Runny03 - Loose Lips (9 page)

B
uster patiently waited on the southwest corner of the square, behind City Hall and in front of Christ Lutheran Church. Yoyo, his best friend, Juts’s large long-haired tabby, sat next to him. Juts and Chessy, worn out from last night’s plantings, had forgotten to tightly close the screen door on the back porch and the animals scooted out once they discovered the mistake.

The singing inside all the churches on the square swelled to a crescendo. The cat and dog exchanged glances, deciding this was extremely interesting, and trotted up the long steps to the heavy wooden double front doors of Christ Lutheran, opened to welcome the faithful.

Yoyo shot down the carpeted center aisle as Buster contemplated his next move. Yoyo’s original intention was to find Juts and Chessy, but the intoxicating fragrance of massed flowers around the altar and communion rail proved too tempting. She picked up speed, hesitating only at the rail because beautiful needlepoint knee cushions were on the floor. This was heaven: something to tear and something to smell. A titter rolled through the congregation, a ripple from back to front. As Pastor Neely faced the altar he was unaware of the source of amusement. A pendulous lily proved more inviting to Yoyo than sharpening her claws on the needlepoint. She launched herself into the air and grabbed it with both paws, yanking it out of the arrangement.
The paprika-colored pollen sprinkled on the floor as well as over her long whiskers.

Juts, wearing the disputed Bear’s department store hat, had her nose in the hymnal looking for the next hymn, and didn’t know Yoyo was experiencing a religious moment. Chessy elbowed her. She glanced up and didn’t see anything because Lillian Yost sat in front of her, her hat massive. The Hunsenmeir pew was in the fifth row and Cora was sitting in the middle; she didn’t see Yoyo either.

Buster, curiosity peaking, followed the cat down the aisle but was waylaid by the heavy odor of chocolate. He ducked into the pew with the Falkenroths and the Cadwalders, where he found a chocolate-covered marshmallow bunny, which little Paula Falkenroth had hidden in her white purse. Paula giggled when Buster, docked tail wagging, slid up to her in the pew. She soon stopped when he reached right in the purse and snatched her candy.

“Daddy!”

“Hush,” Walter whispered. He saw what Buster did but he also knew that Paula was forbidden to carry candy in her church bag. If her mother found out there would be a disagreeable discussion on the way home. Putting out a daily newspaper and building a new house used up Walter’s reserves of patience. He wanted a calm Easter.

Buster scampered out the pew as parishioners turned their knees to the side.

“I want my chocolate bunny!”

“Paula!” Her mother reached over Walter’s chest and pushed the child back on the pew.

Pastor Neely, still invoking many holy writs, faced the altar and couldn’t turn around.

The acolyte proved useless. At fourteen he thought this escapade an improvement on the service.

Yoyo, thrilled with the easy conquest of the lily, attacked the entire enormous arrangement. Flowers scattered everywhere.

“Pssst,” Juts hissed at her cat as she leaned around Lillian’s shoulder.

Upon hearing her mother’s voice, Yoyo paused from her frolic for a moment, then resumed her pleasures.

Cora started to laugh.

“Mother, you’re no help,” Juts whispered.

The more Julia scowled, the harder Cora laughed. Chester started laughing too, as did others around them.

Meanwhile, Buster tore down the center aisle, skidding to a stop at the Hunsenmeir pew, mouth drooling as he held his booty.

No wonder you come to church
, the cat and dog seemed to say.
This is fun!

Finished with his many invocations, Pastor Neely turned from the altar, face radiant with the message “He is risen,” only to find two little furry faces peering right up at him, one smeared with pollen and the other fiercely holding a chocolate bunny.

Not content with her depredations, Yoyo leapt into the middle of the huge altar floral arrangement. Both tumbled onto the floor.

Juts rose, face beet-red, slid past her howling mother and husband, and stalked toward her pets.

Try as she might to maintain her dignity—after all, it was the highest holy day of the year—the sight of Yoyo, crazed with excitement, and Buster, jaws clamped on his prize, proved too much for Juts. She giggled.

Pastor Neely sternly glared down at her.

This made her laugh even more. Juts reached for Buster’s collar. He didn’t resist.

“Come on,” she whispered.

He obediently followed.

