Dear Irene by Jan Burke Page A

going to impede a homicide investigation. Have you already called Frank about this?”
    I was dismayed by the question. “Of course not.”
    “Just wondering how far all this nooky-nooky stuff had addled your reporter’s sensibilities. So what does this letter mean?”
    “Thalia is one of the Graces. She represents Good Cheer. Not much of a clue as to the identity of the next victim, I’m afraid.”
    “‘Enjoy the Saturnalia,’” John read. “Does he mean Saturday?”
    “Maybe, but I would guess he means Christmas, because he tells me to wait for Janus. January is named after the god Janus.”
    “That’s Roman, not Greek, right?” he asked.
    “Right. Thanatos mixes in some Roman references in this letter. Saturnalia was a Roman winter festival in honor of the god Saturn. It was held in late December and there was feasting and exchanging of gifts. Someone once told me that’s why Christmas is celebrated in December, because the early Roman Church made use of a pagan holiday for their own — converting it, you might say.”
    “‘Thalia will learn the agony of Tantalus and more,’” John read aloud.
    “Tantalus — his name gave us the word ‘tantalizing.’ He’s in Hades, and stands in a pool of water that shrinks away from him whenever he bends to drink from it. When he stands up, it fills up again. And over his head, there’s a fruit tree with wonderful fruits that are always just beyond his grasp. He’s always hungry and thirsty, with relief within sight, but out of reach.”
    “Not short on cruelty in those stories, were they?”
    “No. But Tantalus had it coming. He killed his own son and boiled him in a cauldron, then invited the gods to a banquet with his son as the soup du jour.”
    “Cripes.” He was looking at me as if I had authored the tale.
    “That’s really the way the story goes,” I protested.
    “Tantalus thought he could show that the gods were fools, but they knew what was on the menu and decided to skip a meal and punish him. They restored his son to life. Cannibalism was frowned upon by the gods. They didn’t like measly little mortals trying to outwit them, either.”
    He shook his head. “What about Psyche and the seeds?”
    “Oh, that’s a great story — Cupid and Psyche.” I started to thumb through the book.
    “Just give me the part about the seeds,” John said, looking like he wasn’t ready to hear too much more about the Greeks and Romans before lunch. “It’s not gory, is it?”
    “No, no, it’s a love story,” I said, reading over it quickly. “It’s told in Latin by Apuleius.”
    “Never mind that. What happens in the story?”
    “Psyche was a beautiful woman. Venus was jealous of her. It was actually being claimed that she was more beautiful than the goddess, which offended Venus to no end. So Venus sent her son, Cupid, on a mission to make Psyche fall in love with the most vile creature on earth. But once he saw Psyche, Cupid ended up falling in love with her instead.”
    “What about the seeds?” John groused.
    “The middle part of the story is really very—”
    “Look, get to the seeds. Someday when I’m in a better mood, you can tell me all of it.”
    “You, in a better mood? I suspect we’ll be sitting by a very, very warm fire. Our host will have horns, but we’ll have lots of time on our hands—”
    “Kelly, I swear to God—”
    “Okay, okay. Condensed version. Psyche and Cupid loved each other, but as things happened, they were separated. Psyche decided to search for him, but Venus put a few obstacles in her way. Venus gathered a huge pile of the tiniest seeds — poppy seeds, millet, things like that — and told Psyche to sort them by nightfall. As Venus knew, it would have been impossible.”
    “So who helped her?” John said through gritted teeth.
    “Pardon?”
    “The question in the letter! Who the hell helped her?” he shouted.
    “Ants.”
    “Ants.”
    “Yes, the ants took pity on Psyche and an army of them