The Last Suppers

by Diane Mott Davidson

  “They did. Lucille is building a columbarium she intends to dedicate to Father Pinckney. I think she believes when it’s done, he’ll come out of retirement and be our rector again.”

  Boyd muttered sarcastically, “I don’t know if I’d want to return to a church with an ash cemetery dedicated to me. What a place. I thought this was where everybody loved each other. You know, sing songs and give money to the poor?”

  I said quietly, “You haven’t been to church for a while.”

  “Yeah, maybe I’ll go, and you can take me. All right, just a couple more questions. Did Olson get along with his assistant, this Doug Ramsey?”

  Julian appeared with huge bowls heaped with hot buttered popcorn. The fragrance filled the living room, and I gestured to Helen and Boyd to help themselves.

  “I guess they got along,” I said after I thanked Julian and he disappeared. “Doug’s on the Board of Theological Examiners.” I cast around to remember in what other contexts I had seen Doug Ramsey work. He was involved in diocesan work and was Olson’s liaison with the Aspen Meadow Habitat for Humanity. I told this to Boyd.

  “Yeah, we know that. We also heard Ramsey was the bishop’s spy.”

  “What?” I was nonplussed. Father Insensitive, with his overtalkative, exaggerating way and his lists of things to do, a spy? Spying on what? Or whom?

  Somehow, Boyd had rid himself of the match. He took a handful of popcorn, ate quickly, and said, “We heard that the bishop thought Olson was out in left field and moving toward the wall. As in going, going, gone, bye-bye Episcopal Church, hello new denomination.” He scooped up more popcorn, ate it, and reflected. “So tell me. Is moving out of your sedate church’s ballpark the kind of thing people would kill for? I know, you say, you have to look at the different groups.” There was still an edge of sarcasm in his voice.

  “Look,” I said with more ferocity than I intended, “let me give you an example of the kind of thing that can happen in our oh-so-sedate church. On the national level, we had a prolonged and very public fight over the ordination of women to the priesthood. After that was approved, there was an incident at an Episcopal church. A man came up to the altar and tried to strangle a female priest administering communion. He didn’t protest, he didn’t go to another church, he tried to strangle a woman he did not know. He screamed, ‘You bitch, I hate you, what do you think you’re trying to do?’”

  Unmoved, Boyd said, “But Olson wasn’t a woman. This is different. Or is it? Which group did the strangler belong to?”

  My face was hot after my outburst. I grasped the ring box and tried to summon up Tom Schulz’s calm. “I don’t know whether it’s different, that’s the whole problem. I’d say the would-be strangler was part of the Old Guard. Did Doug Ramsey tell you he was a spy?”

  Boyd grinned. “Of course not. You know anything about the financial status of your parish?”

  I said that as far as I knew, the parish had typical financial problems. Typical in what way, Boyd wanted to know. Different church groups wanted money for their projects; there was never enough to go around. There was some squabbling over funds. But Marla had said giving was up.

  Boyd’s eyes narrowed. “Year before last, your parish had a gross income of a hundred thousand. Last year it was a hundred-twenty thou, pretty good growth rate in a recession, but a couple of invalids left money to the parish when they died. Year to date—we’re talking a little over four months—the church’s income was three hundred thousand dollars. This isn’t Olson’s dough, mind you, it belongs to the parish. Could that be something the bishop would be interested in?”

  A dry laugh crackled in my throat. “If the parish was doing that well, and the diocesan office knew about it, I’m surprised they didn’t send up a dozen priests to spy.”

  Boyd said, “One of the women told me that all the money was coming in because there was some magical healing stuff going on here. That Olson was the founder or perpetrator, and people were paying to get a piece of that magic.”

  “Miraculous claims aren’t typical of our church.” Unlike Chimayó, I wanted to add, but didn’t. “Then again, neither are today’s events.”

  “So you don’t know anything about the money coming from some miracle agenda?” When I shrugged, Boyd continued. “Okay, two more questions. I need to know what you know about this”—he flipped a page in his notebook and scanned it—“candidate for holy orders.” He said the unfamiliar words slowly. “Named Mitchell Hartley. Guy wants to be a priest,” he summarized. “Flunked the oral exam for the priesthood last year. We hear Olson was behind the flunking.”

