The Treble Wore Trouble (The Liturgical Mysteries)
Page 22
The St. Germaine Little Theater decided that Welcome to Mitford wasn't really for them, and chose Brigadoon for their summer show. Goldi Fawn Birtwhistle would be directing.
Helen Pigeon's bloodhound, Flash, won Best of Breed in the Asheville Dog Show. Buford did not place.
Meg lost our Lenten bet and I held her to her promise. She cooked me hamburgers three times a week from Easter all the way to Pentecost. I had to adjust my exercise program accordingly, but it was well worth it.
We wriggled through Lent, mixing and blending the liturgy, and eventually bursting forth out the other side into a glorious Easter. Kimberly Walnut, in an effort to be culturally inclusive with our neighbors across our southern border, decided that it would be a wonderful idea to incorporate a little-known Mexican tradition on Good Friday afternoon. This tradition was "little-known" because Pete had invented it on the spot, then got Manuel Zumaya, the cook at the Slab, to back him up. Kimberly Walnut was enthralled by the very idea of being culturally diverse.
And so it was that, after our Good Friday noonday service in the church, all the young children of St. Barnabas (who were on Spring Break that week, anyway) gathered in the garden behind the church for the Blessing of the Paschal Piñata — a large papier-mâché Easter Bunny hanging by his neck from a six-foot-tall cross planted in the azaleas. Kimberly Walnut told the children the "ancient Mexican legend" about the Easter Bunny and how he swallowed all his eggs to keep them from being stolen by El Diablo, the evil fox. El Diablo captured the Easter Bunny, hung him from a tree, and beat him with a stick for forty days, but the rabbit never gave him the precious eggs. Then a rainbow appeared in the sky and El Diablo had to finally let the Easter Bunny go.
Pete and Cynthia, both in attendance, were dumbfounded. Meg was aghast. Even I was taken aback.
"El Diablo?" Cynthia said to Pete. "Forty days? A rainbow?"
"I got most of it from a Dora the Explorer cartoon," said Pete. "I didn't think Kimberly Walnut would go for it."
"Okay," said one skeptical kid after he'd heard the story. "But how does this have anything to do with Jesus? Isn't Easter about Jesus?"
Kimberly Walnut was taken aback. She hadn't planned for questions, preferring to start the whacking immediately after the telling of the ancient legend. "Well ..." she started, "in this story the Easter Bunny represents Jesus and the eggs represent, uh ... humankind, sort of." Then she did the expedient yet unforgivable thing and said, "What do you think, children? How is the Easter Bunny like Jesus?"
"Oh, my stars," muttered Rosemary Pepperpot-Cohosh, dropping her head into her hands. "Bev was right. She really is a nut."
"They both dress in white," said one little girl. "But the Easter Bunny has a bow-tie. I don't think Jesus wears a bow tie except maybe when he goes to Cracker Barrel. I think I saw him there once, but Mom said it was just a lunatic, so stay out of the bathroom."
"They're both invisible," suggested a boy. "Like that wizard in Harry Potter."
"I know!" said another boy, waving his arm frantically in the air. "I know! They both come out of a hole and make people happy."
Meg stifled a snort.
"Rabbits and Jesus both taste good with wine," said little Charlie Whitman. "That's what my Uncle Matt says."
"That's a good one," said Pete, chuckling. "A communion joke!"
"They both have long, furry ears," chirped the girl who spoke first, happy to keep contributing. "Well," she said thoughtfully, "except for Jesus."
"I get presents on Christmas and my birthday," said a very young girl who'd obviously forgotten the question. "I like to get presents!"
"That's right, honey," interrupted Mother P, intervening before things got too far out of control. "We get presents because people love us. We get them on our birthday, at Christmas, even on Easter. But the best present is from God. God gave us Jesus. On Easter, the colored eggs remind us that God loves us more than anything. Does everyone understand?"
All the heads nodded.
Mother P quickly blessed the piñata and the children took their sticks and thumped the Easter Bunny vigorously until he broke apart and all the plastic Easter eggs spilled out. It took a while, but the kids were happy to oblige. "Take that, Easter Bunny!" yelled the little girl who liked getting presents. "Take that!"
Each of the eggs contained a scripture promise and a chocolate kiss. Most of the kids ate the chocolate, threw the scripture lessons on the ground, and went home. It was at that point that Rosemary decided to forego the blended service for the foreseeable future and vowed to have several stern meetings with Kimberly Walnut.
St. Barnabas turned its sights toward the coming year. Easter Season would be followed by Pentecost, then eventually Advent, and another Christmas. Our adventures would continue. It is Meg's opinion that in St. Germaine, North Carolina, anything is possible. Anything? No. Everything is possible.
* * *
"Hmm," said Marilyn, after Pedro had gone. "It's 2010. Ain't that something?"
"Yep," I said. "Pedro bought us a couple of years. Enough time to get our lives in order, do some serious repenting, go to church, tell our loved ones how we feel about them ..."
"Or," cooed Marilyn, giving me a come-hither wink and languoring longly on the sofa, "a couple of years to do just about anything we want." She patted the sofa cushion beside her and smiled like Mona Lisa right after she ate that canary. "After all, the end of the world is right around the corner."
It's good to be a detective.
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