{"id":776,"date":"2016-03-29T21:50:31","date_gmt":"2016-03-29T21:50:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zatma.org\/new-wp\/?p=776"},"modified":"2016-03-29T21:52:52","modified_gmt":"2016-03-29T21:52:52","slug":"the-crossword-puzzle-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/?p=776","title":{"rendered":"The Crossword Puzzle (#1)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"Ming<\/dt>\n
Ming Zhen Shakya<\/a><\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n
\u00a0To see more literature about Zen and the Art of Investigation:<\/h6>\n
http:\/\/www.zenanthonywolff.com<\/a><\/strong><\/i><\/h5>\n
<\/h6>\n
\n

The Crossword Puzzle<\/h2>\n

by Anthony Wolff (Ming Zhen Shakya)<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Part 1 –\u00a0PRELUDE TO AN UNNATURAL DEATH & AN INVITATION<\/h4>\n

 <\/p>\n

It is one of the more peculiar acts of human nature that among adult acquaintances a gift is rarely received in the same spirit as the giver had assumed it would be.\u00a0 No matter how sincere the giver is and how genuinely he desires to help or to please, his generosity is bound to cause him to suffer a loss of esteem.\u00a0 It should come as no surprise that this sudden loss of status may puzzle the giver, and if so, he may find himself drawing the wrong conclusions about the origins of his social demotion.<\/p>\n

What he, or in this case, Nola Harriman, failed to understand is that the giver of a gift automatically places himself in a superior position which can only mean that he places the receiver in an inferior one – a shift which the latter usually finds intolerable.\u00a0 However subtle the shift, it evokes feelings of resentment in the receiver who is expected to thank the giver and praise the gift, though he may personally wish to do neither.\u00a0 A much needed utilitarian gift that is given to, say, the governing council of a small religious organization, is practically an accusation of incompetence\u00a0 The members will make the giver pay dearly for the public imputation.<\/p>\n

Few things in life are as difficult to sustain as being grateful.<\/p>\n

The circumstances that brought Nola Harriman to the uncomfortable edge of a fold-out metal bed in a Morton, Pennsylvania holding cell, could not possibly have been imagined a day or even a year before the event.\u00a0 No one had given her a clue that the faults she had found in Spencer Ghent could be lethal in nature. Nola was an important person in her society, not a particularly well-liked one; and people who conceal personal dislikes are often loathe to inform others of their secret contempt for fear that they may be blamed for any misfortune that befalls the object of their scorn.<\/p>\n

It was in the last week of August, 2013, that Nola was working as a registered nurse in a hospital in Philadelphia.\u00a0 All summer she had chaffed under new regulations imposed by a recently hired Director of Nursing.\u00a0 She had just reached the Flight or Fight stage of the dispute when, fortuitously, her sister Paige Harriman Ghent called, begging her to come to live and work in her home in Morton, Pennsylvania, some eighty miles distant. Paige\u2019s ailing husband, Spencer, was afflicted with ulcerative colitis; and since the nature of the disease involved certain intimacies, rather than hire a stranger to live in the house and see things that Paige thought should be kept private, she sought her sister\u2019s help.<\/p>\n

Though their past history might, in an excess of kindness, be considered sibling rivalry (they had spoken only briefly to each other twice in the last fifteen years), both women believed that people could change and, certainly, to Nola, hearing her sister weep and beg her to come and stay at her house and pay her well to do so, was proof that Paige had indeed changed.\u00a0 Prior to that call she had regarded Paige as the most stubbornly self-centered and irredeemably uncaring person she had ever met.\u00a0 But now her older sister was pleading piteously in obvious distress.\u00a0 Nola accepted the offer.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A few months earlier, in February, 2013, the Zen Buddhist Assembly of Morton, Pennsylvania was and had been for years an ad hoc, but self-supporting assembly that met weekly in each other\u2019s homes for tea and at least the semblance of meditation.\u00a0 The members wished that they had their own temple and a qualified teacher with whom they could regularly interact; but renting or purchasing such a facility was, given their loose confederation, impractical.<\/p>\n