  I told them what I knew of Hartley, whose chief distinction as one of the charismatic parishioners was his vehement opposition to Lucille’s columbarium project. Idolatry, Hartley had fumed at the parish meeting, his face flushed, his mass of red hair quivering. Do you think the Lord would have wanted a columbarium? I knew Father Olson had urged the Board of Theological Examiners to flunk Hartley last year. I did not know why. “Mitchell Hartley goes to the second service at our church,” I said. “I don’t really know him very well.”

  Boyd pulled in his stomach with a noisy breath. “Well, we’re looking into that. Lots of money, miraculous healings, a candidate who was flunked. Now about this Agatha Preston—”

  But before he could elaborate, his beeper went off, and he asked to use the kitchen phone. When he trundled back into the living room two minutes later, he had put his notebook and pen away. “We’ll have to talk more about this tomorrow, Goldy. The team is done over at the church, and they want to go out to Schulz’s place tonight, to see if he left any notes by his phone, or anything else that could help us out. We still have his keys from the creek.”

  Trancelike, I mumbled an okay. Boyd and Helen Keene moved awkwardly toward my front door. Helen dropped down on one knee and retrieved the victim-assistance quilt I’d once again inadvertently dropped on the floor. It was splotched with mud. Helen asked if I wanted her to wash it. I thanked her and said please give it to someone else; I had plenty of blankets. She folded the quilt, draped it over her arm, and gave me an affectionate, unexpectedly lovely smile. They would both be in touch, she assured me, and I should call if I needed anything. The front door closed quietly behind them.

  I sat there in my silent living room and thought back to the cold March afternoon I’d spent with Zelda Preston and her pain. Lucille Boatwright had led Zelda slowly through the church doors, her arm around her slumped shoulders. I’d taken Zelda’s untouched cup of coffee back to the parish kitchen. The powdered creamer was still lumpy and floated on top. Because of my cast, I hadn’t been able to stir it in.

  7

  Still gripping the jewelry box, I moved over to a chair next to unopened boxes transported from Tom’s place along with his oven. I put my hand on the cardboard and stared at the cold ashes in the fireplace. Remember, o man, that dust thou art, and to dust shalt thou return, Olson had solemnly proclaimed over each of us at the Ash Wednesday service, just as he dipped his finger into ashes and made the sign of the cross on our foreheads. He’d been more than Marla’s assessment: a cute charismatic. He had been knowledgeable and kind; his faith was heartfelt. Olson had even charmed his way into Tom Schulz’s heart. And now Father Ted Olson was dead. My chest ached.

  I forced myself to get up and stow the two ring boxes and Tom’s wallet in my china buffet. I allowed myself only a moment of what-could-have-been: In my mind’s eye, I saw Olson smiling over us as Tom slid the ring on my finger. This was supposed to have been our wedding night. A terrible emptiness descended on me.

  Julian and Arch, their torsos wrapped in blue diamond-patterned victim-assistance quilts, were finishing up a bowl of popcorn in the kitchen. Giving me a guilty look, Julian untangled himself and used the business line to make his overdue call to Beaver Creek, canceling Tom’s and my hotel reservations. Arch asked politely to see the page of Tom’s notes. I quickly penned a copy for myself, then gave the photocopied sheet to him.

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nbsp; The moon had risen, the boys had gone to bed, and it was past midnight by the time I had worked my way through all of Tom Schulz’s boxes looking for letters, files or journals—anything with abbreviations. Feeling a pang of guilt for invading his privacy, I checked Tom’s wallet, which had my business card and Julian’s and Arch’s school photos in it. In the boxes, I was rewarded only with bank statements, tax returns, and old bills. Maybe the police would find something out at Tom’s cabin or in the trashed church office that offered a clue, for I surely hadn’t.

  Outside, the air was still fiercely cold and windy. Wearily, I backtracked to the kitchen, where Scout the cat meowed insistently to be fed. In all the confusion, I had forgotten the poor feline, whom I now moved carefully from the food prep area. While Scout tilted his head appraisingly, I ripped open a packet of cat food and dumped it into his dish. But it was not enough. After a few dainty mouthfuls, Scout sought affection by throwing himself on his furry spine on the kitchen floor. I rubbed his stomach and told him that we both should get some sleep. My eyes burned and my head throbbed. Waiting had never been my long suit.

