Decoration Day (3 page)

David walked toward the stairs. “You aren’t mad at me?”

“Curiosity is a powerful thing, Reverend Stanley. I cannot fault you for that. I probably would have investigated myself.”

They walked down the stairs. David passed the second floor and headed to ground level. “It killed the cat, though.”

Marsh laughed. It was a pleasant sound. “True. Fortunately, you aren’t one.”

They stepped onto the hardwood of the ground floor. Marsh led David through the kitchen to the back door. They went outside. A fine mist washed over David’s skin as they walked to an idling Lincoln Continental that had been around at least since the Nixon presidency. The black paint looked showroom-floor fresh, however. The squat man from the gas station walked around the car and opened the door for Marsh, who sat down in the backseat. Thomas—David remembered the name from the patch on the attendant’s uniform—closed the door. He walked back to the driver’s side. David walked around and got in the back with Marsh.

Black leather covered the bench seat. Marsh stared straight ahead as the car began to roll. A piece of glass separated the driver from the passenger compartment. David had seen something like that only in movie limousines.

“This is a very nice car,” he said, mostly to make small talk.

“Yes. Thomas keeps it in fine condition. I’d hate to buy a new one.” Marsh never looked at David.

“Thomas works for you too?”

“You know Thomas?”

“I stopped in at the gas station yesterday. He’s the one who gave me directions to your house.”

Marsh nodded. “His family has been servants to my family for centuries.”

“Centuries?”

The other man finally looked at him. His eyes studied him. “Yes.”

“You don’t find that weird?”

A disquieting smile stretched across Marsh’s lips again. “Not really. It is our way in this town. We keep the old traditions and hold family very important.”

“To the point of keeping families as servants?”

“Yes. Thomas’s family came over from England as servants to the Marshes. When we moved from New England to Tennessee, the tradition continued. It helped to keep us from that horrible exercise of slavery that destroyed so many powerful families.”

David looked out the window as they passed through the town. A few people walked the broken sidewalks in the misty morning. Most looked short and stocky like Thomas and Thomasine. The small café served a few of the dumpy people. The car turned and headed up the mountain toward the church.

“Everyone looks alike,” David said without thinking.

“Only the servants. They marry within themselves, so there are a lot of similarities. You will notice that none of the elders look alike.”

“Is the town population just your servants?”

“We have few outsiders now that the road has been all but forgotten.” Marsh looked out the window into the swirling fog. “It is better that way. My beloved Louisa was an outsider. She came to an unfortunate end.”

“Do you mean that she was murdered?”

“No.”

David wished that he hadn’t come to the town, but when they stopped before the church building, he felt the tug of God’s hand on his heartstrings. His faith seemed to fill him again when he saw the place. A few men dressed in raincoats and large-brimmed hats milled around the graveyard. Despite what Marsh had said, they all looked very much like soggy brown sacks.

“The elders,” Marsh said as Thomas opened the door. “They are checking on their ancestors. It is something we love doing. Our past is very important to us.”

Marsh stepped into the mist. David got out of the car and walked to meet him at the opened gate. They walked in side by side. The other men turned as soon as they crossed into the churchyard as if the elders had sensed them crossing that line.

“Gentlemen, may I present to you Reverend David Stanley? He wishes to pastor our congregation,” Marsh said.

The first elder walked to him. Beady eyes stared from under the brim of the hat. A piggy nose that showed too much nostril turned up to David. The second elder stepped over, examining him from behind round glasses perched on a thin nose. All took their turns looking him over.

“I am Horace Stovall,” the pig-nosed elder said.

“My name is Ebenezer Hollingsworth,” Eyeglasses said.

“Dmitri Covington,” the third, bland-looking elder said.

“I am Nahum Fernwell,” the final elder said.

Of all the elders Nahum appeared the oldest, but with the garb the men wore, it was hard to tell.

“I have made the reverend aware of a few things, like the importance of family, but I have left everything else to be discussed today,” Marsh said.

“How did you gentlemen get here?” David asked.

They all looked at each other as if they had been asked the dumbest question imaginable.

“They were driven here by their drivers, just like us.” Marsh pointed to the road. The Lincoln was gone. “The road is not wide enough for our cars to stay parked on the shoulders. A gas tanker is due any time now. We wouldn’t want our cars or gasoline destroyed.”

“I understand. I met the truck when I came in yesterday. It was an antique.”

The elders murmured to themselves. He didn’t like the sound. They seemed bothered. David decided he needed to be more careful if he was to get the pastorship of the church.

“Since you hold family in such high honor, I think that the first thing I should do for services Sunday is have a decoration,” he said. “Why not celebrate the deceased by making this cemetery look beautiful?”

“Ancestors,” Horace stated. “They are not deceased.”

“I’m sorry,” David said. “We can still celebrate their lives by decorating their graves.”

“Markers,” Nahum said. “Graves are for the dead. These are our ancestors.”

David had no idea what these men meant. All the headstones he’d glanced at so far had birth and death dates on them. He would play along. God pulled so hard on his will he thought he might pass out from the overwhelming desire. He stepped onto the entrance stoop.

“I would like to see inside,” he said.

“I don’t recall a minister so excited about our faith,” Dmitri said. “Ever.”

“God has called to me about this place and this church.” David looked at the elder. “I’ve been struggling with my faith for a long time. This place revives it.”

“So he knows nothing about our ways?” Dmitri asked Marsh.

“I plan on talking to him after he sees our church,” Marsh said. “I’m sure his enthusiasm won’t have waned after that.”

