by Glen Ebisch
Seaside Secrets
A Pastor Clarissa Abbot Mystery
by
Glen Ebisch
For Marie and Joe Flahive: good friends.
Chapter One
Clarissa Abbot stood in the hospital hallway, sweat beading on her forehead. Granted, it was a surprisingly warm day for the middle of May, but the building was well air-conditioned, and Clarissa knew that she was perspiring from nervousness, not heat. She was just finishing up her first week as pastor at Shore Side Community Church in Shore Side, New Jersey. It had been a week of firsts for her, especially since the previous pastor, Reverend Warren Hollingsworth, had spent only a short afternoon with her going over how the church was run before leaving with his son for a new life of retirement in western Pennsylvania. His last words as he went out the door were to blithely say that the church secretary, Mrs. Dalrymple, would fill her in on anything he’d overlooked, which were, in Clarissa’s opinion, most of the essential details.
Unfortunately, Mrs. Dalrymple’s daughter had phoned the next day to say that her mother had to quit her position out of ill health, and she was immediately moving to be with family in northern New Jersey. The gossip around the church, which Clarissa tried—unsuccessfully—to ignore, said that Mrs. Dalrymple had carried a decade-long torch for the old Reverend, a distinguished-looking widower, and was crushed when he suddenly picked up sticks and decided to leave the area without giving her more than a day of warning. There were even some who thought that the Reverend’s sudden decision to move came about as a result of the widow Dalrymple’s increasingly aggressive attentions.
Whatever the cause, all of these desertions, as Clarissa found herself morosely thinking of them, had left her without any help at getting up to speed in her new position. Oh, she had preached a good enough sermon on her first Sunday, and struggled after church to learn the many names of those who came to her welcoming luncheon, but the business side of running the church was locked inside the office computer, which she had so far been unable to access. She had called Reverend Hollingsworth several times during the last week to ask for the computer password, but he had yet to be available—due to spending most of his time out on the links with his son.
But the computer was a problem for another day. Today, Clarissa was doing hospital rounds for the first time since her assignment as a trainee assistant pastor. Fortunately, there was only one member of her congregation in the hospital, a man named David Ames. As she walked into his room, she hoped that he would be as hale and hearty as one could be in the hospital. It was always hard to offer comfort to someone who was both suffering and a complete stranger.
The blinds were pulled back halfway from the windows at the end of the room, offering a glimpse of the Atlantic Ocean a few blocks away. The first bed she came to was occupied by a man who was either asleep or unconscious, and the other had a curtain pulled around it.
Clarissa waited discreetly for a couple of minutes for the curtain to be removed, but eventually decided that she could be waiting there all day. “Hello?” she called out softly.
A middle-aged woman in a nurse’s uniform popped out from around the curtain. She was almost as tall as Clarissa and more heavily built. “I’m just finishing up Mr. Ames’ sponge bath,” she said, giving Clarissa a suspicious look. “Are you a member of his family?”
Clarissa, like a lot of women in the ministry, had mixed feelings about wearing a clerical collar. On the one hand, it defined who you were—which was often helpful if you were, like herself, a young woman and didn’t look particularly ministerial—but it also established a distance between yourself and the people you were trying to serve. Since seminary, she had settled for wearing a dark blouse and black slacks along with a short-length jacket. Her light brown hair, which tended to bleach out to blond in the summer, was cut in a short bob. She was twenty-seven, but knew she looked younger, so she was accustomed to being challenged while doing her job.
“I’m the minister from the Shore Side Community Church,” she replied.
The nurse still looked skeptical. “I thought the minister from that church was an older, respectable-looking man.”
Clarissa wondered if she fell short as a woman or because she was somehow less than respectable.
“He retired,” she said. “I’m his replacement.” She stuck out her hand. “Pastor Clarissa Abbot.”
“Nice to meet you,” the nurse said, taking her hand. “I’m Wanda Bascomb. No offense intended, we just have to be careful about security nowadays.”
