“What a charming image. I’ll be sure to think of you when I’m picking out my support bra and Depends.” Clare tucked the folder under her arm and crossed to the door.

“If you were married to Hugh Parteger, you could afford to have them sent over by your personal shopper,” Lois called after her.

In the church, Clare could see the vestry members gathered around what she now thought of as the Crisis Zone, a series of plastic buckets and basins set on the windowsill and spread over the floor. In the pale winter light shafting from the stained-glass window, the vestry members looked like a Vermeer painting, all well-dressed concern and solemn experience. Until she heard Robert Corlew say, “If you had just listened to me when I proposed an affordable way to fix the damn thing, we wouldn’t be looking at this now!”

“Your way, which was, as I recall, to staple tarp and asphalt shingles on our historic roof!” Sterling Sumner shot back.

“Our historic wreck!”

“Hi, everyone,” Clare said. “Have I missed anything important?”

There was a general chorus of greeting, and Corlew and Sumner sank back into their respective stances, glaring at each other. The former was a small-scale developer whose latest project was a drive-through mini-strip mall. The latter taught architecture at Skidmore after having retired from a firm specializing in high-end, unique houses. They were the cobra and the mongoose of her vestry.

“Sorry I’m late. Why don’t we all take a seat and get started?” Clare plopped into the pew across the aisle from the Zone. She waited until all six vestry members had seated themselves near the tarp-covered pews bracketing the water-damaged space and then she said, “Let us pray.

“Heavenly Father, you have blessed us with many riches and given us stewardship over them. A beautiful house of worship, a close-knit community, and a measure of prosperity. You have raised up intelligent, passionately committed people to lead our congregation. You ask in return, Lord, that we use our resources wisely and always remember that what we do here is not to satisfy our own egos, but for the glory of your name. Amen.”