The Organist Wore Pumps (The Liturgical Mysteries)

by Schweizer, Mark

  Meg looked at me, a question forming on her face. “What’s wrong?”

  I pointed to the painting on the page. It was titled Jael and Sisera and dated 1620. The work depicted the climax of the story in the Book of Judges. Sisera, a general whose army has been routed by the Israelites, takes refuge in the house of his friend Heber the Kenite. Heber’s wife, Jael, tells him that he’s safe there, but when he falls asleep, she nails his head to the ground with a tent peg. This was the scene I was looking at, rendered in beautiful, rich Baroque brush strokes.

  “So?” said Meg.

  “You know the story?”

  “Sure.”

  “Donald Mushrat wasn’t talking about a jail. He was talking about a ‘Jael.’ In Hebrew, it’s pronounced with a ‘Y’, but I doubt that Mushrat knew that. And with his North Carolina accent...”

  “Ja-el,” said Meg. “So Cicero was...”

  “Not Cicero at all,” I said. “Sisera. Jael and Sisera. ‘We have a Jael in our community. I’ve come across some correspondence and I don’t think any of you are aware of the spiritual consequences that this implies.’ Mushrat found out that there was a killer. He knew it was a woman. He read her emails.”

  “Did he know who it was?” asked Meg.

  I thought for a moment. “No, I don’t think so. He would have seen her sitting in the congregation. But she didn’t know how much he’d found out. She didn’t know how many emails he’d read. She couldn’t take a chance.”

  “So she shot him,” said Meg.

  “So she shot him.”

  “Okay,” said Meg. “I’ll buy it. But how did he get her emails?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you know who it is?”

  “Not for sure, but we’re closing in.”

  “Oh, you’ll figure it out,” said Meg. She walked over and gave me a kiss. “I have something else for you. Another early Christmas present. You want it?”

  I didn’t have to be asked twice.

  Chapter 30

  “When’s Noylene coming back in?” asked Dave.

  “The baby’s not even a week old,” said Nancy.

  “Yeah. I know. But I really want to see the little fella.”

  “You just want to see his tail,” said Nancy. “But that’s not going to happen. He wears this thing called a ‘diaper.’”

  “Maybe he’ll need changing,” Dave said hopefully.

  Our table at the Slab Café had been easy to get since Nancy had started stringing yellow “Police Line—Do Not Cross” tape across it.

  “What can I get all y’all?” asked Pauli Girl, sidling up to Dave and giving him a wink.

  “Um...how about an omelette,” said Dave. “Hash browns and some whole wheat toast.”

  “Will do, Sugar,” said Pauli Girl. She looked at Nancy and me.

  “Flapjacks,” said Nancy. “Short stack.”

  “I’ll have a couple of country ham biscuits,” I said. “And some grits.”

  “Gotcha,” said Pauli Girl, writing quickly. She tore the ticket off the pad and headed for the kitchen.

  “And some more coffee,” Nancy called after her. Pauli Girl waved at Nancy over her shoulder.

  “What’s the news on the computer?” I asked.

  “News?” said Nancy. “Here’s the news. There was no hard drive in that computer. It was gone.”

  “Gone?” I said.

  “Taken out. Removed. Stolen. Gone. A big hole where the hard drive should have been.”

  “How long would that have taken?” Dave asked. “To disassemble the computer and pop out the hard drive?”

  “‘Pop out’ being the operative words,” said Nancy, shaking her head in dismay. “These things are almost disposable. Panty and I tried it a couple of times with one of his spare drives. The fastest time we had was one minute forty seconds. The slowest was three minutes and that was because we dropped the screwdriver behind the table and couldn’t find it.”

  “So, nothing on the computer?” I said, knowing the answer.

  “Nope.”

  “Well,” said Dave glumly. “What’s next?”

  “We need to shoot the Glock,” I said. “And check the rifling on the bullet.”

  “Your Glock?” asked Dave.

  Pete walked out of the kitchen wiping his hands on a greasy towel. He tossed it behind the counter, pulled out a chair and sat down at the table.

  “What’s up?” he said.

