The Pig Goes to Hog Heaven Read Online Free PDF Page A

cushioned coffin fashioned from boards wrested from her own bookshelves? Had she not witnessed the slow slide of her ancestral home, garden and all, into the waves of the Western Sea, with the coffined bones securely inside?
    Now he was come again, intent on yet another haunting of Castle Kissane. Of course, he had been murdered. This she acknowledged. But to return? Nothing could justify this intrusion. He had not been done in by her, not by her hand. Nor by the hand of—
    Here her protestations stopped. At the wake, her now husband had boasted that he himself had killed the man, having struck him across the skull with the leggett, the most impressive tool of the thatcher’s trade. Kieran had heard that she— she, Kitty McCloud! —had been called a cow-face by Declan Tovey. The murder was all too understandable. Kieran had obviously felled the blasphemous thatcher. If she had doubted Kieran’s confession at the time, the proof of its validity was now coming closer to her castle courtyard. Declan had come to haunt his killer.
    But another thought troubled her mind. If her husband had indeed murdered Declan, why was she, Kitty, seeing the man’s ghost? Of course, she, too, had confessed to the killing, but it was only to protect her friend Lolly, who, Kitty had been convinced, was the actual murderer. Lolly certainly had good cause. Had Declan not preferred herself, Kitty, to the lesser Lolly? And did not Lolly verify Kitty’s belief with her very own confession? But then, all three—Kitty, Kieran, and Lolly, each in turn—had laid claim to the well-deserved deed. Which was the legitimate claimant would probably never be known. But could a false confession alone allow even the innocent Kitty to be given the dubious privilege now being bestowed?
    Kitty tried to foreclose all further speculations. She would surrender to the event, requiring no understanding, demanding no explanations. But before she could content herself with this reluctant resignation, an added complexity presented itself. Coming through the pasture grass beyond the courtyard sheds was her husband. Even in her distracted state, she had time to be annoyed that he was wearing, along with his everyday corduroy pants and a worn work shirt, the coat meant to be his Sunday best. Also, she had thought he was in the castle scullery—known in lesser accommodations as the kitchen—preparing, as was his habit, the evening meal. To her momentary puzzlement, she saw that there, in a heavily gloved hand, was a bunch of greens. Immediately she realized they must be nettles—or why the gloved hand? These she herself would simmer to a spicy broth, once the current situation had been resolved.
    A greater unease came over her. Quite possibly Kieran, too, would see what she was seeing. Would he, before her very eyes, be confronted by the ghost of the man he may have murdered? As she watched, Kieran dropped the nettles. He had seen what she had feared he would see. Quickly, he leaned down and picked up the nettles. Then, with a sure step, he changed course and walked toward the advancing apparition.
    Declan, in life, had been a man few would care to confront. Challenge of any kind would unfailingly animate his famous temperament: He could be, at one and the same time, both the most fearsome and the most irresistible. Women were known to capitulate after minimal urgings. Strong and brave men would usually manage to relax into camaraderie, some friendships sealed with an exchange of resounding thumps on the back or an occasional slap on the buttocks. No one was protected from a charm firmly grounded in a rascality so assured it never had to resort to arrogance. And besides, who would want to extinguish the least gleam that might diminish so compelling a radiance? Often enough Declan was identified with Lucifer himself, the Angel of Light, astride the threshold of heaven’s gate, eagerly awaiting combat with a mere archangel. How