And then, miraculously, someone donated an old, once-grand house to them, a house that had originally been the residence of the prominent Norris-Giles family.<\/p>\n

On a pleasant morning in March, 2013, six of the regular hostesses of the Zen Assembly inspected the building that would be theirs if they wanted it.\u00a0 Of course they could see that it needed extensive repair, but desire, tending always to diminish disadvantage, let them quickly glance at the problems and focus instead on the advantages – a paved parking lot; stained glass windows; a fenced half-acre of arable land on which they could grow their own flowers and vegetables and turn the building into a real monastic center.\u00a0 No-less than seven upstairs bedrooms could be rented out as guest or novice facilities.\u00a0 As housewives they had often been confronted by dirt and disorder which they corrected by calmly ordering their servants to clean, discard, sew, pr paint.\u00a0 But for devotion\u2019s sake, they decided to do most of the original cleaning of the \u201ctemple,\u201d themselves.\u00a0 They saw the dust and disarray as a challenge and looked forward to conquering them with their own humble and devoted \u201celbow grease.\u201d<\/p>\n

The giver of the gift, having chosen to remain anonymous, allowed his attorney to convey his hope that Morton\u2019s \u2018Bodhisattvas\u201d – though he did not quite know what a Bodhisattva was he did seem to mean them – would make his humble gift of the Norris-Giles House a permanent home for Lord Buddha.<\/p>\n

Not one of the council cared to question his largesse.\u00a0 They had been faithful to the religion and deserved such approbation and a house, too.<\/p>\n

They also did not inquire about his motives when he included a condition precedent to the transfer of deed which obliged them to provide living accommodations for five years to two Japanese men: an elderly gentleman who had formerly been an abbot of a Zen monastery in Kyoto; and a younger man who had for years functioned as a handyman and a\u00a0tenzo<\/em>(cook.)\u00a0 The thought of having a real Japanese abbot to lead their group and an authentic Japanese cook made the strange condition irresistible.\u00a0 In their euphoria, costly repairs would be done by contractors they would hire; while trivial repairs would be relegated to the less enthusiastic. With a flick of a down-turned palm they dispensed with a hundred or more trifles that bore to them no connection to the word \u201chabitable.\u201d<\/p>\n

The worst decision they made was to decline to seek legal advice.\u00a0 The donor had an attorney and the women reasoned that retaining an additional one for themselves would appear to be \u201clooking a gift horse in the mouth.\u201d Also, the saving of a legal fee would increase the sum they planned to spend on decorating the new headquarters of the Zen Buddhist Association (ZBA) of Morton. They obtained six copies of the contract and each, at her leisure, perused its contents.\u00a0 Having applied the same criteria of inspection to the document\u2019s contents as they had applied to the building, they accepted the gift and conditions, providing the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania would grant their articles to incorporate as an eleemosynary organization.\u00a0 This, the Commonwealth did, and by July, armed with a non-profit charter and six duly elected officers, they met again with the donor\u2019s attorney.\u00a0 Legally empowered and filled with irrational hope, they accepted the deed and signed the two-man support contract.<\/p>\n

Everyone knew that the Norris-Giles House had once been proud and beautiful, but time and the de-gentrification of the neighborhood had changed its zoning so that the heirs were able to rent out sections of it to people who would use it as professional offices.\u00a0 Unfortunately, the most respectable of the professionals were two young related attorneys who shared the same waiting room and insisted that they were trying to steal each other\u2019s clients.\u00a0 The disagreements soon passed the misdemeanor stage and the family disputants became the only clients the young attorneys had.\u00a0 They abandoned their leases ( a not unreasonable act since the air-conditioning and running water were not always reliable) and moved out.<\/p>\n

The tenants descended in respectability until a transvestite seamstress had been robbed twice and a shoemaker\u2019s equipment had been critically damaged by vandals. There remained only a tap dance instructor and persons who engaged in after hours entertainments. It was regrettable that each tenant jury-rigged its plumbing and electrical needs to suit individual requirements. Some had removed non-load bearing walls that managed to gouge holes in a once-flawless walnut parquet floor.\u00a0 The last group of tenants included two psychics who competed with each other, arguing fiercely and often in a language no one understood.<\/p>\n