  “Police line. Do not cross,” said Nancy, pointing at the plastic yellow banner.

  “Yeah, yeah. So what’s up?”

  “Nancy was just going to show us how long it takes to change the barrel on a Glock 17,” I said.

  “I have a Glock 19,” said Nancy, unsnapping her holster and putting the gun on the table. “It’s the compact model—a little smaller, but it breaks down the same.” She dropped the magazine, pulled back the slide, looked in, and then stuck her finger into the opening to make sure there wasn’t a round in the chamber.

  “A Glock has fifty percent fewer parts than other handguns of this caliber. This one, for instance, has only thirty-three parts.”

  “Is the safety on?” said a man at the next table. The gun was pointing vaguely in his direction and he looked very nervous.

  “Actually, there are three safeties,” said Nancy. “But none you can see. There’s a trigger safety, a firing pin safety, and a drop safety. It’s the safest pistol on the market. The only way a Glock handgun will fire is for the trigger to be pulled fully to the rear. It won’t go off by itself.” She sniffed. “Anyway, it’s not loaded.”

  “Okay,” said Pete nervously. “I’m sure we all feel very safe.”

  “Watch this,” said Nancy. She located the locking tabs on both sides of the frame and pulled down on them while tugging on the slide. The slide dropped off into her hand. She lifted out the recoil spring, removed the barrel, held it up for us to see, and then reversed the process.

  “That’s it,” she said, clicking the slide back into place. “Barrel removed and replaced in well under a minute. And I didn’t even need a tool.”

  “So what’s the point of all this?” asked Pete.

  “Well,” I said, “we just wanted to know how long changing a barrel might take. Plus, we have a gun we have to re-test.”

  “Ah,” said Dave, comprehension dawning on his face.

  Cynthia came out of the kitchen. “Pete! We could use a little help back here!”

  Pete huffed and got to his feet. The cowbell on the front door announced another patron and Brother Hog walked into the restaurant.

  “Brother Hog!” called all the regulars.

  The Rev. Hogmanay McTavish waved dejectedly and made his way over to an empty stool at the counter.

  “I hear congratulations are in order,” Pete said. “Let me get you some breakfast. On the house.”

  “Thanks,” said Brother Hog.

  “Have you visited the little nipper?” I asked.

  Hog shook his head in the affirmative. “Oh, yes.”

  “Have you seen his tail?” asked Dave.

  “Shut up, Dave,” whispered Nancy.

  “Noylene doesn’t want the doctors to snip that little rascal’s rudder,” Hog said. “But I’m afraid I’m going to have to insist. As the father, I’m sure I have at least some rights.”

  “What’s her rationale?” Pete said. Cynthia gave him a withering look. “If I may ask?” he quickly added.

  “She says that maybe little Rahab...” Hog fixed an unblinking eye on us. “You know that’s a girl’s name, right?”

  We all nodded.

  “She says that maybe little Rahab should keep his tail until he reaches an age where he can decide for himself whether or not he wants to keep it. I say that we know what’s best for the child and should point him in the way that he should go.”

  “Ah,” Pete said. “Sort of like infant baptism.”

  Hog pondered this for a moment then rejected the notion. “No,” he said.
“Nothing like it at all.”

  Pete laughed.

  “So,” I said. “Are you getting married again? Are you going to make an honest woman out of Noylene Fabergé-Dupont?”

  “I asked her. She hasn’t said one way t’wor the other.”

  “How does New Fellowship Baptist Church feel about all this?” asked Cynthia. “Did the congregation make a big stink?”

  “They’re not happy,” admitted Hog. “In fact, I’ve taken a leave of absence until after the New Year. I may have to go back into the tent revival business.”

  “Well, you were awfully good at it,” I said. “You could preach a badger into a turtle hole.”

  “None better,” agreed Pete.

  “Binny Hen the Scripture Chicken was top notch,” said Dave.

  “Souls were saved,” added Nancy. “People baptized.”

  “Picnics on the grounds,” I said. “Music, games, fun...”

