Triple Pursuit by Ralph McInerny Page A

hair.”
    â€œYeats’s poem to Lady Anne Gregory.”
    â€œYou say the most mystifying things.”
    â€œâ€˜Only God could love you for yourself alone and not your yellow hair.’”
    â€œOr silver.”
    â€œYou were going to show me the books.”
    â€œI have. Surely you don’t want to read them.”
    From that point, it was Aggie who escorted him on the tour of the offices. It was then four o’clock. Jack frowned at his watch.
    Aggie said, “Are you taking Colleen home?”
    â€œWe go in different directions.”

    â€œI have an idea.”
    Why didn’t they leave now and go somewhere for a drink? Jack felt that his celebrity days had returned. When they left the office and were saying good-bye to everyone, Jack gave Colleen a small conspiratorial smile.

8
    1
    There were housekeepers who complained that a rectory was a boring place where nothing much happened, but Marie Murkin was not among them. She sat now in her kitchen having a cup of tea with Stella Morris, who had worked at a string of rectories, never yet finding one to her sufficient liking to remain. When possibility called elsewhere she was ever ready to respond, but within months her disappointment began again.
    â€œI feel that life is passing me by, Marie.”
    â€œThen get married, for heaven’s sake.”
    â€œDon’t talk to me about marriage. I may be dissatisfied at Sacred Heart but I haven’t lost my mind.”
    â€œYou never thought of it?”
    â€œThinking doesn’t get you married.”
    â€œOr much else.”
    â€œHow long have you been here, Marie?”
    â€œI was already here when Father Dowling was given the parish.”
    â€œThat doesn’t answer my question.”
    â€œIt’s all the answer you’ll be getting. Next you’ll be asking me my age.”
    â€œI wish I had your stamina and contentment.”
    Marie wished that Father Dowling could hear this unsolicited testimonial.
The truth was, she had little sympathy for Stella’s wanderlust. What had it got her after all? She might have been a woman changing husbands again and again in hopes of finally getting the one she wanted. Life was what you made it, Marie thought, and she was content with her lot, having brought the parish near the mark she had set for it.
    â€œOf course, here you are in a place where excitement never stops.”
    â€œâ€˜Excitement’!”
    â€œI know all about it, Marie. Aged men fighting for the favors of an equally ancient woman. Everyone is talking about it.”
    â€œThey should find a more useful way to occupy their time.”
    â€œMarie, I have come here for the real dirt and you have to tell me.”
    â€œâ€˜Dirt’! What a thing to say. It is all perfectly innocent and silly. The problem is the woman, the flirtiest little seventy-year-old you ever saw in your life. She acts as if she were sixteen, and of course these old goats are enthralled by it. In that particular area of life, men are the greatest fools.”
    â€œWomen aren’t much better.”
    â€œI am talking about the men. Neither one of the men in question would have given a nod to Maud when they were in their prime. Of course, both were married then, but so was Maud. Honestly, it makes one wonder if it is wise to pray for a long life when you see what it does to so many.”
    â€œI’m told that one of them is Jack Gallagher.” Stella had a way of slurping when she took her tea and she had just lowered her cup and not quite swallowed.
    â€œAre you drooling?”
    â€œMarie, I used to hurry with the dishes, get my kitchen spick-and-span and then go off to my room to listen to that man.” Stella closed her eyes and swayed. She began to hum.
    â€œI know all about it,” Marie said impatiently. She herself had been a Gallagher devotee for years, a secret pleasure she had kept from the friars and from Father Dowling when he