Bill Pronzini - Deadfall

He asked me, “Have we met before, brother? I don’t seem to recall having the pleasure.”

I told him it was our first visit to the church. I didn’t tell him I hoped it would be our last.

He invited us to sit down, ushered us to the chairs in front of his desk, held Kerry’s for her, and then bounced around behind the desk and sat down himself. His swivel chair must have been wound up high or built up with extra padding; as short as he was, he still seemed to be looking down at us like a little king on his throne.

“Were you with us for services this morning?” he asked.

I said, “No, we missed them. We just got here.”

“Too bad, too bad. You’re familiar with the teachings of Ezekiel, of course? The resurrection of dry bones?”

I nodded. Kerry took out her handkerchief and sneezed into it.

“Well,” Daybreak said, and smiled, and then said, “The Reverend Holloway tells me you’ve come to offer a donation to the Moral Crusade.”

“Actually, no,” I said. “That was just a ruse to get in here to see you.”

He had terrific poise, you had to give him that; his smile didn’t even waver. “Deceit is a sin, brother,” he said gently.

“That depends on the magnitude of the deceit. Some kinds are more sinful than others.”

“To be sure. But all sin is wicked, brother; those who indulge in it casually are no less apt to be damned than those who embrace it with open arms. The sins of man are the devil’s playthings.”

“Would you say harassment is among them?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Harassment. The kind that’s done in the name of God.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

“This lady is Kerry Wade,” I said. “Does the name mean anything to you, Reverend?”

“No, brother, it doesn’t. Should it?”

“It should if your assistants confide in you. Ms. Wade is your Reverend Dunston’s ex-wife.”

His smile was gone now; but it seemed to have faded out gradually, rather than to have disappeared all at once. In its place he wore a grave, earnest expression.

“I still don’t understand,” he said. “Perhaps you’d better explain the purpose of your visit.”

“Isn’t it obvious? We’re here to put a stop to Reverend Dunston’s delusion that Ms. Wade is still his wife. She divorced him more than five years ago.”

“The Church of the Holy Mission does not recognize divorce,” Daybreak said. “In our eyes, divorce is-”

“-a pernicious invention of man,” I finished for him. “Uh-huh, so I’ve been told. But that doesn’t change the legality of Ms. Wade’s decree. Or her unwillingness to remarry her ex-husband, which is what he keeps pestering her to do.”

Kerry blew her nose loudly, as if in emphatic agreement.

Daybreak said, “May I ask the nature of your involvement in the matter, sir?” I seemed to have lost my status as his brother; now I was just plain “sir.” “Are you Mrs. Dunston’s attorney?”

“It’s Ms. Wade, and no, I’m not her attorney. I’m a friend of hers, a close friend. Dunston has been harassing me, too.”

“Ah,” Daybreak said.

“Ah?”

“Ah.”

“All right,” I said testily, “I confess: I’m a fornicator. What of it?”

Kerry suppressed a giggle and blew her nose again. It sounded like a goose honking.

“Your confession saddens me,” Daybreak said. “It comes without shame. There is so much sin in today’s world, so little shame.”

“And I suppose the Moral Crusade is going to reverse the trend?”

“We will do our part,” he said passionately. “Yes, we will.”

“Well, let me tell you this,” I said. “Sinners have rights, too, the same as moral crusaders. And one of them is the right to live our lives without interference-”

I broke off because Daybreak was shaking his bald head. He said, “Sinners forfeit their rights until they renounce their wicked ways. God has no patience with those who spurn His teachings, who foul the paths of righteousness.”

“Did He tell you that?”

“Sir?”

“Do you talk to God, Reverend?”

“Of course.”

“Does He answer you?”

“Of course.”

I was starting to get flustered, which in me is one step shy of losing both my patience and my temper. I said, “And I suppose He told you it’s okay for a man to hound his ex-wife just because he-”

“A man does not have an ex- wife, sir,” Daybreak said. “When a man marries it is for his lifetime and that of his wife’s; in God’s eyes it is for all of eternity. If his wife should leave him he is justified in demanding that she return to his house and his bed.”

“No matter what she wants, is that it?”

“It is what God wants that matters.”

“There are laws-”

“God’s laws are higher.”

I could feel myself sliding toward the edge of unreason. And at this point I was not even sure I wanted to stop the slide. I said, “Listen to me, Daybreak. I’ve had just about enough of-”

“Oh, stop it,” Kerry said suddenly. “I’ve had enough of this myself.”

Daybreak and I both looked at her. She sneezed, blew her nose, snuffled, and said to him, “You win, Reverend-you and my ex-husband both. I can’t fight it anymore. I’ll go back to him.”

I gawked in disbelief. Daybreak beamed. “The Reverend Dunston will be pleased to hear that, my dear,” he said. “Surely the Almighty will be, too.”

I said, “Kerry…”

She ignored me. “Does Reverend Dunston live here at the church?” she asked Daybreak.

“Oh yes. He has an apartment in our main house.”

“Then that’s where I’ll be living, too?”

“Yes. You’ll find it quite comfortable.”

“But you know, I’m not going to remarry him.”

“There’s no need, my dear. You’ve never been un married.”

“Oh, I understand that,” she said. “But I wonder if everyone else will.”

“Everyone else?”

“Everyone in your flock. And everyone in the Bay Area, not to mention other parts of the country. And especially NOW and the other women’s organizations. Oh yes, and let’s not forget the American Civil Liberties Union.”

“I don’t understand…”

“Well,” she said, “the Church of the Holy Mission may not believe in divorce or the individual freedom of women or the laws of the land, but a lot of people do. I’ll bet the newspapers will be delighted to hear from me.”

“Newspapers?”

“Yes. As soon as I move in with Ray… I mean the Reverend Dunston

… I’ll call half a dozen papers and tell them both your church and your so-called moral crusade sanctions the keeping of women in religious bondage.”

“Bondage?”

“Exactly. When the women’s organizations hear about it they’ll come here in droves and picket the church and disrupt your activities. Then there’ll be national wire service stories and all sorts of television coverage. The church and the Moral Crusade will get a lot of publicity, Reverend Daybreak. Won’t that be nice for you?”

He sat there blinking at her. Me too, only my blinks were ones of admiration. She had succeeded in doing with a few well-chosen words what I hadn’t even come close to doing with a barrelful: rattling him right out of his sanctimonious self-assurance. He said lamely, “My dear Mrs. Dunston…”

“I can see the headlines now,” Kerry said. “ ‘Church Forces Woman to Live with Ex-Husband.’ ‘Church Condones Bondage of Women in the Name of Religion.’ ” She let him have a sweet, guileless smile. “The whole thing will probably become a nationwide cause celebre, ” she said. “In fact, I’ll make sure it does. I’m in advertising, you know-the Bates and Carpenter agency in San Francisco. We’re very good at saturation promo campaigns, the manipulation of public sentiment. Even better than you are.” Another sweet smile. “That should help no end when the lawsuit comes to trial.”