  I longed to get out my electric blanket, turn it to high, and sleep. But sleeping in a warm bed? I couldn’t do it; it would be betraying Tom, who probably was neither warm nor comfortable. I thought of his handsome face with its penetrating green eyes, of his body with its warm folds of flesh that I had come to love. When I tried to rest on the living room couch, the wind whistled down the chimney flue and through the moulding around the picture window. Propelling myself off the cushions at three o’clock, I returned to the kitchen to do the one thing that had ever helped me cope with anxiety: cook.

  I was glad I’d dumped out all of Tom’s recipes before Julian made a dirt-covered shrine out of the box that had held them. The directions for Monster Cinnamon Rolls beckoned. Try for G, Tom had written. Scout, happy to see me again, and ever hopeful for a snack, twined between my legs as I melted butter in milk, proofed yeast, and beat eggs. The recipe made a large batch, which would do for the first church service that was now only a few hours away. Would the person who kidnapped Tom come to church? Could it really be someone from the church? I hoped not. So much for Thou Shalt Not Kill.

  I kneaded the sweet dough vigorously. Because of Boyd’s questions about St. Luke’s, I found my mind wandering back to the Episcopal parishes of my childhood. My father’s business ventures brought us to town after town with the same sign, The Episcopal Church Welcomes You. No matter where our family lived, there was the same church built of stone, with the same stony people inside. The priest had always been a faraway man with his back to a congregation that recited the same prayers and sang the same hymns no matter where you went. Those priests were a far cry from the smiling, disheveled, folk music-loving and sympathetic-to-everybody Father Theodore Olson. In the old days, Sunday School walls boasted pictures of a Jesus who looked more like a blond fellow in a nightgown than a rabble-rousing first-century Palestinian. In those days, the women’s church groups held fund-raising events; the men’s groups went on retreats; the youth groups caroled upper-class neighborhoods at Christmas.

  You never had a murder.

  I pounded out the air bubbles from the risen dough, rolled it into a long, thin rectangle, then slathered on softened butter mixed with brown sugar and cinnamon. The wind whistled around the back doorjamb; I recalled a particular windy moving day from my childhood, when I’d tearfully said good-bye to neighborhood and Sunday School friends before our family settled in New Jersey. I often suspected the reason I’d fallen in love at twenty with John Richard Korman was that he had the baby-faced features, blond-brown hair, and affecting smile of a Sunday School friend whose name I had forgotten.

  I quickly rolled the dough into a fat log and measured where to slice. After my life fell apart and I’d pretty much managed to put it back together, Tom Schulz had appeared, with his large, handsome, self-confident body and spirit. Tom Schulz, who loved Arch and Julian and me with a frightening intensity, who had awakened vulnerability and affection that I had presumed dead, who was willing to do anything to keep us happy. Who had said to Father Olson last night that he and I would not be parted by death, no matter what the wedding vows claimed. And now he was held captive by God-knew-whom for God-knew-what reason. If he was still alive.

  MONSTER CINNAMON ROLLS

  DOUGH:

  ¾ cup (1 ½ sticks) unsalted butter

  1 cup milk

  ¾ cup plus 1 teaspoon sugar

  1 ¼ teaspoons salt

  3 ¼-ounce envelopes (7 ½ teaspoons) active dry yeast

  ½ cup warm water

  5 large eggs

  8 ½ to 9 ½ cups all-purpose flour

  FILLING:

  5 cups firmly packed brown sugar

  1 ¼ cups (2 ½ sticks) unsalted butter

  3 tablespoons ground cinnamon

  FROSTING:

  ½ pound cream cheese, softened

  ¼ cup whipping cream, approximately

  1 teaspoon vanilla extract

  3 to 4 cups confectioners’ sugar, sifted

  For the dough, heat the butter with the milk, ¾ cup of the sugar, and the salt in a small saucepan until the butter is melted. Set aside to cool. In a large mixing bowl, sprinkle the yeast over the warm water, add the remaining teaspoon sugar, stir, and set aside for 10 minutes, until the mixture is bubbly. Add the lukewarm milk mixture and the eggs and beat until well combined. Add the flour a cup at a time, stirring and using enough flour to form a stiff dough. Turn out on a floured board and knead until smooth and satiny, approximately 10 minutes. (Or place in the bowl of an electric mixer and knead with a dough hook until the dough cleans the sides of the bowl, approximately 5 minutes.) Place the dough in a very large buttered bowl, turn to butter the top, and allow to rise, covered loosely with a kitchen towel, in a warm place until doubled in bulk, approximately 1 hour. Punch the dough down and roll out to a large rectangle, 24 inches by 36 inches.

