It was only when we were gathered together like this that I realized how many of us McAllisters there really were, even if we didn’t all share the same last name. We clustered in a corner of the cemetery, more than two hundred of us. A casual passerby might have thought us a strange-looking crew to be attending a grave-side service, for very few of us wore black. It wasn’t our custom to mourn in such a way. Of course we would all miss Ruby, miss her strength and her wisdom and her fierce loyalty to the clan, but we knew she had merely crossed over, not ceased to be. She was still living, only elsewhere. And I had seen for myself the expression of joy cross her face when it was time to walk over that threshold to the next world. I had no doubt that her husband Pat was there to welcome her.
