Feast for Thieves

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Feast for Thieves Page 6

by Marcus Brotherton


  I shrugged. “I suppose you could show me around.”

  “Nothing to see. This here’s the church building. Out back are the privies, a bar of soap, and a faucet for washing hands. There’s a toolshed with a ladder in it, and next door is the parsonage where you’ll stay. To the west lies a hundred and eighty acres of slash pine forest deeded by the church board, and you’ll need to start now to put in a winter’s stock of firewood if you want to stay warm next cold spell. You’re also welcome to chop and sell all you want for your personal savings, and if you ask me, a strong fella such as yourself would be a fool not to spend every waking minute doing exactly that. I left two keys for you on my desk—one for the parsonage, one for the church. Reverend Bobby will be dropping by in an hour to explain more of the job. Have I left anything out?”

  “Reverend Bobby?”

  “The missionary who’s been holding the church together during the war. Didn’t the sheriff explain anything?”

  “Not much, no.”

  “Well, the expectations are straightforward. No smoking, drinking, drunkenness, chaw, gambling, movie going, dancing, loud music, novel reading, gum chewing, card playing of any sort, or unchaperoned visits with ladies in the parsonage. You’ll work more than a full day and receive lower than normal wages, but since it’s a preaching job that’s to be expected. Consider yourself lucky to have a job. The church will need to know your whereabouts at all times, so leave a note on my desk each morning with your schedule as you know it. The phone rings in my office and it’s rigged to a bell in the parsonage, so you’ll know it when you hear it. May sound obvious, but be sure to answer the phone whenever it rings. The car you drive must be nice enough to look presentable, but not so nice as to put on airs. Same goes with your clothes. Wear a shirt with a collar at all times and a suit jacket with a tie when making pastoral calls. Make sure your shirt is well ironed. Have I forgotten anything?”

  I stood silent, letting it sink in. I had no idea the scope of expectations placed on preachers.

  Mert pointed to her car. “I best be off. The cleaning supplies are in the furnace room. You’ll want to get started on the sanctuary—this being Friday, Sunday’s coming quick. Where’s your books and things—they still being shipped?”

  “Something like that, yeah.”

  “Well, we should get along fine, Reverend Slater. I’m firm but I’m fair, and as long as you preach the gospel, keep your sermons short, and don’t cross me, you’ll have nothing to worry about.”

  “Worry about? What do you mean?”

  She held out her hand and we shook. “I sign your checks.”

  It was only eight o’clock in the morning yet the sun was already hot. I wandered behind the church, scoped out the fuller layout of the property, then ambled over to the parsonage front door and peeked inside. It wasn’t locked neither, and inside was a living area with a stone fireplace, an old couch, and one hard-backed chair. A kitchen lay beyond it with a table and the other three chairs along with a sink, stove, and fridge. To the right lay a bedroom with a bare closet and a double bed. To the front of the house lay a second bedroom with a baby crib and two cots nearby, about the right size for children.

  The water was on when I tried it from the kitchen faucet and it ran cold and clear, but there was no indoor bathroom and no shower. A washtub lay to one side on the kitchen floor, and I reckoned that’s what a fella and his family bathed in, respectively, if he so had one. The entire parsonage was maybe five hundred square feet. It was budget-built and not maintained well. The floorboards were warped. The outside walls had been tar papered for insulation, but the paper was ripped and worn. In places I could see straight through the walls to the outside. This ceiling, too, was brown from water damage, and the entire place stunk of not being used. I wondered what sort of a man this Reverend Bobby might be if he didn’t care for his living quarters. Maybe he stayed someplace else.

  I walked outside, saw the firewood area to the right side of the building under a wood awning, and noticed the wood was down to almost nothing. An axe sat near one pole with a whetstone nearby for sharpening. I decided to make good use of my time while waiting for my predecessor to come and show me the ropes.

