The third-floor octagonal windows were dark. Good. No Satanic silhouettes. Um … you might want to ease up on the horror movies, Falcone.
Her mini-light illuminated only a small circle of snow. She swung it left to right a few feet in front of her. The snow had been trampled by many human feet and at least one dog. A big dog—she stopped to compare a paw print with one of her own feet.
Rock salt had eaten holes into the packed slush on the wide front steps. It crunched under her boots. Still no lights, not even an old-fashioned porch lamp. No noises from inside, either. She shined the flashlight on her watch: ten minutes to spare. There should be people moving around inside, talking, warming up their voices, something.
An engraved sign above a circular brass knocker read, Valley of the Redeemed. Ps. 104:8. It wasn’t a verse she knew. She raised the circular brass knocker and let it fall. The sharp sound bounced through the empty house. But it couldn’t be empty. The cars outside, the fresh rock salt, the shoveled path. She banged the knocker again and again till paint flaked off the door.
The knocker pulled out of her hand.
“What do you want?”
THIRTY-THREE
A MAN IN A dark suit blinded her with a ginormous flashlight beam.
She blocked some of the glare with one arm. “Mr. McFarland invited me.”
“Pastor McFarland. He didn’t tell me. Come in then.” He lowered the light and opened the door wide enough for her to enter.
When her eyes adjusted, she saw he was wearing a dark-gray business suit and navy tie. A large pin on his lapel gleamed in the reflected light: an American flag with a gold-colored cross on top of it.
He moved deeper into the house. “How do you know the pastor?”
She followed, noting the shabby wallpaper in the entrance hall. To her right, more reflected glow showed her multi-paned glass doors and a hexagon-shaped dining room. The light from a large fireplace to her left was what stretched into the hall and touched the glass doors.
“I’m a housekeeper at the resort.”
“Okay. I’ll set out a chair for you. It’s a busy night to be inviting strangers, but the pastor knows what he’s doing.”
Five rows of six folding chairs filled the center of the room. Floor-to-ceiling drapes on the far left wall covered what must have been windows. She walked past the fireplace, unzipping her coat, to finger the drapes. Stiff, heavy velveteen—she’d been right. Combined with the folding chairs, they made the room look like a school auditorium.
Floor lamps, the kind stores called “torchière,” were the room’s other illumination. Two flanked the curtains, two more hugged the wall behind a tall coffee table at the opposite end from the fireplace, and a last pair lit the chairs on the wall that backed up to the hallway.
An artificial tree at least nine feet tall commanded the front corner of the room, next to the drapes. Some colored glass balls hung from the inner branches, but the rest of the decorations looked handmade. Tiny white lights sparkled all through it. But the real centerpiece was the Nativity set in front of the tree. Even kneeling, Mary and Joseph were four feet tall, and no human womb could’ve held that three-foot-long baby. Two shepherds and three kings flanked the Holy Family; sheep, a donkey, and a camel lurked behind them. Everyone in the tableau had pinked cheeks, blue eyes, and pale white skin.
If Frank had been there, Giulia would have said a few uncomplimentary words for this abomination from the days of Ozzie and Harriet. But that would sabotage her real purpose, to win these peoples’ trust.
Two grade-school girls knelt next to the sheep and camel, singing “We Three Kings.” They ignored Giulia. Three boys—one high-school age, one middle-school age, and one perhaps in kindergarten—had draped sheets around their shoulders and set paper crowns on their heads as they whispered lines to each other. Next to the tree, Maryjane spread a hand-embroidered cloth over a tall coffee table. Angels in many-colored gowns played various musical instruments all along the border. Giulia went up to her.
“Did you do the embroidery? It’s beautiful.”
Maryjane smiled. “You made it. I’m so glad. Yes, thank you. I let my nieces help. Some of the angels have interesting wings.”
“Kids love Christmas.”
“As do we all. There is no better celebration than the birth of Our Lord and Savior.”
