Slow Fall

by Edgar Warren Williams

  “Millie brought it, didn't she?” Pickett stared at Matt, whose eyes were still on the woman in the middle of the room. “Millie threatened Edmund with it, told him to leave Amy alone. He took the gun from her.” Pickett relaxed back into the soft leather, turning his head toward Jan Ayers. “Then you got the gun from the hall desk. I know that already. What I don't know is who told Ed about Amy—who she was. Millie?”

  Jan stared at Pickett, her face blank.

  “Or did Ed figure it out on his own?”

  “On his own?” Jan's face collapsed around her mouth as if shattered by the burst of hysterical laughter that broke through it. “Fat chance. Of course she told him. Edmund had no idea. As a matter of fact, he wouldn't believe her. It was almost comical—that pathetic harlot come to shame the Reverend Edmund Ayers, come to destroy the ministry of the Lord Je—”

  “Why Ed?” cried Homer. “Why kill him?”

  “Why?” Jan Ayers looked up in amused astonishment. “He found out. We had to kill him—no other choice. We—”

  Jan paused, recomposed her features. And with the air of someone explaining something to a child she said, “The Lord simply presented us with the opportunity once again—this time as Roger Mooring. Edmund found out about our”—she gestured vaguely—”relationship with Ralph Kemp. He knew long before that, I think. But he didn't have the nerve to bring it up. Much less nerve enough to go to the authorities. He—”

  “Look…” Matt's voice brightened, apparently in response to the topic. “His inheritance dried up long ago. His name was collateral enough for a while, but the New Temple strained even that. It was a simple cash-flow problem. We needed cash, that's all. Tithes were not even meeting operating expenses, much less keeping up with the debt payments. Ed said the Lord would provide.” Matt smiled indulgently. “He didn't understand, he never understood, that… well, the Lord's provisions aren't always, shall we say, palatable? Jan and I both realized that he would have to become the front man—the… the…” Matt drew himself up straight in his chair; he fairly beamed. “. . . the Aaron to my Moses. Someone had to do something. Or this great witness would simply—”

  “And that slut's daughter ruined it!” cried Jan. “That whoring child destroyed herself. And then Edmund—”

  “You told her,” cut in Pickett, “didn't you? Amy came by to see Edmund. She wanted the truth, and you threw it in her face. She couldn't take it. That's why she killed her self.”

  “I told her, yes.” Jan straightened, proudly. “But the Lord destroyed her. For her sins. What have I to do with that? He destroys all those who stand between the Word and its witness. I was merely His tool. But when I told Edmund—told him that his whoring child was dead, gone for ever, he blamed me. Me! He gave himself over to Satan, then. Entirely. He had to die. He would tell, he said. He would have actually gone to Sheriff Beane.” The amazement seemed genuine. “He would have told you, Bodie Pickett, if Matt hadn't—”

  “And what about you?”

  “Shut up!”

  “What about you, Nettie Moses?” Matt leaned awkwardly across the desk. “You explain what shooting Millie had to do with the Lord's work, with the Word's witness. Explain that, Nettie dear.”

  “Millie had to die.” Jan polled the room with her eyes. “You see that don't you? She was all that remained of the Reverend Edmund Ayers' fall—the only one left who could taint Edmund and the great work of the Temple.”

  “Your sister,” said Pickett quietly. “That's who we're talking about.”

  Jan Ayers paused, her mouth still open, and turned from Matt to Pickett. Her voice low, barely human, she said: “No sister of mine. I was born anew. Born into the New Jerusalem, from the blood of the Lord, and the Grace of the Lord God… Born anew.”

  Organ music billowed into the close room through a crack in the sanctuary door; a youthful head came with it. “Mizz Ayers? There anything the matter? The service—they're waiting.”

  Without a word, Jan Ayers whirled around and pushed past the young messenger into the sanctuary beyond. Pickett rushed to the door as it closed.

  “No. Leave her be,” Homer shrugged. “She aint going nowheres—not yet anyway.”

  A light tapping and Kimberly's voice came from the opposite door. “Missus Ayers, are you in there? They're waiting. Are you in there?” The door opened. “Oh. I'm sorry.” Kimberly moved back through the door leaving only her head in the room.

  Homer stood. “It's okay.” He leaned over the desk, bracing one hand on the blotter in front of Matt Cheatham, and reached for the intercom.