Despite all this business trouble, in the gamesmanship of selling, sentiment held the higher hand; and the owners, each having his own Utopian solution about the building\u2019s future, disagreed about every solution proposed.\u00a0 Not until an assortment of condoms clogged the drain, did the cost of repair trump the power hand and everyone surrendered to the inevitable and offered the entire lot to anyone who would pay for the dilapidated building and the taxes due on it.\u00a0 A Japanese businessman was the first to hear of the proposition; and he immediately instructed his attorney to procure the property under the conditions he imposed.<\/p>\n

This businessman, though not being a Zen Buddhist himself, claimed to have seen the wisdom of having a Zen Buddhist Center in town and, with the condition that his father-in law and nephew – the old abbot and the new cook – be given living quarters for five years in the Norris-Giles House or any equivalent accommodation that was at least fifty miles from his personal residence, purchased the building and presented it as a gift to these sincere followers of the Buddha.<\/p>\n

The council ladies did not discover that by this act of generosity the donor had gained his own domestic tranquility.\u00a0 Even his wife so enjoyed her new fatherless and nephew-less environment that she insisted that the house her husband had purchased would have been cheap at twice the price.\u00a0 She did not fully understand what her husband knew and the new owners would soon learn: the contrariness and unaccustomed slovenly habits that her father had been demonstrating during the last few years were symptoms of untreated dementia.\u00a0 She also did not know that her ill-tempered nephew had become a drug user and often stole items from her house to pay for cocaine.\u00a0 Naturally he would blame the old man for the thefts; and she was all too willing to accept\u00a0The Spitefulness Of The Aging –<\/em>\u00a0an article she had read in a hair salon – as the old man\u2019s deliberate attempt to ruin her married life.\u00a0 He had never liked her husband.<\/p>\n

With great excitement the new owners – who called themselves, \u201cThe Council,\u201d became officers and directors of the new corporation.\u00a0 As such they made immediate and somewhat quixotic plans to convert the dwelling into a monastic center \u00a0 They immediately founded a new order of American Zen priests, selected Japanese names for themselves from the list of Patriarchs and then, after ordaining themselves, informed others that as soon as the bedrooms were renovated, they would rent the rooms at bargain rates to anyone who was desirous of becoming lay-ordained.\u00a0 As part of their spiritual training such persons would then be obliged to oversee household maintenance, laundry, and kitchen policing.<\/p>\n

An industrious lot, they assumed that they could pay for the repairs by selling hand-made wooden bead necklaces, bracelets, and made-to-order bib-like rakusus, robes, cushions, mats, and sundry items.\u00a0 Incomprehensibly, although they made prototypes of these items to display, they failed to grasp the not altogether obscure fact that the seller completes only half of the commercial transaction.\u00a0 New members were the targeted buyers, but for so long as the building was in such deplorable condition, they could not attract new members.\u00a0 They also could gain no income from rented bedrooms since the leaking roof permitted rain to accumulate on the attic floor from which it would seep through the wooden floorboards and create ugly brown stains in the second floor\u2019s plaster ceilings.\u00a0 From there, rain or melted snow would drip into the many buckets and pans set out to capture it and halt the water\u2019s course.\u00a0 The lowest estimate to replace the roof was a prohibitive $20,000.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, in addition to the costly re-wiring and heating and other plumbing necessities, they were obliged to support the two men who came as a condition of the gift, and The Council was unprepared to cope with the unique set of problems this condition entailed.<\/p>\n

They set to work making the house\u2019s original solarium and morning room into suitable quarters for him and the handyman.\u00a0 They painted the suite and put wall-to-wall carpeting throughout the several rooms.\u00a0 Beds and rudimentary furniture were acquired from Thrift Shops; and dishes, flatware, hot plates, microwave, refrigerator, and dishwasher were brought from their own homes.\u00a0 Less than a block away were an all-night laundromat which, the ladies assumed, the handyman could use, and half a dozen fast-food restaurants and grocery stores.<\/p>\n