  Butter two 9- by 13-inch glass baking dishes. For the filling, beat together the brown sugar, butter, and cinnamon until well combined. Spread evenly over the surface of the dough. Roll up lengthwise and cut at 2-inch intervals to make 12 rolls. Place 6 rolls in each buttered dish. Cover loosely with a kitchen towel and allow to rise until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.

  Preheat the oven to 350°. Bake the rolls for about 20 to 30 minutes or until puffed and browned. Cool to room temperature on racks.

  For the frosting, beat the cream cheese, cream, and vanilla until well combined. Add the confectioners’ sugar and beat until smooth and soft, not stiff. Frost the rolls and serve immediately.

  Makes 12 large rolls

  I cut the dough carefully at the evenly spaced intervals and placed the thick sugary spirals in a buttered pan. I needed to sleep; I needed to pull myself together and find out as much as I could about Father Olson, for surely the murderer’s path led through our parish, or through a committee, or through the diocese….

  My eye fell on the pile of exams from the candidates I was to help examine in three days.

  Olson had told me that in the third and final year of their seminary training, candidates for the priesthood took the General Ordination Exams that now graced my counter. The battery of tests covered the seven canonical areas: Church History, Liturgics, Pastoral Theology, Ethics, Theology, Issues of Contemporary Society, and Scripture. The tests were graded by the General Board of Examining Chaplains on the national level, which then sent the exams on to the dioceses. In the diocese of Colorado, the Board of Theological Examiners read them, determined areas of weakness, and then gave oral exams to the candidates. A candidate had to show oral proficiency in all seven areas before he or she could be ordained. That sounded like a lot, I’d said to Father Olson. Maybe I wasn’t really up to it. Just read the exams and ask yourself whether you’d want to have this person as your priest, he’d solemnly replied.

  Mitchell Hartley’s exam was in my pile, although I didn’t know which was his. Nu
mbers at the top of each candidate’s test sheets kept the examiners from knowing who was who, to eliminate prejudice. I had my list identifying candidates by number somewhere. Unfortunately, there had been a mix-up at the diocesan office, and I had not received my photocopied set of papers to read until yesterday, when I was deep into pâte doughs, bridal bouquets, and Portobello mushrooms. I hadn’t read any of the exams, and the last thing I wanted to do was get academic on what was supposed to have been my wedding night.

  Still. When I looked at the sheaf of papers, I could see the indulgent grin on Father Olson’s face when he’d appointed me to the twelve-person committee, saying that not only did he treasure my culinary abilities, he also valued what I had to offer the Board intellectually. Sure, the way people read Playboy for the interviews. But the diocese had paid the discounted rate I’d given them to bring Gorgonzola quiche, asparagus rolls, cauliflower salad, and chocolate cake to my first Board meeting, when the discussion centered on the ethics of breaking the seal of confession if a person’s life was in danger. After years of casseroles and Jell-O, and without waiting to hear my opinions on confession, the Board immediately proclaimed their faith in me.

  Before the meeting, Father Olson had said there were “a few rumblings” over the appointment of a laywoman who was a caterer to this powerful board that had the final say on whether persons were ordained. “Better tell them about your theological training,” Olson had warned me, “so they, too, will value your mind as well as your mousse.” So at my introduction, I’d dutifully told of the sixteen-week course for Sunday School teachers I’d taken two years before from Canon Montgomery, a member of their board, at the Aspen Meadow Episcopal Conference Center. Canon Montgomery, now soon to be our emergency pastor at St. Luke’s, looked like a ruddy toad. He’d beamed and lapped up my flattery along with his piece of cake. I didn’t mention his aggravating tendency to pat his white hair along its middle part as he put spiritual experience into rhymed couplets.