“He’s got my bunny!” Paula Falkenroth shouted.

“Good God.” Walter covered his eyes.

Margot, his wife, whispered, “Paula, I told you not to bring candy to church.”

“I forgot,” Paula lied.

“Little girl, don’t you forget that you’re in a house of worship,” her father warned.

“Well—” She twisted away as Buster walked past her, Juts’s hand still firmly on the collar.

“I’ll buy you another bunny, Paula,” Juts promised.

The Cadwalders stared at Juts as if to say, “Why do these things always happen to you?”

She smiled weakly and continued on, then turned and called as low as she could, “Yoyo, come on, kittycat.”

Not only did Yoyo ignore the kind entreaty of her mother, she experienced one of those fits of ecstasy known primarily to members of the feline family and certain Catholics. She raced through the plants on the floor. She soared over flower arrangements wherever she found them. Some she cleared, some she didn’t. Galvanized into action by Pastor Neely’s uncompromising stare, the acolyte chased Yoyo, which heightened her celebration of her own powers. She put the brakes on as the lanky boy lurched past her, then she wheeled and gracefully arched onto the altar, where two identical, magnificent arrangements reposed on either side of the large, chaste gold cross. Tempting as those arrangements were, her pursuer was gaining on her. She ducked behind the cross. As he reached for her, she saucily and defiantly reached right back to bat at him. Being a good sport, she kept her claws sheathed.

Then she dropped behind the altar and stealthily crawled to the side as the acolyte got down on his hands and knees, providing the congregation with the sight of his rump, not perhaps the typical object of worship.

Beads of perspiration appeared on Pastor Neely’s forehead. Chester knew he should try and catch his cat, but he was convulsed with laughter and so weak from it he could barely move.

Celeste, Ramelle, and Fannie Jump sat in the third pew to the right of the aisle, pews being assigned according to when one’s family participated in founding the church or joined it. Tears of laughter rolled from their eyes.

Yoyo, not one to shun the spotlight, realized she had the congregation in the palm of her paw. She zoomed out from the consecrated area, vaulted onto the back of a pew, ran along it as hands grabbed for her, then casually jumped off, only to catapult herself onto the exquisite maroon velvet curtains. She climbed the curtains into the balcony, where she discovered the organist, a family friend, Aunt Dimps.

Terrified that Yoyo would feel compelled to play the organ, Aunt Dimps stood, her back to the organ, her arms outstretched.

The sight of Dimps in this strange posture caused Yoyo to reflect upon her actions. She sat stock-still, cocked her head to one side, and then walked toward her.

“Good girl, good kitty, Yoyo.” Aunt Dimps reached down to pick up the animal, who sauntered toward her.

Yoyo sidestepped those outstretched hands, leapt up, and landed
kerplat
on the keyboard. A dreadful screech boomed through the pipes, which so scared Yoyo she scooted off the organ, charged through the balcony aisle, and scurried down the back stairs, which emptied into the vestibule. She saw Buster and Juts out on the steps so she collected herself and walked out.

Juts, hearing the organ cacophony, had put two and two together. She crumpled on the steps, more from merriment than from shame, just as St. Rose of Lima’s opened its doors, the worshipers spilling out like children let out of school.

O.B. Huffstetler, sharp-eyed, guiding his most pregnant wife down the steps, noticed Juts. He called back for Louise, who was coming out the door. “Louise, something’s wrong with Juts.”

Her eyes followed the direction of his finger, as did everyone else’s.

As quickly as she could in her high heels, Louise ran down
the steps, her orchid corsage bobbing with each step. Pearlie and the girls, now alerted, followed, charging across the square.

Breathless, she knelt down by her sister. “Juts, Juts, are you all right?”

Juts laughed so hard she was sobbing. She couldn’t respond.

“Aunt Juts.” Mary also knelt down by the aunt she loved.

“What are Yoyo and Buster doing here?” Maizie asked.

That sent Juts into renewed sobs of laughter.

Pearlie bent over and gently put his hands under his sister-in-law’s arms. “Uppie-do.” He lifted her to her feet, where she sagged against him.

“I think we’d better get the doctor,” Pearlie said.

“No.” Julia shook her head, tried to say something, and then fell apart all over again.