The ZBA sangha,(congregation) followed the northern Soto Zen \u201csitting\u201d school.\u00a0 Although they lined up, kneeling at his doorway for\u00a0dokusan<\/em>\u00a0(personal advice), the language problem reduced his utterances to subjects for them each to solve.\u00a0 They tended to hail the old man as a holy man who walked around, chanting incessantly.\u00a0 They learned the chants but were baffled by the way he occasionally smiled, raised a finger, and pronounced some kind of admonition in Japanese.\u00a0 They purchased new red and gold master\u2019s robes for him and, since he seemed always desirous to perform\u00a0kin hin<\/em>\u00a0(walking meditation) outside, they pulled out the weeds from the fenced side of the house, planted shrubbery, and laid flagstone pathways for him to use.\u00a0 Regrettably, he extended the range of his meditation path to include neighboring sidewalks, and the police notified them that the barefoot old man was following children to school.\u00a0 The ladies had assumed that his strange mumblings were somehow oracular, and a secretary of Japanese descent at the nearby police substation did indeed confirm that the mumblings were of a spiritual nature.\u00a0 She was a follower of the Rinzai Southern school of Zen and the lines the old man repeated were from the Dun Huang version of the Platform Sutra, a scripture particularly dear to the Southern school. And so they learned that not only was their new master from a rival school of Zen, but the mystery of the raised finger and its accompanying advice was also disconcertingly solved.\u00a0 The secretary translated what he was saying as, \u201cYou can make a mirror polishing a brick sooner than you can make a Buddha sitting on a cushion.\u201d\u00a0 This presented a serious theological problem.<\/p>\n

They could read the koans associated with the Southern School, but they could not understand them; and they knew no other Zen but the kind that required hours of sitting and striving to stay awake while not thinking. No one knew how to respond to this apostasy or to the Abbot\u2019s refusal to remove any of his clothing for laundering.\u00a0 The handyman, who was supposed to be a college student, owned no books at all and disappeared for days at a time. A visiting physician told them he suspected that the Abbot had Alzheimer\u2019s Disease. This, he allowed, might be troublesome: hospitalization would be expensive, if, of course, they could get past the problem of not being blood relatives of his. He advised them to speak to the attorney who had handled the \u201cgift.\u201d\u00a0 They called him and were informed that they were obliged to provide for the two religious men.\u00a0 As officers and signatories to the transfer documents, they were individually and severely liable to fulfill the accompanying contract\u2019s terms.<\/p>\n

As to the nephew, they learned quickly to keep their purses under lock and key; but this did not, unfortunately, prevent the young man from making house calls to solicit funds for a variety of non-existent projects.\u00a0 He invariably had to relieve himself and while doing so raided the medicine chests for salable pharmaceuticals and an occasional piece of jewelry.\u00a0 The sangha compared notes about missing things and all their homes were quickly closed to him.<\/p>\n

It was during an October, 2013, visit to a suburban home, the Ghent residence into which Nola Harriman had recently moved, that he attempted to steal several prescription bottles of tranquilizers and Nola happened to notice a bulge in his jacket pocket that had not been there before he went to the bathroom.\u00a0 She positioned herself so that she could look down into the pocket and, seeing the tops of prescription bottles, checked the bathroom and then quietly called the police. He was driving away from the residence when the police apprehended him.\u00a0 Convicted and sentenced to a term of not less than two years, he did remove one of ZBA\u2019s more serious irritants; but his absence did not, however, overcome the other insoluble problems, and the Council planned their exit strategy.\u00a0 Embarrassing newspaper articles about the incident mentioned the ZBA\u2019s address and executives along with the information that Tuesday and Thursday evening meditation sessions were held at the old Norris-Giles House. The Council voted to \u201cride out the storm\u201d and extend their termination date. They also resented Nola (who claimed to be a Zen Buddhist) for the way she handled what they thought should be an ecclesiastical matter.<\/p>\n