The conversation between the two men piqued David’s interest. Something seemed off about it. He wondered if they practiced some strange version of Christianity. Perhaps they handled snakes. He didn’t like the idea of that but felt he could convince them that it was better to handle metaphorical serpents. He noticed that the elders spoke and held themselves better than the other townspeople.

Marsh stepped past him, carrying a large iron key in his hand. He unlocked the door and swung it open. The heavy iron hinges ground together with teeth-jarring metal on metal sound. A rush of stale air hit David in the face as he walked inside.

A very small vestibule gave way to the sanctuary. Small, solid oak pews lined a narrow aisle. The space between pews left little room for legs if the people were as tall as Marsh. David ran his hand over the smooth, oiled wood of each bench as he passed.

The only light in the room came from the leaded windows, but a large candle chandelier hung from the ceiling about where the spire steeple jutted from the roof. He figured that the metal spire helped to hold up the chandelier.

“How do you light the candles?” he asked, staring at the chandelier in wonder.

“With a long match,” Nahum said, obviously as a joke, but sounding devoid of humor.

“We have an altar boy for that,” Marsh said.

David looked at him. “So this is a Catholic church.”

“Not exactly,” Dmitri said.

“Episcopal?”

“Not that either,” Horace said.

“We have our own altar boys. We don’t hold to an orthodox faith,” Marsh said. “After you’ve had time to settle in, I will educate you on the esoteric nature of our faith.”

David’s jolliness wavered. “I don’t know if I can satisfy your needs. I have a very specific form of preaching. It might not match yours if your faith strays far from mine.”

“You should have vetted him,” Dmitri said.

“Perhaps you would like to be the minister with Decoration Day so near,” Marsh said. “You are the most versed in Scripture, Dmitri.”

“No,” the other man answered.

Marsh looked at David. The gaze provided no comfort. “I have total confidence in your abilities, Reverend.”

“So you like the idea of a decoration day?” he asked.

“Believe it or not, our decoration day is this Sunday every year,” Ebenezer broke his silence. “We were afraid that we might not have a preacher for it.”

“How lucky I happened upon your town when I did,” David said. “God works in mysterious ways.”

“Indeed he does,” Marsh said. “Let’s continue the tour.”

Marsh walked past David, directing his attention to the pulpit. Carved vines snaked the sides of the oak podium. Tiny spikes like briar thorns jutted from the carvings. David imagined they represented the thorns used to make Christ’s crown. Now that he thought about the symbol on the steeple, he imagined it represented the Star of Bethlehem. The people of this congregation might believe in celebrating the birth more than the death of Christ, which he could work with. The fears of having to dance holding a copperhead began to fade.

They passed the pulpit and stared down a short stack of steps. A large, open vat sat beside them. David looked into it, expecting to see water, but instead saw deep blackness.

“Is that the baptistery?” he asked.

“No; it is the pit,” Marsh said as if that made sense.

“Pit to what?” David asked.

“To the unknowable,” Nahum said.

David took those words and placed them into his memory. Tonight he would have to mull that over to figure out what it meant. The elders liked to be cryptic, and he was sure that this wouldn’t be explained. He was correct.

“Let me show you into the parson’s apartment,” Marsh said. He pushed a recessed wooden panel. It swung open to reveal a cramped vault room.

A wooden stove sat in the corner. A cot-like bed was on the opposite wall. Under a small, round window sat a table that probably doubled as a desk. A short bookshelf hid behind the door. A door near the bed had a
 
crescent moon cut out of it. He assumed this was the bathroom.

“So I live in the church?”

“Most holy men like to be cloistered near their workplaces,” Horace said.

“A parsonage is just a larger version,” Dmitri said.

“Is there electricity?”

Marsh flipped a switch. A single bulb hanging from the middle of the sloped ceiling chased away only a small amount of the gloom. David noticed there wasn’t a refrigerator in the room—only a small pie safe.

“How about food storage?” he asked.

“We will get you an icebox,” Nahum said. “The last minister stole the one from here.”

“Stole?”

“He wasn’t well suited for us,” Ebenezer said. “I am sure you will do better. You already seem more enthusiastic than he was.”

“We will leave you here,” Marsh said. “I think that you will want to familiarize yourself with the building and grounds. I will send a basket of food to you later. Tomorrow I will send the car to bring you to my house. We will discuss the preparations for Sunday.”

Before David could say anything, the elders left him in his small cell. They never looked back as they left the church.
 

David walked back into the sanctuary. The vat called
the pit
worried him. He wondered if that was where the congregation kept their snakes. Enough light came into the church that he could see into the vat for a ways. Nothing slithered. He hoped that the altar boy wasn’t responsible for stocking the thing. David fished a penny out of his pocket and tossed it over the side of the pit. It never clattered on the bottom or if it did, the pit was so deep that it muffled the sound. David felt as if the walls of the building were closing in, and everything seemed very heavy.

He decided to go back to his apartment and look over the books on the shelf. Maybe they would explain something about the town’s religious practices. He was still examining things when Thomas delivered a large meal about three in the afternoon and departed without a word.

As night fell, David discovered the sermon diary of the last minister at the church. He sat in a straight chair at the desk and opened the book. A sermon outline would certainly aid him in ministering to the people of Innsboro. The first sermon in the book was dated one year ago on the upcoming Sunday. The header read
Decoration Day
, with a heavy pencil line under those words. The sermon outline followed that. The previous minister had chosen to preach about the exodus of the Israelites to the Promised Land. The former minister framed it as their homecoming.