Clare sat mesmerized by the falling snow. With her sermon outline cooling on the desk in front of her, she watched the flakes float past the diamond-paned window, each one a spot of brilliance against the soot-gray sky. Flick. Flick. Flick. She had been like this all morning. Unable to focus on her tasks. Unable to care about them-or about much of anything.

Mr. Hadley stuck his head in the door, bringing with him the odor of furniture polish and cigarette smoke. "Mornin', Father." His usual address for her. She figured he thought of it as a gender-neutral honorific-like Captain, her other newly resumed title. "Thanks fer takin' care of my granddaughter yesterday." Mr. Hadley's North Country accent made the word come out yestiddy.

"How're they doing?"

He grunted. "They'll all be better now she's left that turd of a husband floatin' in the bowl. Sorry, Father."

"Mmm." She squelched her smile. "It must be good to have her back home."

"'Tain't really her home, though mebbe it comes as close as never no mind. My daughter, God love her, dragged the girl all over the country. Never was able to settle, my Sarah. The only place Honey ever came to twice was here. Sarah used to send her to me an' my wife every summer."