Six Geese A-Slaying(15)
She shook her head. Not surprising—I hadn’t either before the Trib called to request directions and a VIP pass. But a quick Google search told me all I needed to know.
“He wants to be Woodward and Bernstein for the new millennium, and they’ve got him stuck in the Style section, writing human interest stories. So he tries to turn every assignment into a new Watergate.”
“But there’s no possible scandal he can find connected with our parade,” Minerva said. “Is there?”
“No, but that just means he’ll drive us crazy trying to find the smoking gun, and when he fails he’ll sulk and try to make us look like lunatics.”
“Oh, dear,” Minerva said. “Yes, we’d be all too vulnerable on the lunacy angle.”
“You should see the article he did on a group of little old ladies up in Loudoun County who make bears for sick children in disasters. He spent most of the article making fun of their accents and their clothes and then toward the end made it sound like he suspected they were using the bears to smuggle drugs or launder money or something. He’s trouble with a press pass.”
“We can’t let him stay!” she exclaimed. “It’ll kill Henry if we have more negative publicity. His stomach was in knots for weeks after that nasty business over the summer.”
Nasty business? Rather a mild term for a murder and the breakup of a major drug smuggling ring. But perhaps her years in Baltimore, where Chief Burke had been a homicide detective, had made her jaded about the crime level in our more sedate rural community.
“We can’t very well chase a reporter away,” I said aloud. “The parade’s free to the public, as I had to explain several times to that ninny who asked us to give Werzel a VIP pass. And if we tried too obviously to shoo him, he’d get suspicious and really make our lives miserable.”
“We’ll just have to keep an eye on him, then,” she said, and strode away—probably to enlist the rest of the New Life Baptist choir in the surveillance. I wondered if it would make Werzel nervous, being constantly under the stern eyes of at least a dozen dignified black women in majestic burgundy choir robes. I hoped so.
I was, for the moment, blissfully unbothered. Slightly chilled, but unbothered. No one was standing in front of me, demanding private dressing rooms, complaining about their unsatisfactory place in the marching order, or asking where to find the rest of their party. Most of the people with nothing better to do were either lining up to get elephant rides or staring down the road waiting to see how many wise men were still in their saddles when the camels returned. I glanced around to see if Clarence had come back, but either he hadn’t or he’d put his goose head back on—I couldn’t tell which of the far more than six identical geese was him. His height should have been a clue, but either many of the SPOOR members were unusually tall or the goose heads added a lot of height. I made a mental note to drop over there before too long to find out what SPOOR had against Santa and whether it was likely to cause any problems during the parade. And possibly to confiscate all the surplus goose costumes, just in case.
Maybe I could channel the SPOOR members’ energies into fixing up the two bird-themed Christmas trees flanking the front walk. When Mother had given Dad and his SPOOR comrades leave to decorate them, I think she’d envisioned the ten-foot spruces festooned with artificial birds, feather garlands, and perhaps a wee tinsel nest or two. It never occurred to her that the SPOOR thought of the trees as for the birds rather than about them. The garlands of nuts, berries, and popcorn were decorative enough, and the little seed balls were not unattractive, but no amount of red ribbon could possibly make large, droopy net bags of suet look festive. And since the SPOOR members had finished decorating them two days ago, the birds had been demonstrating their appreciation by systematically eating the trees clean. They now had that ratty, picked-over look of store counters on the last day of a really good sale. Yes, I should definitely enlist the SPOOR members to replenish the trees. Maybe I could even donate our surplus fruitcakes to the cause.
But not now. For now, everything was under control. I glanced over at my clipboard and saw that only a few bit players had yet to check in. I stuck my clipboard under my arm, stuffed my chilled hands in my pockets, leaned gratefully against one of our front fence posts, and drank in the fantastical sights and sounds around me.
And they were fantastical—even at my busiest, I realized that. I could have been enjoying it all so much more if I didn’t have to feel responsible for it. I felt a brief twinge of resentment at that, and banished it with the thought that by nightfall, my term as Mistress of the Revels would be over. And surely, armed with the memory of this year’s experience, I could gather the gumption to refuse if they asked me again. So next year I could take a small part and enjoy the festivities. Maybe I’d learn to juggle or at least get a medieval costume and march with Michael’s colleagues who attended every year as jesters. Or help Mother’s garden club friends with their traditional flower-themed float. Or maybe just stand at the roadside and be part of the audience.