  “And a good time was had by all,” Noylene said, standing in the doorway with a bundle in her arms. “Hog,” she added sternly. “We gotta talk.”

  Chapter 31

  “Things are heating up in the world of Sophie Slugh,” observed Marty Hatteberg. Members of the choir who happened to show up to rehearsal on time were treated to my latest treatise on the adventures of Sophie and the under-dwarves. The rest of the group would have to wait. But perhaps that was their plan from the beginning.

  “I still don’t care for slugs,” said Marjorie, tossing the page over her shoulder in disgust. “Anyway, I have an announcement. I’m thinking about starting a blog.”

  “What?” said Steve DeMoss. “Do you even know what a blog is?”

  “Sure. You get on the computer and you type in stuff for people to read. Then they give you their credit card numbers.”

  “And you have something that people want to read?” said Phil. “I mean besides how to make bathtub gin?”

  “An important skill back in the day,” Marjorie said. “But I used to be quite a soprano, you know. I thought I’d share my techniques on voice production. You know, some anecdotes, followed by singing advice. Then people will pay to read it and I’ll be a millionaire. I found out about all this on the interweb down at the library.”

  “You were a soprano?” Meg said. “When was that?”

  “In the forties, dear. We had quite the choir in the forties.”

  “But you’re a tenor,” I said. “The lowest tenor we have, in fact. Most sopranos at least keep some semblance of their range over the years.”

  “That’s just the way God made me,” said Marjorie, taking a sip from the flask that she kept under her choir chair. We never asked what was in the flask. None of us really wanted to know.

  “My first blog-thingy article is going to be called Smoking Your Way to a High B.”

  Guffaws erupted from the choir.

  “No, really,” said Marjorie. “Sometimes sopranos don’t like to give away their singing techniques, but I’ve been singing in the church choir for eighty-seven years and I know a thing or two.”

  More laughter.

  She took another sip. “Back in WWII, we sopranos here at St. Barnabas were very competitive. I remember one girl who had a solo with a high A in it. On Christmas Eve she squawked that note like a goose getting sucked into a jet engine. Oh, how we all laughed at her!” Marjorie closed her eyes and smiled, fondly remembering those glory days.

  “We taunted her all the way into Lent,” she added matter-of-factly. “She eventually had a nervous breakdown and had to quit the choir just before Palm Sunday. We really had a lot of fun back then! Anyway, I’ve decided that it’s time I told my story.”

  Marjorie leaned forward in her chair. “The secret of my success...” she glanced around the choir and lowered her voice, “has always been a couple of stogies in the bathroom before the church service!”

  “Hey,” said Mark Wells, “mine, too! I wondered who that was smoking cheroots in the ladies’ room.”

  “Take out the Mouldy Cheese Madrigal,” I announced. “Shephard’s Mass of the Nativity, and the Holst Christmas Day. Also Carson Cooman’s In the Beginning.”

  “When does Muffy sing O Holy Night?” asked Varmit.

  I glared at Meg who’d suddenly decided that Gustav Holst’s use of the half-diminished seventh chord was very intriguing.

  “You can sing it during the pre-game show,” I said with a sigh. “We’ll start singing at 10:30. We’ll have music for a half hour. The service starts at eleven o’clock.”

  •••

  Rehearsal wrapped up after an hour and a half and the choir members made their way down the stairs and through the nave chattering merrily. Christmas was almost upon us. Even the pall of Deacon Mushrat’s demise didn’t keep us down for long.

  Edna sat at the organ, setting a few stops and going over her music for Christmas Eve.

  “Edna,” I said. “I’ve got a question for you.”

  “Yes?”

  “Did you use the computer at the library on Monday afternoon?”

  Edna looked confused. “Yes,” she said hesitantly. “I believe it was Monday. Yes, it was,” she decided. “Monday. I came up to practice but had left my copy of the Olivier Messiaen piece I was going to play for communion at home. I downloaded a PDF off the internet.” She gave me a suspicious look. “Why?”

  I was horrified. “Messiaen? Christmas Eve? During communion?”

  “Sure,” said Edna. “I’m playing Dieu Parmi Nous.”