By the spring of 2014, several month\u2019s before Spencer Ghent\u2019s death, the ZBA council, having waited for the legal\u00a0sturm und drang\u00a0<\/em>to subside, accepted defeat and tried to find the easiest way to undo what they had done. Clearly, they needed to dissolve the charter, abandon the building, and sue the donor for having failed to disclose pertinent facts in the negotiation.\u00a0 However gracefully they could accomplish these goals, they decided that the thirtieth day of July\u00a0 2014, would be their last official day.<\/p>\n

Patricia Monahan, (Shi Bashumitsu) the Council president, had learned the address of the Japanese donor. She met with no resistance when she suggested that on the eve of their last day, they drive to the donor\u2019s home and, like kids leaving a burning bag of dog turds on the step, would ring the door bell and run, leaving the old man standing there alone to be figuratively stomped on.\u00a0 It was not exactly a Zen thing to do, but they were in debt, nagged constantly by their husbands, and desperate. They certainly did not expect that Nola Harriman, whose respect for the law had exposed so many of their problems, would be the one who would rescue them from such an ignominious end.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It was in late September, 2013, that Nola first drove the winding rocky road to the hilltop Ghent house, an old Civil War mansion that was smaller than she had expected. During their long conversation Paige had described her home in detail and Nola had converted every brick into a Hampton Court.\u00a0 She laughed at herself for having seen too many\u00a0Brideshead<\/em>type television shows.\u00a0 Her sister wasn\u2019t British royalty.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s still a pretty place,\u201d she said aloud.\u00a0 But as houses of the period went, this was not a good example. The dominant feature was a turret that stood as an attachment to one front corner of the house.\u00a0 The towering top floor, which actually rose only one storey higher than the attic, contained, according to Paige, stained-glass windows that had come all the way from Venice.\u00a0 Each window faced a standard geographical direction and its leaded-in design depicted the season that supposedly went with the direction. Paige had said that they must not get a lot of snow in Venice. Fortunately, given the comprehensive view of the entire area that the turret provided, only the top panel of each window bore the colored lead-seamed glass.<\/p>\n

At the house\u2019s ground level there were four windows on either side of the portico\u2019s columned entrance.\u00a0 The portico, itself, was the fa\u00e7ade of the foyer, one side of which was her husband\u2019s large study, and the other being part of the family\u2019s living quarters.\u00a0 A second storey contained five and a half bedrooms – the peculiar slicing having been done when modern plumbing was installed. Paige had also said there was a \u201cfinished\u201d cellar and an attic.<\/p>\n

Smaller buildings stood near the main house:\u00a0 a carriage house which had living quarters above a six-stall stable;\u00a0 an all-purpose tack and farrier shed also used tor storage; a modern four-car garage with a curtained-window apartment as its second floor; a pool house and patio; and a marble building that was obviously a mausoleum.<\/p>\n

Where, she wondered, did Paige intend that she should sleep? Paige had promised her her own space. She had casually mentioned that the kitchen staff lived in apartments in the attic, the groundsman occupied the carriage house, and the houseboy lived in the new garage apartment.\u00a0 She had said that she slept in her own bedroom and that her three children – a boy Roland, nineteen; a girl Samantha, seventeen; and a boy, Pierre, sixteen; each had his own bedroom.\u00a0 Five bedrooms then had already been accounted for.\u00a0 The house did not look big enough for six – except for that fishy half-bedroom, and although there was an additional space in the turret, it surely was never intended to be anything but decoration or a protected place to view the countryside. Running straight down the inside wall of the turret was a circular stairway that led from the top down to the cellar and had an exit at each level. It must, Nola thought, afford the privacy of a lighthouse and she hoped her sister did not plan to install her in it.\u00a0 Later, she would learn, that the top semi-room would be occupied by Hines Whitman, Spencer Ghent\u2019s secretary, a location Hines was not happy about. The turret room was cold in the winter and hot in the summer and the circular staircase was iron and difficult to climb and descend.\u00a0 Hines wanted the room that had been assigned to Nola – the \u201chalf\u201d guest room next to Spencer\u2019s Master bedroom, the half-bedroom which had been the main plumbing sacrifice to the modernizing effort.\u00a0 But Nola found the room pleasant and more than adequate for her needs.\u00a0 She was to share a bathroom with Samantha.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

