm when he was in highschool and still remembered the half-snake he’d found embedded in abale then.Hopefully the priest wouldn’t make any discoveries quitethat gruesome.
He showed the priest how to stack the bales.“Tight, now, ’cause this is the bottom row but we’re going to beten or fifteen bales up by the end and we need a strong foundationor the whole thing will fall down.”When that was clear, he noddedat the wagon.“Okay, now climb up there and start tossing themdown.The farther you throw them the less carrying I have to do, sofeel free to work off a little energy.But don’t throw yourselfright off the wagon.It’s a long way down.”
The first bale sailed over Lucas’s head andalmost hit the wall of the barn.He looked back toward the wagon.“Okay, then,” he said with a grin.“This might be just what youneed.”
The priest grunted as he sent another baleflying, and Lucas didn’t have any more time for chatting.Theyworked in companionable silence for about half an hour, until thewagon was empty and they were both covered in sweat andhayseeds.
“Good work,” Lucas said as he pickedsomething dry and brittle from the corner of his lips.He meant it.The priest had performed a lot better than expected.
“Are we done?”He sounded almostdisappointed.