  First things first. I tested the corner of the firewood cover, saw it was strong enough, and cranked out a few sets of overhand pull-ups from a dead hang. A man’s got to stay in shape every chance he gets, and I liked to do a hundred each morning whenever I got the chance. Next I grabbed the axe, chopped kindling, lit a fire in the kitchen stove with my flint piece, and got it blazing. Underneath the sink lay a large pot, and I heated water on the stove and ladled it into the wash tub until full. The bar of soap from the church outhouses was weighty, thick, and a good sort of brown. It plopped nicely into my tub. My filthy clothes I shucked off in a jiffy and I climbed in and settled down for a good scrub. I hadn’t bathed since being baptized, and that was just a scant dunk in the river.

  My, but the morning was warm. A hint of breeze flitted through the open kitchen window. My eyes closed and it got downright dreamy. Outside, a vehicle pulled up. I’d recognize that familiar rumble anywhere—the unmistakable chug of an army jeep. At least Reverend Bobby had good taste in vehicles, I thought, to locate such a find on surplus.

  “In here!” I called. “Be with you in a minute.”

  The front door to the parsonage opened. I heard a gasp. “Reverend Slater!”

  My eyes flew open.

  It was the sheriff’s willowy secretary. Never did catch her name. With a rush I sat forward in the waters to cover my unmentionables.

  “I’m sorry, ma’am. Really I am. I thought you were Reverend Bobby.”

  The secretary stood by the front door, not moving. She glanced away and then glanced back, not in a salacious way but only curious, like she hadn’t any brothers to grow up with. She glanced away again and this time I stared at her then glanced away myself, noticing in a flash her curves through her dress—all set in place by the good Lord in all the right places—and I wondered if she was going to be so ornery to me this time.

  She cleared her throat. “But I am Reverend Bobbie.”

  EIGHT

  Texas wildflowers were beginning to bloom across the road. I sat next to her on the steps outside the parsonage and ran my hand through my wet hair.

  “Well,” I said, “I expected Reverend Bobby to have broader shoulders.”

  “From what?” retorted the girl. “Gripping the pulpit?” She wrinkled her nose my direction and took a sniff. “You might throw your clothes in that wash basin along with you next time.”

  “Relax,” I said. “It’s not the first time you’ve seen me dunked. I don’t know why you’re so worked up now.”

  “I am not worked up. You’re the one who called me inside while you were taking a bath.”

  “I didn’t call you inside. I only let you know of my presence as to not alarm you. Besides, I didn’t think a girl would be driving a jeep.”

  “It’s my daddy’s jeep, and I’ve got no problem with the human form. None of the world’s greatest artists are upset by nakedness as long as nakedness is kept in its proper place. O to bathe in the swimming-bath. To splash the water! To walk ankle-deep, or race naked along the shore.” She looked straight ahead. “Walt Whitman—‘A Song of Joys.’”

  “Oh, you got an answer for everything.”

  “And you, sir, stink like the earth.” She pursed her lips and stood up in a huff. “Let’s take a walk. I can recount what I need to more easily if I don’t smell you.”

  I harrumphed but stood anyway and followed her. She led the way behind the church to a trailhead between the trees and followed it southeast back toward the dirt road that traversed south from Lost Truck Road to the river. The sunshine was bright for the morning, and the asters and goldenrods were already out. I spotted some buffalo clover and wolf flower and redbud with its brilliant pink of early spring.

  “Your name is Bobby? Spelled b-o-b-b-y?”

  “No, spelled
with an ‘i-e’—short for Roberta. Bobbie Barker. I’m surprised nobody told you my full name before now.”

  “So you’re Halligan Barker’s daughter—the sheriff’s?!”

  Bobbie smiled, then her lips quivered. She quickly pushed away her family’s grief. “Emma Hackathorn is my older sister—she’s the woman who came to the accident last night. Our mama’s been gone for five years now, so it’s just Daddy and us and Emma’s four children. That’s our whole family. You?”

  I sidestepped the question and asked instead, “I thought you worked the front desk at the jail. How come you’re the minister?”

  Bobbie nodded. “I fill in at the jail from time to time. That’s what I was doing that morning you showed up. As for my job in the ministry, you ever heard of Rosie the Riveter? That happened in churches, too. All the men were away at war. The ones left in Cut Eye weren’t fit to run a church, except maybe my daddy, and he already had a job.”