On that September day, as Nola first approached the house she could see that the garage doors were open, but since the sun was behind the building, she could see only four dark squares and the suggestion of cars inside.\u00a0 On the other side of the main house, quieted now with autumn chill, the pool waited to be covered and the patio to be relieved of its furniture.<\/p>\n

Suddenly a flock of goats came up from a small arroyo and stopped in front of her.\u00a0 Paige had told her that they kept goats to act as lawn mowers and had instructed her that if the animals wandered into her path she should just blow the horn and they would move away.\u00a0 Nola beeped her horn and the goats disappeared again into one of the many deep rills in the lawn.<\/p>\n

Paige stood on the portico and waved to her.\u00a0 The wind swirled around her, whipping blonde strands of hair across her face, and as Paige pulled them away and smiled broadly, Nola could see her teeth glitter in the morning sun.\u00a0 Until that moment she had not realized how much she missed her sister. Nola smiled back and waved.\u00a0 A connection had been made and she felt a thrill.\u00a0 Considering that this was the first time she had seen her sister\u2019s house, it was odd that she felt as if she had finally come home.<\/p>\n

After the standard yelps, air-kisses, hugs, and arm-in-arm conviviality, they entered the house that was surprisingly well furnished.\u00a0 The Ghent family had invested in beautiful antiques.<\/p>\n

Nola was led into the kitchen to meet Mrs. Eglington, the cook; Gladys Jones, the chambermaid and kitchen assistant; Jules Grover, the houseboy; and Gregor Nikolov, the groundsman, who kissed her hand.\u00a0 Two \u201ccleaning ladies\u201d who lived in town and came to work only three days a week, passed through the kitchen and acknowledged Nola with a wave and nod.<\/p>\n

Inexplicably, Paige made the stern announcement that in her absence her sister was in charge of the house and all who lived and worked in it – a remark that made Nola uncomfortable and did not endear her to the staff. Additionally, Nola\u2019s disposition had a sharp edge to it and Paige\u2019s decree had not served to soften it.\u00a0 Her personality invited criticism: she was casually generous which inspired ingratitude; she was well-built and attractive which inspired jealousy; but what was worse was that she was also an outsider, educated, and forthright – a woman who possessed none of the slickness of con artists who could become anyone\u2019s best friend in a matter of minutes.\u00a0 She also tended to be somewhat bossy and, especially when surrounded by what she considered \u201cair-headed\u201d women, she tended to flaunt her license as a registered nurse along with the knowledge of many classical books she had read as giving her some lofty hierarchical rank. She was also an avid Zen Buddhist of the Rinzai School.<\/p>\n

Still, as the servants looked at one another with expressions of disdain, Nola smiled and tried to think of something to say that would mitigate the announcement\u2019s severity, when suddenly Gregor, a man of about thirty – for whom the word swarthy could have been coined – stepped forward and, using a feather duster as a plumed hat, made a grand obeisance to Paige. \u201cYour vish is our law,\u201d he said humorously.\u00a0 While his head was deeply bowed, Paige reached out to ruffle his long black wavy hair, and then to run her long acrylic fingernails through it to comb what she had disturbed. He looked up at her. \u201cIs not how is said ve vill behave?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIsn\u2019t he the limit?\u201d Paige asked as she winked at him.\u00a0 Gladys smiled at his little joke, but no one else acknowledged it. Paige turned and playfully sashayed to the foyer, pausing at the foot of a wide staircase.\u00a0 \u201cNow we go up,\u201d she said portentously, \u201cto meet the star of the show.\u201d\u00a0 Nola and Jules followed.<\/p>\n

They walked down the hallway\u2019s tufted runner, stopping as Paige opened the door to a guest room.\u00a0 \u201cThis is yours, Sis,\u201d she said.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019ll like it.\u00a0 The mattress is brand new and very comfortable.\u201d Despite all its odd angles, the room was large and sunny.<\/p>\n