  Kimberly scanned the silent faces, and slipped back into the room, backing up against the door and closing it in the process. “Is anything the matter?”

  Homer paused over the array of buttons and looked back to Kimberly. “Not that can be helped, honey.” He pushed the red button. “Skeeter?… Skeeter! Where the hell are you?”

  The intercom crackled. Matt Cheatham moved uncomfortably in the chair. Sheriff Homer Beane loomed over him like a wrathful god.

  “Yessir.”

  “Skeeter, better get in here. Call for another car—we'll need two.”

  “Sir, Singleton and Franklin's already here. They foun another stiff up round the Osteen Bridge. It looks like—”

  “Jesus. Get in here, Skeeter, or am I gonna have to—”

  “Nosir. I'm comin! I—”

  Homer released the button. With a grunt of effort, he pushed himself off the desk. “Just what I need right now, another goddamn body.”

  The revolver slipped from the sheriff's holster without a sound.

  “Let's hope it's the last,” said Matt.

  He held the revolver awkwardly, using both hands. He cocked the hammer. He moved toward Kimberly and the door through which she'd entered. A loud knock at the door brought a gasp from Kimberly.

  Matt grabbed her, pulling her in front of him.

  Skeeter burst through. “Sheriff, that there body they foun, it was—” Skeeter froze, looked at Kimberly, Cheatham, and the long barrelled service revolver that joined the two. Without moving anything else, his eyes shifted to Beane's.

  Beane shook his head.

  “Uh, Mister Cheatham?”

  Matt stood, silent, tightening his grip on Kimberly's arm. Kimberly grimaced in pain. “Please, Mister Cheatham. I… You're hurting me. I don't understand—”

  “Be quiet.”

  Skeeter raised his hands to shoulder height. “Mister Cheatham—look, we got two officers out there in the lobby, and another car comin. They aint no way in hell you gone—”

  “Be quiet.”

  Pickett said: “It was Kemp, wasn't it?”

  Matt turned nervously. Pickett smiled nervously.

  “Kemp. Had to be. The last two shots you fired—the two from your gun—they weren't fired at me, were they? Kemp was coming apart, you couldn't count on him any more. You had the gun again, so you killed him. Not bad.”

  Skeeter cut in eagerly: “Tha's right, sheriff, it was Kemp. He had two holes in him. Small caliber, probably one of those there pocket automatics. Like the one what—”

  “Be quiet! All of you!”

  All were.

  Matt pulled Kimberly with him toward the sanctuary door—and Bodie Pickett, who planted his weight firmly on both feet and stood, hands at his sides, blocking the way.

  “You will please move, Mister Pickett. We are leaving. And if you”—and he swung the revolver back toward the center of the room—”or anyone else does anything to stop us, Kimberly will be the first but certainly not the last to get hurt.” Matt Cheatham moved closer to Pickett and the door. “Do you understand me?”

  Bodie Pickett stepped aside. “Perfectly.”

  “You're a goddamned fool, Cheatham.”

  “No doubt, Sheriff, no doubt.” Matt released Kimberly long enough to open the door. She gasped when he grabbed her again and pushed her into the space beyond. “But then I've nothing to lose. Nothing what-so-ever.” And the door closed so
ftly behind them.

  Homer rushed to it, paused, then turned back to Skeeter. “Send Franklin and Singleton round front to the sanctuary. You wait for the other car out front then cover as many of the exits as you can. And call for all the backup we got. Pickett?”

  Pickett stared down at the floor, apparently lost in thought.

  “You.”

  Pickett started. “Yeah?”

  “You wait here. Lock the door after me so's he can't get out this way. Get going, Skeeter!”

  With that, Skeeter took off through the door he'd entered by. Pickett opened the opposite door for the sheriff. “You lock it now, y'hear?” Pickett nodded, and held the door open as Homer stepped through.

  It opened at floor level. A runway cut through the tiered seating which formed a high wall on either side. It ran to the three broad steps at the base of the center dais, the distance carpeted in red. Matt and Kimberly pressed against the wall, inching their way down the runway toward the dais. Homer followed them, always at the same distance, not threatening, but nonetheless holding his ground.

