In This Small Spot Read Online Free PDF Page A

walked across the
park to a wooden door set in the stone wall. Backing through it,
she followed a flagstone walk to Father Andrew’s small house. The
tray was too heavy to hold with one hand to knock, so she balanced
on one foot and tapped the door with the other. It was opened in a
moment by an old nun.
    “There you are,” she said brusquely. “Come
in, come in,” she said, stepping back to let Mickey enter.
    Mickey carried the tray inside and set it on
the dining table. The old nun hurried over and began laying out the
covered dishes.
    “Don’t just stand there,” she ordered.
    Mickey quickly helped remove the covers, her
stomach growling as aromatic steam rose from each dish. “This is a
lot of food for one person,” she observed.
    “It’s not for one person,” the nun said,
placing serving spoons in the dishes. “Father Andrew has a guest.”
She placed the covers on the tray and rearranged the dishes and
bowls on the table until she was satisfied that everything was as
it should be. “Take that to the kitchen,” she said, flapping a
hand. Mickey carried the tray to the small kitchen while the nun
called out that lunch was ready.
    Father Andrew entered the dining room with
another elderly man in a secular black suit with a white
collar.
    “Andrew,” said the other man, looking
strangely out of place next to Father Andrew in his habit and the
nun in hers, “they spoil you. I can see why you love it here.”
    Father Andrew smiled. “Thank you, Sister
Linus. This looks wonderful.”
    She gave an arthritic bow. “You’re welcome,
Father. I’ll be back to take care of the dishes.” She went to the
kitchen and gestured to Mickey, taking her by the arm and walking
her to the front door. “You can go now,” she said.
    Mickey turned to ask if she was needed to
come back and collect the tray when Sister Linus shut the door in
her face. “You’re welcome,” she muttered.
    She hurried back through the enclosure to
get her own lunch.
    “Michele!”
    Gritting her teeth, Mickey turned to see
Sister Lucille waving at her. “Could you please take this to the
vestment room for me?” she huffed, holding a paper-wrapped package
nearly as tall as she was. “They brought it to the front door by
mistake.” Mickey opened her mouth to ask if this couldn’t be done
later, but Sister Lucille was already walking back to her
office.
    With an exasperated sigh, Mickey turned.
“Where is the vestment room?” she asked aloud to no one as the
community was all in the refectory. She knew a bit about it – “we
have a waiting list of nearly two years,” Sister Rosaria had told
them proudly. “Our orders come from all over the world – and not
just Catholic churches and monasteries, but other denominations and
even synagogues.” But none of the postulants had been there, as
only the nuns specially trained for that work were assigned
there.
    Frowning, Mickey remembered seeing a
“Deliveries” sign on one of the outside walls of a wing of the
monastery. She let herself back out into the enclosure, through the
wooden door again, past Father Andrew’s house to the far end of the
abbey’s main building where she saw a concrete parking pad and a
door. Struggling to hold the roll as the stiff breeze tugged on it,
she turned the knob on the door. The wind grabbed the door and
flung it wide open.
    There was an angry exclamation as she
stepped inside.
    “Close that door!”
    Mickey reached back and wrenched the door
shut. Inside, all was chaos. Swathes of cloth had been blown off
tables, and spindles of thread were rolling across the floor.
Mickey could see the twinkling of sunlight off the motes of dust
and dirt that had blown in with her.
    One nun was scrambling about picking up
pieces of material.
    “Look what you’ve done!” she exclaimed.
    “I’m sorry,” Mickey gasped, dropping her
wrapped roll and reaching for one of the large sheets of cloth
lying crumpled on the floor.
    “Stop!”
    Mickey froze. The nun