They continued on and stopped outside the next room, the master bedroom.\u00a0 Paige made a quick toss of her head to Jules.\u00a0 As he stepped forward, she asked Nola, \u201cAre your keys in the car?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes,\u201d Nola murmured.\u00a0 \u2018I didn\u2019t know where it should be parked.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Four-car – that\u2019s what we call the new garage – is full now, I\u2019m afraid… what with Roland\u2019s new birthday sports car.\u201d\u00a0 She brightened and turned to Jules.\u00a0 \u201cAfter you put my sister\u2019s luggage in her room, take my car out of the Four-car and put it in the carriage house carport.\u00a0 Then put her car in the Four-car and be careful you don\u2019t scrape the sides when you squeeze it in.\u201d\u00a0 As he murmured some remark of obedience and turned back down the corridor, Paige confided, \u201c\u201dBefore we had the new garage built we\u2019d often have to stick the cars in a kind of overhang or in the stable.\u00a0 What a nuisance.\u00a0 And the horses didn\u2019t like it either.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nola wasn\u2019t paying attention to Paige\u2019s words. It was the unmistakable undercurrent of intimacy with Gregor that intrigued her.\u00a0 Realizing that she was expected to comment, she asked, apropos of nothing, \u201cWhat do you do with the goats in bad weather?\u201d<\/p>\n

Paige was not surprised by Nola\u2019s non sequitur.\u00a0 Her mind was equally on the subject that underlay her casual speech.\u00a0 \u201cUnder the stairs in the carriage house is a pot-bellied stove – a small one – that keeps the stables from smelling like a morgue.\u00a0 Horse sweat, shit and piss mixed with dampness.\u00a0 Ugh! We\u2019d never be able to keep Greg or any other groundsman for long.\u00a0 The goats are herded into the room where the stove is. We keep food and water there.\u00a0 They\u2019re happy when it snows.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd here,\u201d she whispered as they approached the closed door of the master bedroom, \u201cis Spence\u2019s room.\u201d\u00a0 She lowered her voice even more.\u00a0 \u201cLook,\u201d she said, \u201cyou didn\u2019t know Spence before, and you\u2019re a nurse and understand how emaciated this illness can make a person, so I know you\u2019re not expecting to see an NFL lineman in there.\u00a0 But you may not be expecting to see a skeleton… and Nola, my dear, prepare yourself to see one.\u201d<\/p>\n

She rapped and then immediately opened the door to a smoke-filled room.\u00a0 She had not exaggerated.\u00a0 Spencer Ghent turned his head and smiled weakly at Nola.\u00a0 In a hoarse voice, he said, \u201cCome in.\u00a0 Come in.\u00a0 And sit on my bed here so that I can get a good look at you.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell,\u201d Nola said brightly, \u201cI\u2019m disappointed.\u00a0 I expected to see someone who would challenge my nursing skills.\u00a0 But you, as we say in nursing jargon, are gonna be a piece of cake.\u201d<\/p>\n

He managed to free his hand from the comforters and tentatively held it out. He hesitated.\u00a0 \u201cMaybe you\u2019d rather not.. not without a surgical glove… you know… eat that piece of cake.\u201d<\/p>\n

The remark was odd and lent itself to so many meanings that Nola was startled by it; but in her career patients often made bizarre statements, and she concealed her confusion. \u201cNonsense,\u201d she said, shaking his hand and giving no indication that it felt like skinless chicken bones. \u00a0 \u201cAs long as I\u2019m at it,\u201d she said in a switch of demeanor, \u201cI\u2019ll take your pulse.\u00a0 So, quiet!\u201d\u00a0 His pulse was only slightly elevated.<\/p>\n