“Yes, indeed.”
Maryjane looked around. “I don’t see my sister. She may be changing the baby’s diaper. Could I ask you to help me with the Lord’s Supper supplies?”
“Of course.” Giulia followed her through the hall and back into a big, square kitchen.
Maryjane took a gallon jug of grape juice out of a refrigerator. “The tray is in the pantry behind you.”
The pantry was a cook’s dream. Five cupboards with leaded-glass panes and deep shelves. Matching, solid-door cupboards below them. The paint was peeling, but that seemed to be the condition of the whole house. She wondered if the church members had pooled their savings to buy this place and were going to repair it when the weather got better. The stainless-steel tray and a bag of three-ounce paper cups had sole possession of the cupboard nearest the door.
“Found it. Do you need the cups, too?”
“Yes, please.”
“That pantry is a little slice of Heaven.” Giulia set the tray on the counter and began setting out cups.
“I agree with you. If only this place was in better repair. But all in good time. We’ll need thirty-three cups, please.” She began filling them halfway with grape juice. “We have a baptism tonight in addition to the Lord’s Supper.”
Giulia kept setting out cups. No wonder she called it a special service.
The man who’d opened the door wheeled in a cart with a plastic laundry tub on it. “Pastor says fill it with hot water and it’ll be lukewarm when it’s time for the baptism.”
“Thank you, big brother. I remember.” She finished pouring the grape juice.
Giulia ran hot water into the sink.
“Thank you.” The woman squatted and took out two half-gallon water pitchers from a bottom cupboard. She and Giulia took turns filling the tub with steaming water.
“I’ll let Pastor know you’re making yourself useful,” he said to Giulia as he wheeled it out. “That is a good beginning if you seek to join the Valley.”
Giulia resisted her evil imp’s the temptation to curtsy. What is it with overbearing, paternal males here? Thank Heaven Frank’s only overprotective.
The opening chords of “Blessed Assurance” played on an electric keyboard sounded from the meeting room. The man pushed the cart with care and the water still sloshed. Maryjane carried the tray and Giulia followed, resisting an even stronger temptation to cast down her eyes and clasp her hands in front of her. Maryjane’s bright perkiness was considerably subdued now.
Twenty-eight chairs were filled. Giulia wondered where everyone had been hiding. The house must be bigger than it looked. She slipped into the last seat in the back row, the only one not in neat alignment. Maryjane set the tray on one side of the coffee table, next to a loaf of round, flat bread on its own tray. The cart-pusher flipped down a braking mechanism on the cart’s back wheels and sat down next to her in the first row.
Giulia glanced at the congregation. She wasn’t the only female in slacks, but she was the only one dressed way too down for church. The kids were unnaturally quiet: no fidgeting, no surreptitious poking of younger siblings. A keyboard had been set up next to the Christmas tree, and a white-haired man played it, with a teenage girl turning pages.
The chords increased in volume, and the keyboardist dipped his head in an ostentatious nod. Everyone stood and began the first verse. Giulia was glad she’d gone to several nondenominational church services over the years. Ecumenism. She’d always pushed for it.
The Wildflower’s maintenance man entered on the last verse, severe in a black suit and white shirt, relieved by a dark green tie. He took a position in front of the table.
He blessed every single person by name, his naturally deep voice resonating in the high-ceilinged room. Giulia steeled herself for unwanted attention as he began the back row.
“Blessings to our guest, Regina. May the light of our Savior guide her.”
Every head swiveled in her direction. She didn’t have to try and fake a blush; all those strangers eyeing her stressed her out on its own. Only on the first day of school, when she was in charge of two- to three-dozen new teenage lumps of attitude, did that many stares give her energy.
McFarland started preaching. Giulia schooled her face into neutral. She was glad it didn’t seem that this was a church where people shouted “Amen!” and “Hallelujah!” because she wasn’t sure how sincere she could make herself sound.
