Julia Spencer-Fleming - All Mortal Flesh

“There you are.”

She whirled around. Geoffrey Burns, the junior warden, stalked down the hall toward her, a tall cardboard coffee cup in one hand. “We’ve been waiting for you to get back.”

“We?”

He shrugged toward the chapter room, where committee meetings were held. “Terry McKellan called me. Told me about the situation. I suggested we get your input before we decide how to respond.”

“Respond?” She knew she sounded like a feeble-minded parrot, but she couldn’t get her head around which situation Geoff or Terry thought they needed to respond to.

“Linda Van Alstyne’s death. Look, come on inside and sit down. You look like crap warmed over.” Burns, a short, darkly intense man, wasn’t exactly known for his charm, but Clare allowed him to usher her into the chapter room. Normally, the graceful space with its oak paneling and leaded windows soothed her. Normally, she didn’t walk in there to be ambushed by Terry McKellan sitting at the large mahogany table with Mrs. Henry Marshall and Elizabeth de Groot. The new deacon looked at her reproachfully, as if she were a dog Clare had left alone too long.

“Elizabeth.” Clare tried to keep her lack of enthusiasm from showing in her voice. “I didn’t expect to see you this late. You must have a long ride home.”

“I do,” Elizabeth said, a touch of gentle censure in her tone. “But I hoped we’d have the chance to finish our talk. I was waiting in the church when Mrs. Marshall let herself in.”

“Clare, you didn’t tell us the bishop was sending us a deacon.” Mrs. Marshall shook her head.

“I only just found out yesterday.” She glanced from the elderly lady in toucan-pink lipstick and matching sweater to Terry McKellan, whose glossy brown mustache and habitual brown tweed jacket made him look like an overweight seal. “I wish you had called me if you were planning a meeting.”

“I spoke with Lacey earlier today, but she decided to come over on her own,” Terry said, rising from his seat as Clare sat down. “Glad we got here in time to meet Ms. de Groot, though.” “Please. Elizabeth.”

Clare had the sensation of being a character in a bad Pirandello play. “What’s going on?”

There was a sudden silence. The three vestry members looked at their new deacon. She met their gazes, smiling, until the penny dropped. “Ah,” de Groot said. “Clare, I’ll wait for you in your office.” She rose smoothly from her chair and glided through the chapter room door.

“Nice woman,” Terry McKellan said. “Seems very sensible.” Although she was almost certain he didn’t mean it as a jab, Clare found herself flushing.

“I’ll ask again. What’s with the surprise inspection?”

Geoff Burns plopped into the chair next to her. “Don’t get your back up, Clare. All of us have heard the stories flying around town today about Linda Van Alstyne’s death. Most of ’em revolve around why her husband shot her. And most of ’em cite you as a proximate cause.”

“ Me? ” Then the rest of his statement caught up with her. “Russ? Killing his wife? That’s…” Words failed the wrongness of the idea. “Ludicrous,” she settled. Mrs. Marshall bobbed her head in agreement. Geoff Burns shrugged. “Geoff, he couldn’t have done it. He wouldn’t have. Not ever. Not for any reason.”

“Clare, I do a lot of criminal work these days. My clients have one thing in common. They’re all innocent.” He sounded as if he were drinking cynicism instead of coffee.

Clare shoved against the table. “You better have a situation besides ignorant gossip, or I’m out of here.”

“Please, dear.” Mrs. Marshall rested one hand on Clare’s arm. “I know this is hard for you. It doesn’t seem like it, but we’re here to help.” Her face, every edge softened by seventy-seven winters, radiated concern.

“None of us like the gossip any more than you do,” Terry McKellan said. “But it’s already loose in the town. The issue is, what can we do to stop it and minimize the damage to your reputation.”

“And to the church’s.” Clare didn’t know why the words were bitter on her teeth. Since the November day two years ago when she had first passed through the great double doors of St. Alban’s as its first female pastor, she had known that she was the public face of the church. Had known that she would always be under scrutiny, by those seeking a pattern for Christianity and by those wondering when she would screw up. She had tried to live up to her office. She had tried for two years of loneliness and isolation, with no one knowing who she really was except God and Russ Van Alstyne.

“I was thinking.” Terry McKellan stroked his mustache. “There’s that fellow you’ve been seeing down in New York.”

“Hugh Parteger?”

“How serious are you two?”

Clare spread her hands. “We enjoy each other’s company. I’ve been down to the city to visit him a few times, and he’s come up here a few weekends.”

“Nothing in the offing?”

“He’s climbing the ladder at an international capitalizing firm. I’m making twenty thousand dollars a year in a dinky rural parish. There’s a gap there.”

“Oh.” Terry’s shoulder’s sagged. “So… do you think he’d be willing to pretend to get engaged to you?”

All three of them stared at him.

“You want me to ask Hugh Parteger to be my beard?” Clare’s voice cracked with incredulity.

“Terry, you sound as if you’ve been reading one of my Regency romances.” Mrs. Marshall shook her head. “False engagement, indeed.”

Geoffrey Burns was, for once, speechless.

“Well…” Terry’s round cheeks reddened. “It may sound silly to you, but I bet it would work. What else are we going to do?”

“Ignore it,” Clare said.

“A word into the right ear can work wonders.” Mrs. Marshall deliberately touched her eye-scorchingly lipsticked mouth. “Pretty soon, everyone who’s anyone knows the truth.”

Geoff shook his head. “The story is a lot better than the truth. People want to hear about illicit sex and murder. No, I think we’ll have to be ready with a credible threat of a defamation of character suit. This is a classic case of slander. Van Alstyne may have killed his wife, but he sure as hell didn’t have an affair with our priest.”

Clare didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Her defenders. “There is no illicit sex. There is no murder. There is no story.” She got to her feet. “I’m not a dreamy-eyed girl in the throes of her first love. I knew I couldn’t have Russ Van Alstyne. I made a choice. I chose my congregation and my position as your pastor. If you can’t appreciate that and support me now when I need you, then to hell with you.”

The meeting broke up very shortly afterward.

When Clare went out the open door of the chapter room and in the open door of her office, she discovered Elizabeth de Groot, sitting wide-eyed and well within earshot, waiting for her.

“I couldn’t help but overhear-” de Groot began.

“Go home, Elizabeth.” Clare sounded rude and didn’t care. “I’m talked out for the night. Go home to whoever it is that loves you and thank God for your blessings. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Wednesday, January 16

Russ’s third day as a widower started at bad and went to worse. He dragged himself down his mother’s stairs-after taking twenty minutes to dress, stupidly holding up pieces of his uniform, trying to remember how they went-to find his mom and sister whispering furtively across the kitchen table. They both jumped up to hug and squeeze him, to rub his back and inquire how he was and how he had slept, and while he appreciated their heartfelt concern, he also knew they were trying to shield him from something.