“I understand.”
“Let me just get Dave straightened up, and you can talk to him. But he gets tired very quickly, just so you know.” She gave Clarissa a meaningful glance as if to suggest that Dave was in dire straits.
A few moments later, the curtain slid back with dramatic speed, and David Ames was revealed, propped up in bed. It was hard to tell his size under the bedclothes, but Clarissa’s guess was that he was tall and thin. He had a fringe of white hair that was clearly losing the fight against baldness, and an equally white mustache which was flourishing, as if to offset the hair loss elsewhere. He had a long face, and would probably have been a pleasant-looking man when he smiled. He wasn’t smiling now.
“Who are you?” he asked sharply.
The nurse rolled her eyes in sympathy and went over to tend to the man in the other bed.
“Reverend Hollingsworth retired. I’ve taken his place,” Clarissa explained. “I’m Pastor Clarissa Abbot, his replacement.” She walked closer and held out her hand, but he just glared at it as if it might hold a concealed hypodermic. She sighed to herself and returned her hand to her side. Some older men responded positively to a female minister, others didn’t. She’d learned to roll with the punches.
“Hollingsworth is gone? I’m in the hospital for a week and he runs off.” David Ames stared at her for a long moment. “Maybe there is something you can do for me. There’s something I need to talk about.”
“I’m a good listener.”
“I’m not going to tell you,” he snapped.
“I saw Father Molloy down the hall,” Clarissa suggested. “I’m sure you could talk to him.”
“I don’t need a priest. I’m not about to confess to anything . . . at least, not exactly.” Ames looked away.
“I’m sure you could just have a chat with Father Malloy. It wouldn’t have to be anything more formal than that,” Clarissa said gently. Father Malloy was well into his seventies, probably around the same age as the man in front of her. She knew some men found it easier to talk with other men of their generation.
“Forget it.”
“Is there someone you do know that I could arrange to have come see you?” she asked patiently.
David Ames stared across the room while Clarissa listened to his labored breathing. The rumor at church was that he was in the last stages of congestive heart failure. She’d been doing the job long enough by now to be aware of how people faced death differently, and she hoped that he would find some comfort in his faith.
“Have Jack Spurlock come to see me,” he finally said.
“The sacristan,” Clarissa replied with a nod.
Ames gave her a blank look. “I mean the church maintenance man,” he said. “A guy about my age.”
Clarissa fought back a smile, knowing it was useless to try to explain that “sacristan” was the proper term for Jack Spurlock’s position. “I know him,” she said. “I’ll arrange for him to come.”
Ames took in a particularly long breath and shuddered. “Tell him not to wait too long.”
“I’ll see that he comes as soon as he can. Now, would you like us to pray together?” she offered, reaching out to touch his hand.
He pulled his hand away and shoo
k his head vehemently. “Just get Spurlock here.”
Chapter Two
Clarissa drove the mile from the hospital to the Victorian house that served as the parsonage. Shore Side was a small city situated along the southern coast of New Jersey that survived mostly on the income generated during the four months out of the year when tourists swarmed to the beach. The entire neighborhood around the parsonage was composed of homes from the Victorian era or even earlier. The parsonage itself was a large, colorfully decorated structure right next to the church, so Clarissa could easily walk out the back door of the kitchen and across a short path to her office, which was sandwiched between the sanctuary and the fellowship hall.
Since it was lunchtime, she parked her car in the driveway and headed into the kitchen. As she walked in the door, Mrs. Gunn, the housekeeper and cook, greeted her: “Ah, it’s good you’re back already, you can have a timely lunch. I made a tuna sandwich on rye and a small salad. Will that be okay?”
“That sounds wonderful!” Clarissa replied, with perhaps a little too much enthusiasm. She still wasn’t accustomed to being waited on and knew she tended to over-respond.
