"There's the tree," I moaned.
"Yes, and it's a fine tree," Diana said. Despite her claims of psychic ability, the woman didn't have a clue.
"That's where I met Aaron."
"Ah, yes, Aaron. I dated his brother Moses, you know."
"Not that Aaron! Aaron Miller." Diana tossed her head in disdain. Unfortunately, the black wig stayed snugly in place. The
gold serpent slipped a bit however, but she didn't seem to notice.
"Moses - now there was a real man! He drove the fastest chariot in all of Goshen. All the Hebrew girls were crazy about him,
but of course we Egyptians got first dibs. And since my daddy was the pharaoh-well, I'm not at liberty to say what went on in the
bulrushes."
"You're a raving lunatic, dear," I said gently.
“That's exactly what I said to Moses when he threatened Daddy with the plagues. Then they started to happen. Now, I didn't
mind the first plague so much - we women can deal with a little blood, right? But those frogs!" She stopped and pointed at the
pond. "Are there any frogs in there?"
"It's chock full of the critters, dear."
Diana grabbed my arm and yanked me away from the water's edge, away from the tree that changed my life. "Those
wretched beasts were everywhere," she croaked. "They were in my bed, on my pillow, even in my drinking cup."
"Hey, stop," I protested weakly, "I wanted to sit here for a moment. This is a very special place for me."
"Because of that silly tree?"
"So what if it is? After all, a gal has a right to lash herself with the whip of regret every now and then. Sure, it may leave
unsightly welts, but the discomfort is nothing compared to choking down crow."
Diana had the talons of an eagle and she continued to drag me until we were well away from the pond. "Aaron broke your
heart, didn't he?"
I unpeeled her fingers from my arm. "Maybe."
"Well, Moses broke mine. I heard he married a Midianite woman who wasn't half as pretty as I, nor a tenth as rich. It didn't
matter - I still loved him. But then after that Red Sea fiasco I never saw him again. He just disappeared into the wilderness. I
guess that shouldn't have come as a big surprise because he was always getting lost - never would stop and ask directions. At
any rate, I suppose I should have made an effort to find him. But then what? I mean, what if I had convinced him to dump the
Midianite and marry me? The truth is, I've never been much of a camper."
"Why didn't you just call him on your cellular?"
Pharaoh frowned. "Are you mocking me, Magdalena? Don't think I haven't heard all those nasty little asides of yours. You
must think I'm stupid as well as crazy."
"If the shoe fits, dear, buy several pairs. Who knows when they're going to let you out again?"
Diana shook her head so hard the golden cobra went sailing, only to land at my feet with thunk. The black wig - if that's
indeed what it was - stayed put.
"Before the day's over I'll prove to you that I am Ankhesenamen. I tell you what - what if I call up my husband,
Tutankhamen? You'll like Tut - everyone does - even though he overdoes it with the jewelry."
I picked up the headpiece and handed it to her. It may not have been real gold, but it was remarkably heavy.
"That's okay, dear. I'll take your word for it. Sorry about the cellular joke."
She plopped the diadem back on with surprising carelessness. "No harm done. And you're right, it would have been so much
easier with a cellular phone. Although I got a letter once - but both tablets were broken, smashed into smithereens - it was almost
impossible to read. I had the court librarian reassemble it, but it was hardly worth the effort. I mean, the message was just was so
negative. Anyway, I never wrote back."
I rolled my eyes the second she turned her head. Don't for a second think that I bought into her story. I may have been under
some kind of a spell, but my chandelier wasn't missing any bulbs.
"Diana, dear - "
"Ah - ah - ah - I must insist that you address me as Your Royal Highness."
"I thought you were a queen. And what ever happened to Mother Anjelica Houston ?"
"I jettisoned Anjelica. And I am a queen."
"Well, shouldn't you be a majesty, as opposed to a highness?"
Diana sighed. "Well, maybe. English is such a difficult language."
"They say the same thing in Oakland, dear. Anyway, I just wanted to ask you a simple question."
"Oh, all right, what is it?"
We had left the pond far behind and were only a pyramid width from the house. "I wanted to know if you knew Irma Yoder
before the war?"
"Which war would that be? The war against the Greeks or the war against the Romans? Tut, you know, had this thing for
Cleopatra, and she wasn't any better looking than that Midianite Moses took up with."
"Stop it," I wailed. "At least get your facts right."
"I beg your pardon?"
"King Tut never hankered over Liz."
"He didn't?"
"Not in his lifetime, at any rate. And it was Ramses the Second who oppressed the Hebrews, and his son who finally let them
go."
Diana blinked rapidly. It may have been only misting, but the kohl was oozing down her face like dozens of miniature lava
flows. I suspected that there were tears involved as well.
"Are you sure ?" Her voice was suddenly weak.
"Reasonably. Many scholars seem to think so. And oh, by the way, you look just like a Rorschach inkblot test."
Trust me, it really was an attempt to cheer her up.
"What?"
I rubbed my index finger along her cheek. Along with some kohl deposits, I scooped up a good inch of putty-like foundation.
"My gracious, is that Jimmy Hoffa under there?"
She jerked her face away, the black wig slapping me in the face "Go away," she said in a little girl's voice.
I am not the mean, overbearing woman some folks have accused me of being. It broke my heart to see King Tut's tootsie
tearing up like that.