His voice could be the one on Laurel’s phone. Trouble was, the ski instructor’s voice had the same timbre. McFarland in preacher mode took on a resonance that did not sound like the phone caller … sort of. Sixty percent. If only I had a tape recorder. I can’t bring out my cell. Everyone would notice. Drat.
He nodded to the man nearest the door, who went out. His footsteps faded upstairs as McFarland compared the Nativity to being born-again, and that to the standard Gospel passage “Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.”
Giulia stopped listening to his words; all her attention was focused on the footsteps she could still hear echoes of. So the new church member lived here? Not a hospitable place. The footsteps stopped. Another set of footsteps joined them, and both pairs walked a short distance down a hall and then descended the stairs.
That’s the sound of two pairs of adult feet. They practice adult baptism then. I need to get baptized here. That would make them open up. Just do it, Falcone. Do whatever it takes to find Katie. If I have to tell Penny I saw a vision of her goddess of fertility, I’ll do that, too.
A woman entered carrying a baby. The man who’d left a few minutes earlier was at her side like a bodyguard.
Giulia’s dual-religion plans screeched to a halt.
It was them? So much for innocent-seeming sweetness. Everyone turned to see, so Giulia would’ve looked out of place if she didn’t stare. They’ve been keeping Katie in this rat trap? She didn’t dare crane her neck to see if it really and truly was Katie. It has to be. It has to be. I should’ve focused my exclusive attention on Maryjane. I might have charmed her into revealing something yesterday. Thank Heaven I came up with that sob story today.
The woman handed the baby to McFarland. He unwrapped the fluffy towel from around it, and the woman removed its diaper. It was a girl. Giulia forced her hands and feet not to twitch, schooled her face to match the generic eagerness on every other face.
Maryjane unlocked the cart and wheeled it in front of the coffee table. The baby lay limp in McFarland’s arms. So limp, Giulia wondered if they’d drugged her. Would they have drugged Katie to keep her mind confused because this isn’t home? Babies are smart. They know where they belong, right? She tried to see the baby’s hands. What if I’m nuts and it’s not Katie? What if it’s that woman’s baby? What if that woman lives here even though it’s a church? She sought that quiet place in herself that she could find kneeling in an empty church. Please be Katie. Please.
“Come, Brethren, and speak for this infant.” He held up the baby. “What do you ask of this Church of God?”
Everyone answered, “Life everlasting.”
“Hear our prayers, O Lord; and by Thy perpetual assistance keep this Thine elect, so that, preserving this first experience of the greatness of Thy glory, she may deserve, by keeping Thy commandments, to attain to the glory of regeneration.”
He nodded at the congregation, and everyone joined in. So did Giulia. McFarland had simply altered the old Catholic rite of Baptism.
“Break all the toils of Satan wherewith she was held: open to her the gate of Thy loving kindness, that she may be free from the foulness of all wicked desires, and may joyfully serve Thee in Thy Church, in the name of Jesus our Lord and Redeemer.” He paused and everyone said, “Amen.”
The baby hadn’t moved through any of this, not even a shiver. Giulia ran through infant CPR in her head, in case she had to make a last-minute rescue. No one else seemed to notice the baby’s unnatural stillness. Just because the baby looked like she was sleeping …
McFarland spoke to the baby now.
“Do you renounce Satan?”
Everyone responded, “I do renounce him.”
“And all of his works?”
“I do renounce them.”
“Will you be baptized?”
“I will.”
The unknown woman slid the towel out from under the baby, and McFarland stood at the long end of the laundry tub. The water had stopped steaming. The keyboardist started playing “Just As I Am.” McFarland put his hand over the baby’s face and submerged her completely.
Giulia clutched her hands together to keep herself in place. Her mouth sang the lugubrious hymn, but all of her real attention was focused on the baby. Wake up. Cry. Don’t be dead. Wake up, little one.