\u201cSince you two seem to be getting on so well,\u201d Paige smiled, \u201cyou don\u2019t need me.\u201d\u00a0 She returned to the doorway. \u201cIs there anything you want me to get?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t see a baby monitor.\u00a0 If you don\u2019t have one, could you get a pair and put one in my room and one in here?\u201d\u00a0 She picked up the large bed pan that was on the foot of the bed.\u00a0 \u201cAnd could you ask someone to go down to a drug store and get a smaller pan… one that\u2019s easier to mount.\u00a0 And I don\u2019t see a walker.\u201d\u00a0 She picked up a prescription bottle that lay beside an overflowing ashtray and read, \u201cMesalamine.<\/em>\u00a0 It\u2019s an effective medicine,\u201d she said.\u00a0 \u201cThere should be more.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh,\u201d Paige said, returning to the bedside, speaking as though she were talking about a child, \u201cbut he refuses to take them. Then he lies to Doctor Boyer.\u00a0 He\u2019s written a dozen different types of medicines for him, and Spence doesn\u2019t take any of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThey don\u2019t help!,<\/em>\u201d Ghent said emphatically.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you take them with?\u201d Nola asked.<\/p>\n

Paige answered.\u00a0 \u201cA nice cold glass of milk.\u201d<\/p>\n

Surprised, Nola responded critically.\u00a0 \u201cSurely his doctor didn\u2019t recommend that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, water.\u00a0 But Spence prefers cold milk.\u00a0 He\u2019s a very fussy patient, you\u2019ll find. He\u2019s supposed to quit smoking, but he won\u2019t.\u201d She returned to the topic of the walker.\u00a0 \u201cYou don\u2019t mean one of those things old ladies use?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes. Lightweight aluminum with good rubber tips. And yes, we\u2019ll have to cut back on those cigarettes and then eliminate them altogether. \u00a0 And does this phone connect to the kitchen?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes.\u00a0 But Mrs. Eglington knows what to make for Spencer.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFine.\u00a0 But I\u2019d like to approve of it first.\u00a0 I have strict dietary rules.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCall her,\u201d Paige said, pointing to an old-fashioned house phone.\u00a0 \u201cShe knows you\u2019re the boss.\u201d\u00a0 She turned, waved her fingertips, and without explanation left the room.\u00a0 As she scampered down the stairs, she called.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m running late.\u00a0 See you at dinner.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nola left the room to put her coat and purse into her bedroom.\u00a0 She glanced out her bedroom window and saw Jules strolling back from the carriage house and Paige marching towards it.\u00a0 When she returned to Spencer\u2019s room, he was sitting up, looking stronger than he had looked before.\u00a0 \u201cI think,\u201d he said, \u201cthat I have to go to the bathroom.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nola helped him to get his feet over the side of the bed and then she bent forward, put her arms around him and pulled him to his feet.\u00a0 His body was flat against hers and she could tell that he had an erection.\u00a0 \u201cYou naughty boy,\u201d she said, smiling.<\/p>\n

\u201cSorry about that,\u201d he whispered; and with Nola supporting him as if they were doing a macabre dance, she led him all the way into the bathroom.\u00a0 She tugged on his pajama bottom and when it was low enough, she guided him down onto the seat.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019ll ring the bell when I\u2019m done,\u201d he said, indicating a cow bell that was on the sink.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll be in my room,\u201d she said.\u00a0 \u201cHave fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

When the bell rang she rushed to his bathroom and found him standing, supporting himself by holding onto the shower door.\u00a0 \u201cJust help me to get back into bed,\u201d he said.\u00a0 \u201cI sometimes get dizzy walking.\u201d\u00a0 He still had an erection and\u00a0saw that she noticed it.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re such a pretty woman, that I wouldn\u2019t insult you by having just a piss hard-on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nola raised her eyebrows.\u00a0 The job was going to be more difficult than she had assumed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An invitation to help correct a problem is often an invitation to accept the blame for it as Ming Zhen Shakya shows in Part 1 of The Crossword Puzzle..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":777,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10,21],"tags":[23,41],"class_list":["post-776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english","category-free-e-books","tag-tales-from-the-sangha","tag-the-crossword-puzzle"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=776"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":781,"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776\/revisions\/781"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zatma.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}