At her welcome luncheon last Sunday, she had spoken privately to Ramona Russell, the woman who currently chaired the church board, and explained that she really didn’t need a housekeeper and cook. She could easily close off the parts of the parsonage she didn’t need, and clean those she used herself. As for cooking, she was no chef, but she could do well enough to provide for herself. There was no reason, she concluded, for the church to spend more money than necessary on her care and upkeep.
Mrs. Russell had taken Clarissa some distance away from the crowd, and spoken to her quietly. “I appreciate your interest in saving the church money, but we employ Mrs. Gunn more as . . . I guess what you would call a social service project,” she explained. “Barbara was widowed several years ago after looking after her husband, a virtual invalid, for many years. She had very little money, and was well into her sixties when he passed. Reverend Hollingsworth had just arrived and, unlike you, he was at sixes and sevens when it came to taking care of himself, so naturally we decided that bringing the two of them together would be ideal for both. She doesn’t get paid a great deal, but it supplements her social security nicely and gets her out of the house for part of the day, which helps her stay active.”
“I see,” Clarissa had responded. “Well, that puts things in an entirely different light. I’ll be happy to have her services.”
Mrs. Russell smiled. “She’ll probably treat you like a daughter, or even a granddaughter, and fuss over you. But she’ll also show you the proper respect a minister deserves. That was one thing your predecessor demanded.”
“I’m sure we’ll get along fine. I’m not one for standing on ceremony.”
“That will make a nice change,” the other woman said with a thin smile. “Reverend Hollingsworth was a bit old-school. He could get up on his high horse at times, and tended to listen primarily to the men. Some of the women in the congregation thought he should have paid more attention to what we have to say, since we do most of the work.”
Clarissa smiled. “It’s not the first time I’ve heard that complaint,” she said. “I hope you’ll find that I listen to everyone equally.”
Mrs. Russell put a hand on her arm. “You’ll never satisfy everyone, but I’m sure you’ll do your best.”
In the six days since that conversation, Clarissa had already come to be thankful for Mrs. Gunn’s help. She didn’t know how she would have kept the parsonage clean and still have time to perform her pastoral duties, even if she had closed off most of the rooms. Like the majority of over-furnished and excessively decorated Victorians, the parsonage seemed to generate an inordinate amount of dust. Every time you turned around, new clumps of dust had appeared along the edges of the beautiful hardwood floor, just waiting to pounce on the rugs. Only Mrs. Gunn’s strenuous efforts kept the house presentable as the public face of the church.
Mrs. Gunn had also proven to be a fine cook of what Clarissa thought of as church food: casseroles, pasta salads, and the like. During the day, Mrs. Gunn always prepared something that Clarissa could easily heat up for dinner. Even better were the cakes and pies she baked. Out of concern for her waistline, Clarissa insisted Mrs. Gunn take home a sizable portion of what she prepared, and she seemed happy to do so. It was, Clarissa thought, a bit like having a mother, without the emotional angst—although Mrs. Gunn wasn’t above giving advice or acting on her own initiative.
“It got so warm this morning,” Mrs. Gunn began as Clarissa bit into a sandwich large enough for two, “that I went over to your office and switched on the air conditioning to cool it down. That place gets so stuffy. I figured you’d be working in there this afternoon preparing your sermon, like the Reverend always did.”
Although Clarissa had already prepared her weekly sermon, she saw no need to sound more efficient than her predecessor. “Thanks, Mrs. Gunn, I will be in there this afternoon,” she said. “Mrs. Williams’s niece, Ashley, is coming in to apply for the office manager’s job.”
Mrs. Gunn gave Clarissa a sideways glance. “You certainly do need a secretary what with Mrs. Dalrymple up and quitting like that. I know she was upset when the Reverend left without giving her warning, but still she should have stayed a few weeks until you got settled.”
“But she was sick,” Clarissa pointed out.
Mrs. Gunn humphed. “She’s always been sick.”
