Marcia Talley - This Enemy Town

One hundred years ago, when the corner of Oakland and Ninth was probably just a cow pasture, someone-God bless ’em-had the good sense to build St. George’s Episcopal Church practically smack dab on the site of a future Orange Line Metro station. To get to the church where I’d meet Chris Donovan, I didn’t even need to switch trains. I’d timed my journey perfectly, too, emerging into the daylight at the Virginia Square/George Mason University stop at 10:15 A.M.

Aside from an apartment tower and a number of lofty office buildings, practically the first thing I saw was the church. The Episcopal Church of St. George and San José took up the entire block. On my right, a large brick sanctuary dominated the complex. Centered over a pair of tall wooden doors, a stained-glass window of Gothic style and proportions sparkled in the afternoon sun. A modern parish hall extended back to the left, and more modern still, two stakes had been pounded into the lawn and a banner stretched between them announcing St. George’s URL. As if acknowledging the parish’s Spanish heritage, an alternate entrance, much older, was constructed of stone. A single bell was suspended in an open, Spanish mission-style tower over its door.

Keeping one eye out for Chris Donovan-she told me she’d be wearing a pink suit-I stepped into the nave, smiled at one of the greeters, accepted a church bulletin, and sat down in a pew near the back of the sanctuary, trying as hard as I could to fade into the woodwork.

I studied the bulletin. The church’s official seal featured St. George jousting with a dragon, but his mount was a bicycle instead of a horse. I smiled, hoping that the service wouldn’t be as laid back as their logo.

I turned to the program for the morning service, and was disappointed to read that while the Holy Eucharist was taken from the Book of Common Prayer, that morning, at least, they were following the more modern Rite 2. I preferred Rite 1, the version that more or less maintained the majestic beauty of the language of King James. Back in 1979, when the BCP was revised, not even the Lord’s Prayer had escaped the commission’s tinkering, and “lead us not into temptation” became “save us from the time of trial.” I stared at the fur hat sitting lopsidedly on the head of the woman in the pew in front of me and thought: Time of trial. Thanks for reminding me, Lord.

As the pews around me began to fill, I gazed east toward the altar. A large red cross was mounted over a brass, open-worked altar screen behind which some sort of tapestry had been hung. On the wall above that, near the apex of the roof, a stained-glass window bloomed like a flower: a five-petaled flower. Five petals, like the Pentagon. I closed my eyes. Was the entire world becoming a place of symbols, each one serving to remind me of the late, unlamented Jennifer Goodall?

During the organ prelude (“ Durch Adams Fall ist Ganz Verderbt ,” by Johann Sebastian Bach) I listened quietly. The Bach was definitely a good sign that the service itself wouldn’t be too happy-clappy or the hymns so “relevant” that the ink was barely dry. As the organist wrapped up the prelude and made a clever little segue into the first hymn, I wondered idly what the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music would come up with in 2012, the next time the prayer and hymn books were due for revision. Back in 1979 nobody’d had laptops or forty gigabytes of anything, so it wouldn’t surprise me if future prayer books came in the form of customizable PowerPoint programs, designed to be projected on huge screens hanging over the altar.

But I needn’t have worried about St. George’s, at least not that day. The prelude was glorious, the hymns traditional-a little Ralph Vaughan Williams makes my heart soar-the choir small, but excellent, and the sermon inspirational, delivered as an extra bonus by a twinkly priest with a neat, slightly graying beard. I relaxed, even enjoying the inspired goofiness of Eucharistic Prayer C: “At your command all things came to be: the vast expanse of interstellar space, galaxies, suns, the planets in their courses, and this fragile earth, our island home.”

Island home? My mind wandered, I couldn’t help it. Palm trees, gentle ocean breezes, a little Parrot Head music on the steel drums. Now that was symbolism I could live with.

During the Prayers of the People, I offered up a proper prayer for my speedy delivery from whatever evils might be lurking in the cold, hard hearts of the FBI, reiterated my request during the post-Communion prayer, and in the time it took to play the postlude, I sat, head bowed, praying for the wisdom to know what to do.

After the service, everyone streamed in the direction of the parish hall, but Chris had said she’d skip the fellowship hour and meet me on the steps of the church. I waited there, as instructed, leaning against the iron railing of the handicapped ramp, my eyes fastened on the massive wooden doors.

When Chris came out, I recognized her at once: the tall, reed-thin soprano who had been singing in the back row of the choir. The pink suit, which was actually a particularly violent shade of fuchsia, had been covered by her choir robe. Chris’s blond hair tumbled about her ears in a tousled bob that must have cost big bucks to achieve that casual, just-slept-in look. She’d draped a paisley scarf over one shoulder and secured it with a jeweled safety pin. In unrelieved checkerboard, I looked comparatively dowdy, like a black and white movie. Chris, however, was in dazzling Technicolor.

I’d told her I would be carrying a copy of Newsweek magazine, so I held it up. She noticed, caught my eye, smiled and hurried over. “Emily?”

I nodded, feeling like the world’s biggest fraud by answering to my daughter’s name. I hated to con the woman, but other than sending a surrogate, I was running out of options.

“Let’s go someplace quiet where we can talk,” Chris said. “There’s a Starbucks by the Metro station, near the clock tower? Do you know it?”

“Yes, I noticed when I got off.”

“Right. I have some loose ends to clear up here, then I’ll pick up my coat and join you in about ten minutes. I’ll have a regular coffee, black.”

When Chris found me, I was still standing at the Starbucks fixings bar, sprinkling vanilla powder on my cappuccino. “Here’s your coffee,” I said, handing it to her. “Chocolate chip cookie, too,” I said, pointing to the counter where I’d set down a cookie the size of a salad plate, wrapped in waxed paper.

She peeled the lid off her cup and took a sip. “Thanks. Where do you want to sit?”

I shrugged. “Anywhere is fine with me.”

With Chris in the lead, we migrated toward a table in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows. Chris slipped her arms out of her coat and turned the shoulders inside out over the back of her chair. I kept my coat on. In the first place, I felt cold. In the second place, I figured I might need it if I had to blow the joint once she found out who I really was.

“Where did you get my name, Emily?” she asked before I could even make a dent in the foam on top of my coffee.

“Jennifer Goodall,” I said, watching her face carefully for any sign of a reaction.

Chris blinked twice, then set her coffee down, using both hands to steady it. “She’s-”

“I know,” I said. “It was a terrible thing.”

Chris stared over my shoulder at something so far away that even the Hubble telescope couldn’t bring it into focus. After a long silence she said, “So, how did you know Jennifer?”

“We met when she came to the Academy.” That was the truth, at least.

“Jen and I were classmates at Annapolis,” Chris volunteered. “After graduation, we went our separate ways, but we met up again at the Pentagon.”