Ron/Janet Benrey - Gone To Glory

“Thank you,” she said. “I appreciate your understanding.”

George Ingles jumped back into the conversation. “You might feel differently about your Christianity if you attended one of our Sunday worship services.” He beamed at her. “Our choir and our praise band are first-rate—the finest in Glory. And Daniel, here, delivers a pretty good sermon.”

“I have to admit that I’m tempted…” she said. “I promise that I’ll think about it.”

George patted Lori’s shoulder. “We can’t ask more than that, now, can we?”

“It was lovely meeting you,” Lori said to George, and then to Daniel, “Thank you, once again, Reverend Hartman. I promise that I won’t be a nuisance.”

Daniel returned a halfhearted wave to Lori as she left, then glanced at George, who was clearly waiting for Lori to be out of earshot before he said anything else. A moment later the church’s heavy front door swung shut.

“It’s the story of my life,” George said with a mock display of anguish. “The ladies love me, even though I never disguise the fact that I’m married. I tell you, Daniel, it’s a curse.”

Daniel knew that his friend was joking, but he still felt another round of annoyance at George’s delight. Why did Lori act the way she did? What did George have that he didn’t?

Enough! Stop thinking like a jerk.

Daniel took a deep breath and wondered why he felt the way he did.

Emma Neilson glanced at the clock above The Scottish Captain’s aging stove and felt a flutter of excitement cut through her rotten mood. Noon! In less than ten minutes she would look out the kitchen window and see Rafe—her husband of scarcely two months—marching along the flagstone path behind the Captain.

Rafe, I need a hug. Badly.

Rafe’s job as Glory’s deputy police chief required that he work long days, often stretching into evenings. Her job as owner and proprietor of The Scottish Captain put her on duty at about six every morning. Their daily lunches together were an oasis of calm during the middle of their twelve-hour workdays that they both could enjoy.

Emma banged a stoneware plate on the small table in the kitchen, fully aware that she was taking her annoyance out on the crockery. Most lunches she could talk about pleasant things with Rafe—but not today. Her morning of shopping in Glory had been decidedly disagreeable. She’d been glared at by three different people—two of whom she didn’t even know.

Ill will toward her seemed to be growing worse with each passing day. It had started a week earlier when Rafe had arrested Tony Taylor for the murder of Quentin Fisher. Many of Glory’s upstanding citizens thought that killing Fisher, a big-city stranger, was a fabulous idea, a fate he richly deserved for defrauding Glory Community Church and trying to con Tony Taylor. They resented Rafe, and Emma, for doing his duty.

Emma glanced at the cover of her latest marketing brochure, fresh from the printer. Her marketing communications firm had sent over the first dozen copies. The photo on the cover, one of her favorites, captured the Captain on a crisp fall day when the trees had reached the peak of color. White letters above the photo proclaimed, “The Scottish Captain: A Charming B and B in North Carolina’s Friendliest Town.”

Friendliest town, my foot.

The clock inched closer to twelve-ten. Emma checked on Calvin Constable’s latest culinary experiments, which had begun to bubble nicely in the microwave. Calvin, her breakfast chef, was an inveterate innovator, whose latest project was to develop a series of hot entrées that combined North Carolina cuisine with international dishes. The dish in the microwave was Southern Fried Thai Chicken. Well, how bad could it be?

Emma turned the brochure over. The back cover illustration was a stylized map of Perquimans County that made the town of Glory seem larger and more important then Hertford, the county seat.

The kitchen door flew open and Rafe entered, his cheeks rosy from a fast walk from police headquarters. Her heart sang to see him looking so happy. She hurried over to hug him and be hugged. After a long welcome-home kiss, Rafe sniffed the air. “Chicken?”

“Mostly,” Emma replied. “It’s covered with peanut sauce that’s flavored with a mix of Thai and Southern spices.”

His face registered mild surprise. “Calvin strikes again.”

“I made us sweet tea to go with it,” she said. “With a touch of cardamom to echo the Thai theme.”

Rafe poured himself a glass of tea. “Mmm. Delicious.” He added after another swallow, “How’s your day going so far, my love?”

She sighed softly then said, “You’ll probably wish you hadn’t asked, but I’ve had better mornings. The Send-Rafe-Neilson-a-Nastygram team was hard at work on the streets of Glory.”

“Sorry about that.” He shook his head. “What can I say, except that’s what small towns are like?”

“The scary thing is that two people I don’t know joined in the fun. They must have recognized me from the picture of us that ran in the Glory Gazette.”

“Have I told you how beautiful you look in that photograph?”

“Don’t change the subject. Jacqueline Naismith—a member of our choir—buttonholed me on Main Street and gave me a ten-minute overview on what she thought about you arresting Tony.”

“I suppose it’s natural that folks in town are mad at me.”

“Actually, they’re mad at us. By some weird logic, I became responsible for the actions of the police department when I married you.”

“I’m sure people will soon calm down.”

“I’ll bet they don’t, Rafe. It will be months before Tony goes to trial. We’ll be castigated until all the facts come out.” She shook her head. “‘Thou shalt not kill’—except when someone cheats your church out of a small fortune, then it’s ‘be my guest.’”

Rafe took her hand. “That’s not what’s going on. Really! Most people are angry that Tony was denied bail and is stuck in jail. They blame the police, although we didn’t have anything to do with the judge refusing bail. That’s almost inevitable with a charge of first-degree murder.”

Emma felt herself shiver. “I cringe every time you say ‘first-degree murder.’ I find it hard to believe that Tony Taylor murdered anyone, a belief I apparently share with most of Glory’s upstanding citizens.”

“There’s a mountain of evidence that says he killed Quentin Fisher. I had to arrest him.”

“I’m sure you’re right…” Emma hesitated. What more was there to say?

Rafe took another sip from his glass. “I really like what you’ve done with the tea. I expect the Captain’s guests will, also. Will you offer it to them?”

She shrugged. “Bed-and-breakfast guests prefer coffee and hot tea to start the day. Iced tea is a drink best suited for the afternoon.”

“How many guests do we have this week?”

Emma bit back a smile. She hoped that Rafe would grow to love The Scottish Captain as much as she did. Every “we” he spoke encouraged her. “A total of five,” she said. “A couple from Virginia Beach, a couple from Washington, D.C., and a woman from Chicago who’s practicing to be a travel photographer.”

Rafe picked up one of the marketing brochures that Emma had left on the table. “Now here’s a fine example of excellent travel photography—I like this picture of the Captain.”

Emma nodded. “Me, too. The old building never looked better.”

The photo had been taken nine months earlier, a few days after the three-story wooden structure with its large windows, deep porch and wide front steps had been newly painted. Emma had chosen the color scheme carefully: cream for the clapboards and corn-flower-blue for the wooden shutters and trim work. The eye-catching double oaken front doors, both freshly varnished, provided a lovely accent. The dressed-up inn looked solid and imposing, just the sort of house a Scottish captain might commission for himself in 1895—assuming he wanted to build an elegant residence for rich single women. That was the building’s original purpose.