By now the congregation of St. Rose’s, as well as St. Paul’s Episcopal, was gathering on the steps of Christ Lutheran.

“Is she all right?” asked Junior McGrail, who secretly hoped she wasn’t.

Juts nodded.

“Well, what’s wrong?” Popeye Huffstetler, ever the reporter, bluntly asked.

Juts kept laughing and pointing to the dog and the cat.

Junior, now upon them, remarked in a stage whisper to Caesura Frothingham, her best friend, “Imagine, Easter Sunday and she’s got dirty fingernails. I wouldn’t want someone to do my hair with dirty fingernails.”

Try as she might, Juts couldn’t scrub out the dirt from planting tulips and bushes all night.

Juts blinked back the tears. “Junior, you only have two hairs on your head.”

Obviously, Juts was recovering.

Christ Lutheran’s service ended and out rushed the rest of the congregation. Within seconds the details of Yoyo and Buster’s
adventure were being told. Most laughed. A few holier-than-thou types were scandalized.

Chessy, Cora, Celeste, Ramelle, and Fannie Jump howled with each detail of Yoyo’s rampage being told.

Chester picked up a purring Yoyo. “Bet the devil made you do it.”

This sent everyone into peals of laughter again.

Junior scanned the park. “I don’t remember azalea bushes there.” She pointed a pudgy finger.

“Oh.” Ramelle shrugged.

“They’re interspersed with tulips. As president of the Sisters of Gettysburg, I planted that with my girls, and it was solid tulips,” Junior babbled.

“Hey—” Caesura, a former president of the S.O.G., exclaimed, “George Gordon Meade’s statue is desecrated.”

“He’s listing to port,” Popeye observed.

Fannie Jump Creighton, serving president of the Daughters of the Confederacy, carefully held her hands behind her back. “Always said Meade was tilted.”

“You started the war!” Caesura snapped.

“I wasn’t even born. Hell, you’re so old, Caesura, not only do you remember
that
war, you probably led the Charge of the Light Brigade for the mother country.”

“Well … well … I never! And on Easter Sunday.” Caesura thumped her parasol on the steps. “You haven’t heard the last of this, Fannie Jump Creighton. I know you’re in on it somehow.”

“Oh, balls.” Fannie stonewalled her.

“How dare you.” Caesura cracked Fannie over the head with her parasol.

“Idiot!” Fannie grabbed Ramelle’s parasol and the two ladies dueled.

Buster barked and Yoyo’s eyes got big as bowling balls.

Chester and Pearlie grabbed Fannie Jump, a substantial example
of the female species, while Popeye and Pastor Neely, robes flapping, grabbed Caesura.

“This is dreadful. This is just dreadful,” Junior wailed.

Caesura, shaken as a hen smoothing back its feathers, pointed her parasol at Fannie Jump. “I will have satisfaction.”

“Now, Popeye, you’ve got to keep this out of the paper.” Junior hung on Popeye’s arm. He was already scribbling. Her weight slowed down his progress.

Getting nowhere with Popeye, Junior seized Walter. “You can’t embarrass her this way. She was insulted publicly and you know how hard Caesura works for the community.”

“Junior, I never tell my boys what to write.”

“Then I am never advertising in the
Clarion
again!” That said, she thumped down the steps, Caesura in tow, just as Extra Billy Bitters, fresh from the Baptist service, bounded up the steps to Mary.

Louise smoldered.

“Honey chile,” Cora whispered in her ear, “we’ve had confusion enough for one day.”

Celeste smiled and sighed. “Mary and Extra Billy find each other more fascinating than we do.”

“You forget how it feels to be young and in love.” Ramelle beheld her broken parasol, as Fannie, now released, and panting, joined them.

“Blistering idiot. Caesura Frothingham is truly one of the stupidest women I have ever known. If she had a brain, she’d be dangerous. As it is, she’s marginally amusing.”

“Now, Fannie.”

“Oh, Celeste, don’t stick up for her.”

“I’m not, but—”

Pastor Neely, not having shaken hands with them as was his custom at the end of each service, came over, his hand extended. “He is risen.”

“Amen.” Fannie solemnly shook his hand.

Pastor Neely then met with the Hunsenmeir group. “Louise Trumbull, what a happy surprise to have you on the steps of Christ Lutheran.”