Paddy turned around and started back. Jimmy watched for a moment, noticed how his aging uncle moved more slowly suddenly, his shoulders hunched. He was a man shaken by the tenuous nature of life. Jimmy felt a breeze whip up over the lake, and more snow began to fall. In his dark suit, he wasn’t dressed for winter. Warmth awaited him back at the cottage in the form of food, family, the familiar things that brought comfort and light in times of darkness.
* * * *
Priority was a cagey word, one not easily qualified. Did the dead deserve it, because they had been wronged, or did the living get earmarked for attention as a result of their present suffering? It was a dilemma that faced Jimmy the next morning as he unlocked the door to his office and entered the small studio. He had two cases, b