  “You trained formally to do this then? You can’t be more than eighteen.”

  “I’m twenty-one. After I graduated high school I took three years of free correspondence courses from the university in Dallas. Their programs were subsidized through the government throughout the war effort. I’ve already got my associates degree. I’m heading for the mission field just as soon as I can gather the money.”

  There came that upturned nose again, at the mention of a college degree, but I said nothing in return. We pushed out of the trees, navigated through tall grasses, and hit a secondary trail and followed it. I recognized this trail. The flowers on the catclaw weren’t out yet, though the bees were already getting interested in the huajillo, the flower of origins that furnishes honey for most of the state.

  “Ah,” she said. “Here again at last.”

  In front of us lay the swath of land that flattened out halfway across the flowing water, the one where a pool had formed in the eddy on the other side. It was the place of my baptism, and the area today, I admitted, looked downright scenic—particularly since I had less threat of getting shot. We stopped by the water’s edge. Pine trees and high grasses ringed most of the pool.

  “He carried her toward the Atlantic ocean, cradling her like a shepherd would embrace a newborn lamb. The cool nocturnal air mixed with the salty sprays of the sea, and the sand shifted under the clams.” The girl looked downright triumphant.

  “I ain’t so sure lamb fits that well with clams,” I said. “Seems a sense of elegance that’s missing.”

  “Elegance?” Now it was her turn to harrumph. “What do you know about elegance? Why do I bother quoting my poems if they’re not appreciated? It’s like casting pearls before swine.”

  “Who you calling swine?” I raised an eyebrow.

  “Well, if the shoe fits …”

  “That’s another cliché. You might want to study up on your literature some more if you’re so intent of writing poetry all the time.”

  “Literature. What do you know about literature? I bet all you ever read are Dick Tracy comic books and the National Police Gazette.”

  “I read … I read plenty.” The end of my words trailed up and off.

  “Yeah? Exactly what do you read? Name some titles. What was the last book you ever read?”

  I kept my mouth shut on purpose. We had a guy in my squad who went to university before enlisting. He kept a library of sorts, paperbacks stuffed into his musette bag that he’d loan out to the fellas. The last book of his I read was Lady Chatterley’s Lover.

  “Just like I thought,” Bobbie said. “This was such a mistake. Here I was trying to be kind, but I declare I’ve never met a man as unwashed and as barbaric as you. We’re heading back to the church.”

  The girl turned around and headed back up the trail. Again I followed her. We walked past the trees and bushes and wildflowers and we were both quiet until we reached the building. The girl and I stood out front near the road and looked at the structure. I sensed a strong need to switch directions conversationally, cleared my throat, and asked, “So you held the church together for a couple of years in your spare time. How’d that go for you?”

  Again she was silent for a time, then she said, “You don’t realize how patronizing that is, do you?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The sentence that just came from your lips. My ministry at the church was not part-time, even though I was doing my schooling simultaneously. I worked my tail off. And I did more than just hold this church together, too. Don’t look so surprised, because the church will expect more from you than you can ever deliver.”

  I might have been insulted at the remark, but instead I stifled a snicker and said, “Look, I appreciate you taking the time to show me the ropes today, but I don’t want to keep you from whatever else you got to do. If I can parachute into Normandy, then I can do this. How hard can this job be anyway? All a preacher ever does is work one day a week.”

  The girl stopped breathing. I’m sure she did. Her ears turned red and I caught the clue too late. She found her breath in a jiffy and exploded.

  “One day a week? One day a week!? You have a pencil on you?”

  I shook my head.

  “Into the office!” It was an order, and she pointed toward the annex. “You’re going to want to take notes on this.”

  I followed her inside. She dug out a pad of paper and a pencil from Mert’s desk and handed them to me.

  “Your week will begin Tuesday morning at seven-thirty a.m. with a staff meeting,” she said. “It’ll only be you and Mert, but she’ll demand a full account of your previous week, including all attendance figures and a complete list of who wasn’t there on Sunday—which is the much harder list to generate, you’ll soon learn. You’ll go over the list and see what needs are evident in the congregation, needs you’ll have to address throughout the week. That list will comprise the bulk of people you call on pastorally to see how they’re faring.”