"Diana, can we talk?"
"What's there to talk about? You think I'm crazy."
I prayed for an understanding heart and a gentle tongue.
"Don't you?"
"Well, we're all entitled to our eccentricities, so let's just say that you are more blessed in that department than most."
The black wig whipped around again, narrowly missing my left eye. "Okay, you win. Sometimes the line between fact and
fantasy blurs for me. Is that so wrong? I mean, just look at you."
"What about me?"
"Well, there you are, a good Mennonite girl, practically never been kissed - "
"Oh, I've been kissed, sister! I've had the full monty." Okay, so I never saw the movie, but Susannah did. Frankly, she was
disappointed that she didn't see the full monty.
"What I mean is, your virtuous, restricted life, based on your religious beliefs, of course, but you're in the minority."
"What's wrong with that?" I wailed. Don't think for a minute that I doubt who I am, or what I believe - well, okay, but doubt is a
perfectly natural component of faith.
Reverend Schrock said so in his last sermon.
"Oh, there's nothing wrong with it, it's just that you might consider loosening up a bit. You know, live into your fantasies."
"Is it profitable?" I asked sensibly.
Diana smiled. "Spoken like a true Yoder. It can be."
I ignored her insensitive generalization. "Okay, so you're no longer Mother Anjelica Houston, but you still heading up the
Convent of the Broken Heart in Bedford?"
"Yes, but now we call it a retreat. We offer psychic adjustment and spiritual travel. You'd be surprised what folks can be
talked into spending their money on, just so long as they think it's something really special, something not available to the hoi
polloi."
"So that's where my clientele went! And all this time I thought they were in Montana frolicking naked with wolves."
"Heavens, no! Montana and Wyoming are passé now. No, Magdalena, I'm happy to say that the Retreat of the Fractured
Soul is now the watering hole of the rich and blameless."
She turned and strode toward the farmhouse. Despite the twenty years she has on me, I practically had to run to keep up.
"Are you trying to tell me that Babs and John and Shirley now hang out in that dump of yours?" I knew that it was only a
matter of time before Travolta would bolt, but not those two.
"Well, not Shirley. Not anymore. She didn't like Sister Agnes's cooking and left this morning."
"Oh, so that's why you're really here. You came to steal Freni from me. Well, I've got news for you, dear. Freni quit!"
"I don't care about Freni. She doesn't cook vegetarian anyway. Like I told you, I came to help you find the missing presence -
I mean, people."
I lagged a cautious step behind. "Which is it, dear? Are you as nutty as Grandma Yoder's fruitcake, or a pragmatic
businesswoman?"
"Both."
"Come again?"
She stopped abruptly and I nearly slammed into her. : "You wouldn't understand."
"Try me."
"Sometimes I am Ankhesenamen, and sometimes I'm me, Diana Louise Lefcourt. Yes, I know, I have a grown son living in
Johnstown, Pennsylvania, but I had three children in Egypt. They're dead now, of course, but I can remember them just as clearly
as I can my son in Johnstown."
She was right. I didn't understand.
"Well, you don't say!" Better a little gentle sarcasm, I figured, than an outright harsh remark. Trust me, Irma Yoder, bless her
aged missing heart, would not have shown such restraint.
"I knew you wouldn't understand. But that's how it is. Some days I'm more one than the other. I don't seem able to control it
much anymore."
"Oh?"
"It wasn't like this in the beginning, you know."
"Oh?" What else was there to say? I had prayed for a charitable tongue, and was still waiting for the Good Lord to send me
the replacement. Until it arrived, it was best to say as little as possible.
"I started the convent, as I called it back then, as a place where women could gather and express themselves freely. The
channeling thing was just a lark - something to amuse us in the evenings. But then gradually it became real to me. Tutankhamen
- well, I was never really him, but something made me pick him as the channeler, and then later Ankhesenamen."
"Could that something have been the devil, dear?"
"Magdalena, you don't still believe in a devil, do you? All red with horns and a tail?"
"You forgot the pitchfork, dear." It was meant to be facetious.
"You do, don't you? Of course you do! How charming." I blushed devil red. I know I'm a dying breed, but there you have it. I
do believe in the devil. Of course I don't believe he - and indeed he is male - necessarily has a tail and horns. Or carries a
pitchfork. More likely he is a wiry little thing with bulging eyes and wears a police chief's uniform.
"Well, at least I believe in God too," I mumbled.
"So do I, Magdalena. But we are all God. Don't you get it? Every one of us is a component of the universal godhead."
Again I thought of a wiry little man with bulging eyes and a police chief's uniform. "Wrong!"
"Oh well, I guess there is no point in trying to enlighten you."
"Likewise I'm sure, dear. So, you went chasing after false prophets and caught up with one. Well, let's see, I don't think
Reverend Schrock performs exorcisms, but the priest over in Bedford might."
Diana grabbed both my wrists. Her extraordinarily strong grip was certainly a testimony to the power of fruits and nuts.
"Look, we can stand here in this miserable wet cow pasture and argue theology and the state of my mental health, or we can
do something to save your life."
"My life?"
Diana nodded. "I wasn't going to tell you this unless I had to, because I knew it would freak you out. But I had a dream last
night in which you were killed. I've had three of these dreams in the past, Magdalena, and every one of them came true."