  I heard myself make a small, pathetic sound.

  Edna patted me on the cheek. “Don’t worry, honey. I’ll play all the right notes.”

  That’s what I was afraid of. I shook my head to clear the thoughts of a Messiaenic Christmas Eve. “Anyway, someone took the hard drive out of the library computer,” I said, looking for a reaction. There was none. “I told Rebecca I’d ask around.”

  “It was working fine when I used it,” Edna said. “That was around three in the afternoon.”

  She told a convincing story. I don’t know if I believed her.

  Chapter 32

  Christmas Eve. I was walking across the park toward a row of shops I hadn’t been in for a while. Since last Christmas Eve, in fact. The snow was just beginning to gather against the hard corners of the gazebo as the wind lifted the large, wet flakes and chased them across the frozen ground. My right hand was stuck deep into the pocket of my old coat; my left hand, partially encased in its plaster cast, was bundled against the chill by a woolen boot sock. Cynthia came bouncing out of a boutique called “Sassafras” with her six-year-old niece Penny in tow. She saw me and gave me a wave. Cynthia was positively glowing.

  “I just love Christmastime,” Cynthia said when I walked up. Both her hands were dripping with shopping bags. “Isn’t this the best?”

  “Very festive,” I agreed.

  “Have you finished your Christmas shopping?” asked Cynthia. “Penny was all done, but she’s helping me with a few last-minute gifts.”

  “Well, not exactly,” I said. “I did get some books and a few choice bottles of wine, but I don’t really do my shopping until Christmas Eve.”

  “Really?” said Penny, looking as haughty as a six-year-old possibly could. “How pedestrian.”

  “Penny!” said Cynthia, then looked at me apologetically.

  “It’s an old German custom,” I said, making up yet another old German custom. “Very bad luck. If you do your shopping before Christmas Eve, the Krampus knows what you’re up to and will come to your house instead of Santa Claus.”

  “The Krampus? I’ve never heard of the Krampus.” Penny looked mildly concerned but crossed her arms defiantly. “And I’ve heard of almost everything.”

  “Well, after all, you are six,” I said. “I’m just saying that some people believe that if you’ve already gotten your presents, and you weren’t a good girl all year, the Krampus will come to your house on Christmas Eve and change your presents for switches.”

  “Oh, I�
��ve been pretty good,” decided Penny, but chewing nervously on the side of her lip.

  “And the very bad children...” I looked up and down the busy street. “The very bad children not only get switches, they get all their old toys taken away as well.”

  Penny’s eyes grew a little wider.

  “And the extra-bad children, the children that aren’t respectful of their elders and also police chiefs, they get whisked away to the coal mines where Black Peter makes them work until they’ve learned to behave.”

  “Hayden!” said Cynthia.

  “But,” I said, bending over to Penny’s height, raising a finger and tapping the side of my nose. “But, if you’ve waited until Christmas Eve to do all your shopping, the Krampus doesn’t have time to figure out what’s what. He skips right over you.”

  “I don’t believe you,” decided Penny.

  “We’ll see,” I said.

  Cynthia glared, but gave me a secret smile.

  “Humph,” said Penny as she walked away. “Krampus, indeed!”

  •••

  “Merry Christmas!” said Mr. Schrecker, smiling as I walked into his jewelry shop. “I have your purchase right here. They did a wonderful job in New York.”

  He reached under the counter, took out a small, velvet-covered box, set it in front of me, and opened the lid. Inside was Meg’s great-grandmother’s cameo necklace, reset in gold filigree and surrounded by diamonds. A new chain had been handmade to match, replacing the original, long since lost. When I’d gotten the piece from Ruby last summer, it had been badly chipped and the setting almost destroyed. Now the cameo had been restored and looked almost perfect. Almost—which is exactly what I told Mr. Schrecker. Almost perfect. I didn’t want it to look brand new. I needn’t have worried. The New York jewelers were artists. The necklace was exactly right.

  “Beautiful!” I said.

  “I’m sure Meg will love it,” said Mr. Schrecker. “Shall I wrap it up?”