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"Mrs. Mountgomery, if this is a bad time I could come back tomorrow — " Remy began.
"No. It's fine. Come in." The woman pushed the screen door open and motioned for him to enter. "I don't think there's ever a good time for something like this. Do you?"
She didn't seem to expect a response, and Remy offered none as he stepped inside his client's home.
The house reeked of cleanliness, the scents of several different cleaning products making his sensitive nose tingle. He followed her down a short hallway, past a den, and into a dining room. An oblong table made of dark cherrywood occupied the center of the room. Six chairs surrounded it. Framed family pictures hung on the walls, with watercolors of spring on Beacon Hill and the gold-domed state house as seen through Boston Common.
Janice stood beside a chair where she had obviously been working; stacks of envelopes, a calculator, and a ledger were neatly laid out. "I was doing the bills," she explained. "Have to have all my ducks in a row now that things are the way they are." She kept her eyes downcast as she spoke. "We've got a good health plan, thank God. Who knows how long he'll be in the hospital before he can come home."
She looked at Remy then, her red, watery eyes locking on to his for the first time. "If he comes home."
Remy held out the manila envelope to her.
"I know this is difficult. I'll try to be quick."
Janice took the envelope tentatively, as if expecting it to be searing hot in her grasp. She held it for a moment, feeling the contents through the paper, and then set it down in the center of the table. She looked back to Remy, eyes swimming with sadness.
"Would you like a cup of coffee, Mr. Chandler? I've just brewed a fresh pot, and I really shouldn't drink the whole thing by myself."
Remy nodded and smiled.
"That would be nice. Thank you."
They sat across from one another at the dining room table, a plate of cookies that neither had touched between them. Janice blew on her coffee but didn't drink, and looked at Remy over the drifting steam.
"It doesn't surprise me at all, really." She laughed nervously, setting her mug down on a white paper napkin. "He was never really the same after the operation."
Remy sipped at his own coffee, his sixth that morning.
"Your husband mentioned something about surgery, and dreams he was having as a result. What was wrong with him, Mrs. Mountgomery?"
She picked up her mug again, holding it in both hands as if to warm them. "He had a brain tumor. They didn't think he would survive the procedure." She finally drank, quiet for a moment. "We even said our good-byes. Believe me when I tell you, there was a lot of praying in this house the morning he went in."
Remy wondered offhandedly whether any of his kind had been listening to the prayers of the Mount-gomerys that day.
Janice continued. "They tell me he actually died on the table, but they managed to revive him." She drank some more, her eyes suddenly focusing on the thick envelope still lying in the center of the table. "Lately I've been wondering if it would have been better if they had let him die."
She dragged her eyes from the envelope.
"You probably think I'm awful. The bitter, spurned wife," she said with a nervous laugh. "But it's not like that at all. After the surgery he just wasn't the man I married anymore. It was like the operation made him into somebody else, like the tumor was really Peter and once that was taken away, he left too. I know it sounds crazy, but that's how it was."
Remy set his mug down on his own napkin and watched as Janice pulled a tissue from her pocket. Her eyes had begun to tear.
"I'm sorry, it's just been so much for me to handle."
The woman dabbed at her eyes and wiped her ru
"How was he different?" Remy asked.
Janice sat stiffly for a moment, thinking, remembering. "He became very distant, distracted. And there were nightmares. Every night, he'd wake up screaming, carrying on about the end of the world."
Remy leaned forward. "Tell me more about the nightmares."
Janice wiped the table in front of her with the side of her hand, sweeping away imaginary crumbs. "Something about seals being broken and horsemen coming. It was all quite disturbing."
Another intrusive chill ran down the length of the angel's spine. It was starting to become commonplace, and he didn't care for it in the least. Waxen seals being broken on scrolls in the possession of the Angel of Death would, in fact, stir the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and bring about the world's end, but any fanatic, or editor at a religious publishing house, would be aware of that.
Janice Mountgomery laughed bitterly and stood up from her chair, empty coffee mug in hand. "Of course, he was completely out of his mind at that point," the woman said. "The kids and I begged him to get help. But he just became more and more withdrawn. We hardly spoke anymore, and then he began sleeping in the guestroom. Said it was so his nightmares wouldn't wake me, but I knew otherwise."
She made her way into the kitchen with her mug, taking Remy's as she passed. He got up and followed her, standing quietly in the doorway as the bereaved woman placed the dirty mugs in the sink and ran water into each.
"He did go back to work, although I don't know how he managed it. That's where he got involved with that woman, his secretary, Carol something or other — Weir? Carol Weir, isn't it?"
She turned off the water and wiped her hands on a red-and-white checked dishtowel, which hung beneath the sink. "I guess she was a bit of a religious nut, at least that's what people tell me. She believed his stories about the end being near. Probably needed help as much as he did."
There was a simmering rage in her voice now, as she leaned against the sink, arms tightly folded across her chest. "It's fu
Janice smiled sadly and glanced at Remy, still in the doorway. "Wives can sense these things." She chuckled nervously. "Listen to me — now I sound like Peter." Then her eyes began to fill and she quickly changed the subject.
"Are you married, Mr. Chandler?"
Remy nodded, though he was usually careful not to reveal too much of his personal life to his clients. Yet this woman was hurting so much that he allowed himself to share a little. "Yes. Yes, I am."
That was all he gave her, but it seemed to satisfy.
"You seem like a very nice man, Mr. Chandler. Your wife is a very lucky woman."
"Thank you, Mrs. Mountgomery." Remy turned and began to move through the dining room toward the hall. "If you don't have any more questions, I really should be on my way."
The woman came quickly toward him, an air of desperation about her.
"Should I pay you the remainder of your fee now, or will you bill me?"
"I'll bill you. That way you'll have a receipt for your records." Remy started down the hallway. "Thank you again for the coffee." He grabbed the front doorknob, pulling it open as he turned back toward her. "Please, don't hesitate to call me if there's anything else I can do for you."
Janice reached around him to help with the door. "I was pretty much set to leave him, before all this, before I called you. I… Ijust wanted to be sure I was doing the right thing. All that talk about angels and devils around every corner, it was enough to make me nuts."
Remy nodded, then turned back toward the screen door, recalling the expression of disbelief, then unbridled joy that spread across Peter Mountgomery's face before he'd shot himself. Had the man just been crazy, experiencing delusions as a result of some defect of the brain? The question gnawed at him. Remy couldn't be sure.