Roy glanced at Mary Jordon. She was sobbing in frustration as Pederson edged her towards the door. “Tell him not to try too hard, will you?”
THE PROBLEM OF THE CHRISTMAS STEEPLE
by Edward D. Hoch
A full-time writer since 1968, Ed Hoch is certainly one of the two or three most prolific fiction writers in the United States, with some six hundred stories in the mystery genre. He is best known for four series detectives: Rand, a British cipher expert; Nick Velvet, a most original thief; Simon Ark, a mystical detective; and Captain Leopold, perhaps the best-known of his creations. Mr. Hoch is a winner of the Mystery Writers of America’s highest award, the Edgar.
“Like I was sayin’ last time,” Dr. Sam Hawthorne began, getting down the brandy from the top shelf, “the year 1925 was a bad one for murder and other violent crimes. And just about the worst one o’ them all came on Christmas Day, when the year was almost over. Here, let me pour you a small—ah—libation before I start…”
It had been a quiet fall in Northmont since the kidnapping and recovery of little Tommy Belmont. In fact, about the biggest news around town was that the new Ford dealer over in Middle Creek would soon be selling dark green and maroon cars along with the traditional black ones.
“You see, Dr. Sam,” my nurse April said, “pretty soon you won’t be the only one round these parts with a bright yellow car.”
“Dark green and maroon are a long way from yellow,” I reminded her. Kidding me about my 1921 Pierce-Arrow Runabout was one of her favorite sports. My first winter in Northmont I’d put the Runabout up on blocks and driven a horse and buggy on my calls, but now I was gettin’ a bit more venturesome. As long as the roads were clear I drove the car.
This day, which was just two weeks before Christmas, April and I were drivin’ out to visit a small gypsy encampment at the edge of town. The traditionally cold New England winter hadn’t yet settled in, and except for the bareness of the tree limbs it might have been a pleasant September afternoon.
The gypsies were another matter, and there wasn’t much pleasant about their encampment. They’d arrived a month earlier, drivin’ a half-dozen horse-drawn wagons, and pitched their tents on some unused meadowland at the old Haskins farm. Minnie Haskins, widowed and into her seventies, had given them permission to stay there, but that didn’t make Sheriff Lens and the townsfolks any happier about it. On the few occasions when gypsies had appeared at the general store to buy provisions, they’d been treated in a right unfriendly manner.
I’d gone out to the encampment once before to examine a sick child, and I decided this day it was time for a return visit. I knew there wasn’t much chance of gettin’ paid, unless I was willin’ to settle for a gypsy woman tellin’ April’s fortune, but still it was somethin’ I felt bound to do.
“Look, Dr. Sam!” April said as the gypsy wagons came into view. “Isn’t that Parson Wigger’s buggy?”
“Sure looks like it.” I wasn’t really surprised to find Parson Wigger visiting the gypsies. Ever since coming to town last spring as pastor of the First New England Church he’d been a controversial figure. He’d started by reopening the old Baptist church in the center of town and announcin’ regular services there. He seemed like a good man who led a simple life and looked for simple solutions—which was why so many people disliked him. New Englanders, contrary to some opinions, are not a simple folk.
“Mornin’, Dr. Sam,” he called out as he saw us drive up. He was s tan din’ by one of the gypsy wagons, talkin’ to a couple of dark-haired children. “Mornin’, April. What brings you two out here?”
“I treated a sick boy a while back. Thought I’d see how he’s coming along.” I took my bag from the car and started over. Already I recognized my patient, Tene, as one of the boys with the parson. “Hello, Tene, how you feeling?”
He was around eleven or twelve, and shy with non-gypsy gadjo like myself. “I’m okay,” he said finally.
“This the boy was sick?” Parson Wigger asked.
I nodded. “A throat infection, but he seems to be over it.”
At that moment Tene’s father appeared around the side of the wagon. He was a dark brooding man with a black mustache and hair that touched the top of his ears, leaving small gold earrings exposed. Though Parson Wigger was the same size and both men looked to be in their mid-thirties, they could hardly have been more different. Except for an old arm injury which had left him with a weak right hand, Carranza Lowara was the picture of strength and virility. By contrast Wigger gave the impression of physical weakness. The parson’s hair was already thinning in front, and he wore thick eyeglasses to correct his faulty vision.
“You are back, Doctor?” Tene’s father asked.
“Yes, Carranza, I am back.”
He nodded, then glanced at April. “This is your wife?”
“No, my nurse. April, I want you to meet Carranza Lowara. He is the leader of this gypsy band.”
April took a step forward, wide-eyed, and shook his hand. “Pleased to meet you.”
“I’m trying to help these people get settled for the winter,” Parson Wigger explained. “These wagons are hardly good shelter for twenty people. And the two tents are not much better.”