He dunked her again. Nothing … nothing … he lifted her out … and she squalled. Giulia breathed again. McFarland submerged her a third time, still squalling. When he pulled her out, she coughed in that tiny baby voice, vomited water, and squalled louder than any tiny baby voice should be able to. It was beautiful.
The woman wrapped the dripping baby in the towel and McFarland held it against his chest. The baby stopped yelling and snuggled against him.
Everyone shouted, “Hallelujah! She is saved!”
McFarland said, “Her silence was evidence of Satan’s tight grip on her, the curse of Original Sin. When she cried, I knew that she was fighting Satan for her soul. When she coughed up the water, it was a sign that the power of Jesus had expelled the evil.”
The keyboard player segued into “All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name.” The back rows began to clap and sway. McFarland brought the baby over by the keyboard, and row by row the congregation came up to kiss her. Giulia’s ten years of convent training to appear calm and serene as all nuns should saved her—if she’d given in to her desires, she would’ve bounced in place or pushed through the others to get to the baby first.
When her row’s turn came, she went first. It’s like a reception line at a wedding. The baby was still awake and staring at everyone. Giulia reached her at last. She bent down to kiss her forehead. The baby’s arms came out of the blanket and patted Giulia’s cheeks.
“Hello, sweetie,” Giulia said.
The baby cooed.
Giulia put her hands over the baby’s and played pat-a-cake. The baby cooed again. Giulia smiled at McFarland and made way for the woman behind her. She walked around to her seat, returning smiles and saying “Amen” when anyone said “Praise Jesus.”
She resumed her seat, looking at the tree, the table, the other people, anything at all to hide her elation. Because when she’d held the baby’s hands, she’d felt the skin tag on each one from the botched surgery to remove the extra pinky finger.
THIRTY-FOUR
WHEN EVERYONE HAD WELCOMED Katie into the church family, the woman took her from McFarland and walked out. Katie fussed as soon as she left the pastor’s arms. The woman shushed and rocked her. There was too much noise for Giulia to hear their footsteps, but she heard Katie’s cries fade upstairs to—she calculated—a second-floor room on the left.
McFarland said a blessing over the bread and grape juice before tearing the bread into thirty-two chunks. He kept a chunk and a cup for himself, and two men approached the table to take the serving trays.
Giulia had a wicked desire to debate McFarland about the use of real wine in biblical times, with relevant passages from several places in the Old Testament. Get your head straight, dummy. Katie’s important, not your
snarky desire to smack down this kidnapper.
Everyone ate their morsels and drank their juice in silence. In this only was Giulia reminded of an actual church service. At the same time, she admitted her bias. Even though she’d been to many Masses and other church services in nontraditional venues, the Cradle Catholic in her still thought of “church” as a stone building with high windows, a Tabernacle, and an altar.
She handed her empty cup to the woman next to her, who passed them down the row to the man with the serving tray. The keyboard player began “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.”
The hard part started after the song. Several men surrounded McFarland to congratulate him on his successful expulsion of Satan from Katie. Giulia knew what was expected of her, so she hung on the outskirts of a group of women, smiling at anyone who looked her way.
Maryjane came over to the group, in hostess mode. “Ladies, this is Regina. She’s new at the resort and needs a spiritual home.”
“Welcome, Regina.”
“You’ll be spoiled for any other church now.”
“Are you in a Godly relationship? My nephew is traveling today, but he’ll be here for Christmas.”
“It’s refreshing to see a young woman who lets the face God gave her shine through.”
Giulia thought, Cat, at that last one, since every woman in the circle was wearing makeup. She had no illusions about her own looks—she considered herself attractive but not beautiful—but subtle digs weren’t the Christian thing to do. And that was another comment she knew better than to make.
Instead, she gave polite, neutral responses to everyone, glancing at Maryjane and then lowering her eyes after the older woman’s “Godly relationship” comment. That’s what the Regina who made up the Wrong Man story would have done.
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