  On the central podium, Jan Ayers stood with her arms outstretched, a black shadow cast by the high white cross above her. The white sculpted figures behind her listened in cool silence to the voice she raised in tribute to the Reverend Edmund Ayers and his vision—the Temple of Glory. The congregation was rapt.

  No one noticed as Matt dragged Kimberly to the steps. Matt looked nervously over his shoulder, noticing Homer—and Bodie Pickett, who still stood in the open doorway. He wheeled around, putting Kimberly between himself and the Sheriff. The first few rows of seats not more than ten yards away could now see Matt's revolver. There were whispers.

  A large sunburned man with grey hair stood from his seat at the end of the second row. Matt's eyes bulged; he turned the gun quickly on the risen man. Sheriff Homer Beane exploded:

  “Stay back!”

  The hall fell silent as his cry multiplied throughout the vast doomed space. The sunburned man froze, he sat back down. The clatter of feet echoed through the hall as Singleton and Franklin ran to the front, down separate aisles.

  “No!”

  At the sound of the sheriff's voice, they froze, revolvers drawn, in front of the dais—and Jan Ayers who stopped mid-sentence. Homer said in his public voice:

  “Nobody move. Everbody stay put, and everthing'll be just fine.” The words multiplied and spiraled through the sanctuary.

  Slowly, theatrically, Homer strode forward toward Matt Cheatham. He stopped not ten feet from Matt and his hostage, braced his legs apart, hooked his thumbs through his polished tooled leather holster belt and, cocking his massive head to the side, said:

  “What's it gone be now, Mister Cheatham? They aint but two ways outta this. And you know what they are. They jus aint no sense in—”

  But Beane gave it up. Matt Cheatham was beyond sense—eyes large and red, face gone pink against the background of his white dress shirt. With an arm around Kimberly's neck, he pulled her behind him up the steps, and onto the dais. Kimberly's eyes started as her own face grew red from lack of air. Matt backed against the white marble figure of a saint, the beatific figure dwarfing both Matt and his burden. Sibilant murmurs ran low through the space.

  Jan Ayers lowered her arms, and descended from the Plexiglas pulpit. When she stood before Matt Cheatham and the terrified Kimberly, she turned.

  The congregation quieted.

  Beginning low, her voice quickly rising to a volume that filled the hall without amplification, Jan said:

  “Lift thy sword, Oh God. Release thy terrible swift sword upon thy children. And kill thy children with death. For vengeance is Mine, sayeth the Lord. And terrible is the wrath of our God. And terrible is the day of His Wrath—”

  “No!”

  Jan froze.

  Matt's voice spoke terror. “No, no you can't! I… I—”

  Jan looked at him, then back to the congregation. “A-a-and kill thy children…”

  Jan looked at Matt then, in silence; he returned the stare. Awe and wonder spoke in the eyes of each, the remnants of Jan's last words the only sound vibrating the cavernous sanctuary.

  Homer stepped forward. His boot missed the carpet, striking the marble floor. Matt started at the sound. Homer froze. But Bodie Pickett moved.

  He moved quickly down the aisle, past the sheriff, and to the steps. He paused there, staring at Matt, his eyes bland and disinterested. Slowly, he mounted the steps, stopping in front of Matt Cheatham, Homer's service revolver six inches from his belly. Apparently calm, his hands to his sides, his weight firmly planted on both feet, he stared into Matt's bulging eyes, his own narrowing and opening in turn. Quietly, as if in intimate conversation, as if oblivious of the thousands of souls staring down on the two of them, Pickett said:

  “That's not all, is it Matt?”

  Matt didn't move, but his gaze became less glassy.

  “It's not, is it? You killed J.B.—or had him killed. The same thing. I wanna know why.”

  Matt's eyes shifted nervously from Pickett to Jan Ayers. Then to the Sheriff.

  “Then I'll tell you, Matt. He was executor of the estate—Clayton and Marjorie's estate, Ed's parents. He knew Ed had overextended himself. He spoke to Ed about it. Was that it? And Ed told him what he thought you were up to. You killed him then, just like the others…”

  Matt mouthed a “no.”

  But Pickett ignored the other's denial. “And just like the others, you pointed the evidence someplace else. Notorious drunk shoots self in drunken depression. You could have predicted the headlines.”

  “No,” and this time the word found voice.

  Still, Pickett ignored it. “That's the way they read. And that's the way you planned it. Isn't it?”