“It would have been nice if she’d stayed a bit longer,” Clarissa agreed, keeping her expression neutral. Even from her limited experience as an assistant pastor, she’d learned to never say anything negative about one member of the congregation to another. Everyone was interrelated by blood, friendship, or enmity, and you never knew whom you might be indirectly insulting.
“But Mrs. Williams’ niece . . .” Mrs. Gunn shook her head.
“You know her?” Clarissa asked.
“Of course. She lived here with her mom and dad until about six or seven years ago. She went to high school at the county school. A bright thing, I’ll give her credit for that.”
Clarissa put down her sandwich and gave the housekeeper a level look. “So what’s wrong with her?”
Mrs. Gunn pressed her lips together and shook her head. “I never say anything bad about someone I haven’t seen in a while. They could have changed.”
Not thinking that sounded particularly encouraging, Clarissa slowly ate the rest of her sandwich, uncertain whether to pursue the matter further or not. Her curiosity was certainly aroused, but she didn’t want to be prejudiced against a job applicant by what might be an irrelevant juvenile past.
“Let’s say,” Mrs. Gunn continued, just when Clarissa thought the topic was dead and buried, “you’ll know right away if Ashley’s the same as she was when she lived here before. One thing you can say for the girl, she was never one to hide her light under a bushel.” For some reason, Mrs. Gunn chuckled at her last remark, as if it had been remarkably witty.
Slightly annoyed by the vagueness, Clarissa finished her sandwich. She thanked Mrs. Gunn once again for lunch and went across the way to her office. A blast of cool air greeted her as she went inside, reminding her that, whatever her quirks, Mrs. Gunn was a real treasure.
She went through the outer office and its small waiting room, and into the space designated for the pastor. She sat down behind the large, ornate mahogany desk and looked at the rich, wood-paneled walls. Ramona Russell had told her that Reverend Hollingsworth, when he first arrived, had strongly requested that money from the general fund be used to update his office so that it would have the “proper prestige.” Not without some grumbling, the church board had agreed, and the result—apparently designed by the Reverend himself—looked to Clarissa like a room from some London gentlemen’s club. According to Ramona, the Reverend had studied at Oxford in his earlier years, and developed a love of all things British—even affecting an English accent sometimes. In
Clarissa’s opinion, he had certainly surpassed himself here.
Although the room seemed oppressively stuffy, she wasn’t about to suggest another renovation to the church board. Anyway, Clarissa thought, having such a pompously masculine office might help offset her age and gender. Glaring at the computer for which she still did not have the password, she gave a sigh of relief that the Reverend had been old-school enough to keep a rolodex with all his important phone numbers. She looked up Jack Spurlock’s name and dialed his number.
“Something need fixing?” he asked immediately after answering, showing that he had caller ID.
“Probably in a place this old, but nothing that I’m aware of at the moment,” Clarissa joked.
Jack laughed. “How are you doing, Pastor?”
“Just fine. I went to the hospital today to see David Ames.”
“Yeah, I heard he wasn’t doing well. I guess it’s his heart.”
“That’s what I’ve heard. He would like to see you,” she told him. “I was wondering if you had some time this afternoon to come with me to the hospital during visiting hours.”
“Dave wants to see me?” Jack asked, the surprise evident in his voice. “Why?”
“Apparently there’s something from the past he wants to talk about, but he doesn’t want to tell me what it is,” Clarissa said. “Are you good friends?”
“I wouldn’t have thought so,” Jack replied. “We went to school together and we’ve both lived in Shore Side all our lives, but we haven’t had much to do with each other since we were kids. I’d nod to him when I saw him at church, but that’s about all.”
“Did he normally attend church?” asked Clarissa.
Jack laughed. “Dave didn’t normally do anything except work on a fishing boat, smoke, and drink. He never married and lived kind of a rough life.”
“Do you have any idea what he would want to tell you about?”
There was a slight pause. “No clue,” he said. “I have the grandkids staying with me right now for an overnight. Their parents are at a wedding. Let me talk it over with Marcie. Maybe I can get away in the morning, and we can go see Dave then.”