Having digested, and sagely commented upon, each item in the “People” column, Mary Andrea Finley Krome then turned to the weightier pages of The Missoulian. The headline that caught her attention appeared on page three of the front section: news reporter believed dead in mystery blaze. It wasn’t the slain-journalist angle that grabbed Mary Andrea so much as the phrase “mystery blaze,” because Mary Andrea adored a good mystery. The sight of her estranged husband’s name in the second paragraph was a complete shock. The newspaper drifted from Mary Andrea’s fingertips, and she emitted an oscillating groan that was mistaken by fellow coffee drinkers for a New Age meditative technique.
“Julie, you OK?” asked Lorie, or Loretta.
“Not really,” Mary Andrea rasped.
“What is it?”
Mary Andrea pressed her knuckles to her eyes and felt genuine tears.
“You need a doctor?” asked her new friend.
“No,” said Mary Andrea. “A travel agent.”
Joan and Roddy got a copy of The Register at the Grab N’Go and brought it to Sinclair at the shrine. He refused to read it.
“You’re mentioned by name,” Joan beseeched, holding up the newspaper for him to see, “as Tom Krome’s boss.”
Roddy added: “It explains how you’re out of town and not available for comment.”
“Nyyah nimmy doo-dey!” was Sinclair’s response.
The yammering sent a sinusoidal murmur through the Christian tourists gathering along the narrow moat. Some knelt, some stood beneath umbrellas, some perched on folding chairs and Igloo coolers. Sinclair himself lay prone at the feet of the fiberglass Madonna.
Joan was so concerned about her brother’s behavior that she considered notifying their parents. She’d read about religious fanatics who fondled snakes, but a turtle fixation seemed borderline deviant. Roddy said he hadn’t heard of it either. “But personally,” he added, “I’m damn glad it’s cooters and not diamondbacks. Otherwise we’d be coffin-shopping.”
Sinclair had cloaked himself toga-style in a pale bedsheet, upon which a confetti of fresh lettuce was sprinkled. With surprising swiftness the apostolic turtles scrambled from their sunning stones to ascend the gleaming buffet. Zestfully they traversed Sinclair from head to toe, while he cooed and blinked placidly at the passing clouds. Cameras clicked and video cameras whirred.
Trish and Demencio monitored the visitation from the living room window. She said, “He’s really something. You gotta admit.”
“Yeah. A fruit basket.”
“But aren’t you glad we let him stay?”
Demencio said, “A buck’s a buck.”
“He must’ve snapped. Stripped a gear.”
“Maybe so.” Demencio was distracted by a sighting of Dominick Amador, clumping unscrupulously among the pilgrims.
“Sonofabitch. He got him some crutches!”
Trish said, “You know why?”
“I can sure guess.”
“Yeah, he finally got his feet drilled. I heard he paid the boy at the muffler shop, like, thirty bucks.”
“Psycho,” said Demencio.
Then Dominick Amador spotted him in the window and timorously waved a Crisco-filled mitten. Demencio did not return the greeting.
Trish said, “You want me to chase him off?”
Demencio folded his arms. “Now what—who the hell’s that?” He pointed at a slender person in a hooded white robe. The person carried a clipboard and moved with clerical efficiency from one tourist to the next.
“The lady from Sebring Street,” Trish explained, “the one with the Road-Stain Jesus. She’s working on a petition to the highway department.”
“Like hell. She’s workin’ on my customers!”
“No, honey, the state wants to pave over her shrine—”
“Is that my problem? I got a business going here.”
“All right,” Trish said, and went outside to have a word with the woman. Demencio had always been leery of his competition—he liked to stay ahead of the pack. It bothered him when Dominick or the others came snooping. Trish understood. The miracle racket was no picnic.
And the queer histrionics of the visiting newspaperman had made Demencio edgier than usual. He could cope with hydraulic malfunctions in a weeping statue; a flesh-and-blood lunatic was something else. For the time being, the recumbent and incoherent Sinclair was drawing plenty of customers. But what if he freaked out? What if his marble-mouthed gibberish turned to violent rant?
Demencio fretted that he might lose control of his shrine. He sat down heavily and contemplated the aquarium, where the unpainted baby turtles eagerly awaited breakfast. JoLayne Lucks had phoned to check on the smelly little buggers, and Demencio reported that all forty-five were healthy and fit. He hadn’t told her about the apostle scam. JoLayne had promised she’d be home in a few days to collect her “precious babies.”