  “No,” said Matt clearly.

  “Isn't it?” repeated Pickett, the mask of calm gone from his face. It flushed with desperation.

  Matt suddenly laughed; then, as suddenly, stopped.

  The laugh echoed into silence. Matt smiled then, shook his head slowly, for an instant closing his eyes. “You pathetic sod… You think that drunk could have found out anything about anything? He didn't know one drink from the next. He didn't have the faintest idea about us.”

  He leaned forward, his smile hardening into a sneer.

  “You get me, Pickett? You understand that? Kill him?—”

  Kimberly gagged.

  Matt shook her, drew his arm tighter around her neck, then looked back up to the tall man before him. He showed his teeth, his eyes crinkling with genuine amusement. “He killed himself, Pickett! Himself! He stuck that gun of his in his mouth and—”

  In desperation, Kimberly kicked back.

  A spike heel caught Matt in the shin. He cried out, threw Kimberly to the marble floor and pulled back Homer's revolver as if to strike her.

  But he never got the chance.

  Three sharp snaps as from a bullwhip broke the echo of Kimberly's fall. The crack of each hammered Matt against the marble statue behind him.

  Jan screamed, the echo of her voice cutting through the periodic echoes of the three gunshots. Her hands went to her throat, closing on her neck and the red rose that hung there.

  At the same moment, to the left of Matt's red silk tie, three gaudy flowers of the same hue bloomed on his white starched shirt. The revolver twisted in his hand, and, for an instant, hung limply from his index finger before it clattered to the polished marble. Matt glanced down to his shirt and the three expanding stains. They had become one. He looked up at Bodie Pickett. His mouth came open; but before it released any words his eyes went white, his jaw slack. Matt Cheatham slid down the white marble statue behind him, and to the floor. His passage streaked the white marble red.

  Silence became murmur; then, quickly, roar.

  Jan Ayers stepped over Kimberly, reaching for Matt's pistol. Catching her foot in the hem of her gown, she went over on top of the other woman, falling toward the gun. Pickett stepped forward quickly and
kicked the revolver out from under her. It skittered across the dais and over the edge. Jan Ayers and Pickett followed it with their eyes as it clattered to the floor at the feet of Mark Ayers.

  He stood, feet braced apart, eyes wild and staring, with Millie's silver automatic still held before him clasped tightly in both hands. A wisp of white smoke spiraled up from the barrel.

  But it no longer pointed at Matthew Cheatham, but Jan Ayers.

  Pickett, his eyes red, his long face as white as those of the saints behind him, stepped between Mark and his mother. Below the roar in the Temple, he said:

  “No.”

  “But—” Mark batted his eyes. “—but she… she—”

  “No. Enough.”

  Mark looked from Pickett to the silver automatic. It trembled in his white hands, sparkling in the reflected glare of the stage lights.

  Pickett raised his eyebrows in a question.

  In answer, the silver automatic dropped to the cold stone floor.

  Homer pushed past, scooped up the pistol, and stopped, staring up into the dull eyes of Bodie Pickett. “Well, boy, I guess you bout—”

  But Pickett wasn't listening. He rushed down the steps, and cut through the pressing congregation toward the double door marked EXIT. He pushed through without stopping. Out onto the steaming asphalt, into the midday glare. Brisk, deliberate, his face blank and hard, Picket continued past the ranks of glittering windshields and super heated steel.

  Until he came to a white '65 Nova. He put a hand to its door.

  He stopped. He looked down at his hand.

  Slowly, he turned his face toward the sky—the high Florida sky, blue with that azure sometimes seen in the eye of a child. He stared up into that sky and into the bright Florida sun fixed in its center like the glint of light that can sometimes hide the black center of the eye. He stared into that light till his hazel eyes brimmed. Translucent blues streaked his face then, and his lids grew swollen and closed.

  And Bodie Pickett looked down at his hand then, and opened the door. He dropped to the hot vinyl. The Nova started on the first try.

  ###

  About the Author

  Edgar Warren Williams is a fifth generation Floridian, born and raised in pre-Disney central Florida. He has made a living as a chauffer, a teacher, a farmer, and an orchestral conductor. A published composer and the author of two out-of-print non-fiction books, he lives in hundred-year-old farm house twenty miles from the closest grocery store. If you enjoyed this mystery, please contact him at