  “So I visit a few people. Okay. Duly noted.” I sat down in Mert’s chair and swiveled to the side.

  “You’re not taking notes.” Bobbie pointed at me. “You better start taking notes, because I haven’t begun to get started. Following the staff meeting you’ll prepare your sermon for the following Sunday morning. Always be thinking ahead. A good sermon takes at least eight hours to prepare. Usually more, but you won’t have time for more. Your day on Tuesday, like any weekday, will be broken up with people dropping in to the office. They’ll say the same thing you did—that a preacher only works one day a week, and then they’ll chat away and eat up hours of your time. These are well-meaning folks, mind you, and the conversations will be important parts of your ministry. But each day and every day, a few people will drop in, and that adds up. Soon enough it’s past supper on Tuesday and time for the deacons’ meeting. That begins at seven p.m. and will sometimes last until midnight, depending on how much church business and praying you need to attend to.”

  I stopped swiveling in the chair. “Church business? What kind of business happens at a church?”

  “Deacons’ meeting is always a full agenda. You worry over how to replace the leaking roof when there’s no money. You debate how to encourage more people to come to services. You squabble with each other because two people want to be married at the church but they have no good reason to get married and folks think it’s a bad idea, so the deacons need to get involved. Catch my drift?”

  “Okay, you have some business talk. I gather that.” I swiveled some more, then started to take a few notes.

  “Then comes Wednesday. On Wednesday morning you’ll meet with the deacon board again during breakfast. They’ll want to go over any points they missed in the agenda the night before. After that you’ll come back to the church and prepare your Wednesday night devotional, the one you’ll give for prayer meeting that night.”

  “Devotional?” I stopped writing. “What’s a devotional?”

  She gave me a cold stare. “It’s like a sermon only shorter. But don’t le
t that fool you. You still need to prepare. Devotionals don’t grow on trees.”

  “That’s a cliché again,” I foolishly said.

  She sat down on the edge of Mert’s desk. A cruel smile began to form at the edges of her lips. “After lunch on Wednesday you’ll begin your visitation rounds. You’ll visit homes in the area until dinnertime, then come back to the church for the prayer meeting. Only five people have been coming to the prayer meeting, but they expect you to be well prepared. You begin at seven p.m., give your devotional, and then pray as a group for the next forty-five minutes about any needs in the community. You should finish your day by eight p.m. unless you’re called to counsel afterward.”

  “Counsel? Who do I got to counsel?” My pencil was dull, and I shaved it on the top of the paper to sharpen the point.

  “Lots of folks. When you’re a preacher, people talk to you about their problems. You’re their sounding board. They vent to you. Cry to you. Unburden the loads on their backs. You listen. And listen, and listen, and listen. Very rarely do you speak. I realize that’s going to be hard for you.” She laughed an ornery laugh. “You should be home by midnight.”

  “Okay. Another long day. I can handle long days.”

  “Oh, it isn’t the long hours.” Her nostrils flared. “It’s the mental load that will get to you before long. Being a pastor isn’t like chopping wood all day. You got to bear people’s burdens and then put those burdens somewhere so you can sort them out yourself. I’ve seen men stronger than yourself crack under the pressure.”

  I stood and started pacing.

  Bobbie continued. “On Thursdays you’ll hold a men’s Bible study during breakfast. I never held this myself, but it will be an expectation that you begin one, for sure. Somewhere along the line you’ll need to prepare for that, but you’ll need to cram that into your schedule somehow yourself. After breakfast, come back to the church. You and Mert have another staff meeting, this one briefer, where you go over your plans for Sunday and she makes up the bulletin. Included in this meeting, you’ll give her a list of all the hymns you want sung on the upcoming Sunday, any special music from soloists that might be sung, any Scripture passages you want read apart from the sermon, and any notices of special events that folks might need to have publicized in the bulletin.”

 

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