“We have lived through the winters before,” Carranza Lowara said. He spoke English well, but with an accent I hadn’t been able to place. I supposed it must be middle European.
“But not in New England.” The parson turned to me and explained. “They came up from the south, as do most gypsies. I’ve encountered them before in my travels. Spain deported gypsies to Latin America hundreds of years ago, and they’ve been working their way north ever since.”
“Is that true?” I asked Lowara. “Do you come from Latin America?”
“Long, long ago,” he replied.
I happened to glance back at my car and saw a gypsy woman in a long spangled skirt and bare feet. She was examining my car intently. I’d seen her on my previous visit, and suspected she was Lowara’s wife or woman. “Is she of your family?” I asked.
“Come here, Volga.” The woman came over promptly, and I saw that she was younger than I’d first supposed. Not a child, certainly, but still in her twenties. She was handsomer than most gypsy women, with high cheekbones and slightly slanted eyes that hinted at a mixture of Oriental blood. I introduced her to April, and they went off together to visit the other wagons.
“She is my wife,” Lowara explained.
“Tene’s mother?”
“Yes.”
“She seems so young.”
“Gypsy women often marry young. It is a custom. You should come to a gypsy wedding sometime and see the groom carry off the bride by force. It is not like your Christian weddings, Parson.”
“I imagine not,” Parson Wigger replied dryly. “But I will come to a gypsy wedding only if you honor me with your presence at my church.”
The gypsy shook his head. “Your townspeople do not like us.”
“They might like you more if they saw you attending Christian services.”
Lowara shrugged. “We have no religion. We would as soon go to your church as any other.”
“Come, then, on Christmas Day. It’s just two weeks away. Once you know the people and are friendly with them, you might even find an old barn to stay the winter.”
“Would a barn be any warmer than our tents? I think not.”
“Come anyway,” the parson pleaded. “You won’t regret it.”
The gypsy nodded. “I will talk to the others. I think you will see us in two weeks.”
Parson Wigger walked me back to my Runabout “I think their appearance on Christmas morning will have a good effect on the townspeople. No one can hate a fellow Christian on Christmas.”
“Some call them beggars and thieves. They say the women are good for nothing but telling fortunes.”
“They are human beings with souls, like the rest of us,” Parson Wigger reminded me.
“I agree. You only have to convince a
few hundred of your fellow citizens.” I didn’t have to remind him that his own popularity in Northmont was not too high at that moment.
April came back from her tour of the wagons, and we drove away with a wave to Parson Wigger. “He’s really tryin’ to help those people,” she said. “That Volga thinks highly of the parson.”
“She’s Lowara’s wife. She must have been a child bride. I treated her son and never even knew she was the mother.”
“There’s an old woman in one wagon who tells fortunes,” April said with a giggle.
“She tell yours?”
April nodded. “Said I was gettin’ married soon.”
“Good for you.” April was some years older than me, in her mid-thirties, and not the most beautiful girl in town. I figured the old gypsy woman was a good judge of human nature.
On Christmas mornin’ it was snowin’ gently, and from a distance down the street Parson Wigger’s church looked just the way they always do on greeting cards. I wasn’t that much of a churchgoer myself, but I decided I should show up. Last Christmas I’d spent the entire day deliverin’ a farm woman’s baby, and an hour in church sure wouldn’t be any harder than that.
Parson Wigger was out front, bundled against the cold and snow, greetin’ the people as they arrived. I waved to him and stopped to chat with Eustace Carey, who ran one of Northmont’s two general stores. “How are you, Doc? Merry Christmas to ye.”
“Same to you, Eustace. We’ve got good weather for it—a white Christmas but not too white.”
“Folks say the gypsies are comin’ to the service. You heard anything about it?”
“No, but it is Christmas, after all. Nothin’ wrong with them comin’ to church.”
Eustace Carey snorted. “What’s wrong is them bein’ here in the first place! I think they hexed old Minnie to get permission to camp on her land. These gypsy women can hex a person, you know.”
I was about to reply when a murmur went up from the waiting churchgoers. A single crowded gypsy wagon pulled by a team of horses was comin’ down the center of the street “Looks like they’re here,” I remarked to Carey.
It was obvious then that Parson Wigger had been standin’ in the snow for exactly this moment. He hurried out to the wagon and greeted Lowara and the others warmly. It seemed that all the gypsies had come, even the children, and after the parson shook hands with them, they filed into church.
“I don’t like ’em,” Carey said behind me. “They look funny, they smell funny, they got funny names.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that, Eustace.”
We followed the gypsies into church and took our seats in one of the front pews. I glanced around for April, then remembered that she’d be at the Catholic church, on the other side of town.
After a few moments’ wait Parson Wigger came out wearin’ his traditional long black cassock and white surplice. He carried a Bible in one hand as he mounted the pulpit and then began to speak. “First of all, I want to wish each and every one of my parishioners—and I feel you are all my parishioners—the very merriest of Christmases and the happiest of New Years. I see 1926 as a year of promise, a year of building our spiritual lives.”
I’d never been a great one for listening to sermons, and I found my eyes wandering to the double row of gypsies down front. If the sermon was boring them too, they were very good at masking their feelings. Sitting right behind them, and none too happy about it, was old Minnie Haskins, who’d given them permission to use her land.
Later, when Parson Wigger had concluded his sermon and prayer service and we’d sung the obligatory Christmas hymns, I sought out Minnie Haskins in the back of the church. Despite her years she was a spry little woman who moved about with remarkable agility. “Hello there, Dr. Sam,” she greeted me. “Merry Christmas!”
“Merry Christmas to you, Minnie. How’s the leg?”
“Fit as a fiddle!” She did a little kick to show me. “A touch o’ rheumatism can’t keep me down!” Then she pulled me aside as the others were leaving and whispered, “What’re all them gypsies doin’ here, Doc? I’m in enough trouble with folks for lettin’ them camp on my farm. Now they come to church!”
“It’s Christmas, Minnie. I think they should be welcomed at church on Christmas Day.”
“Well, lots o’ folk are upset with Parson Wigger for invitin’ them, I’ll tell ye that!”
“I haven’t heard any complaints yet except from Eustace Carey.”
“Well, him an’ others.”
Carey joined us then, still grumbling. “Soon as I can get the parson alone I’m goin’ to give him a piece o’ my mind. Bad enough fillin’ the church with gypsies, but then he takes ’em right down front.”
“Where are they now?” I asked.
“Would you believe it? He’s taken them up in the steeple to show them the view!”
I followed them out to the sidewalk, and we looked up through the fallin’ snow at the towerin’ church steeple. Though each of its four white sides had an open window for the belfry, no bell had rung there since its days as a Baptist church. The Baptists had taken their bell with them to a new church in Groveland, and Parson Wigger hadn’t yet raised enough money to replace it.
As we watched, the gypsies began comin’ out of the church and climbin’ back onto their wagon. “They can’t read or write, you know,” Carey said. “No gypsies can.”
“Probably because they haven’t been taught,” I replied. “A little schoolin’ for the youngsters like Tene would help.”
“Well,” Carey said, “I’m still goin’ to talk with the parson about this, soon’s I can catch him alone.”
I glanced around for Minnie, but she’d disappeared, swallowed up by the fallin’ snow. We could barely see across the street now, as the fat white flakes tumbled and swirled in the breeze. I could feel them cold against my face, clingin’ to my eyelashes, and I decided it was time to go home. Just then Volga Lowara came out of the church and climbed into the wagon. The driver snapped the reins and they started off.
“I’m going in to see the parson now,” Carey said.
“Wait a minute,” I suggested. I could have been wrong but I didn’t remember seeing Carranza leave the church. He might have stayed behind to talk with Parson Wigger.
“The heck with it,” Carey decided at last, his hat and coat covered with fat white snowflakes. “I’m goin’ home.”
“I’ll see you, Eustace. Wish the family a Merry Christmas.” It was somethin’ to say, avoidin’ obvious mention of the fact that his wife hadn’t accompanied him to Christmas services.
I decided there was no point in my waitin’ around, either. As Carey disappeared into the snow I started in the opposite direction, only to encounter Sheriff Lens. “Hello there, Dr. Sam. Comin’ from church?”
“That I am. A snowy Christmas, isn’t it?”
“The kids with new sleds’ll like it. Seen Parson Wigger around?”
“He’s in the church. What’s up?”
“Funny thing. I’ll tell you about it.” But before he could say more the familiar figure of Parson Wigger appeared in the church doorway, still wearin’ his long black cassock but without the white surplice. For just an instant a stray beam of light seemed to reflect off his thick glasses. “Parson Wigger!” the sheriff called out, startin’ through the snow for the church steps.
Wigger turned back into the church, bumpin’ against the door jamb. It was almost as if the sight of Sheriff Lens had suddenly terrified him. The sheriff and I reached the back of the church together, just in time to see Wigger’s black cassock vanish up the stairs to the belfry.
“Damn!” Lens exploded. “He closed the door after him. Is he running away from us?”
I tried the belfry door, but it was bolted from the other side. “He’d hardly run up there to get away from us. There’s no other way out.”
“Lemme at that door!”
It was an old church, and a powerful yank by Sheriff Lens splintered the wood around the
loose bolt. Another yank, and the door was open.
The Twelve